The screech of tortured metal as Specimen 47's cables recoiled from Grandma Mei Lin's Earth-Metal wall reverberated through the dense fog, a sound of raw power clashing with unyielding will. For a moment, even the colossal Purge Unit seemed to pause, its dull red eye-light blinking, as if processing the unexpected resistance.
"Grandma!" Xiaoli cried out, her voice a mix of terror and utter astonishment. The glowing panel in her vision flickered, highlighting Grandma Mei Lin's steadfast HP bar, miraculously untouched.
Kael, usually so composed, took an involuntary step back, his eyes glued to the shimmering metallic barrier. "Earth-Metal… it's a legendary deviation. Unbelievable," he murmured, his voice laced with a reverence usually reserved for ancient texts.
Jax let out a stunned, low whistle. "Grandma Mei Lin's got moves! And… metal? That's not normal dirt, is it?" His own panel, displaying his "HP: 100/100", suddenly seemed less important than the sheer, impossible spectacle before them.
Li Tian, however, felt a surge of adrenaline mixed with a potent sense of vindication. He had known, deep down, that his Grandma Mei Lin was special, but this… this was a revelation that shook the foundations of his understanding. Her serene, almost indifferent expression as she faced down the monstrous war machine solidified her legend in his eyes.
"Host," Prometheus's voice resonated in his mind, sharp and analytical, "Grandma Mei Lin's 'Earth-Metal ' attribute is a highly advanced form of Earth affinity, allowing instantaneous transmutation and manipulation of geological elements at a molecular level. It grants supreme defensive capabilities, especially against physical and technologically-driven attacks. She's essentially wearing the planet as armor. Very impressive.
Her combat parameters are off the charts, but her cultivation path is unique and not fully quantifiable by my current metrics, hence the 'Level: ???'."
The Purge Unit, Specimen 47, recovered from its momentary hesitation. Its singular red eye pulsed faster, and a low, guttural hum vibrated from its core. The segmented cables, once snapped back, began to writhe, transforming.
Their tips sharpened, growing jagged, like diamond-edged drills. With renewed, terrifying speed, they lunged again, striking the Earth-Metal wall with a furious, grinding assault. Sparks flew, a blizzard of emerald green and angry crimson against the swirling grey of the fog, as the cables tried to bore through.
Grandma Mei Lin stood her ground, her gnarled hands still pressed to the earth. Her eyes, ancient and calm, watched the assault.
The Earth-Metal wall shimmered, groaning under the onslaught, but it held. Fine cracks, like spiderwebs of pure energy, spread across its surface only to mend themselves instantly, drawing more metallic sheen from the unseen depths beneath her feet.
She was a living extension of the earth, an unyielding bulwark against the metallic tide.
But then, a different sound began to filter through the pervasive fog. The rhythmic thudding of Specimen 47 had almost deafened them, but now, a distinct, lighter clatter emerged. The whirring of smaller engines, the purposeful march of armored boots.
"Host! Additional contacts!" Prometheus warned, its voice losing its analytical calm, replaced by urgency. "Multiple smaller units emerging from the fog perimeter. Standard Iron Covenant infantry and skirmisher mechs. Threat Level: B+ for the secondary assault. They're flanking your main defense!"
Li Tian's head snapped up. Specimen 47 was merely the vanguard, meant to fix their attention, to pin down their strongest defense. The real probe was the flanking maneuver. He mentally accessed his own system panel, his eyes scanning the vital information.
--- HOST STATUS ---
NAME: LI TIAN
LEVEL: 5 (Neo-Cultivator Farmer)
CULTIVATION: Body Tempering Stage 2 (Foundation Solid)
SKILLS:
- Spiritual Farming (Lv 2)
- Basic Qi Manipulation (Lv 1)
- Elemental Affinity (Earth)
- System Interface Mastery (Lv 1)
SPIRITUAL ENERGY: 17/20 (Optimal Flow)
HP: 100/100 | Morale: High (Determined)
---
He was their anchor, their strategist. Grandma Mei Lin had Specimen 47. The rest of them would handle this new threat. This was where the coordination Prometheus had promised would truly be tested.
"Kael! Lira! Jax! Xiaoli! New contacts! Standard Covenant units. They're trying to bypass Grandma!" Li Tian's voice boomed, cutting through the fog, amplified by a subtle spiritual resonance. "Grandma Mei Lin has Specimen 47. We handle these! Kael, hold the left flank, use your earth for cover! Lira, right flank, blind their sensors with dense fog! Jax, mobile assault, hit their weakest points! Xiaoli, provide fire support, create choke points with ice!"
