In Shen Kai's perception, the vibrant colors representing the life force of the Worker Bee Six veterans had dimmed and extinguished one by one, finally turning into a heart-stopping ash-gray.
A dead silence, like a shroud from the abyss, enveloped the bloody battlefield.
The only sounds left were the sickening, slow squirming of the terrifying "Wailing Aggregation" devouring copious amounts of flesh and blood and the low, viscous, tide-like hissing of its countless twisted faces—a sound mixed with endless pain and ultimate greed, as if in satisfaction.
But amidst that ash-gray landscape of death, one last "color" burned on, stubbornly and unyieldingly.
It was Sergeant Marcus Jones.
Shen Kai saw him propped up against a massive, fractured rock stained dark red with blood. He seemed to be running on his last breath. The once magnificent "Reinforced Sentinel" interface armor on his chest was completely shattered and stripped away, revealing a mangled, bloody ruin of a body beneath it.
Yet, relying on the astonishing willpower of a Pan-Abyssal Federation veteran, he forced his body, teetering like a candle in the wind, to remain upright, refusing to fall in humiliation.
His eyes, crimson from rage, blood loss, and nearly depleted "Crimson" core energy, blazed like burning pyres. They locked onto the massive, writhing monster closing in on him with deep, bone-searing hatred.
The modified elemental projector in his hand, its barrel slightly warped from prolonged, overloaded use at high temperatures, glowed with an unnatural, dark-red light. With the last of his strength, he kept the searing-hot muzzle aimed with unwavering resolve at the "Wailing Aggregation's" constantly pulsing, crack-covered giant "Turbid-Color Core."
There was no escape.
Shen Kai could sense that the crimson red representing Sergeant Jones's life force had dwindled to the point of extinction.
Suddenly, Sergeant Jones roared over the open public channel, his voice thunderous and final, echoing across the entire battlefield.
"Come on! You filthy mongrels from the lowest level of the abyss!"
"You're not even as good as bedbugs!"
"Open your maggot-infested dog eyes and look closely!"
"Come and have a taste..."
"have a taste of just how hard the bones of a Federation soldier are!"
He suddenly bared his blood-stained teeth in a savage, crazed grin.
In that instant, Shen Kai "saw" the last faint wisp of "crimson red" on Sergeant Jones's body erupt with an incredibly dazzling light, like a supernova explosion. He poured the last of his energy from his "Crimson" core, along with his life force, willpower, and soul, into the elemental projector in his hand. It was already hot enough to melt—unreservedly and absolutely.
"For the Federation!"
A pillar of nearly pure white energy—thicker, more dazzling, and more incandescently violent than any attack before—tore through the viscous, deadly, reddish-purple toxic mist on the battlefield. It was like the first light of dawn breaking through eternal darkness—a flame of destruction condensed from the vengeful will of the fallen.
In a tragic pose conveying his all-in bet, he slammed viciously and with unerring precision onto the crack-covered core crystal on the "Wailing Aggregation's" chest once again—for the true, final time in his life.
"AAGGHH—!"
The "Wailing Aggregation" let out a roar that shook the heavens. It was far more shrill, pained, and filled with astonishing rage than any before.