Plan in Progress

"The sniper's in position. How are things on your end?"

Cross touched the tiny in-ear communicator. He was more than two kilometers from Textile Factory No. 17. Even a top-tier sniper couldn't guarantee a hit with every shot at that distance, but Cross could. He had more adrenaline than most, and when it came to sniping, the farther away he was, the more accurate he became.

They had not chosen to attack at night. Darkness would hinder Cross's sniper cover and only create more trouble. After all, Textile Factory No. 17 was Brotherhood territory, and they knew the terrain better.

Cross faced the textile factory directly. Every high point was within his range. After repeated inspections, he had determined this was the best position. There were no Sniper Points nearby that could threaten him.

Through his scope, the garbage truck crossed the bridge and arrived before the textile factory's main gate.

"No problem. The rats are in position!" Fire Fox answered coldly from the passenger seat.

"Be careful. It'll take the rats some time to get inside the textile factory. You'll face a wave of gunfire during that time. Try not to shoot. I'll cover you, so we don't run short on ammunition later."

That was Cross's style: if he could snipe, he wouldn't use a pistol; if he could use a pistol, he wouldn't fight hand-to-hand; if he had to fight hand-to-hand, he absolutely wouldn't waste breath talking.

"Understood!"

After replying, Fire Fox nodded at Wesley. He shifted into reverse and slammed the vehicle hard into the textile factory's gates.

The Brotherhood's assassins noticed something wrong as soon as the garbage truck appeared. Quite a few pushed open the small windows and looked down. Every one of them was an assassin, highly vigilant, but precisely because they were all assassins, none had ever imagined that someone would take the initiative to attack this place.

Boom!!!

The textile factory's gates were smashed open. Watching the reckless garbage truck, the assassins finally snapped out of it and raised their weapons to aim below.

Wesley had stopped in exactly the right place. The driver's seat was wedged inside the gate, using the terrain for cover. From the walls, the inside of the gate was one of the blind spots, and the garbage truck's reinforced Ironhide could not be penetrated by ordinary bullets.

Sloan saw the garbage truck below through the window. At his command, dozens of firing positions began pouring ammunition downward, all of them armed with semiautomatic rifles.

Suddenly, Sloan sensed a jolt of deathly dread. Without thinking, he dropped flat to the floor.

A scream rang out from the rooftop. A body fell, and as it passed the window, Sloan's face twitched. When the dull thud of its impact reached him, a chill rose in his heart.

"Damn Cross!"

Using the wall's shadow, Sloan moved away from the dangerous window and headed for the office on the third floor, the safest room in Textile Factory No. 17. He was the leader, responsible for conveying the Loom's instructions, not fighting intruders with a gun in hand.

Sloan had considered many possibilities, but he had never expected Cross to be bold enough to launch an attack. The difference in their numbers was too obvious. Anyone who could do basic arithmetic would not have made such a choice.

He had called back members who were carrying out missions elsewhere in order to expand the search area and find Cross. Now, he regretted it somewhat. He should have acted sooner.

Fire Fox pressed a button and opened the garbage truck's sealed cargo compartment. Like dumping trash, she shoved more than a thousand rats out of the vehicle.

The dense gunfire had already scared the rats into frantic squeaking. Once they were pushed out, they immediately scattered in every direction. The wide-open space offered them no sense of safety, while the dark textile factory seemed far safer, so they raced toward it at full speed.

Seeing the rats, the Brotherhood's assassins felt uneasy. A few smart ones who knew Pesticide realized how dangerous these rats were and began shooting at them.

Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang...

Cross happily began picking up kills with his sniper rifle. In Bullet Time, killing figures on the high walls or in the windows was effortless.

Realizing the enemy had a sniper, the assassins raised their Sniper Rifles to aim back. But when they looked through their scopes and saw the sniper was two kilometers away, every one of them lost their nerve.

It was too far, beyond their capabilities!

Bang! Bang! Bang—

After several more shots, no one dared show their head again.

