After a brief rest, the team continued to move forward. The central area of zone c1 was even more desolate than the outskirts, with countless huge craters and rubble forming a bleak landscape. Endless silence and deathly stillness reigned here.
"Boss, there are a lot of bugs up ahead," one of the scouts reported.
"There are also some on the left, patrolling in an organized manner," another added.
The three leaders continued to provide information and warn their teammates that their target was likely nearby.
"There must be a bug nest around here!" Zhou Yuan, holding his large pineapple machine gun, walked alongside Storm and Recycling Station. Through his scanner, he could see the movements of the bugs in the distance. They were obviously patrolling and not protecting a nest. What else could it be?
Well...there were other possibilities. There could be a brain bug or a queen nearby, and the bugs were protecting them. But if that were the case, he would have a big smile on his face. After all, high-level bugs were very rare, and there might not even be a hundred of them in the entire bug race. Killing one would surely yield a ton of soul points.
"Boss, there's something happening on the right!" Pastry, in charge of right flank reconnaissance, called out excitedly.
Buck's eyes brightened, and he immediately headed towards Pastry, ordering, "Everyone gather around Pastry! Move closer!"
"Wormhole!" Upon arriving at Pastry's side, they all became excited. There was a huge crater ahead that looked several times the size of a soccer field. On the sloping right side of the crater, there was a cave entrance nearly five meters in diameter. Several sand scorpions were entering and exiting the cave, while several groups of soldier bugs were guarding them. It seemed they were protecting the sand scorpions.
It was definitely a bug nest!
Sand scorpions were the weakest bugs in the bug race, with combat power equivalent to that of a dung beetle. They were responsible for logistics and laying eggs, and only moved around the vicinity of the nest.
"We're lucky!" Buck clapped his hands and ordered, "Guys, let's take out those guard dogs first. Divide into two teams and flank them from both sides."
"Wild Boar, Great White Shark, Storm, Recycling Station, T-Bone, Pastry, you guys go left. The rest of us will go right."
"Now, let's get moving!"
The eleven people quickly split into two teams and moved towards the wormhole along the edge of the crater, one on the left and one on the right.
On the way, Zhou Yuan had already done a quick switch to dual-wielding. Grenade launcher in his left hand and large pineapple machine gun in his right. As soon as Buck gave the order, he could blast those soldier bugs to kingdom come.
There were a lot of patrolling soldier bugs outside the wormhole, probably around one or two thousand of them. However, they were not gathered together, but rather walking around in groups. With just these scattered bug groups, they were no match for the strong firepower of the Special Operations Unit.
Of course, the most important thing is that there are no locusts here.
Locusts are assassins among the insects. They not only move like assassins, but also have habits similar to assassins.
When they are not fighting humans, they rarely interact with other insects and do not live underground with them.
Instead, they live in high-altitude areas with protective barriers, such as mountain peaks and hills.
It is precisely because of this that special forces have the opportunity to approach the insect nest.
If there were locusts ahead, they would have been discovered by the locusts by the time they reached this point.
The locusts' heat sensing and vision are much stronger than the soldier insects'. They are like super long-range thermal sensors combined with high magnification binoculars.
... ...
Five minutes later, the two squads were in position.
They were only a little over three hundred meters away from the wormhole, which was already the safety limit. Going further would risk being detected by the soldier insects' heat sensing.
"Rest in place for two minutes, and take action when I give the order."
"Machine gunners, when we start, use grenades to scatter the swarm and then quickly empty your machine gun magazines."
"The rest of you, open fire freely. Your task is to watch the wormhole and block it with the corpses of the insects, preventing any creatures from coming out."
"I will notify the transport aircraft now. It will take about seven minutes for the transport aircraft to reach this location. After destroying the worm nest, find a landing spot. We must finish within seven minutes."
Buck, with his wealth of experience, quickly came up with a feasible tactic.
The machine gunners would directly use their machine guns and explosives to eliminate the main force of the patrolling insects, while the others would restrict the insects inside the nest.
This tactic had proven successful many times because the wormhole was just that big.
As long as they killed a few soldier insects at the entrance of the wormhole, they could completely seal it off.
The soldier insects outside would be lucky if they could withstand their firepower for a minute.
Before the insects inside the hole cleared the entrance or ran out from another wormhole, they would eliminate the insects outside and use a tactical nuclear bomb to blast the worm nest into pieces.
"Take action!"
Two minutes flew by, and Buck timed it perfectly to give the order to attack.
"Let's go, guys!"
"Go!"
Eleven soldiers flipped into the explosion pit and launched a pincer attack on the wormhole from both sides.
"Bang! Bang! Bang!"
Among the eleven, Zhou Yuan was the most fierce.
He temporarily put away his machine gun and used his grenade launcher to bombard the swarm.
He was using incendiary grenades, which had tremendous power. After exploding, they could generate temperatures exceeding 500 degrees Celsius, surpassing the high-temperature resistance of the insects.
With just one box of incendiary grenades, he turned two nearby groups of soldier insects into scattered bonfires.
[Killed one soldier insect, gained 1 soul point.]
[Killed one soldier insect, gained...]
The prompt panel kept refreshing, but Zhou Yuan didn't have time to pay attention to the rewards now.
After dealing with all the insects within range, Zhou Yuan hung the grenade launcher around his neck and switched back to his heavy machine gun.
He didn't take out the infinite ammunition heavy machine gun because it was unnecessary.
There were only about one or two thousand soldier insects, and after the first round of grenade bombardment, there were less than a thousand left.
A thousand may seem like a lot, but when they were dispersed, they posed no threat to the team.
The team attacked from top to bottom, with the advantage of shooting from above. Machine guns and rifles, combined with constantly thrown grenades and explosives, made it impossible for the thousand soldier insects to withstand their assault.
"Increase the speed, suppress with firepower!"
In less than two minutes, the eleven soldiers converged at a position one hundred meters away from the wormhole.
At this moment, there were not many insects around them.
Those insects were still fierce, charging at them like mad, but they couldn't withstand their overwhelming firepower.
The eleven soldiers formed a line, their triggers never letting go, as they pressed forward against the last batch of patrolling insects towards the wormhole.
"This is the feeling we're looking for!"
Zhou Yuan, after throwing two packs of explosives, had a big smile on his face.
He loved this kind of life!