Ambush

In the central African Black Forest, a wild, ancient land untouched by civilization.

The Hell Angels Mercenary Group infiltrated Africa in just a day and a half, concentrating one-third of their elite forces. Thousands of elite warriors and their accompanying war machines were hidden throughout the vast jungle, silently awaiting the signal to attack.

Gu Xiechen sat cross-legged amidst the densest foliage of a giant tree, quietly circulating the Hanyuan Zhen Dian.

Foundation Establishment, Acupoint Nourishment, Meridian Transformation, Marrow Cleansing, Blood Augmentation, Body Solidification, Spirit Gestation, Primordial Origin, Three Flowers Five Energies. These were the nine major realms recorded in the nine chapters of the Hanyuan Zhen Dian. Gu Xiechen, who had already broken through to the Innate realm and achieved 99% True Qi condensation, had only just completed the Foundation Establishment stage. Like building a skyscraper from the ground up, Gu Xiechen had only just dug the foundation.

True Qi surged through his meridians, his heart beating faster and faster. Streams of extremely pure energy surged from his Dao Embryo. Innate Qi, wrapped in this energy, scoured his 108 major acupoints. Driven by Gu Xiechen's will, small vortices formed within each acupoint, continuously absorbing minute amounts of energy. With his divine sense, he could see Gu Xiechen's acupoints faintly glowing. If measured by high-precision instruments, the temperature near his acupoints would be about one degree higher than his body temperature.

When the Qi within his body felt like it was about to burst forth, giving him a feeling of weightlessness as if he were about to ascend, it meant the Qi had circulated eighty-one major heavenly cycles within him, and the small vortices in each acupoint had spun 360 times. Gu Xiechen took a deep breath, his gluteal muscles pulsed nine times, and his body floated upwards by three feet, silently returning to its original position. The Qi within his body flowed into his Dantian like a hundred rivers returning to the sea. His lower abdomen felt warm, his bones and muscles became soft as cotton, and he could twist his limbs and joints freely without making a sound.

As the last wisp of Qi returned to his Dantian, his muscles suddenly contracted, and a large amount of sweat seeped from his pores. The viscous sweat faintly contained a trace of turbid black energy.

The standard-issue 'Stalker III' combat suit worn by the Federation's regular army special forces promptly wicked away the sweat, and a strong odor of sweat spread through the jungle. A large python that had been hanging above Gu Xiechen's head was disturbed by the smell. It slowly lowered its patterned body and slithered towards Gu Xiechen.

Gu Xiechen slid down the tree trunk gently. Within a few breaths, he had reached another large tree hundreds of meters away.

As an Innate-level fighter, and a first-time combatant, Gu Xiechen had considerable freedom. His primary mission this time was cooperative combat, so he operated alone outside the main ambush perimeter.

The gruff commander's voice came through the miniature earpiece: "Evil Dragon, what happened?"

Gently pressing his Adam's apple, Gu Xiechen reported in a guttural voice: "A jungle strangler. I avoided it."

The gruff commander let out a long sigh: "Damn it, you're really unlucky. Be careful, they'll be here for the transaction in thirty minutes. Don't alert them."

"Understood!" Gu Xiechen ended the call. Inside his combat suit's fully enclosed helmet, a large amount of data scrolled across the miniature display screen in front of his left eye. The elite troops of the Hell Angels Mercenary Group were ready, and a large amount of feedback information was transmitted to everyone in the group via an encrypted satellite owned by the Hell Angels Mercenary Group.

Time passed. As the transaction time provided by Porphyris approached, a change occurred by a deep blue lake in the depths of the Black Forest.

A signal tower, a hundred meters high, rose straight up from the center of the lake. Invisible signals shot into the sky, and the trees by the lake fell one by one as the signal tower continued to rise. Uniform cracks appeared on the ground, and large trees were swallowed by the earth. Smooth steel plates emerged silently from underground, and soon a landing field, one kilometer long and wide, appeared in the dense forest.

A tunnel entrance, large enough for heavy tanks to enter and exit, rose from the ground. First, two heavy cranes slowly drove out of the tunnel. Accompanied by dull roars, specially made flatbed trucks carrying heavy containers continuously drove out, and all vehicles lined up neatly along the edge of the landing field.

The clouds churned in the sky, and a warship, identical in shape to Porphyris's small spaceship but at least three hundred meters long, descended vertically from high altitude with a dull 'hissing' sound. A blue light screen, several meters thick, covered the entire spaceship. This heavy light screen could not only withstand attacks from all kinds of heavy weapons but also absorb all radar waves currently possessed by the Earth Federation. The Roam people's spacecraft relied on such energy shields to enter and exit Earth's atmosphere with impunity, smuggling and transporting all sorts of contraband.

The spaceship hovered a hundred meters above the ground, and powerful scanning waves instantly swept across an area of nearly a hundred square kilometers. After confirming everything was normal, the spaceship slowly landed.

'Whoosh' sounds came from inside the spaceship. The plasma vents at the rear of the spaceship slowly extinguished, and the energy shields on the spaceship's surface gradually dissipated with 'crackling' sounds of electrical discharge. Two streams of white gas were ejected from the middle of the spaceship, kicking up a large amount of dust from the ground. A cargo door fifty meters wide slowly opened, and about two hundred Roam warriors, clad in energy armor with their energy shields fully active, emerged holding halberds five meters long. The upper half of the halberds was covered in a purple halo, and arcs of electricity continuously sprayed from the tips of the halberds.

Several mercenaries in white uniforms emerged from the tunnel entrance. The middle-aged man leading them smiled and welcomed the Roam warriors.

