Chapter 157: Chapter 156: How Did I Die?
BAM!
BAM!
BAM!
Shen Feng’s fists fell one after another. At first, Arthur Seldon could still scream in pain, but soon, all that was left were whimpers and the dull thud of fists against flesh.
His nose was shattered with the first punch, and his jaw was dislocated. Teeth were sent flying by the force of Shen Feng’s blows, and the bones around his eyes cracked.
From the swirling Gray Tide around them, the Salvation Army Warriors emerged one by one. They gathered behind Shen Feng, silently watching.
Their eyes held a mixture of excitement, relief, and a complex flood of emotions, as if a great weight had been lifted.
The Savior had appeared, found the mastermind behind it all, and was finally bringing everything to an end.
Watching Arthur Seldon’s face turn into a bloody pulp, watching Shen Feng carry out the execution in the most primitive way, some of the Salvation Army Warriors silently shed tears.
For the Savior, for their fallen comrades, and for the years of torment they had endured.
For this world, already riddled with wounds.
"Don’t... I..." Arthur Seldon struggled to say something.
But Shen Feng’s fists were his only answer.
BAM!
"You can’t..."
BAM!
"Please..."
BAM!
"I..."
BAM!
He had never imagined that falling into the hands of this young man would mean not even a chance to argue his case, not even an opportunity to spit out threats. The only thing that greeted him was fists!
Fists filled with rage!
Finally, Arthur Seldon could no longer even groan. He was like a piece of ruined meat, letting Shen Feng pummel him at will.
Shen Feng’s expression was dead serious. Each time he raised his fist, it was with the meticulous care of an embroiderer, landing the blow precisely to ensure his target wouldn’t die outright but would still feel maximum pain.
BAM!
"Shen Feng, that’s enough. He died five minutes ago," Jingwei said.
Shen Feng stared down at the unrecognizable corpse, released his grip on the man’s neck, and nodded seriously.
"Yeah, that should do it."
He then spat on the corpse, stood up straight, and stretched.
The gloom and oppression that had weighed on his heart ever since he arrived in this Gray Tide apocalypse were finally swept away!
In truth, excluding the Whisperers, Arthur Seldon could be considered the most powerful enemy he had ever encountered.
The power to control an entire world, to treat everything that entered the super-giant structure as a toy—that was a might worthy of a Divine Spirit.
But having only power without the mentality to match—his virtue not measuring up to his position—was Arthur Seldon’s most fatal flaw.
He might have once been a pitiful man, but a tragic past is never an excuse for evil.
Shen Feng crooked his finger. The Gray Tide on the ground surged, enveloping Arthur Seldon’s ruined corpse. In the blink of an eye, it was completely devoured and dissolved.
Without a single trace.
The surrounding Salvation Army Warriors, their faces flushed with emotion, took a few steps forward. They gazed at Shen Feng, tears glistening in their eyes. They had a thousand things to say, but for a moment, they didn’t know where to begin.
Shen Feng gave a slight, wry smile and said to the crowd:
"This isn’t the time for reunions. First, join me and let’s do everything we can to restore the world."
As he spoke, the surrounding Gray Tide surged once more, enveloping him and the Salvation Army members.
The warriors understood his meaning. They all relaxed their bodies and minds, allowing the Gray Tide to wrap around them and accept its control.
Although Arthur Seldon had been executed, the salvation of the world was not yet over.
Human civilization could not continue to exist within cold metal.
It needed sunlight, air, water, earth made of soil, and plants!
Shen Feng’s consciousness began to probe deeper into the super-giant structure. Without Arthur Seldon’s interference, everything became much simpler.
Over the years, Arthur Seldon had also used the Gray Tide to absorb and store immense amounts of solar energy, so power was not an issue.
As a continuous stream of energy was conducted, the Nanomechanical Clusters that formed the entire super-giant structure, long dormant within it, began to awaken!
Their models might be old, but their sheer numbers were overwhelming!
As these Nanomechanical Clusters gradually awakened, Shen Feng’s consciousness extended down along the entire super-giant structure, probing deeper, gradually taking control of everything!
Every single Nanomechanical Insect now felt like one of his own nerve cells, making him feel an unprecedented level of power!
Meanwhile, the Salvation Army Warriors were also controlling a portion of the Nanomechanical Clusters, awaiting Shen Feng’s command.
Deeper, deeper, extending, extending...
Shen Feng’s consciousness had already traveled hundreds of kilometers downward, gradually bringing the entire super-giant structure under his control.
The endless Nanomechanical Clusters made him feel his mental power amplifying infinitely.
It was then that he finally discovered the current state of the entire Earth.
Hundreds of kilometers of the planet’s surface—meaning most of the crust and part of the mantle—had been completely devoured by the Gray Tide.
Fortunately, further down lay the scorching hot mantle and core.
These regions remained untouched.
