New City

Blocked by four powerful fighters, the Little White Mouse was stopped. Though those telekinetic giant hands could not injure it, they kept it from breaking through the encirclement and charging at the artillery units behind them. Explosions rang out without pause as the monster's flesh was repeatedly torn apart and regenerated beneath the bombardment, making it even more irritable.

"Faster, faster."

The leaders began to grow anxious. The enormous commotion had already awakened even more terrifying creatures deep within the forest. They had not expected these monsters to possess nearly immortal regenerative abilities. A small number of conventional weapons were practically useless in this kind of battle; only a single overwhelming attack could kill it.

At last, the most expensive nuclear warhead left its launch rack. The distance of barely five kilometers vanished in an instant. The several-meter-long missile struck the Little White Mouse directly, and a light as dazzling as the sun lit up the forest.

A massive fireball formed in the air, releasing intense thermal radiation. At its center, the air became plasma under the extreme temperature, while the heated outer air violently expanded in all directions. Trees within five hundred meters were almost completely destroyed. The shockwave only gradually subsided after reaching the convoy several kilometers away, and an enormous mushroom cloud rose over the forest.

Invisible Telekinesis surged forth, dispersing the smoke and dust at the center of the explosion. The four leaders in differently colored outfits looked at the charred mass in the center and finally breathed a sigh of relief. The monster had finally been killed by the extreme heat at the heart of the nuclear blast.

However, before they could celebrate, a voice rang out in everyone's ears at once:

"A powerful lifeform has been killed by outsiders. The residents of this forest have felt anger and will attack all invaders with their full strength."

At the same time, the charred mass at the center of the explosion emitted a brilliant light, ultimately turning into a tiny pure-white egg.

Little White Mouse Egg: Can hatch an intelligent Little White Mouse to assist in battle. Can only be used outside the Sky-Piercing Tower.

That information appeared before everyone's eyes. The Little White Mouse's terrifying combat power from moments ago immediately came to mind. It was stronger than many conventional weapons, and even those powerful fighters enhanced with hundreds of thousands of energy points had been no match for it.

Greed erased their lingering reservations. The four powerful fighters, who had been fighting side by side moments ago, attacked their companions with all their strength. The man in golden clothes, who possessed the strongest combat instincts, emerged victorious. Powerful Telekinesis carried him toward the crater at the center of the nuclear blast.

He clutched the egg tightly to his chest, then rushed outward without looking back. The remaining weapons and equipment could inflict limited damage on the monsters, and the only valuable nuclear weapon had already been used. As long as he kept this egg safe, the operation would not be a loss.

The other three powerful fighters snapped out of their greed upon seeing this and flew outward with all their strength. Though they could not control their flight precisely, flying in a straight line was no problem. Their powerful Telekinesis pushed them beyond four hundred kilometers per hour, and they vanished from sight in moments.

The remaining thousand-plus organization members stared blankly at their bosses flying toward the residential district. Those tanks and artillery pieces were all equipment worth hundreds of thousands of energy points. They were reluctant to simply abandon them.

Before they could make a decision, an adorable cat dozens of meters tall leaped over from a distant hillside. Its paws danced rapidly through the crowd, and in an instant, dozens of people turned into White Light and returned to the city.

Deep in the forest, a tongue over a hundred meters long swept through the crowd like a whip, wrapping up more than a dozen people and delivering them into its mouth. It was a gigantic chameleon, its body blending into the background of sky and forest so thoroughly that almost no one noticed its arrival.

A tremendous roar sounded in the sky, and the two creatures feeding below fled in alarm. A massive sparrow with a wingspan exceeding a thousand meters dove down from the heavens, surrounded by a striking white ring.

The powerful shockwave forced the remaining humans on the ground down. The sparrow crushed a tank beneath one claw, then used its enormous beak to place the fallen humans into its mouth one by one. The instant they entered, they were bitten in half and turned into White Light, returning to the city to revive. A contented smile, almost human in nature, appeared on the sparrow's face.

All the creatures in the forest went berserk, not because of the anger mentioned by the system voice, but because these little creatures had suddenly begun giving off a wonderful scent. The little babies controlling those monsters were immediately drawn over.

Other than the four enhanced leaders, everyone in the remaining force was devoured by the forest creatures. The artillery and tanks were completely destroyed as well. Those little babies hated the smell of gunpowder.

In the residential district, the four leaders had finally escaped alive. The man in golden clothes held the Little White Mouse Egg in his arms and calmly said to the other three:

"Although we failed this time, we have gained quite a lot. Against monsters that can continuously regenerate, only decisive nuclear weapons can effectively eliminate them. In the future, there will be no need to spend huge numbers of points on those conventional weapons."

The other three looked unpleasant. The man in gold had obtained the greatest reward, while they had gained nothing.

However, the man in gold had combat experience in reality, and his control was superior to theirs. Even if the three joined forces, they would not be able to defeat him after he obtained the Little White Mouse. That left them feeling utterly stifled.

Seeing the gloomy expressions of his three competitors, the man in gold could not help smiling. His real name was Oriona. In reality, he did dirty work for powerful figures. Though he held some status, he was still nothing more than a disposable pawn.

This time, he had received instructions from a certain important figure. Manohar was carrying out something major, so he had brought all his brothers to participate in the experiment. He had never expected it to be such unimaginable technology. Just thinking briefly about the enormous benefits involved filled him with excitement.

He believed this was an opportunity bestowed upon him by heaven, and that was indeed the case. Now that he had seized the Little White Mouse Egg, there would be one and only one ruler of this city. He would become the sole victor and, in reality, rise into one of those lofty and powerful figures.

