The Intruders
"Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!! Step on it—! That crazy bastard is right behind us!!"
Inside the rattling command-armored vehicle.
Lin Ao, a direct descendant of the Lin Family that ruled Ark 86, was screaming like a beast, having thrown all sense of dignity to the dogs.
Kaboooom—! Crash!
Behind them, the sound of the earth screaming and splitting apart echoed out loud.
Following that, a horrific rupturing sound—the sound of dozens of tons of metal being crumpled like sheets of paper—slammed into his eardrums.
"Hie, hieeeek!!"
Terrified, Lin Ao checked the monitor in the backseat.
Piercing through a thick storm of dust, a steel colossus with flashing blood-red eyes was pursuing them relentlessly.
[Kieeeeeek—!!]
It was a Leviathan, a Quasi-Named Grade monster that served as a henchman to the Astral Named Grade entity called the Harvester and was a miniature disaster in its own right.
The giant mechanical spider, having surged from beneath the ground, was closing the distance by literally chewing through the elite armored division that Ark 86 boasted, and that Lin Ao had brought along with him for his shady purposes, as if they were mere snacks.
"Vehicles 4 and 5 in the rear have been destroyed!! Connection with the following units has been severed!"
"ECHOs! Yes, the ECHOs! Send those fucking bitches out—!! Lotus! Lotus! The original ones!!"
Lin Ao struggled, kicking the cockpit.
"The Lotus squadron is already engaged in combat with the Leviathan—!"
"Then why the hell can't they stop that monster!!"
Just thirty minutes ago, Lin Ao had been brimming with confidence.
He had been immersed in fantasies of becoming a hero by trampling the hicks of Hongwei-7 and seizing the Anomaly.
"No, no...! I can't die here! I am the direct bloodline of the Lin family!!"
But the moment the ground overturned in the middle of the wasteland and that monster popped out, everything was over.
A desperate struggle was unfolding on the monitor screen.
[Focus on the joints! Secure the platoon leader's retreat!!]
[Full barrage! The legs! Aim for the legs!]
Lingbo, the leader of the Lotus squad—the elite Original ECHO squad of Ark 86—charged toward the Leviathan's steel legs, swinging her twin sword armament.
Following behind Lingbo, another ECHO unleashed a barrage of heavy weaponry in her wake, supporting her leader.
Ka-ka-kak! Crunch—!
Thanks to those noble efforts, Lingbo's sword managed to dig into the gap of the Leviathan's leg joint and tear away the armor plating.
[Now! Weilin—!!]
Kaabooooom!
Weilin's subsequent bombardment struck the exposed joint.
However, the Leviathan didn't even flinch.
Instead, as if annoyed, it swung its leg, tossing Lingbo aside, and then slammed its sharp leg down upon Lingbo where she lay crashed on the ground.
[Ke-heok?!]
Lingbo, who had been at the forefront, was impaled through the waist by the Leviathan's pincer foot and lifted into the air.
[P-Platoon leader... please... run... run away....]
Crunch!
With a gruesome sound, Lingbo's upper and lower body were separated and flung to the ground.
"L-Lingbo destroyed—! Weilin's signal has also been lost!"
Even seeing the ECHOs being smashed, Lin Ao didn't blink an eye.
Rather, his eyes gleamed as he spotted the opening created by Lingbo's death.
"Yes! There! That ECHO bitch peeled the shell off!!"
Lin Ao screamed, the veins in his neck bulging.
"Hey, deploy the mass-produced bitches! Shove them into that hole! I don't care if they have to blow themselves up like suicide bombs!! Just tear off one of its legs! You useless parasites—!!"
Lin Ao's heartless order fell.
Subsequently, the remaining mass-produced ECHOs rushed toward the gap in the armor that the Lotus squad members had sacrificed their lives to create, like moths to a flame.
[...I'll go first.]
[See you later, sister.]
[Tsk. I didn't save my Core memory. Still, I'm not that sad about it.]
Kaboooooooom! Bang!
Even as the Leviathan's drills pierced their bodies and their limbs were ground away by its gears, the mass-produced ECHOs managed to push bombs into the gap of the armor.
Some even attempted to self-destruct by pushing their Core output to the critical point.
Kaaaboom! Bang! Bang!!
Due to their sacrifice, a massive pillar of fire eventually soared up with a chain of explosions.
It was a shockwave built upon the layered lives of the Lotus squad and dozens of mass-produced ECHOs.
[Kieeeeek—!!]
For the first time, the Leviathan let out a scream laced with pain.
As the thick smoke cleared, the joint of the tattered front-right leg finally gave way under the weight and snapped.
"W-We did it! Its mobility has decreased!"
"Good! Well done! Run, quickly!!"
Lin Ao felt not a shred of sadness for the deaths of the ECHOs.
He simply cheered at the fact that his own probability of survival had increased.
"Now! Step on it! Get as far away as possible—!"
While the Leviathan, having lost a leg and its balance, staggered…
Lin Ao's command armored vehicle accelerated frantically.
Just as Lin Ao, pale and trembling with the fear of death reaching his throat, was shaking, the driver let out a hopeful scream.
"Forward, 11 o'clock!! Artificial structure identified! Hongwei! It's Hongwei!!"
Beyond the thick clouds of dust, an artificial structure revealed itself.
Between the forest of collapsed buildings, sturdy concrete walls and barricades built high by someone came into view.
"There! If we hide there, we can live!!"
A vile madness, transcending mere survival instinct, settled in Lin Ao's eyes.
That was the place the blabbering tin cans of the Pathfinder squad had reported.
