The department of R&D wasn't much different from the rest of Area 6, except there were a lot of guys in lab coats.
There were offices and individual labs for the established developers.
When Hilda, a gun enthusiast who was working on the Viper X-1 prototype, saw Robert coming toward her office, she was expecting a compliment on her work. Instead, she heard Robert nagging about the scope.
"The ballistics calculator is lagging when there is heavy wind; it needs to be fixed. The mana concentration in bullets is not enough," Robert reported. "If I want to kill high-ranked beasts, this thing needs an upgrade."
Hilda, now convinced Robert didn't appreciate her hard work, was quite disappointed. She wanted praise, not a lecture.
"You're too much, you know that?" she pouted, taking back the prototype. "And what is he doing? He keeps on looking everywhere. Is he an idiot, too?"
Glancing back, Robert couldn't find words to refute.
It was as if this were the first time Chris came into this room, which it wasn't. He appeared to be looking for something specific, like a child on vacation. It was an embarrassing sight.
"... Sorry about him. I'll take him back," Robert bowed.
Hilda knew about Robert's disciplined nature and Chris's carefree nature, so she couldn't stay angry with Robert. "Just get out of my face," she said, grabbing the Viper X-1 and turning back. "Don't bring him next time, and…"
Hilda didn't continue, so Robert asked, "And?"
Her cheeks flushed red at his voice, and Hilda was glad she turned around. "N-Nothing," she said and went inside her lab, kicking them out and closing the door.
What she actually wanted to say was to give her some compliments, but her embarrassment posed a wall she couldn't overcome.
'That was weird,' Robert thought, but he ignored it after seeing Chris was nowhere to be seen.
"Where did he go now?"
Kai didn't find what he came here for. At first, he thought going inside Area 6 would be all he'd do; he'd take what he needed and get out. But clearly, this place was bigger than he thought.
"Time is running out," Kai said to himself. "I have to find it."
The place where they kept their finished weapons was what Kai wanted to find. There was something he needed to steal from the weaponry of Area 6.
The weaponry of Area 6 was different from the rest of the base. They were finished prototypes, not yet mass-produced, so they kept them for analysis.
Stealing a certain something from that place was Kai's goal. But time was not on his side. 'They're coming. I have to take it before they do,' Kai thought.
But as he hurried along, he found nothing. There were people, not strong, but no pushovers either. If a fight broke out, his odds were slimmer than a hair.
Plus, the weapons he saw back in that woman's lab were even worse.
"What do you think?" Kai asked Zeff, hoping he might have a lead.
["I think you're full of sh*t. We could've clearly avoided all this if you listened to me,"] Zeff replied.
It was true, but not helpful. Kai was the only one hell-bent on infiltrating MB-35. He had a plausible reason for that, but Zeff couldn't care less. They were polar opposites by nature.
["I suggest taking a higher ground will give you a better view,"] Zeff continued.
But disagreements were not enough when it came to danger. It wouldn't help them in any way, forcing them to put aside their differences. Survival was their common ground.
Kai agreed with Zeff. He wanted to take flight and look from above, but…
["That will blow your cover,"] Zeff said, finishing Kai's thought. ["It won't take them long to find the real Chris at the entrance."]
Plausible. And Kai couldn't ask anyone for directions either. It would be suspicious if Chris didn't know such things. More importantly…
What if the weaponry was not here? What if it was somewhere else? If that happened, all Kai would be doing is putting a target on his back in a place crawling with cadets and weapons.
Kai was usually calm, but the pressure was getting to him. The frustration was building, making his judgment questionable.
But just before Kai made a decision, a hand grabbed him by the shoulder, snapping him out of the daze he was troubling himself with.
"What are you doing here?"
Splashing water on Kai's hazy stupor, a 6-foot burly man came into view as Kai turned back.
He appeared to be in his twenties, with a straight face and brown hair. If not for his military-adorned T-shirt, Kai would have mistaken him for a heavyweight wrestler.
"Dude, it's getting late!" but his tone did not agree with his build; he was quite cheery. Then Kai realized, 'Ah, he must be a friend of Chris's'. Which, he supposed, can't be helped then.
"What am I getting late for?" Kai smiled, his forehead sweating. "Actually, I'm in a hurry right now, so if you could just leave…"
The burly guy's arm wrapped around Kai's shoulder. "Of course, you're in a hurry. You should be in the Arena right now."
And as much as Kai resisted, he was dragged through the doors of another room against his will. And his displeasure was shadowed by the carefree attitude of his self-proclaimed 'friend' at the time.
***
'Yeah. The guys above did not inform these guys that the base is currently being invaded by monsters,' Kai thought.
And he was right. If they had, things would've been a little bit easier for him. But like always, he drew the short straw in luck.
The training facility had 20 simulating rooms for individual use and 5 for team missions and battles.
There was one more for the trainees to battle each other in real-time; they called it 'The Arena'.
It was built with one-of-a-kind engineering to host battles used for strategic planning, military exercises, and real-life simulation. But it was only for official battles.
At night, the cadets held some unofficial battles to keep themselves entertained. The higher-ups overlooked this because they thought it would be a breather for the strict daily life trainees were having.
It would be no less than exhausting to stay on the path to becoming elite, even for the most talented youths. So they allowed the use of the Arena anytime the cadets demanded.
And this gave rise to underground fights, which were waged according to the 'rules' made up by them.
Each night, they held different kinds of battles. And tonight, it was 'Tethered Duel'.
"Just great!" Kai exclaimed.
["You just had to disguise yourself as a guy who regularly fights in the Arena. Remind me again never to believe in your chances,"] Zeff commented.
This place was crawling with men who had nothing better to do.
"Show 'em what you got, Chris!" The burly guy who dragged Kai here pushed him to the center of the Arena.
And to make things worse, his opponent looked like a delinquent who would pick street fights on a daily basis; he had no shirt on, and he was quite 'ripped', despite his slim build.
He might've been a Hollywood actor if things were different. But Definitely not someone Kai would want to challenge in a brawl, now.
His name was Michael, Chris's rival and teammate.
"Tonight. Let's fight until we knock each other out. No holds barred," he said, scaring Kai even more.
The self-proclaimed referee explained the rules of "Tethered Duel".
Two contestants have one hand tied to each other, ensuring they are at arm's length.
The objective is to incapacitate or knock down the opponent using only the free hand. Striking and grappling techniques are allowed, but the tied hand must remain connected to the opponent at all times.
The first fighter to either knock down their opponent or force them to submit using their single free hand is declared the winner.
But Kai couldn't care less about that. What he did was blow his cover, and this fight just gave him another idea.
"Alright! Let's get started!" the referee guy said.
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*if you find any mistakes in the chapter, please comment them below so I can fix them as soon as possible.