Sword of Dawnbreaker

Chapter 1313: Chapter 1312: Rear Guard

Regarding the southern Gondor wasteland, Gawain prepared many contingency plans, contingency plans for those contingency plans, and even contingency plans for those contingency plans’ contingency plans — so many that at times Aunt Heidi and Rebecca felt they were entirely unnecessary, but whenever he had the opportunity, he would still keep adding "weights" in the direction of the wasteland.

The first reason is the strong impression left by Gawain Cecil from seven hundred years ago in his memory, making Gawain maintain the highest level of vigilance against the endless roaming monsters in the wasteland at all times. The second reason was based on Gawain’s own judgment — ever since he learned that the ancients of this world used a wall to seal a deadly catastrophe in a wasteland, he felt it was unreliable. After all, countless experiences from his past life taught him that a disaster that is covered up is bound to explode, a wall used to block monsters is bound to collapse, why build a great barrier on the border like a world wonder? Is it not just meant to blow up big when the CGI is released?

Therefore, from the day he emerged from his coffin, he has been preparing for the day when the wasteland’s wall would completely collapse — and now it can only be said that this day has finally come.

He massaged his temples, raised his head from the documents on his desk, and his gaze slowly swept across the large room. The room was filled with many high-ranking officials from the Administrative Office, including Aunt Heidi. There were also many Magic Web Terminals projecting holographic images, with figures both real and virtual gathered here, some waiting for report updates, others waiting for the next step of orders.

"Our soldiers have currently stabilized the defense line," said Sir Philip’s figure hovering over a nearby Magic Web Terminal. This young Empire commander had a tense and busy frontline command post background behind him. "After the Green Forest Barrier was raised, the enemy’s vanguard main force fell into the predator zone and was completely annihilated. We then used our superior firepower to cut off the aberration’s advance route — the enemy’s follow-up forces have now temporarily retreated to the depths of the wasteland. We have taken the opportunity to advance our main force into the interior of the wasteland and have established several temporary strongholds on the southern site of the great walls. Now we are waiting for the purification devices to take effect and continue to dispatch reconnaissance units to gather enemy movements."

Gawain nodded slightly and then turned his gaze to another holographic projection across from him, where a special figure was standing quietly.

It was Beltira — in the holographic projection connected via neural transmission, she had mimicked herself in her human form, while the background behind her was half the Sorin Giant Tree standing on the plains and basking in the sunlight, and half the vast forest standing at the edge of the wasteland, transformed into the Green Forest Barrier. After noticing Gawain’s gaze, she immediately nodded and began to speak: "Everything is well on my side. The remote limbs have successfully taken root, and now I am converting the biomass captured during the day. This might still take some time."

"Alright, there’s no rush on your end - make sure you can stabilize your own root system first. Currently, the great walls in the northern region have developed an irreparable large breach, and you are the most crucial barrier there." Gawain exhaled, and said solemnly.

While saying this, he also marveled in his heart that his bold decision at the time was indeed correct. Allowing the Sorin Giant Tree to expand towards the wasteland is probably one of the most successful plans he has put into action.

This grand and risky plan was not something that could be achieved overnight, and Beltira, located far away in the Plains of the Holy Spirits, certainly couldn’t transfer a part of her limbs instantly to the frontline in the southern Dark Mountain Range. The "Expansion Plan" was initially started a long time ago, and was secretly decided by him and Beltira after careful discussion. They had previously discussed the possibility of the Sorin Giant Tree continuously growing in one direction, and considered numerous plans to solve the problem of remote limb control with Synthetic Brains and the issue of nutrient insufficiency for the root system in the "Expansion Period", using bio-factories along the way.

He treated it as a trump card, and even within the Empire, only a limited number of high-ranking officials and a few direct participants in the plan were aware of its existence. And over the past year, Beltira’s roots have been secretly expanding deep underground. She took more than half a year to spread from the Eastern Holy Spirit Plain to the southern borders, then from the southern borders to the Dark Mountain Range, and spent another two months penetrating through the complex rock layers and subterranean caves and mountain hollows of the Dark Mountain Range. She then secretly grew in the plains near the great walls, and with the nutrition provided by the numerous biomass factories set up along the forwarding forces’ march, secretly developed a massive "prey organ" underground...

