Chapter 603: A Battlefield Like a Meat Grinder

Chapter 603: A Battlefield Like a Meat Grinder

A formation of twelve "Dragonfly" transport planes, serving as bombers, swept over the bombing zone marked on the map.

Once again, the experienced pigman brothers led the formation, piloting the lead plane to navigate ahead, while the remaining eleven wingmen maintained formation beside them.

They fed flight parameters such as altitude, speed, angle of approach, and wind speed into a formula to estimate the approximate bombing distance. The lead plane then signaled the wingmen to drop their bombs, opened the cargo hatch, and the bombardiers simply slid the bombs, already mounted on rails, down one by one.

Though using transport planes to haul bombs was reckless in every sense, the lack of precision could be compensated for by sheer quantity.

One after another, aerial bombs fell like dumplings into the marked urban area, soon igniting bursts of orange-red flames between abandoned roads and high-rise buildings.

Most of the skyscrapers left from the era of prosperity were exceptionally sturdy.

Even after two hundred years of weathering, after a round of carpet bombing, the majority of the buildings still retained their main structural integrity.

Only one hundred-meter-tall tower, likely struck by a bomb on its load-bearing structure, began to slowly collapse northward from one of its middle floors.

Watching the cataclysmic scene and the rolling dust blown through the haze, rising hundreds of meters into the air, Ice and Fire Bro, standing by the cabin window, clicked his tongue in amazement.

"Holy crap... Is all this really necessary for dealing with one sniper?"

Though this was also the approach in reality, it usually involved a single guided missile or a few grenades.

Rarely would anyone go to such lengths, sending an entire bomber formation after a single sniper.

It felt a bit like using a cannon to kill a mosquito.

Unprofessional Fan chuckled snidely, teasing over the comm channel.

"Use that little brain of yours and think: would a mutant use a sniper rifle for a sneak attack? Especially in this thick fog."

Ice and Fire Bro slapped his forehead.

"Ah... Now that you mention it, I get it."

He had subconsciously fallen back into real-world thinking, where such recklessness would never happen, but this was, after all, a game.

Those troublemakers lurking nearby were clearly the little rats of the Torch Church. Whatever scheme they were cooking up, a swift slap would set things right.

The only thing that surprised him was how clear-headed the NPCs were.

Voices from other planes chattered over the comm channel.

"The fog is too thick; we can't see anything on the ground at all."

"Hey, do you think we managed to blow that guy up?"

"That's up to the brothers on the ground to keep their eyes peeled!" Unprofessional Fan laughed heartily, tilting the control stick to lead the bomber formation back toward the ground airport.

After a pause, he added,

"For now, let's think about how we're going to land."

Landing in fog wasn't a big deal for him, but for the rookies, it was another story.

Hopefully, they wouldn't crash too many planes.

Hopefully, the ground crew wouldn't curse them out...

---

The hundred-meter tower snapped in half at its middle, looking from above like a block of tofu cut partway through.

But from the ground, it loomed like a square mountain.

Even though the battlefield was hundreds of meters away, the windblown sand and stones swept over the heads of both sides, raining down like droplets.

The violent gusts momentarily scattered the spore clouds floating in the air.

Mutant soldiers stared wide-eyed, mouths agape at the collapsing tower, swallowing dust without even noticing.

What was happening over there?!

The players, too, momentarily stopped firing, stunned by the spectacle, unable to help exclaiming, "Holy shit!"

"...Awesome! If this were a CG, it'd be epic!"

"666!"

"Epic, my ass!" Shuke, piloting the helicopter, reloaded his machine gun and quipped wryly. "Think about how we're going to get through this first!"

Beta, driving the toy car, lay beside him.

That guy must have thought the thick fog would keep him safe, planning to dash out and show off by fixing the car, only to get his head blown off with a single shot.

He quickly dragged the guy back, but his brains were already splattered—probably sitting at home right now, dumbfounded, with no idea what happened.

The Chimera armored vehicle was stranded in the middle of the road, continuing to lay down suppressive fire toward the mutant positions.

But the mutants had learned their lesson, no longer engaging head-on. Instead, they slipped into the alleys on both sides of the street, infiltrating and encircling them from the flanks.

"Hey, why didn't those flyboys drop a few bombs on our side too?" Shrimp-Hearted Pig wiped the dust off his face and cursed.

Shuke rolled his eyes.

"So you can go bitch on the forums afterward?"

On the other side of the street, the Death Corps brothers crouched, overhearing their grumbling and laughing.

"Make sure Brother Mosquito turns off friendly fire before dropping!"

"Haha!"

"Does this game even have that feature?"

Though trapped in a dead-end alley with no way forward or back, the players defending it showed no sign of tension.

Since the bombers had taken out the distant sniper, it meant command had noticed their situation.

More reinforcements were on the way.

They just had to hold out until they arrived.

