Walking out of the altar, Gaia surveyed the area vigilantly. William and Brad followed closely by his side.
William held a shield in his hand and stood in front of Gaia, shielding him against potential attacks.
"Attuned to Nature."
Gaia now had a total of eight Energy Points, which was more than enough to activate Attuned to Nature.
Attuned to Nature allowed Gaia to hear the voices of the flora and fauna within 10 meters of him. It was a very practical skill in this situation.
After listening for a minute, Gaia' jolted up as he spoke quickly.
"Retreat! We've got company. They're coming in from out ten, twelve, one, and two 'o clock."
As he spoke, he rapidly retreated.
He knew that his skill was very important to this project. As such, protecting himself was now a priority.
William immediately stood in front of Gaia, holding his shield up with both hands.
As he slowly retreated, he kept a close eye for any movements in front of him.
The three of them retreated through an opening in the trees.
A moment later, rustling sounds could be heard from the bushes.
More than a dozen green-skinned creatures with brown spots and goblin-like heads from the bushes. Saliva dripped from their fangs, as they growled in a low voice, running towards the altar.
"It's you guys again." Gaia ran into the altar and turned around. His eyes were filled with rage.
They were the ones who had terrorized him last time.
This time, he had much more people on his side. He wanted to utterly crush them.
Gaia hastily analyzed the situation in his head. They were here the first time he came to Planet Mushu, and they were here again this time. This meant that their nest was nearby.
Hearing the commotion outside, Philip and the rest were already prepared.
The moment Gaia and his entourage ran into the altar, they dodged to both sides. At the same time, Philip's raised hand dropped down.
"Fire!" Philip shouted.
Dozens of AE-21 heavy machine guns were aimed in the direction Gaia was running from. Instantly, a shower of bullets rained down at the monsters.
The two monsters that had just managed to approach the altar were greeted with an endless barrage of lead.
A soldier even took out a rocket launcher, aiming it at the monsters.
Take aim, lock on, fire!
"Boom!"
The shell hit one of the monster's body tearing it to shreds as light blue blood splattered everywhere.
This kind of monster was obviously not as powerful as the spider monster last night.
Their skin was nowhere near as tough. Even a few bullets from a heavy machine gun was enough to pierce through its skin.
Moreover, it was not a fast-moving creature. Even the two fastest goblins had barely made it to the inner sanctum of the altar.
After killing five goblins, the remaining ones seemed to have gotten cold feet. They spun around outside the altar and let out a weird cry.
"Amazing, great job out there!" Brad gave Gaia a thumbs up.
If Gaia did not insist on scouting ahead of time, the troops would not have had the mounted machine guns to face these creatures.
By the time they would have taken to react, the troops might have suffered casualties.
Gaia smiled.
The others nodded at Gaia as they started to recognize his usefulness more.
"Looks like the heavy machine guns are enough to break through their defenses. They aren't that invincible after all!" One of the soldiers laughed coldly.
"That's right." Philip nodded. "Looks like they don't want to come in for round two. Platoon one, push forward! Platoon two, follow platoon one, and provide backup if necessary!
"The researchers will stay behind to collect samples of these monsters, so platoon three, will stay behind to protect them."
"Sir! Yes, sir!"
After another round of gunfights, a few carcasses were left outside the altar. The last few stragglers did not even look back as they crawled back into the forest.
When Gaia went outside the altar once more, he listened carefully before saying, "They've left. It's safe now."
"Inform the troops back on Planet Azure that they can come in now," Philip said.
Once the message was relayed, the troops outside came over to Planet Mushu one after another.
Gaia and the others stood outside the altar, keeping an eye on their surroundings.
When he had some downtime, he opened the system and took a look. His points were now sitting at 50.
He had never personally killed a monster, but he had still earned 50 points.
This meant that as long as he participated in the process of killing a monster, points would still be awarded to him.
This discovery made Gaia excited.
If participation alone was enough for him to get points, it meant that there would be plenty of opportunities for him to earn these points.
Even if the amount of points given was low, they could still be accumulated quite easily.
With that revelation, Gaia was in a great mood.
From time to time, sounds of collisions and heavy objects being placed could be heard from within the altar. The troops were busy transporting supplies to this world.
The engineers that arrived first started to set up a line of defense.
Gaia took a look at his watch, it was already 2 p.m.
Gaia's performance earlier had attracted a lot of attention and curiosity.
"Bro, how did you get your superpower? It's hella useful." Brad, who was accompanying Gaia, asked in a low voice.
Gaia chuckled. "I was the first guy to discover this place. Being the first guy to enter this place gave me some augmentations."
"Oh, I see."
"How long do you think we have to stand guard for today? Can we leave a little earlier?" William suddenly asked.
He suddenly felt a little flustered, a feeling in his gut told him that something big was about to happen.
This gut feeling had saved him many times on the battlefield, so he had always been convinced of his sixth sense.
"It will probably take another hour or two. After all, we need to build a line of defense to deal with the monsters' attacks. It will probably take some more time," Gaia said as he looked at the progress inside.
"What's wrong? Are you in a hurry to go somewhere?" Brad asked.
William said, "I just have a bad feeling. I feel like something very dangerous is about to happen."
Brad shrugged. "I doubt the boss would give you the approval to head back just because of that. The current mission is quite urgent. I don't think having a sixth sense is good enough of an excuse to get you out of here..."
Gaia was listening for movements outside. It was very quiet. The weeds, who had always been talkative, had also gone silent.
This should mean that it was very safe outside, but Gaia also felt that something was off.
He had very little experience with his skill at the moment, so he did not know what this silence meant.
However, there was one thing that was very clear. This world was completely different from their home planet.
Thus, it would not be strange if something were to happen.
Hence, they needed to be careful.
He did not have many points at the moment and he could not even open the mall, so he did not know what was items would be available.
At this point, he only had the same few cards up his sleeve. This fact Gaia made Gaia feel a sense of insecurity.
Two hours later, at 4 pm, two lines of defense had been set up outside the altar.
One was right outside the altar. It consisted of multiple laser shooters that were nailed into the ground. It was mainly used to kill small critters such as venomous insects and snakes.
The other was a one-meter thick and five-meter tall steel wall that covered a 400-meter radius around the altar.
There were machine guns, artillery cannons, and all kinds of lethal weapons mounted onto the steel wall. Many soldiers stood on the sentry posts of the steel wall and monitored the area.
However, this was not very useful. The forest outside the altar was extremely dense.
Even from the very top of the altar, one could nothing but tree crowns. As for the creatures below, they could not be seen at all.