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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator:Bobt
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Midland is the name of the world’s largest metropolis, and at the same time, it refers to the island on which that city is built. The size of that island rising in the middle of the North Pacific is roughly 200,000 square kilometers, similar to the size of Japan’s Honshu Island.
So no matter how enormous Metropolis Midland was, the entire island wasn’t made up of a forest of buildings. When ordinary people say the name Midland, they usually refer to the developed western coastal area.
And the remaining eastern region close to a wasteland was called by its old name from before the world war. ‘Dragonland’.
There was Route 15, a highway stretching from Dragonland towards Midland. As the eastern region was mostly wasteland and plains, that road heading towards Midland was quite smooth and quiet.
On an afternoon slightly past noon. At that time when a mirage was silently shimmering on the road’s asphalt. Far beyond that shimmering ripple, a few vehicles were running.
One large trailer and two pickup trucks sticking close to the trailer from the front and back.
They were driving at a moderate speed, neither too fast nor too slow. The skyscrapers of Midland were visible not far away. Soon, the long and tedious Route 15 would end and they would enter the city center of Midland. The drivers of the front and rear vehicles looked relaxed.
The anomaly began when three heavily modified pickup trucks, clearly visible, appeared from the wasteland on the left side of the highway, shrouded in dust.
The vehicle in the front confirmed their appearance first. The heavily armed combatant in the passenger seat quickly radioed.
[Code 2, Code 2. Prepare for the situation.]
[Code 2 confirmed.]
The combatants riding in the vehicles before and after the trailer immediately checked their firearms and prepared for combat. They saw the modified trucks speeding, raising a lot of dust.
Immediately, an amplified voice through a speaker burst out from the front vehicle.
[Stop, stop! Do not approach any further! If you approach further, it will be treated as an invasion of the company’s property rights and we will open fire! This warning is based on the Midland Administrative Code!]
Despite that warning, the modified trucks recklessly rushed towards the trailer. As they showed no sign of stopping, the combatant in the front vehicle grabbed the radio.
[They’re not stopping. Alright, just open fire-]
The small rockets pouring out from the modified truck as the exterior steel plate fell off were faster than the end of his radio transmission. The combatant’s eyes widened upon seeing those rockets.
Immediately afterwards, the front vehicle, engulfed in flames with an explosion, flew into the wasteland on the other side of the road.
The combatant driving the rear vehicle saw the sight and spat out a curse.
“Fucking hell! What the fuck is this-”
He should have twisted the steering wheel while blurting that out. He also failed to finish his words and exploded after being hit by a small rocket flying from another modified truck.
In an instant, the trailer escort vehicles disappeared. What replaced them were the modified trucks. Two took charge of the front and rear like the previous escort vehicles, and the last one stuck to the side of the trailer.
The door of the modified truck running like that swung open. And from inside, a black and white mixed-colored cyber arm stretched out. The chrome hand grabbed the roof of the pickup truck and pulled the rest of the body. Silver-gray hair fluttered in the rough wind.
Her body, which had escaped through the door, stood on the roof with an agile movement. The sunlight of Midland, passing noon, shone on her standing upright on the vehicle.
She was wearing heavy walker boots, military pants, and a racing jacket, but since the front was unfastened, the heavy tank top she was wearing inside was noticeable. Her left arm, revealed by rolling up the sleeve, was a cyber arm with mixed black and white colors, shining in the sunlight, and in her right hand was a large sniper rifle.
Her long silver-gray hair fluttered chaotically, but the black goggle sunglasses covering her entire eyes and eyebrows were clearly aiming at the target.
At that moment, the sunroof of the truck she had come out from opened and a bald head poked out. He looked around hurriedly and fixed his gaze on the woman, shouting,
“How is it?”
“It’s an unmanned vehicle! Break the door right away and seize the target!”
As the woman shouted that, the bald man climbed up the sunroof, hugging a small hard case bag. As she said, the trailer was an autopilot trailer running without a driver.
