YM778.TV Chapter 385: 137. Boarding and Reconnaissance_3
Chapter 385: 137. Boarding and Reconnaissance_3
Activating “Life and Death Tracking”, his eyes turned pitch-black, allowing Lee to see the neatly arranged Biochemical Soldiers stationed in the middle deck.
All facilities on the middle deck had been removed, artificially transformed into a four-level open dormitory.
The open dormitory stretched from the bow of the middle deck all the way to the ship’s stern, each level filled with sleeping biochemical soldiers.
These soldiers, altered from normal people, lay shoulder to shoulder on the open dormitory, their eyes closed and their breathing steady.
Their brains, covered by glass covers, pulsed at an extremely slow frequency. The soft tubes connected to their heads steadily transmitted fluid.
Each biochemical soldier had a pipe connected to their chest. White steam flowed from within the soldiers into the pipe, travelled along the pipeline into the power room on the lower deck, pushing the fan blades, providing power to the entire ship.
Obviously, this was a cargo ship powered by sleeping Biochemical soldiers.
Noland Lee patted Derek Davis’s shoulder and said softly,
“Magic Vision tells me there are many, many people in the middle deck. You go and see what’s happening.”
Derek turned his head, saw Lee’s jet-black eyes, assumed it was an external manifestation of magic, and was not surprised.
He nodded, made a gesture, and directed the mechanical crab into the staircase leading to the middle deck.
After skillfully avoiding several patrol teams, the mechanical crab successfully infiltrated the middle deck.
“Hiss… So these are the Biochemical soldiers? The sketch you drew is quite accurate. Their brains are exposed as if split bare.”
Derek Davis took a deep breath, his eyes full of shock.
He furrowed his brow, relying on the crab’s vision brought by ‘Perceptual Link,’ quickly counting the number of biochemical soldiers.
“Four floors of open dormitory, twenty rows on each floor… There are about two thousand biochemical soldiers here?!”
Derek Davis lowered his voice, full of astonishment.
He thought for half a second and said,
“It’s a tricky situation, Noland. This many biochemical soldiers is far more than what we can handle. I’ll go check out the lower deck first, once we ascertain the quantity of goods in the hold, we should retreat immediately.”
Just as Derek was about to control the mechanical crab, he was interrupted by Noland Lee.
Noland raised his hand and placed it on his shoulder, raising a finger, pointing upwards,
“Be careful, Derek. Those patrolling sailors have gathered, they’re heading towards the middle deck. Hurry and hide your alchemical construct.”
Derek nodded slightly, the gloved right hand changing gestures continuously:
“Let me see where I can hide it… In this middle deck, apart from the bed boards, it’s only the Biochemical soldiers. If those Empire people come to the middle deck to inspect the Biochemical soldiers, there really aren’t many places for my mechanical crab to hide.”
“Thump, thump, thump…”
The sound of boots stepping in the corridor issued from the corridor above Noland Lee and Derek Davis. All patrol teams left the cabin, moving along the outer corridor towards the staircase leading to the middle deck.
Derek’s right hand sped up its gesture changes, seemingly pressed for time in finding a place for the mechanical crab to hide.
About 10 seconds later, the movements of his right hand halted.
Derek breathed a sigh of relief and said,
“My alchemical construct is hidden. Where are those Empire people?”
Noland’s gaze, passing through the wall, followed the moving patrol team:
“They just walked to the corner of the staircase.”
After observing for a moment, Noland said,
“The patrol team didn’t go to the middle deck, Derek. It was a false alarm. They’re heading to the lower deck. Do you want your mechanical crab to follow? The cargo hold on the lower deck should be locked. If you follow now, the patrol team could conveniently open the door for you, but there’s a risk of being discovered.”
“I’ll give it a try. Let’s see if there’s a chance to slip in.” Derek’s right hand began making gestures:
“If there really isn’t an opportunity to inspect the cargo hold, we’ll return to the exploration ship.”
