Forty Millenniums of Cultivation, page 221
Although they were competitors, they felt a subtle sense of camaraderie now.
If all the four crystal suits were to be captured by the crystal warship within several hours, there wouldn't be a winner even if you were the last to be seized.
The military hadn't revealed to them as to how many crystal suits they would purchase. If the performance of the test-takers was too unsatisfactory and the military decided that they would only purchase a few hundred pieces, it would hardly be a victory for them.
Then again, if one of the crystal suits was amazing enough to play hide-and-seek with the crystal warship for more than ten hours, or even a day and a night, the potential of crystal suits would definitely be proved. Crystal suits would definitely be able to win more favor in the military, which would be a great help for the promotion of other MP crystal suit models, too.
More importantly, for Sword Torrent and Mournful Mist, their designing purposes were different from Tiger King's and Mystic Skeleton's from their conception, which could be compared to the relationship between assault rifles and sniper rifles.
Since their purposes were different, their competition with the other two crystal suits was not fierce. Their chances of winning were slim, but as long as they could do their best in the sham battle and leave a deep impression on the audience by showing their own specialties thoroughly, it would be enough.
Supernova Jiang Sheng and Yuan Manqiu were still at loggerheads.
However, when Ren Xingbei appeared in front of them, the flames in their eyes changed direction and aimed at the commander of the Fifth Fleet at the same time.
The temperature inside the commanding center immediately rose by twenty degrees.
Other than those in the commanding center, top military officers in the military bases all over the Star Glory Federation, as well as high-level Cultivators from Deep Sea University, Star Nebula University, Grand Desolate War Institution, and all other important sects, were all paying close attention to the match, the ultimate confrontation between crystal suits and crystal warships.
It was destined to be a sleepless night.
…
At 10:11 p.m. in the station of the Fifth Fleet, Tide Berserker was doing last-minute checks before taking off.
"Captain Ning, let's show them who we are! These brats are too outrageous! Nothing but four MP crystal suits, and they want to swagger around and poop on our head?"
"Brother Feng, we have every faith in you. You'll definitely capture all of them within ten hours."
"Old Ning, I've bet Old Xing and his lot that you will seize all the four running rabbits in less than ten hours! I'm going to be in serious trouble if you fail me!"
Almost a hundred soldiers of the Fifth Fleet, including captains, vice captains, experienced mechanics and ordinary marines, surrounded an officer whose uniform was full of creases.
The officer's hair was in such a mess that it seemed that it hadn't been washed for at least three months. His chin was bristly. His eyes were drowsy, as if he were in a constant trance. Even in such a thrilling atmosphere, he still yawned one time after another.
He was Colonel Ning Feng, a Warship Connoisseur, one of the best captains in the military and the commanding officer of Tide Berserker.
Faced with the excited soldiers of the Fifth Fleet, Ning Feng scratched his ear and smacked his lips. But without saying anything, he walked onto his warship lazily.
The moment he went on the bridge of the warship, he seemed to turn into someone else. With a quiver, he was entirely awakened.
His sleepy eyes just now were brimming with radiating vigor, like those of a cat which was hunting at night.
In the federal army, Ning Feng had been given the nickname 'Drunk Cat'.
Even a demon king would have to run away like a rat when faced with the Drunk Cat.
Inside the cockpit in the middle of the warship, there was a translucent controlling capsule in which Ning Feng lay in and closed his eyes.
Crimson liquid flowed out from the bottom of the capsule and rose up rapidly, before it filled up the capsule and drowned him shortly.
Right then, Ning Feng's eyes were opened suddenly, from which black brightness was beaming out, making his eyes as deep and vast as the night sky.
With the enhancement of the mainframe crystal processor, his soul expanded to every corner of the warship.
Countless information, data, and images surged into his mind.
Every power rune array, every Taiyi Lightning Railgun, and every armed shuttle, seemed to have turned into his limbs and teeth. The power rune arrays shivered briefly, blinking with the rhythm of his heartbeat and breath.
He was no longer a trivial human being. He was Tide Berserker, a steel beast that was hundreds of meters long.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
With a telepathic thought, the anti-gravity power rune arrays started functioning, roaring like a cascading waterfall.
After a shiver, Tide Berserker took off amidst the applause of the soldiers below. Colorful brilliance was dancing around the warship, making it look like a ferocious dragon.
"Ten hours?"
Ning Feng squinted and scoffed, "Five hours, tops. The four rabbits will never be able to run out of my palm!"
…
At 11:45 p.m. a small carrier was staggering in the sky above the mountains.
It was a thunderstorm weather. One could not even distinguish one's own fingers with the hand right in front of the eyes. Only when the lightning occurred could the steep hills and dark forests be seen.
This was the biggest mountainous zone in the west of the federation. Hills, cliffs, streams, caves, and underground rivers together constituted a complicated territory.
The fifty square kilometers would the battleground for the match to come.
For the sake of fairness, the military had arranged an artificial thunderstorm in the battleground.
Thunder, lightning, and heavy rain would twist the spiritual waves from the crystal suits and block the detection of the crystal warship so that they could run away more easily.
