Safe City Ch.185

Chapter 185: Stealing from [Norn]

[The Safe Cities actually expect us to deal with an opponent like this?]

After one of the city lords in the city lord group chat let out this exclamation, he uploaded a complete video.

The footage showed a bird’s-eye view of [Ota] launching mantle-piercing Liuli at the Manluota region. One after another, the munitions tore through the sky, crossing the outer perimeter and heading straight for the center.

They broke through the dense barrage of interceptor missiles that [Zephyr Company] had sent soaring into the sky and slammed directly into the ground.

—BOOM!!!

The sound in the video was less an explosion than a thunderous rumble caused by the earth itself shifting.

At first, nothing happened. The few mantle-piercing Liuli that had successfully passed through the interception barrage and struck their targets simply disappeared from view, leaving behind enormous impact craters.

But gradually, the ground began to tremble incessantly. Escape airships started shooting abruptly into the sky from within [Zephyr Company]. Some were shot down by long-range artillery fire, while others fled in the opposite direction.

Fine cracks began to appear in the ground. In the area occupied by [Zephyr Company], underground water suddenly burst forth from various points beneath the earth.

The shaking grew increasingly violent. Larger fissures opened up in the ground and between clusters of buildings. They visibly widened and narrowed, as if they were breathing.

But this was no breathing. The entire region was shaking violently. Huge sections of road suddenly bulged upward or collapsed downward. Countless panes of glass shattered and rained down from their original positions. Even the special anti-artillery glass unique to Moon Silk Star was no exception.

Vast stretches of buildings belonging to [Zephyr Company] collapsed along with the sinking earth, plunging into underground chasms whose depths were invisible from the air.

Then the surrounding land beyond the immediate area began to join the upheaval, too.

At this point, the footage became increasingly unclear. The shaking or electronic interference had apparently disrupted the recording. The previously high-definition images began to show strange colors and all kinds of static-like visual noise.

Amid the videos that kept appearing one after another, each riddled with static, one could make out countless Moon Silk bionic surveillance devices belonging to various factions, flying through the air before plummeting to the ground one after another as if they had been shot down—

The scene was practically the apocalypse within the apocalypse.

Cheng Qisheng was watching the battle too, but honestly, the view she got through her believers was nowhere near as shocking as the footage.

No matter how well the [Companies] had established themselves on Moon Silk Star, the planet was still in the midst of an apocalyptic era. The entire Manluota region was enclosed by towering walls.

As a result, most of the views available to the believers consisted of those walls. Only the small number of believers who had managed to get airborne could see what was happening in the distance around [Zephyr].

The city lord who had uploaded the video might have been a photographer or video editor before the apocalypse. The footage she had captured looked practically like something out of a movie.

She was also incredibly bold, daring to hide directly above the battlefield, among the clouds.

After posting the video, she didn’t stop there. She continued sending messages at an astonishing rate.

[Now I understand why, before the [Heaven’s Punishment] appeared, the most powerful weapon on Moon Silk Star was the mantle-piercing Liuli.]

[As expected, the [Heaven’s Punishment] destroys everything, while the mantle-piercing Liuli destroys the enemy’s ability to fight back. The damage caused by the earthquake isn’t even the worst part. The real devastation comes from introducing this weapon into a battlefield dominated by advanced technology. It’s practically like stripping the enemy of their armor outright.]

[The disturbance in the mantle has triggered an intense geomagnetic storm. My Safe City isn’t even that close to the area, yet all kinds of equipment inside the city have already been severely affected. In the region occupied by [Zephyr Company], all electronic navigation systems, radio communications, remotely operated computers, and the like should have been forced out of commission.]

On a technologically advanced society like Moon Silk Star, most of the [Companies]’ weapons relied on machines to receive and execute commands directly.

But a single geomagnetic storm was enough to drastically reduce their combat capabilities.

At the very least, large-scale weapons capable of inflicting massive casualties, such as heavy missiles, would have been destroyed in great numbers or rendered uncontrollable by [Zephyr].

Now, the soldiers of [Ota] finally had something to do. All they needed was to march into Manluota and attack.

The messages flooding the city lord group chat were almost entirely expressions of shock at the [Companies]’ true strength, things like [……], [What the hell?], and [Thank goodness we aren’t the ones fighting them directly.]

However, one city lord noticed a potential problem.

[@IMustBeDreamingSafeCity, you’ve got some serious guts! Even with a levitation device, aren’t you afraid that hiding above the clouds on a battlefield will get you spotted by a [Company]? They might casually fire a shot your way!]

