Star Rank Hunter

As the distance between the two robot armies grew shorter and shorter, the robots attacking the energy shield started turning their weapons against the newcomers. Judging from the exterior alone, it looked like the two armies were equal in strength. However, Borat quickly realized that the enemy robots possessed incredible adaptability, so much so that they seemed more like well-trained soldiers in armor than actual robots. They knew how to organize themselves, find cover, and coordinate with each other depending on the situation. For example, when his robots attempted to focus down a certain enemy, a big robot would activate its energy shield to defend its ally. At the same time, the smaller robots in the area would swiftly move behind the big robot to take cover. The second the barrage was over, they would rapidly emerge from behind the big robot, zigzag a bit to keep their movements unpredictable, and launch a devastating counter attack of their own.

This tactic might seem easy for a robot to execute, but it was a different story to execute it in the air and at the speed they were flying. It wasn't undoable of course, but Borat couldn't shake the feeling that something about these new robots didn't feel right. He didn't know why he was feeling like this, only that the way they moved and more instilled within him a deep sense of unease and irritation. It was during this time the two robot armies finally collided against each other.

For the longest time, Borat had believed that the robot army under his command was the best robot army in the entire GAL. The Robert Family had spent enough money on them to attract the attention of any top family in the galaxy, and even the Eighth Army had chipped in some support here and there. However, his pride and belief were immediately shaken when he saw the outcome of the clash. A group of his robots had been sent flying by the collision, and while they were able to catch themselves in just a short time, the massive dent on their bodies practically announced their failure to all to see. Of course, the enemies' robots hadn't gotten away unscathed, but the dents they suffered were noticeably smaller, they were restored to their pre-deformed state in almost no time at all.

Both sides were made of memory alloy, and yet the new robots had recovered way faster than Borat's. It wasn't just a matter of the gap between materials anymore, this outcome was proof that his robots was fundamentally inferior to the enemy's in some ways. Borat might not be an exceptional researcher, but he was still a member of the Robert Family. He had seen too many things in that brief clash alone.

In the sky, a robotic beast that was shaped like an eagle flew straight toward one of Borat's robots. It looked like they were about to collide in mid-air, but it transformed into a boa at the last possible second and wrapped around its target. At the same time, countless sawteeth covered in high power laser emerged from its body and sliced its prey into several pieces in the blink of an eye.

Similar outcomes were playing out all across the sky. The Xi Family's robots were always able to identify the circumstances correctly, adopt the best form, and "kill" their prey with the best method available to them.

On the ground, some of the smaller robots were also battling their enemies with a similar style. Whenever they encountered a bigger opponent, they would merge together to form an entity that was as big or bigger than their enemy before annihilating them with impunity. One of the fused robots Cillin was observing had caught an enemy robots with its massive fists, ripped it in half, then turned around nimbly to punch another robot who was attempting to ambush it in the face, crushing it completely. If he wasn't mistaken, Xi Kai had most likely taken inspiration from King Kong when he designed this form.

Bang!

There was a cannon shot, and a giant hole appeared on the mecha King Kong's chest. It did not collapse from its injury, however. It simply split up into several smaller beasts and resumed its "hunt" elsewhere.

"What… the hell are those things?" A member of the Free Army could not help but blurt out.

Inside the energy shield, Xi Kai put away his remote controller while declaring, "These prototypes aren't perfected yet, but they'll do for this battle."

His tone sounded regretful, but the upturned corners of his lips revealed his true feelings. He might as well be boasting, See, my prototypes are good enough to deal with these trashes!

After observing the battle situation for a moment, Cillin gestured toward Xi Mu. "Let's begin the next step."

A short while later, a good amount of smaller energy shields were placed on some of the larger piles of energy ores. It was to protect the energy ores from harm. It went without saying that the energy ores would be much less effective if they were blasted to smithereens by a stray shot or something. Also, since White Night had been released from the planet, they no longer needed to protect the whole area anymore. He snapped his fingers, and the Eleventh Squad immediately took off to carry out their duties. Since he had communicated his plan with his crew many times beforehand, even the newcomers such as Mogas were able to perform their responsibilities wonderfully.

Finally, Cillin notified Aikenseth about their intentions. Once the Free Army was ready, Xi Kai shut down the massive energy shield.

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Xi Kai's robots were holding back the main bulk of Borat's forces, so the Eleventh Squad and the Free Army only had to deal with a small portion of them. Cary let out a whoop of excitement before charing straight toward the closest robot.

In fact, the Eleventh Squad was very used to battling robots. When the crew was free, and they didn't have a training session with Shusag, Xi Kai would often pit his robots against them for research purposes. As a result, they were able to enter the zone almost immediately they joined the battlefield.

