I Have Returned, but I Cannot Lay down My Gun

Chapter 568

• [Notification: Gate closure detected.]

• [Notification: Internal welding detected. Remote opening/closing not possible.]

"...Welding?"

"I don’t remember this happening when other users went through annihilation difficulty…"

"When have we ever been concerned with that kind of thing? Let’s get ready."

• Welding???????????
• Hammering nails into a coffin, HAHAHAHAHA
• This is a trap, HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
• But don’t other missions have gates that close similarly?
• That’s true, HAHAHA

The door closed, sparks flying.

This wasn’t just a one-time process, but several times. In other words, the outside and inside were now completely sealed off. But those of us present, though slightly startled, didn’t forget what we needed to do.

The reason was simple. We were likely to succeed by beating up the purple entity floating a few hundred meters away. Moreover, Jin and Lane were still outside, and no matter how much I thought about it, I didn’t think that door would hold up against the weapons they were carrying.

Because of that, none of us cared about the fact that we couldn’t get out anymore.

A cutscene automatically started, and a voice echoed from the air.

"You shameless bastards have finally set foot in Savannah... fine, I’ll admit it. You were the biggest obstacle to Artemis’ revival. So now, I’ll correct that mistake."

"Not only did you get pushed back to the front yard, but you’re even coming out yourself now? Isn’t that a little too late to say that?"

"...Well, it doesn’t matter. It seems you’ve played a fun little trick, but I’ll show you that such foolish tactics won’t deceive us."

• Wow, a cutscene, HAHAHAHAHA
• So this was the proper way to deal with the third Byaam??????
• Again, throwing in the main story with a difficult difficulty level that even normal players can’t follow, HAHAHAHA
• Fact: A notice just went out saying that the Mecha-Byaam backup will be available starting next week.
• Yeah, they’ll be leaving next week, so they need to wrap it up quickly, HAHAHA

The name displayed on the UI was not Marv, but the management AI.

It seemed that the management AI had a rather arrogant personality. For some reason, I was intrigued. Now that I thought about it, I hadn’t met a Mecha-Byaam like that before. Lane, strictly speaking, had a bit of a needy, child-like personality, and Jin had always been pretty steady from the start.

If there was one like that, maybe the Mecha-Byaams would have more diversity. That thought passed through my mind as I stared ahead. Unfortunately, there was none this time.

And then, the air began to heat up.

• [Notification: High-power energy source detected ahead. High-risk energy deviation detected.]
• [Notification: Defense impossible. Evade immediately.]

It was as if the sun itself had risen in the center of the sector, and at that moment…

The same attack that had vaporized us from tens of kilometers away in the past was now heading straight toward us.

???Kagagagagak!

"Ugh…!"

"Avoid indirect attacks! The air where the laser passed is being ionized, and if you’re dumb enough to just stand there, you’ll burn!"

"This didn’t happen when other users did it-!"

• Woah, HAHAHAHAHAHAHA
• Looks like the firepower went crazy, HAHAHAHAHA
• Dice just had to speak, HAHAHAHAHA
• This is the Byaam you chose!!! Hold on with all your might!!!
• Did Dice really choose this? HAHAHAHAHA

If it weren’t for the Icarus gear’s range indicator, we’d be dead.

The 16 of us quickly dove into nearby cover and waited until the target appeared before us. Even though it felt like the Dark Zone raid was leaving everything to us... still, they gave us at least some mission guidelines and objectives.

However, despite waiting for several tens of seconds, nothing happened. We didn’t panic, though. Usually, in situations like this, you could activate something like a trigger to update the objective.

Clenching my fist, I triggered a pulse from the Icarus gear, sweeping the area. It scanned the surroundings, drastically reducing other functions and increasing the scan range. This pulse swept over a large facility, roughly 700 meters in diameter.

And, as expected...

• [Notification: Cooling room, server room, and power room detected.]
• [Notification: Unable to find entrance. Checking control rights… confirmed that they belong to the central sector management AI.]
• [Notification: Manual override required from control room.]

Something appeared.

While all this was happening, my mind was racing. As expected, the third we were facing was completely different from the one other users had faced. What I mean by that is, all the plans based on previous data for the central sector were now useless.

