94: Chapter 94 Zhang Hao's Atonement

Bai Qi's condensed earth-shattering strike, a bloody halberd radiance tearing through the sky like a roaring crimson dragon, aimed straight for the glowing core that had just shifted to the front within the Lord of the Ultimate End's body! The God of Slaughter Domain erupted in full force, dyeing that entire airspace a heart-stopping dark crimson, even causing the destructive energy flowing across the Lord of the Ultimate End's surface to stagnate.

This halberd strike contained terrifying power capable of severely wounding or even destroying a secondary core!

The Lord of the Ultimate End's massive yellow pupils constricted violently. All its tentacles frantically retracted in an attempt to block, but they were desperately entangled by the Black and White Impermanence and the Rakshasa Ghost General, causing a half-beat delay!

Just as the halberd radiance was about to hit—

A sudden mutation occurred!

At the very moment Lin Chen was fully focused on controlling the system, providing maximum energy support for Bai Qi's strike, leaving him no attention for anything else!

A black shadow shot up from the ruins below like a ghost! Its speed far surpassed normal comprehension, even leaving a series of afterimages in the air! The target was not Lin Chen, nor any of the Ghost Generals, but rather—the entrance to the shelter deep beneath the Fortress, where the [Nether Domain Energy Core] that sustained the entire defense system, the spectral soldier summoning array, and the existence of the three Ghost Generals was located!

It was Zhang Hao!

But this Zhang Hao's face was contorted, his eyes completely filled with a murky yellow, his mouth twisted into an inhuman, malicious grin, drool mixed with black mucus dripping from the corners. On the surface of his body, faint, constantly opening and closing maw-like phantoms similar to those on the Lord of the Ultimate End's tentacles appeared, and he was enveloped in a corrosive energy that shared the same origin as the Lord of the Ultimate End's but was more insidious and hidden!

He had been corrupted! Just moments ago, the Lord of the Ultimate End's corrosive black blood, containing its will, had taken advantage of his mental collapse and defenseless state to invade his soul, turning him into a controlled puppet!

"The Energy Core! Destroy it!" A distorted, hoarse voice, mixed with Zhang Hao's own terror and the will of the Lord of the Ultimate End, was forced from his throat.

"Zhang Hao! What are you doing?!" Su Qingyu was closest and saw it most clearly. Horrified, she instinctively raised a pistol in her hand, enchanted with a faint nether talisman, and aimed it at Zhang Hao's back.

But it was too late!

Empowered by the Lord of the Ultimate End's strength, Zhang Hao was astonishingly fast. Su Qingyu's bullet only hit the afterimage he left behind. He crashed into the heavily fortified shelter door, protected by thick Nether Steel and defensive runes, like a human cannonball!

"BOOM!!!"

A violent explosion sounded! It wasn't Zhang Hao breaking through the door; it was him detonating all the forcibly infused Terminal energy within his body at the moment of impact! The corrosive black light spread like a plague, instantly eroding the defensive runes on the door. The sturdy Nether Steel door emitted a piercing screech of twisting metal. Although it didn't shatter immediately, its surface glow rapidly dimmed, and the structural integrity at the joints was clearly damaged! Even more terrifying, the shockwave and energy interference from the explosion penetrated the door seams into the Energy Core inside!

Humm—!

The entire remaining portion of the Fortress suddenly dimmed, lights flickering wildly as if from unstable voltage. In the sky, the three Ghost Generals locked in fierce combat with the tentacles flickered and wavered simultaneously. Though they stabilized immediately, their auras noticeably weakened! Especially Bai Qi's certain-kill halberd strike—the halberd radiance, due to the momentary fluctuation in energy supply, exhibited an extremely slight deviation and attenuation!

It was this minuscule deviation!

"Pfft!"

The bloody halberd radiance grazed past the edge of the glowing core. Though it still tore open a massive wound, gushing out a sea of black energy, it failed to completely shatter it!

That secondary core flickered violently, its glow dimming significantly. It was clearly severely wounded, but ultimately, it was not destroyed!

All efforts wasted at the last moment!

"ROAR—!!!"

The Lord of the Ultimate End unleashed its most violent soul-shattering shriek since the battle began! A cry of agony from its secondary core's injury, and also of frenzied rage at its scheme's success (disrupting the fatal strike)! Its two remaining intact tentacles, along with the one wounded by Bai Qi, surged with power once more, violently shaking off the entangled Black and White Impermanence and Rakshasa Ghost General. With even more insane destructive intent, they smashed down towards the Fortress below, whose defenses were greatly weakened due to the Energy Core disturbance, and towards the three Ghost Generals whose forms appeared slightly illusory after exhausting their strength!

This time, no one could stop it!

"Zhang Hao—!"

Lin Chen's roar exploded like thunder! He watched helplessly as the sure-kill strike was disrupted, as the situation instantly collapsed, and as that bootlicker he had given one last chance to was ultimately corrupted and betrayed him! Overwhelming killing intent almost solidified into substance!

But he had no time to deal with Zhang Hao now! The system's alarms were blaring incessantly: Energy Core damaged, Ghost Generals difficult to sustain, the spectral soldier battle formation showing signs of disintegration... And above, three destructive tentacles capable of utterly erasing everything!