"Welcome, welcome, esteemed guests of the Holsom family. Look what we've prepared for you – the rare earth mineral ingots you urgently need, all of nine-nines purity!"

Gu Xiechen, standing on a large tree branch and watching the spaceship land from afar, suddenly heard the gruff commander's order.

"Brothers, attack!"

Taking out the portable missile launcher from his back, Gu Xiechen did not hesitate to pull the trigger.

A twenty-centimeter caliber heavy anti-ship missile roared into the sky. A military satellite controlled by the African Military Region of the Earth Federation Army happened to fly overhead, providing precise target guidance for Gu Xiechen's launched anti-ship missile.

A total of one hundred missiles of the same caliber were launched simultaneously from various points in the dense forest. Long trails of flames left conspicuous marks in the air, all converging at the same point.

The Roam battleship, its energy shields deactivated, was instantly engulfed in flames. The specially made armor-piercing warheads shattered the battleship's two-meter-thick outer armor, and several missiles loaded with high-explosive warheads accurately penetrated the battleship's rear. The thick armor around the battleship's engine was shattered in a violent explosion, and the chain reaction of explosions instantly leveled half of the battleship along with everything on the landing field. The Roam warriors, their energy armor shields fully active, were blown away by the shockwave with screams, while the other mercenaries were simply pulverized.

A massive mushroom cloud soared into the sky, and the remaining half of the battleship was pushed forward more than three hundred meters by the terrifying explosive force.

Gu Xiechen watched the smoke and fire clouds rising twenty kilometers away, excitedly whistling as he loaded another missile into the launcher. He casually aimed at the area where the smoke was rising and fired the missile again. Another long trail of flame tore through the air, and the second wave of one hundred missiles covered the entire landing field again thirty seconds later.

"Awesome!" Gu Xiechen shouted to the sky excitedly.

The elite soldiers of the Hell Angels Mercenary Group, hidden in the jungle, began to advance towards the Sacred Unicorn's secret base. The gruff commander's order came again: "All fighters, attention, all fighters, attention! You will launch the first wave of attack, you will launch the first wave of attack!"

Just as Gu Xiechen replied, "Understood," the gruff commander suddenly yelled: "Evil Dragon, Evil Dragon! A Roam is heading your way, stop him! Reinforcements are coming!"

Before Gu Xiechen could ask what was happening, a blinding blue light shot towards him from the dense forest ahead.

Almost directly lunging at Gu Xiechen was a three-meter-tall Roam middle-aged man, completely enveloped in a thick blue light flame! He spotted Gu Xiechen immediately and, almost at the same moment he discovered him, launched a storm of attacks at him!

With a mere hum, hundreds of sharp ice blades condensed from water vapor appeared out of thin air in front of Gu Xiechen. The ice blades, two feet long and emitting a chilling aura, flew towards Gu Xiechen like lightning as soon as they formed.

The gruff commander's sharp cry came through the earpiece. Gu Xiechen waved his claws, pushed off, and met the incoming ice blades.

Upon contact, Gu Xiechen was greatly surprised.

His indestructible claws met the gleaming, cold, and paper-thin ice blades with a 'clanging' sound like metal striking metal. Sparks flew from the points of contact between his fingertips and the ice blades. His claws, which could easily tear through steel plates an inch thick, were struck by these thin ice blades, sending a painful shock up his arms. The ice blades came at him extremely fast. Gu Xiechen's claws couldn't deflect them. As gusts of cold wind swept past, hundreds of ice blades enveloped Gu Xiechen's slender body from all directions.

"Hmph!"

The charging Roam middle-aged man let out a disdainful cold laugh. He retracted the blue light flames around him, and his speed suddenly increased. With a mere flicker, he surpassed the rapidly approaching ice blades and, like an illusion, grazed past Gu Xiechen.

The capillaries in Gu Xiechen's eyes dilated simultaneously, his eyes turning blood red. His heart rate instantly increased to over 450 beats per minute. Gu Xiechen had never attempted to stimulate the energy in his Dao Embryo to this extent before. A formless surge of Qi erupted from Gu Xiechen's body. The ice blades, which were about to pierce Gu Xiechen's body, suddenly froze in mid-air.

A pure and tenacious stream of energy, like a celestial river pouring down, gushed from his heart. Strands of Innate Qi swept out from his Dantian. Under Gu Xiechen's mental control, the Qi wrapped around the rampaging energy from his Dao Embryo, like a locomotive pulling a long train, channeling directly into his arms through his meridians.

The Stalker III combat suit on his arms, which was extremely elastic and could withstand direct bombardment from artillery up to 50mm caliber, exploded. Beneath Gu Xiechen's skin, it was as if scarlet lava was roaring. The air friction on his skin surface made 'crackling' sounds, as if a ball of flame had enveloped his arms. His fingers grotesquely elongated by about an inch, while the skin on his fingers became increasingly pale, almost bluish.

Wisps of Qi shot out from his fingertips with a whistling sound. Explosive energy brewed between his fingers. Gu Xiechen's claws swung rapidly like a windmill, and hundreds of ice blades, several times harder than highly compressed alloy steel, exploded into a sky full of ice shards amidst sharp sonic booms. The scattered cold air obscured Gu Xiechen's body. The sparkling white ice shards were still drifting in the air when two enormous claws broke through the shroud of cold air and ice shards, sending dozens of sharp claw strikes through the air towards the Roam middle-aged man's body.

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Comrades, come with a landslide of recommendation tickets and a tsunami of clicks!

Heh heh!

This pig's head needs clicks and tickets...

The more clicks and tickets, the happier this pig's head will be to write! (To be continued)