Just Who Is Ambushing Whom?

A sudden burst of gunfire crackled through the air, bullets swarming toward the convoy like a cloud of wild locusts and startling the players standing beside the vehicles. Who would have guessed the Southern Legion had some tricks up their sleeve and had actually scraped together an army right under their noses! However, the only thing these guys managed to achieve was giving them a fright. Hearing the clatter of incoming rounds, I'm the Darkest took heavy, clumsy strides and ducked behind an off-road vehicle. His heart had been pounding while he was sitting in the car earlier, and sure enough, those bastards were lying in wait up ahead. Thanks to the bonus from his high Perception stat, he had sensed the danger in advance. Because of that, the group hadn't plunged headfirst into the enemy's kill zone and had instead pulled over right at its outer edge. The enemy clearly hadn't anticipated the sudden hard brake either, so the marauders hiding along the edge of the abandoned town hadn't fully brought their firepower to bear. Even so, the crossfire formed by over a hundred people firing simultaneously was fierce enough. "Holy crap! These sons of bitches pack quite a punch!" I'm the Darkest was thoroughly spooked and stayed crouched behind the vehicle, not daring to poke his head out. On the other hand, the other players who had come with him were howling with excitement. Half of them were complete rookies, while the other half were corps veterans. Perhaps because they had been cooped up for too long, even the old hands were shouting and cheering. "Get ready for battle!" "Let's do this, boys!" Combat erupted in an instant! Yet watching from the distance, Wyatt felt that something was increasingly amiss. In particular, when he saw the blue "power armor" hide behind the off-road vehicle in terror, while the Guards Corps swarmed forward in a rush without paying the slightest attention to their Administrator, a powerful sense of discord welled up in his chest. *Is this guy really the Administrator?* While it seemed plausible enough, something felt profoundly off about the whole thing. "Hahaha! Taste this!" Hauling a heavy machine gun from the vehicle's trunk, a Strength-type player traveling with the squad roared with excitement as he racked the bolt with a sharp clatter. The thirty-kilogram heavy machine gun looked like a little chick in his grip. Holding the barrel directly with his left hand, he braced the stock against the shoulder plate of his exoskeleton. Aiming the 20mm muzzle at a low wall three hundred meters away, he pulled the trigger without hesitation. Streamers of tracer fire tore toward the marauders crouching behind the wall like javelins. The ferocious volley instantly suppressed the enemy, blowing several marauders along with the wall into pieces. Mists of blood and shattered stone scattered through the air, and the thunderous roar was dizzying. The gruesome sight sent a shiver down the spines of everyone nearby. As expected of the Guards Corps! Rumor had it that the guards were the elite aces under the Administrator's command, and seeing them today proved their reputation was well deserved! However, the marauders were only intimidated for a brief moment. No matter how formidable their combat prowess was, there were only about thirty of them—not even enough to make up a full century! Seeing his henchmen wavering, the chiliarch leading the charge gritted his teeth and barked at the centurions beside him. "Hold the line! There's only thirty of them! We outnumber them by a hundred to one! Even if each of us just spat on them, we'd drown them!" With that, he grabbed a centurion by the collar, spraying spit across the man's face. "Lao Liu, take a hundred men around their flank! Bring the rocket launchers with you!" "Yes, sir!" The centurion bellowed in response, keeping low as he pushed through the chaotic battlefield, and shouted at the henchmen crouching hesitantly in front of the buildings. "Stop dragging your damn feet! Get moving with me right now! If you dawdle any longer, the Alliance's reinforcements will be here!" Though terrified, the men were cowed by his glaring, bull-sized eyes and bit the bullet to follow him. The group flanked out from the west side of the abandoned town, intending to use the woods for cover to swing around behind the convoy and catch them completely off guard. Admittedly, the plan was sound; unfortunately, they picked the wrong opponents. Over a hundred henchmen surged out of the town in a disorderly mob. But just as they dove into the woods, they ran smack into a wall of armor gleaming with a chilling sheen. Unlike their own force, which shared barely ten sets of exoskeletons among a hundred men, nearly every single one of these fighters had heavy gear, and several were even clad in Xiaguang power armor. Yet what inspired true dread was not merely their equipment, but the aura radiating from them. These people were battle-hardened veterans! The moment his eyes locked with one of the power armors, a cold sweat broke out along Centurion Lao Liu's spine. *It's the Storm Corps!