Chapter 277 - 271: Eight-Cylinder Engine
Chapter 277: Chapter 271: Eight-Cylinder Engine
「Two days later.」
The western border of Zone 18, a two-hundred-kilometer defense line.
High above, a formation of Storm Falcons swept silently across the dim sky.
The aerial bombs mounted on their underbellies unhooked and dropped, striking the back of a "Corrupting Venom Giant Frog" that was tilting its head back to gather power. The blast wave launched it into the air, and it was a corpse before it hit the ground.
The beast tide crossed the invisible line and immediately slammed into another steel defense line constructed of Red Lotus Missiles and Spider-type Killers.
Red Lotus Missiles plunged into the dense swarm of beasts, erupting into clusters of orange fireballs. The Spider-type Killers weaved through the smoke of battle, reaping lives in silence.
Swaths of red dots on the virtual sandbox blinked out of existence.
"Damage report," Allen said, his eyes fixed on the sandbox.
"Total kills have reached 5,721," Jarvis’s voice was steady. "We have twenty-three Golems with irreparable damage. Ammunition consumption is within estimated parameters. Stockpiles are healthy."
Allen nodded slightly.
’Everything is under control.’
The second beast tide was slightly smaller in scale than the first. The ground defense lines of the three legions were operating smoothly, and the beyond-visual-range hunter-killer system was mature. As long as there were no quantum leaps in enemy numbers, the defense line was exceptionally solid.
He reduced his direct focus on the front lines.
The crisis was downgraded. Battlefield management was adjusted from "Emergency" to "Important but Controllable."
On a workbench in the workshop lay the wreckage of the Snail Monster’s Perception Amplifier, along with four micro signal emitters dug out from the brains of Low-Tier Magical Beasts.
That was what truly kept him up at night.
This morning, Forged Fire Fortress synchronized the latest intelligence: the contamination and radiation effects of the abyssal aura had been determined.
The beast tide was not endless. After all, the total population of Magical Beasts on the Molten Iron Mountain Range plane had an upper limit.
He raised his hand and pulled up a timeline in mid-air.
"Project the peak of the beast tide."
Jarvis used the information from the fortress to build an attenuation model and began its calculations.
Aside from the peak of the first wave, the next red crest appeared in the middle of the timeline, followed by a parabolic decline.
"The overall number of the beast tide will reach its peak in two months, after which it will progressively decrease." Allen stared at the curve, his mind racing.
’The Black Wizard’s window of attack is limited. It must be somewhere on this curve.’
’A simple deduction: the enemy won’t strike during the initial phase of the beast tide. At that point, every zone’s combat strength is at its fullest, and the returns on a surprise attack are the lowest. Anyone would know not to choose that moment.’
’They also most likely won’t act after the beast tide has completely ended. By then, the zones will have started to recover, fortress support channels will have reopened, and alertness will be at its highest.’
Allen’s finger drew two red lines on the timeline to the right of the peak.
"Most likely between two and three months from now."
’That’s the answer.’
After the beast tide’s peak, the defense lines of each zone would be stretched to their limits, ammunition stockpiles would be depleted, and large numbers of Golems would be damaged and awaiting repair. The Wizards’ Spiritual Power would be completely exhausted.
It was a "window of fatigue"—a time when old strength is spent and new strength has yet to be born.
’The Black Wizard will definitely tear off their disguise and reap the battlefield during this window. If I were that Black Wizard, I’d choose this time too.’
’So, I must be prepared.’
Allen retracted his hand, his thoughts turning to the metal fragments on the workbench.
The intelligence he had was pitifully scarce—he knew the enemy was using biomechanical modifications, and their encrypted communication technology was far beyond his ability to crack.
Location? Unknown.
Maximum troop strength? Unknown.
Core techniques? Even more unknown.
The two countermeasure approaches, frequency jamming and rapid scanning, had both hit a wall two days ago.
’But I have to break down that wall as soon as possible, no matter what. I can’t leave this problem for later.’
