26: Chapter 26: One shot blasts down the Ice Armored Giant Rhinoceros! Four hundred Truth Points in hand!

Inside the Ice Valley, thick, high-temperature white steam hung in the air, refusing to dissipate.

The entire space had turned into a massive steamer.

"Roar!!!"

The Mutated Ice-Armored Giant Rhino had fallen into a complete frenzy.

It violently broke free from the pile of crushed ice.

Its entire body of horny ice armor was covered in fine cracks caused by thermal expansion and contraction.

The 200-degree boiling water hadn't taken its life, but that bone-deep burning pain made the king shake its head in humiliation.

The giant beast's scarlet eyes locked firmly onto the Polaris, which was looming in the dense fog, and it let out a second deafening roar.

It gave up on the long-distance, straight-line charges that were easy to dodge, and instead, moving its thick limbs, it transformed into a heavy tank, advancing toward the Polaris step by step.

Every step it took caused the ice surface to tremble.

"The beast has gotten smarter?" Lu Chen sat in the driver's seat, his hands firmly controlling the steering wheel.

That a beast could change tactics even when enraged to the extreme showed that its combat instinct was terrifyingly acute.

But in the face of Lu Chen's extremely rational brain, all tactics based on instinct were merely futile struggles.

"Supercharger, shift to second gear!" Lu Chen pulled the lever back halfway.

The roar of the Polaris subsided slightly, but the tracks still maintained extremely high torque.

He stopped performing extreme evasive maneuvers and instead began an incredibly annoying kiting tactic.

The Polaris used the intricate ice pillars and boulders within the Ice Valley as cover, circling around the giant rhino.

Clang! Clang! Clang!

Lu Chen operated the steering wheel with one hand while frantically cranking the handle of the repeating crossbow with the other.

Pure steel crossbow bolts poured out in a dense barrage.

They couldn't pierce the ice armor, but every one of Lu Chen's arrows was shot with malicious precision at the joints of the rhino's armor, such as its knee joints and the edges of its eyes.

The giant rhino was incredibly irritated by this persistent harassment, frequently turning around in an attempt to gore this annoying iron fly with its horn.

But each time, Lu Chen easily dodged it by utilizing the short-distance burst of the supercharger.

Five minutes of kiting.

For a massive Mutant Beast, intense exercise in an extremely cold environment caused its stamina consumption to increase exponentially.

Finally, the giant rhino's speed slowed down visibly.

Large gusts of white vapor mixed with blood streaks sprayed from its nostrils, and that thick layer of horny ice armor heaved unevenly, showing that it was on the verge of physical exhaustion.

Its old strength was spent, and new strength had yet to form.

The time to strike had arrived!

Lu Chen stopped dodging, slammed his foot onto the accelerator, and pushed the supercharger lever to its limit!

The Polaris let out a sky-shaking roar; instead of retreating, it advanced, launching a counter-charge toward the massive body of the giant rhino!

Seeing this, the giant rhino let out a thunderous roar.

It gathered its last remaining strength to lower its head, aiming its three-meter-long spiral horn at the front of the Polaris.

The final, desperate collision!

However, at the very instant the distance between them closed to less than thirty meters, Lu Chen suddenly released the steering wheel and the supercharger lever, his body springing up, and he grabbed the two hanging brass handles above his head!

Under the force of inertia, the Polaris continued to roar forward.

The heavy, semi-enclosed turret on the roof, under Lu Chen's blind operation, emitted a low, heavy sound of gears turning.

The two-meter-long black iron cannon barrel completed a precise micro-adjustment in a split second.

The crosshairs of the scope locked firmly onto the back of the giant rhino's neck, which was exposed as it lowered its head to charge.

There was a small piece of armor there, the exact weak spot that had cracked open earlier due to thermal expansion and contraction!

"It's over, big guy."

Lu Chen pressed the red firing button hard with his thumb.

Bang!!!

A terrifying thunderclap that drowned out all other sounds boomed through the Ice Valley!

The body of the Polaris sank heavily under the shocking recoil, and the tracks gouged two harsh furrows into the ice.

A fifty-pound pure steel harpoon, gleaming with a cold, deadly light, dragged a thick alloy chain behind it, splitting the air and leaving a straight vacuum trajectory in mid-air!

Pfft!

Without any resistance!

That piece of ice armor, which had become incredibly fragile due to the alternation of cold and heat, was like a sheet of paper before the terrifying kinetic energy of the fifty-pound pure steel.

The barbed harpoon plunged deep into the giant rhino's neck, not only piercing through its muscles, which were as tough as steel cables, but also lodging directly between the gaps of its cervical vertebrae!

The giant rhino's overwhelming charge was brought to a dead stop.

Its massive body froze in place from the bone-chilling pain, letting out a desperate wail.

"Three, two, one." Lu Chen counted silently in his heart.

Bang!!

A deep explosion erupted from within the giant rhino.

It was the delayed micro-fuse inside the harpoon being detonated!

The secondary combustion of the black powder produced unparalleled destructive power within the narrow confines of its muscles and bones.

The giant rhino's entire back of the neck and back shattered instantly!

A rain of blood, minced meat, and shattered internal organs mixed with bone fragments blossomed in the Ice Valley like a grand firework.

This arrogant overlord didn't even have time to let out one last scream.

Its massive head hung down limply.

Its hill-like body collapsed heavily, slamming onto the ice and kicking up a sky full of snow dust, dead completely.

Instant kill!

Perfect tactical kiting and ultimate firepower that killed in one blow!

Lu Chen let out a long breath of stale air mixed with the smell of gunpowder.

He pushed open the car door, ignored the bone-chilling cold wind outside, and stepped through the thick snow, walking up to that mountain of flesh.

Lu Chen pulled the skinning knife from his boot and violently slashed open the giant rhino's ruined chest cavity.

Amidst the thick, scalding blood, he dug out a core the size of an adult's fist.

It was crystal clear and radiated an incredibly dazzling blue light!

The energy flowing within this beast core was countless times purer than the one from the Snow Bear earlier!

It could even spark a faint blue halo in the surrounding air!

A top-grade mid-tier beast core!

The corner of Lu Chen's eye twitched uncontrollably; a strong sense of hoarding satisfaction made him almost laugh out loud.

Holding this rare treasure that was still dripping blood, he walked quickly back to the cabin and placed it squarely on the iron table.

"System! Calculate the value!" Lu Chen's voice revealed a rare hint of fanaticism.

[Ding! High-dimensional scanning module activated.]

[Detected: Mutated Ice-Armored Giant Rhino (peak mid-tier) perfect core! Contains an incredibly violent and pure ice-attribute biological source.]

[Single conversion rate: 400 Truth Points!!! Execute conversion immediately?]

Four hundred points!

A full four hundred points!

This one beast core was worth eighty low-grade sourcefire coal crystals!

It was equivalent to more than double the total of the two Snow Shard Gang medium vehicles he had destroyed earlier!

This was the terrifying value of high-tier creatures in the wasteland, as long as you had the life to hunt them!

"Convert all!" Lu Chen didn't hesitate.

The beast core on the table, which could be called a work of art, completely dissipated in the deep blue light, turning into a massive stream of golden data that flowed into the panel.

[Conversion successful! Obtained 400 Truth Points.]

[Current account balance: 440 Truth Points.]

Looking at the skyrocketing number in the top right corner, Lu Chen's severe fear of insufficient firepower was greatly assuaged.

His wallet was full again; it was time to install a real brain for this war beast that was already beginning to take shape.