Volume 4, Chapter 68 – Two Bullets

Anran stared blankly at Aila as she ate the door.

The best metal Anran could currently produce was Lig Alloy. Yet the Crimson Blade, which was made from Lig Alloy, could not leave even a single scratch on the pitch-black door. That alone was enough to demonstrate just how hard the metal was.

Anran tried copying Aila and tearing a piece of metal from the door, but it took an enormous amount of effort just to bend it. Twisting it off would take even longer.

Aila, who had just finished eating a piece, watched Anran’s movements with innocent curiosity. Then she said, “Anran, let me help you.”

Her silver-white hand pressed down on the metal Anran was gripping. After only about two seconds, a crack rang out, and Anran discovered that she had torn the piece of metal free.

“…”

Good lord.

Comparing a human to a robot really was infuriating.

Anran held the chunk of metal in front of her and examined it. It had been torn from near the edge of the door. From a distance, it resembled a lump of black gold with a mysterious sheen. Up close, however, it looked somewhat rough. Its surface was uneven, and no decorative patterns had been carved into it. Presumably, Dawn and the others had only given it the most basic processing.

“Here!” Anran handed the metal to Aila. She had no way to analyze something like this.

“Anran doesn’t want it?” Aila asked.

Anran shook her head.

Understanding her meaning, Aila swallowed the metal in only a few bites.

The ease with which she ate one piece after another made it look as though she were gnawing on chicken drumsticks.

The door was very thick. Even Aila would need some time to bring it down. Anran checked over her equipment, then browsed the forum for a while.

Across every forum related to No. 1886, posts about Trade Station No. 3 had become the dominant topic. Earlier threads discussing local culture, geography, and NPCs had all been pushed down. There were even several livestream threads, most of them centered around videos.

Anran spotted Heloise in one of those threads.

No wonder she had not seen her earlier. Dawn had left her behind to cover the retreat. What a silly girl. Heh.

Thanks to the players’ relentless efforts, Heloise had suffered an injury. Since she had been wounded in the thigh, her combat strength would certainly be greatly reduced.

“…”

Even so, Anran still had to act quickly. Unless the terrain was extremely complicated, players at their current stage had no chance of stopping Heloise if she was determined to escape.

If Heloise brought people here later and attacked her from behind while the others blocked her from the front, Anran could not guarantee her own safety.

“Crunch, crunch…”

Anran noticed that Aila’s body had suddenly gone still. When she checked Aila with Scout, she discovered that Aila had leveled up.

Level 21. Strength: 96. Agility: 43.

For the time being, Anran could not accurately calculate how much Aila’s attributes increased with each level.

Aila leveled up by eating metal. Every time the composition of her body changed, the method used to calculate her attribute growth seemed to change as well. In any case, Aila gained far more attribute points per level than an ordinary player.

“All done.”

Aila turned her attention back to the door and continued eating with complete focus and determination.

It was only when the first small hole appeared that Anran truly understood how hard the door was.

Not only was the material itself exceptionally sturdy, but the door was also nearly twenty centimeters thick. Calling it a door was almost misleading. It was essentially a massive block of iron that had been polished a little and then shoved into place.

Impressive.

The corner of Anran’s mouth twitched. Dawn’s idea had been good, but unfortunately for him, he had encountered Aila.

“Crunch, crunch…”

Once she had opened a hole, Aila no longer needed to tear pieces off with her hands. She simply stuck her head inside and ate through the door like a swarm of locusts. Before long, she had gnawed out an opening large enough for a person to squeeze through.

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“Anran, it’s ready.” Aila stopped eating.

“Very good. Once we deal with those people, we’ll come back. Then you can eat as much as you like.” Anran stroked Aila’s head.

Aila narrowed her eyes slightly and nodded obediently.

Here I come!

Anran quickly squeezed through the opening and immediately darted to the side. The barrel of a machine gun mounted high on the wall swiveled in an attempt to track her position. However, Anran was simply too fast. The barrel swung back and forth twice. By the time Mechanical Interference spread over the area, the Crimson Blade had already pierced and destroyed the tracking camera beside it.

“Bang!”

A sound suddenly came from behind her. Anran’s expression changed slightly. Her foot slid across the floor, and as she spun around, she immediately opened some distance.

“Tap.”

After sliding back only two steps, Anran braced herself against the wall and stopped her retreat. She stared ahead in confusion.

There was no doubt that Aila had made the sound.

Aila was currently lying with her chin against the floor, both feet still caught in the hole in the door, looking pitifully at Anran.

“…”

Expressionless, Anran walked over and picked Aila up.

“Anran, I…”

“It’s fine. It’s not a big problem. Just stay behind me.”

The passage ahead still looked very long. There was no new world waiting behind the door. Anran merely saw a set of door controls in a recess beside it. She did not touch anything. After activating Mechanical Interference, she quickly resumed the pursuit.