* *But why?!* Meanwhile, watching the marauders deliver themselves right to his doorstep, Kakarot, who was leading the squad, broke into a savage grin. "Damn it, after guarding the home base for so long, we finally get a chance to stretch our legs—" Before he could finish, a crisp *clang* rang against his chestplate. A marauder had shot him, but the bullet struck the ceramite chest armor of his power suit without leaving even a scratch. Seeing that an insolent fool dared to interrupt him, Kakarot drew a short javelin from behind his back and hurled it with vicious force. *Whoosh—!* A tearing sonic boom cut through the woods! Enhanced by both his Strength stat and the power armor, the javelin flew like a bolt of lightning, impaling the marauder who had shot at him and pinning the man firmly to a tree, shaking its thick trunk violently. The brutal display terrified the marauders. Several showed absolute panic on their faces and reflexively stepped backward. However, one bolder thug gritted his teeth and hoisted a rocket launcher onto his shoulder. Yet before he could fire, a transparent blade slit his throat. A ripple shimmered in the air, and an exoskeleton-clad player materialized beside the man like a ghost. Blood spurted skyward with a wet hiss. The tilted rocket launcher fired directly into the crowd, sending several marauders flying in a blast of dirt and flame. "Holy crap... using high explosives against power armor? What were you thinking, buddy?" Rest in Peace clicked his tongue, immediately reactivated his optical camouflage, and turned into a translucent phantom hunting down the panic-stricken marauders. At the same time, a tempest of gunfire erupted through the woods. Combat exploded in an instant! And escalated to white-hot intensity in the blink of an eye! Facing an entire company of the Storm Corps, the mere hundred-odd marauders were no match at all. The battle turned into a one-sided slaughter! "Hold them off!!" Seeing that victory was utterly hopeless, Centurion Lao Liu shrieked in terror, turned on his heel, and sprinted away from the battlefield. Yet before he took two steps, a whistling streak pierced clean through his neck, pinning his entire body to a tree. Striding over with heavy, purposeful steps, Kakarot reached out, yanked free the bloodstained javelin, slung it behind his back with a flick of his wrist, and smoothly unclipped a short-barreled submachine gun from his armor. The nearby marauders stared at him in horror, their legs feeling like lead. Perhaps knowing they had nowhere left to run, they channeled their terror into reckless howls, charging forward with whatever weapons they held. Yet within a few breaths, a concentrated volley of bullets drove them straight into the dirt. Emptying a magazine, Kakarot reloaded and swept his gaze over the corpses strewn across the ground, without a shred of pity in his eyes. Every single one of these scumbags had hands soaked in the blood of survivors. They no longer deserved to be called human, and were far more despicable than the mutants in the wilderness. Chambering a fresh round into his submachine gun, he looked at the dozen or so surviving marauders and spoke in a chilling voice. "Leave none alive!" ... At the same time, Hunting Claw, commanding from within the abandoned town, heard the gunfire coming from the nearby woods. Before he could process it, a whistling shell slammed into the roof of an abandoned building not far from him. *Boom—!