13: Chapter 13 The Flame of Fusion and the Fangs of Sgulger

The B-1 level corridor became a meat grinder.

The bone blade of T-001 tore through the metal wall, emitting a teeth-gnashing shriek. The monster, maddened by the scent of blood, swept its six limbs through the Scavengers' ranks. Each swing brought screams and torn flesh. A Scavenger heavy drilling machine was stuck in the middle of the corridor, its cannon not yet turned, when it was pierced through the cockpit by the bone blade.

"Left," Lin Yuan murmured.

He stood at the corridor intersection, his Carapace Armor still warm from its STC casting. Exposed external conduits on his shoulder armor vibrated slightly with his breathing. This was not ceremonial armor; it was a war machine, every armor plate designed to withstand extreme violence.

Scarface crouched three steps behind him, clutching a portable terminal salvaged from B-2. "Two minutes and thirty seconds left until reinforcements break through the emergency elevator."

"That's enough."

Lin Yuan raised his Bolter. The weapon, less than an hour old from the STC production line, still smelled of machine oil. He pulled the trigger.

Boom!

The first bolt hit the Scavenger machine gunner's chest. The Tyranid-modified warrior's Carapace Armor tore like paper, his chest exploding with a bowl-sized hole. Before blood could even spray, the second bolt had already penetrated the comms officer behind cover.

The recoil slammed into his shoulder armor with a dull metallic clang. Lin Yuan remained motionless. The Carapace Armor's cushioning layer dispersed the kinetic energy throughout his body; he only felt a slight push, like someone had patted his back.

"Go."

Rat Eye was the first to charge out. The boy wore a small Carapace Armor, its external conduits thicker than his arms, hissing with the unique sound of a hydraulic system as he ran. He refused to take off this "God-given armor," even though its weight made him stumble.

At the end of the corridor, the Scavengers' blockade was reorganizing. A modified warrior shouldered a Meltagun, its muzzle glowing a dangerous orange-red.

Lin Yuan didn't hesitate. He activated the STC interface, and the neural link of his left arm's Biological Armor instantly stung, like red-hot needles coursing through his veins. The pain caused his aim to shift half an inch, but he forcibly suppressed the tremor, and the third bolt accurately drilled into the Meltagun's power pack.

The blast wave overturned the entire blockade. Flames licked Lin Yuan's breastplate, leaving a scorched mark, but did not penetrate.

"This is... the difference," Scarface panted, his eyes wide. He had seen Scavenger elites, seen Tyranid-modified monsters, but never this pure, efficient violence.

Lin Yuan didn't answer. A golden flash flickered at the edge of his vision, and the Astartes' ghostly whisper echoed within his skull, "Left, in three seconds."

He abruptly dodged sideways.

A bio-identification armor-piercing round grazed his helmet, drilling a deep hole in the wall. The projectile bore the Scavenger mark and a line of small text: Target DNA Sequence LY-001.

They weaponized my genes.

Lin Yuan felt a chill, but his movements didn't stop. He fired a backhand shot, blasting the Scavenger Commander in the sniper nest to pieces. The body fell from above, still clutching an encrypted communicator.

"Get that," Lin Yuan ordered.

Rat Eye pounced, retrieving the communicator from the pool of blood. Just as the boy was about to retreat, a loud bang came from deep within B-1. T-001 had collapsed a load-bearing pillar, and the entire floor began to tilt, dust and rubble raining down.

"It's going to bury everyone!" Scarface shouted.

"Including the Scavenger reinforcements," Lin Yuan glanced in the direction of the emergency elevator, the roar of drills now clearly audible. "Detonate the Fusion Reactor."

Scarface froze. "That will seal off B-1. We'll never be able to come back. All of ARK-11's supplies, all its technology..."

"Sunk cost," Lin Yuan interrupted him, his voice, cold and hard as metal, coming through the breathing grille. "The calculation is clear: no retreat, or die here."

He brought up the STC control interface, his finger hovering over the [Fusion Reactor Overload] option. This was a strategic choice, not a tactical one. ARK-11 was his grandfather's legacy, the most advanced shelter in the wasteland, but now it had become their coffin.

Lin Yuan pressed confirm.

The countdown began to flicker in his vision: [00:45].

"Run!"

The three rushed towards the emergency escape tunnel. Behind them, T-001 seemed to sense the anomaly in the energy core, emitting an inhuman shriek, and turned to pounce on the surging Scavenger reinforcements. The monster and the modified warriors clashed at the end of the corridor, buying Lin Yuan and his companions the last precious moments.

The moment the tunnel door closed behind them, the Fusion Reactor detonated.

The shockwave traveled through the ventilation shaft, like a giant's fist slamming against an iron door. Lin Yuan was pushed by the blast against the wall, his Carapace Armor scraping against the concrete with an ear-splitting screech. He felt a sharp pain from the neural link in his left arm, and the LY-001 gene lock's countdown flickered at the edge of his vision: [71:14:33].

The intense pain made his right hand spasm, almost dropping the Bolter. He gritted his teeth, forcibly gripping the stock with his left hand, his fingernails leaving white marks on the metal.

"The exit is twenty meters ahead," Scarface said, his voice trembling as he looked at the portable terminal. "But..."

"But what?"

"Signals show biological activity on the surface. Not Scavengers, it's..."

Boom!

