The battle was brutally intense.
There were just too many giant beasts, and they knew no fear, no retreat.
Steve's uniform had been torn open in several places, blood seeping through the rips.
Natasha had taken a glancing hit from an energy beam while dodging, leaving a scorched wound along her arm.
Tony's armor now carried several deep claw marks across its plates.
Saitama was still tearing through the enemy like a force of nature,
having already taken down more than a dozen of the monsters in quick succession.
But the enemy's offensive was like a relentless tide—
one wave barely fell before the next crashed in.
"This won't do! We have to break through to the core, fast!"
Steve blocked a heavy blow with his shield, the impact numbing his arm.
"Got it."
Saitama's eyes sharpened as he stared at the endless wave of beasts still pouring in ahead.
He took a deep breath.
"Guess I'll get a bit more serious."
He suddenly accelerated.
His figure blurred, and his fists turned into a storm of afterimages.
"BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG—!!!"
A rapid-fire barrage of impacts thundered through the corridor like a rolling drumbeat.
The five giant beasts directly in front of him didn't even have time to react.
Their hardened shells were pierced and shattered all at once by invisible shockwaves from his punches.
Their massive bodies were hurled backward as if struck by a high-speed train,
crashing into the hordes behind them and bowling them over like living dominoes.
In the span of a heartbeat, Saitama had opened up a brief, brutal corridor straight toward the core area.
"Move!"
Saitama growled softly and dashed into the opening first.
Steve and Natasha followed close behind,
while Tony hovered overhead, pouring suppressive fire down on the beasts trying to close the gap again.
The heart of the outpost was now right in front of them.
After smashing through the final defensive line of flesh and chitin,
Saitama, Steve, and Natasha finally burst into the core chamber of the base.
It was an underground space of staggering size.
The vaulted ceiling soared overhead, and the walls all around were covered in pipes and conduits glowing with ghostly blue energy.
They crisscrossed like veins and arteries in a living organism,
all of them converging toward the exact center of the chamber.
There, a colossal construct loomed, so massive it was almost suffocating.
It looked as if it had been woven from countless twisted strands of black metal and glowing crystal.
At its heart churned a constantly rotating vortex of energy,
spewing blinding blue-white light.
Waves of power pulsed outward from it like a tangible tide,
making even the air itself seem to tremble.
Beams of energy shot out from the device,
linking it to numerous structures scattered around the chamber that resembled incubation pods or hatching nests.
It was obvious—
this was the core nexus that controlled, enhanced, and possibly even "produced" these alien giant beasts.
"That's it! Destroy it!"
Tony's voice came through the comms from his position hovering at the entrance,
where he was pouring fire into the corridor to hold back the monsters trying to force their way in.
"Move!"
Steve didn't hesitate for a second and was just about to charge the device.
But in that exact instant, a suffocating, terrifying pressure suddenly crashed down over them.
From the deepest, darkest patch of shadow behind the core device,
two blood-red points of light flared to life,
shining like beacons in a hellish lighthouse.
Heavy footsteps echoed out, each one like distant thunder.
A figure nearly twice the size of a normal giant beast slowly stepped into view.
This was the leader of the alien invaders.
Its shell was a deep, abyssal dark gold, etched all over with mysterious energy patterns.
Its limbs were even thicker and more muscular than those of its kin,
its bony spikes long and spear-like, razor sharp.
And on its back, instead of a single node,
three energy cores burned like miniature suns, arranged in a triangle,
each one pulsing and flaring with ghostly blue light.
Simply by standing there,
the energy field it radiated made Steve and Natasha feel their chests tighten,
as though an invisible weight had been dropped onto their shoulders.
"ROOOOAR—!!!"
The alien leader bellowed, a roar that shook the entire chamber.
The sound waves hit like a physical shock,
setting the air itself buzzing and making the whole space hum and vibrate.
(End of Chapter)
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