“Looks like you’re still not complying. Try to stay alive, for we are going in.” the two strikes cost the tattooed man in a broken cloak quite a bit of energy, for he was panting as he spoke, then he just swung his hand downwards to signal to others to open fire.

Energy attacks started coming from all those who deboarded the disc shaped spaceship aiming at the safe house. Most of these attacks came from enchanted weapons held by the people surrounding the safehouse, and others came from the few more powerful and prideful power wielders leading the team.

A bubble shaped energy shield was revealed by the constant attacks and started shaking and flickering almost immediately. The protective array redirected some of the shocks and impact from the attacks towards the ground, which caused the surrounding ground to crack, break and crumble, and thus the whole safehouse started slowly sinking into the ground.

“This is taking too long. We need to focus the attack on a single area.” a woman in a suit of black leather armor and two swords sheathed on her thighs, one long and one short, said to the tattooed man.

“That will almost surely kill them, we need them alive.” the tattooed man said.

“If we get the key, then who cares.”

“We also need them to tell us who else knew about the key.” the tattooed man shook his head: “Not to mention, if they hid the key in one of those space magic enchanted storage containers, it could be lost forever if we killed them.”

“There’s plenty of ways to find it even if it's lost in a personal spacial container.”

“But how much time would that take?”

“Just promise me we are not to fight with our hands completely tied, yeah?”

“If it comes to it, you are allowed to kill. But why not try removing their fighting parts first, huh?”

As the siege attacks on the safehouse raged on, the energy shield created by the protective array became weaker and weaker. More and more cracks appeared, and dimmer and dimmer the energy shine from the shield became.

“Almost there! Keep firing...”

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“Boom!”

Before the energy shield was completely broken down, something else was triggered from within the safehouse. The protective arrays were pushed to their limits and into an outburst of an overdrive, and the energy within the protective energy shield was condensed then released in a single outward explosion.

A shockwave was released from this explosion, the attackers who had their focus on the safehouse were not expecting this, and many of them were thrown into the air, some of them that were standing too close to the safehouse even had their hands and arms dislocated by the shock and impact.

Something silver rose from the crater created by the explosion, bright sunlight was reflected off of its surface and many of those who were attacking the safe house couldn’t even look at it directly without using their powers.

It was a giant rhinoceros beetle that was covered with entirely silver shells. And the moment it came out from the crater, it started moving away from the center of the explosion, with six legs quickly moving and a long and curved horn on its head swiping from side to side, clearing up small trees and incapacitated attackers on its way. The ground seemed to move beneath its legs as well, gradually speeding its traversal across the terrain.

“They're trying to escape! After them!” the tattooed man was not knocked away by the shockwave, for he blocked it with his two arms crossed before him and only had to take a few steps back.

Seven figures who were also relatively strong power wielders started rushing after the silver rhinoceros beetle, trying to catch up to it. One of them was a mage, and she launched herself into the air, with bright green fire magic concentrated on her palms.

“Woosh!” two bright green fireballs shot from the mage’s hand and onto the silver rhinoceros beetle’s back.

But the fireball didn’t even get an explosion when it landed on the silver rhinoceros beetle’s back, they just slid off like water droplets on an oily surface and exploded on the ground on its side.

Two small windows opened on the silver rhinoceros beetle’s back, and two muzzles stuck out, like they were some kind of shooting holes in a bunker. Then the two rifles underneath the thick silver shells opened fire on the flying mage.

“Bang bang bang ...” a flurry of enchanted bullets pierced through the air and shot towards the general direction of the mage in the sky. The mage did not expect her targets to counter attack at all, and was hit in the legs, chest and shoulder while she was conjuring another spell. Her defensive artifacts were activated by the artifacts she had with her. But the protection was torn through in just an instant, and her unfinished spell ended up engulfing her own body in green flames as she fell down from the sky.

“Nice shot! Nice fucking shot!” Caroline clapped her hands as the enemy mage fell to her explosive death. The shells one the back of the silver rhinoceros beetle were actually transparent from the inside, and all five escapees from the safe house were able to see what happened outside.

“There’re still a few of them behind us.” Thomas retrieved his rifle as Aimee did hers, and the shooting holes on the shell closed up again.

“Okay, opening the butt for you.” Jason held the wooden card in his hand as sweat dripped from his face: “Kill as many of them as possible!”

Seeing that the escapees from the safehouse still had the weapon and will to fight back, all of the pursuers from behind activated some extra protection for themselves.

“Bang bang bang...” the detectives opened fire from the butt of the silver rhinoceros beetle on the pursuers behind them. But this time the bullets became less helpful, due to the additional precautions employed by their enemies. The few times they landed their shots on their targets, they only impeded their targets’ movements but did not do any lasting damage.

“Let’s conserve the ammo.” Aimee sighed and said: “They’re prepared. Jason, how far and long can we go?”

“I don’t know how far, but I think another 10 minutes.” Jason answered with a wry smile: “Damn it, I should've studied harder.”