Arknights: The Scarlet Devil of Terra — Chapter 39

Chapter 39: Caged Bird

Just as the sniper thought their shot was a guaranteed kill, two pale, delicate hands materialized in the projectile’s path, plucking the heavy bolt right out of the air.

The shooter stared, eyes wide with disbelief, locking gazes with Flandre. The little girl held the lethal projectile gently, flashing them a sickeningly sweet smile.

“Gana~~~”

A split second later, Flandre flicked her wrist. Before either the driver or the passenger could even blink, the heavy bolt tore backward through the air, splitting into two distinct afterimages that pierced both of their foreheads with a sickening crunch. The speeding vehicle instantly lost control, veering violently off the dirt path and slamming into a massive boulder. A sympathetic detonation followed immediately as the volatile black Originium engine ruptured, engulfing the wrecked chassis in a blinding explosion.

The remaining thugs in the back seats never even had time to scream before a thick cloud of highly active Originium dust swallowed them whole.

Even if they somehow crawled out of that wreckage alive, their fate was sealed. They would only join the ranks of the Infected.

Despite the fiery wreck, the rest of the convoy didn’t even tap their brakes. The heavy off-road vehicles continued their relentless pursuit, engines roaring over the wasteland.

“Damn it, these guys aren’t just mere smugglers!” Beatrix gritted her teeth, her knuckles turning white against the steering wheel as she checked the rearview mirror.

Ch’en’s earlier warnings echoed in her mind. Recently, a brutal gang of scavengers had been terrorizing the wilderness routes, hijacking valuable logistics shipments and leaving no survivors. She hadn’t expected these ruthless murderers to be directly tied to the local smuggling rings. The rot ran much deeper than the L.G.D. had anticipated.

“Damn it all!” Beatrix slammed her foot harder onto the accelerator, pushing the engine to its absolute limit.

The pursuing vehicles fanned out, closing the distance. Having witnessed the gruesome fate of their vanguard, they abandoned the idea of shooting at the occupants. Instead, the sharp crack of gunfire echoed across the plains as they aimed squarely for the tires.

Beatrix swerved frantically to avoid the barrage, entirely out of options.

Beside her, Flandre showed absolutely zero fear. The little girl knelt on her seat, peering out the back window at the approaching convoy. A wide, excited smile curled at the edges of her lips.

“So many people! Flandre is going to have so much fun today!”

A tiny pout formed on her face. She felt a twinge of regret—she really shouldn’t have thrown that arrow through the driver’s skull so quickly. If she had held back just a little, there would have been two more toys to play with.

Heavy tires kicked up clouds of dust as several more vehicles suddenly crested the ridge ahead, cutting off their escape route and boxing them in completely.

Faced with a dead end, Beatrix slammed the brakes. She let out a long, exhausted breath, abandoning any thought of a desperate final stand. She turned her head to look at the little girl beside her.

“Can you at least leave a few of them alive?”

“Oh my, Beatrix, what are you saying?” Flandre cupped her pale cheeks with both hands, her crimson eyes widening in mock innocence. “Flandre isn’t a bad child who likes fighting and killing!”

“But you’ve been smiling this entire time!” Beatrix sighed heavily.

Ever since the high-speed chase began, the Feline had felt the suffocating weight of Flandre’s mounting excitement. It was as if they weren’t caught in a life-or-death ambush against hardened killers. To Flandre, these terrifying enemies were nothing more than a fresh batch of dolls ready for a game of house.

Beatrix’s earlier desperate driving wasn’t just to save her own life—it was a futile attempt to give those thugs a chance to walk away.

But they had chosen to box themselves in. There were no choices left.

She could only settle for damage control.

Hearing the accusation, Flandre leaned over to check the rearview mirror. Staring back at her was a flushed, ecstatic face. The corners of her mouth were stretched impossibly high, curving up like crescent moons that threatened to split her cheeks.

“Am I really that happy?” Flandre tilted her head, blinking in genuine surprise.

“I’m not going to watch,” Beatrix muttered, burying her face against the steering wheel in total defeat. “Just… don’t slaughter every single one of them.”

Seeing the Feline’s utterly dejected posture, Flandre’s smile softened just a fraction. “Then Flandre will leave a few just for you?”

“If you can leave a decent number breathing, I’d be eternally grateful.”