That meant, from now on, we would have to completely improvise.

So, what should we do first? One thing was certain: the cooling room, server room, and power room... we had only two choices. Either leave them alone, or destroy them all.

The reason was simple. If we left those three areas intact, we could still get fire support from Jin and Lane, but the management AI, which occupied the third’s body, would likely remain there. On the other hand, destroying them would directly align with the raid’s ultimate goal.

Hmm...

"...It seems staying here won’t do much good. I’ll head down. I’ll take care of the control room, and the rest of you, distract them. When the gate leading to the lower level opens, don’t worry about me and head down immediately."

"...Got it. Don’t die."

"I’ll try my best."

• If you go down and come back up alive, I’ll upvote, HAHAHA
• Even if the Master says it dramatically, we’re not buying it.
• The Byaams will break everything downstairs and come back up, HAHAHAHAHA
• Effort? The third Byaam should be the one putting in the effort, HAHAHA
• Nah, I’m not even worried~

...These rebellious little brats.

Anyway, it was time to move. The air buzzed. It felt as though something that shouldn’t be there was burning my skin. The air was heating up, and as soon as a laser passed through an area, it became hard to breathe.

The battle started from below. As a red aiming laser, previously pointed at us, moved toward our allies' area, I grabbed a chemical projectile launcher and rushed toward the control room entrance, climbing the wall-mounted stairs.

Throwing a Tomahawk at the gap in the closing door to prevent it from fully closing, I shot two oxidizers at the thick steel door. As the entire wall melted, I leaped toward what seemed to be a floating hula hoop.

The weakened steel door was ripped apart, and I successfully managed to push into the control room.

"Whoo..."

Because of the aftermath of the oxidizers, some parts of the shield were melted, but that wasn’t important.

In front of me stood two robots. I didn’t know what inspiration they were designed from, but they looked like something from a dog fight, with missile launchers, miniguns, and what seemed like circular chainsaws attached.

As the circular chainsaws spun with an eerie screech, I remembered that my Tomahawk was stuck in the gap of the door, and I smirked.

Holding the 3kg tactical spike hammer attached to my bulletproof vest, I added:

"Come at me. I’ll turn you into scrap metal."

• Wow, look at those terrifyingly designed robots, HAHAHAHAHA
• Wait, is the third Byaam insane????
• I know this game is rated 19+, but this is too much, HAHAHAHAHA
• The sound of the saw is insane, HAHAHA
• Fact: I bet Eugene would break them all, HAHAHA

The two “dogfight” robots charged straight ahead, firing missiles and miniguns, but as soon as I sensed something, I quickly dodged out of the kill zone.

With an explosion, the two robots jumped into the air, and I twisted my body to evade. Then, spinning around, I brought the hammer down—there was a huge crash, the sound of shattering, and a sizzling electrical sound all combined as one, and one of the robots stopped functioning.

After crushing its body with force, I ripped the minigun off its top and grinned at the remaining robot.

"Come at me like before."

Of course, there was no response, and I didn’t expect one either.

With a loud crash, a flash filled the center of the control room, and the air was filled with the smell of gunpowder.

"…Master, this is Lane. I detected a large number of hostile signals near Sector Alpha. We’re engaging now."

"Archetype, this is Jin from Sector Delta. We’ve identified the Artemis Mobile Strike Team. We’ll clean up as quickly as possible and then provide support."

Meanwhile, elsewhere, the battle was intensifying.

???Giiing!

"This is troublesome. If the entrance gets wider, it’ll be harder to deal with the enemies."

"Damn, my weapon’s meant for large fixed targets... but knowing that, they’re sending these small ones first, huh?"

One shot, two shots, and three shots.

The railgun shots that had been fired with great enthusiasm didn’t last long before they stopped, and Lane and Owens kept firing with the weapons of the humanoids they’d destroyed.

The blind spot Eugene hadn’t thought about—unlike Jin, who could do wide-area attacks, the large tail railgun she mentioned, which was extremely effective against fixed targets, was quite difficult to deal with the medium-sized robots coming in waves.

Furthermore, after several shots, the entrance had widened considerably, and as a result, the number of robots flooding in at once was far more than we had anticipated.

