113: Chapter 113 So what if I'm lazy? I am the Legion.

The entire tumor collapsed inward like a punctured balloon, and the biomass stored inside gushed out, forming a small-scale green rainstorm.

With the creep tumor destroyed, the battlefield's ecology began to change. The pulsating rhythm of the creep became chaotic, the mucus on its surface began to dry up, and the creep in some areas even began to wither and fade. The Zerg Swarm's offensive weakened noticeably.

The common knowledge engraved in the Zerg Swarm's genes is that their fearlessness stems from the creep's recycling of biomass, allowing for infinite reproduction.

Now that the creep was gone, their deaths were nothing but pure, unmitigated attrition. Consequently, whether they were Zerglings, Roaches, Hydralisks, or other more advanced units, they all began to retreat—retreating frantically, regardless of the even greater casualties caused by the retreat.

Of course, not all Zerg Swarm units were like that; with so many bugs, there were always some that hadn't crawled out from underground yet, so they simply chose not to come out at all.

However, Li Yuan had a Zerg Swarm detection map, and the Light Guardians, who shared Li Yuan's map, quickly found them and wiped them out.

Then, they continued to the next creep tumor area, or the areas where the red dots on Li Yuan's map were dense.

The entire battlefield situation entered a new phase: advancing, drawing out the Zerg Swarm, Elia clearing the field with area-of-effect attacks, exposing the creep tumor, Light Mages conducting precision strikes from the air, the Zerg Swarm retreating, and Light Guardians mopping up on the ground.

Over and over again.

A cycle so monotonous it was numbing.

...

By the time the seventh creep tumor Zerg Swarm settlement was cleared, Li Yuan was already lying inside the command vehicle.

This wasn't fleeing the battlefield; it was pure laziness. The command vehicle, or more accurately, a mobile frontline command fortress, had an interior space comparable to a small gymnasium, fully equipped with living quarters, a tactical analysis zone, and a remote control zone.

Outside the panoramic observation window, artillery fire flashed continuously, but inside the vehicle, a comfortable, constant temperature and silence were maintained.

Li Yuan lay on a leather sofa, his head resting on Laya's lap. The angelic girl was carefully peeling a fruit native to the Holy Alliance; the peel was a crystalline pale gold, and the flesh was translucent and gelatinous, emitting the fresh scent of cedar.

She held a slice of the fruit to Li Yuan's lips, and he opened his mouth to take it, his eyes fixed on the twelve floating holographic tactical screens in front of him.

On the screens, the cleanup progress of the entire defense zone was displayed as a percentage: 17%. Below it was the real-time battle report: zero casualties for our side, and the cumulative number of Zerg Swarm corpses killed and recovered had exceeded 800,000.

"Is the fighting boring?" Li Yuan asked on the internal channel. "Why don't you come in and rest for a while?"

There was a two-second silence on the channel.

Then, Chu Xinghe's voice came through, sounding clearly irritated: "I've been bored of fighting for a long time. These bugs can't even organize a decent counterattack; it's just like mowing grass."

"Agreed." Luo Lan's tone was calmer, but weariness could still be detected. "There is no tactical challenge whatsoever; it's purely repetitive labor."

Three minutes later, the two white emperor mechas retreated behind the command vehicle. The cockpits opened, and Chu Xinghe and Luo Lan jumped out, both with expressions of "finally free." They couldn't even be bothered to remove their combat suits, walking straight into the living area of the command vehicle, taking energy drinks from the refrigerator, and slumping onto another set of sofas.

Meanwhile, on the battlefield outside, the piloting rights of the two white emperor mechas had already been seamlessly handed over to the Light Guardians.

The changes appeared almost immediately.

First was the adjustment of the formation. When Chu Xinghe and Luo Lan were piloting, the mechas tended to maintain a relatively conservative battle line, prioritizing their own safety. But after the Light Guardians took over, the five Xingtian mechas immediately spread out in a fan shape, increasing the distance between them by thirty percent, forming a semi-enclosing firepower net. They no longer waited for the Zerg Swarm to charge, but proactively pressed forward, using heavy pulse cannons to continuously bombard the depths of the creep, forcibly "forcing" the units hiding underground to come out.

Next was the improvement in the precision of firepower coordination. The two white emperor mechas no longer performed precision shots, but instead focused on leveraging the advantages of these super-giant mechas equipped with small fusion engines, unleashing area-of-effect firepower at full capacity.

Even more astonishing was the superimposed calculation of attacks from mechas, tanks, and self-propelled artillery, with the effective coverage of firepower from different weapons maintaining a degree of overlap that was just enough to exceed the kill requirements.