* The deafening blast shattered the windowpanes, forcing everyone inside the room to duck for cover. "Damn it—how do they have artillery?!" A marauder fitted with cybernetic augments cried out in shock, his earlier arrogance replaced by utter bewilderment. Hunting Claw was no different. The ear-splitting detonation left him completely dazed. Hadn't they agreed this was an ambush?! How did the other side whip out artillery? They felt like a full regular army! Before he could recover, one shell after another bombarded their surroundings. Scraps of burning shrapnel whipped through black smoke, and the comms channel descended into chaotic screaming. "It's mortars!" "Seems to be coming from the west!" "No—! Wait, there's movement to the east too!" The command channel was in complete turmoil, even though they hadn't suffered an EMP strike. Evidently, the enemy hadn't bothered to waste such high-tech weaponry on them. Or perhaps they felt leaving the marauders' radios working would only accelerate their confusion and amplify their panic... Unable to keep his subordinates under control, Hunting Claw cursed in terror. "Damn it... what the hell are those Southern Legion morons doing! Where's their big weapon! Why haven't they used it yet!" That guy Wyatt had promised him they still had a trump card hidden right in this town, one that could turn their opponents to ash with the press of a single button. Seeing his own men suffering continuous casualties while their ally failed to take action, Hunting Claw cursed their mothers in his heart. Were those bastards saving their trump card to lay eggs with?! Just then, a marauder stumbled in through the doorway. Hunting Claw instinctively raised his revolver at the man's head, only lowering his aim once he saw it was one of his own. The man collapsed to his knees in a wretched state, wailing incoherently. "Boss! Their firepower is too heavy! The boys can't hold out!" Listening to the thumping concussions outside, Hunting Claw looked as though he had seen a ghost. "How is that possible! There's only twenty or thirty of them! You have two or three thousand! How could you fail to stop them?!" "B-but..." The marauder scratched his head in frantic agitation, unable to find the words to explain. Those fighters moved as if they had three heads and six arms, their speed leaving only afterimages, and their aim was sharper than an eagle's. Although the Southern Legion had provided them with some exoskeletons, they had only received them days ago, which hardly caused a fundamental change in their combat capabilities. More importantly, the continuous casualties among their comrades had shattered their will to fight. At the end of the day, they were just bandits; their discipline and training lagged far behind a regular army. Three thousand men sounded like a lot, but if they couldn't deploy properly across the battlefield, they were no different from three hundred. Drowning the enemy in spit? You had to survive long enough to spit first. At this moment, Hunting Claw didn't even know that the two flanking detachments he had dispatched had already been wiped out midway by the Storm Corps. In less than half a minute, another marauder bolted through the door, screaming in panic. "Boss! From the west! A whole unit suddenly hit us! Sounds like thousands of them!" Hearing this, Hunting Claw nearly coughed up blood, desperately wishing he could crack open the man's skull to see what sludge filled it. "Bullshit! Where the hell would thousands of people come from?! All of Settlement No. 10 only has two thousand people! Can they conjure them out of thin air?!" The marauder turned pale, stammering without an answer. Perhaps there weren't thousands, but there were definitely hundreds. Otherwise, so many brothers wouldn't have been chased back by the gunfire. Before he could explain further, an alarmed shout forced its way into the room alongside the clamor of gunfire and artillery. "Boss! The Alliance... damn it, they're charging us!" Hunting Claw's face drained of color. Ignoring the bombarding shells outside, he strode out the door. Just then, a mortar round struck nearby, jolting him so hard he nearly stumbled. No longer caring to curse, he hurried toward the east side of the town. At that exact moment, he caught sight of a suit of power armor standing in the crooked street. Around that figure lay seventeen or eighteen corpses, and the ruins were soaked in a gruesome mess of flesh and blood. A flicker of dread showed in Hunting Claw's eyes. Only now did he realize what kind of monsters he was actually facing. This didn't look remotely like a group caught in an ambush. Instead, they were the ones who looked like prey cornered by beasts... At that moment, Kakarot had no idea the marauders' leader was watching him, let alone what was going through the man's head. Yanking his short javelin out of a wrecked heavy exoskeleton, he shook off the blood and armor fragments, bursting into hearty laughter toward the terrified marauders. "Hahaha! That was fucking satisfying!" ... It had been a long time since they engaged in such a cathartic battle. The