The Ultimate Evolution

The Predator was a race born to fight. They had a lot of experience and talent be it in solo fights or group fights.

After repeated hindrances from the humans, the Arbitrator had realised that the situation on Uplos was probably about to go out of his control, so he did not hesitate to issue the order to deploy three smaller sub-ships to accelerate ahead to Uplos in advance.

Thanks to their size, these three sub-ships could shuttle through smaller and more unstable wormholes that acted like shortcuts. Of course, this also meant taking a huge risk.

It was for this reason that the Predators on the sub-ships were not very important Predators. Each sub-ship carried fifteen people, twelve of which were combat personnel and scouts, while three were researchers. The role of the researchers was to activate the defensive line of the Uplos asteroid belts, so as to prevent the humans from forcibly invading with a large fleet of spaceships.

Two of the three sub-ships met with accidents while travelling through the unstable wormholes, and only one arrived on Uplos ahead of schedule.

As the first batch to arrive on Uplos, their main job was to investigate and stabilise the current situation. After they discovered that the humans had no intention of invading en masse with large-scale fleets, their biggest worry was put to rest.

After communicating this information with the main ship, the arrogance of the Predators caused this advanced batch to attack on their own initiative. They intended to clean up the “parasites” on the planet. Although this advanced batch consisted of only the most basic soldiers among the Predators, they still thought that it should not be a problem for them to solve the complications caused by the humans if they acted together.

And that was how this assault happened.

The Predators obviously regarded all humans as enemies, so in the battle plan of the Predators, this was a fight where they had a disadvantage in numbers. Therefore, there were two key elements to this battle:

First, they would eliminate the leader first to lower the morale of the enemies.

Second, they needed to create mass chaos! Just as cavalries in the cold weapon era broke up and collapsed army formations, once the situation turned chaotic, the enemy would not be able to organise an effective resistance, and the overall situation would be decided.

The Predators executed the battle strategy faithfully. They first focused fire and ambushed the strongest person on the battlefield, then threw the corpses of the sentries whom they had killed and skinned in order to create chaos. They left half of their numbers behind to disperse the crowded spots with shoulder cannons from a distance, while the other half rushed into the battlefield in invisible states, killing the humans with melee weapons and creating more panic….

Strictly speaking, the plan was perfect and had no loopholes. However, the raid by the Predators only managed to cause a great deal of panic to the native humans.

The biggest variable was the group of contestants.

When Sheyan was fighting with Tom the skull man, the rest of the contestants were also on full alert because the strength of the Ten Strongest test subjects had gained their recognition and they had to be prepared in case the test subjects attacked them by surprise!

These experienced veterans had all seen this kind of situation before where the enemies ambushed them when they were about to win. Therefore, although no one knew beforehand that the Predators would assault them, the contestants were all prepared – they were just wrong on the identity of the assailants. Under such circumstances, it was within reason that the advantage would shift bit by bit in the human’s favour over time.

Five minutes and seventeen seconds after the battle began, Sheyan and Ronnie joined hands to kill the first Predator. Before he died, he tried his best to activate another standard Predator device: a mini hydrogen nuclear bomb mounted on his right hand, which ended up being chopped off by Ronnie.

On the seventh minute and eleventh second, the second Predator fell in the hands of Paul and Pokan. Before his death, the Predator self-detonated successfully. The area shone with a terrible light and a mushroom cloud rose fifty meters around the spot. The Traveler test subject happened to be within range of the explosion and unfortunately died.

On the ninth minute and eighth second, Dardanian caught a Predator alive by using his Vine Ent with the help of everyone else.

In the end, the native humans suffered heavy casualties, while on the side of the contestants, Paul lost an arm. Fortunately, the contestants were only wounded and none had died. The first assault of the Predators ended in complete failure.

These powerful creatures had no intention at all to fight to the death. When they realised that they were going to lose, they quickly retreated by dispersing into the jungle even though they had lost four companions. Their invisibility device played an important role during their retreat as it made them very difficult to trace. It was amazing that they were just the basic soldiers among the Predators, yet they had the discipline to retreat immediately when things did not go according to plan.

When the battle was over, Sheyan took a deep breath, but he still felt a strong sense of crisis. If autumn had arrived, would winter be far behind? If the vanguard had arrived, would the main army be far behind?

***

Like a boiling pot of porridge, the human camp gradually calmed down.

