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

Chapter 176 Battlefield Phantom
"Dispatch another puppet squad to provide support."

On the isolated island, Li Zhe, like a ghost blending into the night, quietly lurked in the shadows.

The holographic sand table flashes with light spots, giving a complete view of the dynamics of the entire exercise field.

His voice was calm and even, and it was precisely transmitted to Zero through the quantum communication network.

[Instructions confirmed, Commander.]

Zero's imitation of Star's cool voice echoed in my mind.

[Squad B-7 has been activated and is expected to arrive at the outer edge of the 'One Line Sky' canyon within three minutes via a covert route.]

Li Zhe nodded, his gaze refocusing on the two blue dots on the sand table that represented Xu Lei and Yi Ze, who were now cornered.

"Prepare them for a 'surprise'."

Meanwhile, on another simulated island at the edge of the training ground, a silent "theft" is taking place.

Five mechs, painted in the simple gray paint of Jiangdong Shipyard and of the most basic "Pioneer-II" model, moved silently through the dense simulated jungle like a well-trained special forces unit.

They were none other than Li Zhe's absolutely loyal "worker bee puppet" unit—Squad A-3.

Their target is a "mission item" hidden in an abandoned research facility in the core area of ​​the island—a geothermal core sample emitting faint energy fluctuations.

According to the exercise settings, this sample is one of the key items to activate the final defense system of the central island, with a value of up to 500 points, enough to make any squad drool.

At this very moment, a steel showdown is taking place on this island between "Northern Heavy Industries" and "Xichuan Mecha Engineering Academy".

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

The roar of heavy artillery and the whooshing of energy beams rose and fell, illuminating the night sky over the entire island in a flickering pattern.

Northern Heavy Industries' mechs, as always, inherit their "clumsy, big, and rough" violent aesthetics.

Five "Grizzly" heavy mechs, each over four meters tall, formed an impregnable mobile fortress. With heavy strides, they plowed a patch of scorched earth through the jungle ahead, using shoulder-fired grenade launchers and chain machine guns.

Their opponents, the "Pandamen" team from Xichuan, displayed an extremely flexible and cunning tactical style that was completely opposite to their endearing team name.

Using the complex mountainous terrain, they constantly carried out guerrilla harassment, and their Gauss rifles could always fire deadly electromagnetic bullets from the most tricky angles, accurately hitting the joints of the "Grizzly" mechs.

The two sides fought fiercely, with back-and-forth exchanges, and the battle reached a stalemate at one point.

However, none of them noticed that while they were fighting fiercely, five gray ghosts had silently bypassed their main battlefield and infiltrated the poorly defended abandoned research facility.

The actions of Team A-3 were textbook examples of infiltration warfare.

They made not a single extra sound; even the mech's engine was set to the lowest silent mode.

Like five cheetahs blending into the darkness, they used every shadow and every cover to perfectly avoid all the surrounding surveillance cameras and automatic warning turrets.

When they arrived at the core laboratory of the research facility, the two team members who stayed behind to guard the "geothermal core sample" were even leisurely eating snacks while watching the "live broadcast" of the main battlefield through tactical tablets, cheering for their own team.

"Well done, Captain! Smash those guys' knees!"

"Hahaha, what can these Northerners do besides being tough and thick-skinned? They're too green to play tactics with us!"

Just as they were gloating, two dark figures silently slid down from the ventilation duct behind them. "Pfft—"

Two muffled, soft sounds.

The cockpits of the two remaining mechs were precisely pierced by Gao Zhoubo's dagger during the exercise.

The driver inside didn't even have time to sound the alarm before being declared "dead" and turned into a white light, teleporting back to the academy's resurrection point.

The leader of Squad A-3, a mech codenamed "Worker Bee-01," calmly sheathed his dagger and issued a concise command over the communication channel.

"Target cleared, begin data collection."

The five mechs had a clear division of labor and performed their movements skillfully.

Cracking the code, disabling the energy shield, containing the sample...

The whole process was smooth and seamless, taking less than thirty seconds.

When they returned silently with the priceless "geothermal core sample" and disappeared into the shadows of the jungle...

The two teams on the main battlefield were still locked in a fierce battle, completely unaware that their own "crystal" had been stolen.

This is just one example of the countless "god-level base raids" staged by the "ghost troops" during the exercises.

Over the next few hours, this mysterious force of "worker bee golems" became a persistent nightmare for all the teams.

They appear and disappear unpredictably, never engaging in any direct confrontation.

They are like a group of highly efficient "scavengers," always able to enter the battlefield from unbelievable angles.

While other teams are fighting tooth and nail for points, leaving each other exhausted, they appear silently, snatch the most crucial "mission items" or "loot," and then disappear without a trace.

"Report! The 'high-energy crystal' in Sector B-2 has been taken by an unknown entity! Our people just repelled the 'Tianfu Academy' attack, and when they turned around, the crystal was gone!"

"Command Center! The 'ancient artifacts' on C-7 Island have also been stolen! Our team fought those idiots from 'Shen Gong University' for a full two hours, only to have someone else steal the prize in the end!"

"What the hell! Where did these guys come from?! There's no reaction on the radar at all!"

In a short time, the command centers of various colleges received similar reports.

"Ghost", "Scavenger", "Old Six"...

Various codenames, filled with resentment and awe, were bestowed upon this mysterious unit.

Their presence, like a persistent dark cloud, loomed over the hearts of all the participants.

Even on internal forums, the discussion about the "Ghost Squad" has far surpassed the excitement of the battles between elite squads.

A post titled "The biggest dark horse in the exercise? Who exactly is the mysterious 'scavenger' unit?" quickly rose to the top of the trending search list.

In the post, "war correspondents" from various colleges described their bizarre encounters with "ghost troops" in exaggerated detail, attracting countless onlookers and sparking discussions.

(End of this chapter)