"Understood!" Kael's mental message was crisp, already moving. He slammed his hands down, and the earth near the old farm wall erupted, forming rough, jagged earthen barricades, providing cover and forcing the advancing Iron Covenant infantry to slow.
He began manipulating the soil, creating small, almost invisible pits to trip them. His body pulsed with a dull, earthy glow, his spiritual energy flowing freely.
"On it, Li Tian Ge!" Xiaoli's voice echoed in his mind, tinged with a new determination. She sprinted to a position near a cluster of old fruit trees, her hands glowing. With a sudden burst, patches of ground before the advancing soldiers turned slick with ice, sending several armored figures sprawling.
Simultaneously, a fiery warmth radiated from other spots, causing the air to shimmer and distort, disrupting their optical sensors. "They're slowing!" she reported, her panel showing a slight dip in her HP as she expended energy. Her current HP was 90/100, spiritual energy 18/20.
On the right flank, Lira moved like a ghost. The mist around the farmhouse thickened and swirled under her command, becoming an almost tangible barrier.
The smaller Covenant mechs, designed for open-field skirmishes, found themselves utterly disoriented, their optical sensors struggling to penetrate the magically enhanced fog. Li Tian saw their targeting reticules waver on his mental map. "They can't see us! Pushing them out of formation!" Lira's message came through, breathless but triumphant. Her HP was 90/100, spiritual energy 17/20.
Jax was a whirlwind. He didn't wait for orders, responding to the dynamic flow of battle. With a series of lightning-quick dashes, he appeared almost instantaneously amidst a squad of infantry, his fists crackling with arc lightning.
Bolts flew, impacting armor, sending soldiers convulsing and their weapons sputtering. He moved too fast for their targeting systems to lock on, a blue blur in the grey fog. "Taking them down! These guys are easier than the big brute!" he reported, a wild exhilaration in his voice. His HP was 95/100, spiritual energy 16/20.
Meanwhile, the fight continued at the perimeter. Grandma Mei Lin, seemingly unmoving, was a force of nature.
Specimen 47's drilling cables churned furiously, but the Earth-Metal wall flowed and shifted, regenerating as fast as it was damaged.
With a deep, resonant hum, Grandma Mei Lin expanded the wall, not just a defensive barrier, but an offensive cage. Spikes of dark, gleaming metal erupted from its surface, attempting to impale the Purge Unit's drilling cables, forcing them back.
The ground beneath Specimen 47 became treacherous, shifting under its immense weight, thanks to Grandma's subtle manipulation of its foundations, forcing it to fight for every inch of ground. Her HP remained a pristine 100/100, her spiritual energy reserves seemingly boundless, indicating a cultivation far beyond the rudimentary System metrics.
"Its primary cables are being suppressed by her counter-force!" Prometheus announced, a hint of admiration in its tone. "Grandma Mei Lin's Earth-Metal affinity is directly interfering with its mechanical integrity. This is a battle of wills, Host, and her will is forged in millennia of bedrock!"
The battle raged. The smaller Iron Covenant mechs, blinded and disoriented, stumbled into Kael's hidden pits, their treads grinding uselessly. Their internal comms must have been crackling with panicked reports of unseen enemies and impossible terrain. Kael, grinning grimly, used his spiritual energy to seal some of the pits, trapping the mechs, turning them into targets.
Jax, a storm of kinetic energy, moved from unit to unit, disabling their systems with precise lightning strikes. He'd zip in, discharge a concentrated blast, and vanish before they could retaliate.
One heavily armored infantryman, armed with a flame-thrower, managed to get a lock on him, unleashing a torrent of fire. Jax, seeing the incoming attack on his panel, reacted instantly, performing a frantic zigzag maneuver, barely avoiding the searing heat, his HP dropping to 90/100. "Too close!" he mentally cursed.
Xiaoli's alternating blasts of heat and cold caused their armor to groan and buckle, forcing some to retreat in disarray. She wasn't just creating hazards; she was systematically degrading their equipment. She saw a squad of drone-handlers attempting to deploy aerial scouts and unleashed a volley of ice shards, freezing their delicate mechanisms before they could even take flight. Her spiritual energy dipped to 15/20.
