Chapter 322: Anxiety!
Translator: ryuxenji Editor: H2dH2mr
For these reasons, Qi Long and the other six managed to survive. Even if they had been afraid, they had been thrown by the explosion right into the middle-back part of the mainship. Of course, they had been severely injured in the process. Here, the benefits of having Li Shiyu had to be mentioned — he had instantly brought out the special medical agents he had developed. Their wounds which would normally have needed one or two days to recover were all mostly healed after several minutes.
Initially, Qi Long and the others had considered going to the tail-most end to look for Boss Ling Lan and [Self-Defined Destiny], but the remnant force of the magnetic storm and the low power of their mecha made it impossible for them to get close to the tail. Just as they were feeling helpless, [No Mecha Unrepaired] discovered a secret. The pilotless mecha around them could be claimed by players as long as the damage levels of the mecha did not exceed 40%.
After discovering this secret, Qi Long's group of seven was both surprised and pleased. This discovery meant that they would be able to find a way to go to the tail end of the mainship to find Boss Lan. They looked around and found that there were ten or so mecha they could collect. Those mecha had not been damaged too badly by the magnetic turbulence. The seven of them picked the best seven mecha and changed into them. Then just as they were about to go to the tail, they heard a mecha operator who had come to check on the situation appear in the middle-back area of the starship.
The magnetic tsunami had caused significant damage to the entire mainship. Not only were all of the staff members in the tail end dead, even some of the defenceless staff members and mecha operators outside of their mecha in the central areas of the ship had been killed by the explosive force of the large explosion. It could be said that the casualties were high.
Although the control centre of the mainship believed that there were basically no survivors in the tail end, they still sent a small mecha squad to go investigate. When Qi Long's group had first sensed the appearance of the mecha squad, their first reflex was to hide. However, Han Jijyun had an idea — he instructed the team to go up and greet the mecha squad.
Sure enough, when the mecha squad saw them, the other side was not at all suspicious. Instead, they almost cried out in relief and excitement. They had initially thought that the all their comrades in the tail end had died. They really did not expect to find any survivors ... this made them so ecstatic that they had no mind at all to bother asking for the survivors' team numbers or any other personal information.
Just like that, Qi Long and the others were taken into the safe area of the mainship. When the staff there discovered that they were heavily bruised and injured, they were settled into healing pods for the night.
Frankly, there was a fatal flaw in Qi Long's team's cover story. Their mecha control suits were not the formal military-use control suits. Instead, they were using civilian control suits that Mecha World had produced in the fashion of those military suits, so their suits were still somewhat different from the official mecha suits used by soldiers. However, they were very clever — they tore up the most questionable spots on their control suits. Qi Long in particular had almost overdone it to the extent that he was almost naked. At the same time, they were also ruthless enough to hurt themselves on purpose, staining whatever remained of their own control suits red. Their bleeding wounds caused the rescuers to pay no attention to their control suits, placing all their attention on the group's injuries. This allowed the group to safely overcome this most difficult hurdle.
After a night of rest, they put on the military uniforms that had been specially brought over for them. As the living quarters of the soldiers had been at the tail end and so had also been blown up, all of their clothes and daily necessities were sure to be gone as well. The support staff of the mainship naturally had to think for their sakes. Not only did the staff provide them with military uniforms, they were also each given a standard official military-use mecha control suit. This made Qi Long and the others laugh silently to themselves, glad that they were finally safe.
Of course, there was one other reason why the mainship rescue logistics team was so quick to believe that they were mecha operators of the ship itself. The ship's JMC and the other staff members of the ship who were familiar with the operations of the tail end had all been killed in the explosion, every single one of them. This had contributed to the ease with which Qi Long's group of seven had infiltrated the mainship. The staff members instinctively believed that any mecha operators who were piloting mecha of their mainship must of course be one of their own.
They truly did not believe that someone could sneak in without a trace. Therefore, no one doubted the origins of Qi Long's group. They were all just sincerely glad that their comrades in the tail end had not been completely wiped out. The fact that there were survivors was a comfort to them as well.
There was one more reason they had processed Qi Long and the others so hastily. The staff did not dare to meet the pleading and questioning eyes of Qi Long's team. After the rescue team had found Qi Long's group of seven, they had discovered that the air of the mainship was surging out at a dangerous rate. The mainship did not have enough power left to maintain the atmospheric balance of the air within the ship. In order to ensure the safety of the people in the middle and front sections of the ship, the commander had no choice but to stop the search and rescue efforts and close the airlock gate in the back half of the ship to prevent the air from continuing to leak out.
Although Qi Long's group of seven had pleaded repeatedly for the search and rescue efforts to continue, insisting that there must still be other mecha operators alive in the tail end, the staff still did not manage to enter the tail end again in the end. Time waits for no man — they needed to do their duty by the remaining people. Thus, the airlock gates had to be sealed once more and the search and rescue efforts concluded prematurely.
The hopeful expressions on the faces of Qi Long's team had made the search and rescue soldiers feel extremely guilty; they felt as if they had done wrong by their comrades in the tail end. So after putting them into recovery pods, the staff subconsciously began avoiding them. No one was willing to go verify their identity, because they were afraid that the other party would ask about the final outcome of the search and rescue effort ... just like that, Qi Long's group once again evaded another possibility of being exposed.
