245: Salvation? Only those who save themselves deserve to be saved.

Although those rebelling workers possessed a boiling hot blood and the determination to sacrifice themselves for righteousness, flesh and blood were truly no match for steel.

A group of workers armed with crude firearms and lacking professional training were left bruised and battered when facing regular troops equipped with powered armor and armored vehicles—

At Channel 13, on the defensive position set up by Qi Ruofeng and his team, blood had already soaked the passage beneath their feet.

Countless intact or broken corpses were exposed on the street. An armored vehicle was parked sideways in the middle of the road, and in front of this vehicle, another one of the same model was burning with raging flames.

"Damn it—" Sitting on the roof of the armored vehicle, watching his soldiers clearing the road, the squad leader said in a low voice with a dark expression.

Just a moment ago, a massive explosion had come from the shell factory, followed by a distress call from the slave uprising.

He had immediately organized his team to head to the shell factory, but while they were driving along Channel 13, a slow-moving shell suddenly flew out from a window nearby, striking in front of their lead infantry fighting vehicle.

Then, a group of guys wielding rifles emerged from every corner, firing at them frantically.

Fortunately, while those guys seemed aggressive, their aim was worse than a novice who had just learned to shoot.

They relied on their infantry fighting vehicles, immediately maintained their defensive line, and began clearing out the various firing points.

The only anti-armor weapon the enemy possessed was a few recoilless rifles, but clearly, their gunners had atrocious skills—out of dozens of shells fired, only one barely hit the side of the vehicle, and even that was blocked by the reactive armor.

Other than covering the garrison in dust, these shells caused no damage at all.

But when the squad leader ordered them to continue advancing, something unexpected happened—a guy wearing a light jet Exoskeleton suddenly jumped down from a second-story window nearby, used a jet burst in mid-air, and landed on their lead infantry fighting vehicle.

Then, before he was riddled with bullets, he took out two Thermobaric Bomb units glowing with red light with lightning speed, dropping one on the infantry fighting vehicle beneath his feet and forcefully throwing the other directly into the position of the Industrial Zone garrison—followed by two loud bangs.

The lead infantry fighting vehicle was totaled on the spot, and the Thermobaric Bomb thrown into the crowd killed over a hundred unlucky souls nearby, with dozens more directly injured or crushed by the falling debris and shrapnel.

Moreover, the first infantry fighting vehicle blocked the road, and the rioting workers took advantage of this window to pour fire frantically at the Industrial Zone garrison, suppressing them so heavily that they couldn't even lift their heads for a moment.

Thinking about that explosion, which had nearly sent him to meet his maker, the squad leader of this garrison unit was furious—especially when his combat engineer team finished the demolition and stormed the building, only to find that the rioting workers had left only a dozen wounded personnel behind to cover their retreat, while the rest had long since evacuated.

"Report! We have broken the lock on the factory building! There are fifty-six workers inside!"

At this moment, a subordinate's report sounded in the squad leader's headset. He frowned and immediately asked, "Are you saying you captured over fifty rioters?"

"Report! These workers don't look like they participated in the riot; it's more like they were protected by the rebels."

"Protected? Hmph!" The squad leader sneered disdainfully. "In that case—leave five prisoners of war who won't die so easily, and kill all the rest! Cut off their heads! Continue the pursuit!"

"Yes!"

...At this moment, at Distribution Center No. 3, the smell of blood, burnt odors, and a large amount of inexplicable stench were floating in the air—

After more than two hours of bloody fighting, and at the cost of nearly four thousand lives, the workers had finally taken this building, which had only five hundred defenders.

At this moment, countless retreating defensive units were gathering from all directions, and a large number of reorganized combat units were rushing back toward the outer perimeter.

Qi Ruofeng, having withdrawn from Channel 13, finally arrived here with his thirty-something survivors.

Only when he saw the blown-open gate of the Distribution Center and the guarding worker soldiers did Qi Ruofeng truly breathe a sigh of relief—they had finally arrived.

The situation just now had been extremely perilous. Their recoilless rifle shells had run out, and if it hadn't been for Yang Fangming sacrificing himself with two Thermobaric Bomb units to destroy one of the infantry fighting vehicles, they would all have died back there.

After disarming and entering the Distribution Center, Qi Ruofeng finally met the Commander responsible for their planet in this great uprising—Wei Lai.

"Head of Assembly Line No. 3, Eastern District 12, Qi Ruofeng, reporting for duty!"

Wei Lai looked at the person standing at attention and saluting before him, nodded, and asked, "How many of your men are still combat-capable?"

Qi Ruofeng thought for a moment and replied, "Report! There are thirty men left!"

"Thirty men?" Wei Lai rubbed his chin. "That's a bit low..."

"Integrate into the follow-up units. The enemy's attack is coming soon. Have your men resupply and get ready; we should be making contact with the enemy immediately."

Qi Ruofeng nodded silently. Looking at Wei Lai, he suddenly asked, "By the way, according to the plan, we have reinforcements, right?"

Wei Lai nodded. "Yes, what about it?"

"Why... why don't we just bring the Warship here to rescue them directly? If every star system really has these so-called reinforcements, then we should be able to directly destroy the garrisons in these places, right?"

"We... letting them, letting these people who were supposed to be the ones being rescued, suffer so many casualties and die so many people... is it really... correct?"

Wei Lai stopped what he was doing, immediately looked up, and stared into Qi Ruofeng's eyes. His gaze, sharp as a hawk's, seemed to be questioning him.

"Do you think the rescue we forcibly impose on them is a true rescue?"

After a long while, Wei Lai spoke, "We can only grant them physical freedom, but we cannot shatter the shackles on their spirits."

"Have you not read that book? That book, 'struggle of humanity'?"

"It says in there that dignity and freedom are forged with iron and blood; they come from within, not without. They can never be bestowed from the outside; they can only be earned by oneself."

As he spoke, Wei Lai pointed to a worker leaning against the wall, wiping his firearm. "Most of those people have no education and no ideology—they even have to prepare their own tools while working as slaves on the assembly line."

"Can they understand our so-called rescue?"

"No."

"If we 'rescue' them, then after we are gone, they will just become slaves again, become expendable materials again."

"Only when they fight for it themselves, battle for it themselves, and earn their dignity and freedom through their own fighting,"

"will they truly understand how heavy the weight of this freedom is."

"And such people, even if we are not around, will become us."

"The book says that it is not that you have the right to resist, but that you only gain the right after you resist."

"Go back and wait for orders; the battle is about to begin."

Having understood something, Qi Ruofeng saluted heavily, turned around, and ran back— "Yes!!!"