amaotonovel Chapter 1346 Choice
Chapter 1346 Choice
Night province, night market, tenth floor of the Central Plains War Zone headquarters building.
The corridor was brightly lit late at night, yet so quiet that the faint hum of the elevator could be heard in the distance.
Inside a heavy blast-proof door, the atmosphere in the small operational conference room was so tense it was almost palpable.
The core decision-making team of the Central Plains Theater sat around the oval conference table.
Commander Gu Chengyuan, Chairman of the Zhou Bang Military Commission, sat in the head seat. He was wearing a dark green service coat over an army service shirt with the collar casually open, clearly having just been urgently woken up from his rest.
His usually deep and calm eyes, though still composed, were inevitably tinged with the tiredness of staying up all night, and there were faint shadows under his eyes.
The other members of the theater command standing committee present, including Chief of Staff Wu Bin, Deputy Theater Commander Shao Gang, and Army Commander Wang Tiefeng, were in similar situations.
Everyone's face was etched with weariness, but more than that, it was a kind of exhaustion forcibly dispelled by the sudden and severe situation, replaced by a highly focused and heavy expression.
On the large screen at the front of the conference room, fragmented real-time images from the front lines, intermittently transmitted from the Jinling Military Sub-district and enhanced by the technical department, were displayed, along with a constantly updated electronic situation map marked with large areas of ominous purple and red arrows.
A combat staff officer with the rank of lieutenant colonel, holding a laser pointer, was giving a report in a tone that was as steady as possible but spoke at an extremely fast pace:
"...Based on the intelligence gathered from the Jinling Military Sub-district, the following situation can be basically confirmed:"
"First, the attack began at around 3 a.m., with a large-scale, high-concentration cloud of spores that was actively settling and suspected to be biologically active being released from the core area of Nanjing City. With the help of a stable easterly wind, it spread towards the Gucheng Lake cluster, covering the area much faster than expected."
"Spores are highly infectious, and the protective effect of standard individual chemical protective equipment is questionable when exposed to it for a long time without warning."
"Second, almost simultaneously with the spore cloud, a large-scale, high-speed, multi-form mixed mutated biological cluster appeared on the ground, tentatively named 'fungus-beast tide'."
"Its vanguard has been confirmed to have broken through the outer perimeter of our Jinling Military Sub-district and is rapidly approaching the western and southwestern walls of Gucheng Lake along multiple routes such as E7 and S3. According to the analysis of the last images transmitted back by Zhao Jie's reconnaissance detachment, the group is large in scale, highly organized, and many of its members have biofluorescence characteristics."
"Third, the Jinling Military Sub-district has activated the highest-level 'Furnace Agreement' and is organizing the emergency transfer of all mobile personnel in the Guchenghu gathering area to the pre-designated underground shelter 'Eagle's Nest' and other backup points."
"At the same time, the main force of the 1st Infantry Brigade of Yezhou has abandoned some of the outer perimeter recovery tasks and is urgently building a defensive line relying on the existing city wall fortifications on the west side of Gucheng Lake, intending to delay the fungal beast tide and buy at least four hours of window time for withdrawal."
"Fourth, communications are severely disrupted. The Jinling Military Sub-district is experiencing strong, unknown types of bio-electromagnetic interference in its communications with the rear and its various units. Currently, it is mainly relying on wired communications and manual relay to maintain minimal communication. The advance fleet of the Sixth Army Group has received an alert and has temporarily suspended its berthing and is waiting in safe waters downstream."
...
The staff officer's report was very concise, but every piece of information felt like a block of ice, weighing heavily on the minds of the attendees.
The blurry images flashing across the screen—rolling dark clouds, faintly visible writhing fluorescent lights, a long line of headlights of vehicles in chaotic retreat, and the silhouettes of soldiers running up the city walls—all added an incredibly heavy footnote to this cold report.
After the report was finished, the staff officer put away the laser pointer and stepped aside. A brief silence fell over the conference room, broken only by the low hum of the air conditioning system.
The expressions on the faces of the Standing Committee members were unusually solemn.
"A proactive attack... a spore cloud combined with a ground-based beast swarm, a three-dimensional air and ground strike... this is practically a standard military operational model!" Chief of Staff Wu Bin tapped his fingers on the table, his voice hoarse and filled with disbelief:
"That thing... might actually be treating this like a war..."
"The Eastern Theater Command previously claimed that the 'Jinling Ancient Brain' possessed biological computer characteristics and had extremely strong learning and imitation abilities... Now it seems that it's more than just strong!"
"We underestimated it," Army Commander Wang Tiefeng said slowly, his tone heavy.
"We thought it was just a powerful mutated aggregate that occupied one place, but we didn't expect... it already has a clear intention to expand and corresponding strategic and tactical capabilities."
"The establishment and expansion of the Gucheng Lake settlement is clearly seen as a threat by it!"
The deputy commander of the theater command, Shao Gang, frowned deeply as he looked at the purple area on the screen that represented the spore cloud coverage area.
"The key issue is this method of attack... The spore cloud is ubiquitous and extremely lethal to civilians and poorly protected troops. Even if the city walls hold back the beast tide, if the spore cloud covers the core area..."
He didn't finish his sentence, but everyone understood what he meant: it would be a catastrophic infection and mutation.
All eyes eventually turned to the leader sitting in the head seat, who had been listening silently and staring at the screen ever since the staff began reporting. No one knew what he was thinking at that moment.
Gu Chengyuan reached out, picked up the cup of tea with a faint steam rising from it, brought it to his lips, and took a small sip.
The slightly bitter tea slid down his throat, carrying a lingering warmth, but it couldn't dispel the heavy gloom in his heart.
The bitterness of the tea seemed to subtly echo his state of mind at that moment.
Compared to the purely military and strategic predicament that the Standing Committee members present were focusing on at this moment, there was a more private undercurrent swirling in the depths of Gu Chengyuan's thoughts.
His younger brother, Gu Chengyun...
He initially placed his younger brother under a pseudonym into the "Revival Phase I" program and assigned him to the seemingly dangerous but actually high-potential Nanjing front...
All of this stemmed from a complex sense of responsibility as the eldest brother and profound considerations.
He thought this was a tempering process, a paving the way.
Taking advantage of the upcoming resource allocation and strategic enhancement of the Jinling Military Sub-district, the younger brother Chengyun will grow rapidly in the midst of real bloodshed, laying a solid foundation on a visible record of merit, paving a broader future for him than if he were to follow the established order in a stable rear.
But now?
The surging, deep purple on the screen, representing the extinction of life; the blurry yet ferocious fluorescent beast shadows; and Zhao Jie's cold report stating that the "recovery rate may be less than 70%"...
Looking back now, this was hardly a "forging furnace" at all; it was clearly pushing the younger brother into an erupting, all-consuming volcano!