Accidental Crossfire

Unreliable though he seemed in almost every sense, the pilot named Sun Ze displayed extraordinary flying skills when his life was on the line, somehow managing to keep their rate of descent under control using the sole remaining engine— Even if "under control" was a generous description. "Fifty meters from the ground! Brace for a hard landing—!" Sun Ze bellowed at the top of his lungs, but before his words could fade, a deafening *crash* echoed from beneath their feet. The instantaneous overload of g-forces turned nearly everyone pale, pushing several right to the edge of blacking out. The seatbelts cut so deeply into Ye Shi's exoskeleton that his eyes rolled back, and he came close to suffocating on the spot. At the same time, a dull thud boomed across the wilderness as the spiraling Orca transport threw up billows of dust across the flat plains. "Cough, cough..." Sitting in the pilot's seat, Sun Ze coughed violently. Shaking his throbbing head, he pulled down the overhead release handle while still half-dazed. The rear hatch of the transport lowered slowly, and his senses gradually cleared along with it. "...Unbelievable... I actually brought it down." Sun Ze muttered softly to himself, glancing outside and then down at his hands. The blank look on his face gave way to the giddy relief of surviving against the odds. With effort, he reached over and shoved the unconscious copilot, unable to conceal the excitement in his voice. "Hey, buddy, you alright? Wake up! We survived!!" The man didn't respond, but his heart was beating and he was still breathing; he likely just hadn't recovered from the impact. Unbuckling his harness and standing up, Lao Bai unslung the rifle mounted on his power armor, chambered a round, and looked at Sun Ze in the pilot's seat. "I wouldn't celebrate just yet. We only managed an emergency landing; we haven't returned home safe and sound... This is the wasteland." Looking out the cabin at the unfamiliar wilderness, Sun Ze swallowed nervously as the gravity of their situation finally set in. He nodded slowly. "Understood..." Lao Bai then asked, "How long to fix it?" Sun Ze snapped to attention, looking down at the touchscreen before the flight controls, his fingers tapping across the panel in a rapid flurry. "No idea. I have to assess the damage first... The copilot AI reports foreign debris entered the engine and melted the plasma plume nozzle. Probably some unlucky bird." "Impossible... couldn't be a bird," the copilot coughed as he gradually came to, speaking in a weak, raspy voice. "I remember the radar manual saying... it can track a bullet within fifty meters..." Sun Ze asked anxiously, "Did you bring the manual?" "That kind of thing..." The copilot wheezed for two seconds before finally forcing out the rest of the sentence. "...I think it should be in the toolbox." "...Work on repairs first." Watching the two fumble around for the manual, Lao Bai turned away with a face full of exasperation, deciding it was best not to waste any more breath on them. He was worried his blood pressure wouldn't take it. Though he wasn't a Perception-type, he had a distinctly bad feeling. The Legion's radar technology was passable, but their anti-radar capabilities were nothing special—just as lackluster as Enterprise's air defense, in fact. To slip past Enterprise's radar sweeps, whatever "missile" the enemy used had almost certainly been treated with some kind of radar-absorbent coating. He suddenly thought of the stealth coating on the Lingyun fighter. If he remembered correctly, that tech originated from Shelter 101. The chief of Shelter 101 had been one of the three founders of the Academy. It was entirely reasonable to suspect the Academy possessed similar, or even more advanced, technology. Though he didn't understand why the Academy would suddenly launch an attack, this was the wasteland. Out here, not everything happened for a clear reason. The moment the transport hit the ground, the Burning Corps players had already charged out through the open rear hatch. Splitting into four-man fireteams, they moved in practiced formation to take up defensive cover. Striding out of the cabin with broad steps, Lao Bai issued orders calmly. "Kuang Feng, launch the fixed-wing drone and sweep a five-kilometer radius. Ye Shi, find high ground nearby and set up your rifle. Jieyan, take your squad northeast to search for our pilot. Report immediately if you spot anything suspicious; weapons free. All other squads form a defensive perimeter. We hold this ground until the plane is fixed!" A chorus