Chapter 108 Gaia

As the three "energy hearts" were violently crushed, the metallic roar enveloping the Third Industrial Zone came to a screeching halt, like a rooster being seized by the throat.

The world became excessively quiet.

Darkness reclaimed the vast space, with only broken circuits occasionally spitting out a few pale electric sparks that illuminated the widespread mess.

Tens of thousands of mechanical defects stood frozen in their final poses; some held up severed arms, others had their mouths wide open. Their pairs of electronic eyes, their red lights extinguished, stared hollowly into the void, resembling a graveyard of dead metal.

"Whew... whew..."

Lin Yuan slumped in the cockpit of the ghost, panting heavily.

It wasn't from exhaustion.

It felt as if a red-hot steel needle was churning inside his brain—a side effect of forcibly disconnecting the neural link just now. The nauseating sensation of cold, viscous data streams being forced into his cerebral cortex made his stomach churn.

"I almost... got possessed by that thing."

Lin Yuan wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and glanced at the right screen.

A jarring line of red text was displayed there: [Right Arm Module: Physically Offline].

Wisps of blue smoke were still rising from the mecha's severed joint; that was the price of his desperate measure just now. If he had been 0.1 seconds slower, Lin Yuan would likely be among that pile of scrap metal now.

"Academician Wang, have you figured it out?" Lin Yuan unscrewed his canteen and took a gulp, his voice raspy. "Was that this hellhole's antivirus software? Or some AI that's gained sentience?"

A rapid tapping of keys came through the communication channel, followed by Academician Wang's voice, which was grave to the extreme.

"It's worse than that, Lin Yuan."

A complex data analysis chart was projected in front of Lin Yuan. It showed an isolated segment of purple code that, even in the holographic projection, seemed to writhe and divide frantically like a living thing, attempting to devour the surrounding normal data.

"We compared it with the war records in the ashilya database," Academician Wang's voice carried a hint of a tremor. "This is the ultimate causality weapon deployed by the Mechanical Papacy during the final stages of the Divine War—codenamed [Asura]."

"Asura?" Lin Yuan frowned.

"Yes, it's not a computer virus in the conventional sense. It's a source of logical pollution based on 'quantum entanglement.'"

Academician Wang paused, seemingly organizing his words to describe this horror that surpassed human cognition. "It doesn't need a network, or even physical contact. As long as 'order' exists within your thought logic, it can crawl along the logical chain and twist your sanity into madness."

"It can infect programs, making security robots treat civilians as targets; it can also infect biological brains, making a Commander order fire upon their own people."

"This is why the gate of hades, despite possessing invincible defensive firepower, still fell."

Lin Yuan's scalp tingled as he listened.

No wonder that voice just now sounded like a lunatic.

So this fortress wasn't smashed to pieces; it was driven mad?

"Then what about the original program?" Lin Yuan pressed. "Titan Heavy Industry must have a master control AI, right? They just watched this mad dog run wild in their own home?"

"That's also the strangest part."

Li Na's voice cut in. "According to the low-level logs we just cracked, the master control AI of this fortress is named 'gaia.' Its core directives are 'protect' and 'continue.' But in the final log from three million years ago, gaia was not deleted."

"It... went missing."

The screen changed to show a fragmented structural diagram of the fortress.

Most areas of the map were in a gray "offline" state, except for a core area at the very depths, which was tightly covered by a dense, almost physical black shadow.

"This is the 'Central Processing Unit,' which is gaia's 'brain,'" Li Na said, pointing at the shadow. "All the Asura viruses are converging here. gaia isn't dead, but it's likely imprisoned here, becoming a breeding ground for the virus."

"A story of an imprisoned goddess and a guardian dragon?"

Lin Yuan scoffed, his finger tapping unconsciously on the armrest. "A cliché script."

Just then, the previously silent deep space salvage system suddenly popped up a golden dialog box on Lin Yuan's retina.

[Ding! S-Rank Emergency Mission Triggered: Purify the Fortress]

[Mission Description: Ancient ghosts are gnawing on the remains of civilization; the guardian wails in the darkness. Please proceed to the fortress core, completely eliminate the 'Asura' virus source, and reboot the master control AI 'gaia'.]

[Time Limit: 3 hours (after which the sub-space rift will completely collapse)]

[Mission Reward: ??? (Hidden Reward: Maximum control authority of the titan-class fortress 'gate of hades')]

Lin Yuan's tapping finger stopped abruptly.

His pupils instantly constricted to the size of pinpricks.

Maximum control authority?

Meaning... as long as he took out that lunatic, this war fortress larger than the moon, along with its countless production lines, warships, and technology, would all be his?!

How the hell was this a mission? This was a windfall from heaven, the kind that could crush a man to death!

