With the elite "chanized Infantry Battalion" of the Burning Corps thrown into the battlefield, the critical situation initially facing the battalion reversed in an instant.
The fragnted ruins flickered with pale red arcs of light; with each flash, a heavy infantry soldier had their armor cleaved open by the searing tal stream!
Old White, wielding a Thermal Cutting Axe, felled an enemy with each strike, hacking the power armor of the Holy Light Knights into disarray and tearing open a gap in their line!
The ranks of the Holy Light Knights were swiftly split in two, turning into chaos within the dark, cramped ruins.
The battle had turned into a one-sided massacre!
Moreover, the Cloud Dragonfly Flapping Machines lying in ambush nearby launched their attacks as well!
With guidance from the ground troops’ firepower, rockets housed in their launch nests poured out, turning the Holy Light Knights’ flank positions into a sea of fire with a series of deafening blasts!
The scorching airwave even lted the steel embedded in concrete, leaving corpses in exoskeletons strewn about in disarray.
Watching countless comrades fall in the blink of an eye, the leader of the Holy Light Knights directed his hateful gaze toward the "Dragon Rider" holding a Short Axe, squeezing out a sentence through clenched teeth.
"...Long live Heaven!"
His pupils slowly turned blood red, wisps of scorching white mist drifted from his mouth, and his skin began to distort as if scalded by boiling water, sprouting flesh-red mycelium that fused with the armor covering his body.
He had offered everything to Heaven, including his mind and flesh, in exchange for supre power.
Having fused with unstable gene serum, he had completely transford into a monster.
But he no longer cared.
If he could not witness Heaven descending upon his land, then dying in the last second of Heaven’s collapse would be just as well!
"Roar—!"
His furious roar echoed through the ruins. Stomping with heavy steps, he charged toward the Dragon Rider Power Armor, channeling all his strength into his twisted right arm.
Crimson tendrils extended from his right arm like a sharp Lance, piercing fiercely as he bellowed with rage!
He had full confidence that he could tear the presumptuous insect in front of him to shreds!
However, as the crimson tendril was about to collide with the Dragon Rider Power Armor, sothing he could never believe happened.
The unassuming Short Axe struck his face with an unbelievable speed.
"Clang—!"
In a daze, all he heard was a heavy, dull sound penetrating the steel before his forehead, followed by the scalding flow rushing into his cranial cavity like magma, extinguishing the last bit of consciousness he had left.
"Rest in peace."
Looking at the now definitively dead monster before him, Old White dropped these words carelessly and kicked it aside.
The gunfire in the ruins continued, but the battle had already entered its final stage.
After the last of the Holy Knights were spent, the Holy Light Knights were quickly annihilated.
The remaining struggle shifted to the Fla Hole Tribe.
Despite thousands of Mutants in the ruins struggling to hold ground against the increasingly fierce player assault, resistance beca harder and harder.
This was not Ten Peaks Mountain, after all; there were no winding tunnels for them to dodge and hide.
The re one or two ters of concrete do was like paper maché before the 155mm bunker-busting shells, and the Alliance’s artillery shells seed to have eyes, each heavy shell cutting them down like wheat.
Watching more and more of his subordinates fall, the fire of battle finally reached Borudo Flahole himself, and even though he was utterly reluctant to face these terrifying foes, he had to steel himself and step forward.
Dressed in North Island Heavy Industries-designed Heavy Bulletproof Armor, he held a 10mm caliber assault rifle in his hands and sprayed wildly toward the Alliance’s positions.
The barrage of bullets turned an entire concrete wall to rubble, exposing the steel rebar within.
However, the Alliance’s Soldiers had already moved aside, taking cover elsewhere.
A 19mm Exploding Arrow Bullet struck Borudo’s shoulder, the burning tal stream piercing his collarbone and eliciting a painful scream.
Even with the Mutants’ terrifying vitality and regenerative abilities, such an injury was evidently not enough to kill him, but this first strike on his shoulder was just the beginning.
Bullets fired in rapid succession like a downpour, striking his armor and sparking a series of flashes.
Unable to withstand the barrage, Borudo clumsily retreated to cover.
However, he did not anticipate that this retreat would mark a perpetual inability to halt; he and his subordinates were directly driven deep into their lair by the fierce firepower.
Seeing no way out, Borudo roared as he charged out from cover once again.
"Fla Hole will never surrender! Never!"
The deafening roar intimidated no one, and the players besieging him did not take it seriously at all.
With an RPG shot across the gap, Corner old six swore without any courtesy.
