The Enemy's Surprise Attack, a Swift Counterattack
At 1:23 a. m., just as a system notification flashed a line of text on Ye Mo's terminal, the night on the edge of the city was torn open.
In the center of the abnormal heat zone in the western district, the signal was interrupted at two of the three trap points simultaneously. The monitoring images were completely black, as if the power had been cut off. The third point was still connected, but the transmitted images were distorted into a snowy noise. The street light array could be vaguely seen exploding one after another, with metal fragments drawing arcs in the air, like blades thrown by an invisible hand.
"It's here." Ye Mo tapped the lock button on the main control panel. His voice didn't tremble, but his knuckles turned white. He directly cut off the power supply to non-essential systems, concentrating all energy on the shield nodes and the main control panel. The defense network on the screen instantly turned from blue to red, like a piece of iron that had just been scorched.
Tony responded almost simultaneously. The lights in the maintenance bay suddenly dimmed, followed by a hissing sound from the armory as the Mark Series Armor automatically deployed, its back thrusters glowing orange. He ran towards the landing platform, yelling into the communication channel, "AI take over base fire! I'm taking off in five seconds!"
Before he finished speaking, he had already jumped into the cockpit. The moment his mask closed, the palm cannon was fully charged, and a beam of blue light shot straight into the sky, illuminating the oppressive clouds.
Emma Frost sat cross-legged in the corner of the control room, the Mental Scan network already deployed. She didn't open her eyes, but her brow twitched—the enemy's collective consciousness had appeared, chaotic yet rhythmic, as if someone were tuning it from behind. She immediately locked onto the one with the most intense fluctuations, and with a thought, Mental Blast silently struck it.
Outside, the battle has begun.
A group of Mutants burst out from the intersection of the main thoroughfare in the western district. The leader, not very tall, raised his hands, and the ground electric grid snapped, sparks crackling and exploding all along the way. The second person raised his hand and unleashed Shockwave, shattering an entire row of streetlights, glass shards mixed with electricity falling to the ground. The third person manipulated metal fragments, weaving them into a cutting net in the air, advancing towards the city's core area.
Before they could get close, Ye Mo activated his Steel Bone Body. A layer of gray-black alloy quickly covered his skin, and his joints made a slight metallic clicking sound. He transformed from an ordinary human into a heavy mecha. He kicked open the control room door, rushed into the night wind, and rammed into the metal mesh.
With a loud "clang," fragments flew everywhere, leaving several deep gashes on his left arm. But his Regeneration abilities activated immediately, a faint red glow appearing at the edges of the wounds as they quickly closed. He used the momentum to charge forward, slamming his right palm into the ground, instantly unleashing his Lightning Control —a ring of electric arcs exploded along the ground, blue-purple currents spreading like a spiderweb. Three Mutants convulsed and collapsed on the spot, one of them even emitting smoke.
"One and a half done." Ye Mo took a breath and looked up at the sky.
Tony's armor swooped down, his palm cannons firing three shots in quick succession, precisely hitting the remaining two targets who were regrouping. Shoulder-mounted missiles followed immediately, slamming into the feet of the last Mutants attempting to use steel bars to fight back, the blast wave knocking him to the ground. Then, the armor released jamming smoke, a thick black-gray fog quickly enveloping the battlefield and obscuring the enemy's vision.
"Cover up," Tony reported in the channel. "Could you speed up your clearing operation? My armor doesn't have 'unlimited fuel' printed on it."
"What's the rush?" Ye Mo pressed forward while reaching for the communicator on his ear. "The system says there are seventeen seconds left on the cooldown. Let me absorb this wave of ability fragments before we talk about efficiency."
Before the words were even finished, a figure suddenly flashed out of the smoke, moving with incredible speed. Holding a high-frequency vibrating baton, the figure aimed straight for Ye Mo's back. Ye Mo instinctively dodged, his Steel Bone arm blocking the attack; Mars flew as the metal clashed. The figure, missing its target, immediately retreated, its movements clean and efficient, clearly not one of the previous group of thugs.
"A new face." Ye Mo narrowed his eyes. "Clear-headed, steady rhythm, doesn't seem to be being controlled."
Emma Frost suddenly hummed in the control room. She had just disrupted the enemy's collective consciousness with Mental Blast, but found that one person's mental fluctuations remained unchanged—like an umbrella in a downpour, not a drop leaking through.
"The commander is still here," she whispered. "He hasn't shown his face, but he's directing operations."
Upon hearing this, Tony immediately adjusted his flight altitude and activated the armored radar for full-band scanning. A few seconds later, he locked onto a signal source hidden on the roof of an abandoned substation. Although it was covered by shielding, the frequency of the energy leakage closely matched the remnants of AIM technology.
