News that the Sado Island BETA Hive's surface structure had been pulverized spread across the entire world in an instant.
At the same time, in the Yellow Sea region, relatively close to the Korean Peninsula, an observation unit had been deployed. Its mission was to monitor activity at Hive H20.
"This is Bao-Feng Squadron. No movement from H20's BETA."
The tactical squad known as Bao-Feng had landed on the peninsula and was observing Hive H20 from a distance.
In truth, it was not exactly motionless. They had just observed the Hive launching something into the sky.
That phenomenon was not particularly rare either.
Once a Hive reached a certain level of development, it would fire something into the sky.
As for what exactly it launched, current human technology was still unable to intercept it and determine the answer.
However, the thing that had just been fired had still frightened the people who witnessed it.
The reason was that, in general, for a Hive to launch something into outer space, its surface structure had to be over six hundred meters tall. In other words, it had to have reached Phase 5 of Hive development.
But the Cheorwon Hive currently located on the peninsula had only recently entered Phase 4. In theory, it should not yet have been capable of launching materials.
And yet, under Bao-Feng Squadron's observation, the Hive had shown abnormal movement and truly launched something.
Had the attack on the Sado Island Hive stimulated the Cheorwon Hive, making it fear that it would fall as well and causing it to urgently launch something away?
"Hm?"
"That's..."
"Laser fire?"
Bao-Feng Squadron stared in astonishment as several dozen lasers ahead of them fired diagonally into the sky. Were they concentrating fire on something?
"Captain, what's going on?"
"I don't know either!"
"Is there an attack plan for H20 too?"
"I don't know!"
As captain, she could only shake her head and answer before immediately reporting the anomaly.
Those dozens of lasers appeared to be focusing on a single target.
Twelve seconds later, several dozen more lasers fired upward.
"C-Captain, it looks like they're concentrating on one target, a target approaching this Hive!"
Cui Yifei's voice rang louder than usual.
This was the first time she had seen anything like this. It was also the first time she had ever heard of it.
In truth, she thought she might have seen something earlier. Two faint streaks of light had flashed across the sky.
Perhaps because the sky was currently cloudless and the sunlight was so bright, they had been hard to see clearly.
"What do we do, Captain?"
"We wait for orders. Cui Yifei, you had better calm down too. Don't act without my command."
"I know."
The way she said that made it sound as if Yifei was some wildly disobedient person, so her answer came with a trace of displeasure.
Then it came again. The Laser-class's twelve-second cooldown had ended, and as expected, several dozen beams shot into the sky.
Wait. Several thicker attacks had joined them as well. The Heavy Laser-class were joining the attack.
And this time, the angle had risen again.
Was the object under concentrated fire approaching the Hive?
"Captain, what now?"
"What do you mean, what now? Of course we can't charge in. You don't seriously think a small squad like ours would accomplish anything by rushing forward, do you? Orders are for us to remain here and observe."
One by one, they continued counting silently in their hearts. Once the Laser-class cooldown ended, another volley of light fired upward as expected.
And again, the angle rose.
It looked as if something was about to move from high altitude to directly above the BETA Hive.
The bombardment continued until the ninth volley. By then, the target had already reached the airspace directly overhead.
Hm?
"What is..."
"You've got to be kidding me!"
"That can't be real."
An enormous beam unlike anything they had ever seen fired vertically from the Hive straight into the sky. That beam was probably ten times larger than one fired by a Heavy Laser-class.
"Did it hit something?"
"I don't know."
"It's too high!"
After the irradiation ended, Bao-Feng Squadron's pupils shrank. They saw something glowing.
"Was it destroyed?"
"Is it falling?"
It looked as if whatever had been high in the sky had been struck down and was now crashing back through the atmosphere, producing light and heat through friction.
"No. It doesn't look like it was shot down. It looks like it's flying straight toward this Hive."
"That's impossible. How could anything withstand that many laser strikes? There's no way..."
"A G-Bomb!"
Yifei cut off her teammate's words and gave that answer.
In that instant, terror spread through the entire squad.
"Damn it. Don't tell me they used a G-Bomb on H21, then decided to carry the momentum forward and drop one on H20 too? What kind of bastards would do that?!"
Yifei cursed furiously.
The destruction caused by a G-Bomb far exceeded that of a nuclear weapon.
If one exploded on the peninsula, it might affect her country as well. It could very well create a tsunami that would reach them.
Damn it. Damn it. Damn it.
Right now, all she could do was curse in anger, because she was powerless to stop it.
"Bao-Feng Squadron, withdraw immediately!"
At the captain's order, Yifei did not act at once. Instead, she continued glaring through gritted teeth at the falling object.
