Lackey's Seducing Survival Odyssey

Chapter 1549: Death... Death... Death....

BOOMMM!!!

The sound did not simply echo; it tore through the sky like metal ripping open the heavens, shattering glass for miles and sending tremors through the bones of every living soul beneath it.

”Someone help us! Please, somebody, help us!”

”OH GOD, THEY’RE COMING BACK!”

”It’s falling again! Run away! Don’t look back, just run!”

The people’s screams flooded the city streets as thousands ran without direction, clutching children, dragging the elderly, abandoning houses.

Because...

Behind them marched the machines.

Hundreds of them.

Each towering at least two floors high, forged from dark alloy plates layered like armoured scales, their surfaces etched with glowing blue circuitry that pulsed in synchronised rhythm. Hydraulic pistons flexed at their joints, releasing clouds of steam that hissed into the air like beasts exhaling fury.

Cracknnk... cracnnkk...

The grinding of gears and rotational cores echoed between buildings, reverberating through concrete and marrow alike.

Their metallic claws sliced through skyscrapers as if carving soft clay, entire balconies collapsing under a single sweep. Their colossal feet crushed carriages, asphalt, and bone without distinction, flattening everything into indistinguishable debris.

A woman stumbled, clutching her son to her chest.

”Don’t look at them, sweetheart. Close your eyes. Just close your eyes!”

”M-mommy... Dragon Emperor protect us, right?”

Before she could answer, a machine rotated its torso with unnatural precision. Its forearm split apart, plates folding back to reveal a cylindrical cannon core lined with rotating rings.

NNnnnnngggg!

A low-frequency hum began to build, vibrating the air itself.

Blue particles gathered at the nozzle, compressing into a condensed sphere of volatile energy. The surrounding air distorted from the heat and pressure, bending light around it.

The humming intensified into a shriek.

”NOOOO— WAIT— PLEASE—”

”MOMMY, I’M SCARED—”

PUUUUUUFFFFFFFFFFF!!!

The blast erupted forward in a concentrated beam of plasma.

The street vaporised.

Pavement liquefied into molten slag, houses disintegrated into expanding clouds of ash, and bodies caught within the radius ceased to exist in less than a second.

”...”

Silence swallowed the aftermath.

Smoke curled upward from a street that no longer resembled a street, but a charred scar across the city.

Crack... Pop...

No screams remained, no movement, only the crackle of burning remnants.

High above, several figures twisted midair, bones reshaping, skin splitting as scales burst forth in shimmering waves. Wings expanded from their backs, massive and powerful, slicing through the smoke as they completed their transformation into dragons.

They soared upward desperately, beating their wings against the rising heat.

”That was too close,” one dragon growled, voice rumbling through smoke. ”We barely escaped.”

”Those things...” another said, turning his scaled head downward. ”What kind of nightmare did they build?”

The ground beneath them was scorched beyond recognition. Entire blocks reduced to blackened craters.

A sheiver run down their spine.

A faint hiss interrupted their horror.

Pssssss!

The sound was subtle.

One dragon’s ears twitched. His golden eyes narrowed.

”Do you hear that?”

The machines had tilted their upper bodies upward.

Panels shifted... Targeting arrays extended from their shoulders, mechanical lenses adjusting focus. Their cannons recalibrated, tracking heat signatures against the sky.

The humming returned, deeper this time, resonating through the dragons’ wings.

”They’re aiming at us!”

”Scatter! Now!”

A beam lanced upward without warning.

BOOMMM!!

The first dragon did not even have time to scream. His torso disintegrated midair, wings separating from a body that no longer existed. Scales scattered like burning embers before dissolving into nothing.

”ARRHH— THEY CAN TARGET US IN THE SKY!—”

”NOO— ”

Another beam struck, pulverising a second dragon in a burst of light and blood that evaporated before it could fall.

Those who survived the initial barrage lost control as their wings were broken and their bodies spiralled downward through smoke and ash.

They crashed onto rubble-strewn streets with bone-cracking force,

One dragon groaned, massive chest heaving as it tried to rise from shattered concrete. Its wing bent unnaturally. Blood seeped between fractured scales.

”Get up... get up...” it muttered through clenched teeth, claws digging into debris.

A shadow fell over its broken form.

The towering machine stood above it.

Nnggg!

Shn!

Hydraulic limbs adjusted its stance as its forearm reconfigured once more, plates sliding apart... The cannon extended forward until its glowing nozzle hovered inches from the dragon’s skull.

The dragon’s breath slowed. Smoke drifted from its nostrils. Pain trembled through every nerve, yet its eyes burned with defiance.

”You think this ends here?” it rasped, blood trickling from its mouth. ”Ha..Haha... You think metal can silence us?”

The cannon’s hum intensified.

”You will see the wrath of our drago—”

BOOM!

The blast erased its head in a single violent flash.

Blood and fragments of bone splattered across the surrounding rubble, steam rising as they struck heated metal.

The machine retracted its weapon without hesitation.

Around it, the city burned.

And the nightmare marched forward, unstoppable.

No holding back or talking or taking... just pure destruction!

The machine slowly turned back, its cold blue glimmering eyes narrowing as internal lenses adjusted focus. Servos rotated with deliberate precision, metal grinding softly against metal as it faced the new presence before it.

There she stood.

A bloody and fierce woman, unmoving amidst smoke and ash, her cold eyes fixed on the towering construct without fear or hesitation.

Crimson streaks ran down her arms, Veins popped on her arms, blood splashed on her body like she was falling into it.... whether her own or another’s, impossible to tell.

The firelight reflected in her gaze, yet her expression held... murderous indifference.

The machine raised its fist, plates shifting as the forearm unfolded into a gun like structure. Rotational rings spun within the barrel as energy began to accumulate, blue light intensifying at the nozzle.

