Chapter 8.2 - Drunken Slaughter
It was already deep into the night, but it seemed like it would still be quite some time before the sky would brighten again.
A fair and graceful figure that didn’t seem to possess any weight moved about through the abandoned buildings as if she was as light as a feather. Even though her speed was astonishing, not a speck of dust was raised by her movements. The steel bars that extended outwards couldn’t clip her clothes in the slightest either. In the blink of an eye, she had already reached the outskirts of Dragon City and entered the true wilderness where dangers lurked in every corner. What was strange was that the various defensive installations around the border of Dragon City seemed completely ineffective against her.
As soon as she left Dragon City, she was like a fish in water, her figure gradually disappearing into the darkness.
At this moment, several pairs of eyes that were tightly locked onto her lost sight of their target. They began to search around the darkness in a somewhat nervous and hurried manner. However, this was the wilderness, a place where complex terrain and abandoned constructs laid about in disorder. Now that it was already surrounded in darkness, after losing their target, how could they find traces of her again?
At this moment, on the rooftop of a small, half-collapsed building, a hand that was covered in thick gloves gently pressed against protective lens. Several bright patterns immediately flashed past the lens, and as a result, that fine silhouette once again appeared in its field of view. Soon after, a rifle that possessed unusually great length and weight changed angles, once again placing that slowly advancing figure into its trajectory.
Behind the protective glasses was a mask that covered half of the face, revealing an extremely short and orderly beard. His dark black skin seemed to completely blend in with the night. Those thick lips curled upwards, revealing a thought-provoking smile.
The gun was covered in tactical strips for hiding its existence. Behind the strips of cloth were layers of plasters that carried grains of sand and even a bit of dry grass. Lynch, who held the gun, knew that even though the camouflage strips the Black Dragonriders produced could cut off all metal, heat, and radiation signals, this type of cover was unnatural in itself, and unnatural things risked exposure. For example, the woman that was slowly advancing 1500 meters out was wearing a camouflage combat suit with efficacy that far surpassed that of what the dragonriders could produce, but they were still useless under his protective lens. That was why his gun was covered in a layer of seemingly useless natural camouflage to protect against things that could detect unusual things like camouflage cloth.
Lynch wasn’t worried about her discovering him at all. Right now, his aura was completely restrained, and he was using completely passive methods to search his surroundings. In addition, his camouflage technique had already reached a level where he could almost completely blend into his surroundings. The reason why Lynch used the word ‘almost’ was because he wasn’t used to using the word perfect. It was because after obtaining these protective lens, he finally understood that even his own disguise would appear under these lens.
To this day, Lynch would still often feel proud of his own luck. At least, inside of that dark and hidden tavern, his intuition made him do something seemingly inconceivable, and so far, it seemed to definitely have been the correct decision. That was, to surrender to that machine-like, cold, and abilityless woman.
Luck would forever be something indispensable for a sniping master. This was something that Lynch had always believed in.
The muzzle continued to move at an extremely slow speed. All types of data continuously moved about in Lynch’s brain, affecting his decisions. His probability of landing a fatal blow continuously increased, already reaching the standard at which he would fire. However, Lynch never pulled the trigger. He excelled at patience. Since the probability was still increasing, even if the increase was just a single percentage, then that was still a good thing. In addition, when she entered Dragon City, she suffered a snipe from him in almost perfect condition, so how could she escape his pursuit with only half of her strength remaining?
Peperus… the lips under that beard mouthed out that name.
Lynch enjoyed a hunt, and he loved hunting down big figures the most. As someone that stayed beside the Town of Trials’ indescribable fiend’s side, even if she didn’t have the title of an arbitration official, the authority Peperus possessed was still unimaginably great, at least much greater than what Lynch possessed. She could even kill a dragonrider higher ranked officer, and as long as the enemy didn’t have certainty in killing the fiend behind her, then no one would carry out revenge for the officer that was slaughtered.
Even though Peperus only had a smaller half of her strength left, if they were fighting face to face, Lynch didn’t have the confidence to last even three seconds. This was the strength of a high level figure in the Trials Division. Of course, Lynch focused almost all of his abilities on sniping, hiding, and moving, so his close quarters combat strength was at most at the level of a lower ranked officer. Lynch always thought of himself as a genius sniper, so he concentrated all of his efforts in this direction. He didn’t want to waste evolutions points that weren’t easy to obtain on things that weren’t related to sniping or wilderness combat. The so-called all around development was something only a few truly freakish geniuses could do. The overwhelming majority of people could only be described as mediocre. Meanwhile, those freakish geniuses weren’t formidable because they chose to develop comprehensively, and instead because they found their own suitable path.
For example, that woman who subdued him without even using physical strength.