[I Must Be Dreaming Safe City: They call it fortune favors the bold. Moon Silk Star’s technological development doesn’t place much emphasis on exploring space. There are practically no flying devices designed to operate above the clouds, and even their airships don’t fly particularly high. While I’m hiding up here, with everyone fighting below, there’s a pretty good chance they won’t discover my Safe City.]

Cheng Qisheng was multitasking, observing the situation on the battlefield while keeping an eye on the city lord group chat.

“?”

She sincerely hoped this city lord wasn’t entertaining some scheme along the lines of Let [Ota] fight [Zephyr] while I attack [Ota] from behind.

Otherwise, she’d really have to let the other party experience the power of Blue Sea’s Holy Bomb.

Fortunately, the city lord had no intention of challenging the [Companies].

[I Must Be Dreaming Safe City: Think about it. The massive geomagnetic storm has knocked out all electronic communications. And it’s not just [Zephyr Company] that’s affected. [Ota] is suffering the same consequences, isn’t it?]

[I Must Be Dreaming Safe City: The world mission distributes rewards of varying levels to each Safe City according to its contribution. I’ll lie in wait here until [Ota] and [Zephyr] start fighting each other soldier to soldier. Then I’ll deploy a large number of residents onto the battlefield. Without their electronic identity cards, will [Ota] still be able to tell which of the soldiers fighting alongside them actually belong to their own forces?]

[Besides, they’re accepting anyone willing to fight against [Zephyr]. The Safe Cities alone have already sent three million residents, not to mention all the New Human factions that have joined in. At a time like this, it’ll be easy for my residents to blend into the crowd. The more people there are, the more world-mission contribution we can rack up, right?]

As soon as these words appeared, the city lords who had originally planned to do nothing more than watch from a safe distance began to feel tempted.

Exactly! With the massive geomagnetic storm raging, people could only communicate by shouting at one another. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if their residents could quietly sneak into the ranks?

However, one city lord raised a concern.

[But what if [Ota] mistakes your residents for people from [Zephyr]?]

The genius city lord replied:

[Hahaha, I’ve already prepared for that! [Ota] has its own employee uniforms, and none of them show their faces. I’ve already obtained complete samples of their soldiers’ uniforms. With the Tier 5 Clothing Workshop I have, my residents can put on these combat uniforms, and even [Ota]’s chairman wouldn’t be able to tell the difference!]

[Ota]’s chairman (Great Blue Sea Creator God) Cheng Qisheng, City Lord of Blue Sea Safe City, silently watched the other party’s confident declarations.

It really was a pretty good way to rack up contribution points.

And the reason this person had such a clever method for earning contribution points yet still chose to reveal it openly in the city lord group chat soon became apparent.

[Any city lords interested in joining my contribution-farming plan can purchase [Ota] soldier combat uniforms from me in bulk! Each set includes an armband, name strip, rank insignia, bulletproof vest, tactical vest, high-top tactical boots, and more. Just five nuclear crystals per set! You pay in one second, I ship in one second!]

Cheng Qisheng: All right, mystery solved.

Another person had thrown out some bait to reel in customers and make a business out of it.

As expected, once city lords reached Tier 5 or 6, none of them ever said anything without a purpose.

The other party continued with the sales pitch.

[Quality guaranteed! Knee pads, elbow pads, gloves, belts, helmets—we’ve got everything! Even if you don’t care about the world-mission rewards, these uniforms are still extremely practical for your residents to wear while fighting in various apocalyptic worlds!]

[So Hungry Safe City: Your uniforms are such high quality. Aren’t you worried people will see through the disguise?]

[I Must Be Dreaming Safe City: It’s not like I’m deliberately making the combat uniforms extra high-quality just to squeeze more nuclear crystals out of you. [Ota]’s standard-issue soldier uniforms really are this good! Come on, I’ll give every Safe City one set for free first. Compare it with the real thing, and you’ll see for yourselves. I’m even willing to sign a contract.]

[Oh, and by the way, if you buy more than 500,000 sets, I’ll throw in [Zephyr Company]’s coordinates for free~]

With a major war already underway, the city lords didn’t hesitate for long after receiving samples of [Ota]’s soldier uniforms. One after another, they made their decisions.

[I’m in!]

[Give me one million sets!]

[Damn, these uniforms really are practical. The helmets even come with night-vision goggles. We could use these in all kinds of worlds.]

[So this world mission really is ridiculous. Even [Ota Company]’s ordinary soldiers get uniforms of this quality.]

[If it weren’t for the Cognition Lock, I honestly wouldn’t dare stay here much longer. I’m afraid that once [Ota] finishes off [Zephyr], they’ll turn around, drag me down from my position as city lord, and seize my Safe City.]

