Chapter 272: Shadow, Blonde Hair and

In an instant.

All the ghost‑faced beasts that tried to encircle Athis have become "meat slices" sprawled on the ground; the high‑temperature claw blades have seared the wounds, preventing the foul‑smelling blood from spraying outward.

???

Athis is a bit stunned.

It is not unfamiliar with Optical Camouflage technology; on the contrary, the elite armor worn by the special forces under its command all have Optical Camouflage capabilities, facilitating infiltration, decapitation, and other operations.

But the power claw that flickers with cyan‑blue light, and the incomprehensible scoffing smile just now, indicate that the comrade who rescued it is an Astate…

At that moment.

The Astate voluntarily deactivated the Optical Camouflage, leaving the present elites Athis, Vadamii and Losco, as well as the Covenant Empire troops on the ghost‑faced beast side, all in a state of astonishment.

Wearing Terminator power armor that reaches three meters tall, its right arm equipped with a slender, sharp kinetic claw, its left arm fitted with a parallel‑linked. 75 caliber explosive‑arrow gun, black‑and‑white paint and a jetpack on its back, and a series of other features, all point to the Honor Guard of the Dark Crow Guard—

Shadow.

This Shadow, disregarding the bewildered gazes of the alien beings, raises its left arm toward the front of the street, aiming at the intersection where a cluster of ghost‑faced beasts and jackal werewolves gather.

"Twang! Twang! Twang!" the parallel gun spews dazzling fire serpents.

"Puff! Pfft!!"

A pleasingly crisp sound of bodies exploding reverberates throughout the area.

At this moment, a veil of blood mist rises over the intersection.

"Dong! Dong!"

While this Shadow indiscriminately sweeps fire, it also brandishes its right‑hand kinetic claw, charging forward to reap the Covenant Empire troops that are bewildered.

In the middle of the street.

A beetle‑shaped tank swivels its turret, preparing high‑temperature plasma capable of melting through hull armor, attempting to stop the god‑like Shadow.

But the Shadow would never give the enemy a chance to fire; it immediately activates its jetpack, using the powerful thrust to propel its over‑ton‑weight body into a charge.

Lifting off the ground, it arcs over a hundred meters, then rushes straight toward the tank that cannot dodge.

"Boom!!"

Shadow uses its own body as a projectile, crushing and deforming the entire tank until it is wrecked, with the driver's and gunner's blood gushing from the gaps.

Immediately after, Shadow leaps down from the flattened tank.

"Roar!!"

Just after landing and steadying, a fearless ghost‑faced beast, instead of fleeing, raises its clenched right fist and attacks the back of Shadow's head.

Thus, Shadow turns with a speed barely perceptible to the naked eye.

It then, with sudden interest, extends its left hand, spreads its five fingers, and precisely grasps the ghost‑faced beast's right forearm, blocking the attack.

A little pressure.

"Kaba!" with a sound, Shadow's left hand snaps off the ghost‑faced beast's right forearm.

"Roar…!" the ghost‑faced beast's endless wail.

"Weak, feeble alien, where does your courage to attack come from? Let me show you what absolute power is."

Shadow says, thrusting its right‑hand power claw into the beast's abdomen, then pulling with the left…

"Sizzle!" in an instant, tearing the daring ghost‑faced beast into two halves.

"Aaah!!"

"Ya! Demon!! It's a demon!!"

The Gulu people and jackal werewolves, already low‑spirited, collapse on the spot after witnessing the whole scene, scattering in flight.

"Awo!"

Seeing this, several nearby elites seize the opportunity, swiftly ending these guys' lives, looting their plasma pistols and pointing the barrels at Shadow.

"Heh."

Yet Shadow merely scoffs, ignoring the wary elites, turns and leaves, continuing a leisurely stroll far more practiced than Gabriel and the reservists'.

Meanwhile.

Within the entire elite residential district, over three hundred more Shadows have deactivated Optical Camouflage, assisting embattled elites and efficiently eliminating Covenant Empire troops.

The plaza beneath the megastructure.

"……"

Athis, Vadamii and the group of elites stare at each other, bewildered by the situation.

These are… humans?

In the universe, there truly exist races like "killing machines"?

The elites are somewhat stunned.

"They are Astate."

Losco, who returned from Harvest Star, however shows little surprise, instead explaining to the two senior elite veterans:

"According to our knowledge, Astate are the most valiant and battle‑hardened elite among humans; their speed, reaction and strength far surpass our Sangheli, as well as the shameless Kira Hani (ghost‑faced beasts)."

