105: Chapter 105 The Great Cleanup

"The boss is still alive?!"

Li Muzi was stunned for a full two seconds before her brain processed this short sentence.

She covered her mouth tightly with both hands, tears falling like beads from a broken string, unable to even speak a complete sentence.

"Clang—"

Zhang Ming turned around, his back to the others, and used his rough, calloused hands to wipe his face hard, letting out a suppressed sob.

Lin Qing, leaning against the animal skin, clasped her hands together and closed her eyes tightly, tears of joy sliding down her pale cheeks: "Thank heavens... The boss isn't dead... We're saved..."

Shen Xingyue stood to the side. She watched her teammates, who had clearly been at their wits' end, quietly. Always calm and aloof, a hint of surprise and curiosity flashed in her cold eyes. What kind of person was this man they were so devoted to, the one they called "Boss"?

"Alright, stop crying, wipe your tears, and save some energy for running later."

Luo Ning took a deep breath and roughly wiped the tear stains off her face with the back of her hand.

In fact, the reason they had been trapped in this dark, sunless underground cave was pure bad luck.

Luo Ning had originally led a team here to collect supplies.

As a result, halfway through the collection, a massive scavenger fleet of alien races, composed of Goblins and Dwarven Gnomes, set their sights on this area and descended from the sky, locking down the airspace.

Although the technology of those alien races wasn't great, they didn't skimp on gunpowder.

If Luo Ning and her team's small aircraft dared to take off, it would definitely be blown into a fireball within ten seconds.

Having no other choice, they could only hide deep in the cave like groundhogs, barely surviving.

"Since the boss is coming to pick us up, we can't just shrink in the cave like cowards waiting for him to save us."

Luo Ning's fair, slender fingers slid rapidly across the information system screen, directly calling up the miniature terrain scan of the Shattered Star Rift.

She saw hundreds of red blinking dots densely lighting up around the lonely green dot representing their location.

"I've spent a full half-month setting up thunder traps on this godforsaken island, originally intending to use them when they searched the mountain."

"Now, though... since the welcoming party has arrived, it's time to let those annoying green-skinned Goblins outside have some piping hot ceremonial cannons!"

...

A few hours later, high above the Shattered Star Rift.

The originally calm and thick white clouds suddenly began to churn violently.

Accompanied by a deafening whistling sound, [Cloud Top Fortress] hovered steadily directly above the rift!

Zhou An stood with his hands behind his back in front of the wide floor-to-ceiling porthole of the main control room, his eyes cold as he looked down at the massive Floating Island below.

Through the high-magnification optical detector, he clearly saw the full picture below.

He saw hundreds of crudely designed airships densely circling the uneven surface of the rift and in the low air.

Countless Goblins with green pointed ears and fangs were busy below like industrious ants.

Some were frantically mining and transporting glowing ore, while others were operating heavy artillery, conducting brutal blasting operations on the canyon walls of the rift.

"Beep—"

The encrypted communication connected again.

"I'm here, right above you."

"I see you, that fortress is really cool!"

Luo Ning's voice came through the communicator.

"But don't rush; this bunch of green-skinned bugs and dwarves below have been messing with us for half a month, it would be too easy on them to just leave like this. Let's deal with them first and harvest a wave of supplies while we're at it. I'll set off a 'big firework' for them, and you help clean up the trash!"

The moment Luo Ning finished speaking,

"Boom boom boom boom—!!!"

The ground below the rift suddenly emitted a series of dull explosions!

The thunder traps Luo Ning had spent half a month burying were instantly detonated simultaneously. Violent blue lightning surged from underground like a dragon turning over, instantly blowing a dozen Goblin airships that hadn't managed to take off into pieces, with severed limbs and arms flying everywhere amidst the raging fire!

"Enemy attack! The damn human vermin are underground!"

"In the sky! What is that in the sky?!"

The explosions on the ground instantly alarmed the entire alien fleet, and at the same time, someone spotted the fortress high in the sky.

However, before they could even organize personnel to search the underground cave, [Cloud Top Fortress] smashed its way into the sight of all the Goblins.

Looking at the fortress exuding terrifying pressure, a trace of fear flashed in the Goblin commander's green eyes, but it was quickly replaced by greed: "It's a high-tier human fortress! Shoot it down! Loot everything inside! Open fire!"

"Bang bang bang—whoosh whoosh whoosh!"

Dozens of Goblin airships and Dwarven anti-aircraft ballistae turned their muzzles in unison, and countless crude gunpowder shells tore through the sky, pouring toward [Cloud Top Fortress] high above like a dense rainstorm.

However, these attacks hit the LV5 shield without causing even a single ripple, shattering like eggs hitting a steel plate.

Zhou An watched the ineffective attacks exploding like fireworks outside the porthole and muttered: "It seems the technology of Dwarves and Gnomes isn't very useful in this era."

"EVA, lift all weapon system restrictions."

"Fire control radar, full-screen lock."

[Command confirmed! Highest authority unlocked! Cloud Top Fortress combat mode activated!]

[Main battery charging complete! Missile array deployed! Swarm drones activated!]

"Click clack—"

Outside the massive fortress, the thick, smooth dark gold armor layers flipped open, revealing the hair-raising, destructive heavy firepower matrix inside.

Dozens of terrifyingly large-caliber electromagnetic railgun main batteries slowly extended, and hundreds of tracking missile launch ports opened in unison, locking tightly onto the unsuspecting Goblin fleet below.

"Target, all living alien races below."

Zhou An pushed the kinetic thrust lever on the main console to the very bottom!

"Indiscriminate firepower coverage. Grind them all into dust for me!"

"Rumble—!!!"

The next second, ten thousand cannons fired at once. The entire sky was lit up.