[You know what? That really could happen. I reckon taking down a Tier 6 Safe City would be child’s play for [Ota]. I’ll take a hundred sets.]

[I want two million sets.]

[My population isn’t as large as yours, so I’ll settle for just 800,000 sets.]

Watching the city lords place one enormous order after another for [Ota]’s combat uniforms, Cheng Qisheng was delighted that Blue Sea would have so many additional allies, helping to reduce casualties by an even greater margin. At the same time, she couldn’t help feeling a little regretful.

What a shame! She didn’t want to create any unnecessary complications right now. Otherwise, knowing how highly the city lords thought of Blue Sea’s soldier uniforms, she could have sold them directly on the spot!

Four nuclear crystals per set would still leave her with a very handsome profit!

Never mind. This world wasn’t the right place to sell them. She’d find an opportunity to sell combat uniforms in the next world.

For now, she hoped that this city lord who was always dreaming would make a fortune.

With [Heaven’s Punishment] guaranteed to belong to Blue Sea, Cheng Qisheng didn’t mind other Safe Cities getting involved one bit. After all, when the world mission was completed, the other rewards would be distributed according to each city’s contribution. Those weren’t things that belonged to her in the first place.

As long as no one tried to snatch the meat right out of her mouth, she was more than happy to have additional helpers.

Having discovered a new way to earn nuclear crystals and learned that a large number of reinforcements would soon be arriving, the great Blue Sea Creator God withdrew her gaze from the group chat. Through the eyes of one of her clergy members, she looked toward the direction of [Zephyr Company], where most of its systems had been crippled.

It was obvious that [Zephyr] had a contingency plan.

That was only natural. Once a powerful weapon existed on a planet, any faction with a certain degree of strength would inevitably prepare countermeasures in advance.

Although the mantle-piercing Liulis had triggered a massive geomagnetic storm, the artillery fire coming from [Zephyr]’s direction had not diminished by much.

“They must have buried specialized wired cables underground ahead of time, or left personnel in place to operate things manually. It’s also possible that various missile systems were activated using preset timers.”

Blue Sea’s military command provided an answer, then continued, “We have two options right now.”

“First, we can press forward through the artillery fire. The proportion of soldier casualties will be relatively high. The other option is to keep using mantle-piercing Liulis until every position in Manluota has been rendered incapable of fighting back, then send our soldiers in.”

Marshal Alice quickly gave her answer. “Choose the first option. Send our troops in directly.”

“We still need to save a large portion of our mantle-piercing Liulis to deal with [Norn].”

When it came to matters like this, Cheng Qisheng generally wouldn’t interfere with Blue Sea’s decisions.

As the saying went, leave professional matters to the professionals.

But today, things were different.

A strand of Cheng Qisheng’s spiritual power received a prayer from her believer, Qi Yi.

Inside a vehicle, Qi Yi wore a face that had been altered by excessive plastic surgery. He closed his eyes devoutly and murmured in a low voice.

“Our God, I’ve used the [Replica Mask] to copy the identity of a member of [Norn Company]’s board of directors.”

“By the way, Our God, I investigated the memories associated with this identity. [Norn] persuaded [Zipa] to switch sides and told them that [Norn] had 150 mantle-piercing Liulis. In reality, they have 200.”

“This identity holds a very high position within [Norn Company]. He isn’t the top boss, but he’s at least the number two figure. He has access to [Norn]’s weapons arsenals, as well as a large number of bionic soldiers under his command who will follow his orders. I’m confident I can get at least 100 mantle-piercing Liulis out of there. If everything goes smoothly, I might even be able to bring out some other things.”

Qi Yi racked his brains, trying to think of anything else he could do to help Blue Sea.

“I also know the approximate locations of [Norn Company]’s various weapons arsenals and resource depots. I’ll draw a map right away for you to see, Our God.”

Cheng Qisheng slowly opened her eyes.

One portion of her spiritual power hovered over the battlefield.

Another portion watched over Qi Yi as he drew his map.

Yet another portion was busy counting how many mantle-piercing Liulis Blue Sea had left.

They had only used thirty so far.

360 − 30 + 100, against Norn’s 200 − 100.

The great Blue Sea Creator God spoke.

“Protecting our residents is important. Increase the intensity of our mantle-piercing Liuli strikes.”

“Drill them into the ground until there’s nothing left of them!”

These words, transmitted into the believers’ minds through a divine oracle, had presumably undergone some linguistic refinement along the way.

That didn’t stop the entire Blue Sea military command from bowing their heads respectfully in unison.

“Yes, Our God.”

—Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

—BOOM!!!!!!