Then came the efficiency in utilizing battlefield information. The Light Guardians shared Li Yuan's biological map, and the Zerg Swarm distribution they "saw" was holographic, real-time, and three-dimensional.

This meant they could predict the movement trajectories of Stalkers and pour firepower into that area in advance; they could sense weak points in the Zerg Swarm and concentrate their breakthrough; they could even calculate the energy flow patterns of the creep tumors and launch attacks at the most vulnerable moments.

The result was a skyrocketing of cleanup efficiency.

Inside the command vehicle, Chu Xinghe stared at the real-time data on the tactical screen, his mouth twitching: "These hunks of iron... are they piloting better than me?"

"It's not that they are piloting better," Luo Lan pushed up his glasses and analyzed calmly. "It's that they don't need to 'pilot' at all. They are integrated with the mechas; every sensor input is directly converted into action commands. There is no neural latency, no hesitation in judgment, and no fatigue error. Theoretically, this is the perfect form of mecha control."

Li Yuan smiled and said nothing. He bit into another slice of fruit handed to him by Laya and cast his gaze out the observation window.

The battlefield had completely turned into an assembly line operation.

At the very front, the five Xingtian mechas and the two white emperor mechas formed an advancing spearhead. They no longer performed flashy tactical maneuvers but plowed forward like bulldozers, crushing everything in their path with absolute firepower. Behind them, siege tanks and self-propelled artillery conducted blanket strikes; the targets were not the Zerg Swarm units, but the areas of creep that might hide Stalkers—blasting the bugs out was their mission.

In the sky, twelve Luan Bird fighters were divided into four formations. One squadron provided global surveillance at the highest altitude, one squadron stood by at medium altitude to conduct precision strikes on creep tumors, and two squadrons patrolled at low altitude, using autocannons to clear out any stragglers.

On the ground, dozens of unarmored Light Guardians were busy. They undertook guard duties for the command vehicle and were responsible for cleaning up the battlefield: collecting Zerg Swarm biological samples, marking high-value wreckage, finishing off units that weren't quite dead, and even starting to lay down temporary hardened roads to prepare for the advance of subsequent troops.

Everything was orderly, and everything was efficient and cold.

There were no shouts, no hot-blooded passion, and no charges of personal heroism. There was only steel, firelight, data streams, and a continuous kill count. The Zerg Swarm was still emerging, still charging, and still dying, but the entire battle had lost the texture of "war" and felt more like some kind of industrialized harvesting process.

Elia also returned to the command vehicle.

She didn't speak, just walked over and sat on the sofa opposite Li Yuan, took the hot drink Laya handed her, and sipped it slowly. There was some exhaustion on the young girl's face, not physical, but mental.

Continuously unleashing high-level talents was indeed extremely draining, but what was even more mentally taxing was the numbness brought by that repetitive labor.

"Bored?" Li Yuan asked.

"Yeah." Elia nodded honestly. "At first, I was a little nervous, but later... it felt like finishing homework."

"But the efficiency is very high." Luo Lan brought up a set of data. "Your individual kill count accounts for thirty percent of the team's total, and you precisely destroyed all Stalker units. Without you, the advance speed would have been at least twice as slow, and thanks to you, we broke the stalemate at the beginning."

"I know." Elia looked at her hands. "It just feels... not quite real."

The command vehicle fell into a brief silence. There was only the slight hum of data refreshing on the tactical screens and the continuous, background-like sound of artillery fire outside the window.

Li Yuan sat up, and Laya leaned into his arms. He looked out the panoramic window at the army driven entirely by his creations—the mechas piloted by Light Guardians, the fighters controlled by Light Mages, and those busy individual Light Guardians.

This legion was advancing at a speed of clearing 5 creep tumor settlements per hour. On the defense map, the blue representing safe areas was steadily encroaching on the scarlet Zerg Swarm control zone, like ink spreading on paper.

He suddenly understood the meaning of the phrase "I am the Legion."

Even if he decided to lie down and rest, this army was still operating efficiently, perhaps even better. His will was transmitted through the summoning contract, his vision expanded through the shared map, and his existence itself was a command hub, an energy source, an unshakable core.

As long as he was there, the legion was there.

As long as he willed it, the legion would advance.

Li Yuan lay back on the sofa and closed his eyes. Laya adjusted her position to make him more comfortable and continued peeling the fruit. After finishing her hot drink, Elia also curled up on the sofa to take a nap. Chu Xinghe and Luo Lan began to discuss an optimization plan for a certain mecha tactic, their voices kept very low.

Outside the command vehicle, the war continued.

Steel crushed the creep, artillery fire lit up the gray sky, and mountains of bug corpses piled up. And all of this, they no longer needed to witness with their own eyes.

This trial was going very smoothly so far.