Wow! The item-dropping rate is really high!

She directly used her externalized Spiritual Energy to repel all incoming bullets, even more brutish and violent, yet the opponent's skillful and evasive maneuvers were equally pleasing to the eye. What was more critical was…

She saw that the opponent also had moments when evasion failed, with bullets hitting his body, making direct contact with the skin, only to feeblely deform and fall away.

It wasn't the externalization of Spiritual Energy, but merely… the strength of his own flesh.

Comparable to the physical strength of a transformed gorilla on her team, perhaps even surpassing it?

What kind of monster was this?

The more challenging the target she devoured, the better, but if the target was too strong, she might break her teeth without being able to bite off a piece of meat.

The more she observed, the more her heart raced.

The hunger brought on by the supreme command kept her mind in a state of cold frenzy, yet the rational part of her that discovered more facts told her the target was by no means an entity she could easily handle.

Conflicting wills battled in her brain, as if two little figures wearing different colors were fighting a melee on the brain as their battlefield, the intensity of the struggle was so great it even caused her nerves to ache faintly.

"First, destroy the gun emplacement," came the instruction from the Blackwater City squad leader through the earpiece.

At this range, the emplacements obviously couldn't threaten them anymore, but considering a possible retreat later on—now that the vehicles were damaged, those fixed machine guns and gun emplacements would become their biggest trouble when retreating.

Anticipate defeat before victory, that's the way to remain invincible.

The artificial soldiers from Blackwater City weren't creations solely seeking death.

They, too, were in pursuit of "living" itself.

["Lucky Strike" charging +2.]

"Swoosh! Swoosh!" Figures leaped onto the surrounding wall one after another.

Bai E and the white-haired captain were the first to rush up, laying a solid foundation for their teammates, and Rose and the transformed gorilla who followed closely were also beings of exceptional quality.

As long as they could secure their footing on the wall, breaking through was only a matter of time.

"It doesn't seem like there are that many of them," Rose, who followed closely behind Bai E, scanned the mechanical warriors that were stationed behind the wall, besieging them.

The positions were sparse and scattered, not the sea of steel they had imagined.

"Times are tough for everyone." The attack they received wasn't fierce, and it seemed very likely that this assault would succeed. Bai E even felt a bit like joking.

The mechanical intelligences were competing with humankind for resources, and each of their creations had an extremely high value, so it was reasonable that their numbers weren't as overwhelming as the bugs.

A mere "mining" fortress, it's probably quite normal to not have abundant forces garrisoned, and maybe this was also the core reason why they didn't opt to assist the "attacked transport team".

"Zzzt! Zzzt!" Broken sparks began to ignite everywhere.

Both Bai E's squad and the Grey Iron City squad excelled in close-combat.

The long-range artillery couldn't stop them, and now that they had cut into the inner parts of the fortress like ravenous tigers, they could only rely on those freely-moving warriors to resist.

And the freedom of movement often meant that their firepower wasn't fierce enough.

Even the combatants equipped with close-combat modules, who had some ability to resist, seemed stretched thin in the face of these ultimate elite human warriors.

The joint squad advanced triumphantly, leaving nothing but a trail of steel wreckage behind them.

The fortress was not large in scope, essentially just an expansion around the original information station.

[You have completely destroyed the target, battle experience gained: 20 points.]

The experience provided by ordinary mechanical warriors wasn't generous, proportional to the difficulty of destroying them.

When the final warrior that rushed to defend fell at the muzzle of Bai E's gun, silence fell over the not-so-large steel fortress.

"That's it? Is it all over? That was hardly satisfying!"

"Thought it'd be more trouble, but this was it?"

"Not enough fighting! Absolutely not enough!"

The warriors from Grey Iron City hadn't yet exited their battle state, and being somewhat unruly, they spoke arrogantly.

Then, accompanied by the sound of electric motors, the tall silver-grey alloy gate opened, and a humanoid intelligence that wasn't particularly burly but had a sleek and graceful form slowly emerged from within.

Its bright golden shell immediately highlighted the exceptional status of the newcomer.

"..."

Everyone glanced at each other and eventually all eyes turned to the last gorilla who had spoken.

"Look at the nonsense you're spouting."

The bright yellow exterior shell, daring to use such an eye-catching color, obviously wasn't ordinary goods.

Not to mention the opponent's beautifully streamlined body, which already possessed quite a bit of human aesthetics.

It was rumored that high-level intelligences would use the mechanical force within their bodies to remodel their forms, including body shape and paint color, to match their increasingly sophisticated and human-like intelligence.
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So now... They had hit the jackpot?

Even within the intelligence community, such entities were rare, and over time with the passage of time, there was inevitable degradation and the extremely difficult replenishment of first-generation intelligences, which were now before their very eyes.

Was their luck so bad, or was this information base station just that important to the intelligences?

They didn't know.

But in a close encounter, the brave would go first.

No matter how the warriors of Grey Iron City talked, at least in their war-ready state when faced with such an opponent, they would definitely do more than just spout empty threats.

Pounding its chest that boomed like a lump of iron, the first gorilla warrior of Grey Iron City charged forward.

First-generation intelligence?

So what about first-generation intelligence?

Does first-generation intelligence mean invincibility?

Take my blade!

"Swoosh!"

The bright yellow afterimage was too fast for Bai E's eyes to catch all the details, and the little yellow figure closed the distance to half a step in front of the gorilla in an instant. The visibly built-in, micro-powered Power Fist smashed onto the gorilla's chest, which he took pride in as if it were armor made of steel plates.

"Crack!" The crisp sound was belatedly captured by everyone's ears, but before that, the gorilla's body had already been smashed away by that punch.

"Boom!" The huge body crashed against the steel wall and slumped to the ground.

"Cough!" Broken flesh spewed from the gorilla's blood-stained mouth as he propped himself up with one hand, his attempt at a counterattack as arrogant as ever even as he issued a throat-tearing roar, "Ahhhh!"

The brutal killing power brought clarity to the dazed minds of the two remaining Grey Iron City warriors.

The violent desire to lash out faded from their brains, and they truly realized what their opponent was—

First-generation intelligence!

Endowed with the technological bonuses of the Golden Age, enhanced by hundreds of years of mechanical force evolution.

These were not beings that conventional military strength could compare with.

A look of wariness filled their eyes.

Both the brawny man and the acting team leader simultaneously turned to their own captain, the look of inquiry obvious.

It was as if they had previously agreed that if they truly faced an impossible situation, they were planning to flee.

As survivors who had painfully made it through the many who underwent surgery in Grey Iron City, they were not willing to lose their lives on a mission that could be dismissed as optional.

Bai E's gaze was heavy as she stared at the bright yellow figure, with a faint mist in her eyes and Spiritual Energy fully mobilizing, trying to analyze the opponent's core capabilities and potential weaknesses.

"We're not leaving," Bai E said, not even glancing at the pleading looks from her team members.

Her real goal was certainly not the fortress itself, but since there was not much damage visible on her true target yet, retreating now meant she could forever lose the opportunity to make her move if the other side also retreated.

From her observations since she first met him to the present, she didn't think her squad stood much of a chance against the fully empowered captain from Blackwater City.

Only by leveraging the hand of the first-generation intelligence before her, could she possibly inflict serious damage on her target, thus achieving her goal.

Risk?

Of course, there was risk.

But even her own team members were just tools to her, their casualties never weighed heavily on Bai E's mind.

And besides, she was "immortal," what was there to fear?

"Fight!"