Chapter 135

Destroy Everything 3

-:-

2 days later

Afternoon

Hellhole District

This might come as a surprise but once in a while, Theo just wanted to take a walk.

There were times that he wanted to turn his brain off and relax.

Given the stress that has been hounding him every waking moment, he was in desperate need of a breather.

Diego has done a good job of bolstering his confidence as a future father figure. While it was inevitable that Theo would influence his child in a negative manner, he decided that he must teach them that his actions were wrong but necessary.

As for the specifics, Theo had no plan whatsoever and could only hope for the best.

Despite his newly found resolve to shower his future child with both love and logic, something popped up that weighed heavily on his mind.

The effect of Theo’s infamy on how people would treat his child.

At the moment, the general public viewed him in an extremely negative light.

A military force that obliterated 3000+ lives during the Valkyrie Incident and then god knows how many more during the recent Hellgate Incident.

The current estimate was around 2000+ criminals got caught in the BFG 01’s AOE but there was no way to be sure.

The city could not keep track of the population of Hellhole due to safety concerns of those who actually had to do the job.

Not only that, the BFG 01 obliterated everything within its blast radius.

There were no corpse to count.

Yet despite all these, there was no legal action against Theo. Legally, the slaughters was the result of an exceedingly brutal act of self defense and self preservation against a clear offender.

At least that’s how Miss Samantha explained it to him.

And even if there were legal lawsuits against him and his company, they had to go through a couple of powerful factions that openly supported him.

These were the Ecclesiarchy, Alial Milza and Nosferatu.

And then there were the hidden factions such as Miss Samantha’s and Jabir ibn Hayyan’s.

All in all, this made Theo look like someone who openly abused his power.

From a layman’s perspective, he was your stereotypical evil bastard.

What if such a label gets passed down to his child?

That would pretty much guarantee that the young one will be at the receiving end of undeserved malice.

This will most certainly impact the child’s growth in a negative manner.

Was there a measure against it?

Aside from giving the child to adoption (which Theo was fiercely against), there was no way to completely protect the child from harm.

This made Theo very uneasy for the future.

The level of worry has reached the point where Theo refused to applying the finishing touches to the newly upgraded Terminator Armor because of the increased chance that he might accidentally do something stupid.

With this in mind, Theo decided to take a relaxing stroll through Hellhole District with nothing more than his ever trusty Chainmail undershirt armor and the clothes on his back. More specifically, he went to the area affected by the BFG 01’s artillery strike.

If there was 1 word that could describe the state of the area, it was the word ‘Parking Lot’.

The once noisy area near the mountains was eerily silent. The chaotic architecture of questionable nature was nowhere to be seen, like they were swept away by a giant sized broom.

A few craters could be spotted on the mountain and the otherwise clean ground of Hellhole. This was most likely where the submunitions struck the ground.

One quick sweep of the area brought Theo to conclusion.

“*sigh*... As expected, BFG 01’s first test fire was a complete failure.”

While he has seen the data gathered by his men and could already draw a conclusion from there, he wanted to see the end result for himself.

“I know the miniature was doomed to fail, but I didn't expect so many things to go wrong. But then again, the data will benefit the full scale model immensely.”

Here’s a short bullet point breakdown of what happened to the Doom Bringer ammunition from start to finish.

First: DBA (Doom Bringer Ammunition) leaves the BFG 01’s barrel.

Second: As the DBA climbed to the designated height, the combination of the high heat generated by being fired from the railgun, the intense wind friction and the decrease in temperature as the altitude increased caused minor damages to the DBA’s structural integrity.

Third: Upon reaching the designated height, the natural gravitational pull and a few built in forward thrusters completely stopped the DBA’s momentum.

NOTE: some of the thrusters were malfunctioning

Fourth: the DBA naturally falls back down

Fifth: while falling, the back thrusters fire up to accelerate the DBA while the front thrusters make minor corrections to keep it in route

NOTE: due to the malfunctioning forward thrusters, the DBA went off course.

Sixth: upon reaching 1000 feet from the ground, a large archon battery similarly found in the Terminator Armor used up all of its charge to power thruster of the submunitions and catapulted them to the insane Mach 25 speed.

Seventh: Due to the damaged structural integrity, the DBA exploded the moment it splitted off with the submunitions.

This obliterated ¼ of the submunitions right then and there. Another ¼ or so did not reach the ground due to the insane air friction at mach 25. The rest went all over the place

Here’s the result of the BFG 01’s first field test

The DBA was 200 meters off course.

Most of the submunitions burnt up before reaching the ground

Yet despite all these, the damage dealt was only slightly less than originally anticipated.

It wasn't because the surviving munitions were stronger than anticipated.

It was because of the terrain.

The shockwave from a standard explosion propagates in a even and circular manner.

With its previous performance, its destructive capabilities wouldn't even reach half in normal conditions.

The main reason why it was so powerful this time around was because most of the surviving submunitions touchdowned near or on the mountain side.

Vermillion City and the inlands of the Commonwealth was separated by a tall and decently wide mountain range. Because of how the mountain range hugs portions of the city, namely the Hellhole District, there were many areas where the BFG 01’s shockwaves would bounce off the steep mountain sides and funnel it into the city.

This somewhat amplified the multiple weak blasts into a singular big one.

