Apocalypse, then transforming into a magical girl

Inside the VIP room, the veteran, who had been silent until now, had a look of understanding flash in his cloudy eyes after hearing the words coming from the drone.

"Use fire..." he muttered to himself, then stood up and said to the other survivors, "Don't just stand around. Those who can still move, go and see if there's anything in this building that can be burned, the more the better!"

Upon hearing this, the group immediately began searching the VIP room.

As Wei Yuan watched the veteran begin to dismantle a valuable-looking mahogany coffee table with his bare hands, his lips twitched, and a look of pain appeared on his face—a pain even greater than when his arm was broken.

However, he ultimately said nothing and joined the search for flammable materials. The bank had no shortage of paper documents, which quickly piled up into a small heap.

Old Wang and Feng Yue carefully placed the bucket of diesel they had brought from the subway station aside, and moved some printing paper over as well. Old Qian also found some alcohol-based cleaning agents in the toilet.

Downstairs at the bank building, on the street, Xia Zhaozhao had a huge pile of lithium batteries around her. She tied the lithium batteries together with thin steel strips torn from the GG brand sign next to her and barely managed to carry them on her shoulder.

"...I'm exhausted. Two riddle-solving people, disgusting," she muttered to herself.

Bai Shuyuan's drone had already flown out of the bank building. Seeing all this, she took off the huge, hard backpack from her back.

Her movements were skillful and fluid as she quickly assembled the cold gun parts, and a menacing-looking NTW-14.5 anti-materiel sniper rifle, weighing over 30 kilograms and nearly two meters long, appeared in her hands.

This gun was originally designed to deal with armored vehicles or destroy high-value targets such as radar facilities at long range; she stole it from somewhere.

She rested the gun on the windowsill. Through the scope, the headquarters building of Xinmao Bank, several hundred meters away, was clearly visible.

Bai Shuyuan took out a rather robust bullet from her gun pouch; the brass casing still gleamed in the dim red light. It was a 14.5x114mm armor-piercing incendiary round.

She pulled back the bolt and chambered the bullet.

The magical girl Shrike, also known as Xia Zhaozhao, was standing not far outside the lobby on the first floor of the bank, carrying a large bundle of lithium batteries on her back, with another bundle placed next to her.

"Please wait until the glass breaks, then drop the lithium battery in to attract as many bees as possible." Bai Shuyuan's voice was transmitted to Xia Zhaozhao's ears through the drone.

Xia Zhaozhao gave the drone an OK sign.

Bai Shuyuan held her breath, her crosshairs steadily aimed at the center of the glass window on the third floor of the bank building.

The opaque bulletproof glass on the building shattered instantly, sending countless shards of glass flying in and out, producing a piercing cracking sound.

The 14.5mm armor-piercing incendiary round tore through the thick special bulletproof glass and plunged into the interior of the third-floor cafeteria. It exploded with a bang after hitting a dining table inside the cafeteria, scattering wood chips and concrete fragments everywhere. A ball of orange-red flame rose up and instantly ignited the surrounding tables and chairs.

The sudden loud noise and explosion threw the soldier bees that were wandering on the third floor into chaos. They emitted uneasy hissing sounds and rushed towards the source of the noise, their deformed wings on their backs vibrating violently and producing a buzzing sound unique to bees.

"Now, Shrike, throw the lithium battery in and attract as many monsters as possible."

"Okay~"

Xia Zhaozhao carried a bundle of lithium batteries on her back, her magic surging within her. After a brief running start, she bent her knees slightly and leaped into the broken window on the third floor.

While still in mid-air, she slammed the bundle of lithium batteries on her back into the nearest wasp. Then, a flash of light appeared in her hand, and a greatsword materialized.

"Come bite me, you beasts!" she yelled, charging forward and stabbing her sword into the weakest point of the exoskeleton in the center of the chest of an unfortunate wasp, instantly rendering it unable to fight.

The spacious canteen was an excellent battlefield, but she kept her duty in mind, only harassing the bees at the edge of the swarm and not lingering in for a deeper fight.

She would occasionally wield her greatsword to repel the overrunning soldier bees, while skillfully avoiding the risk of being surrounded.

Bai Shuyuan observed everything through her sniper scope. As she expected, this monster, which she named "human bee," had a social structure similar to that of bees, maintained by pheromones.

At this moment, the monsters here seem to be constantly emitting pheromones that indicate a "threat," and countless soldier bees are swarming in from other places.

Once the number was sufficient, Bai Shuyuan maneuvered the drone to the vicinity of the window and notified Xia Zhaozhao to evacuate.

"Shrike, that's enough. Let's go."

"Alright—" Upon hearing this, Xia Zhaozhao did not delay. Without turning her head, she turned around and ran towards the window, leaping out of the broken window.

"Boom—!" Another deafening roar.

The second armor-piercing incendiary round whistled through the air, precisely piercing a large soldier bee that was trying to pursue Xia Zhaozhao.

The soldier bee's thick exoskeleton was as fragile as paper under the 14.5mm bullet, instantly pierced and torn apart, its body exploding into a cloud of black blood mist.

Subsequently, the warhead, still possessing considerable momentum, accurately struck the cluster of lithium batteries behind the soldier bee.

The lithium battery was instantly ignited by the high temperature and impact, and a blinding arc of electricity mixed with orange-red flames shot into the sky. The firelight quickly engulfed all the monsters around and even illuminated the entire third-floor cafeteria as if it were daytime.

Countless burning battery fragments scattered in all directions, igniting everything flammable around them, and the third floor was instantly turned into a sea of ​​fire.

"...That's truly spectacular."

Xia Zhaozhao stood on a street lamp and sighed.

The stairwell on the second floor was also sealed off with flammable materials collected by the survivors, and the makeshift fire wall temporarily blocked the monster's path down.

Little Green also flew out from the second floor at this moment, admiring this scene.

"...Not enough. The power of lithium batteries is still too weak."

Although it seemed quite legendary, Xiao Lü could tell that while the sound and light of the explosion were impressive, the actual effect was rather limited.

The third floor was an open space. Although the flames were intense, the temperature and duration of the burning lithium battery were not enough to cause fatal damage to the thick-skinned wasps.

The wasps directly caught in the blast were indeed annihilated, but many more on the edge of the explosion were merely thrown over by the shockwave or injured by flying debris. More than a massacre, the scene resembled a foul-smelling fireworks display.

"No. That's not the main purpose." Bai Shuyuan shouted through the drone. At this moment, her golden eyes were staring intently at the situation inside the third floor through the scope.

"I can see that strong alarm pheromones have already begun to spread. Fire and mass deaths of their kind are the highest level of threat signals for social insects."

"The bees must have a queen," Bai Shuyuan concluded. She wasn't a combat-type magical girl; the anchor of "seeking knowledge" gave her eyes that could see more things.

The monsters' bodies weren't simply piles of thread-like structures; they inherited multiple nodes. She could see that these monsters, compared to ordinary black thread-like aggregates, were missing some of their information processing nodes.

Therefore, she concluded that the information processing nodes of these monsters were likely located outside the body, broadcasting to the monsters in some way she did not understand. And this external brain was likely the "queen bee" of the human-bees.

She wanted to force the queen bee to react through this extreme stimulation.

Found it! The source of the pheromones, and the energy reaction of a large number of elite units—

"The 'Queen Bee' is on the fourth floor! And there are strong signs of her evacuation!"