The first thing the two of them thought was that one of Brian’s accomplices was hiding nearby.
They immediately scanned their surroundings warily, though something about it felt strange.
After all, if someone really had been lying in wait, then while they had been fighting Brian and Hodgson just now, that would have been the perfect opportunity for a sneak attack.
Yet that person had done nothing—
As that thought crossed their minds, both men stiffened at something they spotted within their field of vision.
The person who was supposed to have defeated Hodgson was also lying on the ground, wearing an equally miserable expression.
The battle just now had been too intense, and they hadn’t paid attention in that direction.
They had vaguely sensed that something was off. Now they finally understood what it was: the person who should have finished off Hodgson, that battered remnant of an opponent, and come over to help had never appeared.
Normally, once contestants entered the flag-capturing zone, viewership ratings would steadily rise.
Watching the two men stand there looking foolish, some viewers couldn’t help laughing—
【Pfft, and they were talking about taking the flag.】
【Person above, please show some respect for every reserve soldier of the Empire—pfft.】
【Anyone who bet on Poseidon Military Academy must be dying inside right now. Their five main-team members got wiped out in one go.】
【No idea about that, but as someone who bet on Ares Military Academy, seeing another academy have even worse luck suddenly makes me feel much better.】
The two remained on guard for several breaths, but neither their instincts nor their mecha scans detected anything unusual.
They even detected a contestant below S-rank who had stumbled into the flag-grabbing area through sheer dumb luck—someone who posed no threat whatsoever.
For a moment, they began to doubt whether what Lancelot had said was true.
Ross relaxed slightly and looked at Lancelot, his voice stern. “I hope that when you leave the arena and face your teachers’ and classmates’ questions, you’ll still be able to keep up that sense of humor.”
Then, in a commanding tone, he said, “Clear the remaining people out of the arena. Now that we’ve regrouped, their usefulness has come to an end.”
But Lancelot replied, “No. It’s the seniors whose usefulness has come to an end.”
The moment he finished speaking, a figure shot up from the ground, swiftly armed his mecha, and charged at them.
The two were startled. When they realized it was the S-rank Imperial Military Academy student who had caused quite a stir before the competition and had provoked Brian, they relaxed somewhat.
“Overestimating yourself,” one of them sneered.
The other added, “Why are you attacking us? You can’t have had an easy time under Brian these past few days. We rescued you from him. You should be thanking us, the people of Poseidon.”
Their opponent did not answer. He raised his blade and brought it crashing down. The two men disdainfully extended their mecha blades to block it.
But in the next second, one of them was sent straight to the ground. A savage gash split across his mecha, nearly shearing off one of its arms.
The two stared as if they had seen a ghost, horror surging through them.
Brian, still conscious on the ground, burst into laughter. “Idiots. I should be the one thanking you two for getting me out of there.”
“Not only did you rescue me, you even handed me the points for an opponent at my own rank. This round wasn’t such a loss for me after all.”
If Brian had said something like that under ordinary circumstances, they might not have understood what he meant right away.
People instinctively refused to believe in possibilities that were too absurd. With two 3S-ranks and one S-rank standing together, who would believe that the S-rank was the one holding everyone hostage?
But now, beneath the opponent’s relentless assault—like a mountain range crashing down on them—they could do nothing but retreat in disarray, utterly unable to fight back.
Then the two of them suddenly got a clear look at Pei Liang’s mech—
“Is that… the mech His Majesty the Emperor used during his military academy days?”
That was right. The mech’s appearance was magnificent and distinctive; no military academy student could possibly fail to recognize it.
His Majesty the Emperor’s mech was unquestionably 3S-grade. Why was a 3S mech being piloted by an S-grade Alpha?
With shock and confusion filling their minds, the two were defeated in quick succession.
Pei Liang’s mech blade came to rest against their foreheads. “Thanks for helping me get rid of two useless prisoners, seniors.”
“To be honest, one of those guys kept slacking off, and the other had terrible hygiene. I’ve put up with them for days. But 3S-grade prisoners aren’t exactly easy to come by.”
“And after everything we’d been through these past few days, there was some sentiment involved. If I’d wiped them out the moment we entered the flag-grabbing zone, what kind of person would that make me?”
“Thank you, upperclassmen, for solving two major problems for me in one go.”
The two Poseidon Military Academy students were furious. They turned to look at Lancelot, who seemed entirely unconcerned.
Through gritted teeth, they demanded, “Why didn’t you tell us earlier?”
Lancelot replied with perfect conviction, “I’m a prisoner.”
