You Call This a Counterattack?!

In the Southern Sea, on North Island, inside a compact yet luxuriously furnished room, Zhalas, dressed in an immaculate formal suit, paced back and forth. He repeatedly glanced at the digital wall clock, then casually flicked his gaze toward the door, restlessness written plainly across his face. Just then, three soft knocks sounded outside the door. As if answering a predetermined signal, he hurried forward and pulled the door open to find a young uniformed officer standing on the threshold. "Come in." Before the man could speak, Zhalas yanked him inside, cast a cautious glance outside to check if anyone had followed, and quietly closed the door. "What's the situation?" Looking at the expectant Mr. Zhalas, the officer said nervously, "Something went wrong." At those words, Zhalas's heart sank straight to rock bottom, his brow knotting into a tight scowl. Before he could ask, the officer pressed on in a breathless rush of words. "...Gunfire went on for over an hour. From the sea to the beach, blood and corpses are everywhere—humans, and mutants too." Hearing there were both human and mutant corpses, Zhalas clung to a final sliver of hope and asked in haste, "Are there more humans or mutants?" With an ugly expression, the officer replied, "Humans... but those people don't seem to be from the Alliance." Zhalas froze and blurted out, "Not the Alliance's?! Then whose could they be?" The officer shook his head. "I don't know. They carried no clear markings, so their identities can't be confirmed yet. According to footage captured by our drones, they entered Baiyue Strait aboard two freighters and ran smack into the mutant force Torch dispatched toward Port French Fries. Those scaly beasts were blind with bloodlust—the second they saw humans, they couldn't help themselves. They clashed with the people on those two ships first, then chased them all the way to shore. The landing site was a good five or six kilometers away from Port French Fries!" Zhalas's eyes widened. "And then?" With a strained look, the officer said, "And then... the Alliance wiped the floor with all of them." Zhalas: "..." The room fell into silence. Because the sea patrol wasn't around, the Federation's destroyers had lingered in the nearby waters for quite some time, and the drones they deployed watched nearly the entire battle until their batteries died. Watching Zhalas's grave face, the officer swallowed hard and lowered his voice. "...The real trouble is that they were completely wiped out. There are too many bodies—there's no time to clean them up, nor any way to do so. Come tomorrow morning at first light, the sea patrol will return to their patrol zone, and they'll definitely notice something wrong on the beach. My only worry right now is that someone with ulterior motives will link those corpses to today's exercise." Unlike the Navy, which was wholly loyal to the Southern Archipelago Federation, he knew full well there were two factions inside the Presidential Palace. There were good men standing firmly on the Federation's side like Mr. Zhalas, but also cowards who remained indecisive about Shelter 70. If those weaklings realized there was more to the spark of this war than met the eye, their spinelessness would drag the Federation—which held every advantage in this war—straight into an abyss. Zhalas pondered calmly for a long time before speaking in a measured tone. "Even if they link them together, it doesn't matter. That isn't our territory anyway." Seeing that Mr. Zhalas seemed blind to the gravity of the situation, the young officer grew anxious and blurted out, "That is true, sir... but what if someone connects those mutants to the freighters wrecked in the Southern Sea? Up until now, everyone believed those scaly creatures would never leave the Death Coast. But now they've swum over a thousand kilometers, popped up directly to our west, and can even launch torpedoes! Using distance as an excuse to claim they couldn't have attacked our freighters simply won't hold water anymore." Pausing, he lowered his voice further. "I heard people have been investigating those wrecked vessels lately, including the Golden Coast, which the President sent on an expedition to Haiya Province, as well as the wreckage of the ocean current power station... If those meddlers snooping around find anything, we'll be in deep trouble." A sharp glint flashed in Zhalas's eyes. In his clenched fist, his thumb and forefinger rubbed together ceaselessly. Watching the chief of staff's expression, the officer continued in a low voice, "What I worry about most right now is whether the President knows something. No matter what, we have to prepare for the worst. If worst comes to worst, maybe we should just lay our cards on the table with the President—" Under the Federation's current system, the President served concurrently as Commander-in-Chief