The result was... something that resembled a spider’s approach. And seeing that, Lane’s expression began to twist in discomfort.

"Ugh, this is gross...!"

"If this keeps up... it’s going to get troublesome. They’ve learned Eugene’s method. They’re sending out a large number of adequately powered units to overwhelm us."

"...What do we do then?"

"The key is overwhelming firepower. Do we have anything besides the railgun? We could pour all the power directed here onto their heads, and the situation would be much better than now."

Lane thought for a moment but, after a brief attempt, finally spoke up.

"...This won’t work. Power deviation is impossible. If we had something like a Tesla coil to insert in between, it might work, but I’d suggest firing lasers connected to the power source instead."

"About 1 minute and 30 seconds to go. We need to solve this within that time. Find as many solutions as possible."

"Easy for you to say...!"

If they were humanoid, it’d be one thing, but as I said before, the robots looked like spiders.

Because of this, even if we rotated the panels they were stepping on to block their path, it wouldn’t last long... but right now, even that brief moment was crucial. Without hesitation, Lane moved the panels to temporarily block the path, and then spoke up.

"In about 40 seconds, we won’t be able to stop them. If we don’t care about destroying the facilities, we can just blow up everything except the generator with the railgun."

"Sounds like the last resort."

"...Ha, if this were Artemis HQ or Central Park, I could swap weapons from the tail, but here it’s impossible. The management AI cut off Jin’s access, so it’ll be hard to swap my parts."

"..."

"I guess if there were any Artemis humanoids left intact, the situation might’ve been different. As long as they met a certain performance threshold, they could connect to the generator and use its power, but we’ve destroyed all of them on the way here..."

At the same time, the silence continued, and our gazes met.

But this wasn’t just wasting precious time with no plan. Rather, it was me trying to mentally process a brilliant idea that had just flashed through my head.

Lane opened her mouth and, with difficulty, reached for the remote device connected to her—Owens was controlling it—and quickly began granting generator access rights.

‘Artemis humanoids with certain performance capabilities.’

How had I missed the fact that they were right in front of me?

"...I’ll disassemble the nearby parts and recycle them. I’ll attach the permanently weaponized tail. You’ll be quite surprised later, Master."

"25 seconds. We need to get familiar with weapon control, so hurry up."

"Laser cannon... selected. It’s basically like an ion cannon. It can attack with lasers, but by ionizing the air near the laser, it can also do wide-area attacks. Don’t worry, you’ll see once I fire it... it’ll take about 15 seconds!"

"Unbelievable, really."

As I continued firing, I could hear the clattering from behind.

An arm-like tail, which originally had no reason to exist, began assembling in the air, and the tail-weapon was attached to the tailbone area where nothing had been before. It was more like something out of nanomachine technology.

The software for controlling it forcibly breached the firewall of the remote control, and Owens felt an odd sensation as the tail’s potential firepower limit was displayed on the UI.

It was an unusual sight and feeling, as though a new arm had naturally attached itself and moved just by thinking about it.

He added in an absurd tone, and at the same time aimed the tail-laser cannon at the area where the enemies had gathered most.

"I feel like some sort of manifestor. Eugene would have a fit if he saw this."

"Everyone attaches a tail like the Master does."

"Shut up."

???Kiiing!

And with that, a flash erupted.

The laser converged toward the ground at an impossibly fast speed, and an explosion followed. The air around it ionized, creating a storm of intense heat that slammed into the Artemis robots. As everything burst into flames and exploded, the tail converted massive energy into thermal energy, and the concentrator started to melt slowly.

But unfortunately, it was still just a minor setback compared to the damage the Artemis Mobile Strike Team took.

Following the laser’s path, the blackened robot bodies lined up, and in an instant, nearly 5% of the energy was oxidized like popcorn.

After firing a few more laser shots, Owens collapsed on the spot.

To be precise, the area had been completely heated, and the floor couldn’t withstand the deformation caused by the heat, so part of it collapsed.

Even so, a slight smile appeared on his face.

"Can’t say this out loud, but I’m kind of enjoying this."

"Right?"

"I’ll work as much as the cool stuff you gave me. Don’t let your guard down; more could come from another direction."

A flash exploded again.

Jin and Lane were making good progress.