However, the thunderstorm would only last five hours.
The weather would clear before dawn.
Inside the carrier, the four Exos had put on their crystal suits, each with a kit behind him which had a space of around two cubic meters.
The kit was the latest transportation magical equipment developed by the military named 'Floating Supplier'.
It was carved with anti-gravity rune arrays and power rune arrays and was maneuvered by a mini crystal processor. It would fly closely behind a soldier in peacetime. When the soldier was engaged in a combat, the kit would dash away until it was safe to return.
Floating Supplier was designed to be a replacement of marching backpacks. It would neither burden the soldiers when they were walking nor affect the agility of the soldiers when they were fighting. The military was planning to make it a piece of standard magical equipment for the federal army in the future.
Today, the four Exos were provided with four prototypes of such magical equipment in which they could store any supplies and magical equipment that they deemed necessary.
"Hoooo!"
At 11:59 p.m., the airdrop platform on the bottom of the carrier opened slowly. Raging wind immediately crashed into the cabin, growling and howling.
"Last minute check. Prepare to land!"
Chapter 324: Narrow Escape |
The four crystal suits glittered, outlining four figures clearly in the darkness, which looked like solidified lights.
"Hey, guys. Don't be so aggressive. In the sham battle today, just because we are competitors does not mean we are not companions in a different form."
Sha Yucheng, Exo of the Sword Torrent Battlesuit, smiled and said, "Our opponent is one crystal warship. Whoever attracts its attention will give the rest of us more opportunities to run away!
"Taking that into consideration, I hope we can all show what our crystal suits are capable of today and teach those zealots of railguns and warships a lesson on the awesomeness of the Exos!"
"Well said!"
Sha Yucheng's words eased the intense atmosphere a little bit. Feng Kai, Exo of the Mournful Mist Battlesuit, added, "Li Yao, you gave us all a big surprise in the Flying Crystal race half a month ago. I hope you can give an equally shocking surprise to the captain of the crystal warship today."
Li Yao nodded his head and took a deep breath. He was walking to the airdrop platform, when Zuo Feijing suddenly cut in front of him.
The Tiger King Battlesuit today had put on a layer of dense jungle camouflage. It looked inconspicuous, and all its deadly scent had been hidden in the gaps of the crystal suit.
Standing next to it, Li Yao was the only one who could feel the dangerous aura that seemed to be a living thing.
"Li Yao, I'm rather curious. Faced with a crystal warship that is hundreds of meters long and has a main gun whose power equals to a full-strength strike of a Nascent Soul Stage Cultivator, what cunning plans do you have in mind to deal with it? You can't even leave a trace on its surface even if you are to play the self-destruction move again, can you?"
Zuo Feijing paused after every word. He gritted his teeth as he said, "Over the past half month, I've spent every second crazily training. The half month has been as long and miserable as ten years for me, just because I need to prepare myself so that I can defeat you today!
"I hope your performance is even more splendid today. Don't be captured or killed by the crystal warship after only several hours!
"Because if you do, I will be very disappointed!"
A dull synthesized voice suddenly echoed inside the cabin.
"The battle is now begun. Please finish your landing within one minute."
Zuo Feijing opened his arms and jumped down.
The Tiger King Battlesuit rushed into the raging storm. It glimmered in the darkness, before it completely vanished inside the deep, dark forest.
Li Yao was next. He waved at Sha Yucheng and Feng Kai, and jumped out of the carrier, too.
"Swoosh!"
Four stabilizer fins stuck out from the back of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit. Dazzling brightness surged out from the power rune arrays, as it flew above the forests in the pouring rain.
His Floating Supplier followed him closely, which contained all kinds of magical equipment and tools that Li Yao had prepared for his escape.
But Zuo Feijing was right about one thing.
No matter how formidable the enemy was, running away was never Li Yao's style.
Even if the opponent was a crystal warship hundreds of meters long with a pair of 'Heaven Splitters' and twelve Taiyi Lightning Railguns, Li Yao had never planned to just run away without counterattacking.
Whoever wanted to capture him would have to pay a high price!
"Chi——"
Li Yao landed slowly on Sun Flame Summit, which was the highest mountain in the battle zone.
Li Yao strained his eyes to look at the distance. The crystal cameras with super-high resolution captured all the surroundings down and analyzed the features of the territories, before Li Yao compared them with the pre-input map inside the crystal processor.
Li Yao's computational ability was brought to maximum. He began to evaluate the current situation.
Three light spots were shooting at the northwest fast, which were the other three crystal suits.
By Li Yao's estimation, they were planning to hide in the rocky area which was located in the northwest of the battle zone.
Li Yao had studied the map before and was aware that the northwest corner of the battle zone was rugged and full of intersected underground caves, which made it a perfect shelter.
However, Li Yao was not planning to go there.
His opponent Ning Feng, an ace captain of the federal army known as 'Drunk Cat', would certainly concentrate much of his attention on the rocky area.
There were many kinds of probe magical equipment on Tide Berserker that could explore the environment hundreds of meters under the ground easily.