of crisp replies came over the comms. "Copy!" *** Meanwhile, on the other side. Watching the aerial feed projected onto his tactical visor, a flicker of surprise crossed Zheng Hao's face. He had assumed that falling from five or six hundred meters would leave everyone on board dead or incapacitated at best. He hadn't expected them to transition into combat readiness the moment they touched down, without a shred of hesitation. "A bit different from the rumors..." Vice-Captain Song Changfeng's voice sounded over the comm channel. "Looks like the folks from the East Coast aren't all useless after all." "Of course not." Though a hint of wariness stirred inside him, Zheng Hao didn't let it show on his face. Lowering his voice, he continued his orders. "Attention all units. The target hostiles have dispersed into a defensive perimeter. A total of nineteen exoskeletons and one set of power armor spotted... Old People's Federation models: OD-10 Dragoon, Type 5 Light Cavalry, Type 6 Heavy Cavalry. Switch to armor-piercing rounds." Next, he turned to an expressionless young man beside him. "Xuan Feng, take Team B to the marked location on the map and intercept the 'target.'" "Understood." The man nodded taciturnly. The six of them broke away from the main force, advancing swiftly toward the wetlands to the southeast. Zheng Hao glanced toward the sky to the south, his brows furrowing slightly. "A drone..." A fixed-wing drone was circling overhead. It looked rudimentary, but he didn't underestimate his opponent because of it. "Xiao Jiang, can you take it down?" A dissatisfied reply came over the comms. "Captain... I must remind you, we only have two left." "Deploy a Beehive at the crash site." The comm channel went quiet for a moment. "Are you sure? We don't actually need to engage them, only intercept—" "I'm sure." Hearing the captain's crisp, decisive answer, Jiang Xuezhou didn't press the matter further. Taking a deep breath, he replied, "Understood." Several kilometers away, a hatch atop a tracked vehicle slid open. Amid a plume of smoke, a cylindrical canister one meter in diameter shot into the sky, ignited its thrusters, and streaked toward the crash site. Such a conspicuous sight was instantly picked up by the fixed-wing drone circling overhead. With his eyes closed, Kuang Feng tilted his head up slightly and said in a grave voice, "Enemy ground vehicle spotted... They just launched a missile at us! Model... not one I've seen in the game." "Fuck!" Lao Bai's expression shifted slightly, and he couldn't help cursing. Since this was a rescue mission, the transport carried only infantry weapons. Without hesitation, Lao Bai sprinted to the transport, grabbed the two pilots who were frantically attempting repairs, and hauled them away from the aircraft. Flipping through the manual, Sun Ze panicked. "What are you doing?!" "Missile!" "Missile?!" Sun Ze froze, blurting out instinctively, "But the radar—" He was about to say the radar hadn't reacted, but before the words left his mouth, a silver canister had already appeared in the sky above them. To everyone's surprise, it didn't plunge straight into the aircraft, nor did it detonate. Instead, its curved outer casing swung open. Scores of palm-sized drones poured from within, descending like a murderous swarm upon the players gathered around the transport. Lao Bai's pupils constricted slightly. Acting almost on pure instinct, he snatched the EMP grenade obtained from the Administrator off his armor plating, dialed the delay fuse to three seconds, and hurled it into the sky like a baseball pitcher. He wasn't sure if it would work. But it was their only shot! A hundred meters vanished in the blink of an eye. Almost the instant it reached the drone swarm, a piercing whine tore through their comm channel. The nuclear-triggered electromagnetic pulse instantly fried the microelectronics inside the dozens of miniature drones. Before they could scatter, the drones tumbled from the sky like flies hitting an electric flyswatter, raining down alongside the falling hive casing. *** Several kilometers away, seated inside the tracked vehicle, Jiang Xuezhou felt a sharp ache between his brows. His forehead knit together involuntarily. "The swarm was destroyed... The enemy used an EMP weapon." A voice filled with disbelief sounded over the channel. "EMP?!" Jiang Xuezhou took a shallow breath, nodding solemnly. "Yeah... and it was a miniaturized EMP device with immense short-range output. These guys are no joke!" Countering an EMP was straightforward in principle: anything that shielded electromagnetic