Download App
23.69% Out of Space / Chapter 159: Dante's Inferno

Chapter 159: Dante's Inferno

*Recommended music - Nightwish - End of All Hope

UNS Singapore, Gun One

The Huawei Lei Shen series 9 dual 155 mm rail cannon hummed as energy flowed into its rectangular conductive rails. Built and designed by the weapon tech department of one of China's top hi-tech firms, the older ships like UNS Singapore were armed with the Huawei Lei Shen series 9 railgun which was state of the art during the ship's commissioning. Now the latest frigates and cruisers in United Nations of Mankind mounted the latest Lei Shen series 14 and above models. But that does not mean that the series 9 model was any weaker than its more recently developed counterparts.

Heat dispensing radiators shields popped out on the armored turret body as the weapon readied itself for the command to be fired. Inside the turret, autoloaders rotated the ready ammunition stores and selected two streamlined armor-piercing fin-stabilized discarding sabot projectiles each weighing over 3 kg. They dropped onto a loading hoist which carried the shell into the rear breach of each of the railguns and an automatic rammer shoved both projectiles into their respective guns.

A clamp gripped the armature covering the projectiles in place as the rammer rotated and locked the gun breech securing the weapon. All these took less than five seconds to be completed while the gun crew doubled checked their consoles and switches that everything was operational.

-----

"Fire the main guns!"

The weapons officer jabbed the firing key, and a split second later, the left barrel of the Gun One roared. The projectile was tossed out by the magnetic fields hit Mach 18 within a second, causing a vacuum tear in the very fabric of the atmosphere. The sonic boom scoured off all loose particles off the exposed hull of the UNS Singapore, and as the shock blast hit the Colony seconds later, it was like a 7.5 on the Richter scale magnitude earthquake.

Roofs rattled, windows broke, and any loose items fell and shattered throughout the Colony. The people hurdle under cover screamed while the unlucky ones had their eardrums ruptured.

Those onboard the UNS Singapore barely felt the shockwave, only hearing a massive thumping, as the ship's internal sound and shockwave proofing held.

The armor-piercing fin-stabilized discarding sabot projectile screamed through the atmosphere, taking 0.19 seconds to bury its self against one of the snow covered peaks of Sawtooth Mountain and exploded. The peak vanished, and collapsed, raining tons of rock and snow down the slopes. Seconds later, the roar of the explosion swept over the Colony, creating more screams of fear and terror among the civilians.

The public broadcast system blared again, warning the population for a second imminent firing of the main guns and the people panicked more as they quickly hid and took shelter again.

-----

UNS Singapore, Command Bridge

"Holy mother of god!" The bridge crew looked stunned at the destruction wrought by the main gun fire.

"Back at your stations!" Ford barked. "Status?"

"Stan-stand by!" The weapon officer looked slightly pale as his fingers trembled slightly while he checked with the gun crew. "A-all systems normal! Heat levels still within tolerance levels! Gun One auto heat dispensers are functioning normally."

Ford turned and gave Blake a disapproving look. He knew the effects of firing the main gun in an atmospheric environment as he had done a live firing exercise on a barren planet before.

Blake stared back unflinchingly at Ford and said, "Ensure that the Eagle One knows we are firing at his vicinity, make sure they take all the cover and precautions they could."

"Aye, Captain," Ford sighed and turned to the slack-jawed communications officer. "Contact Eagle One, make sure they are prepared and under cover for main gun impact!"

"Aye XO!" the comms officer jolted back to life and started messing around with her comms control, raising Eagle One on the radio. "Eagle One confirms danger close!"

"Warn the population again," Blake said and he waited for the comms officer to do her work and waited, looking at the main screen, watching clouds of snow and rock dust drifting down from the shattered mountain peak.

"Lock on that Hero..." Blake said finally after he mentally ensured that enough warning and time was given to everyone to take shelter. "FIRE!"

And another supersonic boom ripped across the skies.

-----

Uncharted Forest, 291 km away from Sawtooth Mountain Pass

Lt Joesph screamed at the men to take cover, "Danger close! DANGER CLOSE!"

"Get into cover!" His men yelled at each other, shouting to those still fighting the Hero.

The Hero hovered in place, smiling at the panicking and dying soldiers. His body was constantly recovering from the effects of the Sun God's Eye. He forcefully held onto his link to the Sun God's divine powers, protecting the link from the cursed demon explosive spells, and thunderstones.

He gloated at the creatures stumbling away from him in urgency, feeling the terror in their eyes and feeding on their fear of him. Is this what the Ancient Gods felt like? To easily dominate man and creatures? He gave out a bark of laughter, feeling the adrenaline rush as endorphins released from his brain made him high.