After a moment, as the bald man stood on the vehicle roof, the woman grabbed him with her left arm and jumped.
A loud thud was heard as the weight of two people fell on the trailer roof. The woman’s walker boots heavily stepped on the roof, and her tank top also swayed greatly.
The bald man who had climbed onto the trailer roof opened the hard case bag he was hugging and looked for a wired connection socket.
“How long will it take?”
To the woman’s question, the bald man answered while repeatedly tapping the small screen inside the bag.
“3 minutes will do!”
Hearing that answer, the woman turned her gaze and looked around. And soon she could spot shadows running on the road far to the east. The bald man also saw it and his face turned pale.
“…There was a pursuit team.”
“You hurry up and open it.”
The woman, who had snapped at the bald man, moved to the back of the trailer with heavy steps and raised her sniper rifle. Her sniper rifle had no scope. Because her electronic eyes and special-purpose goggle sunglasses served that role instead.
She knelt down on one knee and pulled the trigger almost simultaneously with aiming.
With a heavy bang, the vehicle that had been narrowing the distance began to be pushed back. But there were two more vehicles besides that one, and they immediately counterattacked.
As light flashed from the running vehicles, bullets flew and bounced off the trailer with a tut-tut-tut. Those hits continued right up to the woman sitting. But the woman just moved the target and pulled the trigger with an unshakable attitude.
Amid the bullets raining down on the trailer, her sniper rifle spewed fire in succession. Her bullets didn’t stop at disabling the vehicle drivers. Because they would just change drivers and come back again. So she shattered the heads of all the combatants riding in them.
By the time the series of gunshots ended, the pursuit vehicles were all rolling off the road into the wrong wilderness. The woman stood up, snorted once, slung the sniper rifle over her shoulder, and turned around.
“You said 3 minutes would do?”
The bald man looked at her with a dumbfounded expression. Because 3 minutes hadn’t passed yet.
“…It will be done soon.”
He began to focus on the work again, and the woman with the sniper rifle slung over her shoulder looked around with a sullen expression. As they had been driving without stopping even while shooting, Route 15 was now almost ending and they were approaching the intersection entering Midland’s overpass.
And that meant that they would soon reach a point where Midland citizens’ vehicles would appear in abundance, and at the same time, their figures on the trailer were standing out. A few vehicles were already passing by in the opposite lane.
“Hey! 3 minutes have long passed!”
“Hmm… this…”
“Is there a problem?”
Sweat was dripping from the bald man’s bald head.
“I, I need a little more time. This isn’t an ordinary firewall.”
“What? Damn it, where did you find this spell caster…”
The woman, who was about to get angry, suddenly put her hand to her ear. If someone had been watching her now, they would have felt that her expression was frowning even though half of it was covered by the goggle sunglasses.
“Say that again! What? Another middleman? There are other guys involved here too? That’s a really fucked up story. Our magician can’t even break through the firewall right now. So how many troops do you have on your side… huh?”
She made a dumb sound unconsciously upon hearing the other party’s answer.
“One person?”
Simultaneously with that muttering, a rough engine sound echoed from far away. She instinctively aimed the sniper rifle in the direction of the sound.
That vehicle was coming from the right side of the intersection the trailer was heading towards. An angular hood and a black body shining in the sunlight. A majestic engine sound that could be heard from afar.
The woman who had aimed the sniper rifle opened her mouth blankly. As she pressed a part of the goggle sunglasses with her hand, the special glasses that had been only black became transparent. The black vehicle running from afar was reflected in her sky-blue eyes.
“Holy fucking shit… a Black night? And a ’77 model? There was still a working one of those?”
While she was admiring, the convoy of the trailer and modified trucks passed the intersection and entered the overpass. Following that, the Black night that arrived at the intersection slid smoothly, drifted, and went up the overpass behind them.
The silver-haired woman, who had been blankly watching that smooth driving, soon shook her head side to side and came to her senses. Hobby was hobby and work was work. She was a professional, and of course she could make that distinction.
