Chapter 403: Hell's Gate!

As they approached nearer, densely packed chimney peaks stood numerously from a distant. Red flames peeped out from the chimney, while they spurted out smoky fumes. Smoke and dust converged like humongous grey serpents, slithering away into the sky.

No doubt, this spectacle of emulating the eighteenth century United Kingdom industrial age, was Hell's Gate. Bustling with refinery of loads of Pandora crystals, and a string of incomparably complex processing systems. With such clear indicators, the contestants no longer worried about losing their way. Very swiftly, they hurried towards the deafening roars of machinery and engine motor. Soon, they were greeted by an enormous, at least 100 metre tall, olive green machinery operating inside a mining pit.

To date, this was the biggest excavating machinery invention of the humans - The Bucket Wheel Excavator. It possessed giant tooth wheels of 2 km in circumference, with altitudes of 20 metres; it could easily grip against rocks, and grind down vegetation, wood, even rocks easily. From afar, it appeared like a mini mountain like robotic creature that was slowly operating. Behind it was a profoundly deep ditch, as deep as 50 metres and as broad as 100 metres.

Beside the materials storage compartment of this olive green robotic creature, was an enormous Hell's Gate truck in camouflaged paint. The truck's tremendous back compartment was piled solely with Pandora ores to be sent for processing at the initial phases. It was exceedingly durable, firm; confining the driver compartment to only a tiny telephone booth size at the front.

Although the truck appeared like a granule beside the bucket wheel excavator; when one approached the giant truck, one would discover its massively sturdy wheels to be the height of two grown men. This ensured that the truck could easily overcome the rough terrain of planet Pandora, and resist the threat of various creatures. Just observing several sporadic 2 metre arrows lodged along the tire, was sufficient to illustrate its reliability.

Going a step nearer, one could tell this Hell truck didn't possess reinforced vehicle armour. Although it could resist light assaults, if a creature with deadlier penetrative firepower appeared, it would be able to pierce through it.

At least for now, they could fathom that the Omaticaya clan was fairly civilized. Their protesting methods seem to be mere resorts of firing arrows at those tires, and not directly towards the driver compartment.

Brother Black, Mogensha, was fairly adept at socializing. Following the party, he strolled towards the road constructed for these Hell trucks. Targeting a rumbling Hell truck passing by, he took a big stride and easily grabbed onto the lateral climbing ladder up the driver compartment. The driver was also a black sister with large eyes. She quite closely resembled the female lead Sheva from Resident Evil 5. Turning around, she casted a suspicious gaze over. Mogensha then very naturally knocked against the driver window, and tossed a strip of chewing gum in.

"Hey, beauty. I know you'll give me a ride. After trekking the damned forest for 3 hours and 11 minutes, you and your truck are lovelier than angels in my eyes."

Causing them to be taken aback, Mogensha actually didn't get rejected. Perhaps one could attribute this to his incessant bragging and sexy lips. Immensely proud of himself, he sat at the front passenger driver seat and waved to Sheyan and the rest. Following that, the Hell truck puffed out thick fumes before disappearing behind a rocky bend.

With Mogensha as example, many other contestants learnt likewise. However, the charmless Sheyan tactfully didn't test his luck. Instead, he quickly and easily climbed up the carriage of a Hell truck, and accompanied the Pandora ores.

Due to the low gravity of planet Pandora, these Hell truck big boys travelled speedily through the makeshift roads. At present, Hell's Gate was in its basic stages, with towering reinforced concrete major weapon towers vividly seen from afar; its pitch-dark cannons could easily wreck any disturbing elements from land or air. At the outskirt of Hell's Gate, the contestants went through a light inspection; probably just conventional routine, to prevent unknown viruses from contaminating the inside of the base.

From an aerial perspective, Hell's Gate had the shape of a loose square. Its total surface area was 15.4 square-kilometres, while securing the base were 4 lofty solid perimeter fences that were as broad as 3.93333 kilometres. Not forgetting the various automatic turrets along the perimeter, minor weapon towers were also erected in intervals of 50 metres; manned by workers around the clock. As Sheyan queued, he engaged in visual assessment, basically confirming the perimeter fences were constructed with 3 metre thick reinforced concrete.

