pertwk Chapter 137 The Plan is Exposed, the Gods Lose Control
Chapter 137 The Plan is Exposed, the Gods Lose Control
In the capital of the Cherry Blossom Country, sirens blared incessantly throughout the city.
The mournful, drawn-out tones rose from every corner of the city, swirling and intertwining to form an invisible net that gripped the hearts of millions.
The scene on the street instantly went from order to chaos.
The sounds of car horns, tires screeching against the ground, and the cries of the crowd were all mixed together.
An out-of-control car crashed into a roadside fire hydrant, sending water jets soaring into the sky. Other vehicles swerved to avoid it, resulting in a series of rear-end collisions, and thick smoke billowed from the deformed front of the car.
A young awakened mage dressed in standard leather armor stood at the street corner, trying to use his newly awakened ability—which could barely gather a wisp of wind in his palm—to guide the flow of people.
"Don't panic! Keep order! Head to the nearest underground shelter!"
His shouts were drowned out by the massive wave of panic. An elderly woman stumbled and was knocked down by the crowd behind her; before she could even utter a sound, she was trampled underfoot.
The young awakened mage rushed forward, but was pushed back by the surging crowd, and could only watch helplessly as the blurry mass of flesh was trampled into the cracks of the asphalt road.
The color drained from his face. He crushed the wind ball in his hand and ran into the shelter.
Cars are constantly coming and going outside a cave that has been hollowed out by hoarders.
Three hundred meters underground, the Awakened Ones Unify Headquarters.
The glaring red warning lights replaced all regular lighting, casting flickering shadows on everyone's faces.
"Useless! They're all useless!"
Yoshino slammed a stack of battle reports onto the alloy tabletop, the papers scattering like snowflakes.
He pointed at a row of subordinates in front of him with their heads bowed, veins bulging on his neck, and spit on the face of the person in front of him.
"Didn't you say it would be foolproof? Is this the guarantee you gave me?"
"That's all bullshit!"
Yoshino grabbed a document from the table labeled "Project Takamagahara," crumpled it into a ball, and threw it at the other person's face. "Now tell me, what kind of god crawled out of that snowy mountain?!"
An intelligence officer stepped forward, his voice trembling: "Report... According to the last images transmitted from Hokkaido, the target was enormous, its shape... unidentifiable. After it appeared, Lord Minamoto no Shinsuke's life signal, as well as the life signals of the three thousand Awakened Ones and the sacrificial offerings, all disappeared."
Yoshino's chest heaved violently, and his eyes were bloodshot.
"The route? Its movement route!"
The intelligence officer operated the virtual screen in front of him, and a holographic map of Japan unfolded in the center of the conference room. A glaring red dot was slowly moving south from Hokkaido, the northernmost point of the map.
"Your Excellency, the situation... is extremely dire." The intelligence officer's voice was even lower. "After the monster appeared from the Great Snow Mountain Secret Realm, all the secret realms it passed through along the way, regardless of size, experienced violent energy surges."
On the map, as the red dot moves, the dozen or so blue dots along its path, representing small secret realms, flash one by one, then explode, and finally extinguish into gray, representing "exhaustion".
Wherever the monster went, nothing grew. Forests withered, rivers dried up, and all signs of life were drained away.
"It's devouring." A researcher wearing glasses adjusted his glasses, his face pale. "This isn't right... It's absorbing the energy of those secret realms to strengthen itself."
The entire command center was deathly silent, with only the hum of the server cooling fans.
Despair, like the pressure of deep-sea water, squeezed the nerves of everyone present.
"Stop it!" Yoshino slammed his fist on the table in a fit of rage, issuing his final order, "Mobilize all garrison troops around the capital region, the 1st, 3rd, and 7th Mobile Units. At any cost, keep it outside our lines!"
"But Your Excellency, that's our last strength!"
"Execute orders! Do you want us to just wait to die?!"
"……yes!"
front.
On the makeshift battlefield, thousands of Awakened soldiers stood ready for battle.
The heavy tanks and self-propelled artillery were already aimed at the horizon. The air was thick with a tense, deadly atmosphere.
A soldier looked through the tactical visor on his helmet and saw a grayish-white outline appear on the distant ridgeline.
"Oh my god..."
"Fire!"
The order has been issued.
The deafening roar of artillery fire echoed through the valley. Countless shells and elemental energy projectiles, trailing long plumes of flame, rained down on the enormous figure.
The explosion turned half the sky orange-red.
However, when the smoke cleared, the grayish-white monster still stood on the ridge, unharmed. It didn't even pay attention to the attacks, but simply continued southward.
The commander at the front line saw through his binoculars the enormous mouth that occupied two-thirds of the face.
"Fire! Keep firing! Don't stop!" The commander's voice had changed.
The monster walked down the hillside.
It simply raised one hand, that disproportionately large hand with rings of teeth at the end, and gently waved it toward the position.
There was no sound, no shockwave.
On the large screen in the command center, thousands of green life signal points representing frontline soldiers all turned red at the same time.
The video signal was interrupted, leaving only a blinding amount of static.
The only sound on the communication channel was the crackling of electrical current.
The defensive line built on the outskirts of the capital region, having exhausted the last of the Sakura Kingdom's military strength, collapsed completely within ten seconds.
In the command center, Yoshino slumped in his chair, staring blankly at the red area on the screen that represented death.
It’s over.
It's all over.
The main screen switched to real-time satellite monitoring of the highest airspace.
That enormous, grayish-white creature had already crossed the last line of defense.
It stopped, its massive body standing out starkly against the backdrop of the devastated battlefield ruins.
It slowly turned its eyeless head.
The operator instinctively zoomed in on the map.
A red dotted line, representing the predicted route, extends from beneath the monster's feet, pointing straight to the most densely populated area on the map.
The capital of the Cherry Blossom Country.
Everyone stood up, staring at the increasingly clear red line, their backs soaked with sweat.
In the midst of this eerie silence, a discordant sound came from the corner.
He was an elderly scholar in a white coat; he was the chief of staff of the "Takamagahara Project".
At that moment, he was staring intently at a corner of the monitor screen, at a close-up of the monster's face that had been deliberately magnified.
His body began to tremble, not from fear, but from an uncontrollable ecstasy.
The old scholar pushed back his chair and knelt heavily on the floor.
He clasped his hands together, raised them above his head, and began a devout prayer facing the giant mouth covered in black flames on the screen.
"You've arrived...you've finally arrived..."