True Apocalypse Game

Controllable nuclear fusion was, in essence, still nuclear fusion.

However, with the aid of Beast Gold, the efficiency of nuclear fusion could be fully unleashed, multiplying its output by a hundred, even a thousand times.

Humanity's most powerful weapons had become Super Hydrogen Bombs.

The weakest Super Hydrogen Bombs made with Beast Gold had a yield equivalent to several billion tons of TNT.

This was hundreds of times more powerful than the Big Ivan, the most powerful hydrogen bomb in recorded human history.

Even if such a weapon could annihilate the World Beasts, humanity wouldn't dare use it on Earth.

Otherwise, killing a few World Beasts would be pointless if it meant destroying Earth and ensuring humanity's complete annihilation.

After all, humans were far more fragile than the World Beasts.

However, the plan of the Salvation Army's Advancing Faction was to travel back through the Space Wormhole and detonate Super Giant Hydrogen Bombs on the other side.

If one wasn't enough, they'd use two. If two weren't enough, three. If three weren't enough, they had a hundred more. They would keep setting them off until the World Beasts were gone for good.

Human research had discovered that while a Space Wormhole would be affected by a direct nuclear blast, the impact was limited. As long as it wasn't bombarded with a direct energy assault, it would be fine.

Furthermore, on the other side of the Wormhole lay the largest known Supergiant Star: Shield UY.

This was the Advancing Faction's true objective.

After multiple observations conducted by unmanned Submersibles sent through the Space Wormhole, humanity had developed a data model of Shield UY and identified several critical points in the Supergiant Star's energy structure.

Shield UY had been a Supergiant Star for millions of years, and its immense energy consumption had already left it unstable.

In theory, without external disturbance, it could go supernova tomorrow, or it could happen anytime in the next few million years.

Once it went supernova, the resulting particle storm would be enough to destroy everything in its vicinity. Not even the powerful World Beasts could withstand the torrent of radiation from Shield UY's eruption.

The Advancing Faction's ultimate plan was to drop a Super Hydrogen Bomb with a hundred-billion-ton yield onto one of the critical points in Shield UY's energy structure. They would use the bomb's energy to accelerate the supergiant's transition into a supernova.

Once this transformation was complete, it would annihilate the World Beasts on the other side of the Space Wormhole and destroy their nests.

The immense energy would also destroy the stable structure of the Space Wormhole, permanently sealing the passage to that dead Star Realm and stemming the tide of monsters pouring toward Earth.

As for the World Beasts already on Earth, as long as humanity could get some breathing room, they could be killed, even if it meant burying them under one nuclear bomb after another.

But as grand as the Advancing Faction's idea was, their plan was even less feasible than those of the Escape and Resistance Factions.

Just getting through the Space Wormhole, which was swarming with World Beasts, to reach the other Star Realm was already a near-impossible task.

To say nothing of the fact that once they were through, they would be in the World Beasts' lair, where they would be swarmed before they could even think of deploying a Super Hydrogen Bomb.

The plan to drop a Super Hydrogen Bomb on Shield UY was considered by many to be pure fantasy.

A Supergiant Star wasn't some delicate pocket watch that would stop ticking at the push of a button.

The energy impacts this Supergiant Star had endured throughout its history were far greater than any Super Hydrogen Bomb. The energy released by a single asteroid crashing into it was immeasurable in terms of TNT equivalence.

Wasting vast resources on such an endeavor would only hinder the Generation Ship and Super Giant War Armor projects.

When the Commander revealed he belonged to the Advancing Faction, an unprecedented schism formed within the Salvation Army.

Members of the Escape and Resistance Factions, while still respecting the Commander, had no faith in the Advancing Faction's plan.

They didn't dare oppose the Commander directly, but they made their stance clear by refusing to carry out his orders.

In the end, in a fit of fury, the Commander piloted the first completed Super Giant War Armor, Unit-0. He led several thousand members of the Advancing Faction, loaded with a trillion-ton-class nuclear payload, through the Space Wormhole and began his campaign.

He never returned.

To the remaining members of the Salvation Army, the Commander was all but lost.

Without the Commander's authority to keep them in check, the Escape and Resistance Factions openly broke apart. Each began gathering what little remained of humanity's resources to pursue their own plans.

The discovery of Beast Gold led to a great leap in human aerospace technology. Massive generation ships were constructed and began launching one after another. There was even a plan to colonize the Moon.

Before open conflict erupted between the factions, hundreds of thousands of people had already left Earth aboard massive generation ships, heading for outer space.

However, just as the Resistance Faction had warned, the ecosystems on these generation ships required time to stabilize, forcing them to remain in a holding pattern in near-Earth orbit.

Even so, to the people on the ground, they were a tangible sign of hope.

As a result, support for the Escape Faction surged for a time.

But even by pooling all the world's resources, the number of generation ships that could be hastily constructed was limited, with room for only a few million people at most.

A ticket aboard a generation ship became a guarantee of survival—and a privilege reserved for the elite.

When the general public discovered this, they felt utterly betrayed. Guided by the Resistance Faction, they launched a brutal assault against the Escape Faction.

Those who were denied passage destroyed aerospace bases all over the world.

Someone even launched an intercontinental ballistic missile and shot down one of the generation ships.

Just as the remaining generation ships, carrying hundreds of thousands of souls, were preparing to flee Earth, the World Beasts, which had been lying dormant in the oceans, suddenly attacked. They fired arcing spheres of energy high into the sky, blasting the last of the generation ships into oblivion.

The Escape Faction was virtually annihilated. Their plan was an utter failure.

By this point, the Resistance Faction had built thirty-three Super Giant War Armors. Each machine was operated and maintained by a crew of several thousand soldiers, and they began to engage the World Beasts in pitched battles.

The battles that followed were both brutal and exhilarating.

Every single battle was worthy of the history books.

For the first time, humanity had created such colossal constructs, as if their own myths and legends had been brought to life.

But it was all in vain.

In the beginning, the Super Giant War Armors managed to gain the upper hand through surprise attacks and other tactics, destroying a number of World Beasts.

But soon, more and more World Beasts appeared, and they began to evolve. The newer, larger, and more powerful ones possessed terrifying strength. Before these monstrosities, even humanity's Super Giant War Armors were dwarfed in comparison.

Finally, when the last Super Giant War Armor was destroyed, humanity plunged into unprecedented despair.

The great tsunami had arrived.