Just a tiny bit more—one hundred more recommendation votes will push me onto the front page, won't it, won't it? I've adjusted this chapter; it’s got some real jīqíng (passion/intensity).

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White Dragon stood before the Platinum Mech, the Nuclear Light Thunder clutched in his hand, his expression utterly blank, devoid of the usual playfulness; he looked like an entirely different person.

Ye Chen, enduring the agony of a shattered arm, looked up and saw the Nuclear Light Thunder in White Dragon’s grasp. His face shifted instantly. "What are you doing?"

Just then, the Platinum Mech let out a low roar and lunged with a punch aimed at White Dragon. It seemed White Dragon wouldn't even have the chance to detonate the bomb before being pulverized into dust. Elvira, standing nearby, recognized the Nuclear Light Thunder. Her eyes flared. She suddenly exerted all her strength and lunged toward the Platinum Mech, urgently transmitting, "Detonate it quickly! I'll draw its attention!"

She compressed her voice into a focused line, transmitting it through the ambient gold elements, directly into White Dragon's mind. It took less than a second to convey the message. Although White Dragon couldn't decipher the words, he guessed the gist from her frantic expression. Given his constitution, even the 0.001 second required to detonate the Nuclear Light Thunder would be enough time for the Platinum Mech to kill him hundreds of times over.

Hearing Elvira, Ye Chen didn't know where the strength came from, but he suddenly roared, "No!" Even knowing that detonating the bomb—three Silver-grade Nuclear Light Thunders—could injure the Platinum Mech, potentially damaging its systems and increasing their chance of escape, the sight of that slender figure made his mind feel like it was exploding. All his blood surged backward, and a heart-wrenching fury flooded his chest.

In his previous life, his comrade had been brutally swallowed alive by a monster while covering his escape. That scene had woken him from countless nightmares, leaving him gasping and cold. The image before him was terrifyingly similar. This normally resolute and cold man’s eyes filled with terror. He clenched his fist, the searing pain of his crushed sternum acting like fuel on a fire, making his entire being burn. A dull ringing echoed deep within his skull.

"Agh!"

Ye Chen let out a sudden, fierce yell that instantly cleared his mind, suppressing the pain. Forgetting everything else, he charged forward with a roar, rushing ahead recklessly!

The distance between them was barely a hundred meters, easily crossed in a second, but before the Platinum Mech, even a second was a luxury.

At that moment, the Platinum Mech, locked in combat with Elvira, suddenly sprouted a muzzle from its chassis. It fired a metal slug aimed directly at White Dragon’s head. However, due to Elvira’s interference, the trajectory shifted slightly at the moment of firing, grazing past White Dragon’s ear, the rotational friction shredding his ear into a bloody mess, rendering him completely deaf.

The man's face remained expressionless; not even his brow twitched, as if the pain simply did not exist. He could vaguely hear the roars of his comrades in the distance. A faint smile touched his lips—a smile of farewell.

“Finally, it comes to this…”

A flicker of release crossed White Dragon’s eyes. His mind grew still. He could sense the sounds around him, and Ye Chen’s roaring charge seemed to slow down like a motion picture. He looked up at the sky.

The sky was grayish-white.

In that moment, even the wind seemed to hold its breath.

"Yi'er..." A smile touched White Dragon's lips. "Are you waiting for me in heaven?" He could never forget the girl named Yi'er. They had argued over something trivial, and in a fit of anger, she had left him. In his own anger, he hadn't given it a second thought. Later, when contact never resumed, he realized something was terribly wrong.

He later learned that on the day she left, she was killed in a car accident.

Grief-stricken, he had been overcome with remorse. But what was missed, what was lost, could never be recovered. If heaven truly existed, he often imagined her watching him from above. That was why he never showed his sorrow; instead, he would laugh—laugh like a fool. Even if scorned or disliked, he would never let go of his smile.

If heaven existed, he wanted his laughter to echo throughout the entire place!

“Farewell, my comrades. If there is a next life, I will certainly find you again. The efforts of this life, I entrust to you…”

Though all this seemed slow, it happened in an instant. White Dragon’s eyes suddenly brightened, like the flash of a sharp blade. He clenched his fists, gripping the three Nuclear Light Thunders, and charged toward the Platinum Mech. The detonation buttons on the bombs were marked with Ancient Greek characters, which he fortunately recognized, knowing how to activate them.

"No!"

From a distance, Yue Heng roared like a madman, his eyes bloodshot, charging toward them alongside Ye Chen.

The Platinum Mech seemed to detect the threat of the Nuclear Light Thunders in White Dragon’s hands, recognizing their immense power. It let out a low growl, evaded Elvira, and sprouted numerous barrels and cannons from its body, all aimed at White Dragon.

