The Kurotsukidoo Extermination Battle
We followed behind DTMS's forces at a leisurely pace, launching drones to survey the battlefield situation.
It was true that Senboku City was practically a stone's throw from the Kakunodate area. Iwatare Motohito had boasted that he would show us what a real advance battle looked like, and he covered a twenty-minute distance in just fifteen minutes. But by focusing solely on speed, they fell into an ambush by Kurotsukidoo grunts hiding along both sides of the road and suffered significant losses.
"If you're just going to run that fast, we wouldn't do it like that. What the hell kind of advance battle is that? At the very least, you could have sent drones ahead to scout."
Kiyona Hori grumbled as she drove. She seemed irritated that Iwatare Motohito had bragged about demonstrating a true advance battle.
Every time she got angry, her sister's breasts would bounce and jiggle, and Kiyona Mari had been watching enviously. Noticing my gaze, she let out a little "Hyat!" and crossed her arms over her small chest.
"D-don't look!"
"I wasn't looking...?"
"Are you not looking because my breasts are small?!"
"Whether they're small or big, I said I'm not looking~!"
In truth, if they were big, my eyes would be drawn to them without me realizing it... Seeing me and Kiyona Mari playfully bickering, Kiyona Hori smiled faintly and spoke up.
"Mari, you shouldn't let having small breasts make your heart small too. If you have a generous heart like your big sister, your breasts will grow."
"What on earth are you talking about? What does mindset have to do with breast size!!"
While we were chatting away (?), DTMS arrived in Senboku City. As expected of Senboku City, where most of Kurotsukidoo's current forces were gathered, a large number of troops greeted DTMS.
East Weapon provided rear support by setting up L-16 81mm mortars and firing shells at the clustered Kurotsukidoo forces from the rear. Before World War III, operating mortars required spotters and calculators, but after the war, drones could identify targets and AIs handled the calculations, making mortar operation much easier.
Especially in urban warfare, extremely precise calculations were needed due to buildings and structures, but with AIs handling that, mortars could now be used in city fights as well. Of course, that didn't mean buildings took no damage, but since winning the war was what mattered, they used them anyway, accepting the collateral damage to structures.
Of course, you couldn't just leave the guns in one spot and keep firing continuously. The enemy would quickly locate the firing position, so you had to fire two or three rounds and then move. Also, when the firefight got so tangled that you couldn't distinguish friend from foe, you couldn't use them either. So mortars weren't an all-purpose support weapon.
Especially since Kurotsukidoo had snipers with clairvoyant abilities, you could only get off about one shot before having to pull back immediately. Already, over the open comms, news was coming in that mortar crews had been taken out by snipers. Come to think of it, it seemed Tang Xiaohua kept good subordinates around her. Seeing that she brought along snipers with x-ray vision to counter her weakness to long-range attacks, it looked like she had a clear grasp of her own strengths and weaknesses.
"Before they get wiped out, we should either kill or capture that clairvoyant sniper first. Rianna, can you find the sniper with the drone?"
"Absolutely! I've got a thermal imaging camera installed on the drone, so I should be able to find him. If I find him, what will you give me in return, handsome gentleman?"
Rianna Holden, wearing a bikini-style cyber armor that made her combat power seem extremely high, asked me with a deliberately seductive smile. There was no need to get caught up in Rianna's pace.
"What do you want me to do?"
"Hey, I'm just kidding... You don't have to."
What was that? Was she one of those girls who acts like a slut but is actually a pure maiden? Rianna Holden, with her ears now red all the way to the tips, was controlling the thermal imaging drone to locate the sniper.
A thermal imaging camera captures the infrared rays that people naturally emit. It works quite well in open fields or forests, but in urban areas like this, it was awkward to use. If the enemy hid among civilians, it was useless, and it couldn't detect people inside buildings. Plus, because infrared doesn't pass through glass, it couldn't find people standing behind windows either. So in urban combat, its use was quite limited.
Since that clairvoyant sniper surely knew this too, they'd either be hiding inside a building or have taken countermeasures. Would it be easy to find them?
Contrary to my concerns, Rianna Holden was an outstanding operator and drone pilot. She moved slowly at first, then when she heard the sniper's gunshot, she quickly maneuvered the drone here and there before showing me the screen. There was a small red dot visible in the window of some building.
"Gotcha! If they're inside a building, you can't pick up a person's body heat, but after firing a gun, there has to be residual heat. If you control the drone quickly after hearing the gunshot, you can locate the sniper's position. How about that? Pretty cool, right?"
Aha, so instead of finding the person, it was a method of finding the position heated up by the gunshot to locate the sniper. Looking at the location, it seemed to be in a building quite close to our vehicle.
"This time, I'll show you what I can do, investor."
Sawayanagi Shigeru said as he slowly stood up. Sawayanagi Shigeru, who had been continuously eating something to replenish calories from earlier, seemed to think it was time to unleash the energy he'd stored up.
"Should I kill him? Or capture him?"
"Since he's a fellow superhuman, we should capture him first. If we can't win him over, then we can eliminate him, right?"
In the game Megacop's Youngest Son, there was a system like in some Three Kingdoms game by a certain company where you could capture enemy officers and recruit them. Later on, the protagonist's unit would end up gathering the leaders of the world's criminal organizations. So there was a chance we could recruit this captured sniper, which is why I suggested capturing him for now.
"Capturing him should be easy enough..."
Sawayanagi Shigeru, who had been speaking slowly, took the opportunity while the vehicle was stopped to open the door and step out. Then he disappeared. It was an incredible speed that I could barely catch with my senses.
