Chapter 9: Night Assault

While E.L.H. was finishing up the recharging site, Anna was looking through the data that E.L.H. had collected. She noticed that the wolves went "home" during the night.

"Night is coming down. Seeing as we have successfully set up a backup recharging station we should take the fight against the Devours as soon as possible. Looking at the data that you've collected, the Devours here seem to be diurnal. Attacking at night will give us an advantage."

E.L.H. looks at Anna and displays its cannon, recounting that it doesn't know how to use its weapon greatly.

"I believe that your latent combat skills and your combat module will be enough. It is the cumulative knowledge of combat against Devours made by mankind at its most basic level. You should be able to survive any threats that you encounter should you find yourself in combat. The only issue would be your battery life. I also suggest that you change your cannon's form and ammunition type. It is possible to change it during combat so also keep that in mind when you need a different fighting style. Your capabilities are state of the art and your capabilities are so much more amazing than you think. Dr. Henigen and the others put a lot of effort into you to be the best."

Anna states this with a proud tone.

"I'll give a rundown on how you could change the effective range, impact explosion, size, and others. Your cannon is an energy weapon and the ammunition used are energy based, if not made entirely out of energy. You could edit what comes out, how strong, and how far it'll shoot. The size of the shot is affected by the opening of the cannon. The wider it is, the wider the blast, although it generally lowers the speed of the blast. The effective range is based on the power used to blast the impact blast. The less power, the less range. The impact explosion is based on the power inside the blast itself. You put more power in it and it'll blow up bigger."

"Now that we know our arsenal, we need to come up with a plant to defeat the Devours. First off is that you must not get into a group fight without a major advantage in direct combat, such as being in a small area where only a few can engage you. That is unlikely so don't get into group fights. Using the basic combat module, a singular wolf would be easy to dispatch, but 2 or 3 would be deadly. As for the giant lotus, it is unsure as to if it is just a simple carrier and home that transports the Devours, or if it is also a spawning grounds for them. To determine either, we'll need to spend time to gather that knowledge, but time is limited for us. The longer they are here, the deadlier they'll be so your mission will be to destroy the giant lotus and the wolves as soon as possible. For the lotus, we'll need a massive explosion that will engulf it and the wolves inside as you'll be on the lower side of energy after your first blast."

E.L.H. looks at its cannon, widening it, but it shows its concern on the lack of firepower it has.

"I suggest that you start charging your cores right now to create an impact blast large enough and damaging enough to blow up the entire lotus, or at least 70% of its body. It's this or cause a building to collapse on it, but there are no building large enough. The best solution right now would be to get close to the lotus and break the chitin walls to see if any chitin exists inside. If none exists then explode the insides up with a point black hyper charged impact blast, much like the impact blasts that the lance uses, but much larger and can extend for much longer distances."

"If chitin walls do appear in the inner lotus then you must pierce them and any other inside. In any case, should you every reach below 30% of your battery, you must retreat immediately back to the recharging station. The station is poorly made, but it holds enough power within it that it'll supply you enough to push back a pursuing force and survive the night. Simply being around the recharging station or in contact with it will activate your inner CE cores and absorb the power within it."

"When you do assault the lotus, please succeed in the first attempt. If you don't they'll be wary for another assault. They'll most likely start sending in massive waves either across the sea or mass produce Devours within that lotus. Failure is an unwanted option that will ensure that the next battle will be even more difficult. In a sense, failure is not an option. We're already backed into a corner as it is."

Just as night falls and daylight disappears, a lone wolf walks back to the lotus. The beast is relaxed and looking in the direction of the lotus in the distance. It hears clunk behinds it and looks at the direction of the sound behind it. There's nothing there but falling rocks, which was a common sight in this ruined city. It turns around to head off for the night.

*splat*

E.L.H. shakes off the guts from its lance. Grappling above and dropping a rock to distract the wolf while preparing for an attack from above was a great idea. Reading E.L.H.'s thought, Anna's camera lens glows brightly. Taking out several wolves throughout the time for nightfall was Anna's idea of cutting down the numbers that they could not match right now. Dispatching individual wolves was easy. They were easy to distract and E.L.H. already knew where to attack for a fatal strike. Sneak attacks were necessary to both conserve energy and not alerting the Devours that there was a hostile force within their area hunting them down.

Getting close to the lotus, E.L.H. hides behind a broken wall. There it kneels down and tells Anna to get inside it.

"Please don't get crushed during a fight. I wish you the best of luck and don't fail."

While inside, Anna is connected to E.L.H. and its eyes, but Anna cannot see with her own eyes. She can only hope for the best and given advice when she can. E.L.H. had suggested that she stay behind at the recharging station, but she declined. Without sharing to E.L.H., she had no wish to stay in a world where only she'll live if E.L.H. were to die. She'll rather die with E.L.H. than live alone on a human-less, dying world where she could only wait to die.

E.L.H. observes the lotus. It is gigantic, at least 50 meters wide and 30 meters tall. The chitin looks quite thick and E.L.H. wonders how it will be able to destroy it.

"Rest assured, you have more potential that you believe. Your weapons will see this done. You and your weapons were made for this."