Elvira gasped in horror, knowing White Dragon was their last hope. Gritting her teeth, she rushed toward him, getting in front of the man. She spread her arms wide as countless bullets hammered into her body. These rounds were deflected by the repulsion devices built into her armor, causing no harm. However, her frame was too slender compared to White Dragon’s; she only managed to protect a few vital areas, leaving others exposed.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

One of White Dragon’s arms was struck by a bullet that penetrated Elvira’s defense, instantly vaporized into bloody mist. The intense pain twisted his face. The force of the impact threw him backward, and a bullet struck the side of his abdomen, shattering the flesh the size of a fist.

His head slammed heavily onto the ground. His mind buzzed, his vision darkened, and he could hear nothing. The roars of Ye Chen, Yue Heng, and the others seemed to fade away. He forced his eyes open; the world before him was a curtain of crimson.

He reached up, wiping the blood from his eyes—and water.

Then, dragging his near-shattered body, he gathered the last vestiges of his strength, roaring as he climbed back to his feet. He charged toward the Platinum Mech, determined to self-destruct with it in a mutual annihilation.

White Dragon's desperate silhouette was reflected in Ye Chen’s pupils. He felt his heart tear open, overwhelmed by violent fury. At that moment, the Hundred Spirit Elixir potency settled in his superhuman genes began to digest at an astonishing rate. His superhuman genes, previously fatigued after one activation, were replenished, and under the immense pressure, they began to fuse rapidly.

"Roar!"

A bestial roar ripped from Ye Chen’s throat. He threw his head back and howled, like a beast unleashed. Stomping the ground, he roared at the sky. All the blood in his body seemed to boil and ignite like flames. The metal-plated street actually buckled inward beneath his foot.

On his forehead, a pair of black tentacles began to grow at a visible speed, shooting upward toward the heavens. His skin suddenly took on a faint blackish hue, taking on a smooth, metallic texture like an exoskeleton.

Overwhelming power surged through him. As his blood churned in his chest, he lowered his head. His pair of pitch-black eyes turned blood-red as he fixed his gaze on the Platinum Mech. He roared, and as he moved, he kicked up a violent gust of wind, charging forward.

Having fused with the Hundred Spirit Elixir, Ye Chen’s superhuman gene had advanced from Stage One to Stage Two. Under the intense pressure, the gene that had been activated once earlier was fully recovered. The reason the superhuman gene could only be activated once a day was that after each use, the gene entered a fatigued state; continuous activation would cause a backlash, turning the user into an irrational, monstrous humanoid.

In the Stage Two state, Ye Chen’s strength and physical durability were amplified by fifty times, instantly reaching 3,100 times baseline. With a boom, he stamped the ground, crushing the metal plating inward, and charged toward the Platinum Mech like a savage beast.

Elvira stared at Ye Chen’s sudden eruption of power, momentarily stunned, then filled with disbelief at his terrifying strength. White Dragon, who had just started running toward the Platinum Mech, was caught up by Ye Chen in less than two steps. To his astonishment, Ye Chen snatched the three Nuclear Light Thunders from his hand, preventing him from doing anything reckless.

Then, Ye Chen tossed the Nuclear Light Thunders far away. He glanced at White Dragon; his blood-red eyes glowed with an unsettling light. White Dragon could feel the anger radiating from those eyes.

Time was critical. Ye Chen didn't waste words. After a brief look, he turned toward the Platinum Mech. His eyes sharpened instantly, his expression turning fierce, and he vanished from the sight of White Dragon and the others.

Thump! In less than a blink, Ye Chen appeared before the Platinum Mech as if teleporting. He used no weapons, driving a single punch directly into its lower abdomen—given his height, the stomach was the only accessible target.

The Platinum Mech’s nigh-indestructible metal buckled under the force of that single blow, denting inward. Under the immense power, its feet slipped backward, and its body pitched forward. Ye Chen shot up like an arrow, taking the opportunity to grab the single horn protruding from the Mech’s head.

"Eeeeeee-ahhh!"

Ye Chen roared in furious ascent, his eyes blood-red, veins bulging on his arm, which had thickened by three full rings. With his other arm shattered, he held the Platinum Mech’s head with one hand and hurled it violently toward another section of the street.

The Mech, which was extremely heavy and stood over ten meters tall, was gripped by its hard horn and violently twisted around Ye Chen’s single arm as the core pivot. He hoisted the entire massive body up, holding it with one arm, and brought it crashing down like a hammer...

...

Please drop some recommendation votes; the gap ahead is very small, just a little more to break through.