The brief respite was shattered by a gunshot.

The two sides in the street fighting resumed their exchange, tracer rounds flickering wildly through the narrow blocks.

Those green-skinned beasts weren't truly stupid. Having finally disabled a fire-spitting metal box, they weren't about to let it go easily.

A hundred-man squad, routed from another frontline, was quickly pulled here, and a horde of roaring mutants charged at it.

If they could tear a gap in the Alliance's offensive, they might salvage this crumbling line of defense.

But standing in their way now wasn't just a broken-down Chimera, but also an expanded hundred-man squad from the Death Corps.

Though their gear wasn't as impressive as other regiments, and their rank wasn't outstanding, every single one of them was a fearless hardcase.

And they were masters of street fighting!

Each of them carried a shotgun or submachine gun; some even wielded bolt-action rifles with bayonets, engaging the mutants in close-quarters combat within the alleys.

A mutant swinging a club had just crushed some poor bastard's skull, but before it could savor the moment, another guy with a shotgun blew its head off.

Other players wrestled with mutants, detonating the explosives strapped to themselves, turning both into a shower of blood in an instant.

Even the mutants, accustomed to a savage, blood-soaked existence, showed a flicker of fear in the face of such brutal tactics.

These people were all madmen!

The alley, a dozen meters long, was piled high with severed limbs and corpses; thick blood and organs had turned it into a dark, murky swamp, while the gunfire showed no sign of abating.

Just as the battle between both sides reached a stalemate, a rapid and compact sound of cannon fire suddenly came from the other side of the street.

"Bang, bang, bang—!"

Long, thick bolts of lightning surged toward the mutants charging out of the alley mouth, their knotted muscles instantly bursting into scattered, fragmented rain of blood.

"Roar—!"

A mutant, bloodshot-eyed, howled as it hurled a lit explosive bundle toward the stranded armored vehicle.

That bulging bundle was as large as a schoolbag, coated in black tar, able to stick to the armor's surface.

"Damn it!"

Shuk, the helicopter pilot, cursed upon seeing this, dropping his machine gun without a second thought and charging forward, yanking the bundle off the armor's surface before throwing himself to the ground.

Almost the moment he hit the ground, the explosion's fire tore him into shreds, clattering against the armored vehicle's plating with a metallic din.

If that had been allowed to detonate on the armor's surface, not just a thin-skinned armored car, even a tank would likely have been wrecked.

The mutant's eyes bulged nearly out of their sockets, clearly not expecting that in just three seconds, the seemingly doomed iron box had been saved.

But there was no time left for its astonishment.

At the same moment the bundle exploded, a burst of armor-piercing incendiary rounds swept over with a bang, instantly shredding it into a pile of gore.

"Shuk!!!"

Watching Shuk blown to nothing, Xia Ren Zhu Xin let out a mournful howl, charging to the alley mouth with an assault rifle and spraying wildly, only to hit nothing but air.

Seeing another armored vehicle bearing down, the mutants realized they had lost their last chance.

The lead mutant let out a howl first, and the minions firing from behind cover cursed harshly as they abandoned their positions and retreated.

Except for a few blood-crazed ones still fighting furiously, most of the green-skinned brutes fell back toward the southern defense line.

Seeing the mutants begin to retreat, Canyon Escape Mole kicked the driver, signaling him to steer his vehicle in front of the stranded Chimera, then sprayed two bursts at the retreating mutant soldiers.

The rear hatch swung open, and Elf King Fugui, Yelena, and their group jumped out, spreading to either side of the armored vehicle, setting up their rifles behind cover.

One player who knew how to repair vehicles grabbed a toolbox and dashed to the stranded Chimera.

He moved aside the corpse of the engineer whose head had been blown off, used tools to pop the hood, and immediately set to work with a wrench and screwdriver.

Half-emerging from the turret, Mole glanced up at the bombed-out district, clicking his tongue.

Then he looked at the player fixing the vehicle and called out.

"How is it? Can you fix it?"

The busy player replied without turning his head.

"The engine casing has a hole... I'll try; it should move, but power might be cut in half."

"Then leave it to you; just get it back to base somehow."

"OK!"

The repair player raised his wrench in acknowledgment. Mole was about to retreat into the armored car when Debt-Big-Eye of the Death Corps walked over, rifle in hand.

Before he could speak, Elf King Fugui's eyes widened as if seeing a rare creature, and he grinned cheekily.

"Yo, Big Eye?! What are you doing here?"

Not catching the undertone, Debt-Big-Eye chuckled smugly.

"Pfft, I've been here four days already!"

Yelena looked back with a comical expression.

"I thought you'd gone off the grid."

"Get lost, you're the one off the grid! Your whole family's off the grid!"

Suddenly understanding the guy's expression, Debt-Big-Eye rolled his eyes in annoyance, then looked up at Mole lounging in the turret and called out.

