When she woke up in the morning, Livia had one strange dream.
She dreamed she had become the protagonist of a fantasy story in a medieval Kingdom, where she was entangled in a complex romance with one black-haired boy and one black-haired girl.
‘I thought a “weapon” like me wouldn’t dream.’
Perhaps influenced by that blurry and absurd dream, she felt a little different today.
She did something rare — she looked up, gazing through the cockpit’s window at the lead-gray, unchanging curtain of the sky.
It was a permanent haze of radioactive dust, filled with high-energy charged particles, formed by the massive amounts of energy and pollutants released during the war.
As a soldier, she shouldn’t have too many personal thoughts, but at this moment, a question uncontrollably emerged: ‘Did those clear blue skies, which can only be seen in old records, really exist?’
She had been born and raised in this devastated world and had never seen the blue of the sky.
The irony was that she was currently piloting the final pinnacle of human technology, and her purpose for fighting was exactly for that dream of a “blue world” that existed only in ancient videos and collective human memory.
This was somewhere on the Former Polish Border. The heavy radioactive dust of the Yellow Zone ensured the communication signals were always filled with static, sounding like an endless sigh coming from the depths of the universe.
Livia’s personal unit, the GNX-TY90A Sky Swallow, floated quietly at a low altitude of 50 meters above the ground.
Its streamlined silver armor shimmered with a cold and elegant luster in the gloomy light.
Inside the cockpit, Livia withdrew her gaze from the sky. Her cornflower blue eyes regained their usual calm and refocused on the tactical screen.
On the screen, a facility marked with a red square was belching thick smoke — The Third Order’s No. 77 Purification Concentration Camp.
According to intelligence, allied forces from the Army Without Borders had successfully destroyed the concentration camp’s primary suppression facilities.
Her mission was to clear the mecha patrol squads roaming the outer perimeter to buy precious time for the allied forces to evacuate safely.
Suddenly, a piercing alarm shattered the silence within the cockpit.
On the radar screen, several high-speed signals were diving rapidly from the thick radiation clouds like falcons descending from the heavens.
“Crimson Squadron, identification confirmed,” Livia said.
Livia’s voice had no fluctuations; she had long expected the enemy’s arrival.
The Crimson Squadron, the elite mecha squadron under The Third Order, was the most terrifying nightmare on this shattered continent.
Countless survivor governments that had attempted to rebuild order after the Great War had completely collapsed under their precise and brutal strikes, their people and land eventually annexed by The Third Order.
This regime, which used extreme racism and militarism as its platform, viewed itself as the Guardian of pure Humanity.
It carried out the most brutal purges and enslavement of mutants created by radiation and “New Humans” like Livia.
The war between the Army Without Borders and The Third Order had already entered its 3rd year, yet the dawn of victory remained far away.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Several Phoenix Active Homing Missiles trailed pale exhaust flames, tearing through the murky air as they flanked her from different angles.
Livia did not choose to deploy chaff for a conventional evasion.
Her left hand suddenly pushed the control stick forward, while her right hand blurred across the control panel in a series of dazzling movements.
The angles of the large vector thrust wing nozzles on the Sky Swallow’s back adjusted slightly, and the anti-gravity particle engine emitted a low hum.
The silver machine performed a rapid sideslip that nearly defied the laws of physics, followed by a fluid backflip.
Like a ballerina dancing gracefully in the air, it lightly evaded every lethal “kiss.”
The moment the unit rolled into an inverted position, she raised the long-range beam rifle in her hand, the cold aiming reticle locking onto her targets.
Bang! Bang!
Two precision shots.
Two emerald green beams acted like the judge’s pen of the Reaper, drawing two straight lines of death across the gray sky.
They instantly pierced the cockpits of the two leading enemy machines — Crimson Two and Crimson Three.
Boom! Boom!
Two massive fireballs bloomed violently against the dark sky, briefly illuminating the desolate land below before turning into scattered, burning wreckage that fell like fireworks for this dance of death.
The remaining members of the Crimson Squadron clearly had not expected the target to be so difficult.
They immediately scattered, forming a standard hunting formation to try and drag her into a war of attrition.
However, Livia did not give them the chance.
She pulled the control stick sharply. The Sky Swallow’s engine power surged instantly, and the unit turned into a streak of silver light, diving toward the urban ruins of twisted steel and broken concrete below.
“She’s trying to enter the city! Don’t let her get away!” a panicked shout from an enemy pilot came through the public channel.
However, it was already too late.