They had already wasted a fair amount of time. In any case, she could not allow Dawn to escape so easily.

There were fewer than ten of them in total, so her chances were good.

Apart from several machine guns and cameras along the walls, the only other things in the passage were dim electric lights. This showed that Morningstar had truly been planning this for a long time.

The only sounds in the passage were Anran’s and Aila’s footsteps. With plenty of Stamina to support her, Anran kept Mechanical Interference active without interruption.

“Damn it! The surveillance feed is gone, and I can’t make any calls.”

A young man wearing a hat frantically tapped his phone screen inside a room. However, the empty signal indicator in the upper-right corner made him feel helpless again and again.

“The walkie-talkie. There’s still the walkie-talkie. At least I can notify the captain first.” He tossed his phone onto the table and turned toward the walkie-talkie on another table.

At that moment, the door opened.

Although it had been locked from the inside, the blade that suddenly pierced through it severed the lock in an instant. Two short, soaking-wet girls then walked in from outside.

The young man did not underestimate them merely because they were girls.

One wore heavy equipment and had cut the door open with a single slash. The other had strangely silver-white arms. No matter how he looked at them, neither resembled a pushover he could defeat.

Sure enough, that fact was confirmed in the next second.

The charging girl pinned him directly against the wall before he even had time to react.

“Where does this passage lead?”

“The h-hangar,” he stammered.

The hangar?

An aircraft!

Damn it.

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Anran finished off the restrained young man with a single slash and immediately broke into a run.

“Aila, hurry and keep up.”

If it had been a car, it would not have mattered. Anran could catch up just by running. But if they escaped in an aircraft, she would never be able to chase them down.

Like a raging tornado sweeping through the passage, Anran killed every sentry she encountered before they could survive even a single exchange.

Anran was fast enough to kill an enemy instantly with her blade, delivering a fatal blow while also avoiding the tremendous noise that gunfire would create.

After advancing for nearly a thousand meters, the narrow tunnel suddenly widened. Anran lowered her body and quietly approached the bulging chamber ahead.

“The plan has already succeeded, but what are we supposed to do next? You could say we have no source of new recruits left, and our soldiers are almost all dead. What are we supposed to use to accomplish the organization’s goal?”

Two people ahead were speaking quietly.

“I honestly don’t understand why the leader trusts those people from Night Owl so much. Apart from providing some vague, questionable technology, they have never offered us any visible support. The moment they arrived, they started acting like lords and ordering everyone around. I’d say most of the leader’s ideas probably came from them. Sigh, the current leader, too… If the former leader were still here, then…”

“Shh!” The person who had spoken first immediately tugged at his companion. “Watch what you say, brother. You can’t bring that up carelessly.”

The other man laughed. “Heh. Whether I say it or not, things will still be the same. I’d say Morningstar is probably finished. We have no people left. Are we supposed to resist the government army through meditation? What use was blowing up one trade station? Could it crush all those hundreds of thousands of government soldiers to death? No! Not only can’t it do that, but it’ll completely enrage the government army. In the end, not one of us will escape. One bullet, two bullets, three bullets. They’ll kill every last one of us. Hahaha! Hahaha!”

The more the man spoke, the more agitated he became. Not only his companion, but even Anran began to wonder whether he had already gone insane.

“Stop talking!”

“Speaking of the leader, I’ve always suspected that the former leader’s sudden worsening condition had something to do with him. We didn’t find anything when we investigated, but that doesn’t prove he had nothing to do with it…”

“Qu Hua!” his companion barked.

“After all, the people standing behind him are from Night Owl. It would be easy for them to come up with some new poison, wouldn’t it? Burton, what do you…”

His voice abruptly stopped. He had seen someone emerge behind his companion.

Anran and Burton had noticed the newcomer long ago. That was precisely why Burton had repeatedly tried to silence him, but it was already too late.

The approaching man had very distinctive features. His skin had a bluish tint, and his ears were round. One glance was enough to tell that he was not a native of No. 1886.

“Your speculation was very impressive!” The blue-skinned man clapped his hands and walked over with a smile.

Anran hurriedly patted Aila’s shoulder and whispered, “Aila, record this.”

“Mm-hmm.” Aila nodded. She had a recording function.

The people from Night Owl had not left yet, which meant Dawn was probably still here as well. Anran had originally hesitated over which of the four doors to take. Now that she had seen the route used by this Night Owl member, she had her answer.

He was a Level 22 low-level contact officer of Night Owl, two levels higher than the one she had killed earlier.

“If I told you that your speculation was true, what would you think?” the blue-skinned man suddenly asked as he lowered his hands.

“What?” Burton cried out.

Qu Hua, who had seemed half-crazed moments earlier, was now dumbfounded.

“You’re telling the truth?” he asked blankly.