"Bro, we've got a new mission here, and we're short on hands. You guys free to help?"

Figuring Brother Chicken probably didn't need him and was likely having a blast in his frenzy, Mole looked at him with interest and asked.

"What mission?"

"Support the Burning Corps brothers."

"Those monsters need support?"

"That's what the mission brief says. They ran into trouble in the bombing zone... Can't reach them now. Command thinks it's probably the Torch Church's doing."

Looks like the bombing was for nothing.

Mole stroked his chin.

"Communication jamming?"

Debt-Big-Eye: "Probably."

"Alright, I'll round up a few guys to come along."

Tapping his ear, Mole glanced at the map on his VM and gave calm orders.

"Attention, Groups 2 and 4. New mission. Proceed immediately to the marked point on the map. Also, target area has communication interference—activate backup contact plan!"

The backup plan meant keeping one infantryman offline as a human radio, using group chat to relay frontline intel.

Two crisp replies came through the comm channel.

"Roger!"

Without any hesitation, Mole cut the comm, gave Big Eye a follow-me gesture, and shouted to the brothers on the street.

"You guys hold here. I'll go check the area with the Death Corps brothers and be back."

Rifle trained on the empty street ahead, Elf King Fugui yelled over his shoulder toward the Chimera.

"OK!"

...

At the same time.

Six hundred meters west of the front line, the bombed-out street was a mess, pockmarked with black craters and cracked walls, twisted rebar and concrete flickering with a few dying flames.

Several mangled corpses lay plastered on the ground, likely the remains of strays from the district caught in the blast, leaving only these scraps.

Almost no organic matter exposed outside cover had survived.

Pushing through a broken metal door, Red Tapir emerged from the rubble, his face dark, greedily gulping fresh air only to choke on the acrid gunpowder, coughing violently.

"Damn, that bastard!"

If he hadn't reacted fast enough and retreated with his partner into the sturdy stairwell, he'd have been done for.

Thinking of it, he couldn't help wanting to curse that old geezer—talking only halfway, looking out for himself and bolting.

Anyway, this place was no longer safe; he had to fall back to a secure area...

The moment his right foot hit the street, a sudden warning crept into his mind. Red Tapir instinctively dropped into a roll, hiding behind a concrete wreck by the roadside.

Almost at the very moment he ducked behind the concrete rubble, an arrow struck the spot where he had been standing.

At the sight of that arrow, Red Tapir curled his lip in disdain, yet that sneer had not lingered for half a second before it froze instantly on his face.

From the corner of his eye, he caught a faint glimmer of red light!

“Fuck—”

There was no time to dodge; he only heard a beep, and the arrow instantly burst into a ball of flame, the raging shockwave carrying steel pellets in all directions.

The surging blast slammed into his breastplate, and Red Tapir, taking the hit full-on, felt his innards quake.

Even with the exoskeleton’s protection, he still suffered minor injuries.

With no time to tend to the cuts from the shrapnel, he pulled a smoke grenade, dropped it at his feet, and staggered to another, safer piece of cover.

He tapped the comms button on his helmet and roared into the channel.

“Tang He! Find the bastard who shot that arrow! Tang He?”

No response came through the channel.

Red Tapir’s face stiffened; he instantly realized that Alzu was behind this, and he cursed under his breath.

“That goddamn old bastard…”

The guy was probably about to “unleash the dogs.”

Those underdeveloped-brained creatures couldn’t tell friend from foe; they’d just blindly shove anything that moved into their mouths.

He had to get out of here—fast!

On the other side, watching the one who had dodged the lethal strike, a flicker of surprise crossed Fang Chang’s face—but only surprise.

Trying to run?

“Heh, let’s see where you can run!”

At the same moment the bombardment ended, he and Old Bai, twenty players in total, had arrived by helicopter to sweep the area.

Now that he had pinpointed the target’s location, there was no way he was letting this guy escape.

“Old Bai… target is directly ahead of me, confirmed as a Torch Church Apostle. Position marked on the map. Old Bai?”

Only the crackle of static came through the channel.

Fang Chang’s expression turned grim.

Comms jamming?

“Damn!”

Cursing under his breath, he nocked another explosive arrow onto his Dawnbreaker compound bow, crouched low, and pressed forward toward the cover where the target was hiding.

Nearby teammates must have heard the exchange of fire and were converging on the area.

He had to get to that Apostle before he escaped.

Hold him there!

But just then, a deafening roar pierced the thick fog, and from the street not far off came the rattle of gunfire.

Fang Chang stopped dead in his tracks, whipping his head around—and his pupils shrank to pinpricks.

There, in the middle of the street, stood a bloated giant. Its right arm was a mass of tentacles thick as pythons; its left arm was a hand of steel.

The flesh on its body writhed and swelled like clumps of worms, pulsing with eerie power in the gray-green mist.