Was it really appropriate for a prisoner to loudly announce who the mastermind behind everything was?
“I haven’t been eliminated yet. For the sake of the academy’s interests, I have to remain in the competition until the end so that I’ll have a chance to capture the flag.”
“You seniors were busy fighting Brian just now. I didn’t have time to explain—and even if I had, it would have disrupted your focus. If you had won, then naturally everyone would have been happy. But when I saw that you would need to trade two people just to take Brian and Hodgson out, I knew the situation couldn’t be salvaged.”
“If I made even the slightest move, I would have been taken out. Rather than being eliminated now because of an ill-considered choice, it was better to preserve my eligibility first.”
The two clenched their teeth. Everything about his words was infuriating. Clearly, the brat had stood by coldly and watched them suffer such a huge loss.
Yet by the military academies’ long-standing principle of maximizing benefits, there was nothing wrong with his actions.
Even if the principal had been there, he would have approved. After all, achieving the best possible result was what mattered most.
Then Lancelot smiled again. “Don’t worry. You two seniors haven’t been eliminated either, so there’s no need to be too discouraged.”
“Other than the one Brian took away, five of us from Poseidon were here, and four have been preserved. Looking at the outcome, it isn’t a bad result.”
“It’s just—”
The other contestants understood the implication he left unspoken.
Because Pei Liang had already kicked the three of them to their feet. “Quit playing dead. I deliberately used cold weapons just now so your mechs wouldn’t waste energy for nothing.”
“Your power reserves should still be fairly full. Get up and get to work.”
The three climbed to their feet reluctantly and joined the prisoner squad.
Even Brian’s eliminated teammates were made to come along, since the organizing committee was unable to enter and retrieve the contestants due to the malfunction.
The three immediately objected—they still had to carry opponents they had defeated, and Brian in particular was enormous.
“They’ve already been eliminated. The organizing committee is working on fixing the malfunction, so why go to all this trouble?”
“And if we run into people from Ares Military Academy later, how can you be sure he won’t violate the league rules, play dead, and stab us in the back?”
Pei Liang asked, “How many contestants did you clear out along the way?”
The three of them replied, “We don’t have an exact number, but it should be quite a few.”
There was no doubt that those contestants had been left behind where they were.
Most of them, however, were still capable of surviving. Even if they had to remain inside their mechs, they could handle the vast majority of situations.
But Pei Liang’s brow furrowed, a sense of foreboding rising in her heart.
She said decisively, “Stop wasting time. Give those few a lift—unless you want to face three additional 3S-class enemies.”
Lancelot’s heart skipped a beat at her words. He looked at his sister in disbelief. “You suspect—”
Pei Liang nodded, but did not explain why.
The real reason was that, at the beginning, the other side’s cross-dimensional attacks could rely on information from the original script.
For instance, the original owner of this body would have gone to the slums to meet Chu Xingyu at that particular time. After the players had crossed over, without the script in hand, they would inevitably choose to make that trip in order to gather information and integrate themselves into the plot as quickly as possible.
Pei Liang had gone ahead of schedule. The assassins had been caught unprepared and launched a hasty attack, which showed that the time they had intended to strike was the following day. Where that information had come from was now obvious.
But as the plot progressed, the original work could no longer be treated as an absolute reference. The other side clearly knew her style of clearing games extremely well.
They had predicted that she would definitely enter this mech tournament, and had arranged this trap here.
Yet Pei Liang did not believe anyone’s reach could be that long—not only capable of attacking across dimensions, but also able to track her movements at any time.
It was certainly possible that the other side possessed some method of pinpointing her location within a limited range. But on a planet this vast—
Therefore, Pei Liang’s conclusion was that they had most likely cast a wide net.
As for the contestants’ teleportation routes and the standby ships at the space station, those were details one could learn from the script. Targeted attacks on them would be enough.
Lancelot had an almost blind faith in Pei Liang’s judgment.
But the other three newly joined 3S-class fighters were different.
Especially the one carrying Brian on his back. He said irritably, “Are you fucking seriously still not done resting?”
“From what I saw, you looked pretty lively when you got flattened just now. Now that you’ve recovered your strength, get the hell down and walk on your own.”
Brian put on the delicate air of a willow swaying in the breeze. “Oh dear, I simply can’t. After getting beaten up by your little group assault, my head is still spinning.”
“The moment my feet touch the ground, I get dizzy and feel like throwing up. I can’t even stand properly. As my future comrade-in-arms, surely you wouldn’t abandon me, would you?”
Ross: “...”
