Alien Relic Hunter.

Chapter 255 Avalanche! ! ! (4000 word chapter)
Ke Lan didn't speak, but responded directly with practical actions - he checked the equipment on his body for the last time, then walked to the edge of the cliff, facing the bottomless tiankeng, and jumped down!

Not only did he want to go down, but he was also the most important vanguard in the entire team!

The rocket thrusters on the back and legs ejected fiery tail flames at the same time, helping Ke Lan adjust his posture in the air, and flew towards the pit wall on one side.

With a bang, the Nino alloy claws at the ends of the limbs popped out at the same time, and cut into the hard ice without hindrance. Then, the mechanism at the front of the claws was triggered, and each claw was unfolded. Four barbs with thorns were pulled out, and amidst a tooth-piercing sound of rubbing, twenty ravines of different depths were plowed out on the pit wall.

Ke Lan's position was finally stabilized at a depth of 35 meters - his whole body was firmly attached to the ice on the surface of the pit wall, just like a kind of earth creature called a "gecko".

Ke Lan looked around, and said in the team channel with a throat mic: "Descent depth, 35 meters, safe, no trace of 'Siren' has been found yet, the communication is over."

The word "siren" comes from a sea monster in ancient Greek mythology that can confuse human beings with singing, and here it is used to refer to the alpha language that only Ke Lan can hear, and the secrets hidden in it. mental attack.

Looking down from Ke Lan's position, you can also see those hunters who are suspended by steel cables for mining operations at a deeper level. For the cutting machine, the feet are on the cutting frame that has been driven into the ice. The strong wind circulating in the tiankeng is constantly whipping these people, making hunting sounds... From time to time, some chopped ice shards will come out. They fell in front of them and fell into the dark abyss.

Soon, the hound and others also jumped down from above. They hung themselves at a depth of about 20 meters with their claws, and formed a fan-shaped "advancing formation" with Ke Lan's position as the apex.

"To be honest...the fan-shaped advance formation has been used many times when encircling and suppressing indigenous creatures, but this is really the first time in the vertical plane." The hound's voice sounded on the team channel.

"Anyway, our equipment has three-dimensional maneuverability, and there is not much difference between vertical and water surface..." Ke Lan said, "All units should confirm their own conditions. If there is no problem, I will continue to descend."

"Second position, Hound, no problem."

"No. [-], Akira Asano, no problem."

……

Everyone replied one by one according to the serial number of the preset position. After the confirmation, Ke Lan pulled out the hook claws of his right hand and right foot, and leaned down the entire right half of his body. After finding a new foothold, he pulled out the hook claws Insert into the ice, then pull out the claws of the left hand and foot, and repeat the process.

Compared with the "leapfrog" fall, although this rock climbing-like descent is much slower, it is more stable and does not consume precious fuel in the rocket propulsion.

Anyway, the goal set for the first exploration operation is 50 meters deep, even if it takes half an hour to climb like this, Ke Lan's physical strength is fully capable.

But just when Ke Lan was about to continue climbing down, there was a sudden violent explosion from above his head!Suddenly, a large amount of crushed snow and ice rolled down from above!
"Damn it! What's going on here? What happened up there?" the hound roared loudly. He was just hit by a piece of ice the size of a washbasin while climbing, and the exoskeleton on one side was severely damaged. , the rocket thrusters on the back and waist fell down together with the bracket... Fortunately, the claw on the other hand was inserted deep enough, allowing the hound to hang on the wall of the pit without falling into the abyss.

"Asano Akira! Layton! You go help the old dog!" Ke Lan shouted in the microphone, "Don't fly up now! In addition to the explosion, I also heard gunshots!"

"I heard it too! Damn, it's the gunshots of modified Type 01 assault rifles and Mozambique shotguns, as well as some crude semi-automatic weapons... Grass! Could it be exiles?!" Layton whispered.

