Mifney was stunned. His right hand stopped trembling as he suddenly thought of something and hurriedly asked, "Mr. Russell, I remember you went to carry out a decapitation strike. How did it go? Did you capture the Mechanical Emperor?"
"No."
Russell shook his head. The Mechanical Emperor had been too bold and decisive; if it had been human, it would have been a wise ruler of its generation. He had failed to restrain himself and killed it.
"Didn't capture it..."
Mifney revealed a bitter smile. Having witnessed the destructive power of the Mechanical Squids, he could imagine how terrifying Machine City's defenses must have been. Russell's failure was understandable.
He simply could not accept it. If the decapitation strike had failed once, it would be even less likely to succeed a second time.
Bzzzz—!!
A grating clamor came from the six passageways. The soldiers in the dock froze at the sound, then, unable to find weapons around them, quickly retreated toward the second level.
"The Squids are attacking again. If this continues, how many times can Zion hold out? Can we win?" Mifney muttered to himself, remaining in the dock instead of leaving with the others.
"The war has already been won. The Mechanical Squids aren't attacking; they're buying time."
Russell calmly said something that left Mifney dumbfounded. "I leveled Machine City and killed the Mechanical Emperor. Before it died, it traded the lives of Zion's 250,000 humans for time for the robots to evacuate Earth."
━━∑(￣□￣*|||━━
Mifney said that he understood every word Russell had spoken, but when put together, he could not quite make sense of it. For example, the Mechanical Emperor had been killed...
Could a killed Mechanical Emperor actually die?
"I made an agreement with the Mechanical Emperor. I gave the robots twenty minutes to evacuate.