"Who the hell asked you to surrender? Just die already!"
The armor-piercing bullet, trailing a long trail of white smoke, hit Borudo squarely in the chest.
Accompanied by a deafening boom, the burning tal stream punctured a large hole through him.
"Ah ah ah!!"
Borudo roared in agony, his right index finger still tightly squeezing the trigger, his rifle firing in rapid bursts. However, the accuracy of his shots was becoming increasingly pitiful.
At that mont, he was like a wild beast trapped in a snare, struggling futilely at the edge of the cage.
In the end, his fate was the sa as many other BOSSes who had been killed countless tis by players. With a resentful roar, he took his last breath and fell heavily to the ground, ending his sinful life.
With the death of the clan leader, the last vestiges of the Fla Hole Tribe’s will to resist were brutally extinguished.
Looking at the walls pocked with bullet holes and the bodies scattered everywhere, the players standing on the ruins could only feel their blood boiling in their chests.
They had won!
They had not only won this battle, having defeated an opponent once deed unbeatable but had also achieved the ultimate victory in the entire war—expelling the Torch, which spread chaos and plague, from this land without a trace left!
The thrilling exhilaration was intoxicating, with the blood plasma sticking to their exoskeletons like dals of honor.
From the South to the North, countless enlightened individuals had fought valiantly, and finally, at this mont, there was a result—
"For the Alliance!"
Soone took the lead and shouted, and that rousing cry began to rise and fall across the battlefield.
"For the Manager!!"
"Ow Ow Ow!!"
The dawn rising from the horizon dispelled the last shadows that lood over the district.
Only then did many realize in shock that they had been fighting all night long.
After confirming there were no remaining enemies alive on the battlefield, Old White arranged for people to collect the equipnt of fallen comrades and enemy trophies, while taking a quick tally of the casualties within each squad.
The casualties of one battalion could only be described as horrendous. Originally fully staffed with 400 people, now only just over 50 remained, most injured.
Although it was part of the plan for them to be sacrificial, as a diversionary force, the sight of such casualty numbers was still chilling.
As for the chanized Infantry Battalion led by Old White, there were 30 deaths and serious injuries combined, which even included six heavily armored units wearing power armor—a testant to the brutality of the battle!
However, the accomplishnts of the Burning Corps in this battle were also outstanding.
A total of 5221 Mutants were killed, including 200 nad Warriors and various extre mutants.
In addition, 437 radical Torch mbers were killed in the battle by the players.
Aside from the enemy counts in the fight, the players also found a large number of Black Boxes in Shelter No.20.
These included not only those taken from Shelter No.117 by the Torch for synthesizing bionic blood organs but also so that the Torch acquired from other places.
For example, Black Boxes for synthesizing "Optical Camouflage Plugins" and producing "Destroyer Type I" exoskeletons among others.
Although the Alliance’s industrial capabilities had long since made them independent of Black Boxes and could even self-produce and research complex equipnt like power armor, clearly, no one would refuse such a convenient "wish machine."
Moreover, there were things that even the Alliance could not produce.
For instance, bionic organs and chips.
Aside from Black Boxes, the biggest gains of the Alliance were the 571 researchers captured in Shelter No.20.
So of them were Blue Jackets from other shelters, a few were E and Level D explorers from the Academy, and even so were Level D researchers!
The Torch had always differentiated in their treatnt toward captured prisoners.
Those with knowledge would generally be heavily relied upon by them.
After all, Heaven was a systematic project—its completion was impossible with only a handful of Pioneers; there must also be lower-level researchers to undertake the fundantal research Work.
Only the worthless Waste Land Wanderers would be fed Nago and sent off as breeding beds for the Mutants.
To facilitate managent, the Torch almost confined all the top brains scavenged from the Wasteland in Shelter No.20, which also made it convenient for the players to loot Gold coins.
Standing on the Viper Transport plane, Karen, whose consciousness was linked to the biotic body, looked at Fang Chang uneasily and asked hesitantly,
"... You will help repair my body, right?"
"Of course, we keep our word," Fang Chang said succinctly, standing outside the aircraft.
Karen still had a hint of disbelief in her eyes, but apart from trusting these people, she had no better option at the mont.
Seeing the plane about to take off, she seed to think of sothing and spoke up,
"Wait! Aren’t you coming on the plane too?"
Fang Chang, "We have sothing else to do here."
Karen, "Actually, I can stay and help too. After all, my brain is here and can’t leave—"
Looking at this endlessly chatty individual, Fang Chang sighed, patiently explaining,
"There’s soone who wants to see you, to put her mind at ease, I need you to go see her first."
