After a seemingly never-ending battle, the two sisters noticed that their enemies around them were dwindling.
"What’s going on? What on earth are the Blood-colored Empire soldiers doing? Are they making a joke?" Lin Yushi voiced discontentedly.
Flying mid-air, Sera also had a puzzled expression. Normally, once such a battle started, there would not be a lull part-way. Waves after wave of relentless attacks would ensue until the entire attack plan was completed. That was the standard offensive modus operandi.
But this time, the standard cannon fodder, the Giant Bees, had only attacked once, and there was nothing else.
"Other stations report, something’s happened round here." Sera immediately contacted the other soldiers.
In their current team, Sera was not the only human liaison officer. With the expansion of the team, the military had dispatched another five people. All of these people were liaisons and Du You had delegated their management to Sera.
Now, two of the five were stationed on each side of the path and one in the Central Highlands, keeping constant communication.
"This is the tank position, we haven’t spotted any enemies so far, over." The speaker finished, sending back a live video feed of their location, which Sera found time to view.
From the start of the battle, there had been no enemies on that side. Neither airborne nor land troops were anywhere in sight. There was a peculiar sense that the enemies had given up on that route altogether.
"We have a lot of Giant Bees here, they have been eliminated by Officer Du You. In front, there are numerous Bloody War Dogs, very many indeed. The current situation is not at all dangerous. I’m not kidding, you can see for yourself."
In reply to Sera’s disbelief, the person on the other side of the line connected a live video feed.
Watching the sky blackening with beetles, engulfing all the Bloody War Dogs like a cloud, Sera’s mouth dropped open in astonishment. It took her a moment to gather herself and ask, "Does Officer Du You have another beetle skill?"
"Yes, one specifically for enemies of this biological type," Lin Yushi was delighted to announce.
Before she could share more, her sister blocked her mentally. Speaking about their master’s secret skills was taboo. If too many people knew, they might prepare countermeasures. This was the technological world and a battlefield with which they were less familiar.
"That’s... it’s just incredible," was all the flabbergasted Sera managed to stutter out.
Elsewhere, Du You continued casting spells with an aura of magic power seeping out from him. This turned his body into what appeared from a distance to be a mass of black flame burning, like a great demon lord.
"What a shame, casting is too slow. Most of the magic power has gone to waste."
Du You sighed. He was limited to deploying one Hellfire Thunder spell at a time. Combined with the Spell Splitting Skill, he now could deploy ten spells simultaneously. Though it was decent casting speed, compared to the incredible rate of magic power regeneration, it was lacking.
But now, Du You had nothing to fret over, with nearly all the Bloody War Dogs wiped out. As the Bloody War Dogs perished, the beetles multiplied. The battle was so swift that even the commanders on the Blood-colored Empire’s side couldn’t react fast enough to issue new orders. They could only watch helplessly as their cannon fodder was wiped out.
"Commander, what should we do now? Should we stick to the original plan?"
"Proceed. I see. His skill only works against flesh and blood. Mobilise our trump card squad and avoid sending the flesh-and-mech battlesuits." ɴᴇᴡ ɴᴏᴠᴇʟ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀʀᴇ ᴘᴜʙʟɪsʜᴇᴅ ᴏɴ 𝓷𝓸𝓿𝓮𝓵•𝑓𝑖𝑟𝑒•𝙣𝙚𝙩
The inferior officers had no choice but to shrug their shoulders and continue to follow the commander’s orders.
Shortly after, the battle entered its most intense phase. Watched from Lookout Hill, enemy bio-mechs and warplanes started to head their way from afar.
Blue and red beams in the sky intertwined sporadically with green flashes. Objects occasionally dropped from the sky. On the ground, numerous missiles launched and homed in on their targets.
"Yushi, leave the mechas to you," said Lin Yucha.
"Leave it to me," she replied. The Thunderstorm Arrow was an effective skill against mechas. While not capable of destroying them instantly, it could rob most of their combat efficiency and make them easy targets.
Lin Yucha focused on outputting as much power as possible, using the quick-fire Spiral Snipe to target the warplanes. While her attack speed was fast, the enemy numbers were so overwhelming Lin Yucha’s efforts had little immediate effect.
Sera had learned her lesson. She stuck close to Lin Yucha, using Lin Yucha’s and the Platform Floating Cloud’s cover to protect herself. In such a big fight, Sera knew she was vulnerable to being shot down.
Meanwhile, the battle on the smaller road had begun. On the ground, various flesh-mecha enemies, tanks, and Biochemical Men clad in biological exoskeletons headed their way.
The Biochemical Men of the Blood-colored Empire and Star Ring Alliance were different. The Empire’s Biochemical Men were sentient. Human rights didn’t mean much to them; they were directly used as cannon fodder. However, they had better combat intellect than the Alliance’s Biochemical Men, practically on par with regular humans.
"Prepare, fire!" Protected by their own warplanes, siege tanks began their attack on the small road.
From afar, physical artillery shells soared through the air. Each shell would explode into energy and scatter unique projectiles; the resulting destruction was terrifying. The enemy crowd was stuck on the small road, unable to move forwards.
Over on Du You’s side, they had received information that the enemy had started their offensive. A large number of beetles started to disperse due to the expiration of their lifespan and the lack of fresh flesh to replicate.
The air was increasingly filled with dark elements, perceptible only to professionals like Du You. Ordinary people would at most feel a slightly oppressive atmosphere.
Finally, their enemies showed up. "Pure mechanical entities. Have they detected the beetles’ characteristics?"
Du You observed the heavily armed mechas sprinting towards them on two legs, each one as enormous as a Tyrannosaurus. They were much like the land war armours Du You had seen before, but the classes weren’t comparable.
In the front were the numerous second tier creatures, while the ones in the rear were of the third tier. Mechanical creatures were always mass-produced and there was no shortage of the third-tier enemies according to Du You’s count, thousands possibly.
This time, it was a hazardous war. Du You took a deep breath as his magic power surged around him.