As Oriona imagined his future life, the system notification sounded again. "Residential District No. 2 is full. Connection beginning."

The sky shattered into fragments like glass. The simulated sun, moon, and stars vanished, while another stretch of land appeared at the edge of the city. People enjoying themselves at home near the boundary stared in astonishment at the high-rises rising outside their windows.

The city was shaped like a long, narrow isosceles triangle. The residential district occupied the wide, short side, while the forest covered the narrow, elongated side. The Sky-Piercing Tower stood at the triangle's tip. That was why the residents had to pass through the creatures' blockade to reach their destination.

And now, an identical Residential District No. 2 had appeared beside the city. The two stretches of land connected like two slices of pizza joined together.

"Pizza... pizza?"

Oriona repeated the words over and over. He shot into the sky, looked toward the location of the Sky-Piercing Tower, and after carefully calculating, muttered, "A regular decagon. That is the complete pizza. So there will be ten residential districts in total."

This meant he would need to defeat the people from the other ten residential districts to claim victory. The difficulty had increased countless times over.

Outside, Lin Li was watching all of this.

How could a stage watched by only five hundred thousand people be enough? He would build three giant virtual cities across three factories, each capable of containing five million people and covering more than fifty thousand square kilometers. In the end, three winners would be chosen from fifteen million people. They would become the protagonists of this virtual game and gain real power they could bring into reality.

These three protagonists would draw the attention of all fifteen million people and become information aggregators for the virtual world. Every thought and idea they had would be transmitted to Li Heng without the slightest deviation, becoming a force for his direct confrontation with the human military.

At the top of the office building, Lin Li continuously transmitted his ideas to two connected supercomputers. Using the artificial intelligence exclusive to the president of the Infinity Company branch, he made all kinds of detailed adjustments to this ever-expanding virtual world.

With the support of this enormous multinational corporation, the entire plan proceeded much more smoothly. Infinite Game Company itself had businesses that customized supercomputers and artificial intelligence. Combined with assistance from several warlord organizations, the second city was built in just half a month.

A special notification sounded, drawing Lin Li out of his work in the virtual world.

He had received a structural blueprint. It was not for a machine made entirely of steel, but a design for a composite creature made of flesh and a small amount of mechanical structure.

It was a creature resembling a crawler, with four legs and a long tail. Its body and head were covered in thick black armor, and it had six dark green eyeballs. A total of thirty-two rod-like pipes protruded from its back and abdomen, connected to the creature's twisted heart.

It was a gigantic creature more than fifty meters long, with a total length from head to tail approaching one hundred meters. It was not one of those fictional images from the virtual world, but a biological weapon that could truly exist and weighed more than a thousand tons.

Li Heng had witnessed through the virtual world how those giant creatures performed against conventional weapons. During this time, he had designed a giant organism.

It was feasible to reproduce such a creature in reality. Naturally, it could not simply be an enlarged version of existing animals.

First, as its size increased, the creature would require more and more energy. The super mitochondria and energy-storage cells Li Heng possessed could easily solve that problem.

The second issue was heat dissipation. The thirty-two pipes on the creature's body would continuously spray scorching high-temperature steam outward, carrying away the vast amount of heat generated inside its body by biological activity.

Its rapid cellular repair ability and internal heat-insulating tissue would allow its interior to withstand temperatures exceeding 150 degrees Celsius without damage. In fact, its body cavity would remain in a state of high temperature and high pressure, filled with large amounts of cooling water for heat dissipation. The water would vaporize upon contact with the outside atmosphere and continuously spray out through those thirty-two pipes.

Third was its neural structure. The creature had two primary brain structures, one in its head and one in its abdomen. If either was destroyed, the other could replicate and regenerate a new one. In addition, dozens of smaller control centers were scattered throughout its body, capable of controlling every part of its tissues.

Most important was its energy supply. The energy required to drive such a massive creature through high-speed movement against gravity would reach hundreds of millions of joules per second. Adding the enormous heat loss, its actual consumption would be even greater. This already exceeded the output power of a ten-thousand-ton destroyer. Relying solely on energy stored in its cells, it could only operate at full power for a few hours before losing its combat capability.

When facing a genuine organized military force alone, this kind of giant creature would become a living target the moment it stopped moving at high speed. It would have no time to recharge safely, so it could never stop. The twisted heart within its body was its source of energy.

It was a twisted device three to four meters in size, resembling a braided dough twist. It was composed of black mechanical structures and red flesh tissue. It was the core of this giant creature and its entire energy source. In human society, this device had a resounding name: Stellarator.

Lin Li carefully examined the structural blueprint. The rest of the creature could be manufactured by Ai Yi and the others, but the core fusion heart could only be built personally by Li Heng. He would transport these Stellarator hearts through Jelly organisms spread throughout the oceans across the world, after which Ai Yi's team would assemble them into giant biological weapons.

These giant creatures would eventually be transported through the ocean's Jelly to the major military districts of the Hong Alliance and the Commercial Alliance. They would become the main force on land, confronting human armies head-on and tying down most of their military strength and attention, making it easier for Li Heng to deploy his true trump card.

After all, these giant biological weapons could not withstand the terrifying temperatures at the center of a nuclear blast. Five thousand degrees Celsius was enough to shatter nearly all chemical bonds. They could only cause trouble for Human Civilization; they could not truly defeat those armies.

Fortresses were often breached from within. The Symbiotes spread among the population by small creatures controlled by Li Heng were the true force that would guide the emergence of superhumans and twist the existing social order.