Karen looked at him blankly.
"Who?"
"Heya."
"Heya... that na again," Karen’s face showed an expression of annoyance as she held her head with both hands, fingers tangling in her hair, "I’ve told you, I don’t know her..."
""
Fang Chang: "Alright, stop complaining. She’s probably the only person who can help you now."
Karen looked at him and asked cautiously,
"...but you said you’d help , didn’t you?"
"I want to help, but unfortunately, my knowledge about biology is limited to what’s just in the textbooks..."
Not wanting to listen to this guy’s nonsense any longer, Fang Chang gestured toward the cockpit.
"Godspeed."
The pilot gave him a thumbs-up and then started the engine.
"Wait, wait a minute—"
Karen wanted to say sothing else, but the rolling air currents soon forced her words back into her mouth.
After seeing her off, Fang Chang turned around and returned to the battlefield that was being cleaned up.
Another wave of airdrops had just been delivered by the transport plane, filled not only with three tis the standard ammunition, but also with three tis the normal ration of boxed als.
The appetites of the Awakeners were far beyond that of ordinary people, to say nothing of the players who had just experienced a major battle.
Many were already starving and quickly cracked open the airdrop boxes, squatting on the ground to devour the food.
Fang Chang also grabbed a boxed al for himself. Just as he unwrapped his chopsticks, he saw Corner Old Six approaching.
"Our drones in the Heavens have spotted a troop moving towards us from the northwest, about 10 kiloters away. They appear to be the size of an Army."
Fang Chang took a bite of the grilled chicken with his chopsticks and casually asked,
"Enemy or ally?"
Corner Old Six: "It’s the Army."
The Army...
Fang Chang frowned slightly.
It seed last night’s commotion was too large to go unnoticed, and this thousand-man squad had probably set out a while ago.
"I understand. Leave it to to handle it."
After saying that, he wolfed down his al and opened up the map on his vm, looking for Old White’s location before heading over there.
At the mont, Old White was in the nearby ruins.
While cleaning the battlefield, they had stumbled upon a dungeon deep within the Mutants’ territory.
Initially, the players thought that since the Fla Hole clan had only recently moved to this area from Ten Peaks Mountain, they wouldn’t have had ti to capture any prisoners.
Furthermore, the survivors from Haiye Province had all been wiped out by the Torch Church; there should have been no one for them to capture, so they never expected to find a Mutants’ dungeon here.
However, when the players lifted the cover, everyone was shocked by what they saw inside the dungeon.
The space, though not very spacious, was cramd with tens of thousands of people!
There were n, won, and also kids... but no elderly could be seen.
Most of them were gaunt, with dull, lifeless eyes, and their numb faces lacked any sign of vitality, as if they had suffered imnsely.
Judging by their conditions, they must have been there for more than just a day or two—more like a year or half a year.
Without a doubt, most of these people were survivors from Haiye Province!
Perhaps for experintal purposes, or perhaps to feed those Mutants, the Torch Church hadn’t completely exterminated the local survivors, leaving a few alive.
After learning about the dungeon, Old White imdiately reported the frontline findings to the rear and then dispatched the players who were cleaning the battlefield to the dungeon, prioritizing the survivors’ needs.
Fortunately, there was surplus from the airdropped supplies. After evacuating the survivors in batches from the dungeon, they distributed so of the extra food to them.
Perhaps because they had not eaten human food for so long, when those survivors received their boxed als, they didn’t initially know how to start eating.
A few of the first to snap out of it carefully took up their spoons, shoveling food into their mouths, and suddenly, tears welled up in their eyes.
"Thank you... thank you so much. I really don’t know how to express my gratitude to you."
As the man in tattered clothing spoke incoherently, nearly ready to kowtow on the spot to the benefactors who had rescued them from the Mutants and provided food, Killer Dagger smiled and swiftly pulled on the man’s arm.
"Don’t ntion it, this is just a trivial matter for us."
"To you it’s trivial, but to it’s a lifesaving grace!" the man said excitedly. "My na is Li Junming, a survivor from Willow Village nearby. If there’s ever anything I can do for you, please don’t hesitate to ask... Oh, I forgot to ask, who are you?"
"I am... uh, just call Kill dagger," Killer Dagger said, coughing awkwardly, regretting not having chosen a more normal na and quickly changing the subject, "Actually, you shouldn’t thank , we’re all warriors of the Alliance. If you’re going to thank soone, thank the Alliance."
