Boom!
The anti-tank missile struck directly through the Legend's open rear armor window!
A weapon of that yields detonating inside the vehicle meant certain death.
Black smoke poured from the truck as vehicles converged from every direction, like hyenas circling a wounded lion.
A hyena pack cannot defeat a pride at full strength. They wait. They wait for weakness, for failure, for the moment the lion stumbles and bares its throat.
So, was this that moment?
Boom—
The thunderous engine never stopped. It roared again, like a war drum tearing through the street!
The smoke was thrown behind them. The Legend's cargo armor was fully opened, and inside stood a massive figure in power armor, holding what had once been part of the vehicle's Chronititan armor plating—
Like an enormous shield.
Those Chronititan plates had originally been fixed into the outer hull by the electromagnetic armor system. Once that system failed—once the relay controllers went offline—the plates locked into mechanical clamps.
At the side windows, quick-release mechanisms had been designed.
At the rear cargo bay, it was different.
Besides the mechanical locks, the plates were linked by three Chronititan frame bars, designed to be detached entirely in an emergency.
As long as the one holding it could survive the blast—
It became a shield.
And Jackie, equipped with the XS-1 bio-powered combat exosuit, could survive it.
The linking components between the Chronititan plates were thinner and arranged more like chains.
When the explosion hit, the tremendous force traveled through those slender connectors. Their unique structural layout caused them to yield first—stretching, deforming, dissipating thermal and kinetic energy.
But an anti-armor weapon remained an anti-armor weapon.
Even after the active defense system prematurely detonated the missile's precursor charge, its penetrative force was still overwhelming.
As the smoke cleared, viewers saw the collision axis: beneath the Chronititan plates, the XS-1 power armor still braced behind a shield forged from Chronititan.
The shield itself was largely assembled from manufacturing rejects—unfit for precision components, but perfect when chained together as a slab of protection.
Penetration depth: eight centimeters.
A red-hot crater burned across the surface.
Even inside the power armor, Jackie could feel the heat.
Bang!
He lowered the armor slab. The warped module could no longer realign with the front hull. Side and upper plates now jutted beyond the body, turning the cargo bay into something like a metal trench.
The approaching vehicles silently cursed.
So the damn thing could tank anti-tank missiles head-on.
"Shit! They tanked it!"
"Then fire another—"
Thud!
Several 14mm caseless rounds slammed into the front armor.
These rounds were less dramatic than the Hammer-30's shells, but each one could punch through 25mm of homogeneous armor on a direct hit.
At this range, penetration could approach 40mm.
Forty millimeters might not sound thick—but most contestants couldn't afford anything better. Their armor was standard military surplus. Any thicker and their engines would choke.
So even at the windshield position, this sports car only mounted 40mm plating.
The armor crumpled instantly.
A round punched through warped metal, tore into the driver's shoulder, and detonated flesh and composite in a spray.
A combat stimulant—Fulcan—automatically injected from his cardiac implant into his bloodstream. A surge of electric shock followed, pumping the drug through his body as blood fountained from the wound.
"We have to pull out!"
The passenger screamed.
"There's no way back!"
The driver twisted around and roared back at him.
At the same time, the panoramic crystal display showed the external situation:
At the end of the street, vehicles were piling into the main logistics artery—wide enough for six cargo trucks.
Because the side streets were blocked.
Valentinos.
Even if they weren't winning, even if they were losing—these Haywood kids were fighting like fanatics.
The passenger finally understood.
He saw a huge merc leap from a vehicle, land atop a Valentino pickup, and with one punch and two shots kill the gunner in the cargo bed.
But one Valentino kid didn't die immediately.
He clung to the bed rail, eyes half-terrified, half-ecstatic, shouting—
Reading his lips:
"Witness me!"
Boom!
The battlefield was collapsing inward.
"We can't run!"
The driver yanked the wheel.
"Throw the explosives—"
Whrrp!
The roof armor split open.
Explosion light flooded in.
The windshield glowed white.
V stood on top of the sports car, mantis blades carving downward, opening the chassis like a surgical incision.
Blood sprayed in arcs.
Bang!
Cover fire from Jackie screamed past her.
A nearby merc tried raising a rocket launcher—but the armor only dented under the suppressing fire.
V noticed.
Without hesitation, she hooked a mangled corpse with her blade and flung it into the pursuing car.
Splat!
The body hit the windshield.
Electrolyte fluid smeared across the sensors.
V drove her mantis blades deep into the car's control panel.
The sports car beneath her feet veered violently—slamming into the blinded vehicle behind it.
Both smashed into a roadside holo-ad tower.
V leapt clear just before impact.
"Mano!"
At the same time, Jackie hurled the Blazing Typhoon motorcycle like a missile.
A rocket fired from a nearby rooftop—
But Big Mac's active defense burst round detonated it midair.
Boom!
The shockwave rippled the avenue.
Big Mac's sub-AI calculated V's landing arc and surged forward.
The truck caught her cleanly.
The battlefield was tightening.
"We take out the launcher!"
Leo's voice cut in.
An octo-arm snapped out through a side armor gap.
A focused beam sliced through darkness and lit up the apartment blocks ahead.
Silhouettes moved.
Rocket launchers.
Anti-tank missiles.
"Got it!"
V crouched low.
The Blazing Typhoon's explosive thrusters detonated.
Her leg servos engaged.
Reinforced tendons absorbed hundreds of kilos of thrust.
She launched skyward.
White monowire-thin grapples fired and latched onto the building.
She swung into the apartment block.
Meanwhile, Jackie vented all thermal systems and reloaded automatically.
"Mano, we—"
"Brace!"
Big Mac had detected it first.
Amid the chaos, one engine signature surged forward at full throttle.
A vehicle burst from the cross street.
Jackie's first thought:
A Mackinaw charging a Legendary Mackinaw? Suicide?
Then he saw what followed.
Behind the charging armored Mackinaw—
Several vehicles were lifted into the air by explosions.
Only then did he notice:
The armored Mackinaw was dragging something enormous behind it.
A power armor.
A power armor mounting a plasma cannon.