Rebirth: The Universe's Hidden Heiress-Chapter 145: Another Ironback

Those who had participated in the second round of the Academy Tournament changed their expressions, knowing what this meant—

The black Ironback broke through the ground, standing upright, shattering the entire underground nest. The Queen slowly stretched her body out of the nest, emitting a hoarse and unpleasant roar, commanding her offspring to attack frenziedly, making everyone on the battlefield involuntarily turn to look at her.

Those on the battlefield turned, facing the Queen they had only seen in textbooks, described as a cataclysm for humanity. Their movements froze for a moment in sheer terror.

Facing the Queen, the fear among the Stellar Corps was even greater, but they only panicked for a moment before regaining their composure, because Yuka had broken free from the swarm. She slowly turned to look at them, her mecha covered in the green fluid and blood of dead insects,.

Yuka was still there, and with her, her soldier’s faith and courage remained unshaken.

She would lead them forward.

The well-trained Stellar Corps members quickly divided into two groups following their routine training simulations. One group focused on controlling Ironback, pushing it down to attack its soft underbelly, aiming to kill it swiftly. The other group dealt with the space pirates attempting to flee.

Bartland was once again blocked by a Stellar Corps mecha. He kicked it away but failed to protect his cockpit in time, resulting in several more bullet holes from Ayoi’s gunfire on his barrier.

A bullet grazed Bartland’s right cheek, leaving a trail of blood. Frustrated, he smashed the cockpit of the mecha in front of him with a punch. But as he locked eyes with the pilot, he paused.

It was Alex.

Ayoi took advantage of his moment of distraction and fired another burst of bullets. Bartland’s cockpit shattered completely, with bullets hitting his shoulder and chest, blood gushing out.

Regaining his senses, Bartland staggered backward, then looked down to see Alex’s long sword piercing through his cockpit and his abdomen. Another mecha from behind swung its blade, severing the mechanical legs of his mecha.

As Bartland fell heavily, in his last moments, he saw someone repairing Alex’s damaged protective barrier. With dying effort, not caring if Alex heard him, he whispered, "Your eyes... they’re much like your mother’s."

But they were also different.

His daughter had passively accepted her fate, becoming an Empress in the royal family, heading towards a death she knew was coming. He always thought Alex would, like his mother, submit to destiny, unable to break free from their blood ties. But Alex chose to rebel against everything, fleeing the royal life, joining the Stellar Corps, and even... killing his own father.

In the end, he decided to give them one last gift.

Ayoi pulled Alex up, and together they took a final look at the now-deceased Bartland, then turned to rush towards the insect nest to assist Yuka.

However, just as they were about to enter the nest, a massive explosion erupted on the outskirts, sending flames skyward and blowing the Stellar Corps members around it away!

Alex felt light as air. In a daze, he suddenly remembered Bartland pressing something before his death.

But he could no longer speak.

The shockwave of the explosion caused severe tinnitus, rendering everything around him silent and blurry. It felt like he was flying. He saw his Stellar Corps comrades bleeding on the ground, the Alliance Army taking cover from the flames, new insect eggs continuously hatching, Yuka’s figure once again overwhelmed by the swarm, and Kenji, pushing aside the dead Ironback, charging towards the Queen...

Then, he lost consciousness.

...

Blood slid down Yuka’s forehead, over her eyelids. She fluttered her eyelashes and let out a gentle breath. "So tired..."

Although the explosion caused by the space pirate occurred on the outskirts of the insect nest, Yuka, who was inside the nest, getting closer to the Queen, felt its effects.

Her mecha suddenly felt lighter as it was thrust upward by the blast. She managed to stab her long sword into the ground, anchoring her mecha to prevent it from being swept away by the blast wave.

But the ground she relied on was not stable. She plummeted down with the sinking terrain, and her mecha inevitably suffered damage.

The insectoids that had been covering her mecha were killed by the explosion’s force. The Queen, too, was injured by the blast, and her anger peaked. Her psychic power briefly went wild.

The insectoids on the ground, not yet fully dead, became restless, struggling and twisting their bodies to continue attacking humans. However, the recent explosion caused the ground to collapse. The Queen and her insect offspring all went back below the surface, buried under layers of soil and rocks—

So now, the only target of their attacks was Yuka, alone underground.

Yuka lifted her mechanical arm, numbly swinging her sword, chopping an attacking soldier insectoid in half, then stabbing its brain and withdrawing her blade, ready to face the next incoming flyer.

Her chained hammer, transformed from the butler, was lost in the explosion and fall. Although Yuka maintained a psychic connection with the butler and thought about using her psychic power to call it back, she now had to use her power to repair her severely damaged mecha, or she would be quickly overwhelmed and buried by the swarming insects.

...She was alone again.

Those who could fight alongside her remained on the surface, their fates unknown.

Yuka flicked her eyelashes again, but this time, her long lashes couldn’t stop the blood from a gash on her forehead from seeping into her eyes, turning her vision a bloody red.

Two parasites attacked from behind, tightly entangling her mechanical legs.

Yuka fell backward, swinging her sword in the air, slicing off the head of a flying insect, but she couldn’t stop the sharp mouthparts of a soldier insectoid at her feet.

Her mecha’s damage worsened, and its protective barrier cracked.

Even Oniyon, naturally restraining insectoids, was now vulnerable to their attacks.

’To what extent did Humphrey modify the insectoid genes?’ Yuka thought. She knew that if another attack like the soldier insectoid’s happened, her mecha would be instantly wrecked.

Yuka’s psychic power was nearing its limit. Just maintaining her shattered mecha and reassembling them to continue fighting had drained almost all of her psychic energy. Her brain throbbed from overusing her psychic power.

This couldn’t go on forever.