Chaptet 606.2: The Irresistable Bait

The pre-battle mobilization was complete. Chu Guang left the bridge and handed the ship entirely over to the captain and the officers.

As for himself... He went to the players’ save point.

Deployment of the frontline forces could be completely entrusted to those he trusted, but to ensure the whole campaign was foolproof, he wanted to add one more necessary layer of insurance to the airship.

That task could only be carried out by his beloved little players.

Of course, he would not skimp on the compensation.

The moment he stepped off the bridge, the Heart of Steel began to move like a wound-up machine, orderly, swift, and purposeful.

The radar team quickly locked onto the jamming source coordinates. A 400 mm rocket-boosted projectile was readied and fired, sending a punitive blow toward the distant target.

Elsewhere, on the ground, the Goblin Corps group chat exploded.

“Log in, log in!”

“Action!”

“Hurry up!”

Mosquito hammered out three messages in a second, slapped on his helmet and returned to the game. Just as he climbed out of a Clone Cabin and walked down the corridor, he ran straight into the administrator striding by.

Mosquito’s eyes lit up. If the administrator was present, it probably meant a hidden mission had triggered, so he cleared his comically deep voice and called out in his usual ridiculous tone, “Good evening, exalted administrator!”

The call successfully drew the administrator’s attention.

Seeing Mosquito, Chu Guang’s eyes brightened as well, though he kept his expression composed in the measured manner expected of an NPC. “You came at a good time. I have an honorable and arduous task to assign to you.”

Mosquito was ecstatic, bowing dramatically. “Whatever you command! I may be clumsy, but I am ready to give my life for the New Alliance!”

Chu Guang couldn’t help smiling inwardly at the exaggeration, but he remained impassive on the surface. He cleared his throat once and said, “The mission has been updated on your VM. Follow the mission description and operate as instructed...”

...

The 400 mm main gun aimed at Brocade Lake Municipality. With a long flash of fire, a rocket-boosted projectile trailed with white smoke entered the skies.

The falling scream of the projectile tore through the silent night, and the city’s tranquility was shattered by the deafening explosion that followed.

It was as if daylight had risen from the ground, scattering fog for several kilometers.

On a rooftop, Arzu watched the explosion with a cold smile, then the smile froze on his face. “Tsk.”

The good news was that the New Alliance had indeed taken the bait he had tossed, the heavy rocket struck directly at the disguised jamming source. They had been accurate, albeit ironically so.

The bad news was that the New Alliance had fitted that rocket-boosted shell with a nuclear warhead. Gamma-induced Compton scattering produced a wide-area electromagnetic pulse.

Although the real jamming device hadn’t been destroyed, the instantaneous electromagnetic disturbance exposed the fake radar he had hidden inside the city.

If they fired once more, they could completely neutralize the interference affecting the Heart of Steel.

What was worse for him was that the tiny flaw that had just leaked might already have exposed the location of the Mutant Humans.

Arzu had wanted to appear before that creature in the posture of the chosen Apostle after they had won, but he knew he had to act.

Plugging into the chip embedded in the Biotic Armor, Nightmare,Arzu cleared his throat and spoke slowly. “You had better fly lower.”

In the night sky, Gaen was reveling in power that felt godlike, completely unaware of the exchange between the New Alliance and the Torch Church outside the battlefield.

He had never been so strong!

The whole sky seemed to bow beneath his wings!

The fanged “demons” clustered around him with absolute loyalty. With a glance, he could command them to die for him. They were like cells of his own body.

As Gaen luxuriated in his reverie, a light, fluttering voice drifted into his head and shattered his boundless fantasies.

Annoyed by a voice that had materialized inside his mind, Gaen twisted and frowned, a low snarl rising from his throat. “Who are you?”

The voice replied from nowhere. “I am the chosen Apostle.”

Hearing that familiar title, Gaen narrowed his eyes. “You’re the chosen one?”

The Biotic Armor had been a gift from the Torch Church; of course he knew who they worshipped. What surprised him was that the legendary chosen Apostle would speak to him personally.

