Chapter 171 - Cardenia's Revenge

“Next building, move. Squad 2, enter from the left door on my mark.” Saater commanded his squad of seven to move up to an pre-fab apartment building of four stories.

The squad hugged the wall tightly, using their scanners to ensure that there was nothing on the other side that could break through and kill them. The squad continuously aimed their rifles at various angles, covering the opposite building and checking all the window vantage points. “Don’t put all your trust in the scanners, keep your eyes peeled.” Saater warned.

There were plenty of objects and materials that could absorb radiation or bluff scanners, like the blue spheres in the slovesa temple or Tyson’s active jammer. Combat in the Galactic Era was a game of cat-and-mouse, with countermeasures to every technology.

“Get our drone to check any buildings nearby.” Every squad had a companion drone that served as observation and could easily spot any humans, though it was hard to differentiate between the major gangs and the civilians of Rockhold.

[Squad 2 in position.]

Saater breathed, the hot air from his mouth enveloping his face in the enclosed helmet. “Check chemical filters and ammo. Sound off.”

The squad sounded off in reply with affirmatives, before Saater hoisted his rifle, ready to enter with his wingman holding onto his shoulder and rifle aimed forward too.

“On my mark… three, two, one – GO!”

Saater and the wingman burst through the main door of the building, while Squad 2 entered via a side entrance, sweeping the hallway. “Go long. Pair up.” Saater moved in tandem with his wingmen, their footwork in sync as they checked all the angles.

The prefab apartment’s lobby looked like a run-down hoarder’s paradise, with towers and piles of trash (or treasure) collected and accumulated against the walls. Two staircases led to the upper floors, while the lift was already malfunctioning, a continuous tone of arrival at the ground floor echoing through the lobby.

Without a word the squads moved into the building, slowly clearing each and every room. Many of the rooms had signs of previous habitation, their inhabitants clearly evacuating the city towards one of the lesser cities and outposts across Athen. “Rockhold will never be the same after this…” Saater mumbled to himself.

As they meticulously checked every possible hiding spot, they finally reached the top floor. “Seems to be fairly empty so far. Scanners show anything for this final floor?”

[Plenty of metal reactions, but there seems to be one room that’s lined with lead. We can’t see whats inside.]

“Okay, stay alert.”

Saater cleared the final step of the staircase, stepping into a corridor. He slowly moved, checking the empty rooms. Out of nowhere, a turret appeared from the ceiling, breaking out through one of the gaps and firing a projectile. A loud deafening sound roared through the corridor, the projectile slamming into him with fury and exploding.

The force sent him and the wingmen tumbling back into the stairwell and down the stairs, while Saater’s active earplugs tightened upon hearing the spike in decibels. The wingmen was knocked back by Saater, the impact against the wall and floor delivering a straight concussion.

[GO AWAY! DON’T MAKE ME COME OUT. I HAVE MORE OF WHERE THAT CAME FROM, FUCKERS!]

Saater coughed out blood as his Mirage Gunner’s exosuit energy flickered feebly, as his arms struggled to prop himself up. While the energy shield could absorb damage and disperse it over his surface area, it did not mean it cancelled all incoming momentum.

One of his squad members yelled back down back the corridor. “We’re with the Queen’s Guards, asshole!”

[Oh yeah? Like I give a fucking shit. This is my apartment and my flat. You can be Lucky Snake, Queen’s Guards or Opal Union for all I care, I’ll shoot anyone that comes in!]

Saater finally recovered enough to stagger back into a standing position, a medic immediately running up to him. The medic expertly opened a port on the arms, before attaching a painkiller syringe and pumping it in.

The cold fluid pumped through Saater’s body in tandem with his heartbeat, numbing the aching dull pain from the explosion. “Okay, just give us your lease number and we’ll leave.”

[5829340-OH, there, now go away!]

Saater signalled to his squad to leave, with the medic propping him up down the stairwell.

[Squad 2 reporting in, our sides clear.]

“We’re heading back to base. Return to our cars.”

The two squads left the apartment building, carrying the unconscious wingmen while Saater finally had enough strength to move on his own, though he still winced slightly with every step. The drone was recalled before they boarded a modified armoured hovercar that could fit all seven of them, with the wingmen lying flat in the middle.

“Fucking civvies, can’t they just get the fuck out of Rockhold! They are making our lives harder, fuck.” One of the squad members complained. “We’ve already ran into five of this self-defense assholes.”

The squad members nodded their heads, breaking into a heated venting of all the shit they went through today. Snipers, booby trapped doors, mines on the roads and even walls. The high tension took a toll on Saater, who did not join the conversation, focusing on his own breathing as he still felt his muscles scream out for rest.

The journey was without incident, much to the relief of the squad. They had been ambushed three days ago, so every movement had an element of danger to it.

The armoured hovercar glided over the empty broken streets. Saater didn’t dare move the hovercar into the air, using the buildings for cover. Flying through the air was pretty much a death sentence in Rockhold, especially with the cavern’s ceiling acting as an altitude limit.

As such it almost purely became a ground based battle, along with continuous artillery in the form of mortars and elevated particle beams.