For fuck’s sake. Brian actually had the nerve to put on an act like that?
Meanwhile, after nearly two days of full-speed jump travel, the rescue team was close to reaching the competition grounds.
Richter, dressed in a military combat uniform, stood before the arena’s live broadcast screens.
Rather than watching the thrilling battles breaking out across the field as contestants neared the flag-capture zone, he had ordered the staff to lock onto Pei Liang’s group.
Even though they were merely traveling without incident, he did not switch feeds.
His deputy hesitated before asking, “Chairman, other contestants have also encountered suspicious Zerg. Why are you focusing only on contestant Pei Liang’s side?”
“Because she’s won,” Richter said.
His deputy was startled. “Why do you say that? Most of the other groups of contestants have also escaped without—”
“No. They were just lucky,” Richter said flatly before the other man could finish.
And that was already putting it mildly.
In reality, the situation might be even worse than they had anticipated.
Richter had one of the screens switched back to the scene of Pei Liang’s group fighting the leeches.
Unlike the viewers, he did not have to wait until the match was over to watch the replay.
In fact, he had watched this footage countless times already. Yet every time he saw it again, the shock seemed to strike him to the depths of his soul, making his entire body tremble.
Richter stood with his arms folded, one hand unconsciously tightening around his own arm.
Nearly two days of travel was simply far too long for him to endure.
At that moment, Pei Liang’s group made another discovery in their live broadcast.
They were moving at a fairly brisk pace. After all, though three 3S-ranked fighters were essentially being used as pack mules, the lineup itself was still intimidating.
By now, the contestants from every military academy were likely focused on regrouping. Within such a close range, the mechs’ distance-limited communication systems had begun to work as well.
For instance, both Brian and Hodgson had received summons from their teammates at Ares Military Academy.
But since the two had already been eliminated, that function had automatically shut down, aside from emergency calls for help.
The Ares team assumed the pair had not yet entered the inner zone. Given their strength—Brian’s in particular—unless they had been terribly unlucky enough to run into Arnold or Teresa early on, they should have been able to handle anything that came their way.
“Why is Brian taking so long? He and Arnold are the main event when it comes to capturing the flags. There’s no way they would’ve been dropped too close to each other.”
“Maybe he got so busy farming points that he lost track of time. After losing to Arnold before, he probably doesn’t want to put all his eggs in one basket this time. Taking the first flag would be ideal, of course, but if Arnold gets the advantage, racking up more points would still help.”
“Then there’s no need for us to hurry either. Let’s wait for them a little longer.”
Just as they were talking, they spotted Brian’s familiar figure in the distance.
“Look—isn’t that Brian?”
Once they reached the inner zone, battle could break out at any moment. This was no time to conserve mech energy; their equipment remained powered on at all times.
The scanners immediately magnified the image and confirmed the identities of the figures.
“That’s him. Hodgson is there too.”
“What’s wrong with him? Why is he standing so strangely?”
All they could see was Hodgson’s huge upper body perched atop a pair of comparatively slender legs. On anyone else, those legs might have looked perfectly normal, but on Brian, it looked as though someone had stuck two chopsticks beneath his torso.
The sight was utterly ridiculous.
Then they finally saw clearly.
“Oh, he’s being carried.”
“Wait, that’s—Ross from Poseidon. Why is he carrying Brian?”
The others laughed.
“Hahaha, what else could it be? Ross probably had the bad luck to run into Brian and got captured. You know what Brian’s like—he’s more than capable of making someone from Poseidon carry him around just to humiliate them.”
One of the more level-headed Ares contestants frowned.
“He’s being far too careless.”
“Going into the inner zone without even suiting up in his mech, pulling tricks like this—if he runs into a formidable opponent, his reaction time will be half a beat too slow. He already paid for his arrogance once. Why hasn’t he learned his lesson?”
“You can’t quite put it that way,” someone said. “Count them—there are four people from Poseidon over there. Even if Brian and Hodgson teamed up, they wouldn’t get through them easily. And afterward, they’d still have to deal with Arnold or Teresa. Saving energy is the right call too.”
Still, reuniting with their powerful teammates was always a cause for celebration, so they waved at Brian in the distance.
Brian couldn’t use his mech right now, and from afar, he saw several idiots hopping and waving about.
He had been grinning as he said, “Hehe! Which school’s idiots are about to get unlucky this time? Seriously, sitting in the best seats while someone carries you around and watching people get screwed over is pretty damn fun.”
Hodgson snickered as well. “Anyway, we’re already out. Now we can just watch idiots run headfirst into a brick wall—just like those guys.”