His probability of hitting the target already exceeded 90, but Lynch still didn’t intend to press down on the trigger at all, because he already noticed that the two of them weren’t the only participants in tonight’s game.
The face of Peperus who patiently advanced was pale. Fine beads of sweat already began to uncontrollably seep out from her clothes. This would greatly increase her chances of being discovered, but she couldn’t control herself any longer. The twitching pain from her back was becoming stronger and stronger, but the pain wasn’t what she was scared of. The sniper rifle that continuously targeted her lungs continuously whittled down her vitality.
It was an extremely terrifying sniper. However, if it was because she was feeling ill at ease and already suffered an injury, how could that individual have a chance? This was what Peperus thought somewhat helplessly.
Right when Peperus’ mind was slightly distracted, an extremely fine tripwire appeared in front of her. Her right leg stumbled on it, and then her body suddenly fell downwards.
Before she fell, Peperus was already on guard. Her left hand pressed down on the ground, and then her legs raised straight into the sky, spinning like a pinwheel! The high heeled boots each extended 15 centimeter long crescent blades!
Swish swish swish! Five or six large black nets fell down on Peperus’ head. Then, these seemingly fatal nets were sliced apart into pieces in an almost anticipated manner.
Peperus immediately bounced up from the ground. A small bright silver pistol already appeared in her right hand. What was different from ordinary pistols was that this pistol continuously flickered with blue radiance.
Sharp and clear bang bang gunshots continuously sounded. Peperus fired eight rounds with incomparable speed, emptying the magazine. Whenever a gunshot sounded, there would be one or even multiple lightless flying daggers shot down. Her body bent slightly like a female leopard about to attack, ready to erupt with power at any moment to break through this encirclement in one rush!
Peperus immediately bounced up like an artillery shell that has left a cannon’s chamber! Then, after rushing out close to 50 meters, her body suddenly squatted down before heavily landing on the ground.
The tripwire that made her stumble appeared again like a ghost. This time, it wrapped around Peperus’ ankle, making her body that was advancing fall out of the sky.
The tripwire was clearly not some simple rope. After Peperus fell down, it was as if she lost most of her strength. Even though she was struggling endlessly, she just couldn’t crawl back up.
Lynch gently licked his lips. His aim stopped momentarily at the almost invisible tripwire before following it up and landing on the body of a male whose entire body was wrapped in a dark uniform. The uniform used black as its base, and it conformed with the Blood Parliament’s style. The only decoration that was different was the blood-colored stripe at the center of the uniform.
A dog from the Trials Division! Lynch cursed inwardly. Just like all dragonriders, Lynch hated everything related to the Trials Division. In this era where the three giants predominated, dragonriders like himself without any foundation were like undisputed kings, but in front of the Trials Division, they were nothing different from ownerless dogs. With the fall of a dark saint as well as the restrained activities of the other two giants, everyone felt that in the hands of the little girl, the dark era of the Trials Division had passed. However, no one expected that in less than a year’s time, this little girl proved that she was even more terrifying and fiendish than the three giants.
That male stopped just ten or so meters in front of Peperus, not advancing any further. Six more figures appeared from the darkness, surrounding Peperus. They similarly wore the uniform of the Trials Division, the red stripes wrapping around their left and right sleeves respectively. These six individuals lifted up the powerless and weak Peperus from the ground, and then they stabbed eight 10 centimeter long metal needles into various parts of her bones. The pain and suffering immediately distorted her face, but Peperus only released a few muffled cries instead of screaming out.
The six individuals didn’t stop there. They directly tore apart Peperus’ concealment clothes, stripping her naked. Then coin sized instruments were stuck to various parts of her body. Even though Peperus’ will was extremely firm, when the nipples of her breasts also had an apparatus attached, she couldn’t help but tremble.
“Fucking shit! It’s another pile of dog shit!” Lynch continuously cursed inwardly. He truly wished to press down the trigger and send these seven men into the afterworld and then move on to Peperus. A chance to hunt down members of the Trials Division was quite rare to come by.
After thinking for a bit, Lynch slowly brought out a small and exquisite instrument. He carefully pointed the antenna towards a certain position in the night sky. In that place floated a fist sized metal sphere. He would collect the special information and send it to Helen. The data transmission beam was a straight line, but even after a transmission of close to several hundred kilometers, the amount that would scatter away wouldn’t exceed a square meter. That was why in this state where it could not be intercepted or broken, only a sniping specialist like Lynch could operate this kind of communications device.
Through this apparatus that floated a thousand meters in the sky, everything Lynch saw through the protective lens was transmitted to Helen’s intelligence system. He felt that with other powers like the Trials Division involved, it was best for Helen to make the final decision.
Only now did the male who tightly held the tripwire put the wiring away. He walked in front of Peperus, and with a smile, he greeted her. “We meet again, beautiful young miss Peperus.”