For a unit like the Sky Swallow, which sacrificed heavy armor to maximize mobility, the complex and narrow environment of urban street fighting was its perfect stage.
This was the hunter’s forest.
The moment she entered the airspace above the ruins, Livia immediately shut down the main thrusters and relied solely on the anti-gravity engine for silent gliding.
The Sky Swallow moved like a ghost, noiselessly weaving through the steel canyons formed by the wreckage of skyscrapers.
Rusted rebar stabbed toward the sky like dead branches, and broken walls were covered in bullet holes, telling the story of the Great War’s brutality.
On the ground, murky puddles reflected the eternal gray sky.
Mutated vines grew wildly over the ruins, and occasionally, human remains gnawed down to the bone could be seen.
The Crimson Squadron mechas pursued relentlessly. They didn’t dare scatter too much and could only search in small formations.
They were the overlords of the sky, but in this environment, their radar suffered severe interference and their vision was restricted everywhere. Instead, they had become like turtles in a jar.
One enemy unit cautiously skimmed past a half-collapsed office building.
The moment it crossed paths with the building, a silver shadow lunged like a phantom from the darkness at the side of the structure.
The Sky Swallow’s mechanical feet kicked off the building’s outer wall, using the leverage to complete an unbelievable flip.
The beam saber in its hand drew a lethal arc through the air.
Squelch!
The enemy unit didn’t even have time to react before its cockpit was sliced in half.
“Crimson Five has been shot down! Repeat, Crimson Five is down! She’s among us!”
“Stay calm! Maintain formation! Flush her out!”
However, Livia’s attacks were like spilled mercury, penetrating every gap.
She utilized every piece of broken wall and every cloud of dust kicked up by explosions, constantly shifting her position and launching fatal ambushes.
Just as one enemy unit locked onto her afterimage, a grenade fired from the street beneath its feet the next second, precisely hitting its leg joint.
The moment the enemy unit lost its balance, Livia had already leapt down from the top of another tall building. Her beam saber came down from above, splitting it in two.
The roles of hunter and prey had reversed the moment they stepped into this forest of steel.
In just a few minutes, only the leader of the Crimson Squadron remained.
Livia’s unit was not unscathed; its energy and ammunition were nearing depletion, but she remained on high alert.
The enemy’s captain, the Ace among Aces — Crimson One — had not yet appeared.
At that moment, a shivering, chilling killing intent struck without warning from Livia’s rear flank!
“I’ve been waiting for you!”
A roar filled with rage and suppressed excitement suddenly exploded over the public communication channel.
A custom mecha painted entirely in deep red, with a frame more massive than the standard units, lunged from the shadows holding a giant beam axe like a demon crawling out of hell!
He had been lurking for a long time. While all his teammates were being shot down one by one, he had maintained absolute silence.
Now, he had finally found this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a guaranteed kill.
‘No time to raise my rifle!’
Livia’s pupils constricted suddenly, but her reaction speed surpassed human limits.
She didn’t hesitate to use the expensive beam rifle in her hand as a shield, throwing it violently toward the left.
Crack!
The beam axe severed the rifle without any suspense.
Immediately after —
Boom!!
The rifle’s power core was instantly detonated, and a blinding flash of fire consumed everything.
Although the shockwave of the explosion affected the Sky Swallow slightly, it also successfully deflected the trajectory of the axe, buying Livia perhaps less than half a second of precious time.
The Sky Swallow used the thrust from the explosion to retreat, and its mechanical right hand flashed toward its left hip —
Hum!
The blazing blade of the High-frequency Beam Saber snapped out, drawing a dazzling arc in the air as it steadily blocked Crimson One’s second, more lethal swing!
Sizzle!
Two massive energy fields collided and squeezed against each other, creating a piercing screech and scattering energy sparks.
The massive bodies of both mechas shook slightly, and the lights inside the cockpits flickered violently.
Over the public communication channel, the voice filled with rage and paranoia began to roar:
“Stellar Sigil! I’ve finally caught you!”
Stellar Sigil was Livia’s exclusive callsign as an Ace pilot.
“You New Human monster, you are nothing more than a slave of history! After the Great War, you actually dare to resist the only Order that can guarantee the safety of Humanity!”
Livia listened to the other party’s roar without expression, but her hands moved across the controls like a storm.
Under her extreme control, the Sky Swallow turned into a silver phantom.
The beam saber and the crimson beam axe engaged in the most primitive and brutal melee combat within the narrow airspace.
With every collision, large chunks of metal debris and concrete were sent flying by the energy’s aftershocks.
