The Juggernaut did not grant them a single second of respite.
Its massive hammer slammed into the laboratory floor with a force that felt capable of stopping a heart. CRASH! The marble floor, mute for thousands of years, exploded, sending stone shards three meters wide flying toward the spot where Thorne had stood just a second before. The captain leaped backward—a veteran reflex that refused to surrender to death—but the shockwave still hammered his chest like a giant's fist. His body was thrown back, slamming into a concrete wall with a sickening crack.
"Captain Thorne!" one of the soldiers shouted, his voice cracking with panic.
"Tsk, don't look at me! Focus on that monster!" Thorne stood up, his teeth gritted in a pained snarl. He wiped the blood streaming from his temple with the back of a trembling hand and raised his weapon once more. His shoulder felt as if it had been pierced by a hot nail, but he refused to fall.