He was certain that he would be safe behind those walls.
No, if he used the people inside as meat shields, he could survive intact without a scratch.
"Enter! Get in there right now!!"
At Lin Ao's shout, the remaining armored vehicles turned in unison toward the wall.
However, as they approached the fortress, the driver's face turned pale.
"P-Platoon leader! There is no entrance! All entry points are blocked by the barrier walls!"
As the driver said, the walls were closed so firmly that there wasn't even a door that looked like an entrance.
The armored vehicles circled in place, confused.
In a situation where every second counted, they had hit a dead end.
And in that brief silence, disaster struck from behind.
[Kieeeeeek—!]
Along with a mechanical sound that tore through 0ne’s eardrums, a giant shadow began to appear.
Even while limping with one leg torn off, the Leviathan was closing the distance with a frenzied sprint.
The bloodthirsty red glow of its eyes chilled Lin Ao’s nape, making his soul tremble in fright.
"Hie, hiek?! It's coming! It's coming—!!"
At that moment, the thread of reason snapped in Lin Ao's mind.
There was no time to knock, or to connect via communication to threaten them to open the door.
The only thing that mattered now was his own life.
"Ah, fuck—! Make one! Make a door—!"
"What?!"
"If there's no door, just make one!!"
"B-But attacking another Ark's facility without any identification signal...! T-This is basically a declaration of war!"
"A monster is chasing us! I'm about to die, and that's your problem?! Fire! Blast through it!!"
Click.
Lin Ao pulled a pistol from his coat and pressed it against the driver's temple.
The driver trembled as the cold muzzle dug into his skin.
To survive—no, for his own well-being—he didn't give a damn about other people's circumstances.
"Fire!! If you don't fire it yourself, I'll blow your head off first!! Fire now—!"
A shrill, broken scream.
Eyes filled with madness.
Ultimately, the remaining forces of Ark 86, paralyzed by fear, had no choice but to follow Lin Ao's insane order.
The turrets of the armored vehicles turned in unison toward the wall.
KABOOOOOOOOOOOM!!
As the barrels spat fire, the outer wall of Hongwei-7 collapsed with a thunderous roar.
"It's open! Get in! Step on it!!"
Before the smoke from the explosion had even cleared, Lin Ao's armored vehicle charged frantically through the collapsed wall.
And the Leviathan's giant leg followed closely, slamming down violently.
Hell had broken through the gates of paradise and invaded the Garden of Eden.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
"Ha—!"
It was an absurd situation.
The wall that the ECHOs and I had poured our hearts into building had been miserably demolished by artillery fire.
To make matters worse, a group of unidentified armored vehicles covered in dust was pouring in through the hole.
Fuck, what the hell is going on?!
Unfamiliar vehicles with no identification signals.
And as soon as they entered Hongwei-7, they were tearing through the base, ramming into barricades.
"Those bastards...! Right now...!"
Before I could even issue the order to blast those bastards apart.
Behind the armored vehicles, beyond the collapsed wall from which they had fled, the true disaster revealed itself.
[Kieeeeeek—!!]
A chilling mechanical sound that seemed to make even the world shake.
Cutting through the thick storm of dust, a steel leg the size of a house stepped over the debris of the wall—thump!—and crushed the concrete floor.
"...Leviathan."
A sigh escaped my lips involuntarily.
A named boss I had hunted countless times for item farming in the mobile game Echoes of Humanity — ECHO.
Of course, calling it farmable didn't mean it was weak.
It was a monster that could only be defeated once you had a certain level of ECHO deck power.
It was that damn strong, and it appeared frequently in the story.
"......"
And the Leviathan that appeared not on a game screen, but right before my actual eyes, was truly a monster in every sense of the word.
A giant mechanical spider clad in thick composite armor all over its body.
Its overwhelming size, which looked to be at least 600 meters, blotted out the sun.
Although it was limping, its balance broken with one leg torn off, its hideous majesty and bloodlust had not diminished in the slightest.
Rather, it looked even more ferocious, like a wounded beast.
"Fuck, we're screwed."
I grabbed White Tiger first and shouted at the top of my lungs towards my troops.
"All forces! Prepare for combat—!!"
The first to react were Helena and the Cerberus squad.
Though they had been out on external reconnaissance until dawn, the moment my order fell, their eyes changed, and they grabbed their equipment.
"Luna—! Support the rear! Silva! Secure the sniping point! Aim for its joints!"
"Got it!!"
Helena, having given the orders, loaded her shotgun and dashed forward.
Ta-ta-ta-tang! Boom!
Simultaneously, Bastion, the base defense system, turned its head and spat fire toward the Leviathan.
Amidst the raining barrage, the V-60 squad, having grasped the situation, moved forward with their giant shields.
"Block it! The Commander is behind us!!"
"Shields up—! Brace for impact!!"
The difference in size was incomparable, but they formed a line like a mobile fortress with their giant shields, blocking the monster's path.
[Kieeeeeek!!]
The Leviathan hesitated at the sudden counterattack.
But only for a moment.
The Leviathan lifted its giant front leg high toward the small fry beneath its feet who were attacking it.
K-oooooo—!
Dozens of tons of steel were preparing to fall from above.
If it slammed down as is, even the heavily armored V-60s would undoubtedly be turned into crumpled scrap metal.
"Stay exactly where you are."
And with a cool, calm voice, a black shadow stepped on the V-60's shield and soared into the sky.
It was Arva, an ECHO holding a pitch-black nano-carbon dagger in reverse grip.