“Monster, what do you want to show me? Blood and gold? A shattered throne? Do you think history will look at all this from your perspective?!”
Crimson One’s roar became increasingly crazed.
“Now, you and I shall have a real contest! No interference, no wingmen, no war! Just you and me! Whoever wins is the strongest Ace!”
In their hands, the clunky mechas performed the most heart-stopping sword dance.
The axe blade brushed past the Sky Swallow’s cockpit every time, trailing a string of bright sparks; the blade light tore through the air again and again, aimed directly at Crimson One’s vital joints.
In Livia’s mind, the entire battlefield had been converted into a three-dimensional data model accurate to the centimeter.
Every time her opponent adjusted his movement posture or every slight change in engine power was clearly translated into the trajectory of his next attack.
This was a unique ability she possessed as a New Human.
“I’m going to bury you deep in the ground and trample your corpse repeatedly until it’s dug up! You will never find peace!”
Crimson One launched another frantic attack. Perhaps because he was too eager for success, his unit suffered a momentary imbalance of 0.1 seconds that he himself hadn’t even noticed.
‘Now!’
The Sky Swallow’s leg auxiliary thrusters instantly erupted with maximum power.
The unit performed a Z-shaped flash that completely defied physical common sense, appearing behind Crimson One’s back in an instant — his blind spot!
Thump!
Without a moment of hesitation, the silver beam saber accurately and deeply stabbed into the core hub of Crimson One’s main rear thruster.
A second of dead silence followed.
Then, an explosion erupted from within the machine.
Crimson One’s hulking unit shuddered violently. All the lights on its body dimmed instantly as its power was completely cut.
Like a puppet with its strings severed, it fell helplessly toward the ruins below.
The only thing left on the public channel was the heavy breathing of the opponent, filled with extreme shock and despair, and the monotonous, piercing alarm of the cockpit system.
Only then did Livia’s cold, emotionless voice ring out over the channel for the first and last time:
“There will always be geniuses like you in this world who come to challenge me. In the end, I shot them all down.”
“Goodbye, Crimson One.”
Before she finished speaking, she unilaterally cut the communication.
Crimson One’s final, frantic curse was eternally blocked out by another world.
The Sky Swallow’s silver armor was now covered in hideous scratches and scorch marks.
Small electrical sparks constantly flickered from its left arm joint; it had clearly reached its limit.
Ignoring the falling fireball behind it, the unit dragged its scarred body, adjusted its direction, and slowly began its return flight toward the base coordinates.
It was silent and determined, just like its pilot.
……
*Hiss — *
Inside the base hangar, the cockpit canopy slowly opened with the light hiss of the hydraulic system.
Livia unbuckled her seatbelt. The first thing she saw was the familiar, grease-stained smiling face of Old Zhang, the maintenance chief.
But this time, there was something else in Old Zhang’s smile. He lowered his voice and said in a tone filled with awe and curiosity:
“Livia, my little ancestor, you’re finally back! A Big Shot has arrived from above and asked to see you by name. He’s been waiting here for half the day!”
“A Big Shot?”
Livia followed his gaze downward.
A man was standing beneath the boarding ramp at some point.
He was tall and muscular, wearing a black tactical trench coat.
His left eye was covered by an eyepatch. Just by standing there quietly, he made the noisy hangar seem a bit more peaceful.
The man was also looking at her. His remaining eye was as deep as a calm, black sea.
Livia had just stepped out of the cockpit, still wearing a black skintight combat suit that outlined her perfect figure.
Sweat had dampened a few strands of platinum hair on her forehead, sticking to her incredibly exquisite face.
She exuded a heart-stopping sharpness, as if she had just stepped out of blood and fire.
“Are you our Ace, Miss Stellar Sigil?”
The man spoke. His voice was deep and melodic, possessing a strange charisma.
“It is a pleasure to meet you. I am the leader of the Army Without Borders. They call me The Boss.”
Livia leapt nimbly from the edge of the cockpit, which was more than 10 meters high. Her feet hit the ground with a soft thud as she landed steadily.
She raised her head, her clear blue eyes calmly meeting the man’s gaze.
The Boss extended his right hand — a prosthetic mechanical hand that shimmered with a cold metallic luster.
Livia’s movements paused for a moment.
She silently pulled off her tactical glove, revealing a fair and slender hand that was capable of controlling a killing machine, and gently grasped his.
“…Hello. I am Livia.”
Her voice was like the person herself — cold, calm, and devoid of unnecessary emotion.
This was their first meeting.