Chapter 12

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Protagonist:

Milton

Mins

According to police clues, the killers are most likely hiding in a concealed safe house on Old Street, and a close-quarters indoor battle (CQB) may well break out shortly.

In this kind of operation, even professional special operations forces can easily suffer heavy casualties if they are not careful; equipment must be chosen with great care.

By rights, such an operation requires at least two people — a solo operator's best response is to turn and leave… but there is no choice; Milton has nowhere to run.

Milton first skipped past the weapons and opened the armor-related page.

Reality is not a game where you can restart when you die, where you can make suicidal gambles without psychological burden, and losing just means losing a round.

Dead means truly dead.

With enemy firepower this fierce, buying armor is an absolute must.

"To stop TEC-9 firepower, generally meeting the NIJ Level II standard is enough."

"But… I'd better leave myself some margin for error, some redundancy." Milton shook his head and set his gaze on the Level III armor purchase interface. "In reality, getting hit by a bullet isn't as simple as losing a few hit points."

Stronger gear that might exist in the killers' safe house, combat incapacitation, post-injury treatment… all of it would be unbearable accidents and disasters for the current Milton.

Opening the exchange interface, the panel immediately displayed a prompt.

【Host's current sphere of influence and manpower have not met the standard; to exchange for Level III armor, Red Contraband Points must be consumed.】

【Seizing Level 1 Contraband yields corresponding points; current points: 110380】

Looking at this line of prompt, Milton nodded lightly.

To exchange for better items at lower point costs, one must develop one's own faction.

Otherwise, precious Red Contraband Points must be spent to exchange, and even at the current stage, the exchange shop still shows a pile of items marked as unexchangeable.

Even using Red Points cannot exchange for them!

Otherwise Milton would love to directly buy an infrared thermal imager at a high price; with that thing, fighting a gang indoors wouldn't be a dimensionality reduction strike?

Fortunately, high-end gear cannot be bought, but basic firearms and armor can still be exchanged.

Milton quickly exchanged a set of gear.

【Paraclete RAVIII Level III plates and matching set, 30000 points】

【RAV tactical vest, 2000 points】

【PASGT tactical helmet, 5000 points】

The latest Paraclete Level III full package and US military issue tactical helmet, swapped them on directly!

One set of armor exchanged, consuming nearly 40000 points, and Red Points at that — the cost-effectiveness is obviously extremely low.

But Milton can no longer afford to consider future point planning; he must convert points into combat power right now, survive the present crisis, before he can think about the future.

【Exchange successful, locating storage point (note: exchanged items cannot appear directly in host's hand; they will appear at the nearest location controlled by the host per the proximity principle; please ensure all needed items are exchanged before combat)】

【Your items have been placed in the storage compartment under the pickup truck's rear seat; please retrieve them promptly】

So they aren't delivered straight to hand…

But it is indeed reasonable; otherwise, if Milton pulled an RPG out of his crotch mid-fight, it would be a bit too abstract.

Seeing the armor exchange complete, with still plenty of points on hand, Milton only then turned his gaze to weapon exchange.

The Type 56's firepower is already quite sufficient; Milton spent 3000 Normal Points to exchange for 120 rounds of ammunition, 3 flashbangs, and 3 MK3A2 offensive hand grenades — not that he didn't want more throwing weapons, but the exchange shop displayed 【Sold Out, Restocking】.

Faction not large enough, restrictions everywhere; grenades can only be exchanged three at a time.

As for defensive grenades, their fragment damage range is too large, inconvenient for indoor use; with only three grenades of any type exchangeable, he did not consider exchanging them.

After exchanging throwing weapons, Milton looked toward the pistol exchange point.

He wanted to exchange a sidearm — a pistol.

Not that the current M29 revolver is bad, but it is probably unsuited for the upcoming indoor combat scenario; hard to suppress enemies wielding submachine guns, and too loud for sneak attacks.

