Chapter 648: Capturing Moon Shadow's Breath, Nuclear Missile Launch, the Horrified Black Ice

A shadow rift suddenly opened behind Moon Shadow's Breath.

As the rift appeared, the Parasitic Blood Vine shot out like lightning, wrapping itself around Moon Shadow's Breath.

Moon Shadow's Breath reacted quickly, and the moment she sensed the abnormal aura, her whole body erupted with blood energy.

The massive blood energy blew the blood pool on the plaza apart.

But the Parasitic Blood Vine was shrouded in a layer of blood-colored energy.

It was the new trait it had just gained, Blood Energy Immunity.

Ignoring the blood energy shock, it instantly wrapped Moon Shadow's Breath from head to toe.

The vine's barbs had anti-demonic properties; combined with Blood Energy Immunity, they pierced Moon Shadow's Breath's blood-energy defenses and stabbed into her body.

This trait of the Parasitic Blood Vine was practically a natural enemy to the Blood Clan.

There was no way to fight back or resist.

The Parasitic Blood Vine began to suck Moon Shadow's Breath's blood.

"Ah—"

For vampires, blood is absolutely their most precious resource, the primary carrier of their blood energy.

The Parasitic Blood Vine greedily drained her blood; to Moon Shadow's Breath it was like having marrow scraped from bone.

It was pain that reached down into the soul.

But the Parasitic Blood Vine paid no heed to any of that.

It loyally executed the orders Yu Yuan had issued to it.

—Weaken the target's vitality and combat strength as much as possible, but keep the target alive.

For the Parasitic Blood Vine, the simplest way to achieve that goal was naturally to devour.

On the vines, roots transformed into tendrils that tightly bound Moon Shadow's Breath.

They absorbed her blood-energy with full force, while barbs extracted blood—two approaches at once.

Bang bang bang—

As the spore pods ruptured, Parasitic Spores turned into smoke and blanketed the plaza.

The whole process was seamless, completed in an instant.

The Blood Slave Guard who had originally defended the plaza perimeter barely had time to react before the spore smoke enveloped them.

The parasitic spores instantly landed and took root on those Blood Slave Guard.

Skin, mouth, nostrils…

Red swelling appeared on the Blood Slave Guard; some clutched their throats in agony and fell to their knees.

Others screamed.

The Parasitic Blood Vine, having evolved three times in succession, was long since transformed from its original form.

By the time Yu Yuan stepped out from the Shadow Dimension, Moon Shadow's Breath had already been forced out of combat form.

She was firmly controlled by the Parasitic Blood Vine, nothing like the powerful figure from their first meeting.

Moon Shadow's Breath looked at the man who had suddenly appeared before her, and in a daze she seemed to see a familiar silhouette.

"It's you!"

Her voice sounded like she was using the last breath in her lungs.

A bit hoarse, utterly exhausted.

The glare in her eyes was thick with hatred.

She would not mistake it—this was the thief!

The thief who had stolen all her treasures, all her Blood Brew, and the alchemist Hammond.

Even if his figure turned to ash, Moon Shadow's Breath would recognize him.

It was because of this man that she had fallen to her current state.

She wanted to get up, wanted to kill the man before her.

Unfortunately…

Things did not go her way.

"Moon Shadow's Breath, I think there are a lot of things we can calmly talk about."

Yu Yuan looked at the enraged Moon Shadow's Breath and heard footsteps coming from a distance.

The Loser's Cube activated, and Moon Shadow's Breath was contained by Yu Yuan.

As the Shadow Dimension reappeared, Yu Yuan vanished from above the plaza.

Seconds later, the arriving vampire troops saw instead the Blood Slave Guard reduced to withered bones.

And vines that had taken the corpses as flower pots, rooting and sprouting, swaying like living plants in the air.

"Launch Vehicle 1, Launch Vehicle 2, coordinates confirmed, thirty-second interval, Launch Vehicles 3 and 4 coordinates confirmed, ten-second interval, authorization to fire."

The Alpha's voice sounded inside the command vehicle.

"Launch Vehicle 1 copies, authorization to fire."

