Volume 13 Ancient Bronze City Ruins Chapter 642 "Another Ke Lan"
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At Ke Lan's request, everyone finally boarded the Blasphemer mecha and left the battlefield. After their figures completely disappeared from the end of the field of vision, Ke Lan turned around and looked at the "Mechanical God-Alexander" a few kilometers away.
As the ultimate mobile weapon of the Alpha Civilization, the Alexander, which had been dormant for tens of thousands of years, had a tedious and lengthy activation process, and the transformation and reorganization of the body had not yet been completely completed. The Ark Fleet surrounding the Alexander had already exhausted all the ammunition it brought when the war began. Although emergency air resupply operations were underway, compared to the huge ammunition gap of the entire fleet, the inventory of these dozen supply ships was only a drop in the bucket.
Moreover, what would happen even if all the warships were fully replenished... Even with full crews, the three fleets were unable to blast through the energy shield of the core control area of the Ancient Bronze City Ruins, let alone the current spent force state.
At least 30% of the main battleships were severely damaged and lost their combat effectiveness. Three aircraft carriers and battleships were sunk by the terrifying light beam. Countless weapons were scrapped due to overload and overheating. Just by looking with the naked eye, one could see that the barrage in the air was much sparser than when the battle just broke out, and many battleships were even in a state of complete silence.
Even if the supplies can be completed in time, the firepower of the three fleets will be reduced by at least half - and this is still a conservative estimate.
Moreover, they lost the support of ground forces.
The officers and soldiers on the warship knew very well that the current battle was just "doing their best". It was impossible to win the war with their own strength... From the moment "Alexander" stood up, the balance of victory .
But as long as they didn't receive the order to retreat, they had no choice but to continue fighting.
Ke Lan knew that the members of the Undead Crew must be paying attention to this battlefield, but they showed no signs of sending reinforcements... Perhaps in their opinion, relying solely on human wave tactics would not be enough to defeat the undead behemoth.
"Are you putting all the bets on me?" Ke Lan asked.
The tipster did not answer.
"That makes sense. With your style of doing things, you must have a backup plan."
The other party remained silent.
"If you don't say anything, I'll take it as your consent."
"Alexander's awakening ceremony is coming to an end. We don't have much time left." The intelligence dealer finally spoke.
"Oh, you are anxious now? What if I suddenly change my mind and don't want to gamble my life anymore, what are you going to do?" Ke Lan said, "I don't think you are so despicable as to threaten the lives of my companions, right?"
"We don't have to do that." The intelligence dealer said, "If we can't stop Alexander, the entire Ark will be destroyed... How long do you think humans can survive on this planet without the Ark as a shelter and backup?"
Although what the other party said was a bit of moral kidnapping, Ke Lan had to admit that there was nothing wrong with what he said - he didn't dare to gamble, he didn't dare to gamble whether the crew had prepared a backup plan. If the Ark was destroyed, the living environment of mankind would fall into an extremely bad situation.
Many people will die, most likely including people Ke Lan cares about, and people that people he cares about care about.
"I understand." Ke Lan took a deep breath, found a rock that looked solid, and sat down on it.
"Then don't waste time." The information dealer urged, "In ten minutes at most, Alexander will be fully awake, and no one knows how long your 'ritual' will take."
"Don't rush me." Ke Lan suddenly found the feeling she had when she was arguing with the information dealer before, "If you keep talking, do it yourself."
He stretched out his arms and let the living armor completely cover his arms - the gem-textured armor was indeed much better looking than before, but it gave Ke Lan the illusion that it was extremely fragile.
Ruby is a type of corundum, and its hardness is second only to diamond, but these substances in front of us only look like ruby, and the material properties of the two are very different .
The reason why Ke Lan felt it was "fragile" was probably because this arm armor looked more like a flawless work of art than a weapon.
Since it is a work of art, people will naturally have the mentality of "handling it with care", for fear of bumping it - even if it is just an imperceptible scratch, it will have an immeasurable impact on the value of the artwork itself.
"It's quite beautiful." He stretched out his hand and pinched a protruding corner of the rock edge. He didn't even use much force, and the stone in his hand turned into powder.
The living armor on the palm is still smooth enough to reflect a person's shadow.
"If there is divine power hidden in this, how can we stimulate this power?" Ke Lan asked, looking at his hands.
This time, he used the language of Alpha civilization.
As soon as he finished speaking, the surrounding scene suddenly turned black and white - Ke Lan did not activate the "time stop", but the ability of time stop was automatically released. What made him a little uneasy was that he found that he could not cancel this time stop state.
In other words, the person who activated the time stop was not him.
Ke Lan also did not feel the side effects of time stop - the stabbing pain deep in his brain and all kinds of wailing and howling... Although he had long been accustomed to these things, when these familiar "background sounds" disappeared, he felt that the environment was a little too quiet.
It was so quiet that it made people feel a little scary.
Everything in the world was still, including Ke Lan herself...but one thing suddenly started moving.
Living armor!
Logically speaking, the living armor and Ke Lan could be fused together, and although they could be separated from the body and transformed into various things, no matter what form they took, the connection between them and Ke Lan could not be broken. Even when they invaded the "true core" of the original erosion seed, there was still a thin "tube" connecting the living armor and Ke Lan. But now, it had completely separated from Ke Lan's body and flowed to the ground like liquid.
The living armor still maintained its crystal clear texture, but because of the fluidity, it no longer looked like a gem, but rather like some kind of high-purity gelatin mixed with red pigment.