Of course, this grand "spreading" was not entirely unnoticed. Although Beltira tried her best to keep her roots moving deep underground, she still needed some "nodes" near the surface to supplement nutrients or communicate with local coordinating action members. Therefore, over the past year, in "expansion areas" along the line such as Pompeii, the Cecil Clan, Southgate Fortress, and the Forward Base, people occasionally witnessed some mysterious phenomena.

These mysterious phenomena included, but were not limited to, unusually lush forests, verdant vegetation in winter, and blooming pristine flowers in polluted areas... These things were essentially "debris" that Beltira accidentally shed during her growth process, and this inexplicable "debris" has left behind rumors akin to city legends and countryside tales in many places...

Fortunately, rumors are just rumors, and the implementation of this secret plan proceeded smoothly until today. Unfortunately... originally, Gawain did not plan for Beltira to be exposed so soon. In his initial plan, Beltira would remain an "underground dark front", extending quietly beneath the surface while the advancing forces on the surface launched a frontal assault. She would stealthily extend until the forces advanced deep into the wasteland and the war situation with the enemy reached a critical point, at which time the "Living Forest" would burst through the surface, blossoming in the heart of the wasteland, and deliver a direct blow to the face of the Oblivion Association believers who thrive on stealth.

But this could only remain imagined — who could have expected the great walls to breach with a large hole at this critical juncture?

"I’m sorry, Brother Gawain," perhaps noticing the change in expression on Gawain’s face, Beltira suddenly spoke proactively before Gawain could open his mouth, "Emerging on the surface was my act on my own — I exposed your most crucial trump card."

"This is not your fault. At that time, if you waited for my command to act, the frontline strongholds might have already fallen, and even the adjacent Typhon Defense Line would have been completely torn open. By then, any card we had would have been meaningless," Gawain waved his hand, "That’s why I gave you the authority to autonomously determine under emergency situations, to handle sudden circumstances like this."

Upon saying this, he paused for a moment, then changed the subject: "Given the current situation, we must look forward — what is the situation underground in the wasteland now? Can you still continue to advance?"

"Resistance has already begun," Beltira immediately replied, "As I expected, those cultists have also been using subterranean neural and root systems to establish their command framework, which is a unique technique of the Oblivion Association. Now that they have realized my presence, the root system network... is switching to active defense mode."

She narrowed her eyes slightly, as if sensing the state of certain neural nodes far away. After a brief moment, she reopened them to continue speaking: "Now, the enemy has already concentrated the power of their root system network towards the northern areas, and my roots have encountered fierce resistance during the growth process — now we can only make a frontal breakthrough, bypassing is no longer a feasible option."

Gawain looked solemnly at the former dark Hierarch, who was now alone assaulting the wasteland on an invisible battlefield: "Do we currently hold any advantage?"

Speaking of this, Beltira’s expression immediately showed a trace of pride: "You can rest assured about this. Although their root network resists stubbornly, they are definitely not my match—they never expected to encounter an attack spreading underground, and I’ve been preparing for this for a long time. But it will take some time; I first need to find the flaws in their ’underground immune barrier’..."

Listening to Beltira’s description, Gawain couldn’t help but imagine what such a scene would look like—the roots of the Sorin Giant Tree continuously growing and attacking at the edge of the wasteland, while another opposing dark root network builds a massive countermeasure wall, deep in the soil and rocks unseen by ordinary people. Living roots entangle, attack, using toxins and parasitic spores as weapons, and underground caves and dark rivers as fortress walls, day and night ceaseless, yet silent...

This goes beyond the understanding of "combat" by the world’s people. Even the most outstanding strategists of the time might not find their place in this battle, and even Gawain himself... cannot offer any advice at the moment.

"Be very careful," he could only say, "Do not underestimate the enemy—even though your presence is beyond their expectations, those dark cultists have been developing in the wasteland for years, and no one knows what kind of traps and trump cards they have set deep inside the old Empire. Your ’attack’ underground is solitary, and our ground forces can hardly provide effective support for you, so you must be exceptionally cautious during your deep infiltration into enemy territory."

