Chapter 37: I Told You So

Another Cheetah was flying out of the atmospheric layer one planet ahead. There was a symbol of five white stars on the head of the plane, which meant that it belonged to the air force of the Eternity Galaxy Alliance. The Cheetah quickly leaped and disappeared with a beam of silver light.

Robert opened the element detector. A few seconds later, his smile seemed brightened. "I told you so."

"Vanadium, chromium, nickel..." Bruck read the results of the element detection from the screen and raised his head excitedly. "Man, we're gonna make a load of money this time!"

With all its equipment turned on in the Cheetah, they flew to the planet where the alliance army had just left at full speed. There was a silver cross shimmering on the planet.

Since the mercenaries had set up in Galaxy Eternity, they had behaved themselves and gained a semi-trustworthy reputation. But when getting out of the galaxy, they immediately showed their cruel style of a rogue. Unfortunately, the one bearing the first brunt was the Air Force.

The planet's resources were limited. In addition to the defense duty, the most important task for them was to look for resources, especially important energy resources in other galaxies. When the mercenaries came to the galaxy, conflicts of interest naturally arose between the air force and the mercenaries.

Even though their detective technology was similar, the mercenaries didn't work as hard as the Alliance Air Force and always fell behind. After the alliance had taken over several resource planets before them, they started using some dishonest methods.

They couldn't rob them openly due to their loyalty agreement to the alliance. Their most common method was to follow the Alliance army and take over their resources before the Alliance army could mine on a big scale.

After this had happened several times, the alliance army protested to Freedom City, where the mercenaries' camp was set up. The Mayor of Freedom City expressed that he shouldn't be involved in the affairs of the army, and the mercenaries announced officially that it was impossible that their soldiers would do something like that and assailed the alliance for suspecting the mercenary without thinking it through or respecting them. At last, the problem remained unsolved with all those quarrels and drugs.

Robert and Bruck were the pioneers of the stragglers in the mercenary. The Cheetah flew into the turbid atmospheric layer. Rocks can be found everywhere on the surface of this planet, which makes it look like an enormous walnut. They followed the detector's signal and flew directly to where the signal was the strongest.

As expected, they saw a small workstation halfway among a rock mountain. A flag stood alone on the roof of the station. The alliance manufactured the station with a very hard but light alloy and drilled two meters under the ground, strong and firm. The Cheetah that just left must have spent a whole day building the station.

Usually, when the Air Force found a resource planet, they built a workstation not only as a reception station on the ground for the following soldiers but also as a signal to show that this planet had already been found and taken over by the alliance, so the Zerg would not come here according to the Peace Treaty.

Usually, the mercenaries blew up the workstation and announced they had discovered the planet.

Bruck deftly buried the dynamite under the ground and then enjoyed watching the station blow up to the sky. After collecting all the useful devices left in the debris, Robert and Bruck began to look for the exact location of the mineral.

****

Robert became confused this time. "What's wrong?" Bruck asked.

"Normally, a mineral vein stretches over a large area, allowing us to detect the signal with the same intensity." He looked at the ground under his feet with confusion, "But the signal here is twice as strong as in other places."

"Can it be…" Bruck was excited, "a huge mineral?"

"Very likely!" Robert also got a little excited.

Under the debris of the workstation, the rock layer was broken, and the red soil was revealed. The two decided to take some soil from deeper into the ground as a sample, so they dug hard with shovels.

After digging for three to four meters and being covered in sweat, they then suddenly heard a "clunk."

There was something under the ground.

Robert threw away the shovel and prodded the soil with his hands, which were protected with thick gloves. Soon, something as big as a basin emerged from the soil.

Bruck looked at the thing in Robert's hands in confusion while Robert was visibly angry.

".... a signal transmitter? Made by the alliance?" Robert clenched his teeth in anger. They had gone through so much effort, followed them for three days and three nights, wandering the whole galaxy, and then ended up digging out something like this?

"Will there be minerals under this?" Bruck said, hoping there would be another chance.

Robert answered him by turning off the transmitter, and the signal on the detector disappeared immediately.

"Bastard!" Robert dragged Bruck to run with him to the Cheetah, "This is a trap!"

They rushed into the Cheetah and closed the gate to launch the plane. Bruck still felt horrified. "Robert, I thought you said that the soldiers in the Alliance Air Force are all cowards. Why are they setting up a trap for us?"

Before Robert answered, they heard a rattling sound from the plane as it fell to the ground violently after flying up several meters. Both bumped onto the roof of the cabin, feeling extremely painful and dizzy.

"Crap! It's a magnetic mountain!" Robert righted his helmet. "Who the hell led us here? This is fierce!"

Even though the Cheetah was made of a very light alloy, it still contained a large amount of iron in it. Most Cheetahs didn't carry a heavy demagnetizing device with them because magnetic mountains were not common in the universe.

This was not coincidental. The other Cheetah that just left must have had a demagnetizing device with it.

So...

"So this Cheetah has made all the efforts to find a magnetic mountain, attracted our attention to take us to wander for three days, then spent a whole day building a workstation, and buried the transmitter to lead us here." Robert sat at the bottom of the cabin in shock, unable to believe it. "They went through so much effort yet did it so naturally.... He suddenly jumped up. "Damn it, are these people insane?"