Ambush

"Lieutenant, does he have some special background?" Jake asked Cooper in a gloomy voice, hoping to get a good enough reason for his loss, to ease his mind. Even Rodin pricked his ear to hear his answer.

Cooper just shook his head and said, "I don't know. But from what I had heard at the office, I think some Federation's high-level people were mad at him"

To this remark, Jake nodded. He, too, felt that it might be the truth. After all, his attitude was not very pleasant. However, Rodin had a different opinion about it.

"He's just a teenager. If he had angered some top brass of the Federation, they would have just gotten rid of him. But he's right here."

"Yes, that's what I've been thinking." Cooper added where Robin had stopped and added, "Either he had a very strong backer, or they couldn't disregard his skill. And I think it is the last one."

"But it is true that the child is too disrespectful. He was slouching when he was giving the salute and..."

"Why does it even matter?" Cooper didn't let Jake finish his words, "Tell me Jake, which soldiers would you choose, the one with the best manner, or the one who ran into the enemy to protect the people they haven't known for more than a few hours?"

"That..." Jake wanted to answer the second one but couldn't, and his hesitation put a smile on the face of Cooper. He wanted to say something, but before he could do that, their helmet relayed a voice.

"Stop the car. Monsters are coming."

'It is Aiden.' Robin was the first one to guess the voice, but before he could say anything about it, another voice answered, "There is nothing in the radar."

Aiden, sitting at the top of the last military hovercar, said, "They have surrounded us."

"What the hell is this guy talking about?" Jake didn't hide his dissatisfaction and said, "Even with the mana resistance, the radar on the car can scan up to 5000 meters without error, and this guy…"

However, neither Cooper nor Robin wait to hear his rumbling. Cooper went to the driver and ordered, "Show me the satellite image."

"But sir, there is nothing on the radar." The driver sounded logical.

"Just do what I'm saying," said Cooper. He, too, wanted to believe that Aiden was wrong, but he had a hunch. 'If he is one of the special mana soldiers trained by the Federation, then…'

"Sir, please authorize." Although the driver was not willing, a military order was not something he could ignore.

A notification popped up in his helmet screen, and when Cooper entered his authorization code, a timer appeared at the edge of the vision. The remaining time was 26 seconds and was decreasing.

While Cooper was waiting for the satellite scan to show the result, Robin was quick to climb onto the roof of the car.

There were five cars in the convoy, with the first and the last one being the military vehicles. Robin was in the front car, and Aiden was on the last.

However, when he turned in the direction that Aiden was looking at, he could see nothing but a blanket of snow. And it wasn't just in one direction, every direction was the same.

The human eye could see as far as 5 km when unobstructed. However, the mana apocalypse changed all that. Some of them had mutated and developed a better sense than others.

Like Robin, who can see the things that are 5 km away as clear as the things others will see 100 meters away. So he believed that even if the monster was over 5 km away, he could see the outline, but there was nothing.

Robin was quick to pull out his sniper and concentrated on the direction Aiden was looking. And there was nothing.

'What the hell? Is he bluffing?' Robin, too, felt that it was a false alarm.

"It's underground." Aiden's voice rang in their helmet again.

"Holy smokes! There are too many of them." Cooper cursed in the helmet at the same time.

The car screen was showing the satellite image, and both the driver and Jake could see it. The big and small red dots had covered the entire map.

"They're so close!" The driver couldn't believe what he saw.

"Stop the cars. Make a barricade of cars. Set up the Zero-energy shield modulators in the middle." Copper's voice sounded not only in the soldiers' helmet but also inside the transport cars.

The best thing was that they also trained the drivers of the transport car, and they did as they were told. As others were setting up the Zero-energy shield modulators, one driver cried from the vehicle, "Lieutenant, it's a call from the stronghold."

'Can it be that they noticed the attack?' Cooper was not sure whether or not that was the case, as he received the call.

"First Lieutenant Cooper. Research post #11f is under attack. Please aid the 5th squadron as soon as possible."

'11f? Isn't that the place we are going? And they attacked the place at the same time? Why is it no longer surprising?' Cooper shook his head and replied, "Negative. We are under attack by a group of monsters, over two hundred-strong. We're about 37 km away from Research post #11f. Please send help."

It stunned the operator who was delivering the news. There was silence on the other side. When the operator recovered, he said, "Please continue to hold your ground. Help is on the way."

'If the help was really on the way, why would you be urging me to go Research outpost #11f in a hurry?' Cooper knew the reason, but couldn't do anything about it.

"Will those shields be enough?"