Arzu paused for a moment and answered softly, “Yes.”

To them, each of them could call themselves the chosen Apostle. Although he had not entered the Sanctuary, inheriting Luo Qian’s position was enough. The Torch Church was not excessively formal with insiders, anything that served the ultimate grand plan was permitted.

What Arzu hadn’t expected was that the green-skinned brute would react not with reverence but with a brazen, rude laugh. “Hahaha! You are the chosen one? Watch me smash those two-legged pests to pieces!”

Rather than staying quiet, Gaen howled to the heavens as if to ensure the other side noticed him, thrust his wings, and soared even higher.

What an idiot.

Arzu cursed to himself, forcing his patience and continuing, “Listen. I’m not joking. The New Alliance doesn’t need eyes to know where you are, don’t think hiding in the fog makes you safe. If you don’t want to run into metal shells, have your underlings spread out and fly no higher than 30 meters above the ground. The closer, the better.”

Hearing the voice wasn’t joking, Gaen finally calmed somewhat and reluctantly curbed his temper. “Got it. Now can you get out of my head? I don’t like talking to people who hide their faces!”

He folded his wings and signaled his minions to descend.

“Tsk...” Arzu grunted, angrily cut the connection, and took a deep breath while staring into the dense gray night, forcing himself to remain calm.

Although Gaen was a beast, they needed him. Everything was for the grand plan. It was a necessary sacrifice...

...

On the bridge of the Heart of Steel, it was a hub of activity.

The operator at the control console had just input the radar team’s newly observed jamming coordinates into the fire-control system.

The 400 mm main gun adjusted its aim, reloaded another rocket-boosted projectile, and prepared to fire at the real jamming source.

Then another report came from the radar room. “Large numbers of unidentified flying objects detected due south! Flight speeds between 97 and 99 km/h! They are heading straight for us, they are only 20 kilometers away!”

Upon hearing the report, the captain asked immediately, “How many of them are there?”

𝐟𝕣𝕖𝐞𝐰𝕖𝚋𝐧𝗼𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝗰𝐨𝐦

Staring at his screen, the operator replied rapidly, “10,078!”

The captain’s pupils constricted.

There were more than 10,000 of them?!

His first reaction was that it was impossible, that such a number was absurdly large!

The exaggeration felt eerily familiar, just like before, when the New Alliance had used a decoy plane loaded with an active jamming source to draw the Heart of Steel’s fire, then slipped a transport plane directly over its head while the ship reloaded.

Could it be another decoy?!

Outside the porthole there was only black fog. The sun had fully dipped below the horizon. The airship floating among the clouds was like a submarine deep underwater, visual observation was impossible, and radar was their only pair of eyes.

After a tense moment, the second heavy rocket struck the jamming source in the city.

With the thunderous blast breaking through the mist, the radar returned to normal, and the blurry red blips finally reappeared clearly on the screen.

The captain made an immediate decision. “Scan their silhouettes!”

He needed to know what those craft actually were.

After a flurry of operations, the radar team reported their observations.

“The swarm’s individual sizes range from two to five meters. Flight speeds are wildly inconsistent and their forms are continuously changing... They’re flying too low! Ground clutter severely interferes with returns, making it difficult to acquire precise flight parameters.”

The adjutant looked at the captain. “If I may speak frankly, these don’t look like aircraft... But if they are decoy jammers, the interference coming from the city is overly deliberate.”

He was convinced something else was there. The captain agreed, nodded, and asked, “What do you think?”

After a moment, the adjutant answered, “Not necessarily aircraft... Could they be some kind of mutant species affected by a Spirit Interference Field?”

The captain returned the question, “Can an Spirit Interference Device cover Brocade Lake Municipality all the way here?”

The adjutant’s gaze flickered; he tapped the radar screen with his forefinger. “What if the device is among them?”

At that, the captain’s face changed slightly and he ordered at once, “Prepare the anti-air guns!”

“Open fire on the radar-marked zone!”