Chapter 653: Cruel Massacre
The strong smell of blood in the air and the cruel scene before them, which went far beyond ordinary predation, plunged all the Na'vi who witnessed it into immense shock, grief, and terror.
"This was not the work of beasts!" Tsu'tey was the first to let out a roar of rage. His voice trembled with extreme anger, the veins on his neck bulging from agitation. "The hunters of the forest kill to survive, but they would never commit such... such desecration! This is not hunting, this is a massacre! It is torture!"
Eytukan looked at the valiant warriors who had once fought alongside him, now reduced to such a miserable end. His fists were clenched tight, his nails digging so deeply into his tough palms that they almost pierced the skin.
His golden eyes burned with a raging fire that seemed ready to erupt: "It is the Sky People! Only them! Only those cruel, irreverent Sky People would use this... this method of defiling the dignity of life to flaunt their military might and attempt to break our will!"
The long-accumulated sorrow within the migration column, the piercing pain of losing their home, was completely detonated in this moment by this highly insulting, bloody tragedy, instantly transforming into towering, undisguised hatred toward the Sky People.
Even the voices that, under Sutai's influence, had previously leaned toward temporarily avoiding battle to preserve the tribe's bloodline, were now drowned out by this naked atrocity, which was perceived as a signal of genocide.
Fear was replaced by a much greater wrath.
"They took our Hometree, and now they hunt and torture us like prey!" Tsu'tey raised his sharp spear high, letting out a deafening roar at the growing, infuriated crowd of his people. "Evading will not buy us survival; it will only bring more death and humiliation! We cannot keep running! We must fight!"
"We must let all the clans—let the Tipani, let the Windwalkers, let every clan that listens to the songs of Eywa know the true, cruel face of the Sky People!"
"Even if we are destined to bleed our last drop of blood, we will make them pay a price for this atrocity that they will never forget!"
His words were like a raging fire thrown onto dry firewood, instantly igniting the desire to fight in almost every Na'vi present.
No further mobilization was needed. Tsu'tey and his most radical warriors immediately sprang into action.
They dispatched their most agile Ikran riders, carrying emergency war-summoning tokens stained with the symbolic blood of their murdered brethren and bark sketches depicting the massacre, speeding toward the known directions of several large Na'vi clans. Their furious calls echoed through the air.
Jake stood in the enraged crowd. Looking at the upside-down corpses of his brethren, which had been cruelly stripped of their tissues and missing their skulls and spines, his stomach churned violently, almost making him vomit.
A cold chill shot up from the soles of his feet straight to the top of his head, making his entire body go numb.
He could not believe, nor could he understand, that his own kind, humans who shared similar bloodlines with him, could actually commit such a deranged act that completely crossed the bottom line of his comprehension.
A profound sense of shame that threatened to drown him, along with an intense feeling of rejection toward his own human identity, reached its peak at this moment.
He looked at the hate-ignited eyes of the tribe members around him and found that he couldn't even utter a single weak word of defense for humanity, as if any excuse would be a desecration of the tragic scene before him and the souls of the dead.
Amidst this chaos and anger, Sutai suppressed her inner fear, disgust, and equally surging wrath, quietly retreating to the edge of the crowd.
Her reason was screaming. Although this atrocity was cruel, the deliberateness and sense of ritual it revealed did not match the RDA's style of pursuing efficiency and deterrence as she knew it.
An ominous premonition gripped her.
She had to find out the truth, otherwise the entire race might be dragged into an abyss of eternal damnation.
Using the acoustic wave generator she had previously agreed upon with Rei Ayanami, which mimicked the frequency of a specific forest bird, she sent out intermittent communication signals representing the highest level of emergency toward the unknown distance amidst the noise and angry roars.
She prayed in her heart that the special Sky Person girl could receive it and bring a trace of clear information different from this bloody fog before her.
Inside the Trailblazer mobile base, Ryo received the emergency report from Rei Ayanami.
"Sutai sent a message. The Omaticaya clan's migration column encountered an unknown attack. Five warriors were killed, their bodies flayed, their skulls and spines removed, and hung upside down for public display."
"The Na'vi believe it was done by the RDA, and their emotions are extremely enraged. The militant faction has already begun contacting other clans with the intention of launching a full-scale retaliation."
Listening to this description, Ryo furrowed his brows slightly.
This cruel and highly ritualistic method of killing did not align with the RDA's operational style as he knew it.
The RDA pursued efficiency and deterrence, typically using direct means like explosions and gunfire, or like Quaritch, pursuing head-on annihilation. But this method, which was almost like a hunting display, seemed far too deliberate and primitive.
At almost the exact same time, Maine also sent a message from the Hell's Gate base, his tone grave: "Sir, something happened on the RDA side as well. A small reconnaissance outpost located on the edge of the mountainous region to the northwest lost contact."
"When the rescue team arrived, they found all six soldiers inside the outpost dead. The state of their deaths... is similar to the Na'vi encounter described by Rei Ayanami. They were flayed, their skulls and spines removed, and the bodies were posed in an extremely humiliating manner."
"Colonel Quaritch is furious. He is convinced it is a retaliatory act by the Na'vi and is currently assembling troops, preparing to carry out a large-scale extermination operation."
Both sides had been attacked with the same methods, and both firmly believed it was the other's doing.
Ryo immediately realized the severity of the problem.
This was absolutely not a simple misunderstanding or a cycle of revenge.
An unknown, cruel third-party faction was operating in the shadows of Pandora, and its goal seemed to be provoking an endless, full-scale war between the RDA and the Na'vi.
"We must stop the situation from escalating," Ryo's voice was calm and decisive. "This unknown interference will completely disrupt my layout."
He needed the Na'vi to be divided and controllable, not an unpredictable full-scale conflict manipulated by a third party.
He quickly issued orders: "Rei Ayanami, contact Sutai immediately. Emphasize to her that the attack did not come from the main RDA forces. Tell her that the RDA side was also subjected to the exact same attack."
"Demand that she must convince Eytukan to send representatives to hold an emergency meeting with the RDA side, to confront each other face-to-face and clear up the misunderstanding."
"Maine, you are responsible for convincing Colonel Quaritch. Show him the evidence we have regarding the Na'vi being attacked in the same way."
"Tell him that an unknown faction is trying to provoke a war."
"If he insists on launching an attack, he will only fall into a trap and cause greater losses. Advise him to send trusted representatives to verify the situation face-to-face with the Na'vi."