The air was distorted by the heat as flames leaped through the bushes, the acrid smell of gasoline permeating the surroundings. A melted bumper fell to the ground with a clang. Akabane woke from her unconscious state, her eyelashes fluttering as the blurry world before her slowly came into focus.
Her gaze sharpened on a spot not far away. The entire transport vehicle had tumbled into the valley during the earlier impact and now lay on its side. Half of a man's body had slid out of the cockpit, his head charred and mangled on one side.
She shook her head, swaying as she stood up. Forcing herself to endure the sharp pain racking her body, she set out to find her squad members.
A piercing gunshot shattered the silence of the forest.
"Don't come over! Don't come over!"
A youth screamed, pointing his gun at the predators closing in on him. His hands and feet were so weak they refused to obey his commands. For the first time, he felt that the Zerg, which he could easily cleave through with a blade during training, were as massive as small mountains.
His throat worked as fear completely occupied his heart. Despair drove him to turn the muzzle of the gun toward himself.
A loud bang echoed. By the time Akabane arrived, the youth had collapsed. Watching a squad member she had spent months with die and be devoured by predators, she said nothing. She simply moved quickly to search the area, and soon enough, she found a second squad member.
The boy's lower body had already been swallowed by the Zerg, leaving behind a stark white skeletal frame. Several small predators clung to his waist, feasting on his flesh. He raised his gun muzzle numbly, but the bullets simply bounced off the predators' carapaces. His eyes were vacant.
"Weakness... where is their weakness? I can't find it... I can't find it..."
Akabane dealt with the Zerg and looked at the boy leaning against a rock, who had no hope of survival. Meeting his gaze as a flicker of hope rekindled in his eyes, she simply knelt down and used her medical knowledge to treat his wounds.
It was impossible to stop the boy's bleeding. His blood flowed incessantly, scalding hot. No matter how much Akabane tightened the bandages, the blood would immediately soak through the yellowed cloth, seeping out from angles she hadn't even considered.
"Captain..."
Only after the boy's final, faint murmur faded did Akabane stand up to continue searching for the remaining squad members.
She did not find Jiang Miao. Perhaps the other had survived the ambush.
The thick scent of iron filled her nostrils. She walked to a cave, leaning against the wall as she slowly sat down. She spoke into the communicator, which was emitting electronic static, reporting her squad's situation over and over again.
It wasn't until the blood dried on her hands that she finally put the radio down. There was still no response from the other side. Something seemed to have happened at the camp; not just her, but many squads had their communications cut off. Some had encountered sudden ambushes like them, while others were en route to provide support. Everything was in total chaos, and no one could spare a thought for her.
Akabane hid her head between her knees. In her mind, the huge black shadow that had attacked the transport vehicle flashed by. She had seen its appearance in the very last second.
It was a Wasp Frenzy Striker, with developed mandibles and geniculate antennae, looking like a hybrid of a wasp and a peregrine falcon. Its streamlined abdomen was packed with compressed bio-lipids. Its unique physiological structure allowed this type of Zerg to slam into targets at four hundred kilometers per hour and detonate the bio-lipids inside, with a kill radius comparable to the most advanced aerial bombs.
Under normal circumstances, such medium-tier Zerg would not appear outside of a Tower City battlefield.
Just as Akabane was thinking about how to leave this place, the signal on her communicator was restored.
"Akabane, where are you now?" Snow Crow Ji's urgent voice came through.
"Mount Efeng, coordinates 1991, -2604. My squad was ambushed by Zerg. All members, including the squad staff officer, have been lost," Akabane repeated the statement.
"Those coordinates... the two surviving members of the Wayfarer squad are heading in your direction."
"Understood. I will go and rendezvous with them," Akabane said.
"Rendezvous, my ass! What you need to do now is get away from them immediately and find a way to leave Mount Efeng. Did you receive the coordinates I sent you? Go there. I'll send people to pick you up. Those two are very dangerous; we can't determine if they've defected."
The communication signal was cut off again. Left without a response from Akabane, Snow Crow Ji was frantic, unable to stop herself from swearing again. Her ferocious expression made the nearby technicians tremble.
It had been a long time since they had seen the woman lose her composure like this.
On the other side, Akabane returned to the transport vehicle and gathered her supplies. Looking at the coordinates the woman had sent—which were slowly fading on the communicator screen—Akabane pulled out her Spider-Gu Fang, placed it at her waist, and then walked toward a different direction without looking back....
Before dawn broke, a small heavy mechanized unit traveled south along the highway. The firepower from flamethrowers and machine gun turrets poured out continuously, repelling the Zerg swarms rushing in from both sides. Tank shells exploded against large predators, the flames instantly destroying their surface armor before consuming them. Occasionally, missiles would fly out, locking onto Zerg nests dozens of kilometers away and destroying them.
Heavy armaments escorted several research scholars. Even under such protection, the scholars' faces remained solemn. They were encrypting and uploading the research results they had spent half their lives on. Under the Zerg's technological blockade, information transmission within Tower City was subject to delays, and the technology level of the outside world likely had a generational gap compared to the cutting-edge results inside the city.
This precious knowledge would become the kindling for the continuation of civilization.
"Why are you all so stiff-faced? Come on, you Red Heaven citizens, there's no need to be so tense. They're just some bugs. They're nothing against the firepower of these heavy weapons. If one shell doesn't solve it, then use two."
At that moment, a mercenary from Alphas inside the car spoke half-jokingly.
Watching the mangled Zerg swarms being torn apart and letting out shrieks outside the window, he still had the leisure to chew gum. His hands were even more restless as he picked up a camera and flashed a peace sign at the window.
There was nothing in his contract saying he couldn't take photos near military facilities. With core technology involved, no one could replicate it even if the blueprints were dropped right in front of them. So-called strategic deterrence had long lost its meaning given that Red Heavy Industries held a total monopoly.
"They say you people from Red Heaven are old-fashioned. No one could win a smiling contest against a Red Heaven citizen."
"Alphas sissy," a soldier said coldly, unable to stand his affected behavior. "Shut your mouth. If you say one more word of bullshit, I'll break your nose."
The mercenary didn't care. He leisurely shared the photo to his personal space, instantly attracting thousands of viewers.
He was also a blogger with hundreds of thousands of followers, specializing in filming battlefields from his perspective as a mercenary. Occasionally, he would even use a sub-account to start a livestream on the battlefield.
The most insane time was during the internal company war between Red Heavy Industries and Universal Heavy Industries, where he livestreamed himself running naked and screaming amidst the artillery fire.
Suddenly, a massive boom echoed as the entire armored vehicle began to shake violently. Every soldier inside lost their balance in an instant. The mercenary, who hadn't realized what was happening, fell flat on his face, nosebleed gushing out.
"What's the situation?"
He looked up only to find that everyone who had recovered from the shaking had faces that were pale to the extreme, as if the worst-case scenario had occurred.
"Fuck, it's a Toxic Ravager Chariot!"
"Toxic..." the mercenary murmured breathlessly. "Chariot?"
Rate on N.U.