Lira maintained the blinding fog, her concentration absolute, a silent guardian on the battlefield. She wasn't fighting with overt attacks, but her mastery of the environment was a weapon in itself. She subtly manipulated sound waves within the mist, creating phantom echoes, leading the enemy to believe they were surrounded, further adding to their confusion. A few brave (or foolish) soldiers tried to push through her fog, only to find themselves inexplicably turned around, walking back towards their own bewildered comrades.
Li Tian, amidst it all, was the conductor. He sent bursts of spiritual energy to reinforce Kael's barricades, channeling his Basic Qi Manipulation to shore up crumbling earth. He launched small, precise Earth Spikes from the ground to trip fleeing soldiers, turning the very soil into a weapon.
A Covenant officer, seeing Li Tian as the central figure, aimed a high-powered energy rifle. Li Tian, seeing the incoming red line on his personal panel, instinctively channeled his spiritual energy, creating a thin, but resilient Earth Shield. The beam struck, deflecting off the barrier with a shriek of displaced energy. His spiritual energy dropped to 15/20, but his HP remained solid at 100/100. The shield had held.
Then, just as a particularly nasty skirmisher mech, a multi-legged unit armed with a plasma cutter, broke through Lira's fog and aimed directly at Jax, a vibrant flash erupted in Li Tian's mind.
[SYSTEM ALERT: FARM SYNC 100% COMPLETE!]
"Host! Congratulations! The extensive spiritual activity and the harmonious use of spiritual energy by your companions have fully synchronized the farm's spiritual node with your System! This is a major breakthrough!"
[FARM STATUS: LEVEL UP!]
[FARM IS NOW A LEVEL 2 SPIRITUAL NODE!]
[REWARD: ENHANCED SPIRITUAL ENERGY REGENERATION RATE (FARM ZONE). ACCESS TO NEW FARMING BLUEPRINTS. MINOR SPIRITUAL CULTIVATION BOOST FOR ALL ACTIVE COMPANIONS WITHIN FARM ZONE.]
A wave of pure, invigorating spiritual energy washed over Li Tian. He felt his spiritual energy reserves, which had been steadily dropping, begin to regenerate at a noticeably faster rate.
A quiet hum of power resonated from the very ground beneath his feet. The farm, his home, was now not just a refuge, but a powerful source of strength. This was more than just a fight; it was a defiant act of growth, of evolution.
The plasma cutter fired, a searing beam of energy tearing through the air. But as it struck, Li Tian channeled the newfound farm energy, creating a spontaneous Earth Shield – stronger, denser than any he could have conjured moments before. The plasma beam splashed harmlessly against it, sizzling and dissolving. Jax, startled, spun around, then looked at his own panel, seeing his HP still at 18/20.
"Whoa! Thanks, Li Tian Ge!" Jax messaged, a newfound respect in his voice. "That was close!"
"Farm leveled up!" Li Tian broadcast to his team, a triumphant grin spreading across his face. "Keep pushing! The farm is boosting us!"
A collective gasp went through the companions as their own panels flickered, showing the "Farm Level 2" notification and a subtle increase in their spiritual energy regeneration rates. A jolt of fresh power invigorated them, pushing away the fatigue of battle.
The Iron Covenant forces, already demoralized by their inability to penetrate the strange defenses and contend with the agile cultivators, began to falter.
They weren't prepared for this level of coordinated, elemental resistance, bolstered by an unseen power source. Their disciplined lines broke into a panicked retreat, scattering back into the fog.
Specimen 47, however, remained an unyielding menace. Its drilling cables, though blunted, continued their relentless assault on Grandma Mei Lin's Earth-Metal.
The Purge Unit let out another mechanical roar, this one resonating with a deeper, more profound anger. Its entire black chassis began to glow with a malevolent crimson light, and the ground around it started to crack, not with Grandma Mei Lin's controlled power, but with raw, destructive force.
It was powering up, preparing for a devastating final blow.
Grandma Mei Lin's eyes narrowed, her knuckles white as she drew even more energy from the Earth-Metal. The ground beneath her feet pulsed with an intense, coppery glow, absorbing the cracks, funneling the raw energy into her defensive wall, making it denser, harder.
This was the final, desperate gambit of the Purge Unit, and the legendary bulwark of Grandma Mei Lin was ready to meet it head-on. The battle for the spiritual node, for their home, had just begun, reaching its crescendo.