Bullet holes and bloodstains surrounding the base's periphery. Apart from cannons at the major weapon towers, automatic heavy munitions weapons were also installed to deal with various surface and air intrusions by large hostile Pandorian wildlife. Moreover, those minor weapon towers at intervals of 50 metres were used to exterminate intrusions of smaller lifeforms. At the outskirts, a cleared 30 metre wide strip isolated the base, with automatic clearing machinery patrolling around. The isolated strip was an excavated gorge riddled with landmines, preventing any Pandorian creatures from infiltrating through borrowing.

When the contestants stepped onto the ground of Hell's Gate, their nightmare imprints finally transmitted the notification.

[ You have successfully arrived at Hell's Gate base. ]

[ Warning: Utilizing violence inside Hell's Gate base is an immensely risky behavior. It is highly advisable not to, please remember the above-mentioned instructions. ]

[ You received the sequel battle side mission: 'Hell's Gate trust' . ]

[ Mission objective: Within 72 hours duration, increase your reputation in this RDA base to 'Respected' .

(Your current reputation is 'Neutral'. Reputation successions - 'Neutral' , 'Amicable' , 'Respected' , 'Revered' , 'Worshipped') ]

[ Pointer: During this battle side mission, if one utilizes any item to speed raise one's reputation, its intended effect would be weakened by 50% ]

[ Pointer: The first 3 contestants that accomplishes this mission first, will uniformly receive additional rewards. ]

[ Warning: If this mission fails, a penalty of 8 achievement points will be invoked! ]

[ Warning: If you reject this mission, you will receive a fixed reward and instantly return to the realm. ]

[ Do you wish to accept this mission: Yes / No ? ]

Upon reaching the base interior, Sheyan was extremely gratified to discover the base adopted a tight on the outside, loose on the inside mentality. Besides, if a crime was committed here, there was no other place to escape to. Its periphery were treacherous forests, with 25 hours (Pandora time frame) patrolling by foot soldiers mostly in surveillance against any hostile creatures that may infiltrate the base. The interior was like a relaxed town. Which goes to say, if Sheyan desired to commit atrocities of blood extraction in a certain laboratory, chances of escaping would be relatively high.

In this period, the base interior construction was still at its preliminary stages. From nearby, several officers that modelled american military officers were yelling loudly, calling for them to assemble. With one glance, Sheyan immediately recognized the flat top Colonel Miles Quaritch. Three protruding red scars stretched down from the right of his forehead, successfully betraying his identity.

In this instant, Sheyan was even sinisterly fantasizing of killing him, which would most certainly result in an 'Advanced Machine Piloting Fluency Scroll lvl 7' drop loot. Once this colonel piloted an 'AMP Suit', there was no cause for doubt in his outstanding combat capabilities. During the movie's battle scene, he even managed to fully suppress the female lead that was riding a Tier-7 legendary Thanator. In the end, the male and female lead had to combine to defeat him.

When everyone adopted an uprightly still military attention posture, the colonel remained silent. Instead, he utilized his incisive raptor vision to scan everyone, as though he had x ray vision. After a full 2 minutes, he finally spoke.

"Perhaps I should phone my old friends back at the ISV Venture Star, and commend their efficiency for sending us sufficient manpower. Yet my only question now is.....are you the youngsters that we urgently need?!"

Speaking till here, the colonel paused. With his hands behind, he paced several steps around and continued.

"Only talents that can obey commands and work hard will receive a generous salary, welfare treatment and my good graces. Listen up. If anyone here is a supporter of that chattery old hag Grace Augustine, then I will generously give you 30 seconds to vanish from my sight."

"So now it is about choosing factions eh." Sheyan whispered internally.

Naturally, although the entire Hell's Gate was under the RDA's company control, rivalry factions were bound to happen. One faction belonged to advocates of the Avatar program, mainly led by Dr Grace Augustine. Currently, she had already stayed on this planet for a decade, and her faction mainly composed of scientists and researchers. The other faction belonged to Colonel Miles Quaritch, called the Hawk faction. They solely believed in resorting to bullets, explosives and warfare to settle all problems.

At this moment, Yuan Zhan took the initiative to step forward. He then bowed humbly to colonel Miles Quaritch.

"Colonel sir. Although I'm sorry to disappoint you, but my conscience tells me that we should excavate the riches of this planet, while protecting this beautiful planet. We should not be destroying it at all costs. If you don't mind, may I know where can I find doctor Grace Augustine?"