209: Chapter 209 Crimson Wasteland

The fifth floor above ground, the surface defense hall.

The yellowish halo of the wall lamps spilled onto the vast steel floor. Nine Demon Bone Iron Guard covered in dark titanium-tungsten armor stood like mountains, arrayed around the hall, firmly guarding Gu Shen in the center.

A faint blue light flickered in the electronic eyes of the mechanical spider on Gu Shen's shoulder. Before long, it crawled down his lapel and leaped onto the control console in front.

"My Lord, the three hundred t-7 heavy purgers have successfully completed the underground clearance directive." Crab's monotone electronic voice came through steadily, revealing the precision of data coordination. "From the second to the twelfth underground floors, all wandering low-level flesh Aberrations and surviving zombie colonies have been wiped out. The remains and supplies have been concentrated and stacked in the first-floor plaza."

Gu Shen nodded slightly. This was the greatest benefit of taking over full authority of the Shelter; there was no need to do things personally, as these tireless steel creations would naturally sweep away hidden dangers for him.

He strode toward the freight passage leading to the first floor. A moment later, he arrived at the first-floor plaza.

In the center of the plaza, the mountain-like pile of Aberration corpses exuded a pungent stench of decay. These were mostly low-level monsters contaminated by radiation; in terms of individual combat power, they were not even equal to a Late-Stage Qi Refining Cultivator, but they had the advantage of sheer numbers.

Gu Shen extended his right palm.

Deep within his Sea of Consciousness, the [Heaven and Earth Furnace] let out a vast, long cry that shook the Void Realm. Pale white flames of Law poured out from his palm, transforming into a sea of fire that completely engulfed the mountain of rotting flesh and remains.

Under the calcination of the flames of Law, the foul-smelling radioactive blood and mixed viruses were incinerated into nothingness, while the most primal life substances were continuously purified and condensed within the firelight.

Half an hour later, the void fire rolled back.

Dozens of milky white droplets, lustrous as jade, floated in mid-air, emitting an alluring fragrance.

[Refinement complete. Obtained: 50 drops of essence white dew (Inferior), 5 drops of essence white dew (Medium).]

Gu Shen waved his large sleeve, collecting all these strategic supplies into his Storage Ring. As the saying goes, sand gathers into a tower; such resource gains were enough to make any Loose Cultivator in the Cultivation World jealous to the point of madness.

After finishing this, Gu Shen returned to the fifth-floor defense hall.

He looked up toward the front of the hall. It was the No. 1 anti-nuclear main blast door, ten zhang high and over twenty zhang wide. The door was cast entirely from unknown composite steel, its surface covered in the traces of time, seamlessly embedded in the base built of rock and steel.

Outside the door lay the Wasteland surface, isolated for hundreds of years.

"Deploy fifty t-7 heavy purgers to assemble behind the blast door." Gu Shen said in a cold, hard tone, issuing the order.

"Understood."

Accompanied by the dull roar of tracks crushing the metal floor, fifty t-7 heavy purgers with rugged designs—equipped with heavy tracks on their lower bodies and multi-barrel machine guns mounted on their upper bodies—poured into the hall from the lower passage. They lined up in perfect unison in front of the blast door, their scarlet electronic eyes flickering in the dim light, fully displaying the murderous aura of a steel legion.

Gu Shen walked forward slowly and firmly inserted the dark golden Omega-class access card from his bosom into the main control slot next to the blast door.

"Beep—Highest authority confirmed. Surface No. 1 main blast door, unlocking protocol initiated." A cold, synthetic System voice echoed through the hall.

The next instant.

"Rumble!" The heavy mechanical gears that had been silent for centuries began to slowly engage. The heavy, obscure grinding sound of machinery came from deep underground, and the entire fifth-floor hall trembled violently.

The anti-nuclear blast door, weighing hundreds of tons, was pushed by the massive hydraulic System and slowly retreated into the recesses of the mountain on both sides.

A beam of long-sealed light, following the ever-widening gap of the door, slashed straight into the dim hall.

Accompanying the influx of light was a gust of hot, desolate wind, mixed with the strong scent of sulfur and heavy radiation. This wind brushed across Gu Shen's cheeks, lifting a few strands of hair by his ears.

Gu Shen stood still, his gaze fixed. Facing that ray of otherworldly light, he took a step that spanned eras.

The moment he stepped out of the door and his feet touched the surface, a grand, tragic, and deathly silent scroll—completely devoid of any restraints from the Cultivation World's Heavenly Dao—unfolded before Gu Shen's eyes without reservation.

High in the sky, there was no trace of the sun, moon, or stars. A thick, dark red radiation cloud layer, like congealed blood, pressed low over the vast land. Deep within the clouds, silent, ghostly green electrostatic thunderstorms shuttled back and forth from time to time, illuminating the entire sky as if it were an Asura purgatory.

The ground beneath his feet had long lost its original color. Under the scorching super-high temperatures of the world-ending nuclear explosion back then, large areas of soil and rock had taken on a vitrified, crystalline form. Stepping on it produced an extremely crisp cracking sound.

