Author: 唇亡齿寒 / Lips Gone, Teeth Cold
Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/
Chapter 45
The gates of the Milantu command tower were tightly shut, with defense robots patrolling the entrance, ready to shoot at any suspicious figure. When Darius Bayes led his men out of the underground garage, the robots surrounded them, their eyes flashing red, indicating they were in attack mode. Without even glancing at them, Darius walked straight towards the command tower gate with a submachine gun in hand. Then, the red lights in the robots’ eyes turned off, replaced by green lights, indicating the attack mode was deactivated.
The programmers left in the underground garage gave each other thumbs up.
Half of the soldiers who infiltrated Milantu on the Silver String were technicians. Initially, Leibniz protested that this was too dangerous, but now he deeply admired the Major General’s foresight.
Standing in front of the command tower gate, the Major General lightly pressed the communicator in his ear. “Zorda, can you open the gate?”
“I’m cracking the control program of the command tower. Please wait a few minutes.”
“No time.” The Major General gestured to the soldiers behind him, who immediately stepped forward to install small antimatter bombs on the gate. Everyone then retreated to the underground garage to find cover. After a rumbling explosion, the Major General returned to the surface. The gate of the command tower had turned into a heap of charred ruins, emitting thick smoke.
More defense robots poured out of the tower, but none fired a shot. The programmers had already seized control of them.
The Major General walked unimpeded into the tower. He was greeted by the gun muzzles of the vanguard team guarding the ground.
“Fire!” the captain ordered.
However, before the team members could pull the triggers, they were taken down by the rebelling defense robots.
Darius stepped over their bodies and entered the elevator. Some soldiers guarded the elevator door, while others climbed the winding stairs to search the upper floors.
“Where’s the main control room?”
“Judging by the power distribution in the command tower, it should be on the fifth floor.”
Darius glanced at the surveillance camera in the corner and smashed it with a raised hand. “Let the lovely robots go first.” He stepped out of the elevator. The robots surged in to replace him, and Darius pressed the button for the fifth floor and stepped back outside.
The elevator numbers changed from 1 to 2, then 3, 4, and finally stopped at 5. After a while, the search team reported through the headset, “Reporting to the Major General, there are no living people in the fifth-floor control room.”
“Stand by there.”
“Yes!”
Only then did Darius leisurely call the elevator back down.
“Main control room? Strange, there’s no response.”
Joshua Planck stood at the post he was in charge of in the square. The main control room, which had been continuously transmitting information to them, suddenly went silent. No matter how much he searched, he couldn’t hear a sound. He couldn’t even contact his comrades. The headset and communication terminal were filled with static, as if the whole world had gone silent.
Something must have happened in the main control room, he thought.
Joshua loaded his handgun, silently apologizing to the captain for leaving his post.
The main control room was almost awash with blood. Bodies of the vanguard team members guarding the place piled up at the elevator door. The navigators had been working dutifully until their last moments, now lying face down on the main control panel, blood flowing from the panel to the floor, forming a winding river.
Darius stepped over the bodies to the control panel, made the sign of the cross over his chest to bless the dead, then roughly pushed the dead navigator aside.
“Major General, have you reached the main control room?” Zorda’s voice came through the headset.
“Yes.”
“Then please operate the computer according to my instructions.”
“…I should have let you come here yourself.”
“Oh, didn’t you order all the technicians to hide in the shelter? Get busy, we don’t have much time. First, connect the communication terminal to the computer…”
Joshua squinted his black-golden eyes, staring at the charred command tower gate and the idle defense robots at the entrance, instantly guessing what had happened in the main control room.
‘In this situation, it’s a wonder if the communication isn’t interrupted,’ he thought. ‘Trojan Horse. Should we say that the wisdom of the ancients still shines, or that human intelligence hasn’t progressed much in thousands of years?’
The enemy probably monitored all communication channels of Milantu and might be issuing false instructions, leading the vanguard team into their trap.
Joshua discarded his headset, removed the sniper rifle from his back, and crouched behind a statue, assembling the gun piece by piece. Bringing it out was a wise decision. It came in handy so quickly.
After assembling, he estimated the range of the defense robots. He was just out of range, but if any robot advanced another ten meters, he would be within their firing range.
But the assassin, the Mourner, would never let that happen.
“Second Lieutenant, something seems off outside.”
The soldiers guarding the first floor of the command tower uneasily looked at the highest-ranking Second Lieutenant. The Second Lieutenant raised a hand, signaling everyone to be on alert. The mechanical sound of the defense robots was audible just moments ago, but after a series of chaotic collisions, there was only silence outside the gate. Due to the obstructing ruins, the Second Lieutenant couldn’t see what was happening outside. To get a glimpse, he would have to move in front of the ruins.
“Sergeant Edward, go see what’s happening,” ordered the Second Lieutenant.
Sergeant Edward swallowed hard. Empire soldiers never disobeyed orders, even if it meant going to their deaths. Thus, the sergeant hesitantly walked towards the charred gate.
The Second Lieutenant raised his gun, watching the sergeant’s back through the scope. The young man stood at the gate, evidently terrified, hesitating. How did such a person get selected for the death squad? The personnel involved in this operation were all death-defying loyalists to Major General Bayes; none of them feared death. Sergeant Edward usually behaved bravely. What was wrong with him today?
The crosshairs moved to the back of the sergeant’s head. If he dared to retreat, he would be executed on the spot as an example, the Second Lieutenant thought.
Sergeant Edward stared outside the gate as if he saw a prehistoric beast. He suddenly turned back, eyes wide, mouth agape, seemingly wanting to warn his comrades, but only blood flowed from his mouth.
The crosshairs moved above the ruins. A person stepped on the charred metal and walked in. The thick smoke highlighted his silver hair, making it exceptionally striking. His black pupils emitted golden light, like flames burning in hell.
The Second Lieutenant suddenly understood what Sergeant Edward feared. They indeed feared neither death nor life, but before Death, humans could only offer their reverence.
Darius Bayes finally entered the Milantu central computer’s database, pulling up the map of the Second Sea of Death from the complex information. Sending this map to the fleet would make defeating Joanna Begrel a matter of moments.
There was a commotion among the soldiers behind him.
“Intruder!”
“Major General, please be careful!”
“Argh!”
“Shoot! Shoot!”
Darius didn’t turn around but looked at a nearby monitor, continuously displaying the scenes inside the command tower. One screen was black. Darius thought it was the elevator monitor he had broken. The screens to its right showed the fifth floor. His men were engaging the enemy, retreating from the outermost rooms to the main control room.
“Don’t panic,” Darius told his men. “How many enemies are there?”
“Only one!”
The monitor showed a man charging in alone, moving as swiftly as a leopard, as light as a bird, dodging laser beams while using his handgun to bring death to the enemy. He moved from one screen to another, the third showing him from a different angle.
Darius almost admired the man’s prowess.
“Deservedly known as the Mourner. It’s a shame you’re under Joanna Begrel. You should join me.” He looked at the final screen. The monitor showed the main control room from above. Several bodies lay at the edge of the screen. The silver-haired assassin stood at the door, his gun pointed at him.
Darius still didn’t turn around. He spread his arms and said, “I am Darius Bayes, the Empire Major General. I can offer better conditions than Joanna Begrel. Think about it?”
He heard the Mourner laugh.
“Does it matter if a dead man is a Major General or a recruit to me?”
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