It had to be said that Qi Long and the others were very lucky. All of the surviving soldiers on the ship were grieving over the loss of about half of their comrades. Thus, they were exceedingly kind to the survivors, skipping over some of the typically necessary confirmation procedures. Meanwhile, when the commander received the report regarding the surviving mecha operators of the tail end, he too did not think much about it. He only gave word for the staff to take extra care of them and that was it. This was because at that time, the commander had been consumed with anxiety. How could he bring this battered mainship on its last legs to the Swift Dragon base? Who knew how much longer this ship would hold out for?
"The other party is indeed a rescue ship from the Swift Dragon base. We should be able to successfully enter the Swift Dragon base now ... I just don't know how Boss and [Self-Defined Destiny] are doing right now. I wonder if they're safe ..." Xie Yi whispered, finding it difficult to keep his worry from showing on his brow. Who knew if Boss Lan had managed to survive that magnetic tsunami?
"Don't worry. Who do you take Boss for? Since we all managed to survive, Boss most definitely survived as well," Luo Lang whispered back, his gaze filled with steel-like conviction. Luo Lang was the one with the greatest faith in Ling Lan. In Luo Lang's eyes, his boss would never be defeated, not even by such a horrific thing like the magnetic tsunami.
Han Jijyun nodded and said, "Luo Lang is right. Boss will definitely be fine. Worrying about Boss's condition is not what we should be doing now. Rather, we need to figure out how to infiltrate the Swift Dragon base seamlessly before Boss finds us." Han Jijyun believed that the true challenge lay ahead of them. They needed to begin preparations early. "Once we settle down at the Swift Dragon base, I'm sure that there will inevitably be a registration of the survivors of the mainship. Since we do not know the information of any members of the mainship we can use, at that time, we will definitely be exposed."
"If only Boss were here. He is a hacker, so he would definitely be able to obtain the information of those mecha operators in the tail end and give us some suitable identities." A trace of regret flashed through Lin Zhong-qing's eyes. He too had thought of this problem. As the mainship had been greatly damaged, most of the common soldiers had passed away in this magnetic tsunami. The staff on the ship had been so busy cleaning things up and keeping things together that they had not had the spare energy to properly vet the survivors. However, once everything had settled, both the commander of the mainship and the leader of the Swift Dragon base would be sure to insist for proper checks to be carried out. As Han Jijyun said, their exposure was imminent.
At this point, Lin Zhong-qing could not help but smile bitterly. Once again, he found that Boss Lan was truly an omnipotent existence for them. As long as he was around, any problem would no longer be a problem, able to be solved easily.
"Speaking of hackers, I seem to have heard [Self-Defined Destiny] say before that he too is a hacker. If he were around, perhaps we could also have obtained that information ..." Xie Yi recalled what [Self-Defined Destiny] had said on the transport ship and remarked with some regret.
"That's true! How unlucky. If he were here, we would be much safer ..." said Qi Long in frustration at those words, "If I had known earlier, I would have let [Self-Defined Destiny] enter the mainship first back then."
"It's too late to say all this now. We might as well brainstorm and think about how we should deal with the situation." Li Shiyu interrupted Qi Long's tangent and reminded everyone to stop thinking about useless things.
Han Jijyun nodded and said, "Dux Li is right. The two hackers of our team are not here, so it's pointless to think about ways to get the information via hacker abilities. Let's think of some other way."
The group began to think hard, but unfortunately they could not come up with a good method. Then, Xie Yi saw [No Mecha Unrepaired] staring blankly at a corner. The other was still a second year student in the military academy now due to being held back two years. He was Chang Xinyuan who had been forced into dire straits because he had caught the eye of the Thunder King.
Xie Yi followed his line of sight but saw nothing there except a spider spinning a web ... he stared dubiously at [No Mecha Unrepaired] a.k.a. Chang Xinyuan and wondered — had the other thought of something?
Chang Xinyuan seemed to feel the heat of Xie Yi's gaze, and he slowly came back to himself. He smiled embarrassedly and asked, "Xie Yi, you ... what's up?"
"You were staring off into space. Have you thought of something?" asked Xie Yi curiously.
Chang Xinyuan rubbed his head in embarrassment. "I just never expected that [Lingtian First-String] was actually that Boss Lan who defeated the Leiting Mecha Clan. And it's even more unexpected that I would join your battle clan ... this makes me feel as if I am dreaming ..."
Xie Yi was speechless. When they had first gotten out of their mecha, Chang Xinyuan's expression had been calm and composed. Xie Yi had thought the other had not recognised them and so they had not paid any mind to it. Unexpectedly, Chang Xinyuan knew all about their backgrounds but was only showing signs of it now. Had he just pretended too well ... or was his reflex arc just abnormally slow for him to only react now?
Chang Xinyuan's words made the other people look at each other speechlessly as well. It had already been a full night since then! Friend, for you to exclaim about it now — isn't it a little too late?
The penetrating gazes of the other six made [No Mecha Unrepaired] rather flustered. He once again rubbed his head and said, "Actually, I was just thinking about those words Boss Lan had said to us when we had departed." Unconsciously, Chang Xinyuan had adopted the address of Boss Lan from Qi Long and the others.