“HAHAHAHA—”
Their laughter cut off abruptly halfway through.
“The idiots are from our school.”
The organizing committee was truly wicked. Countless battles were breaking out everywhere, yet they had deliberately focused the cameras on this spot.
The livestream viewers immediately lost it—
【HAHAHAHAHA, turns out the idiot was me.】
【How a championship favorite became the comic relief.】
【I used to hate Brian. I thought he was rude, arrogant, and petty. But why is this guy suddenly so damn adorable? My Alpha—】
【Careful there. You’re venturing into dangerous territory.】
On-screen, Brian and Hodgson had already forgotten that they had been eliminated. They hurriedly waved and shouted at the people in the distance—
“Get lost! Don’t come over here!”
“You idiots, what the hell are you so happy about? I said get lost—why the fuck are you walking faster?”
“It’s over. They’re like dumb dogs that heard someone call them to dinner.”
Ross and the others, who had been fuming all the way from carrying Brian, were laughing so hard they could barely stand upright.
They shouted back from afar, “Hurry up! What are you dawdling for? Your boss is calling you.”
Brian rammed his head into Ross’s helmet, earning a warning from the organizing committee.
As an eliminated contestant, he technically should no longer have any presence on the field. Naturally, he was forbidden from warning his teammates—or worse, attacking other competitors.
Yet Pei Liang made no move to stop the two of them. Brian turned around and saw Pei Liang watching the approaching group with a kind, pleasant smile.
He simply couldn’t bear to look at what was about to happen.
He could practically predict that the scene of the Ares Military Academy contestants gleefully delivering themselves into a trap would make the top ten funniest clips of the year.
But it was too late to say anything now. The group had already reached them.
Their mech visors slid open as they looked at Brian and Hodgson.
“What were you shouting just now?”
Brian and Hodgson stared blankly into space.
“Nothing. Let’s work harder in the next match.”
The others did not understand what that meant. Then they saw Ross and the rest toss Brian off their backs.
Their mechs equipped themselves in an instant, and they closed in around the newcomers with sinister grins.
Pei Liang laughed. “Why couldn’t the first people I ran into have been Poseidon upperclassmen? You seniors are so much more sensible and cooperative than those two useless idiots who were just slacking off.”
Even Ares’s people would have realized something was wrong by now.
They stared at Brian in disbelief. “Where are your mechs?”
Brian and Hodgson lowered their heads and sighed.
The others sucked in a breath. “You’re the ones who were captured? Brian—you were captured by Ross? By Ross?”
Ross was displeased. “What’s wrong with me capturing him?”
Thinking about it, though, they could see it now. There were five people from Poseidon. Under normal circumstances, even if Brian and Hodgson couldn’t defeat all five of them, they should at least have been able to escape.
They must have already exhausted themselves badly before encountering the group.
Ares’s team took up fighting stances, looking at the Poseidon students as though they were perverts.
“Then why are you carrying them on your backs? Were you trying to lure us over? Just like Neptune people—always so devious.”
Ross wore a savage expression. “Don’t make it sound like I wanted to. Your boss reeks like shit—”
It had originally been nothing more than a casual insult, but the moment Brian heard it, his face darkened.
“Do you fucking know something?”
Ross: “…”
Was there some earth-shattering secret hidden in there?
Brian roared, “You know too much!”
With that, he signaled for Ares’s people to attack. Both sides immediately plunged into a fierce battle.
Ares’s 3S-level competitors held a slight advantage. With only four Poseidon students eligible to compete, their chances of winning should have been high.
Except Pei Liang was mixed in among them.
The Ares competitors had thought they would have a tough fight ahead of them, but that they could at least grind Poseidon down. Instead, they were beaten senseless.
What the hell had just happened?
When they focused their fire on Poseidon’s people, it felt as if someone had kicked them right in the ass.
But there were only four 3S-level fighters on Poseidon’s side. The rest were merely S-level or even lower tr—
Then they spotted a mech standing out amid the crowd, dazzlingly conspicuous and flashy.
They had heard countless stories about that mech. But only when facing it in person could they understand the terrifying pressure of being completely overwhelmed by someone at the same rank.
The other side had not even used any heavy weapons. Of course, neither had they—their limit was laser blades, since there was no way to put any distance between them.
By now, most of Ares’s team had gathered. Such a battle naturally caused a huge commotion.
Nearby competitors quickly noticed it as well. Students from ordinary military academies took one look at the scale of the conflict and knew several powerhouse academies had run into one another and started fighting. None of them dared get any closer.