"HHAhaHAHAHAHaahahaahAHAHAHAHhahahaa...!" Dante laughed joyfully, "FEAR ME! BOW BEFORE ME! WORSHIP ME! FOR I AM A GO-!!!????!!!!!!!!????????????!!!"

-----

Something slammed into Dante, and the Sun God's Eye closed, vanishing from the mortal world as if it did not exist at all. A sharp crack of thunder, a hundred, no, a million times louder than the roar of a rifle lagged by 18 seconds behind the projectile that slammed directly into the unaware Hero.

The Marines and Claymore One hunkering down under cover both physically and magically. screamed and yelled as the blast wave overloaded their bodies, battering and tossing them like a ship in a storm. Weakened trees were torn up and uprooted, crashing down as the ground shook from the passing of the low flying projectile traveling at Mach 18.

-----

Dante screamed as his mind could not comprehend what was happening. The terror he has not felt so long since he first gotten his divine powers came rushing in. He felt his heart at the back of his throat and could barely feel any part of his body, only vaguely seeing something dark nesting on his belly.

He barely felt the heat caused by the friction of the air against his body as he suddenly traveled at 5,963 meters per second with a third of the projectile's head buried in his abdomen. His skin turned red, and peeled off, as the air scraped his remaining clothes and skin off and the heat burned his hair away and flash cooked his flesh off, exposing his bones.

Before his brain could process his dire situation as 0.45 second later, he and the projectile slammed deep into the side of the mountain range, sending a mushroom cloud up into the air and sent pieces of rock and stone flying hundreds of meters away.

-----

Blue Thunder roared in fright and tucked his head in under his wing together with his crew as they huddled together, using Blue Thunder's body as cover from the passing railgun projectile shockwave.

The men yelled and cried as the ground shook terribly and Blue Thunder felt true fear for the first time in his life. "I-I think I w-wet myself!"

-----

Gold leader, Sergeant Legos cursed as he fought against the sudden turbulence while the other planes in his flight rolled and dived in the air.

"Shit!" Legos cursed as he saw one of his planes impacted against the sea of trees and did a cartwheel before sinking into the leaves.

"Cobra down! We got another one down!"

-----

Valkyrie One and Two barely managed to stay in the air as the shockwave from the rail gun projectile passed by them several kilometers away, both ships hit air turbulence as the supersonic wave rolled over them.

Greg the goblin screamed and shrieked as he held on to his dear life in the holds of Valkyrie One. The stench of vomit and voided bowels reminded him of his times onboard the goblins raiding ships. "BAD MEMORIES! BAAAAAD MEMORIESSS! NOOOO STINKY MAAAA-NEEEEEEESSS NOOOOO~~~!!"

-----

UNS Singapore, Command Bridge

"STATUS?" Blake roared out, as the UAV feed suddenly flickered and a <NO SIGNAL FOUND> error message popped up. "Get that back online!"

"Aye aye!" The frantic crew quickly jumped into action, trying ways to bring back the UAV.

"Captain, Gun One reports systems holding," Ford reported, "Energy crystal battery currently left 15% power. Temperature holding at yellow levels but heat sinks and dispensers are still functioning."

Blake nodded, "Load the guns and have the crews on stand by, I want to know what's happening on the ground!"

"Sir! No responses from Eagle One!" The comms officer yelled. "Valkyrie Flight reports mushroom cloud sighted in the vicinity of Eagle One, ETA 22 minutes!"

"Airforce Command reports Gold Squadron had lost one Cobra due to the shockwave!" The comms officer reported again as reports from each department started to flood in. "They are requesting a SAR (Search And Rescue) team!"

"Have Valkyrie Flight vector over for SAR duties once they dropped off the troops!" Blake ordered.

"Captain, upper decks 2A, 4B and 5A reporting warping from the after effects of main gun firing!" Ford looked up from his tablet. "I have ordered crews down to do structure checks and support bracing on the structure frames just in case."

"Got it," Blake nodded, "After this get Engineering to do a whole super structural sweep of the ship, check if there are any issues with the ship's structure."

"Aye Captain!" Ford replied. "Damage and casualty reports coming in from the city!"

"Bad?" Blake asked as he eyed a beeping light on his computer and ignored it as it appeared to be a call from the Princess.

"Very..." Ford sighed, "I did warn you, Captain... Your popularity ratings gonna drop."

"Who cares about popularity ratings?" Blake raised a frustrated eyebrow. "I care about making sure a threat like that rabid Hero gets put down once and for all!"

