As gravity instantly returned to the Distortion Layer, tens of thousands of tons of seawater that had been suspended in the air lost their support, roaring toward the depths of the earth like collapsing mountains.
Lin Bei's figure flickered in the rain and torrents. He didn't drift with the current; instead, he fired the blue energy from his left hand in reverse, like a torpedo diving backwards into the abyss.
The Steel Beast: Siren's "Leviathan"
At the bottom of the abyss, a black mothership the size of three football fields—the "Leviathan"—hovered silently above a lava lake.
Its hull was made of light-absorbing material. Countless mechanical arms extended from its belly, tightly gripping the "Coral Heart" in the center of the temple, which flashed with an ominous purple light. The ship's engines emitted a low-frequency tremor; every roar caused large chunks of rock to peel off the surrounding walls.
"Alert! High-energy biological signal approaching at high speed!"
Inside the Leviathan's command deck, a bright blue dot on the radar screen was penetrating the defense circle at an alarming speed.
"That's... that spare part?" The supervisor stared at the screen, greed flashing in his eyes. "Activate deck defense matrix. Don't kill him; I want him alive. Every cell of his is priceless."
Mowing Mode: No Man's Land
The moment Lin Bei slammed onto the top deck of the Leviathan, he unleashed a shockwave mixed with blue lightning.
Three groups of fully armed "Iron Guard" soldiers quickly surrounded him. These soldiers wore hydraulically driven power armor and held high-frequency vibration blades capable of cutting diamond.
"Target locked. Launch capture net!"
Four specially made nano-nets interlaced with high-voltage electricity fell from above.
Lin Bei didn't even look up. He extended his left hand and twisted gently at the void.
The seawater falling from the sky vaporized the instant it touched his fingertips, then collapsed under strong electromagnetic forces into fist-sized high-pressure water mines.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The nano-nets were blasted into confetti in mid-air. Lin Bei's figure vanished from his spot. In the next second, he appeared directly in front of an Iron Guard.
He didn't use a knife. He simply pressed his transparent left hand against the chest of the power armor.
"Resonance."
Lin Bei whispered.
In that instant, the composite armor that could withstand heavy artillery fire shattered like a resonating glass cup, spiderweb cracks spreading from between his fingers, before completely pulverizing into metal dust in a fraction of a second.
"Wha... what is this power?" The remaining soldiers retreated in terror.
Lin Bei gave them no chance. He moved through the corridor like a blue hurricane. Wherever he passed, precise defense turrets and heavy hydraulic doors were all cut and twisted by rapidly compressed water streams in an instant.
He wasn't fighting; he was dismantling this steel fortress.
Aya's Mutation: Betrayal in the Shadows?
"Lin Bei, the Core's self-destruct sequence has been activated!"
Aya's figure flickered in the shadows of the corridor. Half of her face was now covered in a faint, coral-like pattern, her eyes revealing a non-human madness.
"If Siren Company can't have it, they'll detonate it and take the entire continental shelf with them!"
Lin Bei stopped and turned to Aya. "What happened to your face?"
"I told you, I am the immune cell of this system," Aya gritted her teeth, as if enduring immense pain. "The Core is unstable, so I mutate along with it. Lin Bei, go to the engine room; that's the 'slot' for the Core. You must use your left hand to replace the mothership's grappling arm and stabilize it manually!"
Lin Bei looked at Aya. The "premonition" suddenly gave him an extremely blurry image: Aya standing before the mothership's console, coldly watching him being sucked into the Core.
He felt a twinge of suspicion, but the current situation left him no time to think deeply.
"Lead the way," Lin Bei said in a low voice, his left hand emitting a dangerous purple glow.
Engine Room Showdown: The First Boss
They rushed into the deepest part of the engine room.
The space here was massive and oppressive, with giant pistons pumping dark red steam. Blocking the Core slot was a terrifying monster over three meters tall.
It was Siren Company's bio-modified soldier—"The Executioner." It had no skin; its body was covered in external mechanical skeletons, and dozens of tubes constantly injecting blue chemical fluids were plugged into its back.
"Beta, welcome home," The Executioner's voice came through a loudspeaker, ear-piercing and raspy. "Your father made you perfect, but I... am the end of evolution."
The Executioner swung a massive mechanical chainsaw, bringing a scorched smell straight at Lin Bei's face.
Lin Bei didn't retreat; he advanced.
He took a deep breath, the veins in his left hand turning from blue to gold in that moment.
"The end?"
Lin Bei's figure traced an eerie arc in the air, dodging the chainsaw's cut. He turned in mid-air, left hand gripping the void. The high-temperature steam spraying from the surrounding pipes instantly condensed into a three-meter-long heavy ice sword.
"You were pieced together from parts, whereas I..."
Lin Bei brought the sword down. The ice sword sliced through the air with a scream, cutting diagonally down from the Executioner's shoulder.
"...I am the will of this sea!"
The moment the ice sword cut into the Executioner's mechanical body, it unleashed a terrifyingly low temperature, not only severing the metal but instantly freezing the biochemical fluids inside.
The giant mechanical monster crashed to the ground, shaking the entire engine room.
Lin Bei stood on the wreckage, looking at the wildly trembling "Coral Heart," then at Aya, whose expression was unreadable.
He knew the real contest had only just begun.