Boom! Boom! Boom!
A blinding white light tore through the air, carrying searing heat, as if it would split and engulf everything in the world. Beneath the white light, all matter in the universe disintegrated into its most basic atoms.
The Particle Disintegration Cannon—a weapon of mass destruction banned for use among interstellar humans.
With the Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation deploying its clone army, the Mars Revolutionary Army no longer held back, revealing their own trump card. Under the particle cannon, the fierce clone troops, along with all their combat gear, dissolved into particles, wiped out entirely.
As the local power, the Mars Revolutionary Army had an endless stream of reinforcements, surging in wave after wave. The Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation crumbled continuously, with most of the vast Stone Platform City already occupied.
The battle shifted in an instant.
Even Feng Lin, who had in some way sparked this Martian civil war, found it hard to keep up.
Since resolving all the loose ends that day, Feng Lin had quietly lain low within the Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation.
Boom!
That day, the main doors suddenly burst open.
Feng Lin looked over and saw Frank, his face as dark as water, striding into the core laboratory with a group of people. They wore white lab coats, looking utterly dejected, flanked by a squad of clone soldiers. Among them, Feng Lin spotted Aike, who had somehow lost an arm and was pale as a sheet.
The group moved like beaten dogs, their former arrogance from conducting human experiments completely gone.
Frank stopped before the crowd and spoke in a heavy voice, revealing a shocking truth: "Everyone, we've failed! The Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation has lost all its strongholds! Only we remain!"
"What? How could our Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation fail?"
"What do we do? We have to escape—if the Mars Revolutionary Army catches us, we're all dead."
"But we're underground, trapped like birds in a cage. There's no way out!"
...
The core laboratory erupted in a chorus of panicked cries. The egg-headed researchers of the core lab were terrified, completely losing their composure.
The Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation and the Mars Revolutionary Army were mortal enemies. If they fell into the hands of the Mars Revolutionary Army, their past human experiments—nominally on death row prisoners but actually on captured Mars Revolutionary Army soldiers—would come back to haunt them. Every single one of them had blood on their hands from those soldiers. Once captured, their fate would be unimaginably grim.
They had never thought their human experiments were cruel before, but now they were terrified.
Panic spread rapidly through the crowd. Facing this dead end, they felt utterly hopeless.
Feng Lin stood among them, unmoved, showing little alarm.
With cultivation in hand, there was no need to worry!
That was the benefit of having strength.
He had confidence deep down—no matter how dire the situation, he still had a chance to turn things around. As a proper interstellar cultivator, he wouldn't be butchered like these weak researchers.
A thought arose in his mind as he quietly observed Director Frank.
He hadn't expected the Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation, such a massive monopoly, to collapse so quickly!
Now that the corporation had fallen and the crisis was at its peak, the so-called secrets should finally come to light!
Could this be his opportunity?
He couldn't help but feel a sense of anticipation.
As he expected.
Facing the crowd's panic, Director Frank himself remained calm, as if he had some ace up his sleeve. He swept his gaze across the room, noticing that only Feng Lin wasn't panicking. He nodded with appreciation and spoke again.
"Everyone, don't panic! Fortunately, the company still has a private spaceship. It can enter Mars's largest volcano, Olympus Mons, through an underground tunnel and escape from the exit! You are all the technical elite of our Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation and can leave with me! With you here, we can rebuild the corporation anytime."
A light at the end of the tunnel.
"As expected of the director—so shrewd!"
"Right, the dead are just low-level grunts who don't understand technology! Take us, and we can rebuild the Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation anytime!"
"So what are we waiting for? The Mars Revolutionary Army is about to break in—let's go!"
...
The crowd urged him on, eager to leave, unwilling to stay a moment longer.
Feng Lin remained silent, because he noticed Frank only said he would take people away, not "everyone." The implication was worth pondering.
True to form, unlike the crowd's urgency, Frank stood still, his face cold, and uttered icy words.
"But unfortunately, this is only a small spaceship, capable of holding just fifty people. Sorry, everyone, but the Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation doesn't need dead weight. Only the most talented can leave with me!"
"What?" A chorus of shock.
One moment, heaven; the next, hell.
They had just been overjoyed, only to face this sudden reversal.
There were over a hundred survivors present—that meant more than half wouldn't be able to leave safely.
Leaving meant life; staying meant death!
Who would live and who would die? The atmosphere in the room fell into an eerie, deathly silence.
Frank ignored the crowd, tapped his identity chip, and began calling out names from a list. "Antef!"
"Thank you, Director Frank! I'll work hard to rebuild the Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation once we're out!" A tall, thin, pale-skinned, blond man beamed with joy, thinking he had been chosen.
But the next words from Frank plunged him into an icy abyss.
"Antef, your performance is too poor. You can't leave with me!"
"Director Frank, you can't do this! I proposed the new Green Giant Potion modification plan based on the ancient divine medicine!" Antef cried out in protest.
"But it didn't work, did it?" Frank replied coldly, as if pronouncing a death sentence.
Antef was about to scream again.
Frank had no intention of listening further. He gestured, and two clone soldiers approached, grabbing Antef.
The floor beneath them silently opened into a metal shaft leading to Mars's core, where lava churned. Falling in meant total annihilation.
Antef panicked completely, begging, "I don't want to leave anymore, okay? Let me go!"
"No!" Frank's face was merciless. "You know too many secrets. I can't let you fall into the hands of the Mars Revolutionary Army. Sorry!"
He waved his hand, and the clones, expressionless, tossed Antef down the metal shaft. His screams echoed as his body hit the lava, dissolving instantly.
"Lier!" Frank called out another name. A pale, obese man screamed, scrambling to flee, but the fierce clones caught him instantly and threw him down like a dead pig, leaving no trace.
"Krosov!"
"Zhang Tianfei!"
"Miyamoto Saburo!"
...
Frank recited names from the identity chip like the Grim Reaper reading from a book of death. Once a name was called, it sealed their fate of dying in the core.
These weak researchers had no resistance against the powerful clones, dropping one by one like dumplings into the shaft.
The others stood trembling, watching their colleagues die horribly, too afraid to resist—if they were eliminated, they'd have no one to blame.
As the Giant Pharmaceutical Corporation reached its end, so did these people.
Feng Lin watched coldly, feigning fear on his face while sneering inside.
These clones were originally their experimental creations, and now they were dying at the hands of their own creations. It was a fitting end.
What a profound irony!