Chapter 1 The Incredible Process

Standing in a space fortress stretching thousands of kilometers, watching the overwhelming anti-aircraft fire pour from the planetary fortress's surface, then feeling the entire land beneath you tremble, fracture, and roll, a landmass being blown in half, while you, along with one of the halves, uncontrollably plummet towards the planet's surface amidst violent explosions and tumbling – during which you endure prolonged artillery bombardment and the impact of hitting the planetary shield. Finally, you and your fortress crash through the planetary shield, the fortress itself splitting into three pieces as it enters the atmosphere, you and the largest piece falling towards the surface under gravity's pull, without any deceleration, while the external monitors display only an ever-enlarging landscape of lava and poisonous pools…

The whole process was incredibly thrilling.

Although precise calculations and thousands of simulations were performed beforehand, reality proved that even with the performance of a data terminal, fully simulating the real world was impossible. The southern attached island deviated slightly from its trajectory after detaching from the Nakodar mainland, resulting in more vibration than expected and a greater test for the “landing unit.”

Fortunately, both the “landing unit's” inertial dampeners and its occupants withstood the test.

Although Lily was on edge the entire time after the attached island began to fall, howling and desperately grabbing her tail, and Nangong Wuyue had knocked her brother unconscious with her tail before crashing through the shield, constantly babbling, “Big cat, you must have other cats out there! You definitely want to kill me, meow!”…

But at least none of the three threw up, right?

Hao Ren tried to remain calm throughout the process, even using some “mental self-control and forging tips” he'd seen in the work manual, ensuring someone monitored the entire descent. While the world outside was spinning wildly, and the inertial dampeners and force field stabilizers were screaming warnings, he confirmed that neither he nor the entire “landing unit” were receiving any more “artillery attention” from Amantir's air defenses, nor did he detect any radar illumination exceeding the alert value, so the plan should still be successful.

Although the entire world outside was in vibration mode, Hao Ren's heart was at peace.

Penetrating Amantir's murky crimson atmosphere, passing through the Corruptors' anti-aircraft fire net, this thrilling process ended with an even more thrilling impact: an impact that also came with a thrilling crater.

A massive space entity – although the southern attached island was only a small part of the Nakodar fortress, and the part that fell here was even smaller – lay quietly on Amantir's surface, corrupted by evil energy. It was still a behemoth resembling a small mountain, surrounded by a massive impact crater, the high temperature turning the rocks into vapor, which rose continuously from around the crater.

Lily and Gun finally calmed down. The two easily startled girls looked around, bewildered, taking a long time to soothe the fur on their tails. Lily was the first to speak: "Landlord…are we finally there?"

Gun also opened her mouth tremulously: "Big cat, I ate the biscuits by your bed..."

The others unfastened their seat restraints. Hao Ren observed the outside situation through the external monitors and exhaled softly: "Phew…we've safely landed on Amantir's surface, feet first…er, no, heads first. We rolled over too much during landing. The overall attitude adjustment might have been a little off.”

"We're upside down?" Nangong Sanba asked curiously as he unbuckled his seatbelt. "Why don't I feel it? The gravity feels normal."

"Of course, the artificial gravity in the command station is still working," Hao Ren glanced at the system reports and frowned. "But this part of the system wasn't heavily protected because it was useless after entering the planetary gravity field. It's about to shut down."

Lily casually asked, "How long until it shuts down?"

"Three…"

Lily was shocked: "Only three hours?! Then we have to hurry…"

"Two, one…"

"Damn it, Landlord…!" "Aaaah!!" "Couldn't you have said something sooner…!" "Meow meow meow meow?!"

The artificial gravity system shut down, and everyone fell down with a crash. Only two people were spared: Vivian, who could fly naturally, simply spread her wings and hovered in the air, and Nangong Wuyue: The sea serpent girl had cowardly tied herself to the chair with her tail during the fall, and hadn't untied herself yet, so she was lucky.

Actually, Gun was also spared - after all, she was a cat, and still landed on all fours. It would have been more perfect if she hadn't stepped on Lily's tail.

The dazed group climbed up from the ceiling, looking disheveled, but other than Lily pathetically clutching her big tail and sighing a few times, no one complained too much: those who could stand here had weathered storms and knew what was important.

