One person: Starting with the Snow Drinking Blade

The crimson-gold light emanating from King Nathan had now become so intense it was almost tangible. It poured forth from every pore, every hairline, every fingertip, illuminating the entire hall as if the midday sun had entered the room. Her robes billowed and billowed in the light, the edges of the fabric scorched black, and her entire silhouette was gradually blurring, as if a wax figure were melting visibly into the blazing gold.

Her chanting had completely transcended the realm of human voice. The sound was soaring, like the resonance of some metal under extreme heat; each syllable caused the air in the hall to tremble and roar, and the accumulated dust on the roof fell like a curtain of rain. The stone slabs on the ground began to crack, the fissures spreading in all directions from her feet, crawling through the threshold, climbing the pillars, and extending along the walls to the murals of the sacred tree on the dome. Those murals depicted the lineage of King Nathan over a thousand years, and now, one after another, they burst open from the middle, vermilion and malachite peeling away into colorful fragments, scattering and falling into the golden river of light.

"Your Majesty!" Elena knelt three steps behind her, her knees slamming heavily onto the scorching stone floor. Her palms pressed against the ground, her knuckles white from the effort, tears falling onto the stone and quickly evaporating into white steam. "Please...stop! You'll burn yourself out!"

But King Nathan's chanting did not stop at all.

Each of Elena's cries only struck the golden light wall in vain, reflected as blurry echoes. She could even see the outline of the bones beneath Nathan's fingertips, the flesh becoming thin and transparent layer by layer under the backlash of the golden light, like a sheet of rice paper that had been baked through by the sun, the back of which was already faintly glowing.

There were no tears in King Nathan's eyes. Her deep pupils were now entirely golden, and within the lines of her pupils flowed a power more ancient than blood. Her lips moved, uttering ancient syllables, each word shaped like a red-hot branding iron pressed into the air, branding a string of visible golden runes that floated around her. One by one, these runes flew toward the trunk of the divine tree, disappearing into the cracks in its bark, each disappearance causing a few of the faint starlight on the divine tree to rekindle.

She knew she was burning. Every inch of her skin, every meridian, every last bit of spiritual energy was being mercilessly drained by the divine tree, like parched earth greedily sucking up the last drop of water. But she couldn't stop.

Because it was her only option.

Her gaze pierced through the golden light curtain and fell upon the chaotic battlefield outside the palace. She saw the Nathan Guards struggling to hold on, Behemoth's ranks pouring into the plaza, and the outer walls of the side hall where the islanders were hiding crumbling from the artillery fire. If she stopped chanting now, it would all be over. The sacred tree would be taken, her people would become specimens in Behemoth's laboratory, and the island's thousand-year independence would vanish overnight.

So she had to persevere.

Even if it means burning myself to ashes.

Golden light finally emanated from her. Like a fixed star, it collapsed and exploded in the very center of the palace, transforming into a pillar of light shooting straight up from the ground to the heavens! The pillar pierced the roof, turning the stone tiles and wooden beams to ashes, and pierced into the twilight-shrouded clouds, dyeing the entire sky a sheet of molten gold. The land of Nathan Island trembled violently, three-meter-high waves crashed against the rocks on the shore, and flocks of birds in the forests took flight in terror, blotting out the sun.

Golden light, like flowing water, swept across the entire palace, covering every inch of the blood-soaked stone slabs in the square, and enveloping every Nathan Guard still standing. The golden radiance that surged into their bodies was like scalding liquor poured into a dry well; their parched meridians were instantly filled, and broken bones, enveloped in the golden light, cracked and popped back into place. Deep, bone-revealing knife wounds contracted, scabbed over, and healed at a visible speed, leaving behind pale golden scars.

"The ultimate blessing of the divine tree..." An old Nathan Guard, his hair and beard white, knelt on one knee, his trembling hand pressed against his chest. He could feel his heart beating stronger than in his youth, each beat carrying a burning life force. But when he looked up towards the hall, his eyes were filled with tears. "His Majesty is burning his own life to save ours..."

"Your Majesty!" The other Nathan guards knelt down, their scimitars embedded in the cracks of the stone slabs before them, their foreheads pressed against the cold blades. Their shoulders trembled, their teeth clenched, wanting to rush in and stop them, but knowing that doing so would only render King Nathan's sacrifice futile.