"The same old tricks," he sneered. "Killian's men aren't all dead yet."
Ye Mo didn't reply, staring at the rapidly moving figure as it pounced again. This time he was prepared; his Steel Bone Transformation right leg slammed down, and he stomped the ground, unleashing his Lightning Control once more. Current surged through the ground, forcing the opponent to jump away. Just as the man was airborne, Tony locked onto and launched a miniature missile, which struck right in front of his landing point, the blast wave knocking him over.
"It's down!" Tony shouted.
But the next second, the person actually twisted their body forcefully in mid-air, rolled twice upon landing, and actually stood up.
"High resistance." Ye Mo frowned. "This isn't an ordinary modified body."
Emma Frost had just completed another round of Mental Scan. She discovered a strange break in the other person's consciousness field, as if it were periodically cut off and reconnected by something, making it impossible to grasp its trajectory.
"He's using a jamming device," she said. "Every time I'm about to lock on, he 'disconnects' once. It's not a technique, it's a trained habit."
Ye Mo understood—this was a veteran who knew how to evade mental tracking.
Without further hesitation, he charged directly at the high-speed target. His Steel Bone Body surged forward at full speed, leaving a trail of craters in the ground. Seeing this, the opponent didn't try to take the hit head-on, but turned and retreated, still at an absurdly fast speed. However, Ye Mo noticed that before each acceleration, there was a slight twitch in his right shoulder.
"There's a pattern." Ye Mo's eyes lit up. "System, mark the signs of movement."
The internal prompt immediately responded: [Three right shoulder twitches have been recorded; the next acceleration is predicted to occur in 1.3 seconds.]
When the time came, the man indeed started moving. But Ye Mo was a step ahead, moving sideways to intercept. With his Steel Bone left arm, he swung a wide-ranging hook punch, striking the man squarely in the chest. With a crack, whether it was bone or mechanical structure that shattered, the man groaned and flew backward, crashing into half a wall.
"All cleared." Ye Mo panted, the Lightning Control cooldown bar finally finished. He casually used electricity to paralyze the few Mutants who had fallen, making sure they couldn't get up again.
Tony landed on the temporary helipad, his armor deactivated, his visor opened, revealing a face covered in oil. "That punch of yours was pretty cool, but the finish was too slow. If I were the enemy, I would have finished him off already."
"If I were an enemy, I wouldn't waste my breath on you." Ye Mo wiped the dust from his face. "Besides, you're not much faster than me."
The two looked at each other and smiled simultaneously.
Emma Frost's voice rang out at that moment. "Don't let your guard down. I just detected a faint, intermittent fluctuation of consciousness, like someone remotely severing the connection. They weren't acting spontaneously; they were being directed."
Ye Mo immediately crouched down and pulled a damaged communication module from the fallen Mutants's combat suit. The outer shell was cracked, but the remnants of "AIM" could still be seen on the internal circuit board. Only half of the letter "M" remained, as if it had been burned by high temperature.
"It really is them." He put the module back into his tactical pocket. "But this group is more professional and coordinated than the previous ones; they don't seem like a hastily assembled group."
Tony walked over, glanced down, and said, "Killian might not be dead, or someone might have taken over his plans. But this group... is different."
Emma Frost added, "Their mental rhythm is uniformly regulated, as if they've undergone collective training. Ordinary people can't achieve that level of synchronization."
The three remained silent for a few seconds.
The night wind on the edge of the city carried the smell of burning metal, and the occasional crackling of metal cooling in the ruins echoed through the city. Police sirens grew closer in the distance, but no one moved.
"This is just the first wave." Ye Mo stood up, his Steel Bone Body slowly fading back to normal, but his eyes remained tense. "They tested our reaction speed and the strength of our defenses. Now, the real show begins."
Tony nodded, and the armor returned to standby mode, the palm cannon's charging indicator light flashing slightly. He looked up at the sky; the clouds were still heavy, showing no sign of dissipating.
Emma Frost closed her eyes, and her Mental Scan network expanded again, this time to a wider area. She didn't speak, but simply placed her fingertips lightly on her temples, as if listening to a frequency that only she could hear.
Ye Mo stood in the center of the ruins, clutching the broken communication module in his hand, his gaze fixed on the southeastern horizon.
There, a faint afterimage of a signal flashed by and then disappeared.
He was about to speak when the ground suddenly shook.
Not far away, a Mutants lying on the ground began to convulse, and the skin under his combat suit emitted an eerie blue light, as if something was awakening within him.
Ye Mo immediately took half a step back, and his Steel Bone arm began to solidify again.