Such a bold, almost insane plan had been successfully executed to this point already, the result of collective wisdom. Compared to being torn to shreds by an army of deranged Fiends after landing, this little setback was nothing.

"We need to determine our location first," Vivian landed gracefully from the air, helping Hao Ren straighten his messy clothes and hair. "First, confirm if we're in the expected area, then check the condition of the 'landing unit,' and also contact Salamander."

The data terminal had been connected to the various subsystems of the landing unit since earlier, and had already summarized the status of each piece of equipment: "We suffered some impact during the fall. Although the inertial dampeners and force field stabilizers protected the core area, many of the peripheral devices were damaged. Half of the radar systems and sensors are broken, but the main radar and main antenna can still be used because they have independent shields. The energy furnace's output power is a bit unstable, and this unit has cut off the energy supply to half of the redundant systems. The computer system is functioning normally, and the shielding layer is also okay."

"Not bad," Hao Ren nodded. "Much better than the worst-case scenario. What about the landing point?"

"Good news, we landed within the expected range – the landing unit performed an emergency course correction when splitting off those two 'decoy targets,' so the deviation between our current landing point and the previously calculated optimal landing point is less than two kilometers. Also, no large Corruptor defense facilities have been detected nearby, but there are small-scale chaotic energy reactions, probably small patrol units. Some of the energy reactions are approaching, but not quickly. It'll take at least three or four hours for them to get here."

Izhaks chuckled: "Looks like it's the same as planned. We completely fooled them."

He patted Hao Ren's shoulder hard: "Your crazy idea is actually pretty reliable."

Hao Ren winced from the old demon's pat, but he was still quite pleased: "Of course, I'm a certified professional, after all."

Hao Ren's plan was whimsical, but also simple, crude, and effective. It was all about how to land on this planet under the noses of Amantir's defenders.

Whether directly storming in or disguising themselves as Fiends, successfully infiltrating this planet and shaking off pursuers was almost impossible, because Amantir's defense system would scan and destroy any living target that didn't belong to the Corruption Legion, but… what if they were "wreckage" shot down by themselves?

Obviously, the Corruptors weren't so vigilant in this regard.

Organize a massive attack, arrange interconnected offensive steps, choose the timing and entry point based on the information provided by Salamander, and finally let Nakodar actively take a hit of "Amantir's Wrath" to logically throw a piece of debris into the Corruption Legion's base camp.

Nakodar's southern attached island was prepared to be "destroyed" from the beginning, and it also had a large number of explosives buried inside to simulate being shot down by artillery fire. Everything was for acting…

The structure named "landing unit" had a complete protective force field to ensure it could maintain core integrity during its descent into Amantir's atmosphere (most importantly, to ensure the safety of the crew), and it also had several shielding layers to mask the energy reactions deep within – otherwise the Corruption Legion's commander would have discovered that this "wreckage" that had been shot down contained a strong and regular energy surge. Even an idiot wouldn't fall for that.

Now, this landing plan had reached its final stage, and everything was proceeding smoothly according to the script.

The data terminal tinkered for a while and finally set up a hidden communication channel. This special channel, encrypted using Shilin technology, allowed the action team landing on Amantir to contact Salamander.

Hao Ren sent a message: "'The Actor' has arrived on Amantir. We landed in the hills twenty kilometers south of the tear. Preparing to disembark."

"'Ayr' received," Salamander's slightly distorted voice came from the communicator. "Proceed with caution. We will begin our retreat according to plan."

Hanging up the communication, Hao Ren saw the scene in the sky above through the external monitors.

Through the murky crimson clouds, the flashing outside the atmosphere had gradually subsided. The faint silver-white waves and black ship shadows were retreating. This was the final part of the "script": Nakodar Fortress "suffered heavy damage," and the Guardian Legion and drone legions were "fleeing in a panic…"

Their retreat was the best cover for Hao Ren's group.

"Let's move," Hao Ren waved his hand. "Those monsters will be here soon."

Although the landing unit had evaded the Corruption Legion's scan and hadn't aroused suspicion by disguising itself as "wreckage", those monsters would definitely send people to check the situation: after all, such a huge chunk of something had crashed through the shield and smashed onto the ground, even the most laid-back commander would have to send his subordinates to confirm the damage.

Therefore, before leaving this behemoth "landing pod," Hao Ren also had to do some cleanup here.