The silence that followed after the fight did not last long.
In the current world's situation, silence never truly existed. It was just only a brief moment before the arrival of something equally terrifying.
The impact of Brant's battle with the abomination had travelled too far, farther than what it was supposed to.
The energy fluctuations following the violent release of corrupted energy, and the decapitation of the polluted being… all of it had sent unseen ripples through the atmosphere which were not limited by noise alone.
It had become some kind of a signal.
The air itself had become more heavier as Brant froze mid-step, his expression going still.
Veronica, who was already coming over from the mechanical vehicle to heal Brant's self-inflicted injury also stopped mid-way.
Brant's blood armor, still dripping with blood, faintly twitched as he grew more nervous the more the air of uncertainty lingered.
Marco's mechanical heart hummed, releasing more energy as its beating accelerated.
From a distance, something was approaching fast.
A long, warped screech echoed through the ruins.
Listening to the sound, they were all sure that it wasn't something made by an animal, nor a human.
It sounded more like it was produced by the twisting and scrapping of broken vocal cords.
From deep within the inner compartments of the mechanical vehicle, Marco's serious voice dropped instantly.
"It's a Predator."
That sentence alone changed everything.
The beings known as the predators weren't just monsters nor mutated humans.
A Predator was something else entirely.
It was once human, and still maintained its humanoid shape but with no consciousness left to restrain the Inkforce invader.
It had no thoughts, felt no pain, and had zero survival instincts, but only possessing the drive to fight and grow during battle.
The group had learned this the hard way over a course of ten long years of encountering them.
Predators had no upper limit to inkforce absorption, so long as polluted air existed, they would continue to absorb it. Their bodies would warp, tear down, breakdown, rebuild and then grow stronger each second the fight continued.
Fighting a Predator was never all about just winning, but was about ending the fight before it even began evolving.
The ground trembled as it stepped into view.
It stood three meters tall, its body still vaguely humanoid in shape, yet horribly stretched and distorted beyond recognition. Its proportions were twisted, its limbs unnaturally elongated, and its entire form seemed to defy the natural order. It was as though reality had attempted to remember the shape of a human being, only to produce a grotesque imitation of something it had long since forgotten.
The right arm had completely lost its original form, it had now been distorted into resembling a massive organic blade, jagged and asymmetrical, constantly reshaping itself like liquid metal made of flesh.
The left arm was even worse. It was long and thin with too many joints.
Dark claws extended from the elongated fingers, each one sharp enough to slice through steel. Black fluid dripped from its limbs, evaporating into mist before touching the ground.
Its head was tilted at an unnatural angle. The face still existed, but the eyes were gone, replaced by swirling black voids that leaked pollution directly into the air.
After its earlier screech, it simply started walking forward, and with each step, its muscles expanded, its veins thickened, and the air around it darkening.
Steven's expression sharpened as he clenched his fists at his sides, his knuckles paling, though his face stayed otherwise unreadable, with only a faint, tight crease of worry on his brow that betrayed his true emotions.
He spoke in a low, and even voice
"It's already begun feeding on the pollution."
Brant felt it too, his blood vibrated inside his veins, reacting to the distortion. Even his armor was being subtly pulled toward the thing.
Veronica, who had previously been about to leave the mechanical vehicle to heal Brant, froze for a moment before turning back and moving toward where One stood watching the situation. She gently covered his eyes, her face still stoic and calm.
One grew confused at his now-darkened view. He tried to struggle, but instantly realized how strong the arm obstructing his view was.
It was like an immovable mountain, not moving no matter how he struggled.
He gave up the meaningless fight and simply stood there, annoyed.
He had wanted to watch the survival battle about to take place, but had been interrupted by this strange woman. Very frustrating.
He could only sigh before going still, no longer bothering to move at all.
He could still faintly feel the pollution flowing around him and then towards where the thing stood as it absorbed everything.
Marco exhaled slowly, not even bothering to call anyone else to handle it as he stepped forward himself, getting down from the vehicle
"We can't afford to waste any more time here, I'll handle it myself"
He stretched both hands toward the massive mechanical vehicle behind them.
The mechanical vehicle responded almost immediately.
From within the vehicle, some mechanical plates separated as a few hidden compartments opened. Dozens of mechanical components including gears, pistons, rails, segmented metal bones etc...crawled out like metallic insects and assembled behind him.
Four massive arms formed in mid-air, each over three meters long, thick as industrial machinery, layered with rotating joints and hydraulic muscles releasing white steam. The parts fused seamlessly, locking together with impossible precision.
The arms attached and integrated themselves directly to Marco's back.
Marco's nervous system merged with the machinery instantly. To him, the arms were no different from real limbs. He flexed them once in order to get a hang of them.
After that, he steadied himself as the ground cracked open, forming a deep crater.
One moment Marco was just standing there, then the next, he was gone.
The air itself tore open as Marco crossed the distance faster than the speed of sound, thought, and before the Predator's distorted brain could even register any movement.
When the Predator finally reacted and raised its blade-arm to counterattack, it was already too late.
Marco's mechanical arms wrapped around its torso, two gripping its chest, and the other two locking around its shoulders. The force alone created a shockwave that flattened the nearby debris.
The Predator screeched, not in pain but adaptation.
Its body began to swell, its muscles thickening, and claws elongating, with its blade growing sharper as it absorbed more pollution.
But Marco wasn't prepared to let it finish, so he pulled, applying more pressure as the mechanical arms contracted with overwhelming force.
The Predator's body was torn apart mid-transformation. It was ripped and then crushed as its upper body got separated from its lower half.
Black blood exploded outward, splattering across the ruins like black ink thrown against a white wall. The blade-arm shattered into chunks of corrupted flesh and the claws dissolving into smoke.
The Predator never even had a chance to touch him from the beginning to the end.
Marco released his hold on the predator's remains before vanishing again, and reappearing inside the vehicle almost instantly.
The mechanical arms disassembled and crawled back into the machine, like obedient limbs returning to a sleeping body.
Outside, the predator's remains continued to twitch, but failed to regenerate, failing even to sustain a fight, and denied any further chance at evolution.
Brant looked at the dissolving black blood with lingering fear, while even the usually composed Steven swallowed faintly, clearly feeling unsettled.
Veronica, seeing that the battle had finally come to an end, released the frustrated One at last, a trace of something resembling a smile on her face, like someone who'd just won a small, private scheme.
One hopped off the vehicle before running toward the predator's scattered remains. He dragged both the corpse of the abomination and the predator into the mechanical vehicle, before finally breathing a sigh of relief.
Marco's voice came through the speakers, calm but sharp
"Get in, we're moving now. That noise from the battle already traveled too far. There are things out there that even I don't want to provoke just yet."
He spoke as the vehicle's engine roared to life.
Veronica simply continued looking on, nothing visible in her expression, though she glanced at the busy One from time to time.
One, already halfway done moving his experimental materials, continued his work diligently.
After roughly thirty minutes of effort, he finally got the materials into his personal research room.
The mechanically constructed bus was very large, with a great many empty rooms, some large, and others quite small.
This particular room was outfitted like a biological research lab. Various boxes held the heads and body parts of other creatures, especially the abominations.
These boxes and their equipment were sealed together in a way that completely prevented anything from escaping outward, including gas and moisture.
He placed the newly acquired predator's remains into other boxes, after carefully separating them.
He then extended a pipe connecting the boxes to a very large jar containing some dark green liquid..