About a minute after Sawayanagi Shigeru disappeared, there was a knock on the car door. When I opened it, Sawayanagi Shigeru—who looked like he'd lost about ten kilos of the chubby flesh he'd had before—returned, grabbing the nape of the neck of the unconscious sniper who was wearing various cyber tech equipment.
It was indeed an amazing ability, but it was a premature ejaculation-type ability that only lasted about a minute. In the game, it was a character for advanced players. I recalled how once the speed gauge was used up, the character became temporarily unable to fight, making it difficult to use.
Sawayanagi Shigeru dragged his trembling legs back to his seat and started drinking an energy drink. Still, capturing the clairvoyant sniper who'd been causing us trouble all this time in just one minute was a tremendous achievement.
"Let's tie her up before she wakes up."
At Sawayanagi Azuma's words, everyone grabbed the sniper and began removing her tech wear first. We didn't know what functions might be built into the tech wear, so it was important to separate it from its owner.
Hmm... She was a woman. It was a slender-looking female with bright gray hair in twin tails. The Seryu Company people swiftly tied up the sniper as if packaging a delivery. They even gagged her so she couldn't bite her tongue and tossed her to the side. After the war, I'd have to get revenge for her shooting me with bullets.
"Huh?"
"What is it, Rianna?"
When Rianna Holden let out what sounded like an exclamation as if she'd seen something with the drone, Sawayanagi Azuma asked.
"I'll switch it to the big screen."
When Rianna Holden typed away on her laptop keyboard, the large screen attached behind the driver's seat came on with the video feed. Kiyona Mari, who was in the passenger seat, whined that she wanted to see too, but we all ignored her as if by agreement and focused on the screen.
Iwatare Motohito smiled to himself. This was what a true advance battle looked like. Although they had lost a certain amount of troops to the ambush, with East Weapon's supporting bombardment, they had charged into the confused Kurotsukidoo and annihilated nearly seventy percent of the remaining forces.
"The remaining Kurotsukidoo remnants are gathering at Senboku Municipal Middle School."
"We wanted to finish it off ourselves, but it's troublesome, so order the East Weapon mortar unit to fire."
Iwatare Motohito didn't want to yield the handling of the remaining thirty percent of Kurotsukidoo to East Weapon. But because DTMS had also lost a fair number of soldiers in this advance battle, he was going to have them handle the remaining thirty percent with bombardment. It was because losing any more troops could lead to questioning from superiors.
"The mortar operating personnel have been wiped out by the sniper, so supporting fire is impossible."
"Damn it! Those idiots... Getting taken out by a mere sniper! No choice then. Since they can't even seize the opportunity given to them, we'll handle the remnants ourselves!"
Iwatare Motohito cursed out East Weapon thoroughly, then put on his top-grade combat helmet, left the command post, and walked toward Senboku Municipal Middle School where the Kurotsukidoo remnants remained, along with his troops. He wasn't worried. He was wearing a bulletproof vest over his top-grade cyber suit that could even block bullets, so there was no chance of him getting hurt, and he thought his DTMS could handle the remaining remnants even without East Weapon's support.
"If you throw away your guns and surrender, I'll spare you!"
Iwatare Motohito arrogantly activated the helmet's voice amplification function and shouted at the Kurotsukidoo members swarming in the schoolyard.
Seeing the Kurotsukidoo murmuring among themselves, Iwatare Motohito smiled inside his helmet. As expected, they're all submitting to my dignity. He thought narcissistically.
But even after thirty seconds and then a full minute passed, none of the Kurotsukidoo threw down their guns. The murmuring was actually them making way so that someone could walk forward without obstruction.
Like Moses' miracle, the Kurotsukidoo remnants parted, and a woman with greenish hair stepped forward. She had a slender build, but an overwhelming sense of intimidation seemed to suppress the surroundings. The skull-jaw shaped mask in particular added a touch of fear to the intimidation.
The green-haired woman with the skull-jaw mask, who had been looking around at the crowd, fixed her gaze precisely on Iwatare Motohito and began speaking in a low voice. It didn't seem like she had turned on a voice amplifier like Iwatare Motohito, yet the woman's words reached everyone's ears clearly.
"On the contrary, I make a proposal. You don't have to throw away your guns. If you run, you'll live. If you fight, you'll die."
Though it carried a slight Sichuan accent, her Japanese was fluent. Hearing her appearance and tone, Iwatare Motohito realized who she was.
Dokuki Tang Xiaohua!
The infamous Northeast Asia branch leader of Kurotsukidoo. But right now, DTMS held an overwhelming advantage. It was more than enough to capture Tang Xiaohua.
If he captured the famous Tang Xiaohua, even if he lost all his troops, a promotion was guaranteed. Even though she was known for her poison, the anti-toxin function built into his top-grade combat helmet should be able to neutralize it.
"Kukuku! Did you really think that paltry force could defeat the elite soldiers of our DTMS?"
"I don't believe in my troops."
At Iwatare Motohito's words, Tang Xiaohua took another step forward.
"I will take on all of you alone."
As the reckless woman who claimed she would face everyone by herself spoke, the skull-jaw mask slid downward, revealing Tang Xiaohua's face—grinning with bared teeth in a mad smile.
Iwatare Motohito felt a slight chill at Tang Xiaohua's smile, but he was already riding the tiger.
"Everyone, charge! Kill that crazy bitch!!"
At Iwatare Motohito's command, the DTMS soldiers all rushed toward Tang Xiaohua. She watched the charging troops with that same manic smile still plastered on her face.