Chapter 177
Chapter 177
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Translator: Vine
Chapter: 177
Chapter Title: Chapter 10 Lead and Silver Coins (31)
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Screeeeech-!!!!
Bang! Clang!
“Hey, l-let’s turn around! We can’t break through this!”
“Shut up and find the mines! The rear armor’s weaker than the front, so the second we show our ass, those sniper bastards will come swarming!”
Unfortunately, the breakthrough team including Ian and Ezel wasn’t faring much better, making someone’s desperate wish from across the wasteland—being chased by a rabid tiger—seem downright optimistic.
The tank-grade armor they’d trusted was shredded to hell. The reinforced front windshield, layered thick enough to tint the view blue, was spiderwebbed with cracks so bad they could barely make out what lay ahead. And the supposedly indestructible elastic alloy tires had shards from a nearby exploded mine embedded deep, dragging their speed way down.
“What kind of lunatics are these that they can snipe off cutting-edge tank armor with self-repair functions...?”
“Means they’re way beyond your average wasteland gunmen. The hasty mods left weak points where the vehicle and armor connect—”
Crunch!
“—that!”
“Gahhhh!”
“Quit screaming and read the radar! If we hit another one, we’re really fucked!”
“—42 degrees, 13 meters! 15 degrees, 28 meters! 1.2 degrees... 7 meters!”
“Goddamn 7 meters—you should’ve said something sooner!”
Screeeeech-!
Boom!
The moment Ian yanked the wheel hard, the ground nearby erupted, machine-gun-like shrapnel rattling the truck cab.
‘...We’re being herded. Their aim’s top-notch, but they’re pros at setup too. We might actually die here...’
Not pressure-triggered ones that blew on contact, but remote mines they could detonate at will. They’d harass with sniper fire, and when the radar showed danger zones to dodge—
Boom!
Kabloom!
Booooom!
Screeeeech—thud!
“Fuck! I’ve never seen mine herding this insane since the day I was born!”
Dozens of shock mines laid in the direction they veered exploded in sync, the shockwave shoving the vehicle by force. Good thing it was a heavy armed truck—they half-lifted before regaining balance. A standard combat vehicle would’ve flipped from the blast alone.
‘Dust’s too thick to see, but they’re almost here. Barely any gap between shots and impacts—maybe 100, 200 meters tops. And if they’ve been herding us right...’
Beep! Beep-beep! Beep!
“Hey, h-hey, this...!”
Ezel started calling out mine coords but trailed off, speechless.
The smoke cleared to reveal a rocky hill. The exosuit’s radar lit up with mines blanketing the approach—no room for even one person to pass.
“No more hiding now. They just dumped whole mine crates and spread ’em out. Looks like they’re pressed on that side too? Sloppy at the end.”
“If you don’t wanna end up as meat chunks from that sloppy minefield, do something! Reverse! Reverse, goddamn it!”
“I’ve told you, they’re remote, not impact. They’ve probably mined our whole path back too. That’s why they blew so many to trap us here. No way they let us out easy.”
He loved explosives, sure, but this level of waste wasn’t Ian’s style.
‘The modded truck’s armor is too tough for snipers to pierce outright. It’s beat to shit in spots, but key plates are holding. They wanna pin us immobile and pound us... Hm. So the exit mines are about here? Back up, and the rear wheels lift first—flip like a turtle, expose the weak underbelly for pounding.’
Bang! Bang-bang!
Crunch! Crack!
Thud!
No time left for thinking or maneuvering. Enemy rounds finally punched through the layered reinforced glass into the cab.
“...It, it penetrated. Fuck, a bullet’s in the seat!”
“They switched to close-range penetrators.”
Amid the smoke and dust, sniper rounds hammered the windshield relentlessly. Not echoes—shots so close they stabbed straight into their ears.
Ian hesitated a beat, then flung open the driver’s door, yanked the fidgeting Ezel by the collar into the seat.
