Chapter 47: You’re Dead

[Ningcheng Heroes Monument. This is the monument you built for all the heroes who sacrificed their lives on the battlefield of Ningcheng.]

[In every other aspect, you showed absolute partiality toward the Red Heart Society and the Red Heart Corps.]

[Yet when it came to dying in battle, you engraved the names of every single fallen soldier upon this monument.]

[Whether they were members of the Red Heart Corps, auxiliary personnel, prospective members of the Red Heart Society, or merely Ningcheng professionals who came to support the Ningcheng battlefield.]

[As long as they died on the battlefield, you conferred upon them the title of heroic martyr.]

[As long as the Red Heart Corps remained in Ningcheng another day, the families and children of these martyrs would be provided for and raised at the expense of the Red Heart Corps.]

[Moreover, from a certain perspective, the Red Heart Corps was merely a military institution responsible for guarding Ningcheng.]

[The current situation had long since surpassed the defensive scope of the Red Heart Corps.]

[Even if the Red Heart Corps were to retreat and fall back to the Federation's central command to await further orders—though others might not know it—Ningcheng itself would undoubtedly cease to exist.]

[Therefore, whether they were the once-lofty professionals of Ningcheng, or the people of Ningcheng who had only awakened as professionals thanks to the Red Heart Society, all of them strictly followed the decisions and strategies of the Red Heart Corps.]

[After all, even if they did not care for themselves, they had to consider the families and friends behind them.]

[Once the Ningcheng defense line was breached, everything they cherished would bear the brunt of the disaster.]

[Right now, you stand before this solemn Heroes' Monument, gazing down at the neatly arrayed soldiers of the Red Heart Corps, their bodies radiating an aura of fierce murderous intent.]

[From the moment they arrived at the front lines until now, every surviving member of the Red Heart Corps could be said to have been through a hundred battles.]

[Even Lin Xue, who oversaw all affairs of the Red Heart Society and remained at the rear to manage logistics, would personally stand on the front lines clutching her staff to restore the wounds of the fighting Red Heart soldiers when the war grew desperately intense.]

[You look down at the somewhat fatigued Red Heart soldiers, your raspy voice echoing around the cultural square through the sound-transmission device.]

[This time, you do not passionately denounce the injustices of society.]

[Times have changed; the current you are no longer students, but a corps organization wielding absolute violence.]

[Even the lowest-ranking Tier-C corps is still a corps!]

[Along with this change in status, everything about your speeches needed to change as well.]

[Especially under the current wartime circumstances, the pressure weighing upon the soldiers' hearts was immense.]

[Therefore, you needed to let the soldiers see hope in survival, and hope in victory.]

[Yet before you could begin to comfort them in your own way, a sudden anomaly occurred.]

[Right at the front of the formation, Lin Xue dropped to one knee facing your position.]

[The next moment, taking Lin Xue as the core, every department head, battalion commander, company commander, squad leader, and all members of the Red Heart Corps dropped to one knee before you in succession.]

[After everyone had knelt, Lin Xue looked up at you, her face filled with intense urgency.]

[Commander!]

[The situation is critical now, the demonic tide is surging, and the corps has reached the pivotal moment of destruction.]

[Therefore, please leave!]

[Any of us can die, but as long as you remain, the Red Heart still exists!]

[One day in the future, when the Red Heart blooms with glory once more in this world, then we will not be considered truly dead!]

[Listening to Lin Xue's plea for you to leave, every single Red Heart soldier used their eyes to urge you to depart.]

[As your subordinates, as those who offered you their loyalty and held a fanatical worship of your ideology, they could die, but you absolutely could not!]

[You are the leader!]

[You are the sun!]

[You are the light!]

[As long as you could leave alive, they could march smilingly toward the Nine Springs even as they perished together with the abyss monsters.]

[Down below, should their comrades ask, they could puff out their chests and reply with pride.]

[Yet if they were to let you, their leader, die before their eyes, then ten thousand deaths would not absolve their guilt!]

[You look down at the members of the Red Heart Corps urging you onward, feeling your heart flooded as if by a torrent of burning blood.]

[From a purely rational standpoint, you should leave, take the accumulation of the Red Heart Corps over the years, go into hiding secretly, and absorb and refine the Perfect God-Given Crystals every day to raise your professional level.]

[In this way, after your death, your counterpart in another spacetime could enjoy a higher-tier spacetime bestowal.]

[Yet the eyes of the soldiers below were so sincere, their intent to follow so pure, and their devotion so fanatical.]

[They followed you, willing to give their lives and even their souls for you; how could you abandon them and leave at the crucial moment of war?]

[Before you had completely risen to prominence, you could bide your time and develop in the shadows, treating so-called worldly wisdom as absolute golden rules to live by.]

[Yet right now, you do not want to leave.]

[You want to stay!]

[You want to live and die together with the Red Heart Corps that you forged with your own hands!]

[Under your absolute will, this large-scale persuasion effort was brought to an end.]

[Upon learning of your resolute choice not to leave, the Red Heart soldiers felt a trace of disappointment, but even more so... surging excitement.]

[This was the leader they wanted to follow!]

[This!]

[This was the Commander-in-Chief for whom they were willing to lay down their lives and devote everything!]

[The low morale of the Red Heart Corps experienced a rare and sudden rebound at this very moment.]

[This, perhaps, is the complexity of human instinct.]

[In January of the 134th Year of the Transcendental Calendar, with the exhaustion of the very last psionic bomb, the Red Heart Corps no longer possessed the strength to hold back the surging demonic tide.]

[Even though the Red Heart Corps had developed rapidly in Ningcheng over the past few years, with the overwhelming majority being Tier-2 professionals.]

[Under the aggregation of the Crucible Battle Array, the explosive power they unleashed could easily slay Level 40 abyss monsters.]

[The crux of the matter, however, was that more and more abyss monsters above Level 40 kept emerging from the Ningcheng Demonic Cave, an endless horde that simply could not be wiped out.]

[Having lost the front-line defenses, the amplification array's blessings, and the fire support of magical crystal cannons, the demonic tide began to ravage Ningcheng.]

[The demonic tide surged forward, the abyss monsters appearing as endless as the sea; the moment one batch was slaughtered, another batch would swarm around them.]

[Even though the Crucible Battle Array could aggregate the combined strength of the entire corps, unleashing power that surpassed tiers and allowing people to easily slaughter enemies.]

[The sheer integrating power of the collective was vividly displayed at this moment!]

[When the entire Red Heart Corps harbored a determination to die, as professionals continually burned their bodies and souls to amplify the overall strength of the battle array, even Level 40 elite monsters were no match for the Red Heart Corps.]

[Yet human strength always has its limits; continuous charging and killing, coupled with the ceaseless death of subordinate soldiers, caused the power erupted by the Crucible Battle Array to grow weaker and weaker.]

[Ultimately, on the eve of the Federation's Spring Festival, you and the Red Heart Corps under your command fell into an extermination trap meticulously crafted by a mental-type Lord amidst relentless combat.]

[The encircling slaughter of a massive number of abyss monsters above Level 40, combined with the desperate obstruction of dozens of Level 40 elite monsters, continuously depleted the strength of the Red Heart Corps' Crucible Battle Array.]

[Until finally, under a barrage of violent soul impacts from the mental-type Lord, the core inscriptions of the Crucible Battle Array shattered.]

[You died.]