After dealing with the Sentinel base, Ian turned his attention toward the Sentinel headquarters.
This time, Ian did not conceal his movements. The spacecraft boldly flew toward the Hawaiian Islands.
With Ian's obvious intentions, the Sentinels naturally noticed and quickly mobilized idle forces from nearby regions.
Although Ian destroyed the largest Sentinel base, there were still many smaller bases across the Americas, each storing a significant number of Sentinel robots.
Instead of intercepting Ian, these Sentinel robots were redirected back to the Sentinel headquarters on the Hawaiian Islands.
However, Ian seemed in no hurry. He leisurely made his way, stopping occasionally to explore towns along the route.
He discovered that the city they had first encountered was no exception; all the towns were deserted, showing no traces of human activity for at least several months.
"The Sentinels' sweeps were truly thorough!" Ian remarked as he stood in an empty Los Angeles.
"From the evidence left in this city, the large-scale conflict occurred six months ago. It lasted less than ten days before humanity's forces completely collapsed. Afterward, humanity could no longer resist, and this city was cleared out within days!"
Analyzing the situation further, Aisha noticed some traces in the apartment buildings and added, "However, most people seem to have been captured by the Sentinels rather than killed!"
This outcome was somewhat better than humanity being completely massacred.
"Where could they have been taken?"
This question flashed through Ian's mind briefly, but he had no intention of rescuing these people.
The captured aircraft's flight logs only spanned three months, containing no records of the war. Ian had no way of knowing where the remaining humans were taken.
More importantly, given the nature of this timeline's events, Ian saw no reason to rescue the survivors.
The more Ian saw, the harder it was to imagine what had happened in this world.
His curiosity about the Sentinel headquarters grew stronger.
After his slow and leisurely journey, Ian finally reached the Hawaiian Islands late at night.
The islands were brightly lit, with countless warships, aircraft, Sentinel robots, and other defenses at the ready. The Sentinel headquarters had clearly prepared thoroughly.
When Ian saw the formidable Sentinel forces from afar, he laughed:
"Not bad. They've likely pulled back all the idle forces along the Pacific coast. My half-day stroll wasn't in vain!"
In the sea, there were hundreds of warships, thousands of aircraft in the air, three massive motherships over a kilometer long, and at least six figures worth of Sentinel robots.
The scene was even more spectacular than a world war!
Ian, however, remained unfazed. He said calmly, "Good, I'll wipe them all out in one go. This will save me from constant trouble!"
Aisha, though she had never seen such an army before, felt no fear standing beside Ian.
The Sentinels, having prepared extensively, launched a barrage of attacks the moment Ian arrived.
Lasers, shells, missiles, and countless mutant powers engulfed the sky, turning night into day in an instant.
Ian's gaze sharpened, and his expression grew serious.
Without moving a muscle, the law runes in his soul's ocean trembled, rippling the world's laws. The ripples extended across a hundred kilometers.
Pure energy and physical attacks were unaffected, but the strange mutant powers were mostly nullified by the ripples.
Faced with the crushing force of law, even the most bizarre X-abilities were rendered useless.
Psychic attacks, unaffected by distance, struck Ian and Aisha first. However, they were easily deflected by Aisha's psychic shield.
Sentinel robots, ultimately lifeless machines, lacked human will. Their simulated psychic abilities were clumsy and weak, relying solely on quantity to generate psychic shocks through garbage information.
Yet Aisha's psychic shield, purely defensive and at level four strength, remained unshaken by the psychic assault of tens of thousands of Sentinels.
With the most troublesome attacks neutralized, the rest became simple.
The elemental furnace expanded instantly, absorbing material and energy alike.
With the furnace's capacity, it could easily contain even the energy from nuclear explosions, let alone ordinary missiles.
"Is that all?" Ian smirked, savoring the sense of absolute control.
But before he could fully enjoy the moment—
Boom!!!
Suddenly, blinding white light flashed as five mushroom clouds rose, and the world went silent.
It turned out that the initial wave of attacks was merely a distraction. The true threat lay in five nuclear warheads, each with a megaton yield, detonating around Ian in all directions—above, below, and on all sides.
To prevent Ian from dismantling the warheads, they were detonated a kilometer away.
Though a kilometer from ground zero, the power Ian faced was even greater than at the center of the explosion.
"Playing with nukes in front of me?" Ian sneered disdainfully.
Snap!
Ian snapped his fingers.
The fiery explosions began to contract, the forming mushroom clouds shrinking and reverting. The shockwaves and intense light dissipated instantly.
Like time flowing backward, the detonated nuclear warheads restored themselves.
Even Aisha, who knew Ian well, was astonished. "Time reversal?"
Ian enjoyed her awed gaze but explained, "Of course not! Just a little trick from the Master of Elements!"
A process that could have been completed instantly was stretched over five seconds, making it appear even more dramatic.
The ones truly stunned were undoubtedly the Sentinel controllers.
Naturally, Ian wouldn't give them time to react. He snapped his fingers again.
Snap!
The aircraft, warships, Sentinels, and defensive structures on the islands froze and then disintegrated into atoms.
There was no escape, no resistance. It was as if the entire world had frozen in an instant.
Of course, Ian hadn't frozen the world itself. At the moment of his snap, he had gained complete control over the basic atoms composing these objects.
The visual effect was breathtaking, though the range was somewhat limited.
Even with all his power, Ian could only extend his control over a radius of one thousand kilometers—only because this was a timeline branch.
In the main world, Ian estimated his range would be no more than a 100-kilometer radius, and he wouldn't achieve such precise control.
He was still far from snapping away the entire universe.
This thought instantly sobered Ian from his momentary pride.
After collecting the disintegrated atoms into his elemental furnace, Ian and Aisha landed on Honolulu.
Everything man-made on the other islands had been disassembled by Ian earlier. The island beneath their feet was deliberately spared.
Originally the capital of Hawaii, this island was now the Sentinel headquarters.
Its large buildings were mainly steel, while smaller structures were stone or wood. Many bore traces of human life.
But Ian didn't find a single living person on the island.
The traces were fresh, no more than a day old. The island's inhabitants had likely evacuated temporarily.
(End of Chapter)
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