Storm Corps players surging into the abandoned town tore through the enemy like tigers among sheep, their kill counts soaring. Seeing the enemy's fire growing weaker and weaker until it was barely a token effort, the thirty-odd players acting as bait could no longer sit still. They cast off their facade of being "ambushed," ditching their bait and charging toward the town three hundred meters away. Watching the players abandon cover and rush forward, I'm the Darkest yelled in a panic. "Holy crap, cover me!" Before his voice had even faded, someone snapped back at him. "Cover your ass! Just play your decoy part and stay hidden!" "Initiate the team fight!" "Long live the Administrator!" "You have to say it in the Human Alliance language, or they won't understand what you're yelling!" "Who cares!" "Awoooo!" Clearly, these bastards didn't show him any of the reverence due to the Administrator. Watching everyone abandon him and charge ahead, I'm the Darkest stepped out from behind cover with an exasperated chuckle and jogged after them. It wasn't that he was worried about being left alone. He was mainly afraid that if the fight ended before he got a single kill, it would be far too embarrassing. Unfortunately, as a Perception-type player, relying on his Strength to carry an exoskeleton weighing nearly a ton was simply too much to ask, and relying solely on its overworked electric motor to keep pace with the other players was thoroughly unrealistic. By the time he finally reached the abandoned town, the fighting on the south side was essentially over. The single-story houses and perimeter walls, pulverized by heavy machine-gun fire, were surrounded by marauder corpses. The gory scene was like an earthly hell. Seeing that the battlefield no longer required his services, I'm the Darkest sighed and found a stone block to sit down on. "Damn it! You guys didn't leave a single sip of broth for a brother." For a brief moment, he suddenly understood what the Administrator felt like. A long time ago, that guy had charged into the fray right alongside them. Yet at some point, they had developed to the stage where he no longer needed to take the field personally. And rather than having him fight in person, they truly preferred that he stay safely in the rear. After all, unlike them, he couldn't respawn, and the penalty for his death was far higher than anyone could bear... Thinking about it that way, it really did seem a bit lonely—possessing immense strength with nowhere to unleash it. On second thought, though, I'm the Darkest figured the guy wasn't a player, so his mindset might not be the same as theirs. For all he knew, pulling strings from behind the scenes was something he thoroughly enjoyed. There was no telling. The gunfire in the distance gradually subsided. Having lost more than half their numbers, the marauders finally gave up struggling, progressively abandoning their positions and fleeing toward the outskirts of town. However, this would only delay their deaths. Up to this point, the Storm Corps had deployed only two companies. The remaining three companies were on standby right along the retreat route of these deserters. According to the plan, Brother Spring lying in ambush would eliminate part of them, then track the footprints of the rest back to their lair to wipe out everyone remaining in one fell swoop. I'm the Darkest dusted off his armor, preparing to step forward and regroup with his teammates. Right then, a prickle of warning surged up his spine to the back of his head. In a split second, a figure hurtled toward him like a cannonball. Sensing the threat, I'm the Darkest spun around on pure instinct and threw a direct punch to meet the sharp claw sweeping toward his face. *Clang!* A metallic chime resonated through the air, and I'm the Darkest found himself staring into a savage face. The man had a pair of sharp claws grafted to his arms, seemingly made of titanium alloy, which had actually gouged two notches into his fist armor. Not only that, but the man's legs were likely modified as well; his explosive power and speed clearly exceeded ordinary human limits. Failing his initial strike, Hunting Claw used the recoil to flip in midair and landed steadily on his feet. Dropping back into an offensive stance, he glared fixedly at the azure power armor, his venomous gaze like the flicking tongue of a viper. Seeing that the man didn't follow up with another attack, I'm the Darkest stood calmly in place, waiting for him to make the next move. It wasn't that he didn't want to attack, but this iron