"Sirs! UAV back online!" the UAV operator yelled from his station. "Putting it back up on the main screen!"

The main screen flickered to life and the view started panning, showing a trail of destruction caused by the rail gun projectile tearing right over the canopy of the Uncharted Forest, leaving behind a straight line of broken trees.

The image panned towards the circular clearing before it showed a dust cloud still drifting over a mountain face, and the imagery switched to infra, showing a bright blob right at the bottom of the dust cloud. The view panned downwards again, showing figures in the forest, some moving around while most barely moved, laying in various poses on the floor.

"Think we got him?" Ford asked.

"What does the radiation sensor tells us?" Blake asked the UAV operator.

"Nothing except background radiation and very low levels of 'Mu' radiation around the surrounding areas. Mu radiation was the classification Dr. Sharon gave for the magic radiation given off by the Hero and all forms of magic, just that the amount of radiation the Hero gave off was hundreds and thousands of time higher compared to normal magic, making Dr. Sharon able to come up with a method of detection.

"Vector Valkyrie Two into the impact site," Blake said after a while. "I want visual confirmation of kill."

"Yes sir!" the comms officer spoke into her mike as she directed the flight of Marines to their new heading. "ETA 31 minutes, Sir!"

Blake nodded and looked at the blinking light flashing nonstop on his console and sighed, keying the accept key. "Yes?"

"Blake!" The princess's panicky voice could be heard loudly, making some of the crew look his way. "What is going on!?"

Blake hit the headset key and donned on the headset, cutting off the princess's voice from his console speakers. "Something we had to do."

"What is something we had to do? Do you know how many damages are in the city now?" Sherene yelled into his ear. It was the first time he ever heard her yell, oh no the second time, as he thought back to the time she invaded his bunk. "We got calls from many people about being wounded! Are we still required to be taking shelter?"

"Yes," Blake replied, "For at least one hour!"

"Do you know there are fires all over the city now?" Sherene said, her voice slightly cracked.

"Hmm, I can think of someone who probably is in an inferno right now..."


CREATORS' THOUGHTS
Neobear Neobear

Advance chapters are available on Patreon (14 Chapters Ahead)

https://www.patreon.com/neobear

-----

Join the discussion in Discord

https://discord.gg/A8Tm86V

-----

Donate/Support me via Paypal now!

https://paypal.me/neobear

-----

Hope you guys liked the Kame Ha me Haaaa~~~ Give me stones and reviews!

Chapter 160: End of a Hero

Uncharted Forest, Ground Zero

The sharp angular lines of a Valkyrie roared in, banking sharply as its tilt rotors swerved forward, slowing the heavy craft and bringing the Valkyrie to a hover over the blackened ground. Its undercarriage bays swung open on hydraulics and four stubby landing gears deployed.

The powerful wind from the dual rotors blew the green smoke away and kicked up a storm of ashes from the scorched forest. Before the Valkyrie's landing jacks touched the ground, the rear ramp dropped open, and the ship settled down gently. The Marines charged down the ramp, forming up a short distance away before a batten looking Officer wearing a beret and another person with visible wounds dressed in leather armor with a tactical vest.

The second Valkyrie did a single circuit around the destroyed forest and gave a wag of its wings before its tilt rotors swung to the rear and it flew off towards the dispersing mushroom cloud in the distance.

"Sir! Sergeant Arven of 2nd Battalion, Eagle Company, Platoon 2 with two sections at your command sir!" A slightly ashen faced Marine with three stripes on his sleeve yelled over the slowing powered down rotor engines.

"Lt Joesph, this is Specialist Sergeant Tyrier of the Hundred and First." Lt Joesph gave his introduction and raised an eyebrow as a slight stench of sourness drifted over to him, "Are you, ok son?"

"Eh yes, sir!" Arven looked slightly embarrassed, "Air turbulence." He gave a simple explanation.

"Ahh," Joesph smiled, and gave a bark of laughter, "Well, it was pretty rough down here too! Relax, I am no longer the Lord General, just a simple Lieutenant."

"Yes, sir!" Arven grinned back, his nervous tension fading away, "I got medical supplies onboard and medics standing by."

"Good! I will have need of your medics!" Joesph's face turned grim, "There are a lot of wounded. This way."

"Medics! On me!" Arven turned and yelled at the gawking Marines fresh off the Valkyrie, "The rest unload the supplies off the bird!"

Joseph led them towards a small defile, where dozens of men laid in rows with dried blood staining their uniforms. "Most of them suffered internal injuries and broken bones! We need to medivac the more critical wounded out!"