of the Navy; any military action required the President's personal authorization to execute. Even though everything they did was for the Federation, this was ultimately an unauthorized operation, indefensible by both law and reason. The truth was bound to come out sooner or later. And the way things were going, that risk was only escalating. Rather than leaving behind ticking time bombs by keeping secrets today, it would be far better to confess directly, rope the President onto their war chariot, and pursue this war in an even more thorough fashion. Yet before he could finish, Zhalas cut him off without hesitation. "Now is not the time. The President and his supporters still harbor illusions about Shelter 70. We have to give those compatriots who haven't moved on from the past a little time. Don't worry, I'll keep an eye on him. You just keep a close watch on the sea patrol for me. I suspect someone leaked information from their end, allowing the Alliance to prepare in advance." "But..." The officer looked hesitant, clearly wanting to say more, but Zhalas shut him down curtly. "Dismissed. We've been meeting too long. If anything comes up, I'll send for you." "Yes, sir..." Meeting that brooking-no-argument gaze, the officer finally conceded with a nod, turned, and left the room. Watching the door close, Zhalas sank into the sofa and pinched the bridge of his nose with his forefinger. Lay their cards on the table with the President? What a bunch of naive fools. Mr. Mengge would never stand with them. He had founded the Southern Archipelago Federation with his own hands. If he found out that the ocean current power station had actually been sunk by their own people just to provide an excuse to purge Shelter 70, he might not kill Zhalas, but he would definitely kick him out of the Presidential Palace. Besides, even taking a step back and assuming the man agreed to help them cover up the truth of this war, how could Zhalas ever make the Federation his own? He would lay his cards on the table with the President, of course. Just definitely not right now, when the Presidential Palace and the Navy were still thick as thieves... Sinking his consciousness into a shimmering Sanctuary of light, Zhalas lowered his gaze and murmured a silent whisper. "Those gilled monsters you keep have stirred up trouble. You'd better tell them to keep a low profile for a while. "Not to complain, but... you really ought to find some allies who are at least somewhat presentable." ... The next morning. Morning sunlight bathed the northern shore of Baiyue Strait, draping the quiet beach in a layer of gold. Standing at the bow of the patrol boat, Muda stared fixedly toward Port French Fries, his brow slightly furrowed. Sharing his reaction, the sailor beside him murmured, "Such a heavy stench of blood..." Pausing, he added, "Doesn't smell like wild beasts, either." Muda nodded, turned toward the cabin behind him, and called out, "Activate active sonar." "Sir!" The sailor at the helm nodded in response, reached for the console dashboard, and flipped a red switch. Before long, he shouted in surprise, "Due west, six to seven kilometers out—two sunken ships! Judging by the echo signatures, they look like civilian freighters." Sunken ships?! A bad premonition crept into Muda's mind. The sailor beside him looked at him nervously. "Sir, should we go take a look?" Muda pondered for a moment. "Let's check on our neighbors first!" No matter what, over five hundred residents of Coral City lived in Port French Fries. Even though those people claimed to have joined the Alliance, the kinship of being compatriots made it impossible for him to simply abandon them. Of course, that extended to the other survivors of Port French Fries as well. Having gone drinking on the island every now and then, he was reasonably familiar with the people there. Though there had been plenty of misunderstandings between them at first, after spending time together, he realized they were actually pretty decent folk. Completely unlike the selfish, crafty wastelanders on the mainland, they rarely thought only of themselves; they often took other people's difficulties into account as well. Even the water pipeline currently under construction had earned them glowing reviews from the survivors of Ring Island—or at the very least, no one disliked them. Hopefully none of them had come to harm... The speedboat soon pulled up to the pier. Noticing how unexpectedly deserted the camp was, Muda's heart sank slightly. As soon as the boat came to a steady halt, he quickly hopped onto the dock and strode toward the camp with two of his men. Right at that moment, a shelter resident emerged carrying a plastic bucket and a fishing rod, running straight into him. Both froze at the sight of each other. The shelter resident reacted a bit faster. Snapping out of it, he smacked his own forehead and