Noland thought for a moment and said,
“I need to tell you something, Derek. Using Magic Vision, I observed the captain’s quarters. There’s a very tall human inside. Judging from the profile of his body, he is not the captain of this ship. I’m sure of it. The documents that Cindy found for me included the height and weight of the captain. The real captain is supposed to be medium-built, thin, not a brawny, tall individual. Just looking at this person’s figure, he’s more robust than the sailors going back and forth on patrol. This gives me a bad feeling…”
Noland paused and then said,
“The crew and the captain on this ship probably aren’t the original lot, Derek. They are likely Imperial soldiers.”
Derek slowly nodded:
“There is indeed such a possibility, no, it should be said that the real situation is like this. Ordinary crew members and captains don’t have the ability to deal with biochemical soldiers. I also found that the crew is extremely vigilant, having clearly undergone military training. Especially the squad leader of the patrol team. Their senses are very sharp. If not for the camouflage runes on my alchemical constructs, they would have discovered us long ago. What do you estimate their strengths to be?”
“The squad leader is at least a lieutenant. I saw a black ink spray on the back of their heads. It’s the mark of elite fighters. We are dealing with a real group of empire’s elite.” Noland Lee said.
Derek Davis paused for two seconds:
“…True elites. This is much more difficult than I initially thought. Let’s do this. I’ll only attempt to infiltrate the lower deck once. If it’s not successful, we’ll leave immediately.”
Both men fell silent.
Derek Davis focused on controlling the mechanical crab.
Noland, on the other hand, stared at the captain’s quarters, his eyebrows furrowed.
After activating “Life and Death Tracking,” the first two things he did were to observe the biochemical soldiers and deconstruct the captain.
That captain was the only Imperial Major on the cargo ship.
After Noland sent out a deconstruction toward him, he received unexpected feedback.
[System Message:]
[You are about to use Deconstruction on “Unnamed Extraordinary One”.]
[Estimated consumption of 4000 energy Points, Deconstruction can reach 100% completion.]
[Attention!]
[The system detects that deconstructing this character will have negative effects on you.]
[It is recommended to use harmless deconstruction to deconstruct this character.]
There were three unusual things about this system message.
The first unusual place was the easiest to identify, which was that the deconstruction could bring harm.
The second unusual thing was:
The system used “Extraordinary One” instead of “Imperial Major” to refer to that person.
According to Noland’s experience:
When Noland knows that a person is a wizard or a Biochemical Giant, the deconstruction he sends out will give back clear information. The system will determine this person as an “Unnamed Wizard” or “Unnamed Imperial Warrant Officer”.
If this person’s extraordinary identity is different from what Noland envisioned, and Noland has not encountered this type of extraordinary person before, then the system will name him using the title of “Extraordinary One”.
If Noland’s guess is correct, the Imperial Major in the captain’s room is not the “Imperial Fist”, and the other party’s extraordinary path is unknown.
The third unusual place was the energy Points needed to deconstruct this Imperial Major.
The night Noland met Betty, he found that the energy Points required to deconstruct her was higher than that of a typical first rank wizard.
He found out the reason later; it was because Betty was also working as an alchemist.
Every additional extraordinary identity of the deconstruction target will double the required energy Points for deconstruction.
A normal Imperial Major could be deconstructed with just 2000 energy Points.
The one before him needed 4000; twice as much.
This indicated that he also had an “extra job” and juggled an extraordinary profession unknown to Noland.
And it was this extraordinary profession that could cause negative effects on Noland.
Noland pulled up his personal panel to have a look.
[Energy] 58133/22
[Soul Strength] 1313 points
Not to mention 4000 energy Points, even 40,000 Points, Noland could afford with gritted teeth.
He calculated the reserve of energy Points he set aside.
Considering that he had several skills to upgrade, he planned to keep more energy Points on hand.
Noland muttered to himself:
“System, consume 4000 energy Points, harmlessly deconstruct that Imperial Major.”
A moment of vagueness passed through his mind, and large chunks of system messages refreshed.