"Boom boom boom—"

Above the firmament, Zhou An's unreasonable dimensionality reduction strike instantly tore through the dense formation of the Goblin fleet.

Under the ruthless piercing of the beams, the Goblin warships didn't even have a buffer for explosion, directly turning into fireballs burning across the sky, and the Goblins and Dwarves who didn't die in the explosions screamed as they fell to the bottom of the valley.

Amidst this symphony of destruction falling from the sky, Luo Ning in the underground cave could no longer hold back and prepared to take action.

Luo Ning strode into the shadows deep in the cave.

There, a steel beast emitting a cold metallic luster stood quietly. This was her vehicle; after upgrading to LV5, it had become a pure combat mecha.

In pursuit of extreme firepower and mobility, this mecha had abandoned all life-support chambers and passenger space.

The entire interior of the mecha was completely packed with high-energy power cores and complex weapon mounting points, leaving only a narrow, cramped cockpit that could only fit one person; it was a thorough, single-soldier killing weapon.

"Click, clack—"

Accompanied by the dull sound of mechanical interlocking, the armor on the mecha's chest expanded layer by layer.

Luo Ning, like an agile black cat, leaped into the cockpit. The neural connection slot instantly locked onto her spine, and the crystal monitor on the mecha's head suddenly lit up.

"Old Zhang, guard the cave entrance to the death! Don't let even a single green-skinned fly in!"

In the cockpit, Luo Ning shouted back without turning her head. The plasma thrusters on the back of the mecha roared, spewing out dazzling azure tail flames.

"Understood! Be careful!"

"Whoosh—!"

Luo Ning piloted the mecha, like a silver lightning bolt tearing through the darkness, directly breaking through the holographic camouflage curtain outside the cave and forcefully charging into the mid-air of the rift, filled with artillery fire!

"Boss, how can you lack firepower support from me!"

Luo Ning was in mid-air, and the mecha's mechanical arms suddenly opened to both sides.

"Full form deployment!"

Accompanied by a teeth-grinding, yet extremely hardcore sound of mechanical folding and splicing, countless heavy metal parts poured madly out of the mecha's storage folding compartment!

High-frequency electromagnetic railguns, six-barreled Gatling cannon matrices, dense micro-missile launch nests, and even two precious micro-nuclear-powered floating cannons, like a Transformers combination, quickly and crazily spliced onto the exterior of her battle armor!

In just a few seconds, the originally normal-sized single-soldier mecha grew into a giant humanoid artillery fortress over ten meters tall, covered from head to toe in terrifying heavy firepower, right there in mid-air!

"I'm here to help you wash the ground!!!"

In an instant, hundreds of large and small gun barrels and missile launch nests on her body erupted with blinding firelight simultaneously!

Azure plasma beams and high-explosive micro-missiles trailing long tails of smoke wove into a suffocating death web of fire with no dead ends. From bottom to top, it poured crazily toward the Goblin fleet!

In the sky, there was Zhou An's terrifying main battery bombardment.

On the ground, there was Luo Ning's insane mecha firepower washing. The Goblins and Dwarves were instantly plunged into a hopeless three-dimensional crossfire net.

"Squeak squeak wah wah—!!"

The Goblins let out terrified, strange screams, but they also quickly organized a dying resistance.

Although these green-skinned dwarves were ugly, their technology tree was extremely weird and off-the-beaten-path.

The vast majority of their formation consisted of LV3-level heavy warships; at this moment, countless crude but powerful armor-piercing incendiary shells were swarming toward Luo Ning in a counterattack.

In the very center of the fleet, on a massive LV5-level Goblin warship, a Goblin warlord wearing a tattered crown looked at the fleet that had lost more than half its strength in an instant and let out a furious roar.

It keenly sensed the fatal threat coming from [Cloud Top Fortress] high in the sky and made a decisive decision, abandoning all its subordinates without any hesitation, pushing the power lever, and preparing to start the engines to escape.

[Warning! Enemy LV5 flagship detected starting ejection engines, attempting to flee the battlefield!]

It was clearly trying to abandon its remnants and run away alone.

"Want to run?"

"I, your grandmother, buried mines for half a month precisely to prevent you from running! Lock it down for me!"

"Beep—rumble—!!!"

On the outskirts of the Shattered Star Rift, on the surface rock walls for ten kilometers around, and even on the floating debris in mid-air, hundreds of micro-nodes had long been quietly buried by Luo Ning; this was the second big gift, and all the traps erupted simultaneously with blinding, eerie blue electric light!

"Thunderstorm, rise!"

Accompanied by Luo Ning's cold declaration, these hundreds of nodes resonated instantly, connecting into one piece.

Tens of millions of volts of high-frequency blue lightning, like hundreds of dancing giant pythons, wove together in the mid-air of the rift, knitting into a huge, impenetrable net of heaven and earth!

That LV5 Goblin flagship had just started when it was tightly covered by this sudden high-frequency thunderstorm net!

"Sizzle—bang!"

Under the baptism of thunder, those already tattered LV3 Goblin airships instantly suffered severe short circuits and internal explosions.

Like a flock of birds with broken wings, they carried their cargo of explosives and green-skinned corpses, smashing into the bottom of the valley one after another, turning into a miserable sea of fire.

And that LV5 flagship that had been forcibly stopped met an even more tragic end.

Dozens of blue lightning bolts, as thick as pillars, tightly wrapped around its massive hull.

Its proud defensive shield lasted less than three seconds in the violent lightning, then shattered into pieces like fragile glass.

"Boom—!"

The powerless LV5 flagship, billowing with thick smoke, fell from high altitude like a huge meteorite of scrap iron, spinning as it slammed hard into the ruins at the bottom of the valley, exploding into an extremely spectacular mushroom cloud.