"The enemy has six people; if I can manage to sneak-kill one or two before the gunfight, the battle's difficulty will drop exponentially."

"Swap for a suppressed pistol, silencer, and a set of subsonic ammunition; even if they don't see use now, they might come in handy for assassinations later."

Understanding of silencers is rather one-sided for many people.

Some think silencers are completely useless — ears get deafened whether you mount one or not; others think a silenced weapon fires as quietly as a pin dropping.

In reality, for rifles — especially large-caliber rifles — a silencer's role is limited to outdoor combat, reducing the probability of the enemy locating your position.

Colloquially: from hearing the gunshot five streets away, it becomes hearing it across the street.

Very useful in field operations, but zero help for indoor combat.

However… for small-caliber pistols, the silencer's effect is significant.

If such a small-caliber pistol is paired with small-caliber reduced-charge subsonic ammunition with a muzzle velocity around 200 m/s, it truly achieves the pin-drop sound effect.

In fact, at this point the main noise is not the gunpowder explosion but mechanical noise. So to guarantee maximum silence, it is best to set the pistol to manual fire mode, manually rack the slide to chamber a round, rather than rely on the semi-auto pistol's own cycling.

As long as enemies are not distributed too densely, one can completely avoid alerting anyone and complete an indoor assassination!

Of course, this is only theoretical operation; indoor silent combat difficulty is too high, environment complex, variables extreme, requiring extremely professional action and a certain degree of luck.

Milton is just trying his luck; preemptively reducing enemy numbers counts as unexpected harvest; if it fails, so be it.

【Ruger Mark II pistol, 10000 points】

【Aguila. 22 Colibri subsonic ammunition 20 rounds, 1400 points】

【Outback II silencer, 5000 points】

After checking the exchange list once more, Milton, for safety's sake, spent a few more points to exchange for an MP5 submachine gun and its matching ammunition.

This is to prevent the occurrence of a special combat environment where the combat area is relatively narrow and the assault rifle is difficult to deploy.

In this kind of environment, using a submachine gun is still more reliable.

Finally, there are some miscellaneous exchanges.

Regarding optics, Milton spent 10000 points to exchange for an Aimpoint Electronic red dot optic — the benefit of this kind of optic is that aiming does not require a three-point line; no matter what angle, as long as the target is seen in the red dot, one can shoot directly, very suitable for indoor combat.

Although the volume is large and the battery life is limited, it is at least a red dot sight.

One TT Tactical Backpack, one Adrenaline Injector, one 110cm rotary tourniquet, one pair of Pickup Noise-Canceling Headsets...

These things used up another 3000 points.

【Rear seat under-seat storage space insufficient, remaining gear has been placed in the rear truck bed, simultaneously gifted one waterproof rain tarp】

Exchanges were about done, Milton closed the System Panel, laughed self-mockingly: "What stage of Firepower Deficiency Phobia patient does this make me?"

One wave of shopping spree, his own points only had 40000-something left.

Milton inadvertently exchanged for many guns, exchanged for many bullets, afraid ammunition would not be enough, firepower not strong enough.

One assault rifle/submachine gun, one set of Level 3 bulletproof vest, one set of throwing weapons, one suppressed pistol...

Actually, this kind of firepower already belongs to an overflow state.

The rest... can only rely on oneself.

Milton continued stepping on the accelerator, driving toward the Old Street in Maracan Town.

On the way to the Old Street, he happened to pass Liya's Fruit Stall, but Milton did not see this father-daughter pair, the stall door was also closed, looking like no one was inside.

Perhaps they went to restock, repair the damaged stall...

Milton could barely protect himself, had no spare time to mind what others would do, just took a glance and planned to continue driving toward the Old Street District.

At this time, a man waiting by the roadside, who had been carefully observing passing vehicles, saw the work clothes on Milton, his eyes lit up, he hurriedly stood up and walked over, waved vigorously at Milton, quick-stepped forward, seemingly wanting to stop the car!