Volume 16 Tower of Babel Chapter 953 Seeking Negotiation
Everyone fell silent again.
"I have an idea." This time, it was Major General Alexander who broke the silence. "Mr. Hound just said that when Agunaktor arrived above the forbidden sea, the troops stationed on the floating platform had lost contact with the Ark, which means that the interior of the Ark may have fallen into chaos.
"The garrison troops on the floating platform do not have a high priority in the field corps' combat sequence. Their mission is only to monitor the closed sea area, prevent unauthorized ships or aircraft from approaching, and report any abnormalities in the sea area in a timely manner. The highest military commander of this force actually has very little autonomy, and at best it is just a large outpost. Even if the communication between them and the Ark is disconnected, they will not and have no ability to take the initiative to investigate. But those large military bases are different. If they find that there is no news from the Ark, they will definitely send a mobile force to check the situation as soon as possible. As long as we meet the commanders of these military bases, we should be able to obtain a lot of useful information.
"Compared to returning to the Ark to face those Undead Crew members who may have been corrupted, I think this method is safer... With your strength, even if you don't use the Yaguna Tor, you should be able to come and go freely in those military bases, right?"
"With Ze Luo here, no one should be able to stop us." Layton said confidently, "Oh, and there's Asano Showa-san... Hey, where's Sanjusan? I don't think he'll..."
"He's not dead, but his condition is not optimistic... Because there are too many people here, I haven't teleported him here yet." Ke Lan lowered his voice and said, "I'll take care of his affairs later."
"At least he's not dead. At least he's not dead." Leighton laughed and said nothing more.
But Hound and the others have been with Ke Lan for so long that they already know each other very well. When Ke Lan said this, they actually already knew that Thirty-Three's situation would definitely not be as he said... it was just "not very optimistic".
"No matter what, if we want to obtain intelligence, it would be best to make the commanders of those military bases trust us... By the way, do you know any commanders of the bases, or some higher-ranking officers or powerful figures?" Chi Hanfeng asked.
Ke Lan and the Hound looked at each other and said in unison:
"Fort Mukach —General Maginot!"
"Mukakh Fortress—that fat guy Maginot!"
"Yes, we can go to Mukach to find Maginot." Layton also pounded his palm with his fist. "We saved his life before. Even if we are all wanted now, he can't be so merciless, right?"
"Maginot seems to be smooth, but he is actually very loyal to the Undead Crew. He has principles and bottom line when doing things... Otherwise, he would not be valued by the Undead Crew." Hound said. As an officer from the same period, he is quite familiar with Maginot. "But he should give us a chance to explain, as long as we can convince him..."
"It may not be easy to convince him..." Ghost Owl said weakly, "After all, our current identity is... rebels."
"Although we are not in the same system, General Maginot and I have met several times. He should recognize me." Major General Alexander said, "I can participate in the negotiations when the time comes. When Fleet Zero revolted, we also saved a lot of video footage. If we show that to General Maginot, it should have a certain effect."
"As long as this Maginot is not blindly loyal, it will be fine." Chi Hanfeng nodded, "But judging from Lao Gou's description, this guy should still have some brains."
"It's a pity that he spent the first half of his life thinking about how to climb up... He's really no good at fighting." The Hound curled his lips with disdain, "I even suspected that the Undead Crew would transfer this fat guy to the Mukach base, just to use the knife of the heretic to kill this pig who knows too much... After all, the contact with Ke Lan in the early stage was solely responsible by this fat guy. If the Undead Crew wants to wipe out Ke Lan, this fat guy will definitely not survive. Not to mention the generals, even the members of the United Parliament Group, they will kill them without blinking an eye."
"They also kill fellow members of the Undead Crew without hesitation." Ke Lan added. He remembered that after the Battle of Bronze City, Demeter informed him of Pan's death in the communication. Although the Undead Crew was named "immortal", their bodies were actually very fragile. To kill a member of the Undead Crew, one only needs to replace the life-sustaining nutrients injected into the body with a high concentration of cyanide.
Pan's death is obviously related to the missing intelligence dealer, but it is not known whether the intelligence dealer is a "small account" of other members of the Undead Crew or someone else.
But there are two things that Ke Lan can be sure of: First, the information dealer must be a member of the Undead Crew, at least, he used to be; second, the members of the Undead Crew are not just those twenty or so people who use tarot card sequences as code names.
"The tentative plan is as follows. Ze Luo will stay here and transfer the source energy sealed on the top of the Tower of Babel to Yaguna Kotor. I will take this opportunity to deal with Thirty-Three's affairs. After that, I, Old Dog, Asano Akira, Major General Alexander, Valentina and the Blasphemer mecha will take other aircraft and secretly go to the Mukach base. As for Yaguna Kotor, let him hide in the Tower of Babel first. If you need support, I will send a signal in advance."
After Ke Lan merged with the deified body, the spiritual connection between him and Yaguna Tor had become extremely solid. Even if Yaguna Tor was on the other side of Alpha Star, he could sense the existence of this super battleship and control it remotely.
"I'll prepare the aircraft." Layton patted his chest and said, "There are several stealth bombers on Yaguna Kator. I just need to make some modifications to the ammunition compartment and then I can stuff the Blasphemer mecha in."
"Okay, I'll leave this task to you." Ke Lan nodded, "There's no time to lose, everyone should make preparations now. We'll gather at the core center of Yaguna Kator in two hours."
