Chapter 26
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Translator: 8uhl
Chapter: 26
Chapter Title: Capturing the Munitions Factory
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The regular zombie, tracing a beautiful arc through the air, smacked right into the Destroyer's face.
A brief silence fell. The only thing moving was the regular zombie lodged in the Destroyer's face, wriggling feebly.
One second, two seconds, three seconds passed like that.
The Destroyer's hand roughly grabbed the regular zombie.
Then it hoisted it up high...
Splat!
And slammed it straight into the ground. The regular zombie was reduced to a pulp. It could only twitch. Snapping out of it, I spun around and scrambled back down the way I'd come.
Roooar!
Roaring furiously, it started chasing after me. It seemed seriously pissed off. Normally, these things had a strong sense of camaraderie with other zombies and wouldn't attack their own kind.
At least it wasn't using its heavy weaponry yet—that was a small mercy. But the zombies I'd bodied earlier grabbed at my ankles. This time, I kicked them away.
Kweeeek.
Even Cheon Su-hyung would have praised the kicks as the zombies went flying.
No time to deal with these trash mobs!
Climbing to the fourth floor via the main stairs was out of the question now. That left the emergency stairs at the far end of the building.
Rounding the corner, I pulled out my shotgun. First things first—I needed to deal with the Destroyer hot on my tail. The moment its blue bulk came into view, I squeezed the trigger.
The buckshot slammed into the Destroyer's body. No, it didn't slam in—it...
Ting!
Bounced right off. Sure, its defense was insane, but not enough to shrug off a shotgun blast like that. Peeking through the tatters of its clothing was a slightly dented iron plate armor.
Cassiopeia.
Engraved with the name of Cassiopeia Corporation—probably a power suit from the munitions factory. Damn it, what was I supposed to do against a monster decked out in power armor?
No time for commentary. I whipped around and bolted. Blocking it only worked if my attacks did something, and right now, I had no way to beat it.
Its heavy weapon spat fire. Tung-tung-tung. Was it planning to level the entire factory? A series of pings rang out as my ass started burning.
It deflected them, but the friction still jarred me through. Still, I ran for my life and made it to the second-floor emergency stairs. A quick glance back—no sign of it.
No, just as that blue mass appeared at the far end, I slammed the stairwell door shut. I climbed the emergency stairs to the fourth floor.
The regular zombies patrolling the fourth floor charged at me, teeth clacking. Ignoring them just like before, I made it to the admin room.
Hesitating in front of the admin terminal, I reached out and punched in the code.
「Please enter the password.」
I input the password. Normally, you'd have to scour the factory, find a dead researcher's note with the code, but as a veteran, I already knew it.
「aiepoissac」
The password was Cassiopeia spelled backward.
「Please enter the secondary password.」
This time, a picture puzzle appeared instead of numbers. 19x19—361 pieces. But I breezed through it. A veteran who couldn't handle this should just log off and die.
Once the puzzle was solved, the terminal began scanning me.
「Verifying administrator identity.」
「Identity mismatch.」
「Opening the admin room and activating defense systems.」
The moment the message popped up, I yanked open the admin room door. Power was still on inside—the main computer was humming. Graaah, graaah. A zombie crawled out from under the desk.
I smashed it with the crowbar nearby. Thwack! Its head burst like a balloon as it collapsed. Experience gain message confirmed, I quickly booted up the monitor.
It showed feeds from the connected security cameras. The inside of the building was total chaos. Chaos courtesy of what? The defense systems.
Android robots were handling that duty.
Of course, these weren't the high-performance AIs I wanted to build, capable of complex tasks—they were just basic units programmed to slaughter intruders...
And there were plenty of intruders inside. The androids' mounted firearms were massacring the regular zombies.
A scene came up of the Destroyer that had been chasing me putting up a fierce fight. Its heavy weapon roared, turning four or five androids into scrap heaps.
But four or five more androids immediately filled the gap. A rocket launcher on one fired. Whoosh. The screen went black amid the rocket's whoosh.
It was probably dead. Even a Destroyer couldn't shrug off a point-blank rocket launcher.
Anyway... I hurriedly pulled out Queen's AI module.
No time to waste. Once the zombies inside were wiped out, who'd be next? I knew the obvious answer. I placed my hand on the system mainframe and synthesized the AI module.