This ball of "red gelatin" kept squirming, and a human figure gradually stood up from it - just like molding a clay sculpture, first molding the general torso and limbs, then outlining the details bit by bit, and finally completing the full sculpture.
In fact, before the facial features of this figure were "carved", Ke Lan had already guessed what it would look like.
This is "another self".
This scene was somewhat similar to the scene under the glacial ruins where the old dog was "copied" by those pieces of meat, except that the replica in front of him still retained the ruby texture of living armor - through its skin, Ke Lan could see the texture of the bones, organs and every muscle in this human body, and in those "blood vessels", there was even a fluid like blood flowing.
A very strange thought suddenly popped up in Ke Lan's mind: this "replica" of her own was just like the "color-transparent limited edition" made by those toy manufacturers. It obviously omitted the tedious color separation and painting steps, but the price was much more expensive than those "normal versions" in original colors.
Just because the word "limited" is added in front of it.
"What a black-hearted profiteer..."
Seeing the "colorful limited edition" of herself gradually taking shape, Ke Lan did not feel fear. Instead, she felt a sense of familiarity that was difficult to describe in words?
This person gave me the feeling that he was my own brother... No, that's not right. Even if he was a brother, I wouldn't feel this way. To be precise, he was another me... another Ke Lan.
It is me... Ke Lan felt confused, and he felt that there were many things he could not remember. Those memories were sealed deep in his mind, separated by a thick fog that could not be seen through. He knew they existed, but he had no impression of anything related to them.
"You want to activate this power... for what?" Ke Lan of the "Color Transparent Limited Edition" suddenly spoke. It was not affected by the time stop at all. It paced slowly around Ke Lan's unable to move body, and its red transparent eyeballs without pupils looked at him closely.
"To end the war." Although Ke Lan couldn't speak, his mind was still working. After the other party asked this question, his brain directly gave such an answer, and at the same time, the other party's footsteps also stopped.
"Power can only cause war, not end it." The other party added, "Power will attract jealousy and greed, and jealousy and greed will become the fuse of a new war."
"Then at least I want to be the winner." Ke Lan answered without hesitation.
Thousands of years of human history have proven one thing: people or organizations that voluntarily give up their power will end up in a miserable situation - the essence of this world is the law of the jungle, and the so-called "saintly mother" is just an unrealistic and naive idea disguised as a prosperous age. If even the conditions for survival cannot be met, there is no civilization at all, and everything is just empty talk.
In a novel, there is a character that Ke Lan likes very much. She once said, "If you lose your humanity, you lose a lot; if you lose your animality, you lose everything."
The "animal nature" in this sentence refers to the minimum needs of human beings for survival.
If Alexander cannot be stopped now, perhaps mankind will soon be completely destroyed... No matter what happens in the future, at least for now, we have to survive.
"Have you considered the price you will have to pay to gain this power?" the other party asked again.
"Since I want to obtain this power, I won't care about the price." Ke Lan answered consciously, "Your questions are a bit stupid... or are you testing me?"
"You are right to understand it this way." The blood-red figure stood in front of Ke Lan. "This was originally just an insurance, an unnecessary insurance... You should also know that there are many people in the Undead Crew who are not confident in you... They are very worried that you will become the second 'Prophet'."
"Who are you? What do you know?" Ke Lan couldn't help but ask.
However, the other party ignored him and continued to talk to himself: "But I won't doubt you, I trust you very much, and I believe your choice is the same as mine..."
"What's the meaning?"
"Because you and I are the same person."
"Who are you...or rather, who am I?" Ke Lan couldn't help but doubt her own identity.
Could it be that I am really a clone with memories implanted in me at a later stage, as the prophet said?
And this "colorful version of Ke Lan" in front of him is another clone? It's just that its manufacturing process is more complicated, and it is made into a living armor?
But the living armor had not shown any signs of self-awareness before. How could it suddenly turn into another self and discuss these philosophical questions with itself?
Between Pan and the prophet, one of them must have lied to him. Of course, the more likely possibility is that both of them were lying.
There is no doubt that I am a chess piece, but the chess player seems to have lost some control over me.
Including this "other self" in front of him who made Ke Lan feel familiar, he suddenly began to doubt everything... But at the same time, he also knew that perhaps the other party did this just to make him doubt himself.
When you think you have uncovered a truth, you may end up falling into another trap that has been set long ago...
"I know what you're thinking, but I'm sorry, I can't tell you those things." The colorful version of "Ke Lan" stretched out a hand and passed through Ke Lan's chest without any hindrance. "After you officially join the Undead Crew, you will have the authority to view those things. At that time, you will naturally know my and your true identities."
"As for now," it continued, "I can help you activate the power in the blood of God."
"How do I activate it?"
"Activating the power of God's Blood is not as you imagine, without paying any price." The other party said, "You are only half right. It is indeed different from the sacrificial ceremony of the Black Cardinal. It does not require a living being as a sacrifice. But it needs a sufficiently powerful soul as a carrier."
"Soul? Does this thing really exist?"
"It's just a way of saying it. You can think of it as a strong enough consciousness." The other party explained, "Your consciousness has been trained far beyond that of ordinary people, but it is still far from being able to withstand this power . If you activate it directly, the biggest possibility is that you will turn into a monster that has lost its mind and can only rely on instinct to act... just like the original corrosion seed."
"So what should we do?"
"Let me be the carrier... After all, I was born for this moment to come."
