Chapter 204: Chapter 152, Tribe (7K words, please subscribe!)
If there had been a reliable ally force drawing attention at the front, Phoenix’s five starfighters might have had a chance at success. But at the moment, the only allies by their side were the 28 soldiers of Storm Squad.
Although they were also elite, asking them, all 28 of them, to face off against an enemy fifty times their number and distract them for the starfighters… that was impossible, even if they were all killed, it couldn’t be done.
Moreover, even if they could draw the enemy’s attention at the front, launching a successful decapitation strike would be very difficult.
The Green Skin leader looked very strong.
He was clad in heavy-duty equipment, his entire stature reaching up to three meters. His heat weapons and cold arms, after modifications, seemed all exaggerated. His heavy armor was certainly not something that could be easily broken through.
Matins and his team were experienced and well-informed, and after evaluating the monster’s strength, they concluded that not even a veteran starfighter could take it down in a one-on-one fight. Only the five of them, attacking simultaneously, could ensure a swift, no-hassle kill. But any minor issue in the process or delay, and with the constant reinforcement of Green Skins, they might get trapped and unable to come out.
Forget it, forget it.
Focus on surveillance, and wait for Mr. Gu to arrive with the main forces. By then, with a large army pressing forward fully, it would be much easier for the five of them to make a move in the chaos of battle.
There was no need to be adventurous now.
However, as they dampened their efforts, the Green Skins seemed to have discovered them.
The conspicuous Orc leader cast his gaze towards their hiding place from afar.
Matins furrowed his brows.
“Why were we discovered?”
He was truly perplexed.
Had his senses deteriorated from not having fought against the Green Skins for a while?
But upon careful consideration, their actions seemed flawless, and the elites of Storm Squad also did a good job. Logically, they shouldn’t have been so easily detected.
“I don’t know how they discovered us,” said Schneider, “but I do know we’re in trouble.”
Get ready for combat… combat my ass!
Thirty men against a thousand well-equipped orcs led by a boss was a suicide mission.
While the distance between both sides was still great, running away was the most sensible option!
However, during their escape, they soon realized what had revealed their position.
It was, of course, another Green Skin Orc, standing right beside the Orc boss. His hunched figure did not look tall, nor was it equipped with any exaggerated weapons; it looked quite ordinary. The unusual part was the silver-gray metal rod in his hand, which was not originally a product of Green Skin technology. However, on its upper part, it was decorated with beast teeth, multicolored paint, and filled with the style of the Green Skin Orcs.
The old orc pointed his scepter towards the location of the starfighters.
An intuition of imminent danger made them immediately start to dodge.
Just then, a red laser beam shot towards them.
The starfighters were unharmed, but the beam penetrated the bodies of two Storm Squad soldiers.
The bulletproof alloy steel plates beneath their uniforms barely served any purpose; both soldiers had fist-sized, penetrating wounds burnt through them.
The beam, after passing through the two men, extended far into the distance until it hit a distant ruined wall and disappeared from sight.
The two soldiers collapsed to the ground, weakly convulsing and struggling on the earth.
They weren’t dead yet, but death was certain.
No one could save them, and during a retreat, it was impossible to bring along two wounded who would inevitably die within minutes.
This couldn’t really be considered abandoning comrades, but morale inevitably dropped during the escape.
Even without the burden, their escape was far from smooth.
The hunched old orc continually released beams from his hand, firing every few minutes.
The highly penetrating energy beam was something not even the starfighters could ignore. A direct hit by two beams would damage the power armor; three could be fatal.
Even without hitting the same spot, two hits would weaken the armor’s overall defense due to structural changes, allowing the third to be deadly.
Fortunately, the old orc’s attack range was extremely far, still deadly even over two thousand meters away.
However, he lacked high-magnification aiming scopes and the ability to aim shots. Although the beam didn’t suffer from trajectory deviation over long distances, if he couldn’t aim properly it was all for naught. The reason the first shot was fatal was because the team had not had the chance to fully disperse their formation, and they were too close to each other; a random shot was likely to hit, which resulted in the fatal blows to the two Storm Squad soldiers.
Now, as they were on the move and had dispersed their formation further, hitting them was not so easy.
Furthermore, they weren’t without the means to fight back.
Explosive guns, the electromagnetic rifles in the hands of Storm Corps, had the capability to kill enemies at a distance of two thousand meters—although there would be significant attenuation, a hit would still be lethal.
T3 class soldiers were already reliable in shooting accuracy, not to mention the starfighters who could not be evaluated simply by the ‘T’ rating, and even had built-in combat assistance systems in their power armor to help them aim and shoot more accurately.