novelraw Chapter 6 : Academy Seven
Chapter 6 : Academy Seven
After handling the repair shop matters for old Mr. Peter on Talo Star, Chen Sui was given some special metal materials from the mining star.
On the way to the jump flight, he also transferred her a sum of money. Though not a large amount, it would prevent her from being too strapped for cash when she first arrived on Yuguang Star.
She understood this as old Mr. Peter's subtle way of showing care. The repair shop matters weren't actually troublesome, but they allowed her to accept this money without pressure.
On the way to the jump flight, Chen Sui had a feeling of leaving home.
Sitting in the holographic waiting hall built of transparent metal, watching the flight information flashing on the floating light screen, she couldn't help but think of her first duty as a vanguard.
Her teacher Chen Jia, while strictly warning her about precautions, had also placed everything she needed in her backpack.
In the crisis-ridden contaminated area, each time Chen Sui discovered an item she needed, it was an unexpected surprise.
She reclined in her seat, with the transparent metal projection on the ceiling displaying frames of the starry sky, creating an image of rotating star tracks. A white light flashed in her emerald-green pupils.
She couldn't help wondering if her teacher would miss her, if the new vanguard of the underground city would do better than her, if alien species would still attack the underground city.
Would they wait until the day all pollution was eliminated? And her mecha, would they find her mecha? Would that spear that could resonate with her spirit meet another master?
Realizing her thoughts had wandered too far, Chen Sui suddenly smiled.
No more nostalgia for the past, now she had a new path to walk.
"Jump flight TLCD9541 is about to launch, please enter the verification channel quickly."
As the prompt sounded in the waiting hall, Chen Sui gathered her thoughts, followed the instructions through verification, and boarded the jump flight.
The jump ship was docked on a special space shuttle track. One side of the starship was a huge transparent window, the other side a holographic projection screen.
As the ship started, Chen Sui's position was in the passenger cabin next to the transparent window. The tunnel-like light track emitted the special blue glow of energy materials.
Through the track, the black river of stars was incredibly deep. Occasionally, flying objects attracted by unknown gravity would approach. Before they could get close, the special barrier of the star track would flash with electricity, and a dazzling beam of light would shoot out, instantly reducing them to powder.
Chen Sui watched this scene with some amazement, her gaze searching among the stars to see if there were more such spectacles.
The crowd became noisy as the holographic projection opposite opened, with the sound of artillery fire incongruent with the somber atmosphere of the passenger cabin.
Hearing the sound of guns and cannons, a flash of sharpness passed through Chen Sui's eyes. Her muscles instantly tensed, adjusting to a position for the quickest combat response within the well-wrapped passenger cabin, her eagle eyes immediately locating the sound source.
As the holographic projection fully expanded, confusion rose in Chen Sui's furrowed brow, before she realized it was just a false projection.
She slowly relaxed her tense body, unconsciously glancing at the people around in the passenger cabin. Seeing them eagerly staring at the projection, completely unaware of her behavior, she immediately breathed a sigh of relief.
However, Chen Sui noticed that all passenger cabins unanimously adjusted their angles to ensure they could view the projection.
The projected image was pitch black, without a single silhouette, only extremely weak light illuminating what seemed to be inside a cave, with artillery sounds exploding in the distance.
The cave rustled for a while, followed by a heavy breathing sound. A beam of light swept across the lens, illuminating the rugged stone walls.
"Whew, from what I'm hearing, they're still fighting?"
The male voice lowered, speaking in a faint breath.
Someone tapped his mecha with metal, silently urging him. The young man walked forward a few steps, and finally, the mecha's energy lamp illuminated the stone cave. The grayish-yellow stone walls were covered with paste-like green mucus, distributed with some white spots, looking somewhat nauseating.
Chen Sui heard another voice say "yue" once, as if pinching their nose, "I'm going to throw up. Why don't we go out and fight with them? The smell of this ghost worm secretion, I'm really going to throw up."
"Something doesn't seem right."
The calm female student pacified her teammate's fighting spirit.
"Zhu Jing Fu eliminated three people, how could Third Academy be that good?"
"Commander," the initial male voice said, "how about I go take a look?"
"Then we definitely need to go," the nauseous young man continued in his heavy nasal tone: "If Third Academy and other teams join forces, Zhu Jing Fu is eliminated, they can still get the energy monitoring equipment, doubling their points, my goodness."
The female student didn't speak immediately. After a while, she was heard saying: "Indeed, let's observe first, lure that worm over, and let them fight each other."
"What?"
The nasal voice sounded somewhat desperate: "I have to go back into that poison nest?!"
Chen Sui saw a mecha leave the team, heading back in the direction they had come from.
Conversations from other passengers spilled into the cabin, with content differing from what she saw. Looking down at the image, Chen Sui discovered a self-selection panel that could be operated from the passenger cabin.
Her viewing perspective had been from Star Sixth Academy, commonly known as Jaeger-LeCoultre on the StarNet.
This nickname targeted the seven special entrusted institutions from Border Army Zone Eleven. These seven academies were known as Star Military Direct Academies, under the jurisdiction of Border Army Zone Eleven, representing the top new blood in the Star Alliance's military district.
The StarNet distinguished Star Direct Academies from ordinary military schools in other star rings by referring to them by characteristic buildings and landmarks within these schools.
