A scalding shell hit Sun Hang's face, pulling him out of the dreamlike scene. He found himself somehow back on the surface of the Baikal Remains, with Yan Yu'an panting heavily, kneeling on one knee next to him, her arm blade attached to the arm guard full of notches.

Wang Xiyi was standing a little further away, still holding two blue fireballs in her hand, looking ready to throw.

Zhong Ling was still surrounded by a group of mysterious remains, and the free-moving number one remains had shed the armor on its arms, with its own claws hanging half of a broken corpse.

"We're back?" Sun Hang looked up at the sky. The deep blue night sky replaced the pitch-black abyss, and on this nearly light pollution-free Siberian Plain, the stars of the Milky Way were clearly visible.

"When did we return to the surface?" Wang Xiyi was stunned for a moment and withdrew the fireball in her palm.

"I... I don't know either..." Yan Yu'an stammered, the side effects of the enhancer already taking effect. She felt as if all the tendons in her body were broken, and even a quadruple dose of pain relievers couldn't completely block out the pain. "The... the battle ended... too suddenly."

The number one remains flicked the corpses off its claws, silently returning to Zhong Ling's side.

"Is the purification complete?" Wang Xiyi looked at Sun Hang. "Are there any impurities left?"

"There shouldn't be any left." Sun Hang shook his head, and the next second, as if sensing something, he turned to look to the side.

He saw the iconic golden dome of the veterans' sanitarium less than a hundred meters away. The red pentagram at the top of the dome glowed faintly even in the night.

A dense crowd of mysterious creature soldiers stood on the wall of the sanitarium, holding weapons and "staring" at Sun Hang and the others with their unfocused eyes.

After a brief confrontation, the leading soldier slowly raised a hand and saluted Sun Hang with a standard military salute.

Sun Hang smiled at them, and then the group of mysterious creature soldiers gradually faded into the background, as if they had never appeared.

"Is it... done?" Wang Xiyi walked up to Sun Hang, looking at the nearby veterans' sanitarium. "Wasn't there a mysterious creature soldier saluting us just now?"

"It's done." Sun Hang nodded. "Let's go back and have a midnight snack."

...

...

Outside the Baikal Remains, at the temporary reception point.

The once empty wilderness was now filled with various vehicles, thousands of fully armed soldiers on high alert. Ganna, wearing a thick military coat, was pacing back and forth on the frozen ground, rubbing his hands and breathing into them to keep warm. 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

As per Sun Hang's request, the reinforcements remained outside the Baikal Remains, and the mysterious creature hunters were strictly forbidden to approach it. The frontline camp was already prepared to launch a full-scale attack on the Baikal Remains, but a word from Sun Hang took down the arrow already on the string.

Ganna sought advice from Pei Zongjun, but his response was always the same: unconditionally obey Sun Hang's orders.

This highest authority of Dubhe Tower seemed to trust the young hunter Sun Hang infinitely... Ganna trusted Sun Hang a lot too. After all, Sun Hang's achievements were real and tangible. All the mysterious creature hunters' achievements over the past ten years couldn't match the weight of "eliminating Chimera 17 and repelling the Eternal Night." In Ganna's eyes, Sun Hang was like a rising star of human civilization, a torch burning brightly in the night, a miracle maker who turned the impossible into possible...

But just half an hour ago, the communication between this rising star and the rear was abruptly cut off.

The star seemed to have turned into a fleeting meteor.

Ganna had been pacing back and forth in front of the truck for a full half-hour, checking his watch every few seconds, silently counting the time Sun Hang and the others had been out of touch.

"Thirty-one minutes and twenty seconds... thirty-one minutes and fifty seconds..." Ganna sighed heavily, the exhaled breath instantly forming a thin layer of frost on his beard. He made a decision that if they could not contact Sun Hang by thirty-five minutes, he would restart the full-scale attack plan on the Baikal Remains.

No... no... Ganna shook his head vigorously. What if Sun Hang and the others were just caught up in some special situation? Launching a full-scale attack might disrupt their plan.

Perhaps he should first send in an elite squad to search for their whereabouts?

No, no, no... an elite squad might not be enough, more should be sent in...

Even sending more might not find them... maybe everyone here should just go into the Baikal Remains... Since the discovery of the Baikal Remains, they had never undertaken such a large-scale operation, deploying thousands into this mysterious city at once...

It's already at this point, they might as well launch a full-scale attack...

Just as Ganna was caught in deep contemplation, the little girl named Xue Yue suddenly tugged on the corner of his military coat.

"The city... seems to have calmed down."

"Calmed down or not! I'm not calm at all right now... wait, what did you say?" Ganna turned around abruptly, scaring Xue Yue into taking several steps back.

"Don't scare the child!" The fisherman immediately stood up, shielding Xue Yue. "Little sister, don't be nervous, speak slowly."

"Be...before, the city was... shrouded with intense negative emotions... from afar, it looked like the entire city was wrapped in a black fog." Xue Yue said, "But now... the black fog has dispersed, I can feel it, the city has calmed down... those negative emotions have all disappeared."

"Could it be..." Ganna widened his eyes, an incredible thought surfaced in his mind.

Could it be that Sun Hang and the others succeeded?

At this moment, a technical officer suddenly ran up, excitedly shouting: "Report! According to drone observations, the 'anti-peeping film' above the Baikal Remains has disappeared! Moreover, the buildings and terrain inside the city have stopped moving!"

"Did you catch any trace of Sun Hang and the others?" Ganna quickly asked.

"Yes, they are now in the C19 area, moving along the 'Y3L9' road towards us!"

"Is anyone injured?"

"Colonel Yan Yu'an seems to have signs of injury, and five fewer mysterious remains controlled by the Puppet Master, but besides that, there are no obvious signs of injury on Mr. Sun Hang, Night Slayer, and the Puppet Master himself."

"Great! Great!" Ganna clapped his hands, overjoyed. "I knew it! I knew he could create a miracle! Just like back in Shuzhou!"

He no longer cared how Sun Hang did it; he didn't even want to know if the Baikal Remains had been successfully purified—For Ganna, as long as Sun Hang could walk out of the Baikal Remains alive, that itself was already a miracle.

"Re-re-re-report!!!" Another messenger stumbled to Ganna, breathlessly saying, "The radio at the frontline camp received a Morse code message sent on an open channel. Tracing it back confirmed that the sending location is in the central area of the Baikal Remains!"

"A telegram from the Baikal Remains to us? What does it say?" Ganna hurriedly asked, his tone even more excited than the messenger.

"The content of the telegram is in the Former Siberian Federation's military cipher. After being deciphered by technicians, the content of the telegram is confirmed to be—" The messenger paused, then said with utmost conviction:

"We will forever hold this place, never retreat, never surrender, until complete annihilation."