120: Chapter 120 First Arrival

Several standard-issue grenades and spare magazines hung from his tactical harness, a large-caliber pistol was holstered at his thigh, and an assault rifle leaned against his right hand.

He picked up the rifle and performed a quick check: live ammunition, iron sights, signs of wear on the body, but it was not poorly maintained. The magazine was full.

People sat on both sides of the carriage, about eight or nine, men and women, all wearing the same dark gray combat armor as him.

Some were resting with their eyes closed, others were lowering their heads to check their weapons, looking more like a daily routine repeated countless times.

Across the carriage, Shen Yue was also wearing the same combat armor, looking around until her gaze stopped upon his face.

The two sat facing each other, her helmet HUD glowing with a dim green light, reflecting a hint of the wariness peculiar to someone who had just entered a new environment in her eyes.

She gave Zhen Lu a slight nod without speaking.

Zhen Lu also nodded and turned his head to look towards the driver's cabin at the front of the carriage.

This was an armored personnel carrier on duty, and the identity they had been assigned should be as members of this team.

A man sitting in the front part of the carriage spoke up.

He was wearing the same dark gray combat armor as the others, but his helmet was resting on his knees, his face completely exposed.

He was about forty years old, with short hair and an old scar on his left cheek running diagonally from his cheekbone to his jaw; the edges had long since healed, and the color was slightly lighter than the surrounding skin.

His voice was low and deep, still clear and powerful amidst the roar of the engine and the jolting of the carriage.

"We are about to enter the Scavenger Beast nest. Our goal is to assist the Ability User, thoroughly clear out this nest, and eliminate the hidden danger."

He swept a glance over the people on both sides of the carriage, his gaze lingering on each soldier's face for a moment,

"Everyone, start checking your equipment. We have two minutes until we reach the battlefield."

The atmosphere in the carriage tightened instantly.

Everyone began to lower their heads to check their weapons and combat armor.

Some were pulling the charging handles, some were feeling the grenades on their tactical harnesses, and some were fastening their helmets and tightening their chin straps.

Zhen Lu removed the assault rifle's magazine and reinserted it firmly, confirmed that the bolt moved smoothly, and checked the safety on his thigh-holstered pistol once more.

Shen Yue's movements across from him were much less skilled than his, but she followed his rhythm to check her weapons. She hesitated when she reached for the grenades, but Zhen Lu shook his head slightly at her, and she left the grenades where they were.

Zhen Lu stood up in the jolting carriage, walked over to Shen Yue, crouched down, and reached out to help her adjust the buckles on the side of her chest armor.

From the perspective of the surrounding team members, it just looked like he was helping to organize her equipment.

He lowered his voice to the absolute minimum, audible only to the two of them amidst the roar of the engine and the metallic grinding of the vehicle's body.

"We don't know our exact location right now. Just follow the team to complete the mission first. Once we get back, figure out where we are, get a map, and then use the rough sketch your sister gave us to find her location."

Shen Yue's fingers paused on the gun strap, and she nodded slightly. "Got it."

"After the battle starts, stay away from the core area. Your speed is D-rank; you won't have any problems dealing with Mutant Beasts, but don't expose too much."

"Understood." Shen Yue fastened her helmet, tightened the chin strap, then looked up at him, "You be careful too."

Zhen Lu returned to his seat and checked his equipment again.

The team members on both sides of the carriage were making their final preparations, and no one noticed that extremely brief conversation just now.

His and Shen Yue's understanding of this world was currently zero.

There were no memory implants, no knowledge of their identity or background, not even the designation of this armored vehicle or the faction it belonged to.

All information had to be pieced together bit by bit through observation and brief conversations.

The Scarface veteran in front had mentioned the Ability User and the mission to clear the nest during that brief pre-battle mobilization, indicating that the team they were in was mercenary in nature, employed by an organization that possessed Ability Users.

The Scavenger Beast nest was the target, but the exact scale and the level of the Ability User's power were all unknown.

He leaned against the carriage wall, fastened his helmet, and pulled down his night-vision goggles.

He turned his head to look at Shen Yue; she was staring at the HUD inside her helmet, her lips pressed tightly, but her grip on the rifle was already much steadier than before.

Two minutes later, the armored vehicle began to slow down, and the sound of some kind of low, continuous roaring mixed into the wind outside.

The Scavenger Beast nest was almost here.

The vehicle drove forward a bit more, its speed slowed significantly, and the tires crushed deeper ruts into the muddy road.

No one in the carriage spoke; everyone clutched their guns, their bodies swaying slightly with the jolting of the vehicle.

