Chapter 125: Burnt Out.
Seven stood before the troops assembled before him and he walked up and down the lines inspecting them carefully like a General getting ready to lead his forces into battle, only this General fought from the front line, not an armchair far away.
The Gatorclaws stood proudly all supporting their new armour and weapons which were all carefully designed to enhance their already formidable natural fighting abilities and had been carefully designed and built around such things.
The biggest among them were equipped to work as a bulwark carrying with them massive tower-style shields designed to soak up any incoming fire and had been made from a mixture of metal and kevlar padding that produced a sheild thick enough to stop even a bullet from an antimaterial rifle.
Next up was their body armour which made them look like armoured Dragons in a way as it had been designed to make them look somewhat like medieval knights of old, but once you got past the aesthetics of the suits you realised they had been very carefully constructed to have a variety of properties which would make them very well suited to modern weapons.
For instance, the chest plating had been rounded and angled to help it deflect away smaller calibre bullets while being thick enough to rob anything higher of the vast majority of its energy, but it was what lay atop and underneath that plating that he was especially proud of.
Atop the plating, a coating of carbon had been applied to disperse the heat of plasma shot while under the metal plating was a mixture of both ceramic and kevlar that was far lighter than its metal equivalent but just as effective if not more so at catching bullets that managed to breach the outer plating.
The weapons they were carrying were a mixture of modern and old school.
Some were carrying things like heavy miniguns that had been salvaged from one of Seven's many trips to the scrap yard where he had located some old scrapped vertibirds and had relieved them of the weaponry that had been left on them for some reason.
The weapons had been checked and with a bit of repair world had been restored to working order.
Though they only had two of these so the remainder was pretty much relying on medieval equivalents, such as large swords, hammers and axes.
Large custom-made bows were also apparently a favourite among the Gatorclaws which thanks to their immense strength had to be made from large leaf spring suspension systems originally used to prop up a van's weight but now served as the limbs for massive recurve style bows that fired arrows the size of fucking javelins.
Halberds and war spears were also in high demand by the shield bearers who had become known as the phalanx, with a great many of them cutting special notches into their shields or mounting rests on the sides so they could easily control both their shield and weapon at the same time.
Most of the smaller Gatorclaws had opted to use swords and hand axes for close-up combat and had fitted their tails with large spiky mace heads that made it look like they'd bolted a Morningstar to the tip of their tails.
These were the berserkers and it was their job to break through the ranks of the enemy and to sow absolute chaos amongst them by attacking them from within and when you witnessed first-hand what they could do with one of their specially designed claymore-style swords which to one of them was as light and easy to wield as a rapier was a to human it wasn't hard to see why.
Seven had personally witnessed one of them cut through an entire tree trunk with a single cut before another one split the remaining stump in two by bringing her axe down on the top of it.
After witnessing such a thing one didn't have a hard time imagining the sheer fear that such a sight would have on an opposing force who witnessed it, only it wouldn't be trees they'd be doing such damage to it would be human beings.
Then there were Vizzy and Varrel who would be serving as their scouts and fast air support, it would be their job to circle the battlefield high above and to call out targets to their comrades below while harassing the enemy with accurate fire from up high or dive bombing them to unleash their fury up close and personal with their armoured stingers which would definitely make them get their fucking heads down.
Seven and his group would be serving as the command core, with each of them controlling certain groups so that they could achieve multiple objectives at once or to run pincer movements and flanking attacks on the fly.
Visa and Vess's armour had been upgraded now using the designs that they'd come up with for the Gatorclaws and modifying them to make use of Malakai's incredibly strong silk armour which they'd integrated into it.
The result was both of them looked like a pair of armoured Dragons with black-coated steel covering their sensitive bits while leaving their joints free to keep their movement and speed maxed out.
The pair also now had a set of gauntlets that reinforced their claws on both their hands and feet with steel to make it even more terrifying than it ever was before.
They too had implements of death now strapped to their tails with Visa opting for a pair of axe blades while Vess had opted for what appeared to be a trident with sharpened sides.
Shauna had opted for a lighter set to keep her mobile while all the humans of the group were now encased in heavily modified power armour which had been outfitted with things like deflection plating or spaced armour that would protect them from anything like explosive-tipped or armour-piercing rounds.
It had taken them a long time but the group had finally managed to assemble into something that looked like an army equipped to march right through the gates of hell to kick the Devil in the balls, or if you were the one facing them down you might be forgiven for believing that this army had just marched right out of hell itself.
Now all they had to do was find their targets and they could plan this attack out though thanks to Vizzy and Varrel's efforts this didn't take them long.
Vizzy landed next to Seven as he was inspecting the Gatorclaws and he turned to look at the young female Cazador hybrid, he also instantly noticed the smile plastered on her face despite the helmet she was wearing.
"I'm guessing by that face you have good news for me?" he said and she nodded her head enthusiastically making her antennae bob and swish in time with her head.
"They finally figured out that me and Varrel have done a runner and are searching the area near where we led their colleagues into the Yao guai nest, by the looks of it Torch has already done away with the bears but he's got the others spread out looking for tracks," she said.
Seven nodded his head and then noticed that her brother wasn't with her.
"Varrel keeping an eye on them?" he asked and she nodded again.
"Yeah he wanted to make sure we didn't lose them in case they moved further afield and don't worry he's keeping himself above where they can either reach him or even really see him," she said.
"Alright then time to go and have a little word with these fuckers," he said before then turning back to his battalion of Gatorclaws.
"Alright guys you are dismissed we have some work to do but don't worry I'm sure we'll be back soon, we have a raider stronghold to break up remember?" he said and there were various grunts and tail slaps on the concrete in answer to this.
Visa had by now noticed Vizzy's return and she made her way over with Vess to join the pair.