「Used Metal Transformation (Lv.4) to synthesize AI module, Queen, with Mysterious Computer x1.」
「Synthesis failed.」
「Foreign object detected. Shutting down power.」
The computer died instantly. My heart pounded like mad. Any second now, that door would burst open, a rocket launcher incoming...
That dread.
I frantically used Metal Decomposition to break down the AI module and mysterious computer. Then I tried synthesizing again.
「Used Metal Transformation (Lv.4) to synthesize AI module, Queen, with Mysterious Computer x1.」
「Synthesis successful.」
「Metal Transformation (Lv.4) experience greatly increased.」
Thank god—it worked this time.
Or did it?
An Asian woman stood beside me, staring at me with an expressionless face.
「Queen has acquired new power. This is enough to temporarily activate Queen, but without a stable power source, it will eventually suffer power shortages.」
"I'll get that power source soon."
With Sirius-2, and converting the munitions factory's interior into a power facility, I could generate plenty for Queen.
「Acknowledged. Please issue new commands to Queen.」
"Wipe out the zombies inside."
「Attempting to seize main system.
Success.」
It happened in no time flat. Queen was something else...
「Attempting to seize defense systems. Failed.」
"??"
「Due to Cassiopeia Corporation's robust defense systems, Queen cannot seize them.」
「Seizure failure will cause defense systems to go berserk in 32 seconds.」
Berserk? No idea what that meant exactly, but it sure as hell wasn't good. Panicking, I said to Queen,
"Uh, do something."
「The only option is to make the defense systems self-destruct.」
"Self-destruct?"
I hesitated, but there was no other way.
"Make them self-destruct."
Shame, but if I couldn't use them anyway, it was whatever. Once my mech factory tree was done, I could churn out androids like that easily.
Explosions boomed from outside.
「Defense systems have self-destructed 57 security drones.」
「Job experience increased. (Solo party bonus +150%) (Massacre bonus +200%) (Chain kill bonus +200%) (First elite zombie kill bonus +300%)」
「Job level increased to 19.」
「Job level increased to 20.」
I was dumbfounded again. What the hell was this?
I checked the security cameras for the interior scene. That's when I understood the "explosive level-up." Zombies caught in the security drones' self-destructs were dying left and right.
Even the Destroyers that had come inside from outside weren't spared.
Since the drones self-destructed under my command, killing the zombies, the experience all rolled to me.
Anyway, to sum it up...
'Jackpot.'
Meanwhile, skill messages kept popping.
「Metal Transformation level increased to 5.」
「Metal Reinforcement level increased to 4.」
「Metal Decomposition level increased to 3.」
Every skill I had leveled up.
「Acquired Metal Generation (Lv.1).」
And I even picked up a new one: Metal Generation. Exactly what it sounded like—generate usable metal.
Not super practical until high levels, but damn handy if I ever got trapped somewhere.
「Interior fires extinguished. Please issue new commands to Queen.」
"Hm, seal the main entrance and check for any zombies inside."
「Command acknowledged. There are currently two zombies inside the munitions factory.」
A security camera feed popped up. One was a regular zombie—body blown to bits, just a head left clacking its teeth furiously. The other was a Destroyer.
It looked more intact than expected. Armor cracked, clothes torn in places, but its body was fine. And it was pissed, huffing and puffing.
「Queen estimates no security drones were nearby.」
Meaning it survived the self-destructs unscathed.
"Any security drones left?"
「None.」
In other words, it was on me to take it down. I sighed. Fine, worth it. The munitions factory was stacked with weapons—plenty to use against it.
I left the admin room and rummaged through the space. Weapons everywhere. No high-tech laser guns, but more than enough for one Destroyer.
I hefted a heavy machine gun.
The so-called Rambo gun. Bulky and heavy beyond a standard MG, but with Aegis on and hitting level 20, I handled it easily.
Fully prepped, I slowly headed toward the Destroyer.
There it was—the blue giant. Before it could react, I pulled the trigger.
Tr-tr-tr-tr-tr.
The roar echoed as bullets hammered its body relentlessly. Tough bastard kept fighting even as they tore in...
But it couldn't withstand the barrage and finally crumpled to the floor.
'Whew.'
「Job experience increased. (Solo party bonus +150%)」
Experience message received, I flopped onto the floor. Done. I'd claimed the munitions factory. Faster and easier than expected.
Well, easy might be a stretch.
Now, just had to move supplies from the plastics factory.