waves generally shielded against pulses. In theory, encasing equipment in a Faraday cage was enough; it didn't require black tech. However, the swarm required coordination and command from the hive, making it impossible to bluntly shield all external signals. The Academy's engineers had addressed this by adding a compact buffer module to the communication array, which was sufficient against standard EMP weapons. Yet the buffer modules of all fifty drones had been blown out simultaneously! This clearly hadn't been a conventional chemically powered EMP! It was common knowledge that miniaturizing an EMP weapon was just as difficult as miniaturizing a nuclear warhead, especially when trying to maintain output power at that scale. A compact EMP weapon capable of neutralizing an entire swarm meant the enemy's strength likely exceeded their expectations... Solemnity filled Zheng Hao's eyes, and his wariness deepened. *** Meanwhile, beside the transport, Killing Dagger clicked his tongue at the smoking drones strewn around his feet. "What the hell are these?" The players on the ground had been just outside the EMP grenade's blast radius. Though their communications suffered a momentary glitch, they were largely unaffected, and their equipment functioned normally. "Probably close-range drones like the Y-2 Butterfly Knife..." All Good Names Are Taken By Dogs muttered under his breath. "Damn... could it be the Academy?" "The Academy?!" Shendoushi asked in shock. "Damn, what did we do to piss them off?" "This is the wasteland, you think this is real life?" Killing Dagger rolled his eyes. "Cut the crap, let's just farm these old geezers for loot and be done with it!" Even in the real world, an "unauthorized" military operation like this would never be officially acknowledged; casualties would simply be written off as training accidents. Let alone on the wasteland. In this desolate, lawless no-man's-land, anything could happen. Then again, losing an entire drone formation to a single EMP grenade... if these guys really were from the Academy, they didn't seem all that impressive... Unlike his squadmates, Lao Bai didn't let his guard down in the slightest. Especially after hearing Sun Ze's gasp. "A Swarm... that was a Swarm!" "Swarm?" Lao Bai frowned. Sun Ze swallowed hard, his voice trembling slightly. "An Academy weapon. Word is, it leaves nothing alive within five hundred meters. That stuff is mainly used to wipe out mutants..." Lao Bai's expression darkened. Whatever their motive, since the enemy had already gone for lethal force... There was no need to hold back. Over the comms, Kuang Feng's voice came through. "A squad is approaching our position, under eight hundred meters away." Lao Bai tapped his helmet with an index finger, issuing a calm order. "Teams 3 and 4, hold defensive positions. Teams 1 and 2, follow me to intercept! All units, safeties off, weapons free! Repeat, weapons free!" Almost the instant Lao Bai spoke, Jieyan, leading Team 5 deep into a reed marsh, had already engaged enemy units. Muzzle flashes danced across the wetlands, tracers whistling through reeds as tall as a man. Like the Storm Corps, the Burning Corps used a triangular squad doctrine. A ten-man squad resembled a real-world infantry squad, composed of a squad leader and three tactical fireteams. The advantage was clear division of labor, effectively minimizing casualties while allowing veterans to guide newcomers. It worked well in both large-scale engagements and small-scale operations. Yet the tactic wasn't without weaknesses. When equipment parity was close, their firepower could feel stretched thin. Facing interlocking fire from six enemies, Team 5, with only three men, was quickly pinned down. Pressing his helmet flat against a mud pit in the shallows, Jieyan spat out a grasshopper that had flown into his mouth and rolled onto his side to reload. Just as he raised his rifle to return fire, a burst of bullets struck the mud right in front of him as if guided by radar, forcing him to pull back. Splattering mud ran down his collar, and Jieyan cursed into his mic. "Team 5 is engaged! They're definitely after our pilot! Damn it... it's like these guys are running wallhacks!" A chorus of gunfire echoed from the other end of the channel. Evidently, Lao Bai's side had engaged as well. "Expected. They have drones too; no reason not to use them... Have you spotted Luo Yu?" "Not yet—wait!" Seeing a bright dot suddenly appear on his VM map, Jieyan's eyes lit up. "I see him—" Before he could say Luo Yu had entered comms range, a loud *crack* struck