The Scarface captain fastened his helmet, pulled down his night-vision goggles, and one hand was already resting on the door handle. He looked back to scan the team members in the carriage, then yanked the door open, letting the scent of mud and rot rush in.

He roared: "Go, go, go! Hurry, hurry, hurry! Get out, get out!"

Zhen Lu followed the team members in front and jumped out of the vehicle, his boots sinking into the mud and splashing up muddy water.

Shen Yue followed closely behind him, her breathing beneath the helmet clearly audible on the communication channel.

Only after exiting the carriage did he see the full picture of the surroundings; their vehicle was just one in a convoy, with two other armored personnel carriers of the same model parked behind it. Dozens of soldiers in the same dark gray combat armor were filing out from both sides of the carriages. The sounds of weapons clashing and boots stepping into the mud blended together, quickly dispersing through the low, oppressive jungle.

The road beneath their feet was less of a road and more of a long, muddy passage repeatedly crushed by tires.

The trees on both sides were all bizarrely shaped, none of them growing tall. Their trunks were twisted and gnarled, roots unearthed from the mud and tangled on the ground. The leaves were sparse, colored a sickly dark green, looking as though they could die at any moment, yet stubbornly alive.

Looking ahead, the road extended into a large, open mud flat. The mud churned, and from time to time, a pair of pupil-less, grayish-white eyes would emerge from the surface to stare at them before quickly sinking back down.

Those eyes were large and closely spaced, and the entire mud flat was bubbling everywhere.

At the very front of the convoy sat a clearly more advanced heavy armored vehicle, its body a full size larger than the personnel carriers, its armor surface covered in a dark, explosion-proof coating.

Only two people had stepped out of that vehicle, both wearing standard-issue combat armor completely different from the regular soldiers, with energy conduits embedded in the armor surface, emitting a faint, cold glow in the dim light.

The two did not look back, nor did they greet any of the captains, walking straight to the edge of the mud flat and standing still.

One of them raised his right hand, and a huge fireball condensed out of thin air above his palm. The surrounding air was instantly scorched and distorted; Zhen Lu could feel the heat even from dozens of meters away.

The fireball was thrown, tracing an arc before slamming into the center of the mud flat. The explosion radius was at least a dozen meters, mud and the remains of Scavenger Beasts splattered everywhere, and the flames spread rapidly across the mud flat only to be quickly extinguished by the damp mud.

A large number of Scavenger Beasts surged out from the mud. Each was the size of a lion, with a wolf's mouth and a long, thin, rat-like tail trailing behind. Their fur was covered in mud, teeth exposed, and they let out ear-piercing screeches.

They were extremely fast, charging toward the convoy as soon as the explosion passed.

The captains of each vehicle unit began assigning formations simultaneously, their shouts overlapping in the communication channel.

The soldiers raised their guns and fired shots at the lone Scavenger Beasts charging over. Bullets hitting their fur splashed up dark green body fluids; some Scavenger Beasts fell to the ground after being hit, while others just staggered for a moment and continued to charge forward.

The Scarface captain roared orders from the front, and the formation quickly spread out. The front row fired from a crouch, the back row fired standing, and the sound of gunfire rang out in a rhythmic alternation.

But the real pressure was not on the regular soldiers' side. The Ability User who threw the fireballs stood at the very front. Every time he raised his hand, a fireball smashed into the densest area of the Scavenger Beasts, and every explosion cleared a large area. However, the attack frequency was not very high, and in the cooldown interval, the Scavenger Beasts would seize the opportunity to advance a large distance.

Zhen Lu raised his rifle, firing shots at the Scavenger Beasts leaking through from the flank while quickly assessing the battle situation.

The number of Scavenger Beasts was far greater than estimated from the carriage, and there seemed to be something even larger moving slowly beneath the mud; the surface of the mud would occasionally bulge up in a large area and then quickly flatten out.

And that Ability User, judging from the power of his single fireballs, was at least D-rank, but whether it was mid-range or peak D-rank, it couldn't be judged from just these few shots.

Zhen Lu blew the head off a Scavenger Beast that had lunged close to him at point-blank range. He stepped on its head and fired another shot into its chest, then turned his head to glance at Shen Yue beside him.

She had already thrown away her rifle and was clutching a pistol she had picked up from somewhere, standing behind a crooked tree trunk and reloading rapidly.

Zhen Lu didn't call out to her, just moved a few steps toward her, and incidentally shot a Scavenger Beast that was lunging from the side in the side of the head, finishing it off.