Apocalypse Gachapon Chapter 2316: Setback

A repulsive force immediately came back from his fingertip.

It wasn't strong, but with Ye Zhongming's perception, he could keenly detect that a force on the boundary, after repelling him, was spreading outward in all directions from the point of contact.

Ye Zhongming slowly pressed his palm against it as well. Since the attacks from both sides hadn't ceased, countless ripples traveled from his palm into his senses.

The Cloud Peak King stood there like that, and the others didn't dare disturb him, continuing their rather ineffective attacks.

This state lasted nearly twenty minutes!

Ye Zhongming withdrew his hand from the boundary, but his brow remained furrowed.

In his view, whether this boundary was from some piece of equipment or the ability of some powerful being, there must be a limit. Once that limit was exceeded, this obviously energy-based construct would naturally break.

Ye Zhongming felt that if he and all the soldiers gathered here attacked together, they should be able to reach that limit and break it.

But after his investigation, Ye Zhongming found that this boundary could actually transmit the energy it absorbed into the ground—and even, when he probed the air, it seemed to form some mysterious connection with the atmosphere.

That meant breaking it by exceeding its limit might require destroying a large area of land around it, and even blasting the air itself.

If that were the case, not even the hundreds of thousands here would be enough—they might need to bring in all of Cloud Peak's forces, and even then it would only be a maybe, with a high chance it still wouldn't work.

"Stop." Ye Zhongming gave the order and had everyone pull back.

"Boss, why retreat? Shouldn't we try a coordinated attack to see if we can break that damn thing?"

Bai Feng was anxious at seeing the "tempting" oasis so close yet unreachable. His thinking was similar to Ye Zhongming's initial thought—that breaking it was just a matter of not using enough force. He believed that with enough power, a miracle would happen.

"It won't work." Ye Zhongming shook his head. "These boundaries are likely from some kind of equipment. The power of our attacks that gets weakened is probably absorbed by that equipment. The more you attack, the more energy it stores, and the harder it becomes to break."

The others were baffled.

Equipment? Every oasis had such equipment? If that were the case, it would mean the equipment-making level here was very high. But from their clashes with the natives, their gear wasn't impressive—mostly weapons and armor made from treated natural materials. The best they'd seen was roughly equivalent to Earth's gold-grade.

If these boundaries came from some piece of equipment, it would have to be at least purple-grade. Did the Desert Secret Realm have that many purple-grade items?

Ye Zhongming nodded affirmatively.

Based on what he'd sensed, he had reached this conclusion.

He reviewed his earlier impressions, and his thinking grew clearer. He had sensed that energy dispersal in the air was chaotic—simply dissipating into the nearby atmosphere.

But the ground was different.

Very little of the filtered energy seeped underground; most of it disappeared or spread horizontally after moving about ten meters down. The surface transmission was very orderly, all heading toward the center of the oasis protected by the boundary.

Though some energy was still lost along the way—which had confused him earlier—upon careful reflection, most of the energy's movement did follow a discernible pattern.

Given that, Ye Zhongming was nearly certain that these boundaries were emitted by some kind of equipment. Of course, some lifeforms might be capable of it too, but the sheer number of boundaries made that option virtually impossible.

With the equipment's core protected within, what was to be done?

Ye Zhongming looked at the oasis a few hundred meters away, turning over ideas in his mind.

Bai Feng and the others exchanged glances, unsure of what to do next.

Brute force—not an option. Speed probably wouldn't work either, since some long-range attacks had been fast enough yet were still weakened.

So... how did these boundaries distinguish friend from foe?

"Send people to retrieve all the corpses." Ye Zhongming suddenly said to his subordinates, referring to the dead parasites, mutated lifeforms, and natives.

Several teams immediately moved out, covering each other as they recovered the bodies. The process was somewhat dangerous, but the natives no longer dared to exit the boundary, and their long-range attacks were relatively manageable.

Ye Zhongming began examining the corpses, even dissecting several himself, hoping to find differences. But structurally, he couldn't see anything distinct.

"Have some people smear themselves with the blood and flesh of these corpses, even wear their hides. Then launch another assault to see if we can get through."

Ye Zhongming gave another order.

The fighting resumed, with Cloud Peak attacking from multiple points—the real goal being to cover the "camouflaged" soldiers' charge.

The result: failure.

Though they'd failed again, Ye Zhongming at least learned one thing—once the natives died, they were just like Cloud Peak soldiers: they couldn't get in!

Zhao Xingmei and the others had tried elemental attacks, poison gas, magic crystal weapons, military weapons, zombies... now top-tier lifeforms charging, and even the "corpse trick"—none of it worked. Was there really no way?

"Send the remaining corpses back to Cloud Peak, and go to the Coarse Sand Zone to find native lifeforms—both alive and dead—and send them all to the Life Genetics Lab for research, to see if we can find a way at a more detailed level."

Ye Zhongming began issuing orders.

"Have Xia Lei send four more battalions here. Expand our search and reconnaissance in the Coarse Sand Zone, and turn it into a solid bridgehead."

"Your three battalions—for now, your task is to keep an eye on these three oases. Since we can't get in, make sure they can't get out either. See if we can force them into shortages of supplies."

"Find opportunities to lure the natives out—capture them alive. Bring in Cloud Peak's mental-specialist professionals, along with mental-control scrolls, and try to break through from the inside."

After saying all this, without wasting any time, Ye Zhongming said to Zhao Xingmei and the others, "I'll try one last time. If it works, you take these oases. If not, follow what I've said, and then we'll go together to see how things are at Bai Feng's side."