The 500 beast puppets were able to sneak underground and search the place, too.
Once his trace was discovered, the 100 Earthshaking Ordnance Penetrators would definitely not be funny.
Since it was a sham battle, the power of all magical equipment was adjusted to one third of their original. The 'Heaven Splitters' were even adjusted to one tenth of its original power. But still, Li Yao did not intend to know what it felt like to be hit by them.
Once the underground cave in which one was hiding collapsed because of attacks from Earthshaking Ordnance Penetrators and Heaven Splitters, one might be buried inside with nowhere to run to and could only wait to be captured.
"Beep!"
The crystal camera soon discovered a place that fitted the features that he had inputted into the crystal processor previously.
That was the battleground that Li Yao had selected after hours of thorough consideration.
Li Yao took two steps back and then accelerated. He jumped down from the Sun Flame Summit which was thousands of meters high and did not activate the power rune arrays until he almost kissed the ground.
Colorful brilliance surged out from the back of the Mystic Skeleton Battlesuit, pushing it to the southeast as fast as a laser.
At this moment, there were fifty minutes before Tide Berserker was to arrive.
Ten minutes later, Li Yao appeared in the southeast corner of the battle zone, which was also the place where the crystal warship would enter the battle zone.
Compared with the rugged, rocky area in the northwest corner, the territory here was much flatter. There were only several mountains and cliffs which were not very high. The underground caves were shallow and short, too.
However, the water system here was quite sophisticated. Several rivers and streams interconnected in this area.
Because of the heavy rain, their water level had all soared. Their water current was much more turbulent than before.
"This is the place!"
Li Yao compared the actual territory with the map in his crystal processor. Then he opened his Floating Supplier, took out all kinds of magical equipment that were glittering inside and started setting up some camouflage.
At 00:58, Li Yao finished all the disguising work.
At one o'clock sharp, the southeast night sky was torn apart by a resplendent brightness.
Even the earsplitting thunders could not suppress the roars from the crystal warship.
Tide Berserker flew into the battle zone awe-inspiringly.
At 01:02, Li Yao hid himself in a muddy pond below a cliff.
He turned off all the power rune arrays on his crystal suit and his Floating Supplier, which made him no different than a black, iron lump that had been buried inside the mud for its entire life. He opened his eyes that were full of blood streaks and stared at the sky where rainwater was falling down upon his face like needles.
At 01:05, Tide Berserker passed by the place where Li Yao was hiding against the dense clouds slowly.
Maybe it was just his imagination, but Li Yao felt that the air around him was shaking violently, which made his heart beating faster and faster.
A hostile steel beast hundreds of meters long flying above one's head unhurriedly. It was not a pressure that just anyone could withstand.
"Shua! Shua!"
Almost ten ivory lights beamed out from the crystal warship. They were knitted into a light net which scanned through the mountains and forests from above.
Li Yao knew that the mystic lights were meant to detect enemies, and once they found a target, it would be impossible for the target to run away.
However, the thunderstorm weather was a major interference for the mystic lights. Not only were they much dimmer than they should be, they also became intermittent when lightning occurred.
The supposedly impregnable dragnet was ripped open by the power of nature.
Besides, the location that Li Yao had picked was not the best place to hide in inside the battle zone.
Most of Ning Feng's attention had been fixed on the rocky area to the northwest. Therefore, after scanning the below roughly once, Tide Berserker moved on to the northwest without any hesitation.
"Hu…"
Li Yao was greatly relieved. His fiercely beating heart was finally soothed.
The most difficult part had passed.
He had bought at least a few hours of time for himself.
Before the weather was cleared up, it was hardly likely that the crystal warship would come back and search the place once again.
He could hide in this place comfortably and wait until the crystal suits hiding in the northwest rocky area were captured or 'killed'.
Right then, Li Yao's eyelids bounced uncontrollably. Dangerous alarms rang inside his brain.
Ten firefly-like light spots were released from Tide Berserker. They kept a similar distance between each other and were interwoven into a loose net which was marching at the place where he was hiding.
Vicious Bee Armed Shuttles!
Li Yao cursed silently. He licked his lips, only to notice that he had pierced them some time ago because of anxiety.
Although the crystal warship had left the area, ten Vicious Bee Armed Shuttles each carrying five beast puppets, which meant fifty beast puppets in total, had been deployed to continue searching.
Li Yao didn't understand how he had given himself away. The battle zone was a fairly large place. It was impossible to send ten Vicious Bee Armed Shuttles to search every area in the zone.
The place that he had been hiding in was definitely not one that deserved such attention.
Or, maybe he didn't leave any traces. It was just the instinct of an expert that made Ning Feng feel that there was something wrong with the area and prompted him to release the armed shuttles to continue searching.
"Hum! Hum!"
Vicious Bee Armed Shuttles, which looked like fat bees, were extremely large for armed shuttles because they needed to carry five beast puppets. Their power rune arrays were specially revised, too, in order to provide more impetus. As a result, there would be irritating humming noise when they were working.