"Launch Vehicle 2 copies, thirty-second interval, authorization to fire."

"Launch Vehicle 3 (4) copies…"

Whoosh—

Powerful airflow raised rolling dust.

A tactical nuclear missile detached from its launch unit and shot rapidly into the sky.

Thirty seconds later, the second tactical nuclear missile was fired.

Ten seconds after that, the third and fourth tactical nuclear missiles launched simultaneously.

The shock of four tactical nuclear missiles launching was utterly staggering.

The Ten Thousand Nations Pact Civilization began to bare its fangs.

When all four tactical nuclear missiles were launched,

the Alpha's voice came through the earpiece with orders.

"Everyone, depart in one minute!"

At this,

"Company One assemble…"

"Company Two assemble…"

A minute passed, and 120 mechanical armored vehicles carrying all-armed 600 Pioneering Group members

became a torrent of steel, heading toward the coordinates where the Black Ice Express was located.

Black Ice Express.

[Warning! Warning, remote strike weapon detected, please evade.]

The bio-intelligence's alarm suddenly sounded,

making Black Ice freeze for a moment.

"Remote weapon, what is that? A missile?"

"Moon Shadow's Breath wouldn't be that stupid! Missiles are nothing to players of our tier…"

While thinking this, Black Ice had already activated all anti-air defenses.

At that moment he also spotted a streak of flame flying in the distant sky.

The train's biological sensing system zoomed the image in.

When Black Ice saw the missile, a flicker of suspicion crossed his eyes.

This missile looked ordinary, yet an inexplicable unease rose in him.

"No, there's something wrong with this missile!" As a Silver-tier lifeform, an intuition coming from his spirituality immediately put Black Ice on high alert.

He reacted instantly.

The steel teeth at the head of the Black Ice Express closed again and became a drill, beginning to rotate.

On the train roofs, the anti-air defenses—biological radar "big eyeballs" and blood-shooting generators—had locked onto the incoming missile.

Biubiu—

Blood-colored beams fired, and the train head had already burrowed into the ground.

But at the same time, dozens of drones suddenly appeared, diving toward these anti-air weapons; their intent was obvious—interference.

Although they did not directly pull the anti-air weapons away from their targets,

they achieved their interference purpose.

The first three beams failed to intercept the incoming missile.

Each beam grazed past.

Drones continued their interference and even launched suicide charges.

As the missile drew nearer to the train,

when it was only two or three hundred meters away from the train, the beams finally struck the fast-moving missile.

At that moment,

time seemed to stop.

A white flash lit the sky.

The nuke detonated.

A gigantic fireball appeared in midair.

Gamma rays, neutron flux, and thermal radiation swept over the Black Ice Express instantly.

Highly penetrating radiation barely pierced the train's thin outer blood-colored membrane.

The intense light and thermal radiation immediately struck the cars facing the explosion.

Although this airburst could not utterly destroy the Black Ice Express,

it still inflicted some damage on the biological matter inside.

What followed was the high-speed, high-pressure blast wave compressing the train.

A strong electromagnetic pulse damaged a small portion of the train's electronic devices.

All of this happened in an instant.

At the exact moment of the nuclear detonation, Black Ice—already burrowed underground—felt a violent tremor.

A ticking alarm sounded in the trainmaster's cabin.

[Warning, train body exposed to nuclear radiation attack, in a high-radiation environment, evacuate as soon as possible, evacuate as soon as possible!]

Black Ice immediately understood what had just happened.

"Damn Moon Shadow's Breath, she actually has nuclear missiles!"

Black Ice was shocked and furious.

Everyone knew the nature of nuclear attacks; it was no secret.

At the Silver rank, many tech-oriented players instinctively sought nuclear weapon manufacturing methods or comparable weaponry.

But only a minority did so.

Nuclear attacks have limitations—like demonic or magma creatures, unless a nuke detonates right next to them, thermal and nuclear radiation effects on them are almost negligible.

Unfortunately for Black Ice,

nukes were the ultimate weakness for biologically fleshed beings like him.

His only thought now was to get away immediately.

But he did not know that a second nuclear missile was already on its way…