“Wahhh! You’re insane...! Where’re you going!”
“Keep the tires spinning idle. Don’t let me be seen.”
No answer—he dove into the minefield and sniper zone.
He slid under the truck fast. Dirt kicked up behind him. Screeeeech—the improvised smoke screen billowed thick around the vehicle.
‘Not enough to hide a big truck... but plenty for one guy moving from the rear blind spot. Let’s see. If I planted these... definitely around here...’
Ian hustled to his pre-planned spot. Right behind where they’d pinned the vehicle. If he’d designed this minefield, regardless of enemy armor, he’d pack impact mines here to shove them forward no matter what.
Scrrrch—
Sweeping dust revealed the flat, concave shape of impact mines. A feral grin split Ian’s face. What came next was even crazier than the shit his psycho buddy pulled daily.
Vehicle-delay impact mines—each could obliterate anything under 1.5 tons in a 15-meter radius. Prime stuff piled up right here—how could he not use it?
Ian scooped every visible one, slithered back under the idling truck, and placed them meticulously. Drawing on old destructive engineering knowledge from his bomb-and-arson days, one by one, carefully. Some right under the axles. Others propped on small rocks for a slight tilt.
In a minute, he crammed fifteen scraped-up impact mines under the truck. Finally, he dropped the tank-armor tread covers and triggered the metal tires’ maintenance mode to deflate them, sinking the truck. Tires slack, undercarriage half-sealed like a chamber—he confirmed, then bolted to the cargo bay.
Bang bang bang!
“Hey, Ezel! It’s set—get over here and power the suit!”
Bang!
Crack!
“Set my ass! You prepping to die or what!”
“...Kinda! Hurry out!”
“Kinda? What, you carve your tombstone already!”
“Too late for that if you dawdle, scaredy-cat!”
“...Fuck, all you BDSM psychos are the goddamn same...!”
Cursing every god he knew under his breath, Ezel rolled to the vehicle’s rear.
What he saw: Ian in the suit’s auxiliary battery slot, arms full of weapons from the truck. And in his hands, fiddling...
“Y-you madman! Why the hell’d you grab that! Drop it now!”
“Won’t blow, idiot. I yanked the remote trigger first. Figured we needed one to start.”
A concave impact mine.
The mines that had tormented them relentlessly. And the steel-jawed bastard grinning as he tinkered with it.
Ezel suddenly recalled the guy’s tendencies—and got very uneasy.
To him, pins were for pulling, powder for detonating. Buttons for pressing, bullets for firing, no matter what. Using a mine... against the sniper on that distant hill... why?
“Trigger?”
“Yeah. They’re not dumb—smoke’ll tip ’em we’re up to something. No time to tweak the ones under, so rough-placed ’em, and this one kicks it off.”
“Tweak the ones under?”
Ezel’s dread spiked. [Tweak the ones under.] The psycho’s tweaking mines. “Ones” means same as what he’s holding now—and ones he hasn’t touched yet. So he planted live enemy mines under their feet, ready to blow anytime...
Grab!
“Wh-what! You’re crazy!”
“You’re the crazy one! Die alone if you wanna, Metaljaw! We’re dodging mines, not hauling ’em!!”
“I said it won’t blow! It was on our reverse line! Blows if we back up—safe if we stay put!”
“Looks like you don’t know shit about ‘safe’! ‘Safe’ means kicking back in a warm house, peeling fruit, chuckling at someone else’s stream! Not pinned under sniper barrage on a mine pile they can detonate anytime! This... this is just insane!”
Ezel wasn’t stupid. Sudden sag in the vehicle. Impact mines under the truck. Ian’s “trigger.” This lunatic planned to chain-detonate them, blasting the truck into that rocky ravine!
“You know flying from a normal mine explosion gets you labeled ‘dead,’ right? Huh?!”
