Chapter 1585: Bionic Raven

Noticing that every raven on that tree had locked eyes on the pearl bracelet by Molly's claws, the nervous Huo Zhun asked for permission, "Sister Qing, is Guagua going to get jumped by those ravens? Should we give it long-range fire support?"

"No need, Guagua's tough." Lying prone in the snow, Xia Qing wasn't worried about Molly, but had fixed her gaze on the only raven on the prickly ash tree that wasn't staring at the pearl bracelet—it was staring at the spot where the three humans were hiding.

That bird gave Xia Qing a very wrong feeling. Out of caution, Xia Qing decisively raised her hand to signal Wang Man and the others not to move, and called out loudly, "Guagua, pull back, now!"

The instant Xia Qing's order went out, the raven that had been watching them turned its head with a fast, mechanical motion no living animal would make, opened its beak to reveal a… barrel, and fired a laser!

Xia Qing, whose hearing had evolved, clearly caught the "crackle—hiss—" of the laser ionizing the air to form a plasma channel!

"Bang! Poof!!"

"Crack! Hsss…"

The branch Molly had been perched on was hit by the laser; the pearl bracelet instantly vaporized, and the water, sap, and wood fibers in the struck trunk were heated to thousands of degrees in an instant and vaporized, exploding with a blast, then the branch let out the tearing, carbonizing crunch of splintering wood.

The attack sounds that rang out in those brief two seconds made the three retired special-forces members' muscles clench, but not one of them violated Xia Qing's order to open fire—Wang Man and Wu Lianmin, responsible for the left-rear and right-rear defense, didn't even turn their heads, still watching their assigned defensive sectors.

"Caw—"

Hearing Molly the raven's angry screech, Huo Zhun's heart, which had been lodged in his throat, finally dropped back into his stomach. Thank goodness!

"Guagua, come back." Xia Qing called her partner, ordering it to rejoin at once.

If it had been an ordinary raven, it would have been vaporized by that laser beam without a feather left. But Guagua is no ordinary raven—it is a raven that has been through countless rounds of training, tasked with delivering bombs, and its ability to dodge attacks puts it at the very top tier of brain-domain evolvers among ravens!

Molly the raven rejoined and landed on Xia Qing's shoulder, hopping about in a fury, "Xia Qing, Xia Qing! Bomb, bomb!"

Xia Qing raised her hand and handed her returning partner a green-light pine nut, soothing it in a low voice, "Got it, don't worry. Guagua, rest first. If that flock of ravens doesn't deal with that fake bird, I'll shoot it dead myself."

"This should be the bionic mechanical bird codenamed 'Assassin,' the latest from the Qu Fangzhou Industrial Group." Wang Man reminded Xia Qing, "According to the briefing, this bionic bird's attack power is extremely strong—if it takes off, we definitely can't escape. We don't know how many more bionic birds are lying in ambush here. I suggest we call for a helicopter extraction immediately. The other side only launched one attack, probably as a warning to make us withdraw at once."

The name Qu Fangzhou Industrial Group was the first Xia Qing had heard of it, but the moment she heard the name she knew exactly which organization this conglomerate belonged to.

The Blue Blood Alliance!

Facing a high-tech, heavy-firepower weapon, Xia Qing didn't panic, but stared expressionlessly at the bionic bird, whose feathers were puffed out and which was a size larger than the other ravens.

Laser weapons pack enormous energy and generate a lot of heat when fired; the laser cannon at Territory Seven has a 3-second firing interval, and this little gadget on the prickly ash tree must also have a cooling system—the puffed feathers are there to speed up heat dissipation.

"That fake bird is cooling down; it can't take off or fire a second shot for a short while. Huo Zhun, keep your eyes on it. I'm contacting Third Brother right now to ask about this bird's weakness." As she spoke, Xia Qing had already dialed the number and gotten through to her idol.

After hearing Xia Qing's brief description, Zhang San immediately gave a definitive answer, "That's not a flying bionic bird—it's part of a fixed optical sniper weapon. Laser weapons need huge amounts of energy; even if that 'raven's' feathers are all made of high-efficiency thin-film solar cells, it still couldn't pull off an attack of that intensity. So what you're facing isn't a 'laser bird,' but a 'tree' that shoots electricity. That bird is just its 'eye' and its 'barrel.'"

After explaining the weapon's mechanism, Zhang San gave a countermeasure, "Turn on the signal jammer, chop through the trunk the bionic bird is on, sever the fiber-optic cable inside the trunk, and the whole high-draw attack system will collapse on the spot. Stay safe."

"Got it. I'll bring you back a new variety of prickly ash later."

Truly worthy of being an idol standing at the very top—no subject he doesn't know! Xia Qing felt reassured. Hanging up, she gave orders directly, "Sister Man and Brother Min keep up the defense. Guagua teams up with Brother Huo—Guagua, make that flock of birds clear out. Brother Huo, chop down the trunk the fake bird is on, and grab a handful of prickly ash while you're at it. I'll cover."

"Copy!"

"Copy!"

"Copy!"

"Caw!" Molly the raven answered too, hopping onto Huo Zhun's shoulder and flapping a wing at his protective mask, urging him to launch the attack at once and avenge her!

Huo Zhun dropped his pack and shot up a nearby tree, using the footwork unique to elasticity evolvers to leap between trees, rapidly closing in on the big tree.

Just then, the cooling cycle of the bionic raven, which had been sitting motionless with puffed feathers, ended, and its head began to turn again.

Seeing the bionic raven's head tilt upward, Xia Qing immediately ordered, "Guagua, tell that white-eyed raven to get out of the way, fast."

"Caw—caw—"

Molly the raven let out a sharp cry. The white-eyed raven, which had been circling angrily in the air with the flock, screeched and beat its wings rapidly, leading the raven flock to wheel sharply and dive into the Evolution Forest for cover. From that speed, Xia Qing instantly judged it to be a dual brain-domain and speed evolver raven!

"Bang! Poof!!" The bionic raven on the trunk fired again, hitting the big tree in the direction the crow flock had fled. By now, Xia Qing had already turned on the jammer, yet it had still aimed at the raven flock's direction.

Two possibilities could produce this kind of attack effect: first, the signal here isn't transmitted by wireless, but by underground fiber-optic cable, meaning the Fierce Fire underground lab is somewhere nearby; second, before Xia Qing cut the signal, the weapon system had already received the order and locked onto the white-eyed raven.

Either way, that white-eyed raven is the key bird—it very likely knows the location of the underground lab!

"Crack—screeech!"

After the bionic bird's attack ended, Huo Zhun—an elasticity and strength evolver who had already leapt to the neighboring big tree—launched himself with both hands gripping a black blade, rocketing toward the bionic bird's position and chopping through that 15-centimeter-diameter trunk in one stroke. When the trunk split, the sound was not only the snap of wood fibers breaking, but also the ear-splitting screech of metal and composite materials being sheared.

Watching the bionic bird still "standing" on the falling branch, Molly the raven took off and let out a mocking cry.