Beatrix pulled out her phone. During the chaotic drive, she had tried repeatedly to contact Ch’en, but the screen stubbornly displayed zero bars. The convoy was packing heavy military-grade communication jammers.

Without a signal, she couldn’t call for backup. She couldn’t save these fools from what was about to happen.

Outside, the dust settled. Dozens of armed mercenaries closed in, their weapons raised. They moved cautiously, their eyes fixed on the small figure who had just hopped out of the passenger seat and lightly scaled the roof of the car.

Flandre stood atop the vehicle, the wasteland wind tugging at her clothes. With a fluid motion, she pulled away the heavy cloak concealing her back.

Crystalline wings, adorned with vibrant, glowing baubles, unfurled into the open air.

The entire circle of hardened killers instinctively took a step back.

“A Blood Fiend…” someone swallowed hard, staring in absolute terror at the little girl surveying them from her perch.

“Are you all here to play with Flandre? Then let’s play together!”

A heartbeat later, crimson threads erupted from beneath her shoes. They shot outward with blinding speed, weaving across the barren earth and completely encircling the convoy before a single trigger could be pulled.

The threads shot skyward, interlacing into a massive, inescapable birdcage of glowing red energy, sealing everyone inside.

“Since the game has started, no one is allowed to leave! Hehehe, hahaha, hohoho…”

Flandre’s childish giggles echoed from every direction at once. The mercenaries spun around in panic, only to find three identical Flandres standing just outside the perimeter of the crowd. The clones lifted the edges of their frilly skirts, bowing in perfect, synchronized curtsies like elegant little ladies.

Then, a thick, suffocating scarlet mist began to bleed from the ground.

“If Reimu were here, she’d definitely call this an Incident,” Flandre’s voice drifted through the fog. “But Flandre is a good girl—how could she actively start an Incident! I wonder if Sister will be happy when she sees this. After all, Flandre learned how to do it too ＼(^▽^)／!”

Inside the cage, visibility dropped to absolute zero. The red mist was so dense that the mercenaries couldn’t even see their own hands in front of their faces. Even standing shoulder-to-shoulder, they were completely blind, drowning in a sea of crimson.

Panic set in. They relied entirely on frantic shouts and the clatter of gear to locate their comrades.

A few desperate men sprinted blindly toward the edge of the cage, hoping to break through the glowing red threads. The moment their bodies slammed into the barrier, they found the seemingly fragile strings were tougher than reinforced steel. The gaps between the threads were impossibly tight, offering no chance of escape.

“Why are you running? Flandre’s game has only just begun… If Flandre has fun, she might let you die easily. But if Flandre isn’t happy… Would Flandre be unhappy? Hehehe, Flandre doesn’t know either!”

The voice slithered directly into their ears, intimate and terrifying. It felt exactly as if a little girl were clinging to their backs, resting her chin on their shoulders. They could feel the phantom sensation of cold breath brushing against their necks.

No one found the childish whispers endearing. It was pure psychological torture.

A man dropped to his knees, sobbing and begging for mercy to the empty fog. Another screamed, swinging his heavy broadsword wildly into the red void. Others sprinted in blind terror, violently colliding with unseen bodies.

Deprived of their sight and trapped in a cage with an apex predator, their minds shattered.

Before Flandre even lifted a finger to attack, the chaotic sounds of friendly fire erupted. Blades bit into flesh, Arts detonated at point-blank range, and frantic gunfire tore through the mist. In their absolute hysteria, they butchered each other. Within minutes, more than half the convoy lay dead in the dirt.

Hovering above, Flandre pouted, crossing her arms in deep dissatisfaction.

She hadn’t even started the first phase of her game, and these fragile toys were already broken. She had promised to leave some alive for Beatrix, which meant she couldn’t even join in the fun now.

She had gone through all the trouble of setting up such a beautiful, grand stage, only for the actors to kill themselves before the curtain truly rose.

Flandre felt incredibly wronged.

Bored out of her mind, she waved her hand dismissively. The thick scarlet mist dissolved into the wind.

Only five or six men remained standing. They were drenched in blood, panting heavily, their weapons slick with gore.

Scattered all around their boots were the mutilated corpses of their own teammates.

