155: Chapter 155 The Perfume of Death

The secret warehouse of Ares Industries was located in the Red Rock mining area on the border of Country K. This place was originally a rich copper mining belt, but after the war broke out, it became an outlaw zone.

The night sky, like a rag soaked in ink, shrouded the entire desert.

Chen Mo lay on the ridge of a sand dune eight hundred meters away from the warehouse. Through the green vision of his tactical binoculars, the base, disguised as an ore processing plant, was fully exposed.

"Twelve mobile sentries, four fixed machine gun towers." Nightingale's voice came through the earpiece, without a ripple of emotion.

"The gate has thermal imaging scans, and the walls are lined with high-voltage electric fences. This setup is more luxurious than a front-line base of the US military."

"The point is what's inside." Chen Mo adjusted the focus.

The warehouse entrance was guarded by four guards wearing full-coverage exoskeleton armor.

That wasn't ordinary body armor, but the Titan individual powered armor that Ares Industries prided itself on.

Hydraulic rods supported the heavy alloy armor, and Gatling machine guns were mounted on their arms; they were killing machines straight out of a sci-fi movie.

"That thing can withstand a direct hit from an RPG." The veteran captain behind him cursed under his breath, "Boss, if we charge in head-on, we don't have enough men to even fill their teeth."

"Who said anything about charging in head-on?"

Chen Mo lowered the binoculars and took out a uniform from his backpack—one he had seen in the bearded man's memory—belonging to an "internal inspector" of Ares Industries.

On the system panel, the skill icon for [Thousand-Faced Deceiver (Blue)] was glowing faintly.

"In this world, as long as you dress decently enough and speak arrogantly enough, most doors will open for you."

Chen Mo adjusted his collar while changing clothes, "Give me twenty minutes. Wait for my signal."

...

Ten minutes later.

A black off-road vehicle flying the Ares Industries flag brazenly pulled up at the warehouse entrance.

Chen Mo pushed the door open and got out, carrying a silver metal briefcase in his hand.

His face had now been micro-adjusted through muscle manipulation, becoming Robert's deputy in charge of overseas operations—a mean, arrogant German.

"Halt!" The exoskeleton guard at the entrance raised the Gatling gun barrel, its mechanically synthesized voice cold and stiff, "Password!"

Chen Mo didn't stop, but instead quickened his pace, walking right up to the two-meter-tall steel giant, and slapped its armored visor with his hand.

Clang!

This slap certainly couldn't hurt the guard inside, but it was extremely insulting.

"Password? You pile of scrap metal dares to ask me for a password?" Chen Mo roared in pure Berlin-accented English, his spittle spraying onto the opponent's visor.

"Mr. Robert let you guard the door, not block my path! Damn it, do you want me to send this report about the spoilage of the live specimens directly to the board of directors?"

The guard was stunned.

The soldier inside the armor clearly had never seen someone so aggressive, and the other party had mentioned Robert and live specimens, both of which were top secret.

"Sir, but the procedures state..."

"Screw your procedures!" Chen Mo slammed the briefcase onto the hood, pointing at the Patek Philippe on his wrist.

"If the refrigeration system has a problem and the cargo inside spoils, do you think Robert will dismantle you and sell you for scrap, or listen to you explain the procedures?"

The guard hesitated for two seconds, then finally lowered his gun.

"Open the door."

The heavy alloy gate slowly slid open.

Chen Mo adjusted his tie, snorted coldly, and strode inside with the briefcase.

The space inside the warehouse was even larger than he had imagined.

The massive assembly line was hung with corpse after corpse, stripped of their clothing, looking like pork in a slaughterhouse.

Researchers in white hazmat suits moved between the bodies, cutting, sampling, and packing them into boxes.

The air was filled with the stench of formalin mixed with the smell of blood.

Chen Mo didn't look sideways, walking straight toward the core area.

His fingers tapped lightly, seemingly casually, on the ammunition crates and load-bearing columns he passed.

With every tap, a tiny C4 charge, only the size of a coin, stuck like chewing gum into a blind spot.

"Sir, are you here to inspect the core samples?" A supervisor wearing glasses approached, smiling obsequiously.

"Lead the way." Chen Mo spat out the two words coldly, "If that princess is missing a single hair, you better be prepared to fill the incinerator yourself."

The supervisor shivered and hurriedly swiped his card to open the innermost blast door.

In the center of the room stood a huge glass cylinder. A long-haired woman floated in the green nutrient solution.