But the elite academies could not simply ignore it, because their own teammates might be involved in the battle.
Several squads rushed over at full speed, weapons blazing, only to find Poseidon’s group standing there with a few S-level cannon fodder members. They looked somewhat disheveled after the fight.
At their feet lay nearly all of Ares Military Academy’s main roster, including Brian himself.
The incoming forces were primarily from Medusa Military Academy and Imperial Military Academy. There were not many from Imperial Military Academy—only Arnold and that senior nicknamed Know-It-All, who seemed to know a little about everything.
With those eliminated on the scene included, all four powerhouse academies were now represented.
But in terms of numbers, Medusa naturally had the most people.
Medusa’s captain was a female Alpha with serpent-like eyes. The moment she saw the situation, she understood that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
She called out to Arnold from Imperial Military Academy across from her. “Ares is finished, and most of Poseidon’s fighting strength is here too. They’re at the end of their rope.”
“How about we join forces and clear them out first? Then our two academies can securely take first and second place.”
Arnold smiled. “Clear them out, and then everyone from Medusa gangs up on me?”
Snake Woman curled her lips into a smile. “Since when has Imperial Military Academy ever been afraid of being outnumbered?”
Arnold’s expression was rather inscrutable. “I don’t care about being surrounded. As long as you don’t mind.”
Snake Woman failed to understand what he meant.
But Arnold had already stopped paying attention to her. Turning to Pei Liang, he said, “You’ve made quite a haul.”
“How many Zerg have you killed along the way?”
Pei Liang replied, “Ran into some trouble. Didn’t kill many.”
Arnold didn’t feel as though he had gained the upper hand. Taking in the situation around them, he said somewhat unwillingly, “Whatever. With this many 3S-level opponents, you’ve got more than enough to brag about.”
“Ares and Poseidon are practically wiped out, aren’t they? I just got in touch with Teresa—he ran into two or three people from Poseidon over there, while I haven’t gotten my hands on a single person from either academy.”
That was simply bad luck—though Arnold was indeed black in every sense of the word.
Pei Liang smiled. “Doesn’t matter. If we take out Medusa, we can decide the rankings among ourselves afterward. Isn’t that even better?”
Arnold’s eyes widened, then he burst into hearty laughter.
The Medusa contestants were furious at the two of them for talking so arrogantly—especially when one of them was nothing more than a trashy S-rank.
“Arrogant—”
Before they could finish, the so-called trashy S-rank declared in a clear voice, “Everyone from Medusa, you’re surrounded.”
“You have two choices. Follow my command, and you’ll get one of the top-ten flags. Or get beaten up first, then follow my command—and get nothing.”
Her gaze settled on Snake Woman, their leader. “You have three seconds to choose.”
Snake Woman and the Medusa students behind her found it utterly absurd. It was shamelessly arrogant enough when Arnold said something like that—how did this S-rank dare to?
Yet unlike ordinary contestants, Snake Woman, as the top representative of an elite military academy, had a far keener sense for judging an opponent’s strength than most.
Her eyes were sharp and serpent-shaped, and both her temperament and gaze were intensely aggressive. Whenever she locked eyes with someone, it was usually her stare that made them break out in chills.
But the S-rank opposite her displayed no overt aggression. Her gaze was even calm, carrying not the slightest genuine hostility toward them.
And yet Snake Woman could feel an unprecedented pressure coming from someone supposedly at her own level.
It was a sensation that not even several tournament favorites—or the upperclassmen who had come before them—had ever given her.
Snake Woman’s eyes narrowed. In an instant, she made her decision and addressed Lancelot, who appeared to have preserved the most strength among the remaining Poseidon members—
“A revised proposal. Medusa will join forces with Poseidon. How about we eliminate these two from Imperial Military Academy first?”
“On my honor as an Imperial soldier, I guarantee that if we form an alliance, Medusa will yield one flag to Poseidon.”
Poseidon was already at the end of its rope. Its contestants were exhausted, and their mechs could not have much energy left.
With the Imperial Military Academy and Medusa keeping each other in check, this was their best chance to salvage some gains from the situation.
The Snake Woman was confident in her proposal. The corners of her lips curled up as she said, “You don’t have much time to think it over.”
“The remaining members of the Imperial Military Academy should already be on their way here. Once the numbers on both sides reach a balanced standoff, to avoid any unforeseen complications, your Poseidon team will be the first to be eliminated.”
“So? What’s your choice, little brother?”
Lancelot glanced at the Snake Woman, then at his sister.
Then, all of a sudden, a sly smile spread across his face—
