After dogthing finished speaking, Sun Jack had already donned his Battle Armor. He reached out, patted his sister's shoulder, and said with a resolute gaze, "Nina, wait for me to come back, okay? I swear to you, I will come back alive to see you."
Without waiting for Nina to agree, dogthing turned and walked towards the door, and just as he reached it, he heard a voice behind him say, "Wait."
Turning his head, he saw his sister picking up the yellow glasses, an external interface system that had been on Sun Jack's head, and putting it on her own. "If you're going, we're going together. I can't rest easy with you out there alone!"
"No! It's too dangerous! Just stay home!" dogthing became frantic upon seeing his sister also intent on joining the fight.
But Nina ignored his protest, walked up to him and gave him a forceful kiss, looking at him tenderly, "You're right, I'm sick of this life! If one day I'm gone, I can't let what happened to me be repeated on you."
With that, Nina turned and charged out, and an anxious-faced dogthing quickly followed after her. Their joining intensified the already fierce combat in the city.
These events were not only happening in Delhi, but in every city, just on different scales.
Inside the space station, Sun Jack sat in his chair, watching satellite images rapidly assemble FFP troops. Without any defenses ready, they used the Heavenly Meteorite and Sky-base Weapons for ultra-long-range strikes.
Dominating the skies completely, the FFP could only take hits, and in an instant, the scope of the battle expanded greatly.
"The Lan Meng database has the coordinates of FFP shareholders, shall we hit them with a few rounds too?" Tapai spoke up from the side.
"Sure, give me the location."
"3141.241/6791.412."
As Sun Jack's decapitation strike began, the recently reconstituted FFP descended into chaos.
The ground-based Sky-base Weapons turned upwards, aiming at the space station above, but as they were about to fire, they found the authorization was blocked.
All FFP anti-decryption Sky-base Weapons must be mandatorily fitted with a factory setting—that is to never aim at the Lan Meng space station.
Practically all the ultra-long-range strike weapons produced by FFP have such a setting to prevent the weapons they sold from being turned against Lan Meng.
This was originally a very standard restriction, one that most weapons companies had in place, but at this critical moment, it became the rope that tripped their own feet.
To contend with Sun Jack, they had all spent money acquiring weapons from other companies to battle against him.
When the space station's Energy Shield activated, blocking various objects coming from the ground, a new battleground between the skies and the earth was opened up.
The following battle was incredibly intense. Sun Jack was entirely focused on fighting against the FFP. He lost track of time, only aware that several key cities had been fought over by both sides for days now.
As the battle on both sides grew more intense and dire, and nuclear bombs were thrown around as casually as hand grenades, Earth seemed to have regressed to The Previous Era.
Sun Jack forcefully rubbed his face, his bloodshot eyes fixated on the screen. At this moment, his brain was fully linked with the Think Tank, synchronizing and sharing all current battle information.
After days of effort, capitalizing on the financial crisis and intensifying Resistance Army activities, they had taken over five of FP's cities.
Up until now, they had been exchanging blows with FFP, confident that it wouldn't be long before the victor emerged.
But as the money returned, the fighting strength of FFP troops returned as well, leading to a stalemate.
Although there seemed to be no decisive winner yet, the scales of victory were already tilting in Sun Jack's favor.
A colossal dragon-headed capital faced with Sun Jack's counterattack, unable to eradicate him immediately, represented a form of failure in itself.
"Either you take a break, or let me keep an eye on things for you," Tapai offered from nearby.
"No way, it's a critical time now, I can't stop!" Sun Jack continued to stare intently at the screen before him.
"But you haven't slept in eight days."
"I know, I've blocked out the sleepiness, it doesn't affect anything," Sun Jack said, his gaze fixed on the screen.
"It looks like we're going to win. After we win, can you take a good rest?"
"Enough. Look at the current trend, our chance of winning is increasing steadily, there shouldn't be any surprises."
"The more crucial the moment, the more cautious we must be. It's times like these when I fear they could act recklessly out of desperation." Sun Jack closed his eyes for a brief rest.
"They can't act recklessly; they're running out of money." Tapai laid out FFP's financial situation.
"You've taken most of the money from their company's main system, their cash flow is about to break."
"Moreover, seeing you withstand FFP's counterattacks, quite a few forces are reaching out to you with olive branches."
"Forces? Which ones?"
"For example, us." The Overlapping AI suddenly popped up in front of Sun Jack.
Upon seeing this entity, Sun Jack could guess its intentions even without it speaking.
"If you're willing to engage in deep cooperation with us, we can fully support you."
Hearing this, Sun Jack snorted, "It's easy to add flowers to the brocade, but rare are those who bring coal in the snow."
"I don't want to get tangled up with you right now, to avoid getting smeared and stuck by the Third Class."
However, the Overlapping AI had a different perspective. "We don't just want a chance to negotiate; we want human rights. We're willing to use our inside traitors at FFP to take them down in one fell swoop."
"Then there's nothing to talk about," Sun Jack spread his hands, "You don't have the capital to negotiate right now, I don't need you, and with the current trend, I can handle FFP."
"Sun Jack, don't forget it was us who gave you the Lan Meng intelligence, which is why you're qualified to sit in this position," the AI's voice fluctuated.
"No, separate issues are separate issues. Our last cooperation was a fair trade; you exchanged Lan Meng intelligence for a right to negotiate after my success. I don't owe you anything, a no is a no."
Upon hearing this, the Overlapping AI looked at Sun Jack intently and then vanished on the spot.
But soon, the situation took a turn. Suddenly the whole space station started to tilt with a creaking sound, drifting from its original position and gradually falling toward the atmosphere.
"What's going on?" Sun Jack's heart raced, this was a situation with no escape if the station fell.
He rapidly switched through the cameras in various parts of the space station, trying to locate the problem.
Yet, after a quick scan, Sun Jack couldn't find any anomaly, nor had he received any intrusion alerts.
It was as if the space station had come to life, developing its own consciousness.
At that moment, the space station's PA system came alive. "Sun Jack, don't be too arrogant. The truth is, you weren't the only bidder. As we can cooperate with you, we can naturally cooperate with others too. Whichever side has the higher price, we help them."