"Yes, I understand." Beltira replied solemnly.

After a brief contemplation, Gawain spoke again: "Next, let’s discuss the discipline displayed by those aberration monsters during the attack process..."

"Indeed, the obvious discipline, those monsters have a command structure behind them," Beltira immediately responded, "During a brief contact with the enemy’s vanguard—I mean, during the ’eating’ process, I also touched their mental connection. The monsters themselves have limited intelligence, but they connect mentally and receive commands from higher-level nodes. I even recognized one of the most prominent nodes, named Bertrum, one of the ’Archbishops’ of the Oblivion Association’s wasteland branch..."

"Sounds like a similar ’mind command network’ structure to the Crystal Cluster Legion we faced earlier," Gawain said, touching his chin thoughtfully, "But on a larger scale and clearly more efficient—the Crystal Cluster Legion didn’t have such an astonishing number, nor did it have so many bizarre mutated individuals..."

"We... the mind control technology we used initially was in line with one of the branches in the wasteland," Beltira said with a somewhat peculiar tone, but soon continued normally, "Part of it comes from the Eternal Sleepers, and another part belongs to the dark Druids’ neural pulse technology. However, it is very clear that the wasteland branch of the Oblivion Association did not share all the information with us ’fellows’ outside. They retained some key data and improved it over the years... And this improvement likely was completed just recently."

As soon as she finished speaking, Aunt Heidi couldn’t help but curiously ask, "Recently completed? How is that determined?"

"I briefly invaded Bertrum’s mental world—he only thought I was torturing his will and didn’t discover this invasion," Beltira explained, "During the invasion, I glimpsed some streams of consciousness in their massive command system. Although I couldn’t intervene at the time, I could still see that it was a thing birthed not long ago, still slowly growing and perfecting."

Aunt Heidi nodded slightly after listening: "Indeed, if those evil cultists had established this system long ago and successfully controlled all the aberrations in the wasteland, they wouldn’t have waited until now to take action. With such an army, they could have swept the world years ago."

Gawain then asked promptly: "This is important information—is there any breach in their command system that we could exploit?"

"It’s hard to say, I need more information," Beltira shook her head, "It’s best if we can capture a few high-level nodes so I can... analyze them, and perhaps I could find a way to further invade or sabotage that command system from their now mutant neural systems."

"...As the war develops, we’ll find opportunities," Gawain nodded slightly and then looked at Beltira with a somewhat odd expression, "But speaking of which, in your haste this time... eating many monsters that ran out from the wasteland, is everything alright?"

"...Frankly, not very tasty, not even as good as rock from the Dark Mountain Range," Beltira’s expression became even more peculiar than Gawain’s, "But there was no other way at the time. Those monsters were corrupt and toxic, and I had to quickly clean the pollution they left after dying—throwing them into the biomass division pool was the fastest and most effective means. But you don’t have to worry about me; the corrupt bodies of those monsters have been completely digested by the division pool, and their toxins can also be transformed and absorbed by me, it’s just..."

Beltira paused, seemingly struggling to suppress the urge to gag, and continued after a while: "It’s just... indeed difficult to eat, really difficult, worse than eating dirt."

The resentment in Beltira’s words seemed almost tangible, but the people present didn’t know what expression to make. This lady tree’s life form and way of seeing the world have always been fresh and unorthodox, and others were at a loss to console or agree with her. As for Gawain... a peculiar thought involuntarily popped into his mind: he couldn’t help but wonder if soon there would be a new book circulated within the Empire, compiled by Beltira, titled "Gourmet Encyclopedia - How to Eat Dirt in the Empire"...

Thankfully, he didn’t let this peculiar notion linger in his head for too long because soon, an urgent report from the front line reached his hands.

The once dormant sentinel towers at the wasteland border... have restarted.

(Book recommendation time, this time recommending Tianrui Shuo Fu’s "We Live in Nanjing," classified as science fiction, a story of saving the world in the midst of an apocalypse. The author’s previous book was "Dying in Mars," which should be familiar to everyone. This new book has just begun, and it’s still a sapling, but everyone can bookmark it first!)