the back of his helmet. His vision went black, and his entire face plunged into the mud. "Fuck! Sniper!" Without hesitation, Prop Master pulled the pin on a smoke grenade, tossed it into the reeds to the left, and took over command, shouting in righteous grief. "Boss!" "Jieyan's down again!" *** At the same time, on the hillside east of the reed marsh. A young man stationed behind a sniper rifle smoothly cycled the bolt. A smug smirk curved the corner of his mouth as he chewed on a stalk of foxtail grass. "One down." A smoke grenade? Thermal-screening too? Interesting... An empty casing ejected from the chamber, and Zhao Xiao lined up his sights on the player who had thrown the smoke grenade. Yet right as he prepared to pull the trigger, a premonition of death abruptly crawled over his scalp. Reacting almost on instinct, he threw himself into a hard roll to the side. At that exact moment, a hail of gunfire struck the stone slab where he had just been lying, sending rock fragments flying. Swallowing the half-chewed grass stalk, Zhao Xiao abandoned the sniper rifle, drew the submachine gun at his hip, and fired a blind burst behind him. The rocks ahead of Ye Shi burst into clouds of dust and debris. Though none of the bullets hit him, Ye Shi was secretly startled. *Holy crap... this guy's a Perception-type too?!* His genetic purity might not be top-tier, but his level had to be decent! Hunched behind a waist-high boulder, Zhao Xiao glanced at the sniper rifle he had abandoned nearby, cursed under his breath, and shouted toward the other side of the rock. "How the hell did you spot me?" Ye Shi chuckled. "Are you kidding? Who needs to spot you? This is the only high ground around here." "..." Zhao Xiao froze. That... actually made sense. The two fell into a standoff. Less than ten meters apart, each behind cover, neither could gain an advantage... at least for the moment. Unwilling to drag it out, Zhao Xiao gritted his teeth, laid the submachine gun beside the rock, kicked it outward with the tip of his boot, and drew a combat knife, tapping it provocatively against the stone twice. "Hand-to-hand! You game?" He was a professionally trained operative. If the other guy dared to fight him up close, he wouldn't lose! "Sure, why wouldn't I be?" Seeing his opponent drop the gun, Ye Shi grinned. Without a word, he pulled the pin on a frag grenade and lobbed it around the left side of the rock. "You dirty bastard!" Zhao Xiao's face twisted in horror. Forgetting all about picking up his gun, he cursed loudly and dove toward the opposite side of the cover. The roar of the explosion went off almost the instant he hit the dirt. The concussive blast and shrapnel tore a muffled grunt from his throat. Enduring the pain, he started to push himself up, only for a freezing barrel to press against the back of his raised head. "I suggest you don't move." Hearing the voice above him, Zhao Xiao went pale, his teeth clenched so tight he couldn't speak. Ye Shi was about to taunt him when a warning flare erupted in his mind, accompanied by a crimson wave of murderous intent. He threw himself backward to open the distance. Almost simultaneously, a sharp whistle grazed the chestplate of his exoskeleton, leaving a crisscrossing afterimage in the air. Only one thought flashed through Ye Shi's mind. *Too fast!* A figure strode slowly up the hillside. The man's face was completely expressionless, stiff as a machine. He held no firearm; in place of hands were two inward-folding short blades integrated directly into his forearms—uncannily resembling the raptorial legs of a mantis. Ye Shi's pupils contracted. *Damn.* *What kind of cyberpunk nightmare is this?!* The moment Zhao Xiao saw him, relief flooded his face. "Xuan Feng?!" The man replied in a flat, monotone voice, "Leave this to me." Zhao Xiao had just opened his mouth to say "gladly" when he saw another grenade sailing their way. *Again?!* Zhao Xiao's expression warped. Before he could dodge, a tremendous force slammed into his chest. Nearly having the wind knocked out of him, he let out a choked groan. By the time his senses returned, he was lying face-down in the mud at the base of the hill. Spitting out a mouthful of mud, Zhao Xiao couldn't help grumbling under his breath. "Damn it, couldn't you be a little gentler?" Having kicked his teammate down the slope, the man named Xuan Feng turned back to the hostile target who had backed off more than ten meters. His primary targets were mutants or mutated humans occupying ruins. In the baseline logic of his AI core, a line of code stipulated: *Do not terminate human lives unless strictly necessary.