Theo’s final verdict on this particular test firing was this:

“The BFG system cannot work on a miniature scale. The DBA needs a multiple stage shell to protect it from the extreme temperature changes and the high atmospheric friction. The submunition needs a big size increase so that it can actually hit the target before it burns into nothing….. *sigh*.... Time to go full scale then.”

The full scale BFG was 150 meters long that fired a shell that weighed the same as a small ship. As for its destructive capabilities, let’s just say it will be GLORIOUS!

At least that was the case based on the numerical projections.

However, the full scale BFG would most certainly require vast amounts of resources and time to create.

Based on current estimates, it would take all of Theo’s builders approximately 6 months of continuous work to complete.

Naturally, he had no intention of throwing all of his workforce on a long term project. There were way too many jobs that needed doing and too little hands on deck.

Because of this, Theo had no choice but to form a small group and have them slowly build the full scale BFG. Who knows how long that would take.

There was another solution to this problem.

Get more ‘volunteers’.

However, this was difficult due to the eyes of the city was currently focused on Theo and his company, scrutinizing everything he does.

“Hmm… what to do, what to do….” said Theo as he strolled through the blast zone.

After a few minutes of mindless walking, he decided to call it a day and made his way back to the train station.

And as expected of the Hellhole District, there was always some fun to be had.

The moment Theo entered the relatively unharmed part of the district, one of the many welcoming committees came to say hello.

There were 5 individuals of varying fashion styles and weapon loadout stepped out of alleys and surrounded Theo

“Well well well. Look what the cat dragged in. We have a celebrity in our hands!” said the yakuza looking guy.

“So it’s really Theodore Lorne huh… Isn't this too good to be true?” mussed the gangster

“Don't be so negative. It’s not our fault the sheep walked into the lion's den” retorted the lizard looking mutant.

“HAHAHA! There’s 5 of us and one little boy! We have this in the bag!” laughed the heavily tattooed guy

“The ransom on this guy must be in the millions. Payday boys!” said the mafia looking individual as he approached Theo

These guys were probably survivors of the Hellgate incident that banded together to form a new gang or something.

It also didn't surprise Theo that they knew of him. The damn media has been pinning the blame on him for the massive death toll in the Hellgate incident for the past few days.

Mind you, he wasn't angry or annoyed about it.

It was true after all.

Besides, his recovery from the Hellgate Incident and his stressing over his responsibilities as a father has made him forget about his bloodlust.

These 5 were perfect appetizers.

Theo moved back and grabbed the sharpest object he could find…. And it was a pencil. It was nowhere near an ideal weapon, but beggars can't be choosers.

And besides, there was a certain level of charm to fighting in a low tech manner.

“Now now, don't do anything stupid like running away little Theodore Lorne. We don't want to hurt you too much hehehe.”

These were Mafia guy’s last words

The moment the poor slob walked into range, Theo’s left arm shot out, grabbed the man’s throat and ripped it from his neck.

Blood flowed from the damaged carotid arteries like a river, much to mafia guy’s confusion. He didn't know it, but he was already dead.

Theo rushed past mafia guy and charged at the Yakuza guy before they could recover from the sudden event.

He lunged with his pencil, but Yakuza guy was able to draw his short sword at the very last moment to deflect the blow.

Theo pulled the pencil back and used his left arm to block sword. He quickly followed through by driving the pencil into Yakuza guy’s ear and bashing it into the poor man’s brain

By this time, the others have finally snapped out of their daze.

Tattoo guy shot spikes from his fingertips, but none landed as Theo used Yakuza guy’s still warm corpse as a shield.

Theo pushed his meat shield towards Lizard guy who was vomiting acid at him.

He grabbed one of the spikes of tattoo guy stuck on yakuza guy’s body and threw it into Lizard Guy’s balls.

The sudden penetration caused Lizard guy to scream at the heavens in agony. Unfortunately, he did this while he was still vomiting, resulting in a shower of corrosive rain.

Tattoo guy had the unfortunate honor of being in close proximity to lizard guy. He got a face full of acidic vomit which instantly led to his death.

Gangster guy was able jump into a nearby building before the acid rain hit the ground.

Theo used his meat shield as an umbrella as he ran after gangster guy

The moment he entered the building, gangster guy lunged at him with a steel pipe in hand.

Theo used his meat shield to block the blow and rammed it into gangster guy.

Gangster guy screamed in agony as the acidic vomit that remained on the meat shield seared his skin. It wasn't as corrosive as the freshly made ones, but it was still enough to cause a fair bit of agony.

Theo kept pushing the meat shield into gangster guy until the enemy tripped and fell. He mounted gangster guy, used his mechanical left arm to break the poor slob’s pipe welding arm and proceeded to use said steel pipe to shatter its original owner’s skull.

“One more to go.” said Theo as he stepped out of the building and approached lizard guy who was still on the ground, withering in pain.

“Hello there Mr. Lizard. How is your day?” asked Theo in a sadistic manner

“P-please! Don't kill me! I didn't want to do this!” begged lizard guy.

Theo replied to the groveling with a steel pipe to groin.

Lizard guy’s scream was most painful to hear.

“My question was ‘how is your day’. You gave me the wrong answer. Time to die.”

“I’ll answer properly! Please! Spare-!”

Lizard guy’s were drowned under a rain of blunt blows.

Theo kept bringing the steel pipe down until the poor bloke stopped twitching

And just like that, the 5 man gang became the latest victim to Theo’s infinite bloodlust.

“*sigh*..... Not enough… this is nowhere near enough…. I hope the next set of fools will pose a little more challenge”