Is this the end?

No!

In this true desperate situation, as everyone despaired, even Su Qingyu closing her eyes awaiting the final destruction—

That "Zhang Hao" who had self-detonated, his body scorched by Terminal black flames, lying On the verge of death before the corroded Energy Core shelter door, suddenly raised his head!

The murky yellow in his eyes receded like a tide, revealing his original eyes beneath—filled with fear, regret, struggle, and a final trace of... resolve!

The Lord of the Ultimate End's will, after successfully disrupting Bai Qi's attack and detonating him, seemed to relax for an instant. It was this slight relaxation that allowed Zhang Hao's corrupted, nearly shattered soul to seize a moment of control!

He saw the descending tentacles, the teetering Fortress, Lin Chen's livid, murderous face, and his own despicable, manipulated life that had ultimately caused disaster.

"M-Master..." He made a sound like a broken bellows from his throat, blood and black smoke continuously gushing from his mouth and nose. Yet, with his last ounce of strength, he pulled a smile uglier than crying—obsequious, yet carrying a hint of relief.

"Lord Lin... I... I'm sorry... This worthless life... wasn't used well..."

Then, with his arm now only bone and charred flesh, he stabbed fiercely into his own scorched chest! There, a faint but exceptionally pure wisp of Ghost Tamer origin energy remained—the last vestige of his true self, incompatible with the Terminal corruption, obtained when he first awakened.

"In the next life... I... I'll still follow you..."

Before the words faded, he forcibly detonated that wisp of origin energy! Simultaneously detonated was the residual Terminal corrosive energy within him, not yet fully controlled!

This was not an attack, but a... sacrifice! A self-destructive, precisely directed energy marker!

"BOOM—!!!"

An even more violent explosion than before occurred! But this time, the light produced wasn't corrosive black, but an eerie, bloody ghostly glow carrying Zhang Hao's life imprint and Ghost Tamer origin! This ghostly glow did not spread out. Instead, like a conscious arrow, it shot skyward, ignoring spatial distance, and with pinpoint accuracy, branded itself onto the three glowing cores within the Lord of the Ultimate End's body—the cores whose positional trajectories showed brief regularity due to the recent fierce combat and the secondary core's injury, and whose energy fluctuations were most intense!

Especially that secondary core severely wounded by Bai Qi, its glow dimmed—it was marked most clearly and dazzlingly by this bloody ghostly glow!

At this moment, the positions of the three cores and the weak points in their energy flow became as clear as lighthouses in the night to everyone's perception!

"Now!" Lin Chen's roar echoed across the battlefield. Without the slightest hesitation, not even time for any sentiment about Zhang Hao's deathbed atonement, all his mental energy, all his nether talisman reserves poured into the system like a bursting flood!

"Bai Qi! Impermanence! Rakshasa! Blow up those three marked points simultaneously for me!!"

"All forces, attack!!!"

"Kill—!!!"

Bloodlight erupted from Bai Qi's eyes. His somewhat illusory form solidified once more. The bloody war halberd in his hand emitted an excited hum, transforming into a blood-red rainbow piercing heaven and earth, aimed straight for the most clearly marked, most severely wounded secondary core!

The Black and White Impermanence's chains seemed to bypass rules, ignoring the tentacles' obstruction, directly entangling the other two marked cores, performing the most fundamental interference and restraint!

The Rakshasa Ghost General roared, merging his six arms into one, condensing a massive bone war spear imbued with all his ferocity, and hurled it at the final core!

Below, the battle formation composed of a hundred thousand spectral soldiers poured all their power into the three Ghost Generals' attacks!

Three world-annihilating attacks, at the same precise moment, accurately struck the three cores clearly marked by the bloody ghostly glow!

Time seemed to stand still at this moment.

Then—

"PFFT!!!!"

"PFFT!!!!"

"PFFT!!!!"

Three muffled, ultimate sounds, as if the world's heart were being crushed, came almost simultaneously!

Within the Lord of the Ultimate End's body, those three glowing cores that constantly shifted positions and provided infinite energy—under Bai Qi's halberd radiance, Impermanence's chains, and Rakshasa's bone spear—exploded like light bulbs smashed by a hammer! Countless black energy fragments and viscous matter sprayed out from its massive form like a torrential downpour!

"SCREEEEE—!!!!!!!!"

The Lord of the Ultimate End unleashed an unprecedented, indescribably shrill soul-wrenching wail! Its massive yellow pupils instantly cracked, their light rapidly dimming! All its flailing tentacles went limp as if their bones were removed, weakly slapping the void! Its huge, seemingly invincible body began to convulse violently, shriveling, emitting the decay stench of impending demise!

Zhang Hao, with his despicable, wretched life—yet one that awakened at the final moment and atoned in the most tragic manner—tore open the final path to victory for Lin Chen and this shattered Fortress!

On the ruins, only the charred crater left by his self-destruction remained, and in the air, his final, obsequious yet despairing last words, not yet fully dissipated:

"Lord Lin... In the next life... I'll still follow you..."