"Atlas, what are you doing?!!" Emery shouted,

The response that Atlas gave utterly dumbfounded him. Alas, before he could do anything about it, the half-machine acolyte had already turned around and dashed through the Abyss creatures into one of the cave tunnels.

Emery clenched his fists as he quickly realized what Atlas was trying to do. He wanted to stop him, but seeing the group of survivors behind him, he eventually gritted his teeth and turned around. Immediately, he opened the Spatial Gate to transfer the remaining hundreds of people to the surface.

A minute later, all the survivors had been moved to the surface. It was also at this moment that Emery felt the powerful surge of spirit energy that Atlas emitted reach its breaking point and unleashed an earth-shattering burst.

KABOOOOMMM!!!

A huge explosion erupted, which was quickly followed by the collapse of the underground cavern. The sight of the waves of fire engulfing everything and the ceiling of the cave falling down was the last thing Emery saw before he stepped into the Spatial Gate and teleported to the surface.

CRACCKKK!!! CRACKKK!!

When Emery arrived at the surface of the base, he quickly felt a strong vibration rocking the ground beneath his feet. It was akin to an earthquake, as cracks began to appear all over and caused panic and chaos to arise in both the survivors and acolytes.

From where he was standing, Emery saw a massive cloud of smoke rising in the air about two miles away north of the base, which was quickly followed by violent gusts of high-pressure wind.

Given what he had seen, Emery knew what, or, who the culprit was.

"..You don't have to do that."

Now that everything had happened, he could only sigh and hope that the half-machine acolyte could escape safely.

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Turning his head away, he quickly called the 5 Chizpur brothers and asked them to carefully examine the situation of the collapsed underground cave. While the five of them disappeared into the ground with their [Earth Burrow], Emery quickly made his way to the northern wall.

"Emery, what happened?!" asked Julian, his finger pointing at a huge collapsed land that could be seen two miles away.

It turned out that whatever Atlas had just done, it had not only killed the Abyss creatures that inhabited the underground cavern, but also the thousands that were swarming the northern area of the base.

"It's Atlas. He's the one who did all this."

The enormous explosion momentarily halted the advancing horde of Abyss creatures, allowing every person in the base to catch a few moments of respite to recover their exhausted bodies and minds.

Emery quickly took advantage of this moment to observe the situation on the wall, and used his Spirit Reading to scan the surrounding area. In the meantime, he also paid attention to the 5 Chizpur brothers he sent to investigate the collapsed underground cave.

The Chizpur brothers helped Emery clearly understand the current situation underground. Thanks to them, he found out that Atlas' action just now had killed countless Abyss creatures and had also helped eliminate any possibility of an attack coming from below the ground.

However, the traces of the half-machine acolyte could not be found. Once again, Emery sighed.

As for the situation above ground, 4 of the 10 Plasma Turrets that Roran took out had been destroyed. Moreover, he could also tell that at least half a dozen of the acolytes had been lost in this battle.

With nearly half of their defensive power reduced in this battle, Emery asked Magus Bellain and her saint fighters to also join the wall's defenses, strengthening the squad that had lost their members.

After all, since all the survivors were already at the base, they no longer needed to worry about the underground cavern. What's more, the horde of Abyss creatures in the distance had started moving again.

It didn't take long for the horde of Abyss creatures to advance and surround the base again, and thus the seemingly never-ending battle once again began.

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A myriad of spells was cast across the battlefield. Crips sounds of weapons clashing the creatures' body parts resounded in the air. Bodies were cut and split apart, with blood splattered around and dyed the ground red. A chaotic scene of the battlefield unfolded and dragged everyone into its entirety.

[Time left: 0 days 10 hours 20 minutes]

Emery glanced at the countdown and looked at the remaining time with a heavy heart. Many things had happened, countless had fallen, but time seemed to be moving too slowly.

Alas, there was nothing he could do but try his best to support and defend the walls from the onslaught of the Abyss creatures.

Since the battle at the base had restarted up until now, Emery had cast his spell [Mineralized Warrior] four times. Each time summoning a total of 200 Mineralized Warriors at once.

The remaining capacity of the Spirit Pool he had, on the other hand, was spent entirely on the [Rejuvenating Mushroom] spell, meaning that Emery was left without any spirit energy and forced to face the Abyss creatures that attacked the walls with just his sword.

As a Commander, Emery understood that he had to keep the fighting spirit of himself and the others high. However, the reality was that Emery was terrified.

He was anxious as he didn't have and couldn't think of a solution to their current predicament. In fact, he was very close to ordering everyone to retreat.

But in the end, he couldn't. He just can't.

Emery's thought was interrupted by Annara who approached him to deliver the latest update of the creature he had asked her to keep an eye on.

"I lost sight of the centipede 15 minutes ago. It suddenly sank into the ground 150 miles to the north, and hasn't appeared since."

The news did nothing but add another layer of fear to Emery's emotions. His hand began to tremble involuntarily as his mind imagined the sight of stage 7 Abyss creature appeared at the base, but he quickly forced the trembling to stop.

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In the end, Emery nodded at Annara's report and then called the 5 Chizpur brothers again. He had them spread out in all directions, underground a few miles away from the base, to help him increase the Spirit Reading detection in the area around the base.

After that, he went back to the tower where Twik was. Reappearing at the top of the tower, he quickly sat in lotus position, calmed himself down, and used [Nature Grasp] to refill his empty Spirit Pool. While doing so, he also focused his attention on his Spirit Reading to detect the centipede as soon as possible.

Emery knew that soon, he would face one of the toughest fights. Therefore, he had to be in his peak condition in order to give any chance of surviving what's coming.

A few minutes later, he finally detected an anomaly. In the distance, a powerful energy that was suffocating him appeared and quickly came out from underground. However, the specific location was not what he expected. Instead of an area near the base, it appeared near where the transport ship was.

"What?! Why!? Why did it go there?"

Emery assumed that the centipede would come to the base since the spirit being, the offspring was here. Apparently, his assumption was wrong. Entirely so.

Remembering the people he sent to defend the transport, Emery was anxious.

"Klea!"

His body instantly rose from his sitting position, and he was about to cast [Spatial Gate] when he suddenly heard a familiar sound.

"Kuang ku. Ku"

Turning his head, Emery was stunned by what he saw.

Twik has awakened and the bright light that previously enveloped his body had gathered and materialized into a golden crystal that was embedded into a part of his chest.

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Other than an obvious upgrade in stats, Emery was surprised that he can finally hear the voices of the spirit beings more clearly