"Eight dead, and seven badly wounded," Joesph said. "And I have no idea how is the rest with the slaves. Our radio is dead."

"We got radio contact with them earlier," Arven replied as he watched his medics rush to work on the wounded. "They had several casualties but thankfully no deaths, but there are broken bones and burst eardrums from the weaker ones."

Joseph nodded, "Well, that's one worry off my back. Any news on the Hero? Is he killed?"

Arven shrugged and turned towards the dust cloud, "If he's alive, he should be something in there, but I doubt anyone can even live through that, even if he is a god!"

Tyrier gave a snort, "Farker is harder to kill than a cockroach! And what the hell is that spell?"

"I am not too sure either," Arven gave a worried look, "The hoomans have such a powerful weapon hidden."

Joseph frowned, "I guess they have some secret cards kept hidden away after all."

The three soldiers turned and watched the dust cloud hovering over the distance, each in their minds wondering how much more hidden away powerful weapons the hooman has in their disposal that could wipe out an entire mountain or even a god.

-----

Uncharted Forest, Impact Zone

Valkyrie One dipped its nose down as it entered the dust cloud, its rotors causing the smoke and dust to swirl away as it came to a hover before a massive hole against the side of the mountain face, its powerful forward spotlight lighting up the insides of the dust cloud.

Flight Lt Peter struggled slightly with the controls as the rock dust interfered slightly with his rotors, making the Valkyrie sluggish as the filters tried their best to filter out the air in the turboprop engines. "Come on baby!"

He spun the Valkyrie on its axis and slowly and expertly landed, the rear ramps dropping open and Greg the goblin yelled angrily, "Stinky Maa-neess! You mess up my deck! Shoo shoo! Go kill yourselves!"

The sickened Marines ignored Greg's jibs and spread out from the rear of the Valkyrie, the dust cloud hovering in the air blocked some of the sunlight, making the late afternoon seemed like evening.

Lt Rathia looked around his surroundings with a sense of dread. The dust cloud had effectively blinded them as they could only see a short distance away while the air was chock full of rock dust, making his nose and throat itch.

Everyone buttoned up their uniforms and pulled up the collar to cover their nose, as they tried to breathe in as little as possible of the dust. Beams of light stabbed out as visibility dropped and the sky grew dark inside as the sun slowly started to set.

"Sir! Found the hole!" Someone yelled in front and Lt Rathia quick jogged over and a dark wall loomed up before him.

"Sir! Up there!" The Marine shone his torch up toward the surface of the cliff walls, and the beam barely reached the edge of an opening with cracks radiating out in all directions.

"That's what? 15, 20 meters?" Lt Rathia gauged, "I need rope and climbing gear!"

The men settled down around the wall, while those who were better at climbing scaled the walls, easily finding cracks and foot holes on the surface. Soon, a yelled came down from above and a rope was dropped down.

"Section One up, Two stays here," Lt Rathia ordered, "I want Section Two to be on alert, watch our backs and also keep an eye on our ride out of here."

With that, he started climbing the rope, and before long, he hoisted his body into the newly created cave, panting with the effect and from the dust. He took his bottle out and washed his mouth and nose before wetting his throat. "What do we have here?"

The men all gathered up and shone their lights into the gloomy darkness, their beams unable to penetrate that far deep into the hole. The lamps were made with flash runes, powered by mana stones and reflected by a simple reflector surrounding the flash rune.

"All ready? Let's go!" They advanced in loose two file formation, as the tunnel was large enough for up to four people to walk side by side. The rock tunnel had cracks all over its surfaces and continued for over 50 meters before the tunnel widened into a sort of circular room.

"Look!" The point men whispered, as their beams of light played over a shape laying against the walls. They advanced on alert, their weapons held ready as they spread out, giving room for the rest to enter the room. Their lights and weapons all focused on the only thing inside the area.

"It's the Hero!"

"No shit!"

"Farker still alive?"

"You!" Lt Rathia patted the nearest Marine, "Go check!"

"Eh, y-yes sir!" The unlucky Marine sighed at his luck and gathered his courage before stepping forward, to where the Hero was, while the others snickered at him. "Sir, he looks dead, if not he wished he's dead."

Lt Rathia went forward and observed the body. Upon closer inspection, the Hero was actually half buried in the wall, with parts of his body missing. What appeared to be the upper torso and what was left of the left arm with the right arm missing at the shoulder. The head portion looked like an over barbequed round ham, with a thick layer of char and pinkish meat underneath the cracked skin.

