Chapter 278. Invasion
A few withered black tentacles shot out from behind Charles and pierced the chest of a machine gunner. The tentacles wrapped around the corpse and dragged it behind Charles. A grotesque chewing noise echoed afterward as Anna consumed the corpse to recover.
Anna was in her true form as a member of the Diois Tribe. Her tentacles wrapped around Charles' waist as she stuck to his back like a barnacle.
Charles swooped down to snatch a rifleman. The soldier died instantly as Charles allowed his vampiric thirst to take over him. Just as the soldier ran out of blood, another soldier on the brink of death was handed over to Charles by Anna's tentacles.
Charles opened his monstrous maw. He bit the soldier and carried him in his mouth as he rushed toward the nearby troops.
The soldiers stationed on top of Ronker fought back. Anna's tentacles writhed, and a soldier holding a grenade stuffed the same grenade into his mouth before running toward his horrified comrades.
It seemed that almost all forces were told to attack the Pope, which meant the Ronker itself was relatively defenseless. Charles and Anna easily slaughtered the troops on top of Ronker, but Ronker's weak defense didn't mean it was easy to conquer.
Ronker's massive and expansive frame posed a significant obstacle to both Charles and Anna; they couldn't locate Swann at all.
Charles pondered briefly before tapping on one of Anna's tentacles. The tentacle monster loosened her grip on Charles. Having been released, Charles flew quite a bit of distance away from Anna before opening his maw to let out a piercing shriek at the metal floor.
The metal floor in a thirty-meter radius around Charles started to crumble, exposing the partitions down below. Charles folded his wings and took a stance to jump into the depths of Ronker.
"Watch out, Charles!" Anna's piercing cry stopped him in his tracks.
Shwik!
A flash of cold light reflected in Charles' pupils. A soldier had thrust his sword toward Charles at an unbelievable speed. It was so fast that Charles couldn't dodge it in time, but the swordsman's arm suddenly twisted at a weird angle.
It seemed that 372 had decided to lend him a hand. 372 had to have climbed onto the swordsman's arm at some point, and it gave Charles the chance to avoid the sword thrust.
Charles seized the opportunity and spread his wings to widen the distance between him and the swordsman. Charles took a moment to observe the swordsman—from the man's mask designed with intricate gears to the tubes sticking out of his back—Charles had no doubt that he was one of Swann's men.
However, it was rather bizarre to see an Albion Isles denizen use cold weapons rather than hot weapons.
Just then, Charles saw that 372 had crawled up to the man's neck. The swordsman seemed to have finally realized what was going on. He tossed his sword to his left hand and lifted it before thrusting it into his own neck.
He twisted it horizontally to peel the flesh away along with 372.
The man's flesh had yet to hit the ground, but he had already vanished and ran like a gust of wind toward Anna.
Charles had no intention of letting him hurt Anna. He swiftly turned into his human form and fired six shots at the swordsman, but the swordsman slashed out with his broadsword and deflected all six bullets at the same time.
Unfortunately for him, the brief interruption was enough for Anna to make her move. The swordsman sensed danger behind him, and he instinctively slashed out with his sword.
Chomp!
A dull noise echoed as the swordsman and his broadsword were engulfed by Anna's hideous-looking round maw. The swordsman struggled, swinging his broadsword around, but Anna remained unperturbed and continued chewing.
Meanwhile, Charles took advantage of the respite to catch his breath. However, the respite was brief as he heard numerous footsteps behind him. He turned and saw men wearing the same mask as the swordsman walking out of a hatch.
There seemed to be an infinite number of them.
The swordsman just now had been considerably skillful, so Charles didn't dare to let his guard down. He transformed back into a bat and grabbed Anna with his claws before taking off to the skies.
"This is bad. There are too many of them. I don't think we can do this head-on," Charles said.
Instead of responding, Anna reverted to her human form and kissed Charles' terrifying maw.
A viscous liquid spilled into Charles' mouth, and the liquid made him instinctively gulp. It was human blood, and the wounds he had sustained healed at a rate visible to the naked eye.
Charles continued to drink the blood that Anna had regurgitated while circling the speedy Ronker from above. His eyes were narrowed into slits as he examined the Ronker for any vulnerabilities he could exploit.
His eyes suddenly lit up, and he charged toward one of the massive pillars supporting Ronker.
"Anna, they're coming! Stop them while I knock this thing down!" Charles shouted.
Anna nodded. She slid off Charles and clung to the bronze-colored pillar covered in bolts and screws. Soon, a grating noise echoed as the enormous supporting pillars began to crumble beneath Charles' assault.
Charles was surprised to find that the supporting pillar wasn't filled with something solid. Rather, it was filled with a hot mixture of steam and gray fluid that seemed to be serving as hydraulic fuel.
The mixture spurted haphazardly into the air, and the fast-moving Ronker slowly began to buckle. The airspace above Ronker was suddenly filled with the distinct sound of aircraft propellers, but the noise was quickly replaced by shrieks and explosions. Anna had annihilated the helicopters in mid-air.
It seemed that it was more effective to attack the pillars rather than to pursue the elusive Swann. Ronker's supporting pillars crumbled one by one, drastically slowing it down.
Soon enough, the Pope finally found the golden opportunity to strike. He dove straight into the metal construct; the sturdy steel in his way seemed like pieces of paper to him rather than steel.
Pipes, gears, pistons—every obstacle in his way conceded before him.
Charles spread his wings and brought Anna to the hole that the Pope had torn open.
"You did great, my child. If it weren't for you, this fellow would have escaped," the Pope said as he sliced a masked man in half using an unknown power.
Bullets, cannonballs, and even the unidentified relics inside Ronker couldn't hinder the Pope.
Recalling Tobba's warning, Charles asked, "You're hiding a lot from me, right?"
"My child, are you suspicious of me? I'm afraid it's a bit too late for that."
"Better late than never," Charles replied.
"Your intuition is wrong. We're not the same as these riffraffs. We're the chosen ones, while they're nothing but vulgar commoners," the Pope said. He raised his hand gently, and the half-meter-thick steel doors split open to reveal Swann seated in front of multiple monochrome monitors.
The Pope lifted his hand once more, and Swann's chair spun, revealing his half-metal and half-flesh figure to both Charles and the Pope. Madness suffused Swann's eyes as he glared at the Pope and Charles.
"You think you've won, don't you? Do you really think that you're so clever by plotting this kind of scheme?" Swann smiled coldly, and the madness in his eyes intensified.
"If you've got any tricks left, show them to me now. All mortal tricks and schemes are meaningless before the Light God. You will simply be wasting your time; your efforts are in vain," the Pope said with an amiable expression.
"Is that so? Then, what if it's the efforts of another fellow Divinity?"
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