chuckled in stumbling Human Alliance language, "Oh, you're the captain of the Southern Archipelago Federation's sea patrol, right? Muda?" Staring at this unfamiliar fellow, Muda asked in a daze, "You know me?" The angler carrying the fishing rod grinned. "Sure do! First time I've come here, but I heard about you on the forum before." Muda: "...?" Seeing the NPC looking rather dim-witted, the player scratched his head and said, "You need something? Looking for someone, or...?" "Nothing much... I just wanted to ask where everyone went." As he spoke, Muda looked around, then turned an uncomprehending gaze back to the man with the fishing rod. "Why is it so quiet today?" At that, the player chuckled. "Oh, that! Totally normal for it to be quiet. There weren't that many people in this settlement to begin with, and over five hundred took off early this morning. A bunch of them went off with Brother Fang Chang to stir up some shit." "Stir up some shit?" Muda froze once more, baffled by the phrase. Seeing that he didn't understand, the player patiently recounted the whole backstory in his clumsy Human Alliance language. "Basically, last night a bunch of dumbasses came running over from Brahma Province. God knows what was going through their heads, but they actually dared to shoot at us. So we wiped them out right along with the fish the Church of the Torch keeps. Once we took care of them and hauled them in for questioning, turns out they're from the Xilan Empire." Xilan Empire, fish kept by the Church of the Torch, plus a pile of words he'd never heard before—Muda was utterly bewildered. Seizing on the player's pause, he hastily steered the conversation. "Well, as long as you're all all right... By the way, when will that Fang Chang of yours be back?" The player smiled. "Probably about a week. Something up? I can pass a message to him." Muda cleared his throat and said, "No need, just curious... By the way, you mentioned fish kept by Torch just now? What did you mean by that?" The player grinned and continued, "Those mutants, of course! The blue-skinned variety—scales all over their bodies, gills under their chins, carrying all kinds of weapons. Long guns, cannons, even torpedoes! Heard they drifted over from the Death Coast in Haiya Province." The Death Coast?! Muda stared at him in disbelief, shock written all over his face. He had naturally heard that a swarm of blue-skinned mutants lived near the Death Coast, surviving by fishing. What astounded him was that those mutants had actually appeared here! Even in a straight line, it was nearly a thousand kilometers from here to the Death Coast. Could those mutants really swim that far?! And when he heard that those mutants could launch torpedoes, his expression changed completely. "Can you take me to the scene?" The player scratched the back of his head, looking reluctant. "It's not far. Just head west along the coastline for five or six kilometers and you'll see it. Our guys should still be cleaning up the battlefield there... But I've gotta fish. Once that troll Stop Bullshitting and his crew get online, they'll overfeed all the fish. How about I find someone else to take you?" Hearing that the battlefield was only five or six kilometers to the west, Muda immediately thought of the two sunken ships they had detected on sonar, and a surge of excitement stirred within him. If those two ships had been sunk by mutants, they might find some clues on board! Seeing that the shelter resident was itching to end the conversation, he didn't waste any more of the man's time and offered a sincere word of thanks. "Thanks! I can head over myself!" With that, he led his subordinates back to the speedboat and restarted the engine. Steering another five kilometers west, he indeed spotted a group of people in exoskeletons on the nearby beach, dragging corpses washed ashore by the waves into freshly dug pits to bury them. Spotting Muda on the speedboat, Crawling Model Worker standing on the shore immediately recognized the man he'd drunk with before, waving with a smile. "Yo, back already?" Muda shouted back, "Just got back! I heard two ships sank here last night? If it's alright with you, I'd like to dive down and take a look." Crawling Model Worker waved breezily. "No problem! Before Brother Fang Chang left, he told us that if you were interested in those sunken ships, we should let you check them out. Need me to send someone to help you pinpoint their locations?" Muda: "No need, we've already locked onto their coordinates. Thanks!" Crawling Model Worker smiled. "You're welcome! Just in case, let me assign two Electric Rays to tag along with you." With that, he contacted the engineering team via his VM and dispatched two freshly charged Electric Rays from Port French Fries to assist. Those devices weren't just capable of underwater welding; they could also actively discharge electricity to