Chương 147: Chapter 147: The Furnace Pit and Ling Shuyan's Arrival
With preparations complete, the battle was set to commence.
At Lin Feng's command, five Tier 2 awakeners led a hundred soldiers in a surprise attack on the Red Beetle swarm by the wall. Against such low-level insects, shotguns were unnecessary; the soldiers wielded large-caliber rifles and machine guns to eliminate them.
This also provided an opportunity to level up.
After one wave, over a dozen soldiers advanced to lv9 enhanced humans. One more Black Spinal Bug, and they could become the next awakeners.
Shen Jie charged to the front, transforming into the Black Warrior. His black armor merged with his modified combat suit, and his two-meter-long bone blades cleaved the thick wall with a cross slash.
The Tier 2 mid-stage awakener's tens of tons of force, combined with the Black Warrior's explosive speed...
A flash of white light from the bone blade, and the half-meter-thick wall was effortlessly breached.
A four to five-meter-wide gap appeared as the shattered concrete wall crumbled and flew apart.
The gunfire and wall-breaking noise interrupted the shipyard's activity, drawing many Black Spinal Bugs to the dock.
Tier 2 awakeners raised their shotguns, launching an assault, followed by the soldiers.
To help enhanced humans awaken through kills, Shen Jie instructed the squad to target Black Spinal Bug limbs and abdomens, avoiding headshots, leaving them for the recruits.
With five Tier 2 corps members managing the ordinary Black Spinal Bugs, Shen Jie joined Lin Feng.
Lin Feng stood by a deep pit in the shipyard, peering into the water-submerged opening.
The insect hole was twenty meters wide, far exceeding typical surface holes, allowing Tiger Bugs to pass.
The Red Beetles had transported the small, cut steel chunks into it.
The water in the pit, rich in metallic minerals, had a density much greater than air, significantly slowing the descent of the steel chunks.
Yet the Red Beetles didn't dive into the well.
Lin Feng crouched, dipping his hand into the water.
As expected, the water in the pit was hot.
And the deeper it went, the hotter it got.
Thus, the insects weren't collecting and transporting the steel; they were utilizing it on-site to create a biological furnace for synthesizing Tiger Bug mandibles.
The river water a few hundred meters away was the perfect coolant for the high-temperature furnace.
Through psychic sensing, Lin Feng detected a massive light source 200 meters deep in the pit.
It was a living biological furnace, teeming with life energy in the thousands.
Comparable to a high-tier life form!
However, it lacked cognitive abilities and couldn't move.
It seemed unlikely that Tier 2 eggs were present, but there should be no shortage of synthesized orange-quality mandibles.
Lin Feng pondered, then searched nearby for a steel cable as thick as an arm, about 200 meters long. He handed one end to Shen Jie, who secured it to a crane, while tying the other end around his waist.
He then leaped into the pit.
The surface water was around 40 to 50 degrees Celsius.
Bearable for an ordinary person, but as he descended, the temperature surged to 70 to 80 degrees.
This temperature could denature proteins, break peptide bonds, and cook flesh.
Through his helmet, Lin Feng saw the rising heat waves meeting the cooler water above.
He had descended 60 to 70 meters, unable to see the dark abyss below, and the surrounding water grew hotter.
At 70 to 80 degrees, even a Tier 1 awakener couldn't withstand long. At over 100 meters, the boiling water would scald Lin Feng despite his Flying Tiger Armor.
No wonder the insects dared to expose the biological furnace.
They probably weren't worried about human theft.
Finally, Lin Feng halted at 120 meters, surrounded by boiling bubbles.
He attempted to activate the Flying Tiger Armor's absolute defense, but the energy shield, which could block fast attacks, couldn't stop the slow-approaching hot water.
Disabling the absolute defense variant, Lin Feng observed his surroundings in the dim light.
He noticed the pit walls were lined with a blackened char.
Charred biomass formed the outer shell.
It provided excellent insulation.
Even thousands of degrees couldn't penetrate it.
Lin Feng sensed biological activity behind the carbonized layer.
The steel chunks dropped by the Red Beetles were liquefied and absorbed in the biological furnace, synthesized into ultra-hard mandibles with organic molecules.
However, the insulating carbon layer had a critical flaw: the higher the temperature, the more brittle it became.
Unable to delve deeper, Lin Feng decided to destroy the furnace and explore after it extinguished.
He needed orange-quality mandibles more than Tier 2 eggs.
The Flying Tiger Armor hadn't reached full level, and the main equipment, the lv20 Land Cruiser Battleship, hadn't progressed since its upgrade.
Tomorrow was the scheduled trade with Queen Ling Yi, expecting fifty Tier 2 eggs, finally allowing a battleship upgrade.
