Saplin had an epiphany, realizing why the other party had told him the situation was urgent and to pay attention to safety over the phone in a voice of seriousness that was previously unknown to him.
"Open the door, quick!"
Holan, growing impatient, hit him in the face again.
With a cry of pain, Saplin turned and shakily proceeded with the final unlocking.
Moments later, with a "click", the doors of the control center flew open.
"Shut down all the grids, now!"
Holan shoved Saplin into the room, who staggered and slowly made his way to a row of machines.
"Don’t rush, don’t rush... these machines take some time to operate..."
Saplin waved his hand over the control panel, but instead of turning off all the city lights as instructed, he turned them all up to maximum power.
Unfortunately, Holan was a layman who couldn’t understand his operations and thought he was complying.
Saplin pushed a red switch, and suddenly the power plant buzzed to life, its surrounding machinery roaring into action.
At the same time, all lights including those on the streets and residential areas were turned up to maximum power, instantly brightening the city like daytime, visible even to those in the suburbs.
Seeing this unfold, even a fool like Holan now realized he had been tricked.
He immediately lowered the gun barrel, aiming it at Saplin’s thigh, ready to pull the trigger.
The next second, the unexpected happened.
Saplin, with agile movements, spun around, blocking Holan’s arms and wrapping his own around Holan’s waist before throwing him to the ground with a back slam.
Holan’s head spun, and before he could realize what had happened, Saplin delivered an elbow strike, knocking him out cold.
"Damn it, I was once a fifth-degree judo black belt, don’t underestimate me!"
Struggling, Saplin got up from Holan’s body, kicked him a couple more times to vent his frustration, and then sat down gasping for air.
Meanwhile, downstairs at the BRC power plant, a group of seven or eight people arrived at the door, looking grim upon seeing the plant running at full capacity.
The leader of the group tore off his clothing, revealing a body as powerful as that of a brown bear underneath.
"Holan the useless has failed, as expected."
With that, he threw a punch, instantly denting the iron door of the power plant.
The man attacked a few more times, and just like that, the door was forcibly torn off its hinges by his hands.
"Take this place down!"
At his command, the six figures beside him sprang into action, rushing into the building.
At the same time, the man pressed a button in his hand.
A sudden explosion came from the ground; stones were hurled through the air as thousands of black rats poured out of the holes.
With just a thought, the man directed the rats into the power station to wreak havoc.
Simultaneously, military support arrived.
Several helicopters appeared overhead, and fully-armed warriors descended onto the rooftop of the power plant using ropes, quickly beginning to establish defenses.
"Who... who are you?"
Saplin asked the approaching officers with a hint of nervousness in his voice as they neared the control center.
"I’m Ron, a Level 6 Commander of the Guard Army’s Fifth Legion, ordered to provide support to the power plant,"
an officer explained briefly before taking a communicator from his adjutant and started coordinating defense tasks.
"Support? What else is there to support?"
Saplin glanced at Holan lying on the ground, thinking to himself that the threat had already been neutralized in his area and wondering why additional support was mentioned.
However, before he could ask for details, an explosion sounded from outside the building, followed by a rapid succession of gunshots.
"Commander! They’re getting through! Our first line of defense has been breached, we need instructions!!"
A warrior rushed in from outside, anxiously reporting the situation.
Ron obviously hadn’t expected his forces to be defeated in the first encounter.
He angrily slammed the table and stood up, asking:
"Where have those rats gone now? Didn’t I have you prepare lighting equipment? How did they manage to charge up so quickly?"
The warrior also felt helpless.
"Commander, among those rats, there were several human-shaped monsters. They’re bulletproof. They just walked through our bullets and dismantled the lights. We couldn’t hold them off at all!"
"Damn it! Contact headquarters immediately, have them send more support. Arrange for everyone else to assemble on the rooftop right now, we must hold the control center!"
Saplin, witnessing this rapidly changing situation, was utterly perplexed.
He got up and walked to the window to look down, and almost fainted from the fright.
The dense mass of rats was scurrying between the buildings below, some even climbing directly up the walls of the power plant, bypassing the guards outside the building.
"Damn it! What the hell are these monsters? What the hell is going on?"
Saplin’s face turned pale, but everyone around him was too busy to even think of answering him.
Confronted with the rats’ ambush, the batch of warriors that had just arrived couldn’t hold on at all and was quickly forced to retreat.
The sound of gunfire outside the control center had become incessant, accompanied by the screams of humans and monsters.
"We can’t hold them off, there are too many!"
Someone shouted in despair.
"No! We must hold this ground! If the power plant goes down, the whole city is doomed!"
Ron also picked up an automatic rifle and rushed out the door himself.
When Lord Bear’s Anti-gravity Car arrived, what he saw was this precarious scene.
Without a moment’s hesitation, he immediately fired a Flash Spell into the air.
The structure of the BRC power plant wasn’t an entirely closed building; all the corridors were built in the open air.
In such an environment, the Light Ball from the Flash Spell was far more useful than spotlights. A single Skill instantly lit up the entire power plant as bright as day.
"Squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak!"
The rats let out screams of terror and retreated back into the shadows, leaving behind only seven human-shaped monsters covered in black scales.
"Damn Wizards, Lord Makula was right. There indeed is a bunch of fools opposing us!"
The leading man looked gloomily at Lord Bear, who had leaped onto the roof of the power plant, and was somewhat uncertain.
"Lord Divine Messenger, let me go. I will take care of that sneaky bastard!"
One of his subordinates spoke up.
The Divine Envoy, willing to test the strength of the adversary, nodded.
Seeing this, the subordinate let out an enraged shout and charged on all fours towards Lord Bear.
The warriors nearby stirred at this sight.
They had just witnessed the terrifying nature of these monsters. The black scales on their bodies were like steel, impervious even to the bullets of automatic rifles.
What was most fearsome was their agile tails; often, with just a flash of shadow, a teammate would be impaled through the chest and die in agony.
Now, seeing that monster charging again, they instinctively wanted to pull the trigger.
"Don’t shoot, anyone!"
Ron quickly called out to stop them. The man in the strange green clothes, although mysterious, shouldn’t be an enemy.
After all, he stood on their side. If they fired now, they might easily injure him.
Facing the monster charging at him rapidly, Lord Bear didn’t make a single move and just quietly watched.
Then, with a flash of black shadow and a whoosh through the air, the monster’s tail turned into a dark streak, aiming for Lord Bear’s chest.
At this sight, everyone felt as if they were suffocating.
However, what happened next completely stunned them.
Lord Bear, who was only shoulder-high to the monster, responded with lightning speed as the dark streak appeared, gripping the monster’s tail firmly in his hand.