As the red haze cleared and their vision returned, the survivors stared at the carnage. Agonized, guttural cries of despair ripped from their throats.

In the brutal smuggling industry, crews were tightly knit. These men shared hometowns, bloodlines, and brotherhood. When blinded by the mist and consumed by the instinct to survive, the killing meant nothing. But now, staring down at the severed limbs and ruined faces of their cousins and lifelong friends, their sanity completely snapped.

“So, why do humans insist on hurting each other?” Flandre hovered down, landing lightly on the hood of the car. She knocked on the windshield. “Beatrix, Flandre wants to make this very clear—these people killed each other. Flandre didn’t touch a single one of them!”

Not understanding why the surviving men were weeping so pathetically, Flandre simply gestured for the bewildered Feline to come out and do her job.

Beatrix pushed the car door open, stepping out into the blood-soaked dirt. Though she hadn’t seen the massacre through the mist, the gruesome tableau painted a very clear picture.

Her face was an emotionless mask. She pulled several pairs of heavy L.G.D. restraints from her tactical pouch and walked forward.

“I, Beatrix Swire, acting as an Operator of the Lungmen Guard Department, hereby place you all under arrest for murder, smuggling, armed robbery, assaulting an officer, and a litany of other severe charges.”

The survivors offered zero resistance. Their spirits were utterly broken. They simply held out their trembling, bloodstained wrists, allowing Beatrix to lock the cold steel around them one by one.

Securing the prisoners, Beatrix moved toward the intact off-road vehicles. Popping the trunk of the lead car, she quickly located the bulky, military-grade signal jammer humming away. She ripped the power cables out, killing the machine instantly.

Pulling out her phone, she watched the signal bars flood back onto the screen. She dialed Ch’en’s secure line.

“Lungmen profanity… What the hell happened out there?! Your comms have been dead for an hour!” Ch’en’s furious, anxiety-laced voice exploded through the speaker the exact second the call connected.

On any normal day, Swire would have immediately fired back a sharp insult. Today, she just didn’t have the energy.

When the line remained silent for several seconds, the anger in Ch’en’s voice rapidly shifted into raw panic.

“Hey! Hey, Char Siu Cat! Beatrix, say something, damn it!”

“We are approximately thirty to forty kilometers outside Lungmen city limits,” Beatrix replied, her voice eerily flat and detached. “Send a retrieval team. Bring personnel who can drive the seized vehicles back. And bring several heavy transports… for the bodies.”

Beatrix felt an unnatural, chilling calm wash over her.

On the other end of the line, Ch’en was anything but calm. But before the Senior Superintendent could demand an explanation, Beatrix ended the call.

She walked back to her car and slumped heavily into the driver’s seat. The surviving prisoners were chained together in a miserable pile; they weren’t going anywhere. As for the men bleeding out on the ground, the deep, bone-exposing lacerations told her everything she needed to know. Medical aid would be a waste of supplies.

She turned her head to look at Flandre. The little girl was sitting in the passenger seat, kicking her legs, looking genuinely depressed.

“I’m sorry,” Beatrix murmured softly. “It’s my fault for ruining your fun.”

Flandre shook her head, her crystalline wings drooping slightly.

“These people weren’t fun at all. Flandre hadn’t even started playing, and they already chopped up most of their own friends. If you hadn’t specifically asked me to leave a few breathing, I would have just waved my hand and squeezed them all into nothing.”

Flandre crossed her arms, still deeply brooding over the anticlimactic end to her game.

Beatrix stared at the terrifying, god-like child pouting over a botched massacre. A stunned expression froze on the Feline’s face.

A second later, a low chuckle escaped her lips. The chuckle escalated into a laugh, and then into full-blown, hysterical laughter. Beatrix laughed so hard her lungs burned, doubling over the steering wheel as dry heaves wracked her chest.

“Beatrix? What’s wrong?” Flandre jumped, startled by the sudden outburst. She stared at the Feline, wondering if the woman had finally gone crazier than she was.

“Cough, cough… It’s nothing,” Beatrix gasped, wiping a tear from her eye. Flandre helpfully handed her a water thermos. Beatrix took a long, desperate sip, letting the cool water ground her back to reality.

She leaned back against the headrest, a tired but genuine smile touching her lips.

“I just… figured some things out. Thanks, Flandre. I actually feel much better now.”