When the flare dimd, the armory was plunged back into darkness, with only Amilia's presence beside Zhang Ge providing a faint light source.
In this environnt, the passage of ti beca imperceptible. Amidst the silence where even heartbeats could be heard, every minute felt like hours to Zhang Ge.
Might as well lower soone's affection level while we're stuck here.
With that thought, he asked:
"Amilia?"
"Here."
"Why did you beco a Sister Repentia?"
She tilted her head slightly, as if recalling mories, before answering after a mont:
"I once believed all are born in sin. After pledging myself as a Battle Sister, I imdiately joined the Repentia. Yet the more I witnessed, the more I felt my penance was insufficient. The closer I sought death's release, the more blood stained my hands."
Damn, that's hardcore.
Zhang Ge had thought he'd touched a raw nerve, but instead she'd begun recounting how she left scars on others.
He struggled to find a response. Before he could dwell further, the sound of pounding erupted against the second door.
Amilia rose and pressed her palm to the door's surface. After a brief pause, she stated:
"Ti's short."
"How long?"
"Five or six minutes."
Their exposure ca too early. By the ti both doors were breached, Olivière's arrival still lagged by at least five minutes. Considering the ti needed to break out, they had to hold their position for another four hours.
No more chatter. As Zhang Ge ignited another flare, the two began gathering explosives from the armory, stacking them behind the door—"gifts" certain to surprise their foes.
Beyond the door, drilling, pounding, and cutting noises grew clearer, accompanied by maddened growls that seed to pierce the barrier.
After completing their preparations, Zhang Ge returned to the Killing Can and sealed the hatch.
The first breach erupted.
Ceramite shards exploded outward as tal fragnts ricocheted. Though Amilia fired bolt rounds one by one at the tendrils snaking through the breach, the gap inexorably widened.
Ammunition, flas, grenades—these rely delayed the endless onslaught. When their last round was spent, the unhindered tendrils shredded half the ceramite door, pouring through with the tallic groan of twisted tal.
Then white light cleaved the darkness.
Blinding glare erupted from the confined explosion's epicenter. An orange fireball blood within nanoseconds, trailing a concussive shockwave.
Tendrils near ground zero never stood a chance. Pale flesh-vines blanched under searing heat, carbonizing before shrapnel and blast waves shredded them. Dozens disintegrated instantaneously.
The blast hurled ceramite debris skyward, transforming wreckage into lethal shrapnel. The wet crunch of sundered flesh chorused through the chamber.
Charred at-slicks littered the floor. Residual body parts combusted under extre heat.
Within this crackling inferno, the approaching Killing Can's grotesque cylindrical fra grew visible.
Though the blast annihilated an entire wave, fresh tendrils madness-sward the armory.
They found not cowering prey, but rotating power saws descending with cold precision.
Zhang Ge rged with the war machine. The saw's vibrations—ripping muscle, grinding bone, severing tendrils—beca synapse lubricant, each movent outpacing the last.
Enemy filants lashed the Dreadnought's armored hull, scratching paint but failing penetration. Their assaults only heightened the machine's frenzy, its engine roaring louder than the tendrils' shrieks.
Left arm's dual-linked heavy stubber spat incendiary death. Right arm's saw carved crimson arcs. Crushing tendrils underfoot splattered viscera. Blood and gore quickly encased the century-silent war machine, rust and accumulated filth washing away through fresh armor gashes.
This visceral carnage contrasted sharply with his power sword's clinical cuts, catharsis bleeding accumulated frustrations—until Olivière's voice pierced his mind:
"Elevator reached."
Did the blockade yield? Or break?
Dismissing the moot question, Zhang Ge growled:
"Copy. En route."
The Killing Can's upper torso spun 360° at the waist, power saw shredding surroundings—their breakout signal.
Amilia beca a streak of light. Her two-handed sword didn't slice tendrils, but cannonball-swung at full force, bludgeoning attackers into projectiles that bowled over incoming waves.
Zhang Ge's tactics turned primal. Discovering spinning's slaughter-efficiency, he pursued Amilia while rotating ceaselessly—a whirlwind of saw-blades etching blood-drenched mandalas.
Queued ambushers fared no better. The left arm's stubber flashed rhythmically, each round surgically obliterating tendril eyeballs. Blinded victims thrashed wildly, disrupting coordinated assaults.
No finesse needed. No finesse possible. The pair carved a ter-by-ter path to ground level. At the exit threshold, the tendrils ceased frenzy.
Yet both warriors knew: the worm-construct remained. This silence foretold the tempest's eye.
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