You said mechs were going to fight monsters, but instead you're destroying stars with your bare

Chapter 173 Hitting a Big Watermelon

"ten!"

"Nine!"

"Eight!"

……

The atmosphere inside the enormous hangar was extremely tense.

Li Zhe, Xu Lei, and Yi Ze had already entered their respective cockpits and completed the final combat readiness checks.

"Brother Li, how do we fight this time?" Xu Lei's voice came through the team's communication channel, carrying a hint of barely suppressed excitement.

"How else can we fight them?" Ize's voice was full of calm and confidence. "Of course, we'll crush them!"

Li Zhe looked at the constantly changing countdown on the screen, a playful smile curving his lips.

He didn't answer them, but instead issued his first and only command through the squad channel.

"You guys do whatever you want, I'm going first."

Xu Lei: "?"

Xu Lei: "?"

"three!"

"two!"

"one!"

"The exercise begins!"

With Zhu Xingtuan's hoarse roar, the massive gate of the hangar burst open!
In that instant, Li Zhe vanished from everyone's sight like a flash of light!

At the same time, hundreds of mechs roared out from the catapult tracks of the eight mobile academies and rushed into the battlefield shrouded in darkness.

An unprecedented large-scale exercise, bringing together the most elite new forces in the entire East China Theater, has begun...

"Li Zhe is missing?!"

The signal flare signaling the start of the exercise was still trailing a brilliant contrail high in the sky, and the massive hangar gates had just been fully raised, with the biting sea breeze carrying the smell of gunpowder rushing in.

However, at this highly anticipated opening moment, the "Platinum Star," who was supposed to fight alongside Xu Lei and Izawa Munesaka and was full of sacred and majestic aura, left an extremely fast afterimage on everyone's retinas and then disappeared into thin air!

"Holy crap?! Where's Brother Li?!"

Xu Lei's "Thick Earth" mecha had just taken a step when it suddenly braked, almost causing it to fall flat on its face on the deck.

His incredulous exclamation echoed in his sturdy cockpit.

Xu Lei suddenly spun the mech's detectors, like a giant, clumsy iron man who couldn't find his mother, anxiously spinning around in place. The radar screen was completely clean, without even a ghostly figure.

"That bastard..." Izawa Muneko's "Sakura Warrior" mecha remained calm.

But inside the cockpit, his handsome face was also filled with astonishment and confusion.

He instinctively gripped the hilt of his katana, his teeth clenched.

"Are you kidding me...? Are they abandoning us and going solo?!"

He couldn't understand or accept it.

In their view, this is more than just abandonment.

It's more like a humiliating disregard!

This sudden turn of events not only left the two teammates completely bewildered, but also caused an uproar in the joint command center of the eight academies.

On the enormous holographic screen, one of the three dots representing the "First Special Operations Team" suddenly went out within 0.1 seconds of the exercise starting. The white dot representing Li Zhe vanished without a trace, as if it had never existed.

"What the hell?! Signal lost? Or is there a malfunction in the machine?"

"Report to the Chief Instructor! 'Platinum Star' signal from Squad 1 has been completely lost! Unable to track! Repeat, unable to track!"

"Switch all observation perspectives immediately! Find him!"

Inside the command center, Zhu Xingtuan's perpetually icy face was now so gloomy it was almost dripping with water.

He slammed his fist on the table and roared into the communicator, "Li Zhe! What are you up to?! Answer me now! Otherwise, you'll be punished for disrupting the exercise!"

However, the public channel remained completely silent, with no response whatsoever.

Everyone was stunned.

Less than a second into the game, the captain vanished without a trace?

what is this?
Is the legendary "Five-Strike Lightning Whip" a "deception and sneak attack"?
"Outrageous!" Zhu Xingtuan trembled with anger. His adjutant quickly handed him a cup of hot tea. "Chief Instructor, please calm down. Perhaps... perhaps the machine has experienced some kind of hyperspace jump malfunction that we cannot understand?"

"A malfunction?" Zhu Xingtuan blew on the scalding hot tea, took a sip, and a hint of curiosity and amusement flashed deep in his eyes.

He knows better than anyone.

Li Zhe is definitely not the kind of person who would make such a basic mistake.

This sudden "disappearance" must have concealed some kind of tactical intention that he could not understand, yet was full of absolute confidence.

What exactly is this kid trying to do?
Zhu Xingtuan's curiosity was completely piqued at this moment.

He maintained his furious demeanor, continuously ordering the technical department to conduct investigations.

In reality, they had already activated the highest level of private observation privileges, attempting to find clues about the "ghost" in that chaotic battlefield.

Meanwhile, Xu Lei and Izawa Munesaka, having lost their captain, were forced to form an awkward "two-person comedy" team.

Before they could recover from the shock of their captain running away, crisis had already quietly descended.

"Warning! Enemy high-speed unit detected approaching!"

Several mechs painted in the flamboyant ink painting style of "Wu Yue Mech Art Academy" flanked a simulated island like ghosts.

Their mechs are designed with a classical aesthetic, some resembling cranes and others like unicorns, but their weapons are anything but "artistic".

Dense beams of energy, like splashed ink in a landscape painting, drew deadly strokes in the air, instantly engulfing the area where the two were located.

"Damn it! We've been ambushed!"

Xu Lei roared and immediately used the huge tower shield of the "Thick Earth" mech to block the first wave of attacks.

Meanwhile, Izawa's "Sakura Warrior" immediately activated its high-mobility mode, attempting to flank and counterattack.

But the enemy was clearly prepared. Several "Crane" mechs immediately took off and used their agile flight capabilities to entangle him tightly, preventing him from getting close to the enemy's long-range firepower units.

The game started poorly, and they were quickly put on the defensive.

This is the harsh reality of a joint exercise gathering elites!

However, they never dreamed of this.

At this moment, the unscrupulous captain they thought had "abandoned" them was leisurely "watching the battle" on a deserted island dozens of kilometers away from the edge of the battlefield, in a way they couldn't understand.

The ultimate demonic mech, blending perfectly into its surroundings, lies silently hidden in the shadow of a volcanic rock.

Its surface is covered with an optical camouflage layer, like the skin of a chameleon, which completely absorbs all radar signals and energy fluctuations.

Like a ghost that doesn't exist in this dimension...

(End of this chapter)