Especially, among humans there are ten OriginalBodies and a man who calls himself the Chairman…

The prophet is truly laughably ignorant, still having not figured out what kind of race they have provoked.

The words barely left his mouth.

The battle on the scene has already entered a "white‑hot" phase.

Over three hundred Shadows charge at the forefront, together with tens of thousands of lightly‑armed elites, confronting the regular forces of the Covenant Empire.

The result needs no elaboration: a one‑sided crushing.

Although Shadows originate from the Dark Crow Guard, the most adept at infiltration, their weapons and gear are not in the "light‑weight" category.

Beyond the power claw, parallel explosive‑arrow gun and jetpack—these Shadows' most common weapons—there are also 1.0 cal explosive‑arrow machine guns mountable on armors, plasma cannons, thermal‑melt cannons and flame throwers.

Moreover, more than ten Shadow jetpacks were replaced by small missiles and grenade launchers.

Only a Shadow equipped with two grenade launchers came to a halt; then the mechanical arm moved the left-side launcher onto the shoulder armor, aligning the 10 rows by 4 columns of 50mm grenade launchers' muzzles at an elevation angle toward the Holy Covenant troops at the end of the street.

Tong—Tong—!

With the crisp sound, fifteen Viper-type grenades shot out one after another and fell diagonally above the Holy Covenant troops, detonating actively.

Peng! Peng!

Not the violent explosion imagined, but a low-intensity rupture, evenly spreading a misty green 'water mist' that enveloped the entire area at the end of the street.

Then…

Sizzle! Sizzle! The sound of strong acid corroding everything rang out.

Ah! Ah… uh… plus the agonized screams of strong acid corroding into the bones.

The Holy Covenant Empire troops enveloped by the 'water mist' were rapidly 'melting', with flesh and armor 'sticking' together, then 'melting' into the collapsed metal ground, becoming turbid green 'sludge'.

Futile struggling and screams continued.

Even the beetle-type tanks could not escape the strong acid corrosion; only the Grimface Beasts equipped with fine armor, before their energy shields failed, fled in panic from the hellish street.

However, the incessant 1.0-caliber explosive rounds and meteor-like plasma artillery salvo made the Grimface Beasts only remember, before death, the fortune of escaping the strong acid area.

The so-called Viper-type grenade contains a high concentration of Xenomorph blood inside, used specifically to deal with enemies who dare to gather in crowds.

Those elites in the rear, using scavenged weapons, even if they cannot communicate normally with the Shadows, still know that this group of transcendent mortals, the Astate, came to help them avoid the fate of being slaughtered.

Thus, while the Shadows handled firepower output and bore the Holy Covenant troops' attacks, the elites used their speed advantage to conduct guerrilla and harassment, achieving a cooperation that was not quite tacit.

Ao! Ao! Go die, you shameless beast!!

Among them, Ates wielded a gravity hammer picked up from somewhere, charging forward heedless of personal safety, and specifically targeted squads commanded by Grimface Beasts.

This should be considered another kind of guerrilla.

Wadami had no time to look after his old friend, instead organizing the elites present to cooperate as much as possible with the Shadows, and attempting to contact the elites' forces and fleet.

At this moment, the City of Benevolence had already fallen into chaos due to the purge operation launched first by the three priests.

The Grimface Beasts, using the authority granted by the priests and claiming that the elites were heretical traitors, forcibly seized command positions and began to fully take over the troops.

Faced with baseless charges, many hot-tempered elites naturally would not willingly surrender their lives to the Grimface Beasts; instead, they led the Gulu and Jackal peoples who still wished to follow them in resistance.

But the Holy Covenant is ultimately a religious empire; with the three priests' prior plans and deployments, they now also slapped on the labels of 'traitor' and 'heretic'…

No matter how brave and skilled the elites are, no matter how much influence and deterrence they have, they cannot avoid being expelled from the Holy Covenant Empire; in righteousness they belong to true rebels.

Outside the City of Benevolence, the United Fleet tasked with escort also fell into fierce battle.

The fleet commanded by the elites endured firepower suppression several times its own; the sudden outbreak caused heavy losses on their side.

After all, naval combat is not like ground combat.

Moreover, the elites were surrounded, unable to employ their best guerrilla tactics, and were at an absolute disadvantage in numbers and ship specifications, causing them to suffer successive defeats.

Finally, to preserve their only remaining naval strength, a small portion of elite vessels, relying on the opportunity bought by their kin's desperate cover, activated the jump entry point and successfully escaped into Rift Space.

Even the colonial star systems within the Holy Covenant Empire's sphere of influence, the fleets and troops at the frontier borders, also began to gradually stage the purge segment.

