Chapter 424 Extra: Shooting Targets
The Basic Mechas were dubbed as Core Units for being extremely bare bones. Aside from a few thin sheets of metal plating, the Core Units were a joke if they would have been sent out for fighting. Hence, what the Pandawans were going through was just an introductory course to piloting to give them a sense of how the robot driving felt like.
The reason why they could get straight into action right now was that they were basically still in tutorial mode. After passing the tutorial, would they be subjected to the waiting time as indicated by the Pandamonium App.
However, that too was an artificial timer meant to waste the cultivators' time and to create hype. It would be rather sad if Niu Lang had put in so much effort making all these robots and no one would like to play.
But to date, at least 60 cultivators were playing simultaneously which could rival the number of cultivators playing the Pet Card Arena and the Orcs Spinning Top Blades. The System also noted that there were already some cultivators obsessed with the current game, clocking almost 3 hours real time in without any signs of stopping. (The park was barely opened for 4 hours in real time.)
When the Core Units were in autopilot mode in order to get out of the Hangar Bay, virtual consoles were booted up to display instructions to the cultivators as a part of the tutorial. There were visual guides and cues in the entire cockpit showing what the controls were for and the cultivators took whatever time they have to learn as much as possible.
Stepping on a pedal to drive the engine like a car accelerator, flicking a few buttons to activate a radar map in front of them or switching to infrared vision. There were even levers and buttons to control the movements of the hands. Moreover, the helmet they were wearing was directly connected to the camera feed that was being shown via the Core Unit's head.
But right now all of the Mecha robots were in autopilot mode. All those control and button mashings were for nought. The Pandawans could only use that time to familiarise what was presented in the cockpit.
It wasn't until all eight Core Units reached a large desert field like terrain that the autopilot came off. That was when there were minor cues to tell the cultivators what to do which allowed them to start moving the robot as they wished.
In less than a minute, Shi Hui became the first robot casualty when she moved her Core Unit's right leg too far front, causing the robot to lose its balance and fall right into the dunes of the desert. "How the hell do you even control this!!!!" She screamed while frantically pushing all the controls.
Not only her, but the rest were having difficulties balancing their robots except for Bu Dong and Deng Long who seem to have more 'gamer' sense than the rest.
"You useless smellies, look at the left corner of the control panel, there is an assisted AI movement, turn that on." Furi grumbled in the intercom of all the pilot's cockpit when he saw the situation from afar in his jeep. Mari was his personal assistant, and current driver while at the same time, evaluating the rest of the Pandawans.
The cultivators immediately turned on the Assisted AI Movement mode and their performance instantly improved. Some of them even tried to jump around or sprint around until Furi spoke to them through the intercom once more.
"Smellies, the targets will be up in 20 seconds. They could be anywhere within this desert terrain so unlock your weapons. The Core Units are all equipped with a basic sidearm pistol. If you'd like a challenge feel fre-"
"just shoot down all the targets. Highest score gets secret prize from me." Mari interjected, and the intercom was immediately jammed with all sorts of chatter. Jia Ying was excited and asked if it was some sort of chi infused potion or some secret equipment? Separately, Deng Long believed that the prize had something to do with this Supa Robot Wars game which everyone boo-ed at him simultaneously.
In the meantime, Bu Dong sent out a voice prompt to the cockpit AI which had been playing the tutorial for him asking where he should press to unlock the pistol.
"Move your Mecha's right arm and hover it around the right upper thigh of the robot. There will be a prompt appearing right in front of you, allowing you to unlock it and retrieve the sidearm pistol." The AI instructed. For the rest except for Deng Long, a voice command was all that was needed to retrieve the pistol since they had the Assisted AI Movement mode turned on already.
"That movement mode might be useful now, but it will definitely hinder you if you plan to play long term." Deng Long constantly reminded himself as he tried his best to do what the AI cockpit told him to since he was moving the robot manually. However, compared to Bu Dong, Deng Long had more difficulties controlling the more delicate movements though he seemed to be getting the hang of it.
Twenty seconds had passed as the group fiddled around with their pistol and the stationary wooden target boards appeared right in front of them. Without much difficulty, they had taken down their first targets, but the next wave of stationary wooden targets was now miles away from them. Although it took a few more shots than the first one, it was still manageable for everyone.
The third wave of stationary targets became a challenge when it appeared at random places and even further from them. Se Lang knew that its pistol had an effective range as he briefly went through the weapon specifications which were pulled out from the AI cockpit database while waiting for the time to pass.
Hence, Se Lang moved closer to the target before firing his shots and hit them within two shots. Meanwhile, other Pandawans like Yue Wen used two whole magazine clip trying to shoot the wooden target down because she was not used to the range. Her lack of knowledge in that regard also prohibited her from fully utilising it.
Jing Ru, on the other hand, was similar to Se Lang but instead of moving forward, she made her robot prone and fired from a distance. She did some quick mental calculations with the aid of the AI cockpit and managed to get her first shot to hit the target despite using a pistol.
That gave her brownie points in the eyes of the System- erm, Mari and Furi. "As expected from someone who was trained by a Police Sniper. She made used of the AI cockpit to assist her for giving her a good shot." Furi grinned at Mari
"She even took account of the wind speed which their current AI had yet to implement it into the hit probability rate. She would definitely succeed as a heavy arms support ." Mari nodded her head in agreement with Furi.
Bu Dong was amazed that the bullets were not unlimited like in games, the cockpit featured some realism by showing him how much ammo he had left in his gauntlets where the pistol magazines were stored. There was no recharge of bullets unless there were ammo crates around which he assumed none were given since he did not see any around the desert terrain.
His notion got reinforced when Yue Han accidentally spent them all by spraying the pistol bullets just to hit a particular target, leaving him empty. Bu Dong decided to be nice to his friend and threw Yue Han a magazine. "This is the only one I am sparing you! I haven't much left myself!"
When Bu Dong threw the pistol magazine at Yue Han, the fourth wave of stationary targets coincidentally appeared as well as something else. "Didn't you say this is just a training mission!" Jia Ying continued to shoot the stationary targets as she saw two Core Units similar to theirs emerge from the dunes of the desert. They were painted in solid red, making it very easy for the cultivators to spot them.
"I did tell you to kill some moving targets, right? So, stop complaining and destroy those Core Units! The stationary targets are now optional!" Furi scoffed as he folded his arms and watched the scenes unfold.