NOVEL WEB Chapter 92 - Flood
Chapter 92 Flood
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The mission system of Dark Zone boasted an unparalleled degree of freedom compared to other games.
This was especially true in the case of Yoo Jin’s West Point infiltration mission — it was through extreme difficulty that this became apparent. In essence, players could decide on their infiltration points, routes, and even basic operations.
Of course, in reality, such freedom could be a significant burden for users, so every mission had a basic story framework. For instance, rescuing a person had to be done, and objectives that needed to be blown up had to be destroyed.
This was also the case for the Artemis infiltration mission that Yoo Jin and Harmony were currently playing — to be specific, in this mission, information leakage was set to fail unconditionally, and the activation of the EMP was predetermined.
However, conversely, this meant that the flow of the mission could vary unimaginably beyond those points.
What did this mean?
[Choice: Extract additional Artemis data.］
Normally, right after the EMP activation, the two players would have to flee — such unexpected small missions that popped up were hidden triggers and a major way to raise mission clear ranks.
In today’s case, as always, it was due to Yoo Jin’s tactical-handed spike hammer.
It’s the first time I see something other than the objective to escape coming up, lol.
“Thank you for the thousand won donation, whoa.”
───Crash!
The reaction to donations here is quite generous, lol.
A kill for a thousand won donation? This is crazy, lol.
Teacher, please go easy on them!
No wonder there’s no disruption in the chat, lol.
Look at her using the hammer instead of the gun on purpose, she’s wicked, lol.
Artemis missions, characterized by small-scale infiltration and numerous data servers, mostly required intense close combat that couldn’t be experienced before, and shooting servers before achieving the objective could lead to mission failure due to cumulative damage.
Therefore, on days when such missions were set to very hard difficulty, many users usually carried high-powered, large-caliber handguns like the Desert Eagle to kill enemies in one shot with minimal ammunition.
Of course, in situations where strength couldn’t solve the problem, the joke about wondering if there was more strength available sometimes proved true.
The fact was, Harmony was the witness and evidence of this.
“…Do you know how scared I get every time you do that, Teacher?”
“Hehe.”
She glanced at Yoo Jin after looking at the enemy’s body, which had been so thoroughly crushed that she didn’t want to explain even though it was just polygons.
No one but Harmony knew — that avatar was almost a deception. Yoo Jin had embedded her real body directly into her avatar.
In a way, Yoo Jin was openly advertising to everyone, ‘I can do this in real life too.’ How could that not be frightening?
Yoo Jin moved through the server room, smashing nearby enemies and shooting distant ones with the MK18, becoming an excellent distraction and giving Harmony room to maneuver.
At a crossroad, a UGV advancing quickly came into Harmony’s sight as she took cover. With a strange sense of floating, a pulse swept the area. The reticle of the dot sight covered the marked weak point.
Harmony’s slender, long finger rested on the trigger, weighing only a few grams.
───Ratatat!
Flames and fragments flew into the air.
In less than a second, the bolt cycled several times, sending dozens of 5.56mm rounds through the air. The tungsten cores implanted inside performed effectively regardless of how hard the impact points were.
As holes riddled the UGV’s body, constant firing continued. Just over a second, and 31 rounds hit targets all around.
Harmony let her body fall into the rhythm, pulling out a magazine from her pouch and reloading smoothly. The drone, exposed to the barrage, reverted to a pile of scrap.
[Notification: Artemis Data Center access node confirmed. Synchronizing network. Data transmission will complete in 7 minutes 32 seconds.］
Oh nice, lol.
The person who used to drop magazines while reloading has finally become human…overwhelmingly emotional…!
Shooting a drone in full auto is a classic, lol.
This is what Dark Zone is all about, lol.
Our senior Harmony, the military girl, does not spare her shots!!!!
A state of intense concentration.
Combat demanded extreme focus, causing perceived time to stretch and compress like taffy, depending on whether it was loose or tight.
Enemies continued to flood in endlessly. The structural complexity of the server room meant that reinforcements couldn’t all enter at once, which was advantageous but also meant many were waiting outside.
There was always a reason why sudden missions were difficult.
However.
───Boom!
“Whoa!”
Bang.
Then a splash.
As Harmony just managed to hack a drone charging at her using a pulse, three ominous thumping noises were followed by grenades veering upwards towards the ceiling.
Amidst the shaking explosions,
“Teacher! Water is leaking from the ceiling───!!!!”
“What did you do?”
“I’m innocent too!”