The oceans, rivers, and lakes still existed, and even held a considerable amount of aquatic life.
This was related to the Nanomechanical Clusters’ difficulty in processing liquid matter.
The entire Earth was now like a walnut encased in a layer of Gray Tide, with the Gray Tide as its hard shell.
The situation was terrible, but it was slightly better than he had expected.
Shen Feng’s consciousness continued to expand until it had finally taken complete control of the Gray Tide covering Earth’s surface.
The sleeping Nanomechanical Clusters had all been activated. Shen Feng’s consciousness now permeated the entire surface of the Earth!
An unprecedented feeling of power washed over him. He could feel every aspect of the entire planet.
Inward, into the depths, he could feel every subtle tremor within the Earth. The humans living in the structure seemed like nothing more than dust-like ants.
Outward, looking into the cosmos, he could see the vast, starry sky and The Stars shining brightly. He could feel the fluctuating gravitational pulls from the sun, the moon, and the other major planets of the Solar System. The immense firmament had never seemed so captivating.
All the Nanomechanical Clusters were his eyes, his ears, his sensors, his hands and feet.
He was a giant who held the fate of the entire planet, the sum total of everything on this ancient world!
Compared to Arthur Seldon, Shen Feng himself possessed a Silicon-Based Brain, which gave him far greater control over the Gray Tide.
Gazing at the vast firmament, Shen Feng was momentarily lost in thought and muttered to himself:
"One is hundreds of millions, hundreds of millions are... Bah, bah, what am I saying!"
Jingwei’s exasperated voice came through:
"Stop spacing out and get back to work!"
Shen Feng stopped letting his consciousness wander. He focused his mind and sank his awareness deep into the Gray Tide.
Arthur Seldon hadn’t let the Gray Tide devour everything in the world. He had preserved quite a few things for his own amusement, to pass the long, lonely nights.
Shen Feng soon found a room located more than a hundred meters underground.
Everything here was perfectly preserved, without any damage.
Nor had it been renovated.
It was just a somewhat old house.
Inside, two figures were moving about.
Two people.
The older one was a woman in her thirties who looked very gentle. The younger one was a little girl, cute and well-behaved.
They were playing a game in the room, creating a heartwarming scene.
But Shen Feng knew with a single glance that these were two humanoid Construction Machines.
On the room’s wall hung a family photo of three. The man standing beside them was Arthur Seldon.
Clearly, this was his daughter and wife.
The crazy pervert still had one last shred of humanity.
However, judging from the surroundings, Arthur Seldon hadn’t been here in a very long time.
With a wave of his hand, Shen Feng completely erased all traces of the room and the Construction Machines within it.
’Let it be buried along with his sins.’
Shen Feng’s consciousness moved on, sweeping past carefully preserved traces of civilization. Among them were even a library and a museum, as well as gene and seed banks for various species on Earth.
Evidently, while Arthur Seldon hated humanity, he was certainly good to himself.
These were all things he had left for his own enjoyment.
Finally, his consciousness discovered a massive underground space filled with numerous servers.
In the climate-controlled environment, the servers were in excellent condition. They had also clearly undergone a secondary modification by the Nanomechanical Clusters, making them incredibly durable and resilient.
Stored within them was most of the information from the bygone human civilization.
Including all of its internet data.
Shen Feng controlled the Gray Tide to envelop the servers, power them up, and quickly entered them to begin searching for the information left behind by this world.
Much of it consisted of news reports on various battle records after the Gray Tide outbreak, along with many tragic and heroic stories of homelands, showing the brilliance that human civilization flared with in its final moments.
Of course, they ultimately failed.
But this wasn’t the information Shen Feng was looking for.
His goal was simple: to find out how his "self" from this world died.
’How exactly did he die?’
Jingwei joined in at this point, helping him sort through the information.
The vast amount of information was like a boundless ocean, and what Shen Feng was looking for was a needle in that haystack.
Fortunately, he had a clear target from the start.
He would start by tracing the path of his Parallel World counterpart’s entry into the North American Eagle Country.
"Wuyou Town, Nebraska, was recently the scene of a large-scale gang war. The bodies of Snake Eye Mercenary Company CEO Faulkner and his mercenaries were discovered... The incident also involves local gangs from Lincoln City..."
Shen Feng quickly found the report on the shootout, then continued to search for information around that date.
At that time, he was still in New York.
New York City.
"...Lockheed Martin Company director Kadi Cohen was shot and killed by a mysterious assassin at an electronics exhibition today..."
’This is it.’
Shen Feng immediately began to search for more information related to this event.
Soon, another piece of news entered his consciousness:
"...Today is a day of grief for New York City. At midnight, a second shooting occurred at the Hilton Hotel, just a few hundred meters from the electronics exhibition where Kadi Cohen was assassinated. An Asian teenager was found shot to death..."