"The Alliance is..."
The man’s eyes carried a hint of bewildernt, clearly unfamiliar with the term.
But that wasn’t surprising.
When the Torch Church completely conquered Haiye Province, not just the Alliance, even the City of Dawn had yet to be founded, and the entire region of Qingquan City was still under Giant Stone City’s territory.
Located in a remote area, Haiye Province might at best only have so civilian contact with the southern parts of Brocade River Province, and they might not even know where Giant Stone City was.
Killer Dagger said with a smile,
"Exactly, the Alliance, where all the survivors have united. Our goal is to end this rotten Wasteland... Anyway, you’ve been saved, and we’ll get you out of this damned place as soon as possible."
The "Overlord" transport plane wasn’t capable of vertical takeoff and landing, so using a plane to move them wasn’t very practical.
But the coast was not far away to begin with, just about 100 kiloters.
Now that the Torch’s main base had been taken down, waiting here for the ground forces to co through and then relocating these survivors to the coast using trucks was just as well.
According to past practice, the Alliance would probably build a new settlent near the coastline afterward to shelter those survivors who were displaced because of the Torch.
Standing on the edge of the group of survivors, Old White suddenly noticed a teenage boy in the crowd staring intently at him.
Or more precisely, at the blood-stained power armor he wore.
Indeed, firearms and chas were the romance of n, whether in reality or in the ga.
Seeing a glint of longing in that lone child’s eyes, Old White walked over, squatted in front of the boy, unfastened his helt’s face shield, and gave a friendly smile as he said,
"My na’s Old White. What’s your na?"
"...Wang Rui."
"Your parents?"
"They’re dead."
Old White thought for a mont, not knowing how to comfort the child.
But then he suddenly had an idea, smiled, and ruffled the boy’s hair.
"Wait here for a second."
He stood up and walked to where the fallen comrades’ equipnt was piled up, picked out an exoskeleton that was so damaged it was almost beyond repair, and detached the Burning Corps’ dal from the broken bulletproof breastplate.
Generally, players would add so DIY identifiers to their standard gear to increase recognition.
For example, the emblem of the Burning Corps was composed of a flag in the shape of a fla and a power armor standing amidst fire—
indicating that they were always ready to burn for the Alliance, always present on the most dangerous battlefields.
Returning to the boy’s side, Old White handed him the dal.
"I’m sorry to hear about your parents, but all we can do is save those who are still alive... This is our emblem, and I hope it can bring so courage to your life from now on."
The boy’s eyes widened in surprise as he looked at the soldier who called himself Old White, his mouth opening and closing for a while before he stuttered out,
"Is it okay to give this to ?"
He liked the gift, but felt it was too valuable and was embarrassed to accept it.
"What’s the problem? If we’re not around one day, it will be up to you to carry on the legacy."
Old White grinned and patted the boy’s shoulder, then gently nudged him.
"Go on, stay with your kin, and comfort those who haven’t yet recovered from their past hurts. You might have to stay here for a couple of days, and then we’ll send soone to take you to a safe place."
Blushing, the boy said thanks and clutched the dal that symbolized honor tightly in his palm, then turned and ran off.
Watching the little guy disappear into the crowd, Old White smiled and patted his hands before getting up from the ground.
He had a feeling he had just done sothing familiar, like that of the Manager.
But it seed normal.
After all, one tends to be influenced by those around them.
People are social animals, and after spending a long ti together, they naturally learn from and influence one another.
It used to be him leading them to change the Wasteland, now it was their turn to do the job.
Just then, a familiar voice ca from behind him.
"Passing our Army’s legacy to an NPC might be a bit difficult. They only have one life, after all, and we all learned how to parachute by dying a few tis."
Seeing Fang Chang approaching from behind, Old White laughed heartily and replied,
"Haha, you have a point, but I think it’s precisely because they have only one life that they can better carry on our traditions."
"Oh?"
Old White showed a wry smile and continued,
"There is life and death in being human, the unchanging are stones, they are the ones who truly belong to this world, we are just passersby... that’s how I feel."
"Maybe, although my feeling is just the opposite of yours. I’m feeling more and more like I belong to this world."
Not continuing on this subject, Fang Chang ended the conversation with an ambiguous remark, then moved on to the matter at hand.
"Let’s talk business. The Army is here."
Old White’s eyebrows lifted slightly.
"That fast?"
"Yeah," Fang Chang nodded, speaking with a serious tone, "It’s likely they noticed us the mont we made our move."
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