“Why would it be false?” The blue-skinned man took out a small bottle. “Burden No. II. Ingesting ten milliliters will cause the internal organs to stiffen. It’s a very low-grade poison, but this is all I can give you at the moment. Finding raw materials on No. 1886 isn’t easy.”

Burton took a step backward and glared at the blue-skinned man with a vicious expression. “You want to kill us to silence us?”

“Don’t worry. This has nothing to do with the former leader. We simply need to conceal our next movements, so we’ll have to ask the two of you to die.”

“Do people from Night Owl think they can do whatever they want?” Burton roared.

“Don’t underestimate us!” Qu Hua quickly drew a pistol.

He aimed the muzzle at the blue-skinned man’s head and was about to pull the trigger.

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“Heh…” A scornful smile appeared on the blue-skinned man’s face. With a soft chuckle, his figure vanished from Qu Hua’s sight. His outstretched fingers were already about to clamp around Qu Hua’s throat.

When killing someone, of course he had to use the distinctive method of force-feeding them poison…

“Urk!”

The scene before the blue-skinned man’s eyes suddenly lurched. Then he discovered that someone had seized him by the throat. The attacker was a somewhat bedraggled girl wearing a strange pair of glasses.

“Guh, guh…”

He could not get the words out.

“I’ll borrow this.” Anran smoothly took the bottle of Burden No. II from his hand.

Burton and Qu Hua, who were standing behind him, were both bewildered and terrified. Qu Hua’s index finger trembled, but he finally pulled the trigger.

“Bang!”

“Haah…”

A hoarse sound escaped the blue-skinned man’s throat as several bullets struck him in the back.

A moment earlier, Anran had pulled him in front of herself as a shield.

Still gripping the blue-skinned man’s neck, Anran charged forward and knocked Qu Hua away. Burton turned and tried to flee, but Anran picked up the pistol and finished him off with several shots. Qu Hua soon followed him.

“Guh, guh…”

“Guh, my ass!”

Anran finally strangled the gurgling blue-skinned man to death as well.

She earned a total of 40,000 EXP.

The three of them were rather weak, but their positions were not low. As a result, they gave far more EXP than ordinary NPCs.

“Take this!”

Anran handed a gun to Aila.

The two of them followed the route from which the blue-skinned man had emerged.

The path was not long, and they soon reached its end.

There, Anran saw her target.

Four people were gathered together. A blue-skinned man stood beside a relatively young man, while a small civilian spacecraft was clearly parked behind them.

“Hiss…”

Anran’s eyes lit up, and even her breathing became rapid.

“@&%#”

The people were still saying something. Apart from the two standing in front of the spacecraft, the remaining pair stood guard on either side.

An opportunity.

Anran took a pile of components from her backpack and assembled them into a rifle.

She nodded to Aila, then wrote on the tablet embedded in Aila’s chest:

“I’ll shoot the one standing on the left in the middle. You shoot the one on the right.”

Aila nodded in understanding.

Incendiary round chambered.

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Click.

The crosshairs settled on the forehead of the man suspected to be Dawn.

Precision Mechanical Enhancement Lv. 4 increased penetration by thirty-five percent.

Anran’s hands were perfectly steady, without the slightest tremor. She even stopped breathing and narrowed one eye slightly. The instant the man turned toward the spacecraft and raised his hand, Anran pulled the trigger.

“Click!”

The rifle’s recoil was practically negligible to Anran.

Carrying the Lv. 4 Backstab bonus, the bullet tore from the barrel with forty percent greater damage and thirty-five percent greater penetration.

“Whoosh!”

“Bang!”

Aila’s shot flew out at exactly the right moment as well.

The bullet cut through the air without slowing and buried itself in the back of the man’s skull, bursting out in a cloud of blood. Immediately afterward, flames rose at a speed visible to the naked eye.

Game notifications sounded one after another.

“Weak-point critical hit confirmed, dealing 200% damage.”

“Additional penetration confirmed, dealing 170% damage.”

“Backstab attack confirmed, dealing 140% damage.”

…

“Burning flames inflict continuous damage of -30 per second.”

…

“Dawn has entered the [Severe Injury: Bleeding] state and will lose 5% of his HP per second.”

“Dawn has entered the […]…”

“…”

“Leader!”

One of the guards beside him immediately shouted in panic. Ignoring the possibility that enemies were still nearby, he rushed to Dawn’s side and caught his collapsing body.

“Leader! Leader!”

“Pfft!”

At the same time, Aila’s bullet struck the other man squarely in the chest.

Blood sprayed everywhere.

“Crack!”

Then an astonishing scene unfolded. The man’s chest burst apart at an absurd speed. His body rapidly hunched over as it began undergoing a series of horrifying and bizarre changes.

Pitch-black limbs, a body coated in slime, a hideously elongated face, and a tail hanging behind him…

“You have triggered the hidden mission [Biochemical Mutation]. Do you wish to accept it?”

“???”

Holy shit.

The monster’s gaze had already fallen on Anran and Dawn.