Murder Dagger, swinging two fists like iron cauldrons, drove a heavy punch into its chest, the exhaust vents on his shoulder blades spitting nitrogen-acceleration flames.

But that force, enough to flip an armored vehicle, only sent ripples across the mound of maggot-flesh.

The bloated giant let out a dull, mournful cry, yet did not take a single step back.

Through the haze, Fang Chang heard Murder Dagger’s strange yell.

“Holy shit?! What the hell is this thing—”

Before he could finish, a lightning-fast tentacle lashed across his chest, sending him flying like a baseball. He hit the ground hard and lay still.

Fang Chang stared at the monster, unable to look away, and swallowed hard.

“The Butcher…?”

No—

This thing was even more grotesque than the mutant slime fruiting body in Clearspring City!

Not only was it several times larger, its destructive power had clearly jumped more than an order of magnitude! It was somewhat like that evolved form from the previous wave.

Seeing the mountain of flesh lumbering toward Murder Dagger, Fang Chang knew he couldn’t wait any longer. Without hesitation, he loosed an arrow straight at the monster’s face.

The explosive blast erupted across its visage, blowing its head to pieces and sending them flying.

Fang Chang blinked in surprise.

His explosive arrow only carried a few dozen grams of charge—maybe a bit more than a standard fragmentation grenade.

Since when was it this powerful?

But as he expected, things weren’t that simple.

The headless monster acted as if nothing had happened; its massive body didn’t even sway.

Then, the writhing clumps of flesh, as if controlled by some autonomous will, slithered like earthworms up to the shoulders of the meat-mountain.

In less than ten seconds, an abstract head had regrown on the empty shoulders. And looking closely at the blasted remains, they weren’t skull fragments at all—just worm-like chunks of meat.

Some were blown apart, but more were still alive.

Abandoned, they stubbornly twisted their broken bodies, crawling back toward the meat-mountain, as if trying to rejoin that body.

Watching this unbelievable sight, Fang Chang’s eyes went wide.

What the hell kind of insane black tech is this?!

And where did this thing come from?!

What made his scalp crawl even more was—

Those hollow eyes were looking at him.

Though dozens of meters away, though through layers of gray-green mist, Fang Chang could clearly feel that he had successfully pulled the boss’s aggro.

The tentacles undulated like seaweed floating in shallow water—but he had seen how fast they could move.

Murder Dagger, who had taken one hit, still hadn’t gotten up!

“Another boss fight, huh…”

A fighting spirit slowly kindled in Fang Chang’s eyes. He drew another arrow from his quiver, this one with an orange label, and nocked it onto his mechanical compound bow.

It was a fire arrow packed with solid hydrogen and high-performance kerosene, capable of easily creating a fire zone several meters wide.

If explosions won’t work—

Then fire it is!

……

Several hundred meters from the bombing zone, on a certain building, Alzu stood in a different spot, his face expressionless as he watched the bustling city, a cold smirk suddenly curling at the corner of his mouth.

He didn’t expect that a mere servant could hold back the Alliance’s most elite troops—no need to think twice, those guys were from the Burning Legion.

Still, causing a bit of chaos to help that fool from the Tribunal escape was more than enough.

Though he didn’t much care for those two incompetents who could never accomplish anything but always managed to ruin everything, if they didn’t die in the bombing but were captured alive, it would be a nuisance for him.

He hoped they might learn a little lesson from this failure and rein in their overweening confidence just a bit.

Their enemies were no easy match, completely different from those dull-witted natives.

That 404 Shelter, which even he had never heard of, might well prove more dangerous than the Corporation and the Academy combined.

A year ago, the fools of the Tribunal should have understood this truth.

Just then, footsteps sounded behind him.

An old man, stooped and with a face crisscrossed by wrinkles, walked up and stopped behind him.

The old man’s skin was a dark green, and he wore a ceremonial robe with bizarre patterns.

From his appearance alone, one could tell he was a mutant.

Yet, just by looking, no one could guess how long he had lived.

Gazing at Alzu’s back, he let out a soft sigh, lowered his eyes slightly, and spoke.

“The Alliance’s men seem endless for no reason; our tribe has suffered heavy losses. At this rate, I fear we may lose this war.”

Alzu turned to look at the aged mutant, fixing his gaze on those cloudy eyes, and suddenly spoke.

“Gomo.”

“What is it?”

“Do you wish to restore the glory of Singularity City?”

His voice carried a hint of seduction.

Gomo frowned slightly, then relaxed his brow and said softly.

“I dream of it.”

“Then persuade your child for me.”

Alzu withdrew his gaze from the old man’s face, looked back toward the distant city shrouded in thick fog, narrowed his eyes slightly, and continued.

“Ask him to hold on just a little longer.”

“Soon, the Saint will grant him power rivaling that of the gods.”