On the distant horizon, what undulated were not green mountains, but a massive, suffocating primitive forest of mutations.

Those plants had long undergone malignant mutations. Giant trees tens of zhang high resembled huge umbrellas of flesh propped open, with thick tentacles hanging from the edges of their canopies; weird, purple-black vines twisted around each other, like countless giant pythons breeding wantonly on the earth. Visible pink hallucinogenic spores floated in the air, drifting everywhere with the heat waves.

"My Lord, external environmental parameters updated." Crab's probe rotated rapidly, collecting physical data from the outside. "The current gravity coefficient is 1.05 times that inside Shelter No. 7; the gravity is slightly higher than normal. The oxygen content in the air is low, and it is enriched with high concentrations of carbon monoxide, neurotoxic gases, and excessive radioactive isotopes. In such an environment, carbon-based life exposed to it would face genetic collapse within half an hour."

Gu Shen stood quietly in the wind and sand, his robes fluttering and snapping. He naturally sensed the radiation energy in the air, comparable to a deadly poison, crazily seeping into his body through the pores all over him. If any Foundation Establishment Initial Stage Cultivator from the Great Yu Cultivation World were standing here, they would surely be terrified to the point of despair by now, urgently stimulating their True Essence to prop up a protective spiritual light to resist the toxic gas.

Gu Shen made no move to resist at all.

The toxic gas entered his body, heading straight for his Dantian and Qi Sea along the twelve main meridians.

In the center of his Qi Sea, the dim, profound [Nirvana Star Core] seemed to have encountered sweet rain after a long drought, suddenly accelerating its rotation. Deep cyan toxic True Essence rose to meet it, completely swallowing and crushing those violent radiation energies.

The Origins of the two worlds were connected. This Wasteland air, which was enough to kill a Mortal, was completely transformed into the purest nourishment under the crushing force of the [Nirvana Star Core], continuously feeding back into Gu Shen's limbs and bones. His Cold Jade Bone emitted a joyful hum beneath his flesh, and his entire body felt extremely comfortable.

The Heavenly Dao of the Cultivation World was like a strict, harsh cage. For every bit of Spiritual Qi a Cultivator absorbed, they owed the Heavenly Dao a bit of Karma, and when breaking through to a new realm, thunderous liquidation would surely descend.

But here.

There was no Karma, no Heavenly Tribulation, and absolutely none of the oppressive Laws of the Great Yu Heavenly Dao that felt like thorns on one's back.

"Heaven and Earth are unkind, treating all things as straw dogs. Although the Heavenly Dao of this world is dead, it has left behind this boundless, ownerless, violent power." Gu Shen gazed at this vast, boundless bloody Wasteland, a surge of uncontrollable pride rising in his heart. In this world unrestricted by cultivation Laws, he was the absolute Dominator who had jumped outside the Three Realms; this Wasteland would be his exclusive, endless treasury of resources.

"March."

Gu Shen raised his right hand, pointing directly at the crisis-ridden mutant forest ahead.

Rumble—

The fifty t-7 heavy purgers received the order, their tracks rotating crazily, crushing the crystallized scorched earth. They formed a neat advancing formation, their tracks kicking up clouds of dust, and drove out of the base gate without fear, plunging headlong into that giant forest filled with deadly spores.

The roar of steel broke the long-standing silence of the Wasteland. The tracks crushed thick mutant vines, and the barrels of the multi-barrel machine guns gleamed with a cold, sinister luster under the dark red sky.

Gu Shen followed leisurely behind the purger formation, with the nine Demon Bone Iron Guard closely following by his side, like an imperial guard protecting a monarch.

Entering the edge of the forest.

The surrounding giant fungi, which had originally been still, seemed to have sensed the intrusion of an alien species. Their canopies contracted violently, and with a few muffled "poof" sounds, large clusters of highly corrosive acidic spore liquid were sprinkled down like rain, covering everything.

The metal shells of the T-7 purgers were doused by the acid, emitting bursts of white smoke, but it failed to stop their steady advance. The machine gun fire-control radars quickly locked onto their targets.

Rat-tat-tat-tat!

Tongues of fire spat out, and a dense rain of bullets instantly tore apart those giant fungi releasing venom, large patches of dark green sap mixed with broken branches and leaves flying everywhere. Pure industrial violence plowed a wide, smooth path through this mutant ecosystem.

Gu Shen watched coldly from the sidelines as this one-sided slaughter between machinery and mutant creatures unfolded.

The Wasteland was vast, and the mutant giant beasts and pre-war ruins it nurtured were as numerous as hair on an ox. He had ventured to the surface this time, firstly to understand the surrounding environment, and secondly to find more high-level spiritual materials and pre-war resources for the [Heaven and Earth Furnace] to refine.

Deep in the forest ahead, a faint, extremely dull roar could be heard, and even the scorched earth beneath his feet trembled slightly with it.

That was the fierce might that only a true high-level predator of this Wasteland could exude.

Gu Shen's eyes flickered, the thunder pattern gold-slaying blade let out a crisp ring in its scabbard, and the Battle Intent of an extreme Body Cultivator was ignited with a boom within his chest. His Wasteland expedition had only just begun.