The air trembled with the familiar hum of imminent destruction as it pointed directly towards... Thalia.

The beam glowed brighter.

And then she was gone, before it could even find her,

BOOMMMMM!!!!

A single punch.

That was all it needed.

Her flaming fist pierced straight through reinforced alloy plating, through rotating cores and compressed reactors. A gaping hole exploded open in the machine’s chest as fragments of molten metal scattered across the ruined street.

The machine flinched violently, its body jerking as sparks erupted from severed circuits.

Cracknnkk... crunnnkk...

It staggered backwards before kneeling, internal mechanisms failing one by one.

Thalia stood before it, her red-yellow flaming fist glowing like a miniature sun.

Flames rose along her arms and shoulders, swirling around her body in controlled fury. She stared at the machine coldly as if it were nothing more than scrap awaiting disposal.

Without hesitation, she seized its metallic head.

Fire engulfed her hand.

The flames intensified, melting reinforced plating as though it were wax.

Steel dripped like water and... there she heard it... the same sound her people went through...

”ARRHHHH!!”

A distorted scream echoed from within the tall metallic machine. Something trapped inside howled as the fire consumed its casing.

Thalia’s expression did not change.

She clenched harder... with the same cold expression.

Meanwhile, in the sky,

Weirdly flying metallic machines shaped like birds, yet with no wings moving, streaked across the night like missiles.

Their frames were angular, aerodynamic, engines blazing blue beneath their chassis. They did not flap or glide.

They cut through the air like jets!

Mounted beneath their bodies, rotating barrels spun rapidly.

PPPRRRTTTTTTTTTTTTRRRTTTRRRTTTT!

A rain of bullets tore through the night.

Dragons twisted midair as projectiles struck their scales, piercing through flesh... Sparks erupted where rounds deflected, but many did not.

One by one, massive bodies lost control, spiralling downward in trails of blood.

”WWWHHAAARRRRRR!!!”

The dragons roared and unleashed flames in retaliation, torrents of fire blazing across the sky.

Yet the metallic birds accelerated beyond their reach, engines roaring louder as they darted aside with indragon agility.

They were smaller than expected, almost the size of a small house, making them difficult targets against the dark sky.

”S Shit! It’s coming back!” one dragon shouted as the jet curved sharply, locking onto them once more.

”Split up! Don’t stay in formation!”

PPPRRRRRRTTTRTRTRTRTRTRTR!

The sky filled with tracer lines.

Cuccckkk!

Chhccckkk!

Bullets tore through wings and chests. One dragon convulsed midair before plummeting downward, blood splattering across rooftops like crimson rain.

Just as the second one was about to fall, something else moved.

Spark!

A purplish black whip sliced through the darkness faster than the flying jets could track.

It streaked across the sky in a single fluid motion, cracking with thunderous force.

It zoomed past the first jet in less than a second.

BOOM!

The metallic bird detonated, fragments scattering like shattered stars.

The whip curved again.

BOOM!

Another jet exploded before its targeting system could recalibrate.

One by one, those jets blasted apart without understanding how they were being destroyed.

Raven soared through the night in her long, slithering Draconyx form. Her tail, elongated and whip-like, shattered the high-speed machines effortlessly.

Purple-black energy coursed along its length, cracking the air with each swing.

Her heterochromatic eyes scanned left and right, calculating trajectories as she redirected herself toward another squadron heading toward the palace.

Raven zoomed instantly with a spark of purplish-black left behind.

The jets reacted instantly when they noticed another object appearing near them, insanely fast. Their formation split apart with mechanical precision, cannons rotating toward her from multiple angles.

PPPRRRRRTTTRTRTRTRTRTRTR!

A storm of bullets surged toward her.

Raven twisted her body sideways, purple wings folding slightly as her tail snapped downward, striking the first stream aside.

Sparks exploded as metal rounds collided against the hardened aura of dark flame encasing her body.

None of the bullets pierced her body.

They moved left and right to find her weak point and kept firing bullets at her.

She surged into the centre of their formation.

One jet attempted to veer upward, engines flaring brighter in a desperate climb. Raven’s tail coiled midair, then lashed upward with explosive force. The impact crushed the machine, snapping it in half before its internal reactor detonated.

BOOM!

The explosion bathed her in orange and blue light.... Her eyes glowed as she looked down and saw the machines destroying her beautiful city and its wonderful people!

”WWWRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!”

Her scream of pain and grief echoed through the Empire as she dove furiously... Only to be hit by 10s of blue beams shot towards her furiously.

BOOM!

BOOM!!

BOOOM!!!

Watching the scene from the rooftop of the Palace, Xara stared at the disaster.

Why were they attacking all of a sudden, and in the middle of the night?

Evacuation had barely begun when the assault already started.

Lyirrs and the others were securing civilians.

Thalia and others were fighting against those crawling tall machines while Raven was protecting the sky.

Drakhairs was facing both threats, protecting land and sky, yet it was impossible to unleash his full power without evacuation.

Soldiers, Generals, Commanders, everyone was doing their best to protect and move the civilians away!

But for how long?

Before Xara lay a blood-soaked city. Flames devoured buildings. Screams echoed through smoke-filled streets.

Metallic monsters marched without hesitation, without mercy.

Her face frowned deeply as her eyes reflected burning skylines.

”Why are they doing this?” she muttered.

She knew she was not right in her mind, yet this scene pierced through every haze.

She felt something unfamiliar rising within her chest.

Pity.

Confusion.

Had they accepted the offer?

No.

She knew no one would accept that.

It was worse than death itself.

Yet as she watched machines tear through lives as though they meant nothing, as she listened to children scream beneath collapsing structures, a dangerous thought crept into her mind.

Was that deal... truly worse than this?