drive away mutants—a new application the players had developed through practical experience. Considering that the speedboat's psychic interference device had limited output, Muda didn't refuse. Only after the two Electric Rays arrived did he order the engines started, following them out to the waters where the wrecks lay. The state of both freighters was utterly gruesome. Gaping holes had been torn into their hulls. Once flooded, they had plunged to the seabed, wedged one behind the other into the jagged, rocky seafloor. Mutilated, bloated corpses drifted around the wreckage—some snagged on the hull, others tangled in seaweed, left to the mercy of nibbling schools of fish like a scene straight out of hell. Leaping into the water in a deep-dive suit, Muda felt his scalp prickle and his stomach churn violently at the sight. The two Electric Ray drones, crackling with arcs of electricity across their dorsal surfaces, glided toward the front of one of the freighters. Sputtering current drove away the scavenging fish, opening a clear path forward for him. Following one of the Electric Rays, he swam forward. Sweeping his flashlight around the bow, Muda quickly found the inward-dented breach on its side. In that very instant, his pupils contracted sharply, disbelief and shock involuntarily flooding his gaze. The ruptured damage created by the explosion was an exact match for the scars on the hull of the Golden Coast research vessel printed in the newspapers! Although confirming whether it was caused by the same weapon model required professional forensic analysis, the discovery left him slack-jawed in astonishment. Snapping a photo of the blast breach, he swept his flashlight around the vicinity and, sure enough, located the remnants of a torpedo near a reef. It was a fragment no larger than a palm. Its crude, slapdash stainless-steel casing was virtually identical to the one they had recovered near the Golden Coast. First, the signal of a psychic interference device had been detected near the ocean current power station. Then, the Dolphin, supposedly "stained with the blood of twelve freighters," turned out not to have a single weapon aboard. And now, the aquatic mutants whom the titled consultant experts claimed "would never leave the Death Coast" had not only appeared a thousand kilometers away, but had even brought the exact weapon that sank the Golden Coast research vessel... Did those bastards have a single shred of truth in their mouths? Fury blazed in his eyes. His fists clenched instinctively, and he couldn't help hissing a curse through gritted teeth. "Damn them..." ... While the Southern Archipelago Federation's sea patrol was busy collecting evidence from the two sunken wrecks, hundreds of kilometers away on the Brahma Sea, a nuclear-fusion-powered submarine cut through the water at nearly fifty knots, surging toward Golden Gallon Port. A distance of two thousand kilometers would take diesel-powered freighters and an inexperienced crew a full week of plodding at sea. For the Dolphin, however, it wouldn't even take a day. If sea conditions were favorable, twenty-two hours would suffice. In addition to the chiliarch named Dhiraj and over a hundred battered, bruised Xilan Empire soldiers, more than five hundred players belonging to the Burning Corps were aboard the submarine as well. Over half of them had only arrived at Port French Fries that morning aboard the airship Niuma, stepping straight off the airship and boarding the submarine alongside munitions hauled from Dawn City. All of them were the Alliance's elite, their tier levels 25 at the very least. Not only were they outfitted with Type 5 "Light Cavalry" and Type 6 "Heavy Cavalry" exoskeletons, but twenty brand-new DLZJ-1 "Glow" powered armor suits were among their ranks! Aside from basic infantry gear, support equipment such as 88mm mortars, Y-2 quadrotor attack drones, and "Pigeon" missiles was readily available in full force. To clear space for munitions and spoils of war, Fang Chang had Captain Chen Jianhong empty the cargo holds overnight, transferring the containers into the newly built warehouse at Port French Fries for players interested in scavenging to sort through. Looking at the exoskeletons and power armors radiating an aura of slaughter inside the submarine's cargo hold, Captain Chen Jianhong felt that something was amiss and couldn't resist speaking up to Fang Chang beside him. "I believe I told you: the Dolphin is a cargo submarine. We aren't a warship, and we won't—nor should we—participate in any offensive military operations." Fang Chang smiled. "I know. But every citizen of the Alliance has the duty to uphold the Alliance Constitution. Besides, this isn't an offensive attack. The other side declared war without warning, and we are merely forced to launch a counterattack." Rolling his eyes at the nonsense, Chen Jianhong couldn't help shooting