…

Inside [Zephyr Company]’s command center, the higher-ups watched as one mantle-piercing Liuli after another came hurtling toward them, almost as if the weapons cost nothing at all. They could hardly believe their eyes.

“They have more?!!!”

“Has [Ota] gone insane? With this many mantle-piercing Liulis, shouldn’t they be saving them to deal with [Norn]…?”

—BOOM!!!

This relentless bombardment, consisting of various missiles interspersed with the occasional mantle-piercing Liuli, continued for nearly half a month.

Although it might sound downright hellish, when it came to warfare on Moon Silk Star, everyone actually adhered to the rules fairly closely.

Whether attacking or defending, no matter how fiercely the two sides fought during the day, once night fell, both sides would become quiet as mice.

After all, whoever made a sound would attract the night beasts.

But no matter how “courteous” a war might be, it would eventually come to an end.

Neither side had [Heaven’s Punishment] at their disposal. The fact that [Zephyr] had managed to hold out for so long was already a testament to the effectiveness of its earlier preparations.

But today, no more missiles came flying from [Zephyr]’s direction.

There was no need for Blue Sea’s missile interception systems to do anything. Zephyr’s military capabilities had been completely destroyed.

“That’s enough. It’s time to launch a large-scale ground assault.”

Alice saluted the statue of the great Blue Sea Creator God standing in the command center.

“May Our God watch over us.”

The other officers likewise had eyes shining with fervor.

“May Blue Sea endure forever!”

A small number of soldiers had already breached the perimeter, but the much larger force encamped outside began pouring into Manluota from every direction. Viewed from above, they looked just like swarms of locusts gathering during a drought, surging toward their destination from all sides.

“Gulp!”

Inside the numerous Safe Cities that had quietly made their way above the clouds, many city lords watched the scene through binoculars and couldn’t help swallowing nervously.

Over the past half month, their courage had been thoroughly beaten down until they could hardly muster any at all.

The two sides had deployed one weapon after another, with seemingly endless varieties. [Ota] in particular was practically like a force that had access to the entire planet’s arsenal.

Thank goodness, thank goodness they’d remained cautious enough to keep their heads down throughout the entire conflict without provoking the [Companies].

Otherwise, if they’d gotten into a fight with one of these local behemoths, even if they managed to escape this world, they’d probably still suffer devastating losses.

While countless Blue Sea residents, residents from other Safe Cities, and members of various local factions that had joined [Ota] fought across the ruins of Manluota, Qi Yi was speeding along in his vehicle.

He was driving a gigantic Moon Silk freight truck.

The kind with a hundred mantle-piercing Liulis loaded onto it.

Using the face, voiceprint, palmprints, and iris scans of Dacius, a member of [Norn Company]’s board of directors, Qi Yi successfully opened the doors to Norn’s weapons arsenal and stole a hundred mantle-piercing Liulis. He was practically beside himself with excitement.

And he hadn’t just stolen those weapons. He’d also made off with a million nuclear crystals, sticking firmly to the principle that a thief should never leave empty-handed.

“Got them! Got them! Got them!!!”

The convoy of freight trucks sped forward at full throttle.

Behind them, large numbers of tactical airships from [Norn] were in hot pursuit, trying to kill them.

At the same time, however, Blue Sea airships were swooping in to encircle and destroy the pursuing tactical airships.

Qi Yi was heading toward Manluota, since the main forces were all gathered there now.

Along the way, the various Blue Sea military units that had been lying in wait for precisely this moment joined the pursuit one after another, forming successive lines of interception.

The closer they got to Manluota, the more outnumbered and isolated [Norn]’s airships pursuing Qi Yi became.

Finally, the last airship was destroyed. It crashed to the ground with a tremendous explosion.

Qi Yi didn’t even look back.

All he needed to do was keep his vehicle racing forward at maximum speed.

As for everything else, his fellow Blue Sea residents would take care of it for him.

That’s how Blue Sea people operated: trust was the name of the game!

———

[Norn Company]

As the chairman watched the footage transmitted by the airships turn completely black, he slammed his fist down on the table.

At first, [Norn] hadn’t suspected anything was wrong. After all, Dacius was the chairman’s own grandson, and he had always regarded [Norn Company] as his inheritance. He would never willingly do anything to harm the company’s interests.

And yet, he’d actually gone and done this?

Why?

Why on earth?

That traitor! What benefits had [Ota] offered him? He had a stake in [Norn Company] too!

The usually composed chairman now looked as though his eyes were about to burst into flames.

“OTA!!!!”

“Immediately! Right now!! Get our people organized! Open the weapons arsenal!”

“I want to declare war on [Ota] this instant!!”

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