Chapter 120
Chapter 120
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 120
Chapter Title: Fortress Assault
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"M-Monster!"
"Kill that bastard!"
The pirates let out hideous screams upon seeing me emerge in the heart of their fortified camp.
Blinding beams of light rained down mercilessly in their wake.
Over a hundred pirates, dozens of walkers, and defensive turrets scattered everywhere—all opening fire at once. The barrage they unleashed was utterly overwhelming.
Had I not yet evolved into a Near-Adult, that attack would've inflicted wounds beyond recovery.
'But not anymore.'
Rain pattering on a car hood—that's the sound echoing off my exoskeleton. Their attacks were utterly futile against my carapace, which was as tough as living armor.
Time to teach these wastrels the value of conservation.
I charged straight through the hail of fire, plunging into their midst.
Six combat arms lashed out simultaneously, targeting the armed pirates.
Having grown to over 20 meters tall upon reaching Near-Adult, my arms and claws had scaled up accordingly.
Each graze of my claws split their bodies apart, while those snagged by my combat arms sailed far away, smashing into the camp's barricades.
"Argh! Crazy bastard!"
"Aaaah! Dieee!"
A bone axe protruding from the tip of a combat arm beheaded one pirate, only for erosion tentacles to snatch his head before it hit the ground and devour it.
A few pirates, in a last desperate frenzy, drew sonic blades from their belts and charged me.
Ultrasonic blades capable of slicing through thick timber and sturdy metal came flying at me.
"Huh?"
Those blades that had once filled me with dread multiple times now snapped like twigs with astonishing ease.
The pirates stared in disbelief at the scene unfolding before them, faces frozen in stupidity. Losing focus mid-battle is the ultimate fatal mistake.
They paid the price as their useless heads detached from their bodies.
"Damn it! Just unload everything!"
"Fuck!"
Heavy Walkers clinging close to their comrades unleashed storm guns and plasma launchers from their arms toward me as I massacred everyone around them.
A barrage of massive depleted uranium rounds and destructive plasma beams turned my position into a scorched wasteland. Pirates who'd had limbs torn off by me and were dying were instantly pulverized into meat chunks by stray shots.
'What a waste.'
Seeing that, I lamented the squandered genetic essence—until a plasma energy blast, far more potent than any Gauss rifle, slammed into my head.
｢Grrrrr｣
An attack that would've blasted a Subadult far back now merely twisted my neck slightly.
"Th-This is insane!"
"Even the plasma launcher isn't working!"
I heard the Heavy Walker pilots cry out in horror.
To be honest, it wasn't entirely ineffective. The spot on my exoskeleton hit by the beam had reddened from the intense heat, and I felt the pain.
But it was well within what I could endure.
'Gotta give back as good as I get.'
My jaw split into two prongs as two organs inside my body rapidly activated.
The Acidic Fungus Gland, a fused trait born from my original Acidic Blood.
The Decay Fungus Organ, which produced spores laden with rot mold.
These demonic organs busily prepared to inflict excruciating agony on the enemy.
A yellowish-green liquid and black spores surged up my throat and spewed from my maw.
The deadly contaminants hurtled toward the Heavy Walkers and surrounding pirates.
Acidic fungi that melted alloys corroded the Walkers' armor, allowing decay mold harmful to human flesh to seep inside.
The pilots, unable to escape, screamed as they were coated in fungus.
"Gaaaah! S-Save me!"
"Kweeeek!"
"Wh-What...! Watch out... Graaah!"
The thick armor that normally shielded pilots from threats had become their prison.
The mind-linked Walkers halted their firing and rampaged in place. Pirates using them as cover were crushed into paste beneath multi-ton steel feet.
"W-We can't win!"
"Boss! We need the boss!"
As I smashed pirates and Walkers alike without mercy, the survivors lost heart and fled.
No need to pursue them.
The fog enveloping the fortress—and the nests crawling up from below—would handle them.
"Guh, kehek?!"
"Poison in the fog... Guh!"
They barely took a few steps before realizing their lungs were failing. Forgetting their flight, they collapsed, vomiting blood laced with chunks of flesh.
All pirates in the fortress wore powered suits. Their helmets offered toxin resistance, but it wasn't enough against the enhanced smog tower formed by merging ten nests.
'Even if they hold out, it won't last.'
The tenfold-strengthened toxic fog rivaled the swamps of Saintopia 02 continent—slightly weaker, perhaps.
The suits' built-in protection would buy them mere minutes at best.
A few pirates less affected by the fog weren't safe either.
"Urk! G-Ghost! Ghosts!"
"Heh, hehehe... Fl-Flowers... so beautiful..."
Hallucination Beetles bursting from nest spores, and viscous spoonworts seemingly grown from pirate blood, targeted them. Tenfold enhanced, they were hard for pirates to evade.
The pirates had thought this fortified camp the safest spot. They were wrong.
They should've fled the planet, even defying Muriel's orders.
'You chose poorly.'
My erosion tentacles harvested the heads of fallen pirates mid-battle, plucking them like fruit from a tree.
"All Walkers, fall back to the central plaza!"
"Retreat!"
The surviving Walkers ceased fire and pulled back hastily. I knew what they were banking on.
In the central plaza stood the camp's mightiest force.
Humanity Cartel's boss and 20th-ranked Muriel, the deer-horned Cult.
She awaited me.
I flattened my upper body to the ground and crawled after the Walkers.