Ke Lan immediately switched to the communication channel of the "Greek" and asked, "Captain, what's the situation above the sinkhole?"

The captain of the "Greece" is a more than 40-year-old middle-aged man. He used to be the chief mate of a heavy assault ship in the Second Fleet. After retiring, he was hired by the Soma Consortium. The top of the high-speed airship.

As a retired soldier who has experienced many battles, the captain's reaction was very calm: "The relic hunters above the sinkhole have been attacked——the attackers were a convoy of eleven unidentified modified vehicles. Coming from the direction, there is still a distance of 500 meters from the temporary observation station and the hunter camp, and rocket launchers and individual missiles are being used to carry out long-range strikes on the camp. Estimated at the current speed of the convoy, it is expected to rush into the camp in [-] seconds."

"Didn't the early warning radar on the ship detect this group of attackers?" Ke Lan couldn't help asking.

"There should be a stealth device in the convoy that can shield radar detection, so it was not discovered in advance." The captain replied.

"... Can the identity of the attacker be deduced from the characteristics of these vehicles?"

"The attackers should be exiles in the wilderness, but it is impossible to judge which force it is." The captain paused and said, "The Polaris Hunting Group in the camp below sent a signal for help to our ship, whether to fire or not?" assistance?"

"Assistance is permitted, but pay attention to the range of attack and minimize accidental injuries... In addition, send out carrier-based drones to cover our return."

"Received, ready for fire assistance, attack target: exile convoy."

Ke Lan's goggles are equipped with a screen directly connected to the small command system. From this screen, he can clearly see the pictures taken by the drone: only the port rear and starboard front of the "Greek" At the same time, flames more than ten meters long were ejected from the side, and the entire empty ship slowly turned sideways, and the weapon compartments on the side facing the attackers opened one after another, and four rapid-fire railguns and two honeycomb missile launchers protruded from them. .

This is the strongest firepower that a civilian airship can carry. Although this little firepower can scratch an itch in front of a battleship, it is more than enough to deal with the convoy of exiles.

From the footage of another drone, Ke Lan finally saw the true face of the attackers—they were eleven off-road vehicles modified like tanks, with a large number of rusty rivets welded to the front of the vehicle , three pairs of wheels with a diameter of two meters are wrapped with thick metal tracks, and the rear of the car is filled with all kinds of long-range weapons.

This is indeed the style of the exiles, but even among the exiles, this convoy can definitely be regarded as luxuriously armed. Many large settlements can't make up such an armored vehicle even if they spend all they have. Let alone eleven.

Ke Lan shared the footage of the drone with the rest of the team, and the hound immediately scolded: "Fuck, are these bastards crazy?"

"No, they're not crazy... They're here to snatch the stele." Ke Lan suddenly thought of a possibility, and couldn't help but shudder.

"Stone tablet? What's the use of them grabbing this thing? Do they think that people from the research institute will spend a lot of money to buy this thing from a group of exiles?"

"They didn't grab this for money, but for research... This group of people are not ordinary exiles." Ke Lan said word by word.

"Research, it's up to them—" the hound got stuck in the middle of the sentence, and after a while, he said with some difficulty, "You mean, this group of people were sent by that heretical sect?"

In addition to Ke Lan, the relic hunter who founded the heresy sect can also understand the text of the Alpha civilization. These steles are only hard to decipher alien documents at the research institute, but in his hands, they are immediately read. It has become a valuable research material!

Judging from the research level of the heretic sect on the Seed of Corrosion, Ke Lan has no doubt that that guy can reproduce the biological weapons recorded on these steles, and even improve them!

That person escaped from the ark a long time ago, and he has been hiding in an unknown place in the wilderness, and these exiles who are active in the wilderness are the real foundation of the heresy sect!
No one knows how far the heretical sect has developed among the exiles, but one thing is certain is that they have enough force to conquer every settlement of the exiles and absorb the population as their own. Congregation.