She raised the sniper rifle again and aimed at the Black night. And her eyes directly met the driver’s eyes, crossing the long distance.
Black eyes clearly visible even though half-buried in the shadow inside the car.
The woman who met those eyes shuddered unconsciously for a moment. For some reason, her legs tingled and the finger on the trigger wouldn’t move. It felt as if her body had frozen in front of a powerful predator.
At that moment, the bald man who had been struggling with the trailer’s system for a long time shouted abruptly.
“It’s open!”
Simultaneously with that shout, the small hatch on top of the trailer made a beep sound and opened with a clank. The bald man quickly approached and grabbed that hatch.
“It’s open! Now secure the items!”
Thanks to the bald man’s shout, the woman, freed from the strange restraint, bit her lip and put her finger on the trigger again. Unlike the Black night a moment ago, this time she just couldn’t let it go even though she didn’t know what it was. A professional should be able to return what they suffered.
But before that, the bald man’s scream erupted first.
“Aargh!”
The woman, who hurriedly turned back, saw the blade that had pierced through the bald man’s chest and protruded out. That blade had stretched out from inside the emergency door the bald man had opened.
The bald man looked at the woman with pitiful eyes.
“Sa, save…”
The bald man’s body floated up as he said that. To be precise, he was lifted up, skewered on the blade. The one holding that blade began to reveal his body, squeezing through the narrow emergency door.
A height exceeding 2 meters, limbs packed with solid muscles, undulating scales, glowing yellow vertical pupils, and a long tail sweeping the trailer ceiling. Seeing the face of that snake, the woman muttered.
“Lizardman…?”
At those words, the yellow eyes of the lizardman, who had been looking at the bald man skewered on the blade, turned towards the woman. The forked tongue flicked.
The next moment, the lizardman’s blade, which had tossed away the bald man’s body, swished towards the woman.
“You fucking son of a bitch!”
The woman rolled back, spitting out curses like a scream. The lizardman, who had stretched out the blade, tilted his head looking at the woman rolling back. The sniper rifle he had sliced was rolling on the trailer roof and falling onto the road.
The woman, who rolled back and straightened her body, immediately radioed.
“All troops! Attack that half-baked snake bastard!”
At that command, muzzles popped out through the windows from the modified trucks surrounding the trailer. The muzzles spewed fire without hesitation. Hundreds of bullets poured out from the three vehicles in an instant.
The woman took out the pistol from her waist, aimed, and lowered her body. It was to avoid possible stray bullets and accurately target the lizardman, but she couldn’t pull the trigger even after aiming at him.
Unlike the Black night a moment ago, this time she was just dumbfounded.
“What the…”
The lizardman’s response to the hundreds of bullets was just to cover his head and belly and crouch down. The mercenaries’ rifle bullets couldn’t penetrate that lizardman’s skin. Crumpled bullets were raining down on the trailer roof with a tut-tut-tut sound.
Unless it’s a heavy weapon mounted on an armored vehicle, eventually the moment comes when the bullets are exhausted and reloading is needed. That moment came for the mercenaries who had been surrounding the trailer and pouring bullets at the lizardman.
The crouched lizardman straightened his body and let out a strange roar, kie-e-e. Then the large blade he was holding made a clanking sound and divided the blade, becoming a double-bladed sword with blades above and below the handle.
As the lizardman threw it, the blade flew like a disc and split a modified truck in half.
The startled modified trucks swayed, the woman also opened her mouth as if dumbfounded, and the lizardman caught the double-bladed sword that returned like a boomerang and roared again. The trailer on which all those situations were unfolding was still running at the same speed from beginning to end without change.
And in the Black Night that was following them a little behind, Locke, who was holding the steering wheel, was snickering.
“The situation is killer.”
As if agreeing with those words, a rough orc ballad’s high note was bursting out from the Black Night’s radio.
With that song as the background, Locke began to recall the time he had met the middleman William yesterday morning, looking at the mercenaries and the lizardman ahead who had started shooting again.
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