Chapter 149: The Meat Grinder
Chapter 149: Chapter 149: The Meat Grinder
Chapter 149: The Meat Grinder
Commander Vok stared at the distant sky in complete disbelief.
The Level 146 Cultist stood in a ruined staging area just outside the main transit hub. Seconds ago, he had been waiting for the signal to march his reserve battalion across the central bridge.
Instead, he had just watched a blinding pillar of cosmic stardust vaporize the entire Vanguard barricade, taking hundreds of elite Cult warriors with it.
The ground beneath his boots was still vibrating from the sheer impact.
A low-level Cult scout sprinted into the staging area. The man was covered in soot, gasping violently for air.
"Commander!" the scout shrieked, falling to his knees.
"The central bridge is gone! The Vanguard Knights did not cast that spell! There are masked anomalies slaughtering our forces! Sector Four is completely frozen in red ice!"
Vok grabbed the scout by the collar and hauled him to his feet.
"What do you mean frozen?" Vok snarled. "The Null-Fiends are immune to magic!"
"The ice was physical matter!" the scout cried, trembling uncontrollably.
"Our Fire Mage was instantly killed! The entire vanguard is dead!"
Vok shoved the scout to the ground. Cold sweat dripped down the Commander’s scarred face. The invasion was falling apart. But retreat was not a viable option.
The Fifth Elder was a merciless master. The dark priest would never accept a tactical withdrawal.
If Vok returned to the underground shadows empty-handed, the Elder would rip his soul out and feed it to the Miasma abominations.
Vok had to make these losses count. He had to secure a victory right now.
"Listen to me!" Vok roared, drawing his jagged broadsword. He turned to the two hundred surviving Cultists and mutated hounds gathered in the ruins.
"The main avenues are death traps! We will bypass the plaza entirely! We push through the eastern industrial alleys! We will flank these masked freaks from behind and slaughter them in the crossfire! Move!"
The Cultists roared in desperate agreement. Driven by the terrifying threat of the Fifth Elder, the battalion surged forward. They abandoned the wide streets and rushed into the narrow, claustrophobic pathways of the eastern industrial sector.
The alleys were eerily silent. Tall brick walls and thick steam pipes boxed the Cultists in. They sprinted over the cracked pavement, their weapons drawn, expecting an ambush at every corner.
Instead, they heard a sharp giggle.
High above them, sitting casually on a rusted fire escape, was Lyra. She wore her featureless mask, but her chaotic body language radiated pure excitement. She was twirling a glowing green glass vial between her fingers.
"Look at all these volunteers," Lyra cheered cheerfully, looking down at the packed battalion.
Commander Vok looked up. His eyes widened.
"Kill her!" Vok ordered.
Lyra did not give them the chance to cast a single spell. She dropped the glowing vial directly into the center of the horde and snapped her fingers.
[Alchemy Art: Corrosive Bloom.]
The glass shattered against the pavement. A blinding green light erupted through the alleyway. The explosion did not produce fire. It unleashed a massive shockwave of highly pressurized acid.
The Corrosive Bloom expanded like a violent flower. The front line of the Cult battalion was instantly engulfed.
The acid was terrifyingly potent. It melted through their hardened leather armor, dissolved their steel weapons, and ate through their flesh in milliseconds.
Dozens of Cultists collapsed to the ground, screaming in unimaginable agony as their bodies were reduced to bubbling puddles.
Up on the fire escape, Lyra leaned over the railing, clapping her hands together.
"Oh, do not make those faces!" Lyra mocked, laughing at the melting soldiers below.
"If you survive, it is science! If you don’t... it is data!"
The surviving Cultists in the middle of the pack panicked. They tried to push forward through the thick acidic smoke, desperate to escape the blast zone. They thought it was just a stray trap.
A massive figure stepped out from the shadows at the end of the alley, completely blocking their exit.
Cole stood tall, cracking his neck. He wore his heavy mechanical gauntlets.
"Calm down, Lyra," Cole called out, chuckling behind his mask.
"Leave some data for my toys."
Cole slammed his metallic fists together. The gears inside his gauntlets spun with blinding speed, linking his mana directly to the hidden mechanisms he had installed along the brick walls hours ago.
[Forge Art: Gatling Execution.]
The Cultists froze in terror.
The brick walls on both sides of the narrow alley violently opened. Six heavy automated turrets extended from the hidden compartments. The barrels glowed with super-heated arcane energy.
"Fire," Cole commanded.
The alleyway instantly turned into a mechanical meat grinder.
The turrets unleashed a deafening barrage of high-caliber magical ammunition. The crossfire was inescapable. The narrow walls trapped the Cultists perfectly in the kill zone.
Bullets tore through the mutated hounds, shredding their flesh and dropping them in seconds. Cult mages tried to cast blood shields, but the sheer kinetic velocity of Cole’s rapid-fire execution shattered their barriers instantly.
Blood sprayed across the brick walls. The deafening roar of gunfire masked the desperate screams of the dying army. Cole stood calmly at the end of the alley, directing the turrets with microscopic movements of his gauntlets.
Within thirty seconds, the massive Cult battalion was reduced to shredded corpses.
The turrets clicked empty. The barrels smoked heavily in the humid air.
Cole lowered his hands, preparing to call the Captain to report their success.
Suddenly, a massive figure burst through the lingering green smoke.
It was Commander Vok. His crimson robes were burned away. His left arm was heavily mangled by the gunfire, and his face was blistered by the acid.
But the Level 146 warrior was fueled by pure desperation. If he did not kill these two anomalies, the Fifth Elder would inflict a fate much worse than death upon him.
"I will not die here!" Vok shrieked, raising his jagged broadsword. He channeled every remaining drop of his corrupted mana into his legs, launching himself directly toward Cole in a suicidal charge.
"Cole! Catch!" Lyra yelled from above.
Cole did not flinch. He knew exactly what his partner was doing. He simply took one step backward.
Lyra tossed a tiny, pitch-black sphere from the fire escape. The object seemed to swallow the ambient light around it. It fell in a perfect arc, intercepting Vok mid-air.
[Alchemy Art: Mini Void Mine.]
The tiny sphere struck the Cult Commander directly in the center of his chest.
There was no explosion. There was a sickening spatial crunch.
A localized gravity well tore open on Vok’s sternum. The Mini Void Mine acted like a hungry black hole. It violently absorbed the surrounding matter on impact.
Vok’s broadsword, his armor, and his entire upper torso were instantly sucked into the microscopic singularity.
The singularity collapsed, vanishing with a quiet pop.
Vok’s lower half hit the pavement heavily. The terrifying Cult Commander was dead.
Lyra hopped down from the fire escape, landing gracefully next to Cole. She walked over to the bisected corpse, pulling out a small notebook from her pocket. She jotted down a quick calculation.
"Implosion radius is stable," Lyra muttered happily.
"The prototype works."
Cole deactivated his heavy gauntlets. He looked down the ruined alleyway, admiring the complete mechanical devastation they had unleashed together.
"Good work, crazy girl," Cole praised, bumping his metallic fist against her shoulder.
"We aim to please," Lyra beamed under her mask.
Cole tapped his earpiece, opening the secure squad channel.
"Captain," Cole reported, his voice crisp and professional.
"The eastern flank is secured. The enemy routing force has been entirely neutralized."
"Understood," Draven’s cold voice replied over the comms.
"Hold your positions. Phase one is complete."