Chapter 152: A Lifeline

"Throw away your Spirit Balls, give up resistance, and we are willing to guarantee your personal safety!"

"Give up resistance, don't make meaningless sacrifices. If you die, your superiors will just keep living it up — no one will grieve for you!"

"The Quicksand Team accepts prisoners! Those who surrender can have their personal and property safety guaranteed!"

Loudspeakers were set up at the road junctions, broadcasting surrender appeals on a loop toward the interior of the block.

The over ten thousand civilians living in the block were not ten thousand pigs. The Quicksand Team had to ensure ordinary civilians wouldn't "aid the tyrant," and had to empty the place as much as possible so that the formal members engaging in close combat wouldn't be dragged into messy fighting.

However, the Dog Pack Team had long anticipated the possibility of surrender appeals, and had gathered the civilians on the outskirts and relocated them to the interior—

With no traitors inside, the Luo Qi Group could presumably hold out for quite a long time.

But the Jiemate Group, those turncoats, had long prepared everything. They had secretly turned a large batch of people in advance, taking the lead in surrender, and were surrendering to the Quicksand Team from various points across the three blocks.

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Large numbers of civilians walked out of the block, faces full of panic and unease, edging forward tremblingly under the Jiemate Group's prodding — clearly not of their own will.

But once the Quicksand Team guaranteed their safety and property as promised, and their families were properly settled—

Their emotions naturally relaxed.

In turn—

The Quicksand Team members then asked them to take part in the surrender appeal operation.

In an instant—

One carefully staged model case after another was born.

Under the Quicksand Team's arrangement, they used loudspeakers to broadcast their own voices into the block, calling on their friends and relatives to come out and surrender. Their heartfelt tones actually persuaded quite a few people.

Of course—

How could the Luo Qi Group's people simply let the civilians leave? These hostages were excellent human shields and auxiliary combat machines — whenever the Quicksand Team charged in, they could always buy them some time.

The Quicksand Team itself never dreamed the Luo Qi Group would let people go. They only used those voices to stir up the hearts of those civilians and outer members, preventing them from standing firmly with the formal members — splitting the internal environment to create exploitable cracks.

At the same time—

The various action groups had already rushed to key locations.

Cut the water, cut the power, sever medical support, and ensure supplies couldn't be transported from outside to inside. The Quicksand Team had already prepared for a long-term battle.

Large numbers of drones flew from the air into the interior of the block. Although they were quickly shot down by the Dog Pack Team's people, the instant they exploded they scattered countless leaflets.

The leaflets prominently featured surrender illustrations — to ensure even the illiterate could understand, simple drawings were specially used.

The Luo Qi Group's members were undoubtedly also targets for their surrender appeals. Under the Jiemate Group's covert manipulation, in fact many of the Luo Qi Group's Dog Pack members had already developed the desire to surrender.

They were different from those people at the top — they had joined the Dog Pack Team for profit, without the original founders' loyalty. As the profit group was broken up by outside forces, as long as they were made to see reality, no one would keep fighting to the death.

Running with the Dog Pack Team is just getting by; running with the Quicksand Team is also just getting by.

For this, the Quicksand Team only needed to give a gentle push, and the Dog Pack Team's already-tottering great building would immediately collapse.

Trapping the Dog Pack members was essentially cutting off their life-saving straw.

Outer members began clearing the buildings the Dog Pack Team had abandoned, checking whether any people who hadn't come out were still inside, and any secret passages that might lead somewhere.

All Baimu, as a member of an action group, shouldered the vital mission of seizing the high ground of the block to gain control of the overall situation.

Due to a shortage of manpower, the Quicksand Team couldn't directly send people deep into the alleys to surge all the way to the target building. They could only deploy fog to spread it through the block, then have All Baimu and Otsuka change into Dog Pack Team uniforms and infiltrate the block to take down the targets inside the building.

Using that as a stronghold to control air supremacy, information dominance, and the high-ground view.

——

"Stay close to me, don't panic."

All Baimu said softly to the slightly nervous Otsuka.

"Got it!"

Otsuka, carrying a strange piece of machinery on his back, nodded.

Although wearing Dog Pack Team uniforms could to some extent confuse the Luo Qi Group's sight, completely deceiving them was undoubtedly a fool's dream.

The two of them charging into a block full of enemies was simply madness.

Still, All Baimu had to be grateful that the Oulei region had no firearms — he didn't have to worry about being shot in the head by a bullet from some unknown source a hundred meters away.

It was just that all kinds of improvised bombs were certainly not in short supply.

Like the flashbang All Baimu had used before — it couldn't kill him through his protective suit, but it could definitely leave him dizzy and seeing stars.

"Go go go! We'll use drones to cover you!"

A Quicksand Team member shouted in his ear.

All Baimu and Otsuka immediately plunged forward through the smoke — the former gripping a device whose top continuously swept like a radar and marked the target location.

Before they had advanced long—

A terrifying explosion sounded from the horizon.

Even though white smoke billowed all around, All Baimu could still see the huge black cloud rising — that seemed to be the Dog Pack Team's power station, one of the facilities they mainly defended.

The explosion of the power station, regardless of the outcome inside, would intensify the panic in the hearts of those trapped inside.

At this point, All Baimu only needed to place the temporary signal tower on Otsuka's back at the highest point of this block, letting their side gain information dominance — he believed they could take down the people here very quickly.

Passing through the white smoke—

The two arrived at a wide and quiet main street.

To be honest, the Dog Pack Team was far inferior to the Quicksand Team in every respect — just looking at this street made it clear.

Although one could also see entertainment venues like restaurants, bars, and dance halls, the atmosphere and exterior decoration alone gave one a sense of oppressive confinement — grayish-white crumbling walls, sewage everywhere, uneven ground, garbage piled into mountains.

Combined with the sallow, emaciated appearance of those civilians who had come out earlier—

A prison?

A garbage dump?

And yet this block was already considered one of the more prosperous ones among those controlled by the Luo Qi Group — yet it still looked like this.

It wasn't hard to imagine just how outrageously the Hound Squad oppressed the people under them — no wonder they were a pack of scum who wouldn't even spare children or the elderly.

With such intense oppression, Baimu didn't believe there was no one in the Hound Squad who shared his own convictions.

But thinking it over, that person probably wasn't in the block he was responsible for — otherwise Flobo couldn't have failed to tell him.

The two of them moved quickly along the base of the wall, watching their surroundings warily.

Perhaps the pillar of thick smoke rising in the distance had drawn most of the Hound Squad members' attention — their advance went very smoothly, and along the way there wasn't a single ambusher who launched an attack.

However.

Just as Otsuka saw the building getting closer and closer, gradually letting his guard down, Baimu suddenly blocked his forward movement.

"Shh — someone's here."

Baimu lowered his voice, pointed at the many pieces of cover deliberately placed around the building, then pointed at the device in his hand.

The Hound Squad members might have thought they were well hidden, but they had underestimated the power of high-tech — life-detection equipment. Although this gadget couldn't tell him how many people were ahead, it was enough as long as it alerted him to the presence of living things.

Otsuka was suddenly startled.

"What do we do?"

"Of course we find a way to fight our way in." Baimu took out a Poké Ball.

Seeing this, Otsuka instead clenched his teeth hard. "Wait — I have an idea!"