Chapter 154 Particle Light Spear

The camera struggled to capture Ji Cheng's figure as the heavy doors of a mechanical fortress burst open with a deafening crash, revealing him clad in combat gear and wielding a glowing energy sword.

He had intentionally requisitioned this light blade from the armory. It was a mass-produced standard issue from the Imperial Ministry of Industry, possessing relatively modest power—not even a proper mechanical weapon in the truest sense—but its chief virtue was looking utterly spectacular.

After all, this was a live broadcast.
Publicity demanded that visual appeal come first.

Pausing for a brief moment until he noticed the corner of his eye register the tracking drone locking onto him, Ji Cheng crossed the threshold of the fortress.

A whistle-arrow pierced the air with a terrifying, piercing shriek, driving straight into the interior. In the slowed-down footage viewed by the audience, the metal projectile met no resistance, merely slicing cleanly through several terrified heads within the fortification.

The velocity was so extreme that it looked as though the arrow had simply swept past a cluster of red mist, rather than detonating those heads into gushing clouds of blood.

Before the blood mists had even fully billowed outward, Ji Cheng had already bolted out of the fortress, swift and agile as a hunting leopard. The audience watched the dazzling, cold gleam of the sword in his hand, accompanied by the violent, echoing concussions roaring from their speakers.

Ji Cheng flicked open the quick-release buckle on his thigh harness, swiped his palm across it, and a pitch-black lightning bolt shot forth from the strap.

It struck dead-center against a mechanical fortress disguised under a layer of rock, which then rapidly ignited like burning oil—a thermite grenade.

Boom!

The thrilling, heart-pounding combat not only made every viewer in South Harbor City tense up instantly, but also deeply startled the various powerhouses watching from close quarters.

"He actually charged right in to slaughter them alone? Wasn't he afraid of running into traps?"
"What I want to know is what kind of weapon was flying around his head?"
"So fast!"
"That must be the most famous whistle-arrow of the South Harbor Federation, but he seems to be using it far more powerfully than the official files indicate."

Inside the city.

The live broadcast screen was completely obscured by flames, leaving only the crackling sound of burning echoing from playback devices everywhere, reverberating across the entire skyline.

"The Speaker looks terribly young!"
"Pay attention, he's also extremely handsome!" a female viewer corrected.
"I got totally ripped off, I was just bending down to tie my shoes and missed everything!"

"The fortress that so many soldiers couldn't conquer before was cleared out by the Speaker in the blink of an eye..."

In the past, the general public had circulated numerous rumors regarding the election of the new Speaker. Due to information asymmetries, the conclusions they reached varied wildly, and most of them were absurdly wrong.

Simple-minded individuals believed that the new Speaker had simply ascended to the top through sheer, overwhelming strength that suppressed all opposition. Other residents, employing a modicum of thought, claimed it was merely the product of a power struggle, with him emerging as the ultimate victor.

Yet others, holding higher status and possessing broader intelligence networks, perceived the iron-fisted methods of the young Speaker through various omens—in the first few days after his arrival in South Harbor, the major government agencies throughout the city had still reeked of blood.

Now, however, every citizen firmly held one conviction:
The new Speaker was vastly superior to his predecessor!

Ordinary people understood little about the class distinctions among superhuman beings, nor did they know that Ji Cheng's current strength still lagged far behind Zhang Sheng's, but in terms of public opinion and propaganda warfare, Ji Cheng had won by a landslide.

In the command building, Su Yi and the meritorious Thorn had their house arrest lifted and were now similarly watching the live stream in a luxuriously decorated room.

"Barely a month ago, I was still trading blows with him on equal terms."
Su Yi parted her lips slightly and massaged her chest—the exact spot where the original body owner had struck her, which still harbored a dull, lingering ache.

She still found it hard to believe that Ji Cheng could grow to such terrifying heights in so short a time. Without slow motion and instant replays, that horrific level of power made his movements impossible to track with the naked eye.

"Still, come to think of it, I'm a woman who once got beaten up by the Speaker... That has to count as some kind of honor, right?" Su Yi glanced down at her chest, a bizarre sense of pride welling up inside her.

On the television screen, the live broadcast continued. Ever since the superhumans entered the fray, the battle had progressed like a hot knife through butter.

"Wow, he is so strong! I want to be his subordinate so badly!" Thorn watched with a surging heart, excitedly shaking Su Yi's arm. "Why don't you help recommend me?"

"Where would I have that kind of pull..." Su Yi pouted, adding silently in her heart: Besides, you aren't even a superhuman.

As the battle progressed, the atmosphere within the city reached a fever pitch, and the television station intentionally concentrated the vast majority of the camera angles on Ji Cheng, while glossing over the other superhumans with mere fleeting glances.

In the distance, sunset was imminent.

The tracking drone flew to Ji Cheng's flank, shooting against the backlight.

The deep, crimson afterglow of the twilight sky framed a swift, expressive sequence of slaughter silhouettes.
The highest picture quality, meticulously designed scenes and choreography.

Countless citizens watching held their breath, filled with awe.

"This is even better-looking than a movie."
"Lord Speaker just exudes the aura of a true powerhouse!"
"Totally, and even killing people looks so effortlessly smooth and graceful!"

Notified through his earpiece that the city's response was overwhelmingly positive, Ji Cheng grew even more spirited, leading his squad straight into the thickest sectors of the blazing firefight.

Across this land, a tempest of death had been whipped up.

Dozens of Tier 2 superhumans relentlessly maneuvered and carved through the defensive lines formed by the mechanical fortresses. The live feed transmitted the crisp cracking of shattering rock, the sharp snaps of breaking bones, the rapid concussions of firearms, and the dying screams and laments of the fallen.

The cathartic slaughter did not last indefinitely; the situation shifted the moment Ji Cheng and his forces fought their way back to the main South Harbor military lines.

From somewhere unknown, a massive wave of reinforcements emerged from the Black Island organization. The most prominent among them were humans who had undergone heavy mechanical modifications, alongside a multitude of bizarre entities that looked like chimeras stitched together from human and beast parts.

The former possessed bulging muscle fibers and eyes blazing with a do-or-die fanaticism, their mechanical arms carrying an overwhelming, explosive momentum in every strike and parry.

In stark contrast, the powered armor of South Harbor City appeared fragile in both material and technology, completely reversing the previous dynamic where individual combat prowess had dominated.

Fortunately, the broadcast possessed a delay of several seconds, allowing the television station to swiftly switch the feed to the temporary studio inside the "Hunter" aircraft, where Chen Qian began stalling for time.

Along the South Harbor defense line, a superhuman from the Red Eagle Republic utilized a specialized instrument to project a laser beam, carving a blazing blue arc that pierced straight through the bodies of several mechanically modified soldiers.

Just as a triumphant smirk formed on his face, five or six human-beast hybrids lunged from the shadows. The Tier 2 superhumans who had just rushed back barely caught a glimpse of the moment before a violent flash of blue light engulfed the area in a deafening blast, reducing both the superhuman and one of the hybrid monstrosities into a bloody, indistinguishable sludge of flesh.

At the sight of this, Tian Gang let out a furious roar and charged forward, accelerating into a ferocious tackle. He gripped a whining chainsaw, its built-in motor driving teeth that delivered staggering lethality.

Yet he was a fraction too late. The twilight was illuminated once more—this time by a golden flash originating from an ellipsoidal device in Lei Junming's hand.

"A particle light spear!" the crowd cried out in alarm.

Ji Cheng, positioned in the center, fixed his eyes upon it, and his face turned pitch black.