Sheyan and the other contestants did not leave, but prolonged their stay temporarily. They needed to analyse the previous battle and summarise some basic information about the Predators and their combat capabilities.

On a flat piece of rock at the side was a Predator corpse which had been dissected by Cyborg No. 1.

The campfire next to the corpse illuminated it brightly, showing every detail. The Predator’s blood flowed down from the rock, dyeing the ground underneath a tragic emerald.

Cyborg No. 1, holding a branch, began to point out the anatomy of the Predator.

The Predator was a humanoid creature with 50% similarity to humans, 30% similarity to insects, and 20% similarity to wild beasts. Their beige skin was four times thicker than human skin and three times stronger. Their body surface was covered in a tough mesh, which could be used to hang a variety of external equipment.

The average height of a Predator was about two meters. Their heads were 1.5 times bigger than the head of a human being and their brain capacity was very large. Their skulls were much tougher than the skull of a human, but the head was still one of the Predator’s weak spots.

The inside of a Predator’s abdominal cavity was totally different from a human’s. The lymphatic and blood systems of the Predators were integrated into one, and they had no heart, intestine or other such human organs. There were usually five fist-sized glands in their abdominal cavities, which could be divided into three categories according to their functions:

1. The digestive glands.

2. The gonad.

3. The immunity gland.

Among these three types of glands, only serious damage to the immunity gland right below the chest could possibly result in death. Therefore, when attacking a Predator, it was not recommended to invest too much effort in the abdominal area.

The bones of the Predators were about 4.7 times stronger than human bones. Their muscle density was also 6.4 times higher than that of a human’s. This meant more energy was required to take them on in direct confrontation.

When attacking a Predator, it was strongly recommended to target their ankles. Their ankles were not well protected and were the most vulnerable parts of their entire body. If the attack was successful, their mobility would be reduced by about 60%.

***

After explaining these things, Cyborg No. 1 extended his hand to a stone next to him. There were a lot of strange, beautiful things on the stone.

They were the standard equipment of the group of Predators which attacked them earlier. The equipment could be divided into two categories according to their functions: combat and support equipment.

The support equipment included:

Mask: The mask worn on the face of a Predator provided a variety of spectral scanning functions, as well as functions such as x-ray, magnification, and so on. The right eye had an infrared automatic aiming device. The mask could also record and translate the languages of other species. It was an important equipment for the Predators to track their prey and understand their opponents. The mask connected to a Predator’s trachea, so the trachea needed to be pulled out when the mask was removed. The Predators obtained the gas needed for survival through the mask. The mask was also a symbol of status for the Predators – different masks represented different statuses, soldier types and honours.

Microcomputer: Equipped on the left arm of a Predator, the microcomputer had a very complex structure. It could control most of the thermal weapons and high-tech equipment on the Predator’s body, such as the spectral scanning system, stealth system, etc. It could also be used for biological analysis. It came with a laser projector to help the Predator analyse relevant information. It was also a mini-bomb.

The combat equipment included:

Wrist Blades

High-Energy Plasma Shoulder Cannon: The shoulder cannon had the same power as the main cannon on a tank.

Net Gun: The razor-sharp net could restrict a prey’s mobility and could also kill weaker enemies.

Shuriken: This was a very sharp long-range cold weapon. It was sometimes ejected from the mechanism on the arm, and sometimes thrown with the hand.

***

The humans quietly took in the explanation of Cyborg No. 1 and committed it to memory. All this knowledge could possibly be life-savers at critical times.

Cyborg No. 1 went on to say, “According to the analysis of my offline database, these Predators were just the lowest-level scouts. Their mission was simply to investigate. They had probably gathered together and launched the previous raid because they underestimated their enemies.”

“Besides that, the living Predator we caught should be something like a support personnel in the squad, because he was only armed with the shoulder cannon and wrist blades, and also carried a portable medical & maintenance kit.”

“The portable medical & maintenance kit is an important logistic equipment for the Predators. It’s oval in shape and foldable, and will open with a touch. A variety of medical instruments, weapons and tools can be placed inside it, such as syringes (possibly containing dosages of adrenaline-like stimulants), scalpels, cloths and foldable combustion boats.”

“In particular, it contains a blue liquid which can dissolve glass, lime and other inorganic substances to form a blue medicinal gel that can be used for treating wounds and even severed limbs.”