EROS [Zerg]

[Dear Eros, you have received an invitation from the "Fight to the Death" team.]

Eros sat in the egg-shaped capsule, and a silver-blue dialog box floated in the black virtual universe before him.

“Arveson, I accept the invitation.”

Okay, I've accepted the invitation from the "Fight to the Death" team.

You have become a member of the "Fight to the Death" team.

A cold, mechanical voice echoed in the virtual space.

Eros heard a hissing sound of electricity, and then a series of white dialog boxes suddenly appeared in front of his eyes.

"Finally here, I've been waiting for you for so long." Rioli's voice rang in his ears, and a blue mech appeared in his sight.

"Sorry for keeping you waiting."

Eros piloted his mech to Rioli's front and suddenly noticed two more black mechs behind Rioli.

"Let me introduce you. This is Annie Walter, this is Damifia, and with you, our [Fight to the Death] team now has four members!"

Rioli said to the two black mechs behind him, "He is Eros, the female insect who came to our class."

“Annie, do you remember? He’s the female insect who gave us cakes at the banquet last time.”

"So it was you." Annie exclaimed in surprise, "You're actually a student at our academy?"

Damifia, who had never seen Eros before, shook hands with Eros while manipulating the mecha's iron arm: "You're a female insect from the Comet class, and it's quite rare to see you attending a mecha combat class."

“Who can resist the allure of mechs?” Eros smiled and shook hands with Damifia.

"Why haven't I been matched with any other teams yet?" Annie was getting anxious as she watched the circle in front of her spin incessantly without getting a response.

Eros also found it strange. He saw on the screen that the matchmaking time had exceeded thirty stars, but he still hadn't been matched with any other teams.

Out of curiosity, he clicked on the past records of the "Fight to the Death" team and was shocked to find that they had suffered a series of defeats, and their ranking had dropped to the bottom 100.

To encourage the insects to team up and challenge teams with higher rankings, a victory would allow them to take over the opponent's ranking.

"With such a poor record, I doubt any team would be willing to challenge us," Eros said, somewhat perplexed. He then suggested that we directly challenge other teams.

The three little females all agreed to the suggestion, "Which team should we challenge first?"

“The lowest-ranked team,” Eros said decisively.

“Challenging teams like that won’t improve our ranking,” Damia disagreed.

"We have a better chance of winning against the lowest-ranked team, and our win rate will also be higher. Although we won't get ranked, we can gain experience points. If we gain enough experience points, stronger teams will come up and challenge us."

Eros had participated in human-machine team challenges in the intelligent battle mode and knew the combat rules of team challenges in the virtual training arena.

Team challenges involve defeating opposing teams to improve your team's ranking. Higher-ranked teams will receive more advanced equipment in the virtual training arena.

To prevent female insects from refusing to accept challenges from lower-ranked teams, a points system is also set up in the virtual training ground. Teams will receive a certain number of points for each victory, plus 20% of the points for losing teams.

Points can be redeemed for equipment for mechs in the virtual training ground. However, to prevent high-ranking teams from deliberately beating low-ranking teams to rack up points, the points system is divided into twenty-six tiers. The higher the tier, the more points you get. Sometimes, beating ten low-ranking teams yields less points than challenging one high-ranking team, and you get more points if you succeed.

"Let's give it a try then." Annie opened the challenge page and found several teams currently ranked at the bottom online.

After looking at the lowest-ranked teams and considering that there were no traps, Eros decided to "select the lowest-ranked team and force matchmaking."

Eros smiled and pointed to the white frame in front of him: "That's the [Number One] team."

To maximize the fighting spirit of the insects, each team has only three forced match opportunities per day. Teams that are forced into a match cannot refuse and can only accept the challenge.

Annie had just locked onto this team and sent a forced match when a chat window appeared on the opposing team's screen.

【Fight them to the death!】Are you guys bored?! You think you can challenge us with our ranking?!

Immediately after entering battle mode, the opposing team sent a surrender request.

……

……

Jessica received a message from the opposing team, and when he saw it, he was so angry that his beard almost stood on end.

[Beat them to death]: [So, "number one" in your case means last place.]

"What do you mean last place? We used to be a top ten team in the Empire!" Jessica angrily pounded on the virtual control panel and immediately called her teammates to log on.

These retired female soldiers originally lived in a nursing home, with nothing to do all day. Feeling lonely and bored, they logged into the virtual training ground just to reminisce about the passionate spirit of their youth and to look at the virtual space in front of them.

The brittle exoskeleton could no longer withstand the intense battles of his youth, and his gradually declining mental strength could no longer sustain prolonged mech operation.

But their decaying bodies couldn't change their pride. Jessica exited the egg chamber and called out her old comrades who had moved into the retirement home with her, ready to teach these little bugs who had stumbled in and were being rude a lesson.

Eros looked at the voice message Rioli sent to the opposing team. Although he was also surprised that the team called [Number one] had no fighting spirit at all, he wondered if this kind of taunting was a bit hurtful.

Eros: "Riolli, we'd better be more careful in the future."

"Okay, I'll be more careful next time." Rioli scratched his head.

"I won a game for free before the match even started. It felt so easy..."

As soon as he finished speaking, the message appeared on the screen that the "Fight to the Death" team had been forcibly matched.

"What?" The four insects looked at the matchmaking target [Number one] on the screen at the same time.

"How could it be them? Didn't they just surrender? Why are they back?"

"Could it be that Rioli's words just now provoked him?"

Rioli said somewhat guiltily, "What are you afraid of? I'll fight one if one comes, and ten if ten come!"

The little bugs always have a mix of cuteness and exasperation, Eros shrugged helplessly: "Looks like we'll just have to accept it."

After saying that, he tapped the "Challenge" button on the screen with his finger.