Chapter 329: Mission 1 [4]
"Tell me, where is Dhruv Laden?!"
Standing behind the D Rank Bioforger Gene Augur, Leon could not help it as his lips twitched.
Despite being the one who strategized and proposed the attack plan, seeing the veteran Lt. Colonel playing his role so diligently still felt a bit comical to him.
He struggled to stay in character.
In contrast to Leon who felt that the current situation was funny, subjected to the questioning of the D Rank Gene Augur, the E Rank terrorist almost pissed his pants in terror as he shook in fear.
And of course, despite his fear, he didn’t respond.
Instead, he gulped, then he screamed loudly. "Gud er
Buoyed by the pious fate of their superior, the other surviving terrorists regained their courage as they also chanted piously.
"GUD ER STØRRE!"
"GUD ER STØRRE!"
Hearing them, Leon almost rolled his eyes. ’This sh*t again?’
Unlike him though, the moment he heard them, Lt. Colonel Umar revealed a sinister smile on his face. "Fine, go and meet your god f*ckers...!"
BAM!
He smashed the E Rank Ascended’s head into the wall, crushing his skull with the vice grip of his hand!
And as blood spilled out like a fountain, he controlled it.
Blood Manipulation!
The blood congealed under his control, shooting out like arrows and piercing all remaining survivors on the heart, ending their lives.
And with that, it came to an end.
They slaughtered over 100 terrorists in 10 minutes!
...
In the 2nd underground layer...
BADUMP! BADUMP!
Hidden behind his full-face insectile black mask, Dhruv Laden could feel his anxiety shooting up and his heartbeat accelerating as he stared at the footage showing the 2 D Rank Ascended rampage and slaughter his subordinates.
’Dammit!’ He cursed angrily. ’Since when did that bastard get an ally?’
’And who is he? I’ve never seen him before!’
He recognized Umar Farouq immediately. Afterall, this was an enemy that he’d been dealing with for decades and they’ve clashed a few times already, with either one of them winning each time.
There was no single dominant figure among them.
Since coming to the West, he also knew that the black bastard had been tracking him, but he didn’t expect Umar to attack so swiftly because he was 100% sure that his decoy deceived the veteran mercenary.
’He attacked because he found an ally!’ He stared at the footage coldly.
On one hand, he was angry and immediately wanted to go to the surface to confront Umar but on the other hand, he knew that going 2v1 against D Rank Ascended was a death sentence.
He was a D Rank Ascended himself, so he knew how risky such a move was.
He was too experienced to risk such a fruitless endeavor.
The normal him would have taken the backdoor already by this point to escape, but the reason why he didn’t escape yet were many.
First, this time, what was at stake was too valuable.
Garak was a promising Ascended that he recruited himself. In the Extremist Movement, he was seen to have just as much talent as Lucian, and unlike Lucian, Garak had him to advocate on his behalf in the Extremist Council.
This was why unlike Lucian who never had an opportunity to get high-quality ADE dampeners to discretely attempt the D Rank Trial, he was able to secure ADE dampeners for Garak to attempt the Trial.
Garak was too valuable to him and the Extremist Movement to be killed easily before he reached his full potential, this was the main reason why he was reluctant to abandon him and escape.
But there were other reasons.
The second reason that gave him confidence was the fact that he was sure that Umar and his ally haven’t found the 2nd underground layer yet.
Afterall, if they did, they should have focused on here first, right?
And lastly, he felt that this was an opportunity to get a lot of contribution points by killing his very first D Rank Ascended.
If for some reason, Umar lingered to search for him and in the process, Garak Ascended, he was confident that if he worked together with Garak they could kill Umar. He just hoped that the troublesome mercenary didn’t have any of his parasitized victims in range.
As for Umar’s ally, he already saw him fight.
Apart from the Gun Drone outside, he fought like most Mechanists, hiding behind their constructs.
Dhruv was confident that once he showed his true power with Garak in front of such a weak-willed D Rank Ascended Mechanist, he was surely going to abandon Umar to save his own life.
This was his masterplan.
The only reason why he was still anxious was because for some reason, coincidentally, both D Rank Ascended were currently directly on top his current position where they just slaughtered the last of his subordinates in the surface.
Dhruv frowned. ’Something is not right...’
He couldn’t quite wrap his fingers around the feeling, but his instincts that were honed for decades told him that something was wrong.
Before he could overthink it though, he saw the 2 D Rank Ascended leaving the underground bunker, making him heave a sigh of relief and relax.
But then, right after they left, the earth suddenly shuddered and the world became extremely white!
’Eh...?’
BZZZZZT!
...
Leon’s assault plan was simple: Trick Dhruv Laden and make him feel comfortable, slaughter all the terrorists in the first layer and turn their blood into weapon tools for Lt. Colonel Umar Farouq to weaponize and penetrate the layers separating the first layer from the second underground layer.
This would create the opening that they needed for the deadly ambush.
The second underground layer was buried deeper and shielded by dense composite plating, accessing it would require the Sentry-IV shooting at full power but Leon didn’t want to reveal the full power of his Gun Drone too early.
This was why he thought of a substitute.
Another way outside using the Bulwark MK.II Titan Drone that could create enough firepower to break into the 2nd underground layer was Umar’s Blood Manipulation, he confirmed it himself.
With enough blood, the Lt. Colonel can create an attack that’s dense enough to penetrate through the dense layers of composite plating separating the second underground layer from the first layer.
This was why they needed to slaughter all the terrorists first while making it seem like coincidence led them to directly above the protected chamber beneath.
Dhruv Laden knew Umar a lot, but just like the mercenary didn’t know him in detail, the terrorist also didn’t know Umar in detail.
He didn’t know the limit to his abilities and the exact way that his Blood Manipulation worked.
This was why he failed to pay attention to the flood of blood in the first underground layer that were slowly gathering.
After slaughtering all the terrorists and not finding Dhruv Laden, Leon and Umar put on their A-game acting skills, acting vexed and disappointed as they finally returned to the surface. It seemed like they had failed their main mission.
And that was when the Lt. Colonel did it.
Blood Manipulation!
Organic Weaponry!
Ability Convergence Technique: Dense Detonation!
All the blood spilled by over a hundred terrorists gathered, forming a thick cluster of congealed blood as with Organic Weaponry, Umar armed the blood properly for destruction, and then it all detonated in a violent explosion.
BZZZZT!
KABOOMMMMMMM!
The explosion cut through layers of dense composite armor plating, falling on the terrorists below, killing some and heavily injuring some, including Dhruv!
The D Rank Cyber Gladiator was fooled by the A-level acting and was caught completely off-guard.
And just like that, a path leading directly to the second underground layer from the surface was opened, a path giving the Sentry-IV Autocannon Drone direct access to the heavily reinforced chamber where a terrorist was attempting a Trial!
Leon’s grayish white ADE erupted like a tsunami.
Enhance!
BZZZZ!