Chapter 694: Moon Surface Live Stream

“Hmm, an Evil Soul. Looks like I didn’t kill the wrong one.”

Although he wasn’t sure who this glob of a Silver Slime Monster he’d just slaughtered was, the presence of an Evil Soul meant he hadn’t made a mistake. It must have been some insignificant whelp trying to bite off more than it could chew by blocking his path.

And besides a tiny speck of light at its center, this Evil Soul was almost entirely pure black.

After absorbing the Evil Soul, Su Zhou surveyed his surroundings, looking at the Shapeless Ones that had stopped in their tracks. They were just milling about in the distance, unable to find a target.

Strangely, even looking at these monsters that were clearly his enemies, Su Zhou felt completely calm. He had no desire whatsoever to eliminate them, as if he had entered a sage-like state.

‘It was probably because I used the Soul of Fury earlier.’

He nodded thoughtfully. After the battle, Su Zhou had realized that when he used a part of his Soul to fight, the corresponding emotion it represented would fall dormant. In other words, it was temporarily disabled. He couldn’t get angry now even if he tried.

The Soul of Fury was powerful, but it could only target one person at a time. Besides, it was ultimately Su Zhou’s own power. It didn’t increase his strength out of thin air. Instead, it boosted his instantaneous energy output, raising the upper limit of his burst power. His total energy reserves, however, remained unchanged.

‘This must be one of its inherent limitations.’

By now, all of Su Zhou’s clothes and equipment had been destroyed in the previous battle. He could walk on the Moon naked, but that would be rather undignified. So, Su Zhou generated scales on his body, forming them into a suit of Light Armor.

Then, he raised his head and looked toward the Spiritual Power Beacon, which was no longer far away. His expression was quite serious. “It’s time to deal with this problem.”

「Meanwhile, in the distance.」

Inside the Moon Surface Vehicle, Bai Jingtiao was observing the location of the energy burst and driving toward the direction of the battle.

Gu Yaoluo, on the other hand, was contacting Meng Jin, with whom communications had been restored. “Can you see what’s happening at the battle site? What’s the word from Earth?”

“The fighting was intense just now, but it’s calmed down—I don’t recommend you go over there.”

In near-lunar orbit, Meng Jin was in the command module inspecting the nuclear missile launch platform. His reply to his teammate’s question was brief and brutal: “With your level of strength, you’ll probably die if you get too close.”

“Even a kindergartener could see that!”

Gu Yaoluo was getting flustered. “What I mean is, if Captain Su is at a disadvantage, you launch the nuke to cover Professor Su’s retreat! If Captain Su loses, we turn back to the Moon Landing Shuttle right now and get the hell back to Earth.”

“You’re so pessimistic, just like the folks on Earth. Why don’t you ever consider the possibility that Captain Su might win?”

“Who says I haven’t? Aren’t we driving over to support Professor Su right now because we’re assuming he’s already won?!”

“Well, you guessed right.”

Meng Jin turned his head, glanced at the corpse of the Deep Space Caller in the observation window, and nodded. “It took a while to get the info, but according to the data Earth just sent, the Deep Space Caller was absurdly strong. Even on Earth right now, it would be considered a top-tier power.”

“But, not as strong as the Captain’s blade—he just got hacked to death.”

Having just escaped with their lives from the pursuit of numerous Shapeless Ones, the astronauts bantered for a few moments to de-stress before quickly returning to their serious work.

And when a visibly thinner Su Zhou rendezvoused with Bai Jingtiao and Gu Yaoluo, he didn’t waste any words.

“Notify Earth that I took care of a pretty major player. Also, what are Earth’s instructions regarding that Spiritual Power Beacon?”

“Roger that.”

After handing Su Zhou a spare proxy terminal, Gu Yaoluo began sending a report to Earth. Meanwhile, Bai Jingtiao, who was turning the vehicle to drive toward the Spiritual Power Beacon, asked, “Are you alright, Captain?”

“Not good at all. The Moon has no air and no water. The sun has set and the temperature is dropping. My healing speed is starting to slow down.”

After putting on the terminal, a weary Su Zhou sat in the passenger seat. “Right now, I feel like I could eat a blue whale… No, two of them.”

After Su Zhou got in, the Moon Surface Vehicle moved as fast as a small spaceship. Soon, they began to approach the traces left behind by Su Zhou’s earlier battle with the Deep Space Caller.

In reality, the entire battle had lasted less than an hour, but even so, in that short amount of time, the marks of their fight had left incredibly distinct and eternal scars upon the Moon Surface.

The destroyed Ring Mountain, the crushed wreckage of a few spaceships, and the leftover lakes of now-cooling lava all made the originally silent Moon Surface seem ‘lively’. Watching these traces, Bai Jingtiao and Gu Yaoluo couldn’t help but feel a chill in their hearts.

Just how strong was a Commander Tier? They already knew, in theory. Whether it was Su Zhou’s power that swept through the Beast God Realm, or the combat footage from the Demon Realm that circulated internally, it was all proof that a Commander Tier possessed the ability to destroy a city.