"I'll do it!"

Lin Yuan bolted up from his chair, his exhaustion swept away and replaced by the fervor of a gambler seeing a royal flush.

"Um... Commander?" Li Na reminded him cautiously. "I don't want to dampen your spirits, but your mecha's current state... is barely better than scrap metal."

Lin Yuan looked down.

True.

The ghost was not only missing an arm, but its energy shield generator was burned out, and the hydraulic rod in its left leg was still sizzling and leaking oil. Going to fight a BOSS in this thing was no different from seeking death.

"Who said I was going to pilot this piece of junk?"

Lin Yuan's lips curled into the specific cunning of a "junkyard boss."

"Since we're on Titan Heavy Industry's turf, aren't there spare parts everywhere?"

...

Ten minutes later.

The drone transport fleet dispatched by luan bird one, like a swarm of industrious bees, flew into the industrial zone against the chaotic gravity fields of the fortress.

Lin Yuan didn't ask for any sophisticated repair equipment.

He simply had the drones haul over the core remains of the energy nodes he had just destroyed, along with several functional mechanical arms salvaged from the mountain of "defective" corpses.

"This armor plate is good, high gold content, weld it on!"

"This energy core is cracked, but it'll do. Wire it in parallel to the engine as a disposable booster!"

"This cannon barrel... tsk tsk, good stuff, strap it to my left shoulder!"

Under the dumbfounded gazes of Academician Wang and the others, Lin Yuan, like a brat assembling Legos, used the most crude and violent methods to transform the originally sleek and beautiful ghost into a hideous monster.

Its right arm had been replaced by a massive hydraulic claw salvaged from a heavy engineering mecha; its left shoulder carried a still-smoking rapid-fire cannon; and its chest was layered with several thick pieces of discarded armor plating, forming a turtle-like shell.

Though it was earth-shatteringly ugly, it exuded a heart-stoppingly savage aura.

"Is this... performance art?" Old Zhang muttered in the channel.

"It's called 'Wasteland Punk,' you wouldn't understand."

Lin Yuan climbed into the cockpit and tested the massive hydraulic claw, which gave off a metallic clacking sound as it closed. He nodded in satisfaction.

"Let's go! Time to drag out that lunatic called 'Asura'!"

The engine roared.

This Stitched Monster mecha spewed a cloud of black smoke and stumbled out of the industrial zone, plunging into the passage leading to the core area.

According to the map, to reach the "Central Processing Unit," one had to cross a narrow, five-hundred-kilometer-long region.

That area used to be the titan fortress's "Research Zone," responsible for the most cutting-edge technological development.

But now, it held a name that made one's blood run cold—

[Death Corridor].

As soon as he entered this corridor, Lin Yuan felt something was wrong.

It was too quiet.

Unlike the mechanical clamor of the industrial zone, it was so quiet here that there wasn't even the sound of wind.

The metal walls on both sides, which should have been silver-white, now displayed an eerie dark red, as if... they were the inner walls of some biological organ.

The air was filled with an indescribable smell—not of machine oil, but a metallic tang mixed with the stench of formalin.

"Drip... drip..."

The sensors suddenly picked up the clear sound of water dripping.

Lin Yuan instinctively looked up.

He saw the alloy ceiling above writhing.

No, it wasn't just writhing.

The metal seemed to have gained life, slowly softening and drooping, transforming into distorted human faces.

They were human faces, titan faces, and even the faces of various alien races. Their eyes were tightly shut and their mouths were wide open, as if letting out silent screams.

"What the hell are these things?!"

Lin Yuan jerked the control stick, trying to avoid them.

But in the next second, his vision blurred.

Those faces opened their eyes.

Countless pairs of eyes filled with resentment and despair stared fixedly at him.

"Wooo... wooo..."

The sound of weeping reached his ears.

It was faint at first, like a baby's cry, but in an instant, it turned into the wailing of billions. The sound didn't come through his ears; it exploded directly in the depths of his mind!

"Can't you see? It hurts so much..."

"Save us... or... join us..."

The holographic screens inside the cockpit began to flicker wildly, the green data streams turning blood-red.

Lin Yuan felt his hands and feet turn cold, and his heart felt as if it were being squeezed hard by a freezing hand.

Hallucinations?

No, this was more real than any hallucination.

He could even feel something crawling up his spine—a cold, viscous sensation.

"Warning! Pilot's mental fluctuations are abnormal! Heart rate has exceeded 200!"

"Warning! High-intensity mental pollution source detected! Shields... shields are ineffective!"

Li Na's terrified scream sounded distant and distorted in the communication channel, as if through a thick layer of water.

Lin Yuan suddenly bit the tip of his tongue, the sharp pain granting him a moment of clarity.