The accompanying fusion upgrade materials had to be acquired soon.
Determined, Lin Feng didn't hesitate, drawing his lv29 electromagnetic cannon and switching to armor-piercing mode, firing into the depths.
The armor-piercing rounds slowed in the water, impeded by friction, with the heat melting the tips.
Many disintegrated before traveling fifty meters, dissolved in the outer furnace shell.
Those that ignited flashed briefly in the high-temperature water, washed away.
They illuminated the bottom, sending more boiling bubbles but not damaging the core furnace.
Unable to destroy the core, Lin Feng, sweating profusely, calmed himself.
An idea struck him, and he fired at the pit walls instead.
At short range, the armor-piercing rounds penetrated the carbon layer, exploding inside.
The blasts created shockwaves, sending huge waves from the bottom, propelling Lin Feng to the surface.
With the walls collapsing, rocks and mud fell into the furnace, blocking the flesh plug and insulating the core's heat.
Without water circulation for heat exchange, the furnace, like a sealed pressure cooker, expanded under rising pressure and temperature!
Back at the surface, with Shen Jie's help, Lin Feng returned to the surface, quickly pulling him away from the pit.
Seconds later, a loud rumble echoed from the furnace below.
The ground shook violently, with cracks spreading from the twenty-meter-wide pit, splitting the concrete like a spider web, fissures up to thirty centimeters wide, with boiling water seeping through.
The water turned blackish-yellow as the high-pressure furnace exploded, ejecting dark red magma, polluting the water with black bubbles.
Poisonous gas from bursting bubbles dispersed into the air.
Fortunately, Lin Feng had retreated to the dock with Shen Jie, where the Tier 2 corps held the gate against Black Spinal Bugs from the town.
Shotgun blasts echoed continuously.
But with the furnace explosion causing tremors and collapses, both insects and soldiers paused.
Another crackling noise echoed.
Underwater explosions caused initial shockwaves and vacuum bubbles, which, as they dissipated, imploded under pressure.
A two-stage blast!
The shipyard's riverside dock crumbled into the water.
Like a collapsed dyke, the river flooded in, quenching the boiling pit.
The river's filling temporarily halted the nearby collapse.
Even Lin Feng gulped at the terrain-altering explosion.
The furnace's high-pressure blast destroyed half the shipyard, over two square kilometers, starting 200 meters underground...
Like a nuclear explosion with a hundred-kiloton TNT yield!
It could instantly kill a high-tier queen!
No wonder the local queen placed the mandible synthesis device by the river.
To prevent accidental self-destructive blasts harming itself and the swarm.
With the furnace destroyed, the Black Spinal Bugs retreated on the queen's orders, hiding in the town.
Lin Feng, seeing this, frowned.
"Don't pursue. Clean the port battlefield, collect usable materials."
"Without vehicle protection and lacking urban combat experience, charging into town is suicide."
The five Tier 2 awakeners nodded.
Last time in Jia City, Lin Feng's oversight led to a Black Spinal Bug ambush. This time, with most soldiers not even Tier 1, they couldn't withstand a swarm in urban combat.
Some recruits struggled with shotgun recoil, needing breaks after a few shots.
Ordering cleanup, Lin Feng had the Tier 2 squad stay alert while he and Shen Jie, with dozens of soldiers, returned to the dock.
The explosion's aftermath faded.
Leaving a hundred-meter-wide crater.
The river's cleansing washed away the mud and hot water.
Now divers had to retrieve the orange-quality mandibles from the furnace.
Lin Feng expected a good haul.
He ordered the collection of steel cables from the dock, tying them into hundreds-of-meter-long ropes.
These arm-thick steel ropes could lift thirty to forty tons easily.
Lin Feng and Shen Jie jumped in.
With Flying Tiger Armor and Winged Tiger Berserker form, they feared no insects. Once the furnace cooled, they moved freely.
Soon, Lin Feng reached the core, where the water was still 40 to 50 degrees, but it didn't hinder them from clearing the stones from the furnace.
Beneath the broken flesh shell lay a thick layer of cooled metal, nearly mandible material but lacking plasticity.
Lin Feng touched it, receiving a notification:
"Insect Mandible - Incomplete, Orange Quality"
"Note: Usable as synthesis upgrade material"
Unexpectedly, the massive semi-finished piece, weighing tens of tons, was useful. Lin Feng tied the cable to the metal.
Testing its security, he signaled.
The soldiers at the dock pulled with all their might, dragging the secured object ashore.
With the semi-finished piece removed, a small pit appeared beneath.
Together, they cleared the buried tunnel.
A small passage, three meters wide, lay before Lin Feng.
It likely connected to the furnace's base, for refining the initial liquid metal.