Although the total population of the exiles is not as large as the humans on the ark, the number of settlements, large and small, is a number that should not be underestimated. If these people are... no, not all of them, as long as there are ten If one of them is transformed into a biological weapon by a heretic sect, it will be a very terrifying force.

They don't even need to rush to attack the Ark, they just need to keep attacking the relic hunters everywhere, and plunder the spoils unearthed from the ruins by these hunters. With that person, the heretic sect can digest the spoils faster than the Ark, with the help of Alpha Civilized technology, within a few years, the gap in technological level between the two sides will be completely subverted.

And there are only two ways to change this situation: the first way is to capture or kill the founder of the heresy sect alive, without his heresy sect, there is no way to pose any threat to the ark; the second way is to It was Ke Lan who disclosed his abilities to the top management of Ark, and an arms race like the "Cold War" of the old era was launched between the two sides.

……

"Fire!" The captain's order came from the channel, and hundreds of small guided missiles poured out from the launch nest, dragging white trails and flew towards the exile's convoy. When there were almost 100 meters left, they all lost their heads—some fell to the ground and exploded, some flew crookedly into the distance as if drunk, and the most outrageous one was He turned the angle directly and crashed into a temporary barracks built by the Polaris Hunting Group!
"Hey! There are anti-guidance and jamming devices on these armored vehicles! Their appearance is just a camouflage, and the equipment carried on these vehicles is no less than that of the regular army of the field force!" Seeing this scene, Layton said anxiously, "No Use missiles, directly blast him with magnetic rails! I don't believe they have shield generators on their cars!"

A faint blue streamer descended from the sky and went straight to the modified car at the front of the convoy. Just when the blue streamer was about to touch the car, a gorgeous light shield suddenly lit up in front of the car——

The hound immediately scolded: "Layton, you are a fucking crow mouth! Next time, please don't say a few words!"

"boom!!"

The arm-thick electromagnetic bullet slammed into the energy shield fiercely, and nearly two-thirds of the projectile was vaporized in an instant, while the remaining one-third deviated from the planned trajectory and just penetrated into the energy shield. into the ground.

Although the modified car could not be destroyed directly, the huge kinetic energy contained in the projectile still lifted the car instantly and smashed it into another car behind the convoy!
The two cars that collided with each other suddenly had a more violent explosion - the car ammunition that died in the explosion affected most of the convoy, and amidst the continuous explosion, nearly half of the modified cars were killed. It turned into a blazing fireball, and the vehicle behind had to step on the brakes.

"Good fight!" the hound shouted, but in a flash, he suddenly felt something was wrong, "You...do you hear any... rumbling sound?"

"Explosion?" Layton asked on the communication channel.

"No...it's not an explosion, it's...the sound of something collapsing...from far to near..." Ke Lan heard it too, and he shuddered suddenly, "No, it's an avalanche! Firefight and explosion The resulting vibrations set off an avalanche!"

Before the words fell, countless cracks appeared on the ice layer in front of them in an instant—the next second, the ice surface they were clinging to had already shattered!
"Fuck! Run! Use the thrusters to fly out!" Layton yelled, pulled the mechanical arm hard, lifted the hound with the damaged exoskeleton in his hand, and activated the rocket thrusters behind him, but it didn't wait He adjusted the angle, and a large heavy object, who didn't know whether it was ice or broken rock, hit him firmly, pushing the two of them into the abyss!
"Layton! Old dog!" Ke Lan turned around and shouted, but soon, he also felt as if someone had punched his back hard, and the thrust that kept him suspended in mid-air suddenly disappeared, and his whole body In an instant, he lost his balance and fell into the depths of the tiankeng...

During the fall, Ke Lan managed to raise his head, only to see the majestic snow waves sweeping across the incomplete glacier like a tsunami. They carried broken rocks and rushed to the edge of the tiankeng, and then rolled down—whether Ke Lan Lan and the others are still hunters working on the pit wall, they cannot be avoided at all!

(End of this chapter)