Unbeatable?

The battle inside the Chemical Refinery had entered its final cleanup phase. The Players were like a pack of excited hounds, driving the scattered, fleeing Cultists into a blind panic. Shouts, Lasgun fire, and the Cultists' desperate wails blended into a chaotic symphony.

Quite a few Players got carried away with the chase and were nearly about to rush beyond the Chemical Refinery's designated combat zone. Then, one Player suddenly bellowed, bringing everyone nearby to a halt. "Wait! Stop! Someone ran into a pure-blood Genestealer!"

"A pure-blood Genestealer?!" The Players who heard him immediately stopped pursuing, allowing their prey to scramble away. "Where? Where was it spotted?"

"How do you know someone ran into a pure-blood Genestealer?" another Player asked doubtfully. He had just bayoneted a Cultist to death and had yet to come down from the thrill of killing.

The Player who had first raised the alarm immediately explained, "I was slacking off and browsing the forums. One of the brothers who got wiped posted about it. It's over in the C-3 Catalyst Synthesis Zone!"

"Give me a keyword, I'll take a look!" someone nearby immediately responded, opening the game's built-in forum interface as well.

A few seconds later, that person's voice was also full of shock. "Holy crap, it's real! The post is titled Surprise in C-3, Brothers, Come Quick, and the poster even has the gold badge for 'First Closed Beta Participant'!"

The news exploded among the Players like a depth charge.

"Quick, quick, quick! Go tell everyone else!"

"Forget those Cultists, they're not worth any merit! A boss has spawned!"

"Gather at C-3! Gather at C-3! There's a pure-blood Genestealer! I repeat, there's a pure-blood Genestealer!"

News that a pure-blood Genestealer had appeared in the Chemical Refinery spread through every Player communication channel at viral speed. The Players who had been scattered in pursuit all turned around as one and swarmed toward the C-3 Zone marked on the map.

The first to reach the C-3 Catalyst Synthesis Zone was Seventh Squad, led by the Ogryn Big Eagle Cop. They happened to be closest to the area, and among all the Players, they were also the most eager for a satisfying battle against a powerful enemy.

The entrance to C-3 was a massive alloy blast door, half-open at the moment. Beyond it was pitch-black, permeated by a pungent chemical smell.

"That Genestealer should still be inside. Should we wait here and set up an ambush?" one Seventh Squad Player cautiously suggested as he looked into the deep entrance.

"What're you scared of? Just go in!" Big Eagle Cop's booming voice was full of impatience. He slung his enormous metal club over his shoulder and strode inside at a jog. "Watch me flatten that Genestealer with one swing!"

"Hey, big guy, wait!" another Player hurriedly called out while rapidly working through his system shop interface. "Hold on, I'm buying some high explosives to strap onto myself."

Someone beside him immediately teased, "You're turning into a firefly too, huh?"

Assassin's heroic scene of strapping himself with explosives and using Heaven and Earth Together to blast the Chaos Sorcerer into nothing but ashes had left an extremely deep impression on every Player. Now that another obvious elite-level unit had appeared, quite a few Players naturally intended to copy that simple, brutal, and immensely powerful tactic. After all, death merely meant reviving on the spot a few seconds later.

Deep within the maze-like pipes of the C-3 Catalyst Synthesis Zone, Liam, the Fifth Generation Genestealer, had long since heard Seventh Squad approaching.

After all, the squad had an Ogryn. Every step that huge creature took on the metal grating walkway produced a heavy, rhythmic clang that echoed endlessly through the empty plant. It was almost impossible to conceal such noise, so Seventh Squad simply abandoned any thought of stealth. Liam, meanwhile, remained silently curled within the shadow cast by a thick overhead ventilation pipe, like a part of the darkness itself.

Soon, Liam saw those human soldiers enter its field of vision. The giant at the front swaggered along with an extremely heavy-looking metal club resting on his shoulder. To Liam, they had already entered the perfect attack range.

But it did not attack immediately.

It wanted to see whether its earlier discovery by that group of mortals had been a coincidence, or whether these Astra Militarum soldiers truly possessed some special detection method it did not know about.

Seventh Squad quickly drew close. They acted as usual, with the members still chatting quietly among themselves. The Ogryn was even humming a tuneless song, seemingly completely unaware that a lethal killer was lurking overhead.

Could that earlier incident really have been just a coincidence? Liam considered. Yet out of the caution of a top predator, it did not relax in the slightest. The muscles beneath its carapace tensed slightly as it adjusted its center of gravity, ready to unleash a fatal strike at any moment.

Closer, closer—

The instant Seventh Squad's vanguard stepped into the optimal attack range, the Players struck without warning!

The enormous Ogryn roared and raised his iron club, while everyone else instantly lifted their Lasguns. Every attack focused at the same moment on Liam, concealed atop the overhead pipe!

"Just as expected!"

Liam, having been prepared, easily evaded the attack. Its body became a blurred purple-black afterimage, weaving through Laser beams and shrieking fragmentation grenades before landing unharmed on the floor some distance away. But now, all wishful thinking had vanished from its mind, replaced by utter confusion and a hint of wariness—these mortals truly had a way to detect it reliably.

It seemed it would have to leave one alive to interrogate.

"It's down here! Get it!" Big Eagle Cop roared. His massive body burst forward with astonishing momentum as he swung his huge club at Liam, who had just landed, with crushing force.

However, Liam merely shifted slightly to the side. The Ogryn's enormous iron club smashed down grazing its body, while one of its claws flashed out like lightning.

A piercing sound of tearing metal rang out. Big Eagle Cop, along with the sturdy iron club in his hands, was instantly sliced into several pieces. The heavy metal plate armor on his body, strong enough to withstand several direct Lasgun volleys, might as well have not existed before Liam's claw-blades, cut apart with smooth, clean edges. Blood and chunks of flesh splattered everywhere as the Ogryn's huge body crashed to the ground.

The other Players' attacks were equally futile. Their Laser beams could not keep up with Liam's ghostlike figure and only blasted a series of blackened impact craters into the walls and pipes behind it.

"Watch me use Heaven and Earth Together!" The Player who had strapped explosives to himself in advance roared as he activated the fuse and charged forward without hesitation, hoping to recreate Assassin's glorious feat.

But unfortunately, Liam was not that foolish Chaos Sorcerer.

Facing the approaching walking bomb, it did not even make an unnecessary movement. With a light push from its lower limbs, its entire body leaped backward more than ten meters as though weightless, landing steadily in the distance. Immediately afterward, the Player detonated in a thunderous explosion, countless steel balls and fragments spreading out in a fan-shaped barrage.

Liam crossed its four arms in front of itself. Amid a dense series of sharp metallic clinks, every incoming fragment was effortlessly blocked by its hard carapace, failing to inflict even the slightest damage.