Chapter 671 434: Do Your Best to Kill Me (4)

Only now did these people truly understand why the authorities had so urgently called a halt to "Killing Day."

But as they watched the figure who looked like a Demon God on the livestream, a despairing question surfaced in everyone's mind.

"Can something like that... truly be defeated?"

...

「In a hidden safe house somewhere.」

Vera and Zhou Zhipeng stared intently at the live broadcast on the computer, their expressions indescribably complex.

By now, the two of them had long since left Shenmu City.

They were hiding in a nearby city.

The cold light from the screen cast shifting shadows on their faces, mirroring their turbulent emotions.

"The Boss... what exactly is he trying to do? And what's the deal with all those Intern Readers and Yin Beasts…"

Vera's expression was complicated.

It wasn't that she hadn't considered Hu Qi's strength.

But what she was seeing now far surpassed her imagination.

She couldn't understand why an Intern Reader of his power level would be on a mission like this with them.

'Is that so-called Reincarnation Bookstore out of its mind? Is this even fair?'

Of course, she only dared to grumble about this inwardly.

Beyond that,

what unsettled her even more was that she could clearly identify the figures of many Intern Readers among the besieging forces.

Their unique fighting styles stood out starkly among the ordinary people.

"I'm not sure, but based on my guess,

it's highly likely that some kind of change we're unaware of has occurred.

For example, the main quests of these Intern Readers might have changed for some reason—to something like killing the Boss.

That's the only way to explain why they're fighting so desperately.

As for why we didn't receive the quest, perhaps it's because we're on the same team as the Boss.

But regardless, all we need to do now is lie low and survive these thirty days. We shouldn't get involved in anything else."

Zhou Zhipeng, who was beside her, finally said after a moment of silence.

As he spoke,

a faint note of relief was audible in his voice.

Hearing Zhou Zhipeng's analysis,

a flicker of lingering fear also crossed Vera's eyes.

She wasn't an idiot.

She knew this was undoubtedly the most likely scenario.

Nothing else made sense.

Fortunately, they were on the same team as Hu Qi and had no reason to oppose him.

...

'Who the hell is this guy? Why does he look so much like the figure I saw in my hallucination...?'

On a rooftop several kilometers away from Hu Qi, Hakawa Yuuma stared at the distant figure, his expression as grim as iron.

Hu Qi's image was already deeply etched into his mind.

The man who had 'killed' his little sister, his underclassman, and his upperclassman right in front of him.

Although it later proved to be just a hallucination, that face haunted him like a nightmare.

"Hm?"

Suddenly, Hakawa Yuuma's brow furrowed, his gaze shooting toward the sky like a bolt of lightning.

On the overcast canopy of clouds, a nearly imperceptible black dot had appeared at some point.

At the sight of this, his pupils abruptly dilated. His eyes instantly turned a pure, inky black, his vision piercing through the thick cloud layer to an altitude of three to four thousand meters.

In his line of sight, the black dot rapidly grew larger.

It was a stealth bomber.

It was circling silently overhead, its bomb bay slowly opening.

A huge, black object detached from its hook and began to fall.

The moment his eyes landed on it,

Hakawa Yuuma felt every cell in his body begin to tremble uncontrollably.

It was his biological instincts screaming at him about the danger.

His power had taken a quantum leap in just a few days.

To an ordinary person, he was practically a Superhuman.

Yet, at this moment, he was still filled with endless fear.

"Is that..."

As if he had realized something, his expression twisted in an instant.

Without a shred of hesitation, he kicked off the ground.

His figure shot out like a phantom, becoming a blur as he frantically sped into the distance.

...

「At the same time.」

Because the livestream wasn't from a single perspective but was filmed from several different angles,

the anomaly in the broadcast was also noticed by viewers.

"Is that... a nuke?!"

The faces of everyone watching their screens changed drastically, undisguised horror appearing in their eyes.

No one had expected the higher-ups to go this far.

Even if they could actually eliminate this monster, the price was far too steep.

Shenmu City would be utterly reduced to a dead land.

The blast from the nuclear explosion was just the beginning; the truly terrifying part was the radioactive contamination that would last for a hundred years.

The city would probably be uninhabitable from now on.

It was the equivalent of trading an entire city for one person.

...

「Back at the epicenter.」

Hu Qi seemed to have noticed it as well.

He raised his head, his gaze turning to the sky.

At that moment,

the nuclear warhead had reached a position six hundred meters above the ground.

Just then,

the nuke was detonated.

The reason for an airburst detonation was its greater lethality.

In an airburst, the hypocenter is a certain distance from the ground. The shockwave strikes the ground and reflects, creating a second shockwave that expands the kill zone.

Furthermore, kill factors like thermal radiation and initial nuclear radiation could also affect the target area more effectively.

The first thing to be seen was light—an incomparably dazzling light.

A white light a million times brighter than the noonday sun.

It was as if a great sun had exploded in the sky.

Endless light transformed into sharp swords, piercing through everything.

The instant the ordinary people who had not yet evacuated Shenmu City saw this scene,

the intense light filled their vision, like countless white-hot steel needles stabbing straight into their eyes.

Their eyeballs felt as if they had been instantly ignited, and they lost their sight.

In the instant of the explosion,

the entire world seemed to plunge into an even deeper, deathly silence.

Heaven and Earth grew as dark as ink.

All extraneous noise was completely devoured.

Beneath the shroud of light,

the lake water within Shenmu City vaporized in a thousandth of a second.

Concrete surfaces vitrified.

Nearby skyscrapers softened and collapsed like wax figures, their glass curtain walls exploding into countless shimmering shards.

They formed a lethal rain of diamonds in the shockwave.

The next second.

BOOM!

A colossal roar suddenly erupted.

At the same time,

a plasma fireball with a temperature of several million degrees Celsius expanded, devouring everything within a radius of several kilometers.

Cars were tossed into the air like toys, melting into molten iron in mid-flight.

Trees were instantly carbonized, turning to ashes while retaining their final forms.

Within a radius of several kilometers, everything from humans

down to various animals and insects, didn't even have time to feel pain.

Their silhouettes were permanently seared onto the molten ground, reduced to dark shadows.

Everything between Heaven and Earth became twisted and collapsed beyond recognition, like a paint palette overturned by God.

The next instant,

the shockwave from the explosion spread outward at several kilometers per second, toppling reinforced concrete buildings like toy blocks.

The entire city trembled, and the earth groaned.

A giant mushroom cloud rose from the ground, churning as it ascended into the stratosphere.