Chapter 986: Close at Hand

Under the torture of the azure electric arcs, the few mechanical dinosaurs in Lockdown's collection room soon had no strength left to continue roaring.

Lockdown watched all of this with an expressionless face, yet he felt very satisfied inside.

Few in the universe knew of Lockdown's origins, and he had always claimed to be a Wanderer with no fixed abode.

But in truth, Lockdown was not a Wanderer in the real sense; like the Decepticons and the Autobots, he also came from Cybertron.

When he was born, Cybertron was still in the era of the Cybertronian Elder Council.

That was the most glorious, yet simultaneously the most corrupt, time for the entire Cybertronian civilization.

The Cybertronians had once used revolution to drive away the Quintessa Civilization, liberated countless enslaved slaves, and once abolished the gladiatorial arenas.

It was just a pity that the preservation of the noble system planted the Spark for the subsequent enslavement and revolution.

And Lockdown, like Megatron, was a slave who had walked out of the gladiatorial arenas.

It was just that he did not have as much luck as Megatron, who had a powerful teacher—The Fallen—who, though evil, had taught him many things.

Nor did he have a political ally—Sentinel Prime—who had schemed against him countless times, yet was ultimately stabbed in the back by Megatron.

In the darkest memory of Lockdown's life, he seemed to have been born in some filthy, makeshift workshop.

Lockdown did not know where he came from; he knew that from the moment he was born, he had arrived in hell.

In a gladiatorial arena run by a Cybertronian Noble, he was raised as a slave gladiator, struggling to survive almost from the moment he was born.

Slave gladiators in the arena were born to please others.

In that memory that Lockdown was unwilling to recall, almost shortly after his birth, he began to be used to fight against Predacons, relying on one narrow escape after another to trade his scarred body for a full meal and more resource rewards.

He hated the Cybertronians to the extreme, hated those "masters" who had given him life yet treated him as a toy to be constantly tortured.

He tried to escape from the arena time and time again, but failed time and time again, only to be met with even crueler torture and even more dangerous dueling opponents.

Finally, one day, Lockdown learned to endure and learned to wait patiently.

He performed even more crazily in the arena, using more vicious hunting techniques to win the favor of those nobles and spectators, in order to trade for more energy and resources to perform an Enhancement on himself.

This long wait lasted until after the revolution broke out.

The Cybertronian military commander—Megatron—joined forces with the sidelined King—Sentinel Prime—to initiate a reckoning against the Cybertronian Elder Council and the nobles.

After the revolution broke out, Lockdown joined the Decepticon camp almost immediately.

With the help of the revolution, he wantonly slaughtered those Cybertronian Nobles who had once played with him in the palm of their hands for amusement.

Because of his cruel methods and cold-blooded, ruthless personality, Lockdown was recruited and became one of the Commanders immediately after the Decepticon Legion was established.

But soon, even Megatron, who had extended the invitation to him, felt that he had misjudged him.

Lockdown was not a team player, and the madness and cruelty he displayed on the battlefield were chilling, even within the Decepticon Legion, which was full of madmen and lunatics.

Moreover, because he cared very little for lives and disregarded orders and duties on the battlefield, he was sternly reprimanded by Shockwave more than once, and his status was reduced again and again.

Before long, all the high-ranking Decepticons had a clearer assessment of Lockdown in their hearts.

He was by no means a qualified Commander, and could not even be considered a qualified Warrior.

A desperate outlaw who did not fear death, a killer who would stop at nothing—this was the evaluation of Lockdown by the high-ranking members of the Decepticon Legion.

Yet, within the Decepticon Legion, the one thing they did not lack was desperate outlaws.

In the end, Lockdown was squeezed out of the high ranks of the Decepticon Legion.

He lost his status as a Commander, and not many Decepticons were willing to get close to this villain who was as cold as ice and who might stab you in the back at any moment.

As the resources he could obtain from the Decepticon Legion became fewer and fewer, Lockdown also began to harbor resentment toward the Decepticon Legion.

So, in one battle, he betrayed the Decepticon Legion and defected to their mortal enemy—the Autobot camp.

Sentinel Prime certainly would not believe that this true villain, whose hands were stained with the souls of nobles, would willingly defect to him.

He assigned Lockdown to the intelligence agency under stealth management and sent his trusted aide Jibutian to serve as his teacher to train Lockdown, attempting to make him a sharp blade in his hand—a blade to deal with the Decepticons.

But Sentinel Prime clearly underestimated Lockdown's rebelliousness and selfishness; when he realized that he was not valued by the Autobots, and that his teacher arranged by Sentinel Prime—Jibutian—always liked to boss him around, Lockdown became furious.

Lockdown soon betrayed the Autobots again; he ambushed and killed Jibutian, who had been nagging and humiliating him, and also took away Jibutian's armor.

Through Swindle, an arms expert he had known in the Black Market years ago, he sold Jibutian's head to the Decepticon Legion and then earned his first pot of gold from them.

After that, Lockdown transformed into a Bounty Hunter.

During the civil war, he hunted many Autobot heads and exchanged them for many resources on the Black Market.

After the civil war ended, Lockdown subsequently left Cybertron and continued to be a Bounty Hunter among other civilizations in the universe.

There were not many employers in the universe who could accept his various evil deeds; the Decepticons and the Quintessa Civilization were probably the few who could barely tolerate them.

This time, Lockdown had come to Earth, a planet in a remote corner of the universe, to act as an outpost for the Quintessa Civilization after receiving their commission.

If it was convenient, he also wanted to go see an old friend, to meet with Swindle, with whom he had cooperated many times in the past.

With a cold snort, Lockdown ended the torture of these mechanical dinosaurs and walked toward the cockpit.

More than a year ago, when he suddenly received a familiar summons from an unknown starry sky, Lockdown was also surprised.

As for the situation with Swindle, Lockdown actually knew about it.

Back then, Swindle, under the coaxing of Starscream, tried to resist Megatron.

After failing, he was actually able to be coaxed by Starscream again, and as a result, when he was liquidated afterward, he was used as the matrix for replica warriors and tortured for millions of years.

From beginning to end, Lockdown, who understood most of the situation, never thought about helping Swindle.

Friends?

They didn't exist!

In his eyes, there were only two types: prey that could be hunted, and dangerous prey.

Even the Prime of Cybertron, who was feared by the queen of the notorious Quintessa Civilization in the universe, was nothing but prey in Lockdown's eyes.

"Hope, don't let me down!"

In the cockpit, Lockdown looked at a particle in the distant starry sky that was gradually growing larger.

Earth was already close at hand!