Although buried deep within concrete, three multi-purpose high-explosive grenades hitting the wall caused the cooling pipes in the ceiling to crack, and ice-cold water began pouring into the server room.
The outcome of modern defense industry, material engineering, and architectural engineering clashing was on the verge of catastrophic failure, and grenades that advanced several stages, capable of penetrating over ten centimeters of armor with one shot, were enough to shatter concrete.
The sirens on the ceiling blinked, indicating that everything was going wrong.
[Warning. Leak detected. Warning. Leak detected. Water prevention system cannot be activated due to backup power cut. Server malfunction in 3 minutes 22 seconds. Complete flooding in 10 minutes 52 seconds.］
[Notification: Data transmission will complete in 56 seconds.］
Crazy, lol.
So proud of you, Harmony! You’ve done it again!
What’s with the server room flooding, lol.
Sorry, I’m such a fool for trying to predict the future!!
Why implement this kind of scenario, you Icarus madmen, lol.
“Whoa! Water is pooling on the floor! Do we have to stay here!?”
“The data will transfer automatically as long as the servers don’t get destroyed. Secure the evacuation route and the locations of the ceiling pipes.”
“Oh, yes! Let’s see, shortest escape route, shortest route…climbing equipment…done!”
Yoo Jin, who had quickly run across the floor starting to shallowly pool with water, added.
Having received the data, she tinkered with the ICARUS gear with terrifying focus, then began carefully maneuvering an Artemis UGV under Harmony’s control.
With the sound of thumping, grenades fired from the surrounding doors. As all gates blocking the exit were destroyed, Yoo Jin accessed the nearby CCTV to check the location and distribution of nearby enemies.
“…Think of the basement as a freely modified donut shape. The main elevator is in the middle, but it’s hard to use…let’s backtrack the way we came and exit through a side passage toward the water control room to the main entrance.”
“What about all those enemies?”
“Let’s draw their attention.”
The UGV’s 3-burst grenade launcher, with over twenty rounds left, rotated freely following her gaze.
It aimed at the ceiling — at the several meters thick cooling water pipes above.
Yoo Jin rarely smiled as she spoke.
“Are you ready for a water park?”
She’s truly crazy….
Thump thump.
After the flashes and explosions, water poured down like a waterfall.
Running out of the server room to avoid the downpour that seemed ready to flood the world, Harmony would never forget that donation.
“Hehe.”
The schedule of pro gamers might seem intense, but AP soloing was, in a way, a forced march. When the time came, you’d enter the designated room, shoot everything in sight, and leave. Either you die in the process, or you’re the sole survivor.
Being dedicated solely to AP soloing was a relief for her. Most of the others in SSM alternated between soloing, duo, and squad, undergoing a real forced march.
Anyhow, Dice — she was currently gathered with other pro gamers from the same team in SSM’s lecture room.
It was a sort of debriefing room. They discussed their gameplay, what they did well, what they did poorly, and how their movements were, among other things.
Unsurprisingly, Yoo Jin was the topic of conversation almost every day recently. The reasons were numerous: she had joined SSM as a temporary coach, displayed incredible performance, and so on.
And this was true for Dice as well.
She was the one who had openly declared the wild card in the early scrimmage and brought Yoo Jin to SSM temporarily.
Though recently, there had been fewer such stories than before───
“You don’t seem to watch Yoo Jin’s stream much? Everyone’s going wild right now.”
“Oh, Coach Pierre….”
Never mind.
It was Yoo Jin again. Was she causing another spectacle? Come to think of it, it was her streaming time. She had forgotten because today’s matches were particularly intense, leaving her especially tired.
After the coach casually dropped the brief comment and disappeared, curiosity began bubbling up as she logged into Tricky. [Harmony and Dark Zone Joint Stream] — the problem was the viewership number next to it: around 15,000 people.
Moreover, it proudly ranked first in the real-time HOT broadcast list, so she couldn’t resist clicking it.
Then,
[Waaah, Teacher! Put me down!
Put me dooown─!］
[Carrying and running is faster!］
[Whoa, there’s a tidal wave behind us! They said all the water pipes burst!］
It indeed looked like the basement of Artemis Corp….
What on earth had happened to cause a flood in the basement?
The brief description on the UI’s blueprint said the water supply system had malfunctioned due to the EMP, and with all the cooling pipes destroyed, the underground facility was flooding….
“What the hell is this madness….”
Anyway, it seemed like there would be more to ask about tomorrow.
What crazy people.
In response to the sudden donation competition, I present you Chubby Yoo Jin, haha.
Cute, right?