back, "I've never heard of a counterattack reaching two thousand kilometers away!" "Well, now you have, haven't you?" Fang Chang chuckled, patting his shoulder and offering patient comfort. "Don't worry, you won't take part in any fighting. You just need to wait in a safe place until we finish our business, then pick us up and leave." Seeing Captain Chen still harbor misgivings, Fang Chang added, "If you really can't accept it, just think of it as a humanitarian rescue." Captain Chen blinked. "...Humanitarian rescue?" "That's right," Fang Chang said with a straight face. "Based on leads provided by other shelter residents, we suspect human trafficking and organ trade operations are underway in Golden Gallon Port. Normally, our reach doesn't extend that far. But since they took the initiative to provoke us, we might as well wreck their port and snatch some people back while we're at it." Captain Chen: "..." Did this guy just slip up? One second he was preaching humanitarian rescue, and the next he blurted out his true intentions. Still, he didn't oppose it. He had heard bits and pieces about what was happening in Brahma Province; after all, plenty of survivors in Port French Fries had fled from there. If they could pull a few more souls out of that living hell, it would be a good deed. The cataclysm two centuries ago had turned the entire planet into a wasteland. Civilization hadn't just suffered a systemic collapse; it had mutated into monstrous distortions amid that decay. In his eyes, the only place left on this planet that could still be called normal was a survivor faction led by shelter residents like them. Almost every shelter resident harbored some degree of savior complex, and as a shelter resident himself, Chen Jianhong was no exception. There was no need for fancy excuses like "defensive counterattack." Rescuing suffering survivors. That alone was more than enough for him! On the other side of the vessel, blindfolded with his hands bound behind his back and tossed into a cabin, Chiliarch Dhiraj finally abandoned his futile struggles after several failed attempts to break free. The cord was spun from devil silk. Unless his arms could turn into a devil moth's mouthparts, he couldn't hope to snip even the tiniest nick in it. Listening to the sound of the tide beneath the deck, no matter how foolish he was, he could guess what these blue moles were planning. Most likely, they intended to do to them what they had tried to do—board civilian freighters and land at Golden Gallon Port. Shameless bastards! Treacherous villains! If you've got the guts, fight a fair and square duel! Dhiraj cursed internally, completely oblivious that his insults applied just as well to himself. Only when exhaustion set in did the furious roar echoing in his mind fade. Pressing his cheek against the cold deck, he panted, his heavy eyelids drooping shut. Who knew how much time had slipped by. He seemed to have dozed off for a while, waking groggily only when hunger gnawed at his stomach. Just then, he noticed that the sound of the sea murmuring in his ears was different from when he arrived by ship—it sounded much duller, like the ghostly whispers of phantoms. A faint unease stirred in his chest. And when he thought about spending a whole week blindfolded inside this claustrophobic cabin, that faint unease swelled into outright dread. "Hey!" He couldn't help shouting, craning his chin off the deck to catch the guards' attention. "At least take off my blindfold!" No one answered. Just as anxiety gripped him, footsteps sounded ahead, accompanied by the faint click of a key in a lock. Having been blindfolded for so long, his hearing had grown exceptionally sharp, and he swiftly picked up the subtle rustle. Assuming it was someone bringing him food, he seized the opportunity and yelled at the top of his lungs, "Can you take off my blindfold? Are you seriously afraid of a prisoner bound hand and foot?!" To his surprise, however, the person didn't seem to be bringing a meal. At least, in the breeze wafting from the door, he caught no aroma of food. "Quit your squawking. You're home. Get up and get moving." Home...? Dhiraj froze, and then sheer terror warped across his face. He had indeed dozed off groggily, but there was no way in hell he had slept for an entire week! Right now, they probably hadn't even cleared the Brahma Sea—how could they have arrived?! A horrifying thought flashed through his mind. Could it be... These bastards were going to toss him into the sea to feed the fish?! "No! I'm not getting off!" Looking at the lunatic screaming his head off, the player sent down to fetch him sighed helplessly. Why did he have to get stuck with the most boring chore? Not bothering to waste words on the prisoner, he grabbed the man by the collar, hoisted him up like a scrawny chick, and shoved him out of the compartment. "Behave yourself!"