…
…
Inside the Ark, West Area 12.
Giraffe was the last one to board the floating vehicle. After entering the cramped cabin, he couldn't help but look back outside - but soon, the cabin door was closed.
The soldiers in black clothes and armor stayed in West District 12. Their mission was to search for the three "missing" people including Soap - Soap, the transport plane pilot Noir, and the intelligence dealer nicknamed "The Joker".
It was no secret that some people in the team had turned into monsters and even killed other members of the team. Although the team leader forbade these mercenaries to go up to the third floor, Giraffe already knew what they had seen on the third floor through conversations between the soldiers.
Four soldiers were killed, and their bodies showed serious mutations... At first, the team members thought that the four soldiers had mutated first, and then the killer had to take action to protect himself. But after checking the bodies, they soon discovered that the one who killed the four soldiers was probably a monster whose mutation was far superior to those four.
The flesh and blood of these four soldiers were drained alive in a horrifying way... To be precise, they were not killed, but were "eaten" by the monster as food.
Among the three missing people, at least one turned into a monster.
As for whether the soap was the man-eating monster or the "spare rations" taken away by the monster , Giraffe had no way of knowing. He wanted to ask the soldiers for more details, but even the soldiers themselves could not explain it clearly - the deaths of the four people were so horrific that these soldiers who were used to seeing life and death had some mental problems. The most serious one even accidentally pulled the trigger and caused the gun to go off, but fortunately no one was injured.
But for some reason, after boarding the floating vehicle, the giraffe's worries about the soap disappeared in an instant, and instead he felt an inexplicable sense of crisis.
His intuition told him that this sense of crisis had nothing to do with the soap, nor with the monster that had killed four spear squad soldiers and sucked their flesh and blood.
There was no observation window on the cabin door, or rather, there was no observation window in the entire cabin... This seemed to be an aircraft converted from a cargo carrier, and even the seats in the cabin looked like temporary additions.
There was no light in the cabin. After the cabin door was closed, it became pitch dark. Giraffe was about to speak, but the team leader asked first: "Why don't you turn on the light?"
"The light is broken." said a black-clad soldier who was registering them. This was the first time Giraffe heard these people speak - his voice was dull and had an indescribable weirdness. The mask worn by this person should have been equipped with a voice changer that is often used by security agents, which can process the wearer's voice so that people cannot hear his original voice.
"Are these soldiers in black from the Security Bureau?" the giraffe muttered to himself.
"Broken? Don't you want to repair it? It's just the cabin light, it shouldn't be difficult to repair, right?" the team leader asked again.
"We have just broken out of the enemy's encirclement and the aircraft was seriously damaged. The light broke at that time and there was no time to repair it. If you are not used to the darkness, you can turn on your built-in lighting equipment." The other party's answer was perfect and impeccable, and even the giraffe could not find any words to refute.
With a "click", a soldier from the Spear Squad turned on a tactical flashlight, and a white beam of light hit the top of the cabin. The light spread out in all directions, and the backs of the people sitting on both sides of the cabin were stretched and distorted on the cabin wall, becoming like a humanoid monster, which made the atmosphere in the cabin feel even more eerie.
"Who are the enemies?" The captain's tone was filled with impatience. "You should tell us now, right? In Zeus's communication earlier, he said that when you arrive, he will tell us what happened on the Ark. If it wasn't the right time just now, then you can tell us now, right?"
"The road to our destination will not be smooth. We will pass through a war zone. You will see for yourself then." said the soldier in black.
"What are you looking at? This cabin doesn't even have a window—"
The team leader stopped talking halfway because he discovered that, at some point, many more pitch-black tentacles had appeared in the cabin. These tentacles were hidden in their shadows, spreading out in all directions little by little... Because there were now so many tentacles that the shadows could no longer hide them all, they were exposed to his field of vision.
"What is that?!" The captain subconsciously wanted to touch his gun, but suddenly found that his body had been entangled by these black tentacles - these tentacles were not very thick, and there was no strong force from them, but the captain's body could not move at all, as if he had been injected with some kind of paralyzing toxin.
He wanted to scream loudly, but a black tentacle had already drilled into his mouth and extended into his throat, making him lose the ability to speak.
Under the captain's horrified gaze, the black-clad soldier who was sitting opposite him and had just spoken to him suddenly wilted - to be precise, the equipment and clothes "he" was wearing collapsed due to the loss of support, and a large group of black tentacles emerged from the loose clothes and squirmed towards the captain.
“Bang! Bang!”
Gunshots suddenly rang out in the cabin. The team leader turned his eyes with great effort and looked to the side and rear - the one who fired the shot was the mercenary nicknamed "Giraffe". His legs were also entangled by the black tentacles, but his upper body seemed to be able to move freely. He was holding a pistol tightly and firing repeatedly at the approaching tentacles.
His mouth was wide open, and a black tentacle as thick as a hair was attached to one side of his cheek. He seemed to want to shout, but only a slight "ho ho" sound came out of his throat.
The bullet penetrated the black tentacles, but other than causing a moment of stiffness, it did not cause any substantial damage - the team leader noticed that there was a black and yellow biohazard logo on the Giraffe's magazine, which meant that he was using active ammunition.
Active ammunition is ineffective...Aren't these black tentacles seeds of erosion?
This was the captain's last thought. He could feel several tentacles piercing his upper jaw, running along his nasal cavity to his brain. Then, his consciousness fell into endless darkness...