Heavy Walkers excelled at holding lines and pouring fire on foes, not mobility. They outpaced humans but couldn't match my locomotive speed.
Whenever I closed in, I struck from behind. With toxic fog thick outside, pilots couldn't abandon their cockpits and simply awaited death.
By the time remaining Walkers numbered fewer than five, we reached the central plaza.
"......"
There stood a Cult with deer antlers, gripping a brilliantly shining golden spear.
A cross-shaped halo headband glowed faintly purple around her head, and she wore a full-body powered suit in bodysuit form.
Muriel, fully battle-ready, eyed me with an e-cigarette between her lips.
I pounced on a fleeing Walker, yanking out the pilot. Before her eyes, I seized his arms and legs with two limbs and tore.
"B-Boss! Save... Kaaaaaaaagh!"
My combat arms could rip starship hulls barehanded. No mere human in a powered suit could withstand it. The pirate wailed for his boss until his upper and lower halves separated in death.
Muriel frowned at the sight.
"Tch, barbaric."
"S·u·r·p·r·i·s·i·n·g·."
"Surprising? Pfft, that's my line. Who'd have thought you'd reached Near-Adult."
She spat disdainfully, irritation lacing her words.
She knew I'd evolved but showed no shock or fear.
Her demeanor screamed unwavering confidence in her superiority.
"D·i·d·n't· e·x·p·e·c·t· y·o·u· t·o· s·t·i·c·k· a·r·o·u·n·d·."
She chuckled as if I'd cracked a joke.
"Run? Me? You seem to be misunderstanding something..."
With that, Muriel raised the lighter in her left hand. She wasn't holding a mere lighter—it was a terminal shaped like one. She pressed the switch hard.
Suddenly, eight small spider-like machines erupted from the dirt around me and latched on. Too fast for my auxiliary senses to detect, I couldn't dodge.
As red lights flickered on the machines, my body grew heavy as waterlogged cotton. It felt like my life force was being drained into them.
'Blood Reaver!'
Blood Reaver—the name of the machines clinging to me.
One of Star Union's unique-grade war weapons.
They latched on at blinding speed to siphon life force rapidly, boasting extreme durability that made detaching them solo near-impossible.
They were undetectable and struck with insane ambush velocity, as I'd just experienced.
That's why Blood Reavers were killer weapons against biological players or foes in the game.
Unable to resist, I slammed my head into the ground. I couldn't even twitch a finger, let alone rise.
"You think I'd fight a monster like you without any prep?"
Muriel approached smugly, grinning.
The moment she raised her spear high—
I whipped a combat arm at her side.
"Guh?!"
She barely dodged, my sharp claw leaving a thin gash on her flank.
As she retreated, my erosion tentacles lashed out.
She deflected the six-pronged assault with her spear. While she parried, I yanked a bone axe from the ground in my prone state, aiming for her ankle.
"Not a chance!"
Her body glowed purple and rocketed upward. As my bone axe scraped the dirt, she landed lightly far away.
Her suit writhed, sealing the gash on her side. Within seconds, she was back to pristine condition.
Her face, however, had lost much of its earlier composure.
"How are you moving with Blood Reavers attached?"
"T·h·i·s· o·n·e·?"
In lieu of reply, I rose, peeling off the Blood Reavers stuck to my body.
Silver moss blanketed the pitch-black spider machines.
'Good thing I saw it coming.'
A single Blood Reaver would've paralyzed me worse than my neurotoxin injection on biological foes. Victims lose life force and mobility, defenseless.
'No wonder it's unique-grade.'
Mother of the Sky had said Muriel owned two—used against her.
As a physical fighter reliant on bodily prowess, Mother of the Sky must've been severely handicapped.
'But eight on me?'
Contrary to her intel, Muriel had eight. And she'd unleashed all on me.
No player in the game had ever used eight at once on me. Unique-grade gear isn't handed out like candy.
'A Subadult would've died right there.'
Even as Near-Adult, eight nearly immobilized me; a Subadult's life force would've depleted instantly.
'She put some thought into it...'
Before engaging her, I'd preemptively activated Gremlin Moss against surprise attacks.
The silver moss, ready in my exoskeleton's pores, perfectly countered her trump card.
'Infected by Gremlin Moss, Blood Reavers are useless for 20 minutes.'
No worries about stolen life force, either. Human sacrifice effect turned corpses on this nest-infused soil—my camp now—into my energy.
My tail-tip, touching the ground, was greedily siphoning it as we spoke.
I peeled off the last spider machine from my head and tossed it at her feet.
"D·i·d· y·o·u· t·h·i·n·k· I·'d· f·i·g·h·t· a· m·o·n·s·t·e·r· l·i·k·e· y·o·u· w·i·t·h· n·o· p·r·e·p·?"
"......"
Echoing her own words verbatim, Muriel's face hardened.
"...Annoying bastard. Makes me wanna gut you and spill your guts."
"I·n·t·r·i·g·u·i·n·g· i·d·e·a·. I·'l·l· k·e·e·p· i·t· i·n· m·i·n·d·."
Muriel gripped her spear, assuming a combat stance.
I didn't know her thoughts or plans. Auxiliary senses could guess psyche from heartbeats or reactions, but not perfectly.
Didn't matter.
She knew nothing of me, but I had prime intel on her.
'Victory springs from information asymmetry.'
Before assaulting the camp, I'd created nests to shape the terrain in my favor.
Gathered max intel on my prey, devised strategies.
Superior in terrain and info, only one thing left.
Win.