They soon reached the outskirts of the central sector, where the Queen’s Tower was, which was most likely the only ‘safe’ zone in the entire city. They cleared the first guard checkpoint, moving past rows upon rows of buildings with huddled evacuees fighting over rations of nutri pastes in crowded pre-fab buildings and makeshift shelters.

Many of the civilians were in the process of joining the Queen’s Guards as well, though they did not have exosuits. Saater could see training grounds where thousands of recruits in basic combat armour with no energy shields practice with rifle shooting and house clearing. “They are just going to be cannon fodder when the real fight starts.”

The hovercar landed in an open zone at the base of the Queen’s Tower, where a team of technicians immediately ran up to resupply the hovercar and prepare it for the next mission. Saater’s two squads left their vehicles, swapping with another fresh squad that immediately boarded. The rotation was fast, the fresh squad already ready to fight.

“Get some rest, our next shift is in two days.” Saater told his squad before leaving to meet Julia in the Queen’s Tower.

Julia was currently standing in for Cardenia, who had disappeared into the depths of the Queen’s Tower to prepare something. Even Julia did not know what trump cards Cardenia had, but they both trusted in her.

As such, Julia was the overall commander for the entire defence operation, with five hundred command staff under her handling everything while relying on basic A.Is to allocate shifts and logistics.

“Good work out there, Saater.” Julia smiled weakly as she laid in a chair, her nerval jack plugged in and observing the fight from every angle she could.

The operations center was in the middle of the Queen’s Tower, with cameras that could allow them a bird’s eye view of Rockhold.

Before Saater could reply, a slight shudder rocked the Tower, a sign of artillery shells impacting against the energy shield of the Tower. “Those idiots never give up do they?” Saater sighed.

It would take more than just a few mortars to break through the dense energy shield that was powered by multiple generators in the sealed basement. The energy shield served as a protection for the entire sector right under them as well.

“If I were them I would be continuously shelling the Queen’s Tower too. It erodes the mental health of the people under us and keep us continuously on high alert. It’s straining.”

“How long have you been awake now?”

“Four days or so, I still got space for another boost in me.” Julia weakly fiddled with a syringe near her chair’s holster.

“You’re going to be braindead at this point, get someone to swap with you.” Saater groaned. “Maybe they can’t do it as well as you, but at least sleep it off for twelve hours. You earned it.”

Julia sighed, before noticing how weak and sluggish her body had become. Saater called a medic team to move Julia to a medbay to recover, while he found a temporary replacement for Julia.

“Sir, I’ve never helmed an operation before.” The replacement was visibly nervous before jacking in.

“But you’ve been supporting a company of squads so far, correct?” Saater asked.

“Yes sir, I’ve been in charge of sector 15 since the start.”

“Good, now treat the entire city of Rockhold as your sector. Anything you can’t handle, delegate. Got it?”

“Yes sir, I’ll do my best.”

Saater left the operations center, wincing slightly as the painkillers began to wear off slightly as he stumbled down the corridor back to his personal room. “Looks like I need to take a break too…”

Elsewhere in the Queen’s Tower, there was a training zone, dedicated to full members of the Queen’s Guards recruited before the conflict. A level dedicated to realistic combat, Niko was practicing his urban combat, fighting off three other Queen’s Guard in a dense urban environment.

Niko still wore the Solar Glint, though many of it’s components have been replaced with better versions. The sword he used was no longer than thirty centimetres in order for him to wield it effectively in close quarters without having the tip of his sword get blocked by the walls around.

He fought off one attacker with his sword, before rolling out of the way of another attacker’s gunfire, before pulling out his own energy pistol and firing with his left hand accurately, nailing the energy shield of the second attacker.

With a combination of both pistol and short sword, he was able to fend off both ranged and become a dominant force in close combat. The practice duel ended with Niko’s victory over the three attackers, though Niko was left panting heavily as he collapsed to the floor.

A holovideo call appeared from his multi-terminal, showing the visor-covered face of the Queen. [Great work Niko. Seems like you’re ready to join the fight. Take a break and you’ll join another squad on the next shift twelve hours later. Protect Rockhold.]

“Yes ma’am! Thank you again for protecting my family here!” Niko saluted while he laid on the floor, his chest heaving.

[Good.] The call ended, with Cardenia nodding as another unencrypted call reached her, however the caller’s name got her to pick it up. “Hmm, the ‘White Fang’ contacting me again?”

“You seem to be in trouble.”

“Then you will know that I’m not exactly in a good position right now to talk.”

“I would like information on the agents you plan to deploy in the city. Having that information will save lives.”

“Agents? Of course, I will send a detailed list of their particulars to you via a separate channel right now.”

“Received. When will the agents be activated?”

“Hmm, when they are fully embedded within the enforcers, which I assume would be two weeks into the battle.”

“So a month from now.”

“Approximately.”

“Good, thank you.” Ardan ended the unencrypted call.

Cardenia smiled. Both of them were not talking about spies or infiltrators, but rather chemical agents that would be used to flood the city when the enforcers entered. She expected the Athen Enforcers to have countermeasures, but she would try it anyway.

