Evolve(28)
The upper body had a somewhat flattened part, and the armor was relatively thin, probably for the sake of weight reduction, with its armament focusing more on energy weapons than on live ammunition.
Unlike typical robots, its head was not separated from the torso. In a way, it slightly resembled a fighter jet.
Perhaps it was because a special booster pack was attached for quick maneuvering. Its upper body was already flat, but the addition made it look even longer than it seemed.
The frame itself was on the slender side, and the structure looked like it would collapse if you gave it a tap. But I had already confirmed through records just how these unmanned autonomous weapons moved and how lethally effective they were.
And the very scene I was witnessing now attested to that fact. The area was littered with the corpses of mutated creatures.
Fortunately, I was wearing a helmet with an airtight seal, or else the horrific stench of death would have completely numbed my sense of smell given the mountains of corpses. The pool of sticky blood on the floor was just a bonus.
The mutated creatures, which appeared to be early types of ghouls, had one thing in common: their bodies all had holes somewhere. The weapon placed next to a Lemora explained why those holes existed.
A laser lance. An energy weapon that channels all its output into a single point of penetration. The section responsible for handling the high-output energy was hideously melted, suggesting its limits had been pushed.
The hand presumed to have been holding the laser lance was grotesquely twisted. It seemed that when the weapon became useless, the robot had continued to fight with its fists.
Should I say it was befitting of a robot that obeyed commands, even at the cost of damaging its own frame? Its obsession with killing even one more opponent was almost chilling.
"Lemora..."
I read the name engraved into the armor on its chest. There was a number attached after the name, which seemed to indicate the unit number.
Lemora was definitely smaller than a power loader—about seventy percent its size. As I was examining it in more detail, Celestia approached.
"That word can mean 'obstacle,' but in this context, it's more likely referring to the remora fish."
"Remora fish? ... A shark?"
"If you're talking about the actual animal, the name only makes it sound like a shark, but it's not a real member of the shark family."
Celestia continued, further confirming that this robot was definitely not a sky whale.
"A remora is a species that lives attached to large creatures like whales. Depending on the species, it could be commensalism or mutualism, but that's not important right now. This robot is likely a small craft that travels along with the sky whale."
"If that's the case, the sky whale would be something like an assault carrier or an aircraft carrier."
"Which means it's right above our heads. I'm not sure whether it's hidden by the fog or it's positioned in invisible mode."
"Hm..."
Eric looked upward again, but unsurprisingly, nothing was visible. All that could be seen from the boundary between the building's interior and exterior was the damaged ceiling caused by the crossfire.
"Hyun-woo, are you going to keep looking around here? There are more Lemoras if you're interested."
Nadia pointed to a pile of corpses. I saw no reason to approach those nauseating remains. I doubted there were any pretending to be dead, but even if I went near, there would be nothing to gain.
Maybe there was a body still wearing the identity bracelet, but digging through the pile just to get one wasn't worth the effort.
We were already pressed for time. Not knowing what was happening outside made me too anxious to waste it.
The unmanned autonomous Lemoras were the same. The Lemoras here had been rendered inoperable and had melted their data chips at the same time. Celestia had checked this multiple times—it was the same as what we had seen with the Hercules underground in the Heaven Mining Base.
'If only I could contact Licorice.'
If Licorice were here, she could have drawn out even more information from the keywords we'd just uncovered. Searching with specific keywords is fundamentally different from searching from zero. I couldn't help but regret that I couldn't do so.
"I'm going to head upstairs now. We need to check the position of the reactor. Nadia, you'll wait here, right?"
"I have no choice. The power loader can't enter any farther."
The first floor of the control tower was at least arranged like a lobby, with a relatively high ceiling and quite a bit of space. After that, the upper floors were much lower—the power loader would have had to crawl just to get inside.
"Eric, Kanna. You two stay and assist Nadia. Just in case something happens."
"Understood. We'll check for any local chaff dispensers while standing by."
Given that communication was impossible unless using a loudspeaker or a direct interface, it wasn't smart to split up. Though I didn't like it, I had to content myself with leaving Eric and Kanna on standby.
'This is the right choice.'
Celestia's participation was essential for authorization to find the reactor's location from the control room. It would work if Nadia and I stayed while Eric and Kanna supported Celestia, but that wouldn't balance our fighting strength.
It was better for me to be indoors to handle any threats. Nadia, who had a grenade cannon mounted on her shoulder for firepower augmentation, needed more space to avoid harming herself with her own weapon.
"Celestia, let's go."
"Yes!"
"Hyun-woo, be careful!"
The mechanical giant waved its arm. With its sheer size and broad gestures, it was still highly visible even within the fog. I gave my customary thumbs up and headed deeper inside the control tower with Celestia.
