Chapter 436: Terror Awakening IV

Chapter 436: Terror Awakening IV



***

Each of the five squad leaders led their squadrons through the dark tunnels, diving deeper into the Behemoth's domain with each step.

They battled fiercely to stop Templar from setting up their Thumpers, which were later found out to simply be neural network disruptors, set up on old-world frequencies.

This meant that it would only affect the AI manager and its systems, not anything else, it wouldn't even affect Lyra since, unlike it, her systems were based on the new world, not the old.

She just had an access key to the old world.

But that didn't diminish the consequences of their failure.

In any case, if fate had come to pass, what would the platoon, or rather, Lyra being there even do?

Well, actually... she could do something that Amon couldn't.

Something that only she, an AI, could do.

Make a deal with the ruin's manager.

And that might just save Amon the effort of dealing with a Behemoth.

So their mission was made clear, updated, and the blanks were filled.

Now they knew how the terror would awaken, and it was simpler than theorized.

Yet knowing that didn't help much.

While it did increase the methods of getting through this disaster to two, none of them were very likely.

In fact, one of them seemed almost inevitable.

Templar were sending their entire force in, using teleporters that had been secretly placed all over the ruin, likely since long ago.

They were just never-ending.

Even with the hundred soldiers the Elite cohort had already killed and the additional fifty they had eliminated since then, the platoon had faced no fewer than three hundred soldiers in total.

Of course, most of them weren't Celestials but plain old hunters, yet that still was an impressive number, especially when compared to Emir's measly platoon of fifty men, women, and half-cyborgs.

While he did make for the low quantity with quality, it was not enough to cruise by with no casualties.

The deaths... they were many.

For every twenty they killed, one of theirs was either severely injured or dead.

It was a race against time.Nôv(el)B\\jnn

Just who would lose their 'resources' first, Emir or the Praying Lady...

There seemed to be no answer to this question.

Truly, this fate wasn't merciful.

Even Jake, a squadron leader, couldn't escape it.

The poor Ranger lost the very thing his Specialization needed.

His eyes.

They were burned alongside his face, his skin melting off.

Minutes before then, he was leading his squadron with the precision expected of a Ranger, just off an encounter with a few soldiers, his once sharp eyes scanning the shadows for any sign of movement.

Then, he spotted a group of soldiers in the distance, already halfway through setting up their Thumper.

Without even needing his command, Jack's squad split up into small cohorts and attacked. Most used long-range weapons to pick them off before they could react, but one cohort went close to flank them.

Jack took the lead himself, eventually taking down the last of them with a few well-placed shots.

After making sure that no one was around, he began to dismantle the device, something that

he had gotten used to in the past however long.

But then... the unexpected happened, like always.

It exploded, his face and upper body taking most of the impact.

Thankfully, none of the others were close enough to get swept up, but that alone showed that it was a targeted attack.

They wanted to kill or at least hurt him, and they succeeded.

He was now blind, at least on one side.

The Zenith Warden in the squadron was of no help to the other.

One might blame her, but it wasn't her fault, Jake's innate healing capacity was limited.

As an Ascendant second sub-rank, a Knight, his body could not heal from injuries that

disabled the entirety of an organ.

Only Paladins could do that.

He had to be.

Unfortunately, he couldn't bring along the Mechs they had back in the garage.

The reason was simple and quite obvious: they couldn't be seen using them.

All Mechs belonged to the UEF Army and were illegal to be owned by anyone other than them.

Bringing those killing machines here would only put a large target on their backs, giving the UEF free reign to weaken the family as they liked.

His squadron played off his skills and copied what was done to Jake, killing Templar soldiers

with their own devices before they knew what hit them.

Those men couldn't even report what was happening.

Every time they closed in on death, an EMP blast would occur, disabling their comms and

stopping them from reporting what happened.

This resulted in a cycle that always started with their explosive deaths.

The squadron was on the weaker side, even with Leo carrying them, they couldn't avoid

deaths, and there was no blaming them.

A majority of them were techies like him, or newly awakened hunters, brimming with talent

but not much experience.

That showed quite a bit.

When they first encountered a group of soldiers, they almost allowed them to set up the

Thumper and reach full functionality.

In Leo's own words, the only thing they had left to do was match the exact frequency to

connect to the ruin, as every location needed a different frequency, a countermeasure put in place by the AI manager.

Desperate, he managed to hack in and pause that process at the last moment.

He then corrupted the device's systems, disrupting its function and causing it to malfunction.

The only reason no explosion resounded was because he didn't know that such a thing could happen and at such a scale.

Since then, and sometime after, the deeper they descended into the ruin, the more explosions rang out.

Those were eventually heard by the other squadrons as the tunnels began to converge.

It wasn't long till the five squadrons found themselves heading toward the same direction-

the myocardium of the Metro's Heart ruin.

The air there grew even heavier with Aether, and slowly, every sound had faded, obscured almost as if in deep water.

Kiera and Lyra were the first to arrive, reaching a large, empty circular chamber.

The walls were tall there, and the roof was high up, similarly empty of anything as if this

place was designed to induce boredom.

But when they stepped foot in the chamber, a man appeared, his back facing them.

He wore a long dark blue coat made of soft fabric, with gold lines running through it. Underneath, they could see a lighter blue shirt, paired with black pants and tall boots. His familiar features were easily recognizable.

They almost couldn't believe their eyes.

That curly black hair, and gentle visage.

There was no mistaking it.

...It was Amon.

He stood before a fully functioning neural network disruptor, which had around fifteen men,

or at least the limbs of what appeared to be fifteen men, strewn about, painting the device as

well as the white chamber in red.

And before Lyra could react or do anything to stop it-just anything-a pulse was emitted,

sending a shockwave through the whole ruin.

"NO!"

She felt it.

There was no escaping this.

It had happened.

The AI manager, the one they had fought so hard to keep dormant, was now enraged.

And in the next moment...

A hologram materialized before them.