At the end of the escape tunnel, the manhole cover leading to the surface was pried open from the outside. A green claw reached in, covered in rough scales, its nails like rusty drill bits.

Lin Yuan raised his Bolter.

The first Snotling poked its head in. It looked like a skinned hellhound, muscles exposed, corrosive saliva dripping from its maw. Its eyes had no pupils, only murky yellow, and the moment they locked onto Lin Yuan, a gurgling sound erupted from its throat.

The roar of the Bolter was deafening in the narrow passage.

The Snotling's head exploded into fragments, green blood splattering on the walls with a sizzling, corrosive sound. The corpse fell from the ladder, landing at Lin Yuan's feet.

"Not six hours," Lin Yuan stared at the timer strapped to the corpse, its hands showing [01:58:00]. "Martin's information was a decoy. The main force arrives in two hours, the vanguard is already here."

Scarface's face was pale. He instinctively reached for the Scavenger communicator, his finger pausing on the send button. The channel was still open, but he heard silence. Only dead quiet in the main channel, and occasionally, distorted screams.

The main Scavenger force had been annihilated on B-1.

Scarface's finger moved away from the send button. He looked up at Lin Yuan, at the still-smoking Carapace Armor, at the Bolter dripping green blood. The risk calculation was made in an instant: the Scavengers were dead, Lin Yuan was alive, and Lin Yuan had just authorized him access to the STC energy interface.

"I have control," Scarface whispered, raising his portable terminal to display the authorization interface. "Technical partner?"

"If you want to live," Lin Yuan had already turned to the tunnel exit, his Bolter pointed at the manhole cover. "Rat Eye, get to the surface. Take the high ground."

The boy nodded, his movements clumsy on the ladder due to the weight of the Carapace Armor, but he refused to remove the equipment. His fingers caressed the armor's surface, as if confirming its real existence.

"Astartes Acolyte..." Rat Eye murmured, his voice filled with religious fervor. "I am ready."

Lin Yuan was the second to climb out of the manhole. The wasteland's surface wind, laden with radioactive dust, hit him, scratching the surface of his Carapace Armor. The skyline was a sickly purplish-red, and distant storm clouds rolled.

He quickly scanned the terrain. This was ARK-11's northwest exit, a collapsed parking lot, littered with abandoned vehicles and concrete debris. Perfect cover, and also a perfect ambush site.

Two Snotlings sprang from behind an abandoned truck.

Lin Yuan pulled the trigger half a second early. It wasn't foresight; the whisper in his skull had sounded again, "Right side, pounce." The hallucination had become a precise tactical warning, but at the cost of the ghostly image of a fallen Scavenger flickering at the edge of his vision.

A bolt ripped through the first Snotling's torso. The second had already leaped, its sharp claws reaching for Lin Yuan's faceplate.

He dodged sideways, his movement a half-beat slow due to the nerve pain in his left arm. The claws left three deep scratches on his shoulder armor, severing one external conduit, hydraulic fluid spraying out.

Lin Yuan smashed the Snotling's skull with his rifle stock.

"Three," he counted, simultaneously checking his shoulder armor for damage. The crude energy weapon of the greenskin had left scorch marks on the plate, and the auxiliary armor was penetrated, but the main armor layer had blocked fatal damage. "Maintain a triangular formation."

Scarface climbed out of the manhole and immediately dove towards the wreckage of an abandoned armored vehicle. He opened the Scavenger Commander's encrypted communicator and quickly cracked the password. An unsent message popped up on the screen: [District 7 - Harvest Protocol - Target Confirmed - LY-001 Sample Priority: Highest].

"District 7?" Scarface frowned. "There's someone above the Scavengers?"

Lin Yuan didn't answer. He was staring at the corpse of the last Snotling. Its abdomen was cut open, revealing a deformed biological gland, which shimmered with a blue light similar to the STC interface.

He crouched down, and the Biological Armor on his left arm suddenly stung, resonating with the gland. A system warning popped up in his vision: [WAAAGH! energy residue and ARK gene tech homologous sequence detected].

Greenskins and Ark technology are connected.

This discovery was like an ice pick in his brain. Lin Yuan stood up, looking at the distant horizon. Beneath the storm clouds, a green tide was vaguely visible, writhing, closer and more pressing than Martin had reported.

"Detonate the entrance," Lin Yuan ordered.

Scarface entered the final command. A dull roar came from the direction of ARK-11's main entrance, the ground shook, and dust and smoke rose into the sky. The path to the underground shelter completely collapsed, cutting off their retreat and shaking off their pursuers.

Lin Yuan stood in the wasteland wind, the scorch marks and scratches on his Carapace Armor recording the recent battle. He had lost a base, gained three battle-tested armors, intercepted a mysterious faction's mark, and a terrifying clue about gene homology.

Rat Eye walked up to him, holding the gland cut from the Snotling's corpse in his trembling hands, but his eyes were firm.

"Where to now?" Scarface asked, his fingers unconsciously caressing the STC energy interface controller.

Lin Yuan looked in the opposite direction of the storm clouds, where the outline of an abandoned medical station was faintly visible against the purplish-red sky.

"First, survive," he said, raising his Bolter and pointing into the distance. "Then find District 7, and ask them why they want my blood."

The wasteland wind stirred up radioactive dust, blowing against the Carapace Armor with a fine rustling sound. The countdown flickered in his vision, the green tide writhed in the distance, and Lin Yuan had already turned, taking the first step towards the medical station.