The power hadn't been cut, so the lights were dispersing illumination everywhere, almost like lighthouses. Even though we were inside the building, the numerous holes peppered through it had allowed the fog to infest the interior. Still, it was less dense than outside, which was a relief.
"The power is still on, but I bet the elevator doesn't work."
"The personnel in the control tower probably destroyed it to delay us as much as possible."
Celestia nodded in agreement. Destroying the elevator was probably the simplest way to block access to the control room. It was fairly effective for the little effort it required, at least at first.
As long as the passage wasn't completely blocked, there were plenty of alternatives: we could climb in from the rooftop or blast open a vertical shaft and use wires to ascend.
In fact, the footage we saw from the black box showed similar actions. Our side bombarded the spaceport site with missiles, so it wasn't often attempted, but that was why we didn't see much of it.
The scenes of ships about to launch—or shuttles left unattended—engulfed in flames from the missile strikes were still vivid in my memory. Even from just a video, it was harrowing; I couldn't even imagine what those on the scene must have felt.
We checked the elevator in passing. As expected, it was unusable. Not only was the emergency wire mechanism destroyed beyond repair, but the securing device was also utterly wrecked, with the entire passageway blocked off.
Clomp. Clomp. Our footsteps pushed the fog aside as we walked. There was no sign of infected Lemora. Most likely, the intact Lemora had destroyed the infected ones, or perhaps the infected Lemora was biding its time, waiting for an opportunity in the fog.
Either way, the fact that none were visible was a relief. If any appeared, I'd have to make a choice. We climbed the ruined control tower via the stairs.
Under the flickering lights, it was filled with swirling mist like fine dust. Long scratches began to appear on the walls. With each step, the number of corpses we tripped over increased.
Some Lemora had collapsed, blocking the path, while others were debris destroyed by ghoul swarms. In between them lay what appeared to be the corpses of pureblood supremacists.
It seemed that most of the personnel stationed at the spaceport were robots. Every time I saw a human corpse instead of broken parts, it was marked with the pureblood supremacist emblem.
There were bracelets, but they were all fake identities and the kind that couldn't yield any data. I kept them anyway, just in case.
"Some of these died in the middle of mutating."
"That means they used every method at their disposal. They probably feared their plan would fail because the robots were too powerful."
I forcibly unblocked the passage by dragging away a Lemora. Kugh! The pieces of debris scraped along the floor.
Celestia looked past the opened passage. The carnage in there was even fiercer, with more wreckage and corpses scattered everywhere. She examined one piece of wreckage and spoke up.
"As I thought, these drones use technology from Earth. I know a bit about military tech too, but I've never seen circuits like these. It's more advanced than Hercules. Maybe an upper-tier type?"
"Is it that much? They said only prototypes of Hercules existed because it was still in development."
"Which is what's strange. That's what I definitely heard."
Celestia let out a small sigh. Ever since the keyword "Earth government" came up, things had been feeling off. No, perhaps we only realized it now—they likely operated this way from the start.
"Celestia."
"Yes?"
"... Never mind, it's nothing."
For the first time, I felt doubts about Earth. I was about to ask if we could trust Earth, but that sounded a bit strange, so I clumsily let it slide.
I had thought of Earth only as the place I needed to go. I never considered anything else—I couldn't afford to.
No matter how strange the Earth government seemed, it wasn't more suspicious than the pureblood supremacists. No matter how dangerous, not more so than them. At least, not so far.
'Still...'
If the Earth government continued to seem suspicious, I could just trust Myosotis. And after all, my goal was to reach Earth, not to join the government. Even though I'd be under their sphere of influence, earth and the Earth government were two different entities.
When I shook my head, Celestia tilted hers, but she quickly resumed leading me to the control tower's control room.
When we finally reached the roofless top of the tower, we saw more Lemoras. Dozens were heaped around as if a final battle had taken place. It felt like I was looking at a graveyard.
A faint light shimmered in the distance. Despite the state of devastation, could the console still be functioning? Hoping so, I moved forward. Or rather, I thought I did.
I didn't realize the shimmering was not from the console but something else entirely.
Between the broken Lemoras that had ceased working in their battle against the mutants, a lone unit stood upright. A faint breeze drifted by from somewhere, gently dispelling the fog like a sigh.
And then, a pair of eyes, both red and blue, glowed in the darkness. Holding what looked like just the hilt of a laser lance—it was a Lemora.
An unmanned autonomous weapon immune to chaff. I didn't know the underlying principle, but that Lemora was still operational.
When I saw its back, I thought it was relatively unharmed—
"... Of course not. Celestia, back up."
I clicked my tongue as I looked at the Lemora which turned to face us—more accurately, the infected Lemora. The back looked intact, but the front was a mess, its head half-blown off and the gap filled with organic tissue.
「cladlqwk qkfrus-」
Had it lost its chaff immunity due to infection? Only when we came close enough for visual confirmation did it react.