It must be said, the priests used the political capital provided by the war, then lifted the long-held grudge and equally formidable Grimface Beasts to power, and this series of 'small' operations are all tactics that politicians ought to have.

But…

Meanwhile, the mid-level area of the City of Benevolence.

Here, akin to a magnified ship corridor, there are groups of three or five Grimface Beasts patrolling to ensure no mistakes occur in this area.

Just like the units tasked with slaughtering elites, the patrolling Grimface Beasts wear novel armor, carry excellent kinetic and energy weapons, and are vastly improved in every aspect.

At this moment.

One patrol group of Grimface Beasts suddenly turned into 'wooden people', maintaining the posture of stepping forward, yet remained stiff and motionless in place.

?

Noticing this oddity, it instantly drew the attention of two other patrol groups, and additionally two Grimface Beasts rushed over to inspect their fellows.

!

Only see the expressions of the motionless fellows ferocious, as if they were struggling against some 'thing', or rather, against a more fitting 'idea', trying to regain control of their bodies.

??

Seeing this scene, the two free-moving Grimface Beasts were somewhat at a loss, but next they saw the 'brains' of those few fellows.

It was the brain tissue in the literal sense of the head.

With a few 'Pa! Pa!' sounds, the fellows' skulls rapidly burst open, blood and milky-white tofu-like tissue splattering outward, spraying onto the faces of the two Grimface Beasts.

!!!

Gazing at the headless corpses limp on the ground, the two Grimface Beasts, terrified, looked around in all directions and hoarsely shouted 'Hou! Hou!', alerting the entire patrol group to heighten vigilance.

Pa! Pa!

But a series of skull explosions caused all members of the three patrol groups responsible for this corridor to die, the perpetrator unknown, plunging them into endless darkness.

Di! Di!

The alarm suddenly sounded, prompting more and more patrol groups to rush to the corridor.

But no matter how many Grimface Beasts came, none died a natural death.

Boom! Boom!

Amidst the sound of skull explosions, low-intensity explosions were also mixed in.

It turned out that the Grimface Beasts whose heads remained intact had dodged the strange attack but failed to dodge the small-caliber penetrating explosive rounds.

The collapse of their bodies and skulls made the Grimface Beasts fall like huge dominoes, unable to stop, row after row.

A group of invisible Ghosts, maintaining extremely high lethality, passed unhindered through the corridor tunnel and straight into a large room resembling a central control room.

After dealing with the few Grimface Beasts left behind here, a flash of cyan-blue light passed, only then allowing the six Ghosts to voluntarily reveal themselves.

They wore hostile-environment suits (HES) upgraded multiple times, held small-caliber sniper explosive projectile guns, and at the muzzle also mounted a special suppressor as long as forty centimeters.

And the team leader was none other than NuoWa, who kept her signature blond ponytail.

At that moment, she glanced sideways with her peripheral vision at the open gate behind her, and, releasing Spiritual Energy, she said: 'Captain Lin Mi'er, the subsequent operations are up to you.'

She said.

Mu'er, who was supposed to be secretly executed by the Ghost-faced Beast, together with his over thirty subordinates, walked into the Central Control Room with shock they could not conceal.

The elite forces could not believe that the seemingly frail NuoWa and her companions could unleash such formidable strength, especially the Spiritual Energy that the elite clan could not fathom.

Not long before.

When the priests launched the purge operation, NuoWa, lurking in the shadows, together with five Ghost agents, moved to rescue Mu'er and them.

Then, letting Mu'er serve as guide, they made their way all the way to the 'heart' of the City of Universal Love——

Central Control Room.

In fact, after communications were restored on Harvest Star, the company learned that the Punishment had captured two enemy ships, and NuoWa, following Sui Bian's orders, boarded her flagship Griffon and rushed to Harvest Star.

Afterward.

She, together with twenty-three Ghost agents, and over three hundred Shadows personally led by Kelakesi, infiltrated the cruiser where Mu'er was stationed.

After a fifteen-hour jump voyage, they reached the Holy Land of the Holy Covenant Empire, easily evading the searches of the Honor Guard, and successfully entered the City of Universal Love.

Then after.

Before NuoWa and Kelakesi could carry out their covert provocation, the priests promptly implemented the purge.

However, this turned out to be convenient for them, and so the Ghosts and Shadows, already dispersed everywhere, took advantage of the chaos to carry out various operations.

Thus the three priests were indeed highly competent politicians, but they misjudged the Ghost agents under Umbrella and the Honor Guard, especially just how formidable a single OriginalBody could be.

(End of chapter)