Chapter 251: It’s a Trap? [Part 1]
Frankly, the gray cat was the best choice here. Right now Cillin couldn’t leave and acquire a sample himself, and it would be best if the action was kept secret. Guan Feng had told him about a couple of things, and among them was that tact was necessary even in the RAS. After all, there was nowhere in the whole world that was completely free of corruption.
So again, this fat cat was the best choice to send out to collect the samples, especially since it was bored stiff anyway. However, Cillin didn’t have an accurate estimate of a Sea King’s strength, so he wasn’t sure if Wheeze was up to the task.
The gray cat felt like exploding into a ball of fur when Cillin questioned its abilities with extreme skepticism.
“Do you seriously think that buncha fishes can threaten me?!”
Cillin thought for a moment before smiling in response. He still couldn’t be sure if Wheeze could collect the samples smoothly, but there was at least no way for these creatures to threaten the gray cat’s life. After being together with the gray cat for so long, he had almost forgotten that it was a half-cyborg.
“Do what you can, but no more than that!” Cillin emphasized.
Wheeze flicked its ears before replying impatiently, “I know!” Then, Cillin let it out of the window.
“Eh? Cillin, why did you let Wheeze out of the room at such a sensitive time?!” Daduo asked in astonishment when she saw the gray cat jumping out.
“It said it needed to get out. It was bored to death apparently.”
“Well it’s not the only one who’s bored. I’m feeling stifled myself,” Walley said lazily while lying on the table.
Although the room was regulated by a life support system, none of them felt particularly comfortable probably because of the way the building was designed. They couldn’t help but feel choked inside this place.
Meanwhile, sea beasts had landed on the shores and made contact with the defense forces, even though they couldn’t hear any cannon fire because the shoreline was quite far away. But judging from the blurry images they were watching on the network, they knew that the battle was ensuing intensely.
The thick blue fog that enveloped the city and the sky also blocked some cameras’ vision. Unlike the normal fog, this blue fog contained some metal ions and other disruptive elements. That was why it was able to disrupt the humans’ scan systems. Right now the scanners’ functional range had shortened to just their nearby areas.
Demand for scanners immediately rose like a rocket every time a situation like this popped up, although the people of this planet were used to fighting inside the sea fog. They hadn’t been able to invent a scanner that could penetrate this particular type of sea fog, but they could still respond swiftly to the changes on the battlefield.
A few people followed behind the honorary scholar and went to the other room. The people who remained all happened to be familiar faces.
York continued to hack into global networks so they could keep up to date with the battle situation. He also brought up local scanner footages for the group to check out.
“The RAS actually has better scanners that should work even in this unusual sea fog environment.” Eros said, “Do you think they would try supplying some equipment and softening up that minor noble?
“I don’t think so.” Vino snorted. “Assuming that that minor noble would even appreciate the gesture, do you really think those old fellows of the RAS would be so kind? On the contrary, they want this battle to go south for the people on this planet and for the sea beasts to reach us as quickly as possible. Once the planetary government suffers a blow, the minor noble would be forced to ask for reinforcements from us. This way, the trade would speed up and their reputation would grow.”
“You’re right. Who knows, these old fellows may even try to pull some strings from the background.” Daduo agreed.
“So, how long do you guys think this battle is going to take?” York pointed at the images on the screen and asked.
The rumbles of cannon fire and the roars of the sea beasts all sounded extremely eerie under the blue fog.
“The sea beasts should naturally return to the sea after the fog has dissipated. That’s what the people outside just told me.” Kenasenza said the moment she reentered the room, “Something about this fog still doesn’t sit right to me though.”
“What do the local citizens say?” Cillin asked.
Kenasenze shook her head. “They thought that this was all par for the course. The fog is a little bigger than normal this time; nearly the entire continent is covered by a layer of fog. The central regions aren’t hit quite as hard as those near the shores, but the citizens also mentioned that a fog this big normally happens once every twenty to thirty years, or even seventy to eighty years. Every time it happened the shore cities suffered heavy damage, and defense lines had to be rebuilt. It hurt both financially and physically.”
Cillin took a seat and fell silent. The feeling that something wasn’t right didn’t go away.
Two days later, the fog remained as thick as ever. Still, it was starting to weaken around the central regions. This was undoubtedly good news to the people of the continent and a boost of morale to the border guards. They seized the opportunity to take out as many sea creatures as possible before the fog faded away, and the enemies retreating with it.
The threat level of a lot of places in the central region was lowered due to the improving situation. In fact, this was quite obvious in the area Cillin’s group and the RAS were staying in. Although the air vents of every building were still closed, everyone inside obviously looked a lot more relaxed. Sometimes, the local soldiers would even chat and laugh with one another. The RAS looked miserable, however.
For the past two days, it was almost as if the minor noble and the planetary government had forgotten that they existed. Guards were left behind to ensure their safety - and make sure they didn’t stick their noses where they didn’t belong to - but no other contact was made otherwise.
Cillin’s group also relaxed a little upon learning that the battle was going in favor of the humans. Their rooms surrounded the RAS’, so everyone returned to their rooms and napped whenever they were out of business to tend to. Any news would reach quickly their ears anyway.
Right now Cillin was flipping through multiple images quickly inside his own room. York and everyone would probably be flabbergasted if he knew that Cillin had hacked into the planetary network too. After all, so far they only knew that he was one, Guan Feng’s student and two, pretty good at fighting.
Cillin briefly checked the footages of every shore region before hacking into the border guard’s internal network and obtaining a report as a result. The report contained an in-depth log of the defense battle such as what level of sea beasts had appeared at what area, the number of sea beasts that had shown up, the number of sea beasts they killed, the damage estimates of local cities and so on.
The young man’s attention was quickly turned to the red labels on the map though. He fell into deep thought.
The red labels marked where the Sea Kings had appeared. According to this research report, the sea beasts had gotten a bit closer to the inner continent compared to the last time they invaded en masse. They also broke through quite a lot of border defense lines.
Something just doesn’t feel right. What is it exactly?
Cillin played a video and listened to the Sea Kings’ roars. They sounded scary even though it was just a recording, and the border guards who had to fight them likely felt even worse. The blue fog hid many things from view. All he could manage was a rough estimate of the damage suffered by the human side, the number of battleships and armored vehicles that were destroyed, the number of fighters and spaceplanes that were lost and… nothing else. Again, the fog had hidden the true severity of that battle, and the people would only learn of it after the fog had completely faded away.
Cillin tapped the table with his finger incessantly. He had reviewed the border defense lines, the buildings that looked like defensive fortresses and their internal weaponry and equipment, and logically speaking the Sea Kings shouldn’t have been able to break through as deeply as they did. So were they really more powerful than he had imagined, or was there something else in play?