Civilians would die to the chemical agents, but she did not care. An evacuation warning had already been issued by her – anyone who still remained behind and did not explicitly join the Queen’s Guards as a support staff, engineer or combatant were not in her consideration.

A beep on her multi-terminal showed Ardan had responded with a data package of his own: the details on the Athen Enforcers and Keepers that he had collected so far.

Cardenia did not have access to this information herself, her own criminal network unable to spread that far into the higher upper echelons. “How the hell are they getting all of these information? From Ceres…?”

She quickly read through the data package, her expression worsening the more she read. “Oliver, you really are going all out aren’t you? Treating me as an example to show the rest of the planet…”

Cardenia wasn’t sure if she could hold onto Rockhold now with the additional information with just the Queen’s Guards alone. Even with the addition of the support from the White Fang and Dark Exterior cell groups might not be enough to stem the tide.

“Both sides intend to use me as a tool… You think I’ll tolerate this?” Cardenia grunted as she stood up from her seat. Instead of being in her office at the top of her Queen’s Tower, she was at the deepest level of the Queen’s Tower, a basement floor only accessible by her.

However, it was more of a separate cavern than anything, with the ceiling being fifty meters high. The walls of the cavern was lined with Sturore-enhanced alloys, preventing drills from penetrating the base of the Queen’s Tower from underground.

The layout of the cavern was extremely high-tech, with countless repair bays that towered more than twenty meters each along the sides. It looked like a self-contained military bunker base, with a few cargo lifts leading to Rockhold.

At the end of the long cavern stood a slovesa ranking monument with only one name etched onto it. Cardenia couldn’t read slovesa glyphs, but it didn’t matter now.

At the base of the monument was a series of twenty-five-meter diameter metallic rings stacked ontop of each other connected to chunky power supply wires that ran all the way back to the building. Cardenia walked up to a control terminal at the other end of these wires, jabbing in a sequence of commands.

The metallic rings began to levitate, orientating themselves around to form something like an arch. With a push of a button, the slovesa monument began to light up, filling the entire cavern in a dazzling glow.

The rings rotated, spinning faster and faster until the space between the rings began to crack, slowly fracturing the space until a dark void began to appear.

Outside, the city of Rockhold began to dim significantly, the power draw from the rings far too strong. Cardenia stared at the control terminal, which counted down from five minutes.

She walked up to the portal, before retrieving her Dynasty emblem and tossing it into the portal.

From the void, a large, gigantic metallic leg stepped out with one foot. The leg was humongous, about ten meters tall and the size of a pillar. What followed was a complete mechsuit covered in a black and green pattern, towering more than twenty meters and almost touching the top of the portal.

More than ten of these mechsuits walked through the portal, and at the base of their feet were thousands of support crew as well as ground troops, numbering a complete division of 17,000 people.

They filled up the entire cavern, with the final mechsuit passing through the portal as the rings shattered, the void portal collapsing in itself. The slovesa monument began to fracture, before the top half broke off and collapsed onto the floor.

The cockpit of the mechsuit opened up, revealing a grinning man that eerily looked related to Cardenia in terms of looks, except for the fact that he had a blackened left arm that was pulsating with green pulsates. The blackened portions of the skin creeped halfway up to his left eye, his pupils emerald green as well.

He leapt down the mechsuit with nimble agility, landing next to Cardenia. “That portal must have been very expensive. Don’t suppose you got another one?”

Cardenia scowled at the white-haired man. “Don’t fuck with me, Warren, you knew from the start this was a one-way trip.”

“Indeed it is.” Warren chuckled. “Nothing more exciting than making it back to the Loeric Empire and wreaking some havoc. I assume you have an escape plan of some sorts.”

“I can get you into space. The rest of your troops… not so much.”

A sinister grin appeared on Warren’s face, the wrinkles on the blackened left cheek revealing a eerie green glow under the skin. “Oh, they already knew that. Isn’t that right, BOYS?”

The troops all saluted Warren, echoing with one combined voice. “Sir yes sir!”

Warren turned to face Cardenia again, his face leaning in close. “You haven’t paid everything yet, you know. I know it’s a one-way trip, but these mechsuits were not easy to make.”

“The location to the Hawthorn Vault on Athen will be provided after this battle.” Cardenia stoically replied, not intimidated.

Warren’s eyes squinted as he stared into Cardenia’s eyes with obvious rage. “Don’t think that just because I’ve been exiled for twenty years that I don’t know how the Dynasty works. If you ever so much as think of sacrificing me as cannon fodder, you will know pain far beyond anything you’ve experienced in your training, Dynasty or not. I WILL get my hands on the Vault.”

“In such a large urban battle, I think everyone is cannon fodder. Even your mechsuits may be taken down by the Athen Enforcers.”

Warren scoffed as he leapt back up the mechsuit and into the cockpit. “You are but a kid playing in small backwater planet battles. This division of mine has been trained in countless wars within the Beyond that are far beyond your comprehension. Of course, the mechsuits will be destroyed, but how much are the opponents willing to sacrifice?”