The residual heat of the earth's core magma had yet to dissipate, yet Ian's figure already stood quietly upon a patch of crimson glass.
Taking a single step, his figure blurred and reappeared tens of kilometers away, perfectly taking in the two approaching groups.
One side consisted of Hunters piloting Gravity Mechas, while the other was the surface squad led by Bai Yuekui.
Ian did not reveal himself; he simply concealed his figure and observed with great interest.
His gaze lingered for a moment on Bai Yuekui's tall, athletic figure.
'These legs, this figure, this aura... as expected of Boss Bai.'
Bai Yuekui, who was surveying the scene, suddenly felt her back tense up.
A feeling of being locked onto and watched made her instantly turn her head, her sharp gaze sweeping across the empty wasteland.
"Boss, what's wrong?" Xia Dou asked, leaning in.
Bai Yuekui furrowed her elegant brows; the feeling was fleeting, as if it were an illusion.
"It's nothing. I think I just heard things," she replied.
Ian chuckled softly, no longer paying attention to the explorations of these "mortals."
His "doomsday sightseeing" tour was only just officially beginning.
With a flash of his figure, he appeared hundreds of kilometers away. In his senses was a slumbering Monarch-class Pola Beast—his first target.
...
Lighthouse, core control room.
"Alert! A Monarch-class life signal has been detected in Sector C-34!"
"What?" Old City Lord Morgan exclaimed, abruptly standing up right after he had just sat down.
However, before he could issue any orders, the technician's next report followed immediately.
"Report! The Monarch-class signal in Sector C-34 has... disappeared!"
The entire control room fell into a deathly silence.
"Disappeared? What do you mean disappeared?" a high-level manager asked with a trembling voice.
"Just like before... it vanished into thin air. It was there one second, and gone the next!"
The chaos began from this moment.
Over the next few hours, the Lighthouse's monitoring system descended into absolute madness.
"Report! A Monarch-class has appeared in Sector N-12!"
"Report! The signal in Sector N-12 has disappeared!"
"Report! Dual Monarch-class signals have appeared in Sector A-09!"
"Report! The signals in Sector A-09 have..."
"There is no need to report anymore!" Charles abruptly interrupted the technician, spreading his arms wide with an expression of manic devotion.
"Do you all still not understand?! This is not a malfunction! This is a miracle!"
His voice echoed through the control room, carrying a bewitching power.
"The Lord of Light and Shadow is purifying this filthy land! He has heard our prayers, and He is cleansing the monsters entrenched upon our home!"
Every disappearance of a Monarch-class signal seemed to serve as ironclad proof of his words.
Inside the control room, the members of the Light and Shadow Church fell to their knees one after another, praising loudly.
"Praise the Lord of Light and Shadow!"
Fear was replaced by fanaticism. The invisible influence of the Light and Shadow Church grew stronger with every sounding and fading of the alarms.
...
The clamor of the Lighthouse's upper levels had yet to reach the dark corners of the lowest level.
A Dustminer huddled in the shadows of the pipes, clumsily carving into a scavenged, rusted iron plate with a sharp piece of metal.
He had never seen a god, but he had heard the prayers of the Citizens.
He carved his yearning for the light and his fear of the shadows into that pattern.
A crude sun symbol, half light and half dark, gradually took shape.
This was his own humble faith.
Charles had once said that Dustminers were unworthy of glimpsing the Lord's glory.
...
Old City Lord Morgan leaned back in his chair wearily; every alarm made his heart pound with dread.
He looked at Charles, who acted like a madman in front of the screens, and at the high-level officials kneeling in blind obedience.
Cough... cough, cough...
He covered his mouth, suppressing the pain in his throat, his palm trembling slightly.
For this broken ship known as the Lighthouse, as external threats descended, the inside was also beginning to descend into madness.
The scales of power seemed to be tilting in a trend he could no longer suppress.
...
On the surface, at Bai Yuekui's temporary camp.
"This is the thirteenth time."
Bai Yuekui looked at the compiled data on the screen, which marked the locations worldwide where Monarch-class Pola Beast signals had appeared and then bizarrely vanished.
Every single location was left with the exact same trace—vitrified earth.
"Boss, what exactly is going on? Could the Pola Beasts be infighting? But why would they fight so fiercely?" Xia Dou asked, her face full of confusion.
"This isn't infighting."
Bai Yuekui's finger traced a clear path across the map.
"This is a kind of... hunt."
Her voice was very soft, yet it made everyone present's hearts sink.
"Something out there is treating Monarch-class Pola Beasts as prey."
This conclusion was hard for the group to believe. After all, Monarch-class Pola Beasts already stood at the absolute apex of the Mana Ecology.
Bai Yuekui stood up, her face bearing an unprecedented solemnity.
"Everyone, shrink our area of operations and raise the alert to the highest level."
She looked out the window at the dim, yellow sky.
"This world... has become far more dangerous than we imagined."
...
Meanwhile.
Ian hovered ten thousand meters in the air, looking down at the riddled, scarred planet below him.
On the Transmutation Tablet's interface, a long string of numbers flashed with a delightful glow.
The energy required to exchange for the [Emperor Hero Armor] had been fully gathered.
He looked toward the tiny black dot in the distant sky—the Lighthouse.
The stage was set, and the fanatical believers were in position.
It was time for the "Lord of Light and Shadow"... to make his personal debut.
...
The roar of Gravity Mecha engines tore through the dead silence of the wasteland.
Despite the shifting tides of the outside world, the Lighthouse's survival supplies would not appear out of thin air.
Suppressing the heavy doubts in his heart, Marc once again led the Hunter squad toward an Old World city ruin.
Along the way, they were besieged by a small pack of Spine-Snake type Pola Beasts.
"Everyone, maintain formation!"
Marc piloted his Gravity Mecha, wielding a massive light blade like the wind, precisely severing the heads of the lunging Spine-Snakes.
With Matt bringing up the rear, the squad successfully fought their way out of the Pola Beasts' encirclement.
When they dragged their exhausted bodies and fully loaded supplies back to the Lighthouse, they stumbled upon an unexpected scene at the elevator platform.
The Lightbearer, Charles's most loyal lackey, was leading a squad of Light and Shadow Church guards, pinning a Dustminer firmly to the ground.
"Let him go! What are you doing?!" Marc shouted, leaping down from his Gravity Mecha.
The Lightbearer slowly turned around, holding a rusted iron plate high in her hand.
"Captain Marc, we are executing the Lord's will and purifying a blasphemer."
Carved onto that iron plate was a crude, half-light, half-shadow human figure.
The Lightbearer's voice was shrill and fanatical.
"How could the Lord's glory be glimpsed and depicted by a lowly, filthy creature like a Dustminer?!"
"He dared to blaspheme the Lord, so he must pay the price with his life!"