"Huh!" Cooper didn't realize when Aiden appeared beside him. Nonetheless, he replied, "If it were only one, then it would have been a problem. With parallel resonance from six shields, the chance of breaking is low."

Aiden looked at the space in the middle of the five cars. They were hurriedly assembling what they called 'Zero-energy shield modules'. But Aiden did not understand parallel resonance.

"With the parallel resonance, all six shields will work as one. So as long as there isn't a monster strong enough to overwhelm all six shields in one strike, it'll be impossible..."

Cooper couldn't finish his words as the ground shook.

"Big monster at five o'clock and nine o'clock," Robin reported through the helmet. And both of them went to the car roof. Soon they found all the beasts had started to emerge from the snow.

'That one has three mana circles, but those two on your left may have only two circles.' Mraz confirmed the strength of the beast inside his mind.

And Aiden had no intention of questioning his judgment. He was, after all, the one who had discovered all the monsters under the snow before Aiden had noticed them.

Aiden looked around to find that the so-called three circle mana beast looked similar to the one Luke had shown him.

"Ice troll!" Even if Mraz hadn't told him, he would have easily guessed it was the same beast.

"Huh? Ice troll?" Aiden's mumblings confused Cooper, yet at the same time, he was curious. He asked, "But it doesn't like the one we have seen before."

Aiden didn't realize that Cooper was listening to him. However, he had no intention of hiding it, to begin with.

"They are the same. It is just stronger, and more used to mana. Let's say it is just an evolved version of that ice troll."

"An evolved version?" Hearing Aiden, his face couldn't stop twitching. 'Does he think this is some kind of game?'

"The ice troll we saw before was the first form, and that one is the third form." Aiden pointed to the ice troll, which had a long pillar on its shoulder and human heads hanging from its waist.

"And that one is the second form."

Cooper followed Aiden's finger and found two large slouching beasts which were coming towards them.

It was a lot more muscular than the one that attacked the recruit transporter. Other than overgrown lower canines, and the long white beards and hairs, they had no special traits.

'How could they be the same thing?' Cooper wanted to, but he couldn't believe Aiden's words. While he was thinking about it, six machines on the ground surrounded by five cars began producing low-frequency noise.

Soon the first module shot up a line of light. And as it spread, it covered all the cars inside the thin layer of white light. Then the next one shot out. And it continued until all six did the same thing. The shield was still thin in an end, but it had a blue hue around it.

Aiden, however, wasn't interested in these things. He was studying the incoming monsters.

'Those are Ice-dwarves, aren't they? Could they even wield such a heavy hammer?'

'Don't underestimate them. They might look small, but even without a weapon, they could crush the heads of your species.'

As Mraz was commentating, Aiden was taking notes of everything in the personal database. That's one of the reasons he's been here for, after all.

'But those imps might become a problem.'

'Imps?' Aiden wasn't sure what Mraz was talking about. But other than beasts he had identified, there were only those infant-sized blue-skinned monsters with tails he had never seen before. He wanted to know about them, but...

"Enemies within the target range. Waiting for order." The operators who had assembled the mid-range guns on the top of the cars reported in unison.

"Fire at will." With so many monsters around, Cooper, on the other hand, didn't hesitate at all.

And the thunderous noise of the metal and light splitting machines massacred the silent desert of snow.

Each of the mid-range guns was equipped with a single laser and two projectile systems. And when these mean machines showcased their full potential, nothing remained standing in the two-kilometre radius around them. It took a single second to dye the snow in blue with blood.

"What? That was it?" Jake exclaimed with a bright smile on his face.

"What can you do? They are just made of flesh and blood after all." One soldier chimed in.

"Then why are we wasting energy on these shields? Should we put it off?" another soldier asked Jake.

Jake was one of the second lieutenants of the 17th squadron. He was the commander of this 12-man troop. Apart from him, only Cooper had higher authority here, as neither Robin nor Aiden was a sanctioned officer.

Yet when he ordered to shut down the shield, another voice cried, "No."

And the voice was loud enough to draw all the attention of the surrounding soldiers.

However, Aiden didn't care about the gazes directed at him. Whether it was full of curiosity or contempt, he couldn't dare to take his eyes off the tens of imps that shone in bright blue.

And with each passing moment, they were becoming brighter, enveloping all the wounded or barely breathing bodies of those monsters.

"No way." It was Robin who cried in shock. "That is impossible!"

Some soldiers looked at him curiously, but when they followed his line of sight, their face became white as a sheet of ice.

"How?" And Jake was no better. "How are they moving again? They should be dead."