’If my Demon Eyes are shot down, I can replace them. He takes one, I’ll build two. It’s a war of attrition I can afford.’
’If the enemy has other tricks up their sleeve, I’ll deal with them as they come.’
Allen closed his eyes. All of his thought sub-threads were tasked with heavy responsibilities; not a single one was idle.
Seven sub-threads, each possessing about seventy percent of his main consciousness’s intellectual capacity. Current configuration: Threads one, two, and three controlled the Craftsman’s Hand, grinding away at the Sixth Legion’s core components. Thread four managed the mines and logistics. Threads five and six monitored the battlefield. Thread seven was dedicated to R&D.
His main consciousness still had to work on breaking through to Second-level Wizard.
He had already pushed himself to the limit.
’But limits... are meant to be broken.’
"Jarvis, I’m transferring all of thread four’s mine management authority to you. From now on, you will work with the Demon Eyes to take over the production monitoring, logistics coordination, and patrol scheduling for all eight mines."
"Confirmed. The automated mine scheduling module has taken control. This will reduce response efficiency for unforeseen incidents by fourteen percent," Jarvis advised.
Allen was unmoved. "My fourth thread will join forces with my seventh thread. Establish a ’Dual-Core R&D Group’."
In his mind, two torrents of thought merged into a single river, doubling his processing power.
Allen assigned tasks to the two threads.
Sub-thread seven would continue to focus on the frequency jamming approach.
It would perform a brute-force spectrum analysis on the implant’s signal and attempt to reverse-engineer the hardware by dismantling the implant’s internal metal structure. This would help deduce the possible range of its physical operating frequency, compressing the brute-force search space from "full-spectrum" to a sufficiently narrow band.
’I don’t understand biotechnology, but with enough time, I can definitely crack the Rune technology and metal components.’
The core objective was to develop wide-area jamming technology to precisely cover the implant’s operating frequency, preventing any of the enemy’s spies within the zone from transmitting intelligence.
Thread four took over the development of the rapid scanning technology.
The previous bottleneck was clear: the flesh and blood on a Magical Beast’s surface interfered with the weak magnetic anomalies of the metal implants. A single probe’s sensitivity was off by three orders of magnitude; it couldn’t penetrate at all.
Allen switched to an engineering-based approach.
’If a single point isn’t enough, use an array.’
He would have six Demon Eye Mark IIIs equipped with special magnetic anomaly probes fly in a low-altitude network. Multi-point data fusion combined with search algorithms would forcibly raise the equivalent sensitivity by two orders of magnitude.
Was that enough?
No. It was still one order of magnitude short of being able to clearly identify every "spy" Magical Beast from high altitude over a wide area.
But it was enough to detect metal implants within 500 meters and pluck them out from the beast swarms.
Especially any potential relay stations.
The Snail Monster was dead, but it couldn’t be the only advanced modified creature in the beast tide. The low-to-mid-tier modified beings responsible for collecting the signals from the "spies" were the true backbone of the entire surveillance network.
’Take out the backbone, and even if the spies are still broadcasting, their signals won’t get through.’
"Temporarily reassign five Alchemy Servants from the component production line. They are to fully support the Dual-Core R&D Group in manufacturing the interference field generator prototype and the scanning array components."
"Confirmed. Delivery of the Sixth Legion’s core components will be delayed by approximately eleven percent."
Allen didn’t hesitate.
’Having the Sixth Legion at full strength a few days late is acceptable. But the countermeasures against the Black Wizard cannot be delayed by a single day.’
The door to the Meditation Room closed.
Deep within the workshop, the roar of machinery seemed endless. Sparks flew, and the piercing sounds of metal component production interwove into a furious industrial symphony.
Threads one, two, and three were churning out Golems.
Threads five and six were directing the hunt for Magical Beasts.
Threads four and seven were building the radar.
An eight-cylinder engine, running at full power.
Every piece of ore, every drop of Magic Power, every single second in all of Zone 18 was squeezed to its absolute limit, forged into a blade in Allen’s hands.