A brief silence fell over the battlefield. All eyes were drawn to the golden pillar of light shooting skyward. Even Behemoth's soldiers instinctively stopped firing, lowering their guns and staring wide-eyed at the sky dyed ablaze with molten gold. The sight was so magnificent, so awe-inspiring, that it transcended the realm of war and hatred, instilling in them an instinctive feeling—whatever it was, it was unstoppable.

Ron stood on the observation deck, his pupils behind his sunglasses reflecting the crimson-gold light. His lips were pressed into a tight line, his jaw muscles twitched twice, and then he suddenly raised his hand and slammed it against the railing. The cast-iron railing was dented by his punch.

"Damn it! That woman's gone mad!" His voice cracked between his teeth. "She's going to burn herself to feed that tree! Everyone, all-out attack! We must take the palace before her blessing is complete! If she dies, we'll have nothing!"

"Yes, sir!" The communications soldiers shouted, relaying the order in all directions.

Behemoth's ranks surged violently once more like a swarm of bees whose hive had been disturbed. The cyborgs trudged heavily across the rubble-strewn plaza, high-pressure steam billowing from the metal arms of the SP recipients, and streaks of orange-red fire spurting from the muzzles of their assault rifles in the twilight. But the Nathan Guards, empowered by the ultimate blessing, had their combat strength surge by more than one level. Those figures who had just been teetering on the brink of exhaustion were now like transformed individuals; their wounds had healed, their strength had returned, and their eyes shone with a terrifying light. When a scimitar cleaved into a cyborg's metal arm, it sent up a series of fist-sized sparks, and the muffled thuds of flesh colliding with flesh resembled the rhythm of a battering ram pounding a wooden door.

The two sides were locked in a fierce struggle on the gravel in the center of the square, like a pot of boiling steel, neither able to devour the other in a short time.

No one noticed Elijah.

He stood in the shadows of a dilapidated corridor at the edge of the battlefield, the hem of his black trench coat fluttering in the golden light. He slightly turned to the side, hiding behind a pillar, coldly watching the brutal carnage unfold before him. Firelight danced on the lenses of his gold-rimmed glasses, reflecting two small, flickering suns, but his eyes remained utterly still, like two frozen, deep wells.

His right hand remained in his trench coat pocket, his fingers gripping a cold, hard metal object tightly. It was a small remote-controlled detonator, its plastic casing warm from his palm, the button surface worn smooth from countless rubs.

The day he joined the Nine Guards, he planted the first batch of explosives in the crevices of the roots in the core area of ​​the sacred tree. These explosives were made of passivated plastic manufactured by Behemoth, sealed in waterproof and shockproof ceramic shells. The yield of each explosive was precisely calculated—enough to sever the pith of the sacred tree's trunk without causing a structural collapse of the entire palace. He spent three years, deploying all the explosives in sixteen separate operations, each time under the pretext of "inspecting the decaying roots" during his nighttime duty. King Nathan trusted him, his fellow members of the Nine Guards trusted him, and no one ever bothered to look into the unassuming ceramic cylinders in his pockets.

Now, after years of waiting, the net is about to be cast.

He peered through the gaps in the pillars into the depths of the hall. Nathan had transformed into a humanoid ball of golden light, her outline blurred like a reflection in water under the blazing sun. She was still chanting, still overdrawing her power, still scooping herself spoonful by spoonful into that greedy ancient tree. Nie Lingfeng was held back by three cyborgs on the east side of the plaza. Sean's mechanical arm was relentlessly punching the back of his blade, causing the Snow Drinking Blade to emit a series of piercing long screechs. On Ruan Feng's side, Gade was already staggering from the stench of alcohol; although he still possessed seventy or eighty percent of his fighting strength, he was clearly becoming impatient. Zhang Chulan and his group were completely entangled by Behemoth's reinforcements in the southwest corner of the plaza.

Everyone has something to do.

No one was watching him.

Elijah slowly pulled the remote detonator from his pocket. His finger rested on the red button, a very light button, no bigger than a pea, requiring no more than two hundred grams of force to press. But he held it there for a full three breaths, his fingertips trembling slightly.

He remembered the first day he entered Nathan's Palace when Alfonso patted him on the shoulder and laughed, saying, "You're a Nine Guard now, don't embarrass us guys"; he remembered how Elena would always bring back an extra late-night snack and leave it at his room door after each mission; he remembered the warmth of King Nathan's palm on his shoulder when he personally pinned the silver medal symbolizing his Nine Guard status to his collar.

His eyelids drooped slightly.

Then he pressed the button.

boom------!!!