However, while Cary was carving an enemy robot into sushi, he suddenly noticed that a monkey-shaped robot next to him had leaped into the air to dodge a burst of enemy fire. While spinning over its attacker, it caught the robot by the neck before landing on the ground and heaving it right over its shoulder. The poor robot drew a beautiful arc in the air before its entire body was smashed into the ground.

A muscle twitched in Shusag and Cary's face when they saw this. Why does this look so familiar, both men thought to themselves. It was then they recalled that Xi Kai's robot had applied the exact same maneuver against them while they were training in the training room. Shusag had been skilled enough to break out of the maneuver, but Cary was not as skilled as he was. That was why he could feel it in his bones when the poor robot had been literally smashed into the ground.

On a side note, the robot was smashed into the ground only because the planet's ground was harder than normal, and because the victim was a robot, not a human. Had the monkey-shaped robot pulled the same maneuver on a human, it could smash them hard enough to turn them into paste and still not "plant" them into the ground.

The strike looked fatal enough even for a robot, but the monkey-shaped robot was clearly a believer of overkill. It kicked its defeated opponent twice before turning around to face down another opponent. Cary was one hundred percent sure the monkey-shaped robot would have popped out its laser arm blade and carved the poor thing open if the other robot hadn't interrupted it.

There was a chance that the enemy robot was still functional, but judging from the fact it hadn't climbed back to its feet and that it was discharging electrical sparks from time to time, it was incapable of further combat at the very least.

Wheeze had no intentions of getting involved in this fight, or at least not at the beginning. Right here and now, there was nothing more important that the energy ores before its eyes. When the small pile of unprotected energy ores a few feet away from it abruptly exploded to smithereens though, it saw red and went absolutely bonkers.

"You meowtherfuckers! Just because I'm cute doesn't mean I'm harmless!"

And so, everyone bore witness to a round, fat, ugly gray cat transforming into a ferocious mechanical beast in the blink of an eye.

Wheeze expanded its wings and shot into the sky. Then, it opened its mouth and let out a powerful roar. Everyone who heard it felt as if someone had stabbed an entire stack of needles into their eardrums.

The roar was unblockable even with the helmets of their protective suits because it wasn't just made up of sound waves. This was evident from the fact that all the robots within hearing range of Wheeze's roar, which was very far, started to lag all of a sudden. Xi Kai's newly made robots were no exception. However, the researcher's robots lagged much less than the Robert Family's robots, and the small difference was all it took to widen the gap between the two robot armies into an unbridgeable chasm.

This was just the beginning, however. After wing-slapping a couple of eyesores out of its sight, Wheeze officially began venting its anger. In terms of speed, not even Xi Kai's new robots were a match for it. The gray cat might be unreliable at times, but it was hardly slow-witted when it got serious. Since the moment it joined the battlefield, Borat's robot army had been unable to land a solid hit on it. The best they managed was a glancing hit.

Reysen visibly shuddered when Wheeze popped out its claws and went to town on a big robot. This particular enemy had beaten the crap out of his men, and the gray cat had clawed out half of its waist with a single swipe.

Inside the spaceplane, Mo Heng pointed at the gray cat rampaging across the battlefield and asked Xi Kai, "So, when do you think you can build a humanoid or beastial robot that's a match for Cillin's pet?"

Xi Kai shot him a mirthless smile and said nothing. The pleased look on his face also vanished completely.

Comparison breeds competitiveness, and competitiveness breeds excellence. While it was true that Xi Kai's robots were superior to the Robert Family's, they were nothing compared to the gray cat. Without exaggeration, Wheeze's performance had snapped Xi Kai out of his smugness and made him realize that he still had a long, long way to go.

It wasn't just Wheeze either. Czedow was another robot that he felt completely out of reach to him. If Wheeze was the definition of high profile, then Czedow was the example of the complete opposite. Like a true shadow, he was someone you would notice only if you were actively looking for him. Even so, he had done countless astonishing things when no one was looking. He was an anomaly you could not help but be impressed with every time you really looked at him.

Right now, Czedow was battling the robot army just like anyone else, but unlike usual he stood out like a sore thumb because of several reasons. For one, he was dressed in casual clothing when everyone else was covered in protective suit or Armor. Two, he was fighting with his bare hands. Three, he had no wings like Wheeze, but he was flying no slower than all of the robots around him. And four, his attacks were neither flashy nor impressive-looking, but the trail of bodies he left in his wake could only be described as terrifying.

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Mo Heng was right. When could he build a robot like this? When could he create a robot army where every robot was as strong as Czedow or Wheeze?

He had a long, long, long way to go.

