Chapter 729: Chapter 729: The Sweep
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With no intention of revealing the identity of the person inside, Green Arrow Duck didn’t use an external loudspeaker to speak. Instead, he used the projection device on the Panther to display a three-dimensional map of the sewer system, marking everyone’s current positions.
Starting from their current location, he then marked the connected passages in three colors—the classic red, yellow, and green. Green Arrow Duck also fired paint rounds from his railgun, marking every passage that was actually connected.
John Wick understood and said, "You mean the colors shown on the map correspond to the actual passages?"
Green Arrow Duck simply nodded.
Comparing the map with the actual surroundings, John Wick said, "There’s only one red passage, and it leads to an area with a large number of red dots. So that’s where those new vampires are gathered.
"The green passages include the one from the direction where you appeared. Judging by the abilities you’ve demonstrated, I believe there are no enemies left in the green passages. So yellow means you’re uncertain—there might still be a few enemies there?"
Another nod.
"So you want us to attack the red passage? You’re not telling us to leave through the green passages, are you?"
Communicating solely through gestures was difficult, so Green Arrow Duck had no choice but to activate the electronic speech mode. The Panther produced the voice.
"Clear. Yellow."
The voice didn’t come from the stuffed duck, but from the four-legged metal panther. This surprised everyone slightly, but they quickly accepted it.
Seeing that everyone understood him, Green Arrow Duck spun around elegantly, activating his hovering mechanism. Compressed-air devices in his duck feet propelled the frictionless mech forward at high speed. Seeing this, the Panther immediately followed.
Unlike a car, whose wheels would splash water everywhere as it passed, the Panther’s running motion still kicked up quite a bit of filthy water from the ground, making everyone frown.
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Watching the two Duck-Panther armors disappear into the distance, someone finally complained, "Where did they find these reinforcements? Are they even on our side?"
John Wick’s thinking was much simpler.
"They killed the vampires, and we’re still alive. What more proof do you want?"
"You intend to follow that monster’s instructions?"
"Once we’ve come this deep, aside from the passage we came through, nobody knows what’s ahead in the other passages. Do you have a better idea? Or should we do what we did before and split our forces among the passages we haven’t explored?"
In fact, the reason this group had ended up together was that they had split off from their original teams and subsequently been brought together with people from other groups by the intersecting passages. This showed that the sewer system was laid out like a network rather than being a single one-way path leading downward.
The strange stuffed creature’s suggestion reduced the number of passages they would have to explore separately. That also meant they could put more people into each individual passage.
At this considerable depth in the sewers, where they had already begun encountering enemies and had even been surrounded like they were here, nobody would object to having a few more comrades at their side. So no one opposed John Wick’s proposal.
Seeing that nobody had any other suggestions, John Wick said to the two people who were more seriously injured, "Mike, Johnny, you two head back the way we came. Everyone else, form groups of three or four and pick a yellow passage.
"I’ll take the first one on the right. From the map I just saw, this passage eventually leads to the red zone as well. Anyone who still has ammunition, follow me."
As he spoke, John Wick was also sorting out the ammunition for his firearms. He replaced the magazines in all his guns with fresh ones, putting away magazines that still had rounds left and discarding the empty ones.
He hadn’t been using the rifles he’d been carrying earlier simply because he’d run out of ammunition and hadn’t had time to change magazines. In a real firefight, nobody would stop to reload in the middle of an exchange unless they were absolutely forced to and had nowhere to run. Switching to another loaded gun was faster.
Now that he had the opportunity, he naturally hurried to reload all his weapons. And John Wick wasn’t the only one. When the others saw what he was doing, they quickly followed suit. The entire process took less than half a minute.
The two men who had been told to withdraw didn’t insist on staying behind until they could no longer fight. They sensibly handed over their full spare magazines, took weapons that still had ammunition, and supported each other as they withdrew from the battlefield.
There was pay for this operation. But if you were dead, no amount of money could be spent. They understood perfectly well whether they should choose perseverance or staying alive.
The remaining people checked each other’s condition and exchanged subtle nods.
"Go!"
At the command, everyone split into groups according to how well they knew one another and entered different yellow passages.
The strange stuffed creature’s warning had been clear enough. These were passages where he either wasn’t sure what lay ahead or knew there were still enemies. So everyone remained extremely alert, taking care not to be ambushed by the new vampires.
Meanwhile, Green Arrow Duck and the Panther, who had charged ahead to wipe out the Reapers, took the passage containing the largest number of enemies.
At this stage, the two of them directly activated their solar lamps, illuminating the passage ahead as brightly as broad daylight.
Any Reapers still within the area would naturally suffer severe burns from the ultraviolet light. If they remained under it for too long, they would even die. Thus, the Reapers were driven toward the same location. Any that were too slow were finished off by Green Arrow Duck with a follow-up shot.
Eventually, they arrived at a large underground space that had apparently been newly excavated.
Before approaching, the two Duck-Panther armors switched off their ultraviolet lights. The purpose of turning them on had been to drive the Reapers toward a single location. If they kept the lights on after reaching their destination and scattered all the Reapers gathered there, they would only be defeating the purpose.
The reason they judged this space to be newly excavated was that there wasn’t even the slightest source of illumination inside. Every living creature moving around here relied either on its natural night vision or simply felt its way around.
Such a minor obstacle was naturally no problem for the mechs designed by Henry. By combining several different reconnaissance modes, they effortlessly surveyed the terrain and environment, mapped the distribution of living creatures, and shared the data with the database of all mechs on the same system.
Now all he had to do was wait for the other three to arrive. Then they could launch an all-out assault on the Reapers and wipe out this new breed of vampire in one fell swoop.
However, surprises always happened faster than planned operations.
A group of humans stormed into the Reapers’ lair with overwhelming momentum.
They relied only on the faint light of flashlights to determine their surroundings rather than using ultraviolet lamps to slaughter everything in their path.
The latter required enough brightness to actually burn vampires or Reapers to death and, frankly speaking, consumed a tremendous amount of power. The human side still primarily relied on ultraviolet-type weapons rather than marching into the sewers with solar lamps blazing.
The weak illumination was enough to let them move freely, but its drawback was that they couldn’t see very far ahead—not even the traps the Reapers had set.
As for the fact that these people had charged straight into the enemy’s lair without realizing it, Green Arrow Duck, watching from the sidelines, could only be rendered speechless.
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