More than ten assassins armed with guns rushed out through a small gate in the wall. They wanted to kill Wesley on the garbage truck. With the high wall blocking the way, they did not need to worry about being hit by sniper fire.

The logic was sound, but they had barely taken a few steps before Fire Fox and Wesley, standing tight against the crack of the gate, forced them back with grenades. After two explosions, these brave but unlucky men were severely wounded by shrapnel and died within moments.

The explosions from the grenades made the assassins afraid to move rashly, while the rats became even more agitated and all ran into the textile factory.

Soon, curses and gunfire erupted throughout the factory. Stimulated into madness, the rats darted everywhere and spread as quickly as a virus. Ordinary rats would not have made the assassins' expressions change so drastically, but these rats had watch-shaped timed bombs strapped to their backs.

More and more assassins joined the great rat extermination effort. The rats filled every corner, and their overwhelming numbers drove the assassins into despairing wails.

Killing the rats did not mean disarming the bombs. Seeing the countdown numbers on the watches, the textile factory descended into even greater chaos.

There was too little time. They couldn't disarm them!

Driven by their will to survive, some began charging the main gate, only to be blasted back by Fire Fox and Wesley. The assassins who retaliated from the windows were picked off one by one by Cross.

The impregnable fortress had now become a coffin with no escape. Once they were dead, all they needed was a priest to bury them!

Second by second, time passed. Fire Fox listened to the desperate wails inside the textile factory, but there was not a trace of pity in her eyes.

There were many people in the textile factory who had been deceived by Sloan just as she had. They believed themselves to be assassins of fate, fighting to preserve world peace, yet without realizing it, they had become accomplices to Sloan's profiteering.

To be fair, these people were innocent. They were merely victims.

But Fire Fox's beliefs had made her heart incomparably cold. These assassins were innocent, but weren't the people they had killed innocent too? How many happy families had been torn apart because of them? How many children had wept before their parents' graves? Perhaps these assassins had not known, but they were already sinners.

"Time's up!"

Fire Fox looked at her watch and dropped to the ground with Wesley, both covering their heads.

Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom—

A dense series of explosions erupted throughout the textile factory, almost simultaneously. In an instant, every pane of glass shattered, while screams and wails echoed endlessly through the smoke and dust.

The textile factory became a living hell. The swirling dust reduced visibility. Parts from shattered Looms lay scattered across the ground, but there were even more broken limbs and dark red bloodstains.

The Watch Bombs alone were not powerful enough to reduce the textile factory to such a state, but the special ingredients in the Peanut Butter were another matter. Their explosive force after heating up was no joke.

Those killed instantly were lucky. They would not bleed to death in agony. Those missing arms or legs, or with wooden splinters and metal fragments lodged in their bodies, were the miserable ones. They did not have much time left. They would not last until an ambulance arrived, and even if ambulances did come, there were too many wounded to save.

"You can move now. The plan went smoothly. Be careful from here on out. It'll be difficult for me to provide you with cover."

Cross watched through his scope, a flash of satisfaction in his eyes. He maintained his sniping posture, preventing anyone from escaping the textile factory. Based on what he knew of the Brotherhood's members, if anyone fled amid the chaos, it would most likely be Sloan.

"Received!"

Wesley replied and took a deep breath. His heartbeat instantly accelerated as he entered Bullet Time. But when he turned around, Fire Fox had already rushed out ahead of him, making him hurriedly follow.

The two advanced from the main gate, vaulting through the blown-out windows. Their neural firing exceeded human limits, and their active thoughts rapidly analyzed information gathered by every sense. Their brains issued commands at the fastest speed possible, killing everyone still capable of resistance.

At the same time, Russell broke in through the back door. The plan was to attack from both front and rear and clear out the textile factory's first-floor hall.

When Russell entered, the enemies before him were busy holding back Wesley and Fire Fox. Looking at the figures with their backs turned toward him, Russell threw a Grenade into the crowded area, then raised his M4A1 and began spraying the rest.

Of course, before that, he had also thrown Flashbangs!

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