But before witnessing it firsthand, the ‘city’ in their minds was just a collection of skyscrapers, a few city blocks, or maybe a small town. Now, however, judging by just one of the massive lava pits they had passed, a fight between two Commander Tiers, if it lasted just a little longer, could easily annihilate a city of a million people, and there would be almost no survivors.

Su Zhou, who had been resting with his eyes closed, received a communication from Earth after some time.

The Zhengguo Aviation Administration Bureau had already observed the Strong Spiritual Power reaction that erupted on the Moon’s Far Side via satellite, and could basically confirm that Su Zhou had defeated the Deep Space Caller. A video clip sent later by Meng Jin further proved this point: on the Moon’s Far Side, as it was gradually plunged into darkness, a brilliant crimson flash flared to life. As it did, another patch of silver Spiritual Light dimmed, leaving only the crimson Spiritual Light to rise up like a volcano erupting on the Moon, illuminating the land for hundreds of li around.

[You’ve worked hard, Su Zhou.]

Subtitles from Yu Saint lit up the proxy terminal’s screen, a string of characters flashing: [However, the most pressing matter is to deal with the Spiritual Power Beacon and stop it from continuing to transmit information outward.]

[Unfortunately, after so much time has passed, there is a high probability that the Beacon has already successfully transmitted its message. Destroying it now would be too late.]

Reading this, Su Zhou already guessed what Yu Saint was going to say next. And just as he expected, the subtitles flickered as a new mission was issued: [If possible, please approach the transmission source and try to analyze the information it contains. Knowing ourselves and our enemy is the foundation for formulating our next plan.]

Nodding slightly, Su Zhou skillfully tapped the screen to reply, “Understood. I guarantee I’ll complete the mission.”

Although the battle on the Moon Surface had been incredibly fierce, on Earth, the vast majority of people had no idea such a life-and-death struggle had even occurred. Only a small minority sensed that something was amiss from the vague official statements and the prolonged silence from the moon exploration team.

“What is the government doing? Insisting on a moon landing during a solar storm, and now the astronauts have lost contact, right?”

“Logically, the astronauts should have reached the Moon by now, but the government still hasn’t started the livestream they promised…”

“Yeah, they’ve been building up the suspense for half a month, saying they were going to reveal some brand-new truth on the Moon—I’m still waiting to see Fairy Guanghan or the ruins of the Moon People!”

For the past few days, similar questions and doubts had been flooding the relevant discussion forums and official website message boards of the Zhengguo Aerospace Administration.

And the ‘Moon Landing Livestream’ show, which should have started its promotional hype long ago, had been nothing but a black screen ever since the rocket launch a few days ago. The promised livestreams from inside the Lunar Landing Module and of the astronauts’ daily lives were nowhere to be seen, making many followers cry that they’d been deceived and threaten to unfollow, report, and block the channel all in one go.

But today, some netizens who hadn’t unfollowed yet were shocked to discover that the ‘Moon Landing Livestream,’ which had been a black screen for four or five days, had actually started up again!

And by the looks of it, the astronauts had already reached the Moon and were driving a moon rover, heading somewhere unknown!

“It’s on, it’s on, it’s on!”

“Stop driving, just row!”

“Whoa, when did the stream go live? If it weren’t for the notification, I would’ve totally forgotten about this.”

The number of viewers in the livestream channel kept increasing, and bullet comments appeared in droves. Not only did Su Zhou himself draw a huge audience, but there were also many people who followed space news closely. They had already gathered from various official hints that this moon landing had another purpose and would definitely result in some major news.

However, no matter how lively the bullet comments became, the video itself was completely silent, showing only a slightly bumpy and constantly shaking feed.

You could see that this was indeed the Moon; both the starry sky in the background and the rugged Moon Surface proved it.

However, some sharp-eyed netizens also noticed something wrong with the video.

“Wait, something’s not right. Look, doesn’t that Ring Mountain look like it’s been stepped on by someone…? And that dark patch next to it, isn’t that lava? The kind that just cooled down, too!”

“There was clearly a fight here just now, wasn’t there?! Don’t tell me we’ve already gone to war with aliens on the Moon without us knowing?!”

“The ravaged landscape, the silent camera… it implies that after prolonged torment, the cameraman’s spirit is broken and unable to even cry for help.”

“Implication my ass!”

And just as the numerous netizens were discussing endlessly, incredibly clear white subtitles suddenly appeared at the bottom of the previously silent video.

[This is the Zhengguo Moon Landing Team. We are now traversing the beautiful Moon’s Far Side under the leadership of Captain Su Zhou.]

“Beautiful? You call this beautiful?”

“Excuse me, can you explain what’s up with that obvious sword scar? I think I also just saw a super-sized footprint. That must be the footprint of someone’s True Body, right?”

“The euphemistic language implies that beneath the beauty of the written words lies a hideous reality too terrible to behold.”

“Implication my ass!”

Noisy bullet comments flooded the screen. Regardless of what the viewers were thinking, another white subtitle appeared at the bottom of the video, continuing its explanation matter-of-factly: [Due to various unforeseen circumstances, our moon landing livestream was delayed for some time.]

[Therefore, we’ve decided to cut to the chase and directly show everyone the ruins of an ancient alien spaceship.]