Just as Academy Seven was known as Zhu Jing Fu.
Seeing Sixth Academy preparing to exit the cave, Chen Sui became somewhat curious about the school she was about to attend and switched her perspective to Academy Seven.
The holographic image instantly changed to a huge stone cave where two teams were confronting each other.
Academy Seven had only two people, one in front holding a long cannon, Academy Seven's output Jin Yu, and behind him, protected, was Academy Seven's analyst mecha.
The opposing side had numerous people, with the team leader in front, facing the stubbornly resistant output opposite.
Chen Sui adjusted her view to confirm that the two teams confronting Academy Seven were Third Academy and First Academy.
"Someone's coming."
In the First Academy team, a deep black mecha with gold lines drawing thorny flowers on its arms suddenly put away its weapons and glanced to the side.
Third Academy's navy blue mecha looked up, scanning the surroundings. Chen Sui saw several holes at the top of the stone cave, one of which was where Sixth Academy had been.
The driver of the navy blue mecha spoke in a subdued tone: "Let's end this quickly."
The black mecha from First Academy laughed lightly, then somewhat teasingly said: "Happy to oblige."
First Academy's commander's voice turned cold: "Bai Li, Tian Ran."
"Understood," the voices of First Academy's two outputs sounded.
Two black mechas sped out. Chen Sui hadn't clearly seen what the mechas looked like when she saw a shadow in mid-air.
Opposite, Academy Seven's lone-fighting output Jin Yu, in less than a second, captured the mecha's paused position and immediately fired a shot.
The gun cannon with huge ammunition spewed forth, the opponent ejected a shell, and a black energy mass collided with the artillery fire.
The gun cannon immediately fell silent.
"I'm saying," a crisp female voice sounded from the black mecha in mid-air, Bai Li Wei, carrying the absorption cannon, said: "Why struggle? Hand over the monitoring equipment and leave, can't you? If you go out, you might kill a few energy bodies, get some points. Staying here losing everything would be a big loss."
Jin Yu opposite didn't speak, but Academy Seven's analyst, whom he was protecting behind him, shouldered his own gun cannon: "What are you thinking? Fighting for half a day and still daydreaming, hurry up and fight, stop wasting words."
"Jin Yu, beat her, let her know that villains die from talking too much."
Academy Seven's output Jin Yu silently mounted his cannon, firing several shots continuously toward the opponent's position.
Behind him, Academy Seven's analyst aimed the gun cannon and fired at Tian Ran, who was rushing toward her.
The two sides bombarding each other made First Academy's commander Jiang Tianyi in the distant black gilded mecha click his tongue lightly.
"Zhu Jing Fu's analyst is really troublesome. Commander Lin, why don't you send someone too?"
On the other side, Third Academy's commander Lin Fengchi scanned behind him. The other three people in his team surrounded the central analyst mecha in a triangular protective formation, constantly guarding against others.
"Raging Sun."
At the front of the triangle, Third Academy's output called Raging Sun drew a light blade from behind.
Chen Sui saw Jiang Tianyi hum a few off-key musical notes. Behind him in the team, a similarly black mecha gently pushed the analyst forward into the leader's protection range, then approached Third Academy's analyst.
It seems these allied schools aren't so unbreakable after all, Chen Sui thought, watching First Academy's sneaky attempt to sabotage.
As the seemingly two-sided, actually three-sided game progressed in the stone cave, Chen Sui keenly heard faint sounds coming from inside the mountain cave through the holographic projection.
Based on the sound's location, Chen Sui's gaze turned to one of the cave openings in the projection.
In the center of the stone cave, Third Academy's output Raging Sun's joining had put Academy Seven's two people at a disadvantage.
Just as First Academy's mecha approached Third Academy's analyst, the gun cannon he had been tossing up and down suddenly paused.
Only to hear Jiang Tianyi's humming stop abruptly as he sternly commanded: "Move."
First Academy's output aimed the gun cannon at Third Academy's analyst. Raging Sun, who was surrounding Academy Seven's analyst with Tian Ran, turned back upon hearing artillery fire from behind, saw this scene, and wanted to withdraw to assist.
However, Tian Ran dodged Academy Seven analyst's gun cannon and waved her hand, "Ghost Fish, hold him."
A huge fish phantom flashed behind her, extending several tentacles from the phantom to entangle Raging Sun's mecha.
Seeing this, Academy Seven's analyst swiveled the cannon muzzle toward Bai Li, pulling Jin Yu out of the entangled battle.
The two quickly retreated to a corner.
The battlefield instantly changed players, with First Academy and Third Academy firing intensely at each other.
Simultaneously, from above the stone cave came a heavy step, as if about to crack the cave.
Accompanied by a thin, long spike protruding from the stone cave, Sixth Academy's mecha with glowing lights flashed out, like liberation, breathing deeply: "Finally alive, I was suffocating."
Unfortunately, no one paid attention to his voice. After him, a rhinoceros-like monster with a massive body pounced down from the entrance.
The height of the entrance made it crash heavily, creating a small pit in the stone cave.
The rhinoceros's large nostrils spewed two red air waves. It rolled up from the ground and opened its fangs toward the surrounding crowd.
A resonating beast roar echoed throughout the cave.
A pillar of fire spurted from the beast's mouth, extending toward the mechas.