Vengeance Is Mine Read Free Page B

backward in shock.
    The strong light exposed a small mountain of countless silhouettes. They were probably two or three kilometers ahead. They were all various types of Gastrea, big and small. As if they had been waiting for that moment, red dots suddenly appeared in the darkness. When Rentaro realized that they were all the red eyes of Gastrea, he gave an involuntary groan. In order to approach the civil officer camp unnoticed, they had closed their eyes and tread softly.
    What was really frightening was their number. The Seitenshi’s prediction was that there were about two thousand Gastrea gathered outside the walls, but this was at least twice that. The self-defense force that was supposed to act as the advance guard was nowhere to be seen. And yet, the vanished SDF troops and the additional Gastrea seemed to balance each other out in his mental arithmetic.
    “There’s no way…” His stomach dropped, and he felt like hurling. How did the Gastrea Legion manage to defeat the entire self-defense force? The SDF should have had the knowledge to completely shut out the Gastrea the way they had in the Second Kanto Battle.
    The Gastrea realized they had been exposed by the flares, and so, no longer needing to hide, they looked toward the sky en masse and gave a loud howl. The air rumbled, sending Rentaro’s skin prickling. Finally, a conspicuously large Gastrea at the front rushed toward them, and the rest followed, one after another, making a number of rhombus-shaped battle formations. The front line drove toward the civil officers in a straight line, tips of their swords aimed forward.
    The invaders let out a rumbling war cry, one that sent a crack through the ground and clouds of dirt alike, to the point where it was hard to tell if it was the ground shaking or the entire earth. Sweat poured from Rentaro’s frame, and the hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.
    What was with these Gastrea that could follow orders? They didn’t look like a troop of Gastrea, they looked like a school of fish that had gathered together, resembling one giant organism. Even humans who had trained for years would have had a hard time moving together like this.
    Just then, a piercing pain stabbed into Rentaro’s head. He felt like he had noticed something important, but the thought had dispersed before becoming clear.
    Enju came close to him with an uneasy expression on her face and squeezed Rentaro’s palm tightly.
    The Gastrea were less than two kilometers away.
    The civil officer troops were also experiencing a precipitous drop in morale. Even battle-hardened veterans were struck with fear.
    “E-everyone, prepare for battle!” Hidehiko instructed his subordinate adjuvants, but his voice shook, and the hand he raised into the air was weak.
    “Everyone, prepare for battle!” Rentaro repeated the order. Realizing that his own voice also sounded slightly nervous, he made an effort to stop his teeth’s chattering. He drew his XD gun from his hip and pulled the slide so it would be ready to fire at a moment’s notice.
    The Gastrea were one kilometer away.
    As the Gastrea slowly closed in on them, every single one of the civil officer troops seemed racked with nerves.
    Five hundred meters away.
    Reinforcing the front lines were the crustacean- and beetle-type Gastrea. Their forewings and bodies hardened with keratin and chitin were made into even harder armor by the Gastrea factor, and they glittered as they reflected the flares they were being hit with one after another.
    An adjuvant line that was equipped with rifles took a step forward and fired them at the commander’s signal. There was the dry sound of bullets firing while muzzle flashes dazzled their eyes. The NATO-standard, high-speed Varanium rifle cartridges rushed into the first line of Gastrea. They were bullets optimized for destroying the insides of Gastrea, and would change into a mushroom shape to expand the wounds. The Gastrea’s flesh would be ripped apart in the