Muttering unintelligibly, as if its language function was broken, it raised its laser lance. The blue light unique to blue crystals shone through the gaps in its armor, supplying energy to the lance. An energy spear formed from the otherwise broken shaft.
Even if not perfect, we had already seen Lemora's behavior patterns. Infection may have altered them slightly, but they wouldn't be too different.
The moment Celestia and I opened our distance, the lance aimed at one of us. The booster pack on its back deployed, releasing blue particles. With no hesitation for a standoff, lemora dashed forward, closing the gap in the blink of an eye.
'No wonder the ghouls were cut down en masse!'
Charge, then stab. Facing it without knowing its pattern, perhaps I would've been injured by that strike. Luckily, it was after me, not Celestia.
I tried to slow Lemora's charge with telekinesis, but my output was still too low—even for a moment's braking. We collided, but the moment of impact it vanished like a mirage. The recoil I felt was just an extra.
I internally sighed and glared. Then I raised my plasma cutter toward the Lemora that passed by. It wasn't quite like a laser lance, but the weapon I used was also fairly close to a spear. I was specialized for thrusts as well.
With inhuman visual acuity, the Lemora tried to track my movements. Instead of thrust reversal to decelerate, it kicked off the wall to forcibly change direction.
Though its maneuver range increased, its speed hardly dropped, and it succeeded in redirecting itself for another charge and stab. A simple pattern. Perhaps the infection was not complete?
It lacked the intimidating presence shown in the black box footage. I'd been tense, expecting unpredictable maneuvers and swift battlefield sweeps, but at this level, it didn't seem too troublesome.
"Haah!"
I thrust the plasma cutter. In fact, it was less me attacking and more the Lemora offering up its head. Unable to control its own speed, its head and part of its upper body were neatly sliced off.
Without letting go, I held the would-be airborne body in place by force. That pattern of ascending with its booster and skewering an enemy like a shish kebab—it was usually the Lemora's trick, but I played it this time.
Bang...!
The infected Lemora was ruthlessly slammed down. The massive shock on impact shattered its frame—in addition to the booster pack, of course.
Its head was completely blown off, but the blue crystal core wasn't destroyed, so it wasn't dead yet. Celestia finished off the infected Lemora.
Stepping on the twitching Lemora, she placed her linear rifle at the core. The smart pistol didn't have enough firepower; she was aiming to end it with one big shot.
She fired. The pulse rifle's discharge, distinct from the smart pistol, echoed through the area. Lemora's twitching ceased immediately.
"Haa... Its performance may have been downgraded, but it was still hard to get a proper aiming point. If it weren't for you, Hyun-woo, this would've been tougher. And it would've caused an even bigger commotion."
"It's probably because it's your first time facing one. With more experience, you'll spot its openings."
"Openings?"
"Yes. The one we just fought hesitated briefly after it failed its charge. If you target that moment, you can easily stun it. The projectile speed is high anyway, so you probably won't miss."
"... I'll work on it."
Celestia considered my advice, looking a bit dispirited. She said that even though she dispatched it as quickly as possible, the noise must have been loud enough for the others below to hear, so we had better hurry.
The lack of smooth communications was annoying. In other situations, I'd simply report the situation as under control, but here it was hard to be instantly certain which side had finished.
"Celestia, I'll examine this one for a moment; check if the console is working."
"Okay, I'll make it quick."
While Celestia checked the console, I examined the darkened infected Lemora.
The core parts penetrated by the linear rifle revealed their cross-section. Some kind of fluid—lubricant or something else—was oozing out.
'It's definitely dead.'
Seeing the blue crystal ground into powder and mixed with sticky fluid, I didn't have to worry about it reviving. Unfortunately, I still couldn't get a data chip.
Judging by how long it had been melted, it must've been destroyed before it got infected, not during our fight.
'How many more of these things are there?'
The only reason I could handle this so easily was that it was just one inside a building. If there had been more infected Lemora, I'd have been scrambling to avoid them. Especially if I couldn't reduce the possible scenarios outside.
'Maybe overwhelming firepower would be enough.'
Fighting just now, I felt that these things were tough—but not so tough I couldn't break them. Against fast enemies, area attacks work wonders. If I fire a shell along their predicted path, it'll sweep them up.
'The real problem's the uninfected ones.'
But I'd worry about that when the time came. Even though I knew it'd be better to think about it now, Celestia called me with a trembling voice that yanked me from my thoughts.
"Uh... Hyun-woo, you need to come look at this with me..."
"Is something wrong?"
"Yes. Very."
Celestia stepped aside to show me the console screen. It was flickering as if about to die, but I could still read the words on the display.
「SOLAR FURNACE ROOM UNLOCKED. CURRENT SOLAR FURNACE LOCATION UNKNOWN.」
And I couldn't believe my eyes.