Mo Heng scratched his gray hair and let out an awkward chuckle when he saw Xi Kai's mood going from highly spirited all the way to gravely solemn. Not knowing what to say, he kept his silence and returned to watching the battle on the screen. He was old, as much as he hated to admit it, he could only watch a battle like this from a safe space now. That did not mean he had departed the battlefield, however. When he built Cary and his friends their space fighters, when he improved the Eleventh Squad's weaponry, and when he watched these children fighting on the battlefield with his creations, he felt like he was right there with them. His heart might be old, but his blood still boiled just as easily as ever.

Meanwhile, Cillin wasn't idle either. On one hand, he wielded a thin, long blade that carved through any metal as if they did not exist. On the other, he wielded the PTS S, a Snake King that devoured any and every without mercy. Not only did the robots shot by the PTS S crumbled to the ground with little to no resistance, Aikenseth, Reysen and Blue all noticed that quite a number of robots had exploded before they even got close to him. Heck, he wasn't even pointing his gun at them, but they were still destroyed somehow.

Aikenseth recalled the first time they had encountered Cillin and Czedow on the passenger ship. He had no doubt they would have died if he had given in to his suspicion and chosen to fight the young man back then. Forget Czedow, Cillin alone could've sent them all to hell without a scratch, and while he hadn't seen it with his own eyes, he was sure that that strange cat had been on the ship as well.

Once again, he was glad that he had not made an enemy out of the Eleventh Squad. It might be a small, unassuming force with only a few stars in it, but they had pleasantly surprised him so many times that it would be outright idiotic to continue to judge the book by its over.

We must continue this alliance no matter what. That was the promise Aikenseth made to himself after this experience.

Unnoticed by Aikenseth, Blue was experiencing a revelation of her own. What caught her attention was the blade Cillin was wielding. Most people wouldn't be able to recognize it, but she knew because her late adopted father—a former boss in Sector V who was assassinated by his enemies—had kept a diary, and inside was a record the infamous Star Rank Hunter, Oskulos and his thin, long blade.

Blue was already suspicious when Cillin had pulled out the blade, but after she saw him cutting down the robots with borderline supernatural ease—something their expensive blades could could barely achieve—she became certain that it was none other than the blade of Oskulos!

Oskulos was killed by someone. That was the rumor that had spread throughout the entire Sector V. However, there had never been a definite conclusion as to who his killer was. Some people said that it was the other Star Rank Hunters who did him in, and some said that it was the Heavenly Edict Generals who did it. No one had any reason to suspect otherwise because at their level, it was almost unthinkable that they could die to anyone else.

But now, Blue discovered that Cillin was wielding Oskulos' blade. How could she not be shocked?

Just who on earth is he?!

Xi Kai's robot army, the Eleventh Squad and the Free Army weren't the only ones who were fighting against the Robert Family's robot army. From time to time, traps such as spike traps, pinion traps and more would appear out of nowhere and impede the robots further. They were all controlled by White Night as a matter of course. The planet had had many visitors in the past, but they had all been devoured without leaving a trace behind. The traps might be far less effective against robots than they were organics, but they were still a major boon for Cillin's side.

The tide began to turn in their favor. Inside the spaceplane, Borat looked like a demented man as he watched the ongoing battle with bloodshot eyes, fingers scratching his own head hard enough to bloody the scalp and tear out chunks of his well-groomed hair and muttering indecipherable things underneath his breath. When a subordinate came over and tried to persuade him to escape, he slapped them hard enough to bleed out of their mouths.

His subordinates did not care about the act of violence, however. Together, they physically dragged him away from the control room and toward the escape ship. Keeping Borat alive was their number one priority because it was a direct order from the higher-ups of the Robert Family. If they failed their duty, they and their families would all be going to the grave with him.

Half an hour later, a disc-shaped spaceplane abruptly ejected itself from the main spaceplane and sped toward the sky. Borat and his main subordinates were all inside as a matter of course.

The spaceplane was clearly a special construct. Xi Kai's robots tried to shoot it down, but it was gone in just the blink of an eye.

"Meow dammit! I can't believe he got away!" Wheeze exclaimed in anger before grabbing an enemy robot who was unfortunate enough to be in its path at this exact moment. As if venting its emotions, it swallowed the robot in one gulp, chewed visibly a couple of times, before spitting out the pile of scrap metal it had been turned into.

Xi Kai pressed a fist to his forehead when he saw this. How the fuck am I supposed to create a robot like this!?

The mastermind had escaped, and the remaining enemies were all fodders. So, Wheeze ditched the robots and flew straight toward the abandoned spaceplane, hoping that Borat had left behind some valuables in his haste to escape.