They measured the passage, then entered.
Lin Feng led, stepping on solidified residue, discovering the passage walls were mandible material, enduring the blast with only cracks and seepage.
They traversed hundreds of meters, where seepage ceased, leaving only residual cooling metal.
Judging by direction, they were under the town.
Lin Feng's psychic sense detected a large nest below.
The passage showed signs of Red Beetle activity, retrieving the biological metal for final synthesis of Tiger Bug mandibles.
Following the trail, they emerged from a tunnel, Lin Feng holding his electromagnetic cannon and Tiger Tooth Chainsaw Sword...
He flew, landing steadily, releasing the Flying Tiger Armor's tiger bug aura, deterring nearby Black Spinal and Red Beetles.
Shen Jie, with the steel cable, followed.
This nest differed from the one they entered in Wu City's east.
The walls were covered in glowing green fungi, illuminating the dim cavern, letting them see.
In the nest's depths stood a massive fleshy wall, lacking distinct features, resembling a growing brown-red tumor.
Lin Feng squinted; it was the insect factory for Tier 2 mandibles!
Like the biological furnace, it was a living entity!
They began cutting the flesh.
The Tiger Tooth Chainsaw Sword and Shen Jie's bone blades struck resistance.
They extracted orange-quality mandibles, synthesized through organic fusion.
One, two, three...
They found twenty-eight, fourteen pairs of mandibles.
Enough for a Tiger Bug swarm.
Lin Feng believed this was only a day's output. Given the shipyard's processing speed, hundreds, if not thousands, were already produced.
Enough for the queen to hatch Tiger Bugs en masse.
The local queen was preparing for the Lake Tai battle.
Amidst the slaughter, Lin Feng's psychic sense detected many fast-approaching Tiger Bugs.
No time to waste, Lin Feng ordered Shen Jie to secure the mandibles with cables, sending them into the metal passage.
Lin Feng fired at the nest entrance, collapsing it, blocking the Tier 2 insects.
The Tier 2 queen hadn't reached mid-Tier 3, so no new Tier 2 insects existed.
But the priority was removing the mandibles.
Preventing deeper entrapment.
They could fight their way out, but dragging the material without corps support was impossible!
Shen Jie worked quickly, and with Lin Feng's help, they secured all the mandibles in minutes, sending them through the passage.
Shen Jie led, pulling the cable, Lin Feng covering the rear, pushing hard.
With nearly a hundred tons of force, they moved the mandibles through the 500-600 meter tunnel.
Behind, Tiger Bugs roared, breaking the tunnel shell, meters away.
Fortunately, water seeped in, reducing friction, and soon they reached the furnace entrance.
Shen Jie secured the mandibles, sending them ashore.
Only the Tiger Bugs' angry roars echoed from the depths.
With the mandibles safely retrieved, Lin Feng sat by the crater, relieved.
Now, they awaited dusk for Chen Yanyan's fleet evacuation.
Resting, Lin Feng entered the dock.
The ship being built seemed to be a warship, but the insects had stripped much of it, leaving a hull of only a hundred tons.
During searches, Black Spinal Bugs launched feigned attacks, with a dozen Blue Wing Bugs scouting.
The soldiers repelled them, and Lin Feng used the Death's Eye to snipe the airborne Blue Wing Bugs.
Shen Jie retrieved their corpses.
Failing to gain anything, the insects ceased probing.
The Tiger Bugs remained unseen.
Perhaps sensing Lin Feng's presence.
Or warned by the Haicheng Queen.
...
At sunset, as Chen Yanyan's fleet arrived, crossing the bridge, she brought unexpected news:
"A woman named Ling Shuyan, claiming to be Jin City's research director, came to discuss something."
"She traveled far from Jin City; is it related to your trip to Old Mountain Park to meet Professor Ding?"
Lin Feng smiled, watching the soldiers load mandibles into the battleship's storage, then explained his plan to recruit researchers for Tier 2 corps modifications.
Chen Yanyan frowned slightly:
"She doesn't seem friendly."
"I sent them to the field hospital, saying you'll return later."
Lin Feng nodded, leaving the battleship to the dock, merging the ship's remaining materials with collected Black Spinal Bug mandibles and Blue Wing Bug membranes, creating twelve winged vehicle replicas.
The remaining materials in the warehouse were turned into lv19 shotguns, some integrated into vehicles.
When the fleet was ready to return, they had twenty vehicles as auxiliary ships, doubling their size.
This firepower easily suppressed tens of thousands of insects.
With everything ready, including survivors aboard...
In the sunset glow, Lin Feng stood at the prow, ordering the return:
"I haven't met her in person, let's go meet this Ling Shuyan."
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