anovelconsole Chapter 545 - 545 Assault on the Odium Syndicate (10)
Chapter 545 - 545 Assault on the Odium Syndicate (10)
Liesel's eyes went wide as she recognized the object that had just been tossed down the hole she had created in the ceiling.Just as she had been tossing grenades up to cause widespread damage to the people that had surrounded hers and Burke's squads, it seemed that one of their enemies had decided to repay the favor after learning of her trick.
Obviously, Liesel had considered the possibility but had figured it she would be able to pull off her ambush a few times before getting into a situation like this one.
Still, it was apparent that the people attacking them this time were far better equipped, possessed greater skills, and were more decisive than the first couple groups of enemies Liesel and her squad had faced.
She wondered why the station's leadership had held back their stronger forces until now, but trying to devote too much thought to it would be a waste of time. Especially with a grenade falling right in front of her.
Liesel prepared to respond to the sudden threat, but it turned out that there was no need for her to.
Casey, her ever reliable companion, had been anticipating that something like this might happen since Liesel outlined her plan.
Using a tube that expelled a burst of intense air pressure, she blasted the grenade back up the hole towards the people that had dropped.
Seeing this, Liesel swiftly dislodged herself from the ceiling and fell back towards the floor.
The few moments she felt herself suspended in the air felt like an eternity.
There was no telling what sort of grenade had been used by their enemies, and depending on the type and yield, she could easily still be within its blast radius.
Luckily, she landed before the weapon went off, and the instant her feet touched the floor below, she jumped in the direction Casey was already running with all of the strength she could muster.
This sent her flying down the corridor, and not a second too soon, as the explosive grenade went off.
A loud resounding boom followed, and while only a small portion of the explosion cascaded down the hole, the blast was still enough to severely damage the area and collapse the ceiling.
'I definitely would not have gotten out of that unscathed had I stuck around for any longer.' Liesel thought as she glanced at the fallen rubble.
As she did, she was surprised to find a couple of people on the edges that had managed to survive.
They were wearing full combat armor and likely had personal shields that had offered some protection against the explosion.
Still, they were not in good shape by any metric.
Liesel could see red already seeping through the armor in places on one of them, while the other survivor appeared to have indigo blood judging by the color of the substance pooling at their feet.
Without any hesitation, both Liesel and Casey leveled their laser rifles at the two disoriented individuals that were desperately trying to free themselves from the collapse.
They were in rough shape with several deep lacerations, and undoubtedly some broke bones.
Yet, that was not enough to keep them down, as both of them had clearly received at least some level of physical augmentation judging by the fact that they were still moving.
A few doses of recovery nanomachines, and the two of them would be back in fighting shape. Something that neither Liesel nor Casey were going to let happen.
Each of them pulled the triggers on their weapons several times until both of the enemy combatants lay unmoving. Now they would no longer pose any threat.
"We've certainly got their attention now. My scanner's picking up more movement from above, and some on this level. It seems that they're not going to let us continue to roam around freely any longer."
"It's bit sooner than I was hoping for, but we expected this. This should help keep some of the pressure off Burke. Now let's go, we've got more havoc to cause and enemies to eliminate." Liesel said, dashing off to meet the closest group of troops trying to surround them.
She soon had eyes on the first team that was closing in on her and Casey.
There were ten of them, with the person in the lead wearing power armor, while the other nine were equipped with the standard gear she had seen on the other Odium Syndicate soldier.
Liesel was not the only one to have spotted her targets, as the team of enemies quickly leveled their weapons at her and opened fire.
'You got this, you did all of that training just to be ready for a situation like this one.'
The first volley of lasers flew past as Liesel used her impeccable kinetic visual acuity to read the trajectories of her adversaries' attacks and her enhanced reflexes to avoid the blasts.
Her dodging was not perfect since a few hits struck her personal shield, but it was enough for her to rapidly close the distance between her and the people shooting at her.
When she had gotten closer, she grabbed two items that were holstered in the belt at her side.
Springing to life once she activated them, a hardlight sickle and small circular buckler appeared.
These were both new additions to her repertoire that she had been practicing with over the last several months.
After seeing Olivia's and Ezra's prowess using similar weapons, Liesel had decided that she wanted to learn how to wield them as well.
Some of her family members used hardlight weaponry themselves, but Liesel had never really considered incorporating them into her fighting style due to the amount of effort it took to truly master them.
When she was still with the Kaizer Fleet on her aunt's vessel, learning how to be a better pilot and the intricacies of ship-to-ship combat was far more important.
Most mercenary work revolved around battles in space or guarding convoys or important locations.
There were plenty of mercenaries that went their entire careers without ever participating in a battle such as the one that Liesel found herself in.
Still, she knew that Avery's plan for his company was for it to be all around excellent in basically every field.
He was aiming to become a top mercenary leader and being both capable and versatile were necessities to rise up the ranks.
Liesel knew this from her own family's fleet. Whenever all of them got together for a mission, they became a force to be reckoned with basically no matter what the situation was.
'I thought that I was decently skilled in close combat, but it did not take long for the others to prove me wrong.' Liesel thought, reminiscing a bit despite being in the thick of battle.
It had only taken a few painful losses against Avery, Kasandra, Kaiden, Olivia, and Ezra for her to realize how average she was outside of her piloting skills.
She was still one of the best in that regard even amongst the best of the Asteria Mercenary Company, but in mock duels she proved to be unable to hold her own even against some of the new crew members that had been recruited. The ones that already had years of mercenary experience of course, not the ones that had been brought aboard merely because they had drive and potential.
The extra augmentations she had later received from Dr. Raiti had helped, but that only put her at a similar physical baseline compared to the others. Her lack of skill had still been evident.
Certainly, Liesl could have been content that she was exceptional in piloting and dogfighting, but she wanted to be capable just like the other leaders of Avery's Company.
She had been given a leadership position almost as soon as she had joined because Avery respected her skills and lineage. So, she did not want to let him down and be a disappointment even if she knew he would never think of her as such.
That was why she had quickly discarded her pride and begged Olivia to teach her how to fight with hardlight weaponry.
After watching her fight, Liesel had come to understand why masters were so respected and feared.
She did not doubt that Olivia was worth a hundred regular soldiers, if not more.
Fortunately, the older more experienced woman had been happy to teach Liesel. She had said something about how having a student could help her sharpen her own skills and get back to the basics.
This led to Liesel spending several of her few hours almost every day engaged in grueling training.
She already had the necessary augmented body and combat training to get started right away, but Olivia had still pushed Liesel to her limits time and time again.
Thankfully, all that effort had paid off, and Liesel felt confident in using her new weapons in combat already.
Deflecting volleys of laser blasts while continuously moving was still beyond her, but Liesel was good enough to deal with her current opponents.
Once she had gotten too close to the individual wearing power armor to keep firing at her, they swung their oversized laser rifle like a club.
There was a lot of force behind the attack, enough to injury Liesel.
Except, it was nowhere near fast enough to hit her.
Easily she ducked under it and slid between the legs of the power armor.
As she passed by, she hooked her sickle into the back of the armors' knee joint and cut through it.
One slice from her weapon would not be enough to fully piece through the suit's heavy armor plating, but the joints were not nearly as tough, and she reached the flesh of the person within without any difficulties. Leaving a debilitating wound on them, and their power armor.