Chapter 892: War chariots

Translator: Legge

Right now, P5092 was in a race against time.

If all his speculations were right, he would have to complete the construction of the defensive line in the forest before the Pyro Company troops got beaten back.

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However, this was as good as putting himself in a dangerous situation. When the barbarians chased the Pyro Company troops back here, the 3rd Division would have to provide covering fire for all of the defeated Pyro Company troops.

If it weren’t for the sake of helping the Pyro Company preserve more of its strength, P5092 could easily have retreated back to the Great Wall where it would be much safer.

It was precisely because of this action that Ren Xiaosu was sure that P5092’s ideals of keeping humanity’s flame alive in the Central Plains was not just talk.

Too many people in this world talked the talk of ideals without walking the walk. There were also too many people in this world who called upon others to practice kindness and virtue but were lowlifes in reality.

Ren Xiaosu admired those who had ideals and were willing to pay the price to uphold them. This was the reason why he was willing to help Jiang Xu, Wang Jing, and P5092.

But when Ren Xiaosu headed north with Yang Xiaojin to investigate, not even the 3rd Division’s soldiers who had been tagging along with him felt that the two of them would have much of an effect on a battle involving tens of thousands of people.

Before leaving, P5092 reminded Ren Xiaosu seriously, “I know you’re very powerful, much more powerful than most of the supernatural beings I’ve met. In the future, you’ll have a place in the history of this superhuman world. But in a battle involving tens of thousands of people, there really isn’t much a single individual can do. So don’t push yourself too hard. Your utmost priority is to survive.”

Ren Xiaosu nodded and replied, “Don’t worry, I won’t overdo it. I’m just going there to investigate, so there won’t be any danger.”

“Mhm, I wish you a safe return.” P5092 said, “From the most rational point of view, you’re one of the most important people from the Central Plains to be kept alive. You definitely have higher priority over other people. I hope you can understand this fact.”

With that, Ren Xiaosu headed north. On his way there, he lamented to Yang Xiaojin that while everyone was said to be equal, the Pyro Company had probably determined which classes of humanity were worth keeping alive by assigning them a priority level.

Perhaps, superhumans, scientists, and the like were top priorities for the Pyro Company to protect.

This obsession was so weird it seemed contradictory to the concept of human rights. But after Ren Xiaosu had worked together with the other party for a long time, he did not know how to refute it.

It could only be said that everyone with ideals in these wastelands adhered to their own principles and followed their own paths.

From a bird’s eye view, the other five Pyro Company divisions could be seen marching quickly in the wilderness.

The mechanized infantry’s E-33 armored vehicles and E-34 tanks provided cover at the front of the formation like mobile fortresses that kept pressing forward.

Meanwhile, the infantry followed closely behind the armor.

This was the most common form of cover that infantry units adopted in battle when working with armor. Once they discovered signs of the enemy, the armored vehicles and tanks would become the best bunkers for providing suppressive fire.

As the tanks rolled across the ground, the tracks dislodged soil and left trails behind them, riddling the ground with holes.

North of the Pyro Company, the barbarians were fleeing for their lives. Amid loud explosions, the ground around them was bombarded by the tanks. From time to time, heavy machine guns firing from the armored vehicles would send rocks and dirt flying all around.

As the two sides fought each other ferociously, the barbarians, even with their superior physical fitness, were unable to shake off the Pyro Company’s troops.

When a division commander of the Pyro Company saw this, he was overjoyed, because as long as this situation continued, it would only be a matter of time before they wiped out the barbarians.

Today’s battle went much smoother than expected.

However, not all five of the division commanders were blinded by this seemingly easy victory. The 1st and 4th Divisions had already started slowing their advance and gradually fell diagonally behind the rest.

To avoid stirring up the rebellious thoughts of the division commanders, P5092 did not directly call and order them not to give chase. It would have been futile.

But he could try other methods, such as getting the 3rd Division to quickly contact their acquaintances in the other divisions to start spreading rumors of the barbarians setting a trap.

All the Pyro Company officers had graduated from the military academy, and those who had graduated in the same class were posted across the entire military. Without any communication restrictions currently in place, it was not exactly difficult to contact someone since even the company-level troops were issued with their own communications equipment.

So when the rumors began to spread to the other five divisions, some of the P5 commanders started reassessing this pursuit. Most importantly, they also felt the operation tonight had gone too smoothly.

But right at this moment, a group of the expeditionary army’s troops were waiting to the north with dozens of large cages made from a special metal by their sides.

Inside those cages, gigantic, heavyset brown bears had just woken up.

They were not domesticated brown bears. When they woke up, they started roaring angrily at the barbarians standing outside their large cages.

The expeditionary army’s troops had placed a pile of black spherical objects behind the cages. The surfaces of those objects was rough like a ball of dung rolled by dung beetles.

Dozens of barbarians lit the black balls with torches at the same time. In an instant, the black balls started burning and releasing a large amount of pungent white smoke.

When the northerly wind arrived, the barbarians stood upwind of the white smoke as it blew towards the cages.

When the brown bears in the cages caught a whiff of the smell in the white smoke, they furiously slammed themselves against the cages and deformed them!

Before The Cataclysm, brown bears were one of the largest and heaviest animals on land. They could reach a length of 2.8 meters and weigh up to 800 kilograms. Its sense of smell was seven times keener than a hound’s.

At that time, brown bears were the dominant beasts among land animals.

After the cities in the North were battered by nuclear weapons, the brown bears in the wilderness had evolved to a frightening level. Very few people were aware that the land where the expeditionary army lived was the place that suffered the most during The Cataclysm. It was a devastating sight everywhere.

The Pyro Company’s higher-ups had speculated that this was probably the reason why the barbarians’ civilization and technology had regressed entirely while their physical fitness collectively evolved.

Suddenly, a brown bear broke through its metal cage and caught a barbarian who was standing a little too close off guard and crushed him under its paw.

As the brown bear had a keen sense of smell, it instinctively detected something unpleasant in the white smoke.

At this moment, the battle cries of the Pyro Company troops to the south attracted the attention of the brown bears.

Eventually, all of the brown bears broke out of their metal cages. Driven by the white smoke, they dashed madly southwards like war chariots running amok.