Hm?
After that point of light suddenly flickered several times, Yifei blinked and saw a faint flash near the Hive more than one hundred fifty kilometers away.
What was going on?
The falling point of light flickered several more times. This time, Yifei stared closely and adjusted the camera carefully. The analysis came back as:
"C-Cannon fire?"
She could not help letting out an incredulous sound.
The thing falling from the sky was firing on the BETA Hive.
"Captain, it's cannon fire!"
Multiple data checks confirmed it. It was definitely cannon fire.
Some kind of machine was vertically bombarding Hive H20?
Was this a joke?
Suddenly, a connection from the ship came through. It was the commander. Without saying anything, he immediately transmitted several satellite images.
"It really is a single-machine insertion!"
"What kind of TSF is that? That's absurd!"
"That's suicide!"
Voices of disbelief rang out. But calling it suicide was not exactly right. After being irradiated by lasers so many times, it still had not been shot down. Clearly, this machine and Bao-Feng Squadron's TSFs were on entirely different levels.
Then the commander's order came through: Bao-Feng Squadron was to take the risk and move closer for observation.
...
Boom!
With a thunderous roar, the three pulse projection cannons once again used electromagnetic fields to fire high-explosive shells. In an instant, the shells exceeded Mach one thousand and struck the BETA Hive below.
One of them finally plunged successfully through the Hive's launch port. Orange light flashed, and flames surged out from the opening.
It looked as if that shot had hit the BETA's ammunition depot and caused its munitions to detonate sympathetically.
In truth, it had probably struck the Super Heavy Laser-class at the exact moment it finished charging and was about to fire, causing the energy to detonate.
And Kain had seized precisely that opportunity to fire.
Previously, he had been somewhat worried about the Super Heavy Laser-class in space attacking again. In the end, however, the space-based attack had stopped after two beams.
According to Kouzuki Yuuko, satellite observations from space showed that the Super Heavy Laser-class seemed to have overloaded itself. After two shots, it had overheated and melted down on its own.
Since he had already come this close, Kain decided to descend directly from geosynchronous orbit to prevent this Hive from launching another Super Heavy Laser-class satellite that could irradiate Sado Island.
He had not flown here alone. Instead, he had released the unmanned transport aircraft that had previously carried him into space and used it to rapidly carry him to the airspace directly above the Hive.
Then he inserted alone, planning to plug the opening.
If he could not get out afterward, then at worst, he would simply leave this world and have Yuuko cultivate him again.
Good. The opening was close.
The triple pulse projection cannons fired all remaining ammunition, while the two particle-beam weapons at his waist also activated plasma cannon mode and opened fire.
As for the missile cannons and autocannons, their ammunition had already been exhausted on Sado Island.
Hm?
Was it trying to close?
Without hesitation, he pushed the back-mounted wing thrusters to full output, accelerating the machine he controlled even further downward and breaking into the Hive's launch port before it could close.
Boom!
A tremendous crash rang out, and the impact left him slightly dizzy.
If he had not used the Lambda Driver to deploy a cushioning stance shield, the armor would absolutely have shattered after hitting at that speed.
The impact seemed to smash through several floors before he finally broke into a vast pit and slammed heavily into the bottom.
"Oh?"
He saw an enormous glowing object inside this vast space. It looked very much like the Hive Reactor.
And the Hive Reactor was the brain of this Hive. In other words, it was a Brain-class BETA.
Did this count as good luck?
As long as he destroyed the Brain-class BETA, the BETA belonging to this Hive would march toward other Hives and be absorbed under their control.
In other words, even if the BETA from this Hive were currently attacking somewhere, they would stop attacking once the Brain-class died and migrate toward the nearest Hive with a living Brain-class.
Of course, they probably would not head to Sado Island. That would require crossing the sea. They would likely move toward the nearest Hive on the Asian continent and come under its control.
Hm?
Something wound around the machine. They were rootlike tentacles that seemed to belong to the Brain-class, piercing up through the ground beneath his machine and coiling around it.
He immediately operated the powered sword and cut them apart. At the same time, he switched the two particle-beam weapons at his waist into rapid-fire mode.
Switched into-
In the next instant, Kain's expression hardened.
An abnormal psychic force had touched his machine through the tentacles and invaded it. Then, following the Lambda Driver's mental link, it tried to invade his brain.
Interesting.
Then he wondered whether the Untouchable Domain would work as well.
He immediately used D99 at maximum concentration and maximum dosage.
The instant it was injected, his brain sensed a change different from anything before.
What was this?
A massive quantity of "data" suddenly surfaced in his mind.
This was...
BETA data?
(End of Chapter)
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