contraption was simply too damn heavy. If he didn't have to move, he couldn't be bothered to budge. Staring at the "Administrator" for a long while without finding an opening, Hunting Claw let out an unsettling laugh. "Not bad moves..." "Right back at you." "Heh, I thought you pampered types turned into cowards on the battlefield. Didn't expect you to have some skill." I'm the Darkest wanted to shrug, but the shoulder pauldrons on both sides refused to budge, so he gave up. "That's because you've never seen me on a battlefield before." "Is that so?" Hunting Claw narrowed his eyes, scrutinizing the prey before him, and chuckled again. "Your subordinates are strong, but of all the mistakes you could make, you shouldn't have given me this chance to face you alone." Seeing that the man was exceptionally talkative, I'm the Darkest couldn't help but yawn. "And then? What can you do now that you have it?" The instant I'm the Darkest yawned, Hunting Claw's pupils shrank. He had finally caught that fleeting opening! His legs flexed violently, his tendons unleashing terrifying force that cracked the concrete beneath his feet! The claws blurred into an afterimage, shooting toward I'm the Darkest like a bolt from a crossbow. "Die!" Letting out a ferocious roar, he put all his strength into the deadliest strike of his life, thrusting toward the man's throat. From this day forth, he would become a legend among the marauders, revered by every raider across the wasteland! He would personally sever the Alliance Administrator's head! Yet at that very moment, a massive fist smashed toward his face like an iron hammer. Shock tore through Hunting Claw's mind. He hastily raised both arms in a cross-block, but the hand reaching for his face locked firmly around the pair of titanium alloy claws. The tough blades vibrated with a groaning hum, and having secured his opponent, I'm the Darkest finally breathed a sigh of relief. Strength and reflexes were never his forte. Fortunately, the exoskeleton still proved somewhat useful, drawing on its remaining charge to push its motors into overdrive, allowing him to block the lethal strike while anticipating his opponent's next move. The blades bit deeply into the steel armor, but that only made it harder for the titanium claws to pull free. Looking at the panic-stricken marauder, I'm the Darkest's eyes darted, and a mischievous grin spread across his face. "How about I tell you a secret?" Without waiting for an answer, he popped open the helmet's visor. "Actually, I'm not the Administrator." The moment he saw that face, Hunting Claw went completely blank, as if struck by lightning. Not... the Administrator?! Then what in the world had they spent the entire night lying in ambush for?! Before he could gather his wits, a compact javelin whistled in from the side and slammed viciously into his humerus. The titanium components cracked instantly. He only had time to utter a pained shriek before the ceramite spearhead sheared clean through his arm, maintaining its momentum to plunge straight into his ribs. Electrical sparks burst forth instantly. Impaled through and through by the javelin, Hunting Claw was killed on the spot, tumbling to his knees before I'm the Darkest. "Damn... you're stealing my kill!" Snapping his visor shut, I'm the Darkest tossed aside the titanium claws in his grip and raised a middle finger at Kakarot not far away. The latter chuckled teasingly. "I just worried you couldn't handle him." I'm the Darkest rolled his eyes, too lazy to argue. "What about the nuke? Is there actually one?" Kakarot walked up to him, pulled the javelin from the corpse, and slotted it back into the holster on his back. "Found it already, right in the town center. But they've already armed it, set on a one-hour timer." Evidently, the enemy intended to detonate the nuke while the Alliance was clearing the battlefield. That one hour was likely meant as their own escape window. However, the Southern Legion hadn't realized that the Guards Corps had been watching their movements long ago and had anticipated this trump card ahead of time. Hoping to catch the Alliance off guard with a nuke was wishful thinking at best. I'm the Darkest's expression turned serious. "Can we defuse it?" "Doubtful. We gave up on that anyway," Kakarot shrugged, then smiled slyly as he shifted the topic. "Besides, why defuse it?" "There's still an hour left, and we've already pinpointed the approximate coordinates of their headquarters. We can just load it onto a Viper transport and deliver it right back to their doorstep."