* Now, however, clearly fell under "strictly necessary." Any organism posing a threat to Beacon squad members had to be eliminated by any means, even if it required using dismemberment tools intended for massive mutants. Brushing off a metal fragment embedded in his synthetic skin, Xuan Feng walked unhurriedly toward Ye Shi without a word. Watching the monster approach, a drop of cold sweat slid down Ye Shi's forehead. He leveled his LD-50 straight at its head. "What the hell are you?" Not even a grenade killed it! What kind of Terminator was this?! "Irrelevant to you." The man flicked out the folded mantis blades and bent his knees slightly, like a mantis poised to strike, ready to deliver a lethal blow to its prey. The sight sent Ye Shi's heart straight into his throat. He could foresee lethal danger... That didn't mean he was fast enough to dodge it. At the critical moment, over a dozen crimson tendrils shot out from the reed marsh below the hill, whipping forward like chains to wrap around Xuan Feng from behind, quickly locking down every joint in his body. With his motor functions restricted, a rare look of confusion appeared in Xuan Feng's eyes, as though he had never encountered such a situation before. He tried to move, but couldn't budge. The spring-loaded blades snapped inward like shears, yet they fell just short of the tendrils binding his joints, unable to slice through. The tendrils seemed intimately familiar with human anatomy. Xuan Feng looked down and fell into contemplation. "Hmm... problematic." Coincidentally, Little Yu, crouching in the reeds, was trapped in almost the exact same bewilderment. "*Yiwu???*" The thing it had latched onto was like a block of cold, hard stone. Whether through the eyes, ears, mouth, or nose, it couldn't find a single cell to infiltrate. Much less a neuron to hijack. This guy... Why couldn't it eat him? "What the hell... what is that thing?!" Seeing the crimson tendrils burst from the reeds, terror seized Zhao Xiao's face, and he scrambled backward instinctively. Xuan Feng was the most advanced bioroid in their entire squad, purpose-built to tackle Deathclaws, mutant leeches, mutants, and other extreme threats that conventional weapons struggled against. Without exaggeration, his individual combat capability was the squad's absolute ceiling; even their captain was no match for him! Yet right now— He was immobilized, unable to move an inch. Gritting his teeth, Zhao Xiao mustered his courage and drew the pistol tucked into his tactical vest, preparing to aim at the tendrils binding Xuan Feng. It was the last gun he had on him. Yet before he could fire, a freezing barrel once again pressed against the back of his head, followed by a sharp bark. "Drop the weapon! Hands on your head, flat on the ground!" Zhao Xiao froze. The tendrils had rattled him so thoroughly that he hadn't noticed the approach behind him. Seeing him hesitate, Luo Yu kicked him in the back. "Final warning. Drop the weapon right now!" "Don't shoot, don't shoot!" Captured twice in one day. With a bitter smile, Zhao Xiao tossed the pistol aside, put his hands behind his head, and slowly lowered himself. Just as he was about to lay flat, his eyes met a patch of filthy black mud, and his expression instantly locked up. "Uh, can... can I pick a different position?" He asked awkwardly in a small voice, trying to plead his case, but the man behind him had no patience for banter and delivered a swift boot to his backside. Watching the guy's head plant straight into the mud, Luo Yu rolled his eyes. "When you're told to lay flat, you lay flat. Stop whining." Tapping his index finger against his VM, Luo Yu brought up the flashing comm window, cleared his throat, and spoke. "This is Luo Yu. I've successfully rendezvoused with the rescue team... How's it going on your end?" The gunfire on the other end of the line had already died down. It seemed the fight there was nearly over. "We're just about wrapped up here too... The hostiles took heavy casualties and are falling back. Can you make it back on your own, or should I send a few people to escort you?" Luo Yu glanced back up at the hillside. Ye Shi was trying to figure out how to shut down the bioroid restrained by Little Yu, but with little success. The three of them were stuck in an awkward standoff. With a subtle twitch in his expression, Luo Yu continued, "Uh, we ran into a bit of a situation here... If it's convenient, you'd better send a few guys over." Lao Bai's response was crisp and to the point. "Copy that."