“Listen, you shriveled-ball coward! No other way out of this! Trust me! Back in my pussy days, I yanked thousands of 5mm rounds to blow a building! Sprayed forty fingernail-sized plasma rods to win 50-to-1! Don’t doubt the expert! Snipers’ll bail before we close anyway! No other way to rush ’em this fast!”
“Damn... dammitttt!!!”
Whirr—clunk!
Ezel powered the exosuit, tears of blood in his mind. Spilled milk now. Unless he shot the pyro’s head off—which’d likely get his own skull ventilated first—the guy would execute his mad plan.
Whoosh—click!
Ian saw Ezel ready, slapped a makeshift timed fuze on the mine, tossed it behind the truck, slammed the cargo door, and dove into the battery slot.
Tick. Tick.
Eons in seconds.
“...One question.”
“12 seconds.”
“Not that. Those 5mm powder and plasma rod stunts you mentioned... friendly casualties?”
“...!”
Ian hesitated—uncharacteristic. But as Ezel eyed the rear with dread, that creepy grin appeared.
Heh.
“...Sorry in advance.”
“For wha—?”
“No need to know. You’ll be in shape to accept it by then.”
.
.
.
.
.
.
“Ah.”
Comprehension snapped Ezel’s sanity.
“You fuckeeeeer!!!”
“Krahaha! Get used to it, Cherry! Professor’s got you marked! No matter how you squirm, you’re in for dozens more of this madness! Embrace it! Join BDSM’s bosom, Ezel!”
“Gahhhh!!! God! Buddha! Jesus! Confucius! Chancellor! Mong! Kimi! Jim! Nadella! Mom I never meeeeet!!!”
Ezel spotted the stimulant jab Ian had slipped into his thigh amid the sting—wailing in advance for the tragedy ahead.
Click—
Reeeeee—!!!!!
Ezel’s screams harmonized with the impact mine’s energy buildup whine.
Thoom—
“Gh—!”
No time to think “it blew”—sheer shock and g-force hit. Ezel dangled mute from the controls. Cargo bay hid the outside, but the midair chill and gut tickle screamed it. Freefall terror too.
Whoooosh—
Zone 38 executioner snipers—cold pros—panicked at the sight.
Their perfectly trapped turtle of a truck vanished in dust—then rocketed skyward.
Whoosh—whoosh—whoosh—
A person jumping wouldn’t faze them. Vets, seen all wasteland weirdness. But a spinning hand-axe of a huge truck? Reinforced frame, tank plating slathered on—a mad beast hurtling straight at them. Right at their position!
“It’s... flying... here?”
Mumbles spread panic to chaos among the snipers.
“Enemy air support!”
“Scatter! To the next perch—”
“Gahhh! Flying truck!”
Whoosh—whoosh—whoosh—
BOOM!
Ian—unrivaled wasteland destructive engineer—nailed the drop with minimal error.
Shock separated cab and cargo, but(?) they landed smack in enemy central.
Scraaaape, whirr—thud!
Screeeeech—
Cargo bay wedged in settled. Half-torn door creaked open on a hulking figure.
Whirr—clank!
“Gahhh! Gahhh! Gaaaaahhh!”
“Krahaha! Told ya you’d bite your tongue!”
Out burst Ezel, foaming red blood-staunch mix like a maniac, and Ian leaping from the battery slot, hefting a massive machine gun.
“Been a while, ugly bitches—!”
Snipers snapped to, raising barrels—but prepped Ian was faster.
Rrrrratatatatatatat!
“Krahaha! Return fire on your grand welcome!!!”
Snipers shredded in seconds; he suppressed the rest behind cover.
“Cherry! Pull your one-man weight or we all die!”
“Gahhh! Aaaahhh!”
Tongue-bit garble from Ezel—he blocked incoming fire with his shield in reply.
“Euuu, aaaah, aaaaa—”
A grotesque cross spewing sticky flames. Piled mutant innards—barely biological—faced Ezel.
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