Most of his skin was gone, and his flesh was either stripped away or charred black with some greyish roasted bones sticking out. He was barely even recognized as a person, as what was left behind was just a vague black shape.

"It that even a person?" One of the Marines commented as he shone his light at the body with less than half its body barely intact. "Look what is that?"

A glint of light could be seen inside the body from the flashlights of the Marine as he played over the body. "Don't touch it with your bare hands!" Someone warned.

Lt Rathia removed his bayonet and poked around at the body where the glint was seen, "Could be just a piece of the projectile left?"

His sword bayonet suddenly poked something hard and with any hesitation, Lt Rathia stabbed in and jerked, ripping the charred flesh open and something fell out with a clink on the rock floor.

Suddenly the body gasped, its chest rosed up and down, and a pair of eyes with startling eye whites opened wide on the blackened and scarred charcoal lump. "UHHHHMMMM!" It suddenly gasped for air scared the shit out of the Marines as they all jumped in fright.

"FARK!" Everyone fired their weapons almost at the same time, cursing and swearing at the suddenly alive body! "DIE!! FARK!!"

The roars of gunfire in the enclosed area deafened the men, and Lt Rathia was yelling, "Cease fire! CEASE FIRE!"

The gunfire slowly died down, while one Marine gave a last shot at the spasming body. "Cease fire!" Lt Rathia glared at the Marine who gave an innocent blank look. "Goddamnit!"

He waved the smoke away while the men kept their weapons trained at the Hero, cursing at the Hero for scaring them and wondering how the hell is he still alive after all this. Rathia noticed the Hero seemed to be struggling desperately to move the remaining stub of his only hand with melted flesh towards the object on the floor.

He glanced down and with his gloved hands, he picked up the strange crescent shaped object and shone his light on it.

"OHHHHhNNNNNNNnnnnNNNnn..." The Hero moaned out, his vocal cords had burnt away, his left arm ending in a melted blackened stub waved desperately at Rathia.

Rathia frowned as he eyed the Hero before looking carefully at the object, and found that it was actually just a part of a large piece of something, only that it was broken into a crescent shape. Complex runes covered its surface coated with bits of overcooked Hero parts and blood.

Rathia grimaced at it before something clicked in his mind, he looked back at the Hero who appeared to be shriveling up as he tried to grasp the object in his hand with his handless arm. "Is this the divine artifact of the Sun God?"

He waved the artifact in front of the Hero who opened his lipless mouth, and a moan came out. "Well, Mr. Hero, no more artifact for you."

The body of the Hero suddenly seemed to sink in, and the eye whites of the Hero turned dull and yellow, and he soon stopped its desperate movements, his head resting down on his ruined chest with his arm stretching out towards Rathia.

"Is he dead?" Someone asked and using his muzzle, he gave the body a poke. "That's dead right?"

"Mine the place," Rathia said, as he held the artifact at arm's length. "Give me your rope pouch," He gestured one of the climbers and dropped the artifact into the sling bag. "Use all your explosives and bring this place down."

The men nodded as they checked their gear, removing claymore mines and grenades. They stacked the explosives against the tunnel walls, into the cracks and crevices. Once done, they unrolled the fuse lines and gathered at the edge of the cave.

"Alright let's get out of here and blow this place up!" Rathia said, and they climbed back down to the waiting men who were on alert due to the gunfire they heard. Once safely down, Rathia gave the command, "Set the fuses, we should have 30 to 40 seconds to get clear!"

"Blow it up! Let this be his tomb!"


CREATORS' THOUGHTS
Neobear Neobear

Advance chapters are available on Patreon (16 Chapters Ahead)

https://www.patreon.com/neobear

-----

Join the discussion in Discord

https://discord.gg/A8Tm86V

-----

Donate/Support me via Paypal now!

https://paypal.me/neobear

-----

You guys happy hes finally dead? Yes? Then give me all your stones!

Load failed, please RETRY

Weekly Power Status

Batch unlock chapters

Table of Contents

Display Options

Background

Font

Size

Chapter comments

Write a review Reading Status: C159
Fail to post. Please try again
  • Writing Quality
  • Stability of Updates
  • Story Development
  • Character Design
  • World Background

The total score 0.0

Review posted successfully! Read more reviews
Vote with Power Stone
Rank 200+ Power Ranking
Stone 33 Power Stone
Report inappropriate content
error Tip

Report abuse

Paragraph comments

Login

tip Paragraph comment

Paragraph comment feature is now on the Web! Move mouse over any paragraph and click the icon to add your comment.

Also, you can always turn it off/on in Settings.

GOT IT