She was covered in tubes, her pale skin almost transparent under the lights, like a broken doll.

This was Sofia Al-Thani. The oil princess worth hundreds of billions, now soaked in a jar like a lab rat.

Two researchers were holding thick syringes, preparing to inject some kind of blue serum into the IV tube.

"That is an improved neurotoxin." The supervisor introduced it eagerly from the side.

"It can keep her brain in a vegetative state, but retain pain response. This is the best sample for testing our new generation of interrogation agents..."

"Truly fascinating."

Chen Mo placed the briefcase on the console, his fingers resting on the latches.

"So fascinating that it makes me want to vomit."

Click.

The case popped open. Inside were not documents, but a modified sawed-off shotgun and two high-explosive grenades.

Before the smile on the supervisor's face could even freeze, Chen Mo's gun barrel was already pressed against his chin.

Bang!

The supervisor's head exploded like a rotten tomato, red and white matter splattering across the console.

The alarm sounded shrilly in an instant. The two researchers screamed and tried to run, but were blown away by Chen Mo with two backhanded shots.

He kicked the control panel of the glass tank, shattering it, and the green nutrient solution gushed out with a splash.

Sofia slid to the floor with the liquid, coughing violently, soaked through, and shivering.

"Hostile attack! Hostile attack in the core area!"

Heavy footsteps came from outside the door. The four exoskeleton guards rushed in, their Gatling guns beginning to warm up and spin.

"Just in time."

Chen Mo yanked Sofia up from the ground and pushed her into the blind spot behind the console.

He grabbed the detonator from the bottom of the case, a manic smile appearing on his face.

"Art is an explosion."

He pressed his thumb down.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

The micro C4 charges previously stuck to the ammunition crates and load-bearing columns detonated simultaneously.

The entire warehouse instantly turned into a massive powder keg. The shockwave of the explosion, carrying shrapnel and flames, sent those exoskeleton guards who had just rushed in flying.

Taking advantage of the chaos, Chen Mo rushed out of cover like a cheetah.

He didn't dodge, but instead rushed toward the nearest fallen exoskeleton.

[Close Quarters Combat Mastery] erupted with full force!

He dodged the gun barrel still spitting tongues of fire, and his tactical knife precisely stabbed into the hydraulic pipe connection at the exoskeleton's neck—that was the weakness he had seen in the bearded man's memory.

Hiss—

High-pressure hydraulic fluid gushed out, the guard screamed, and the armor instantly paralyzed.

Chen Mo seized the opportunity to snatch the Gatling gun from the opponent's arm and shoved the barrel into its shattered visor.

Rat-tat-tat-tat!

A metal storm erupted at point-blank range, turning the guard and its helmet into a sieve.

"Nightingale! Do it!" Chen Mo roared into the earpiece.

The skylight at the top of the warehouse suddenly shattered.

An armor-piercing incendiary shell whistled down, precisely piercing the remaining fuel storage tanks.

A sea of fire spread.

Chen Mo hoisted the unconscious Sofia and rushed toward the exit amidst the firelight of the exploding exoskeleton armor.

Behind him, this sinful laboratory worth hundreds of millions of dollars was collapsing.

The moment he rushed out the door, system notifications frantically flooded his mind.

[Destroyed Titan-type exoskeleton armor x3, gained 15000 EXP.]

[Extracted key technology fragment: High-Energy Micro-Hydraulic Transmission (Purple).]

[Extracted key technology fragment: Neuron Connection System (Incomplete).]

The support off-road vehicle had already rushed to the entrance, and the veterans were suppressing the remaining guards with vehicle-mounted heavy machine guns.

Chen Mo threw Sofia into the back seat and vaulted into the car himself.

"Drive! Don't skimp on the gas!"

The off-road vehicle roared into the desert night, with continuous explosions coming from behind, dyeing half the sky blood-red.

In the vehicle, the woman who had been unconscious slowly opened her eyes.

Sofia didn't scream, nor did she cry.

Her eyes, like emeralds, stared fixedly at Chen Mo, watching his hands covered in blood and gunpowder smoke.

"You have a scent on you." Sofia's voice was hoarse, yet exceptionally clear.

Chen Mo was bandaging the wound on his arm and didn't even look up at the remark: "Gunpowder? Or the smell of blood?"

"The scent of death." Sofia huddled in the corner, her eyes as hollow as a ghost that had lived for a thousand years, "Exactly the same as the night my father died."