At the center of the gravity bomb's detonation zone, everything within nearly two hundred square meters had been crushed together into a colossal floating sphere.
Concrete.
Steel.
Vehicles.
Fragments of buildings.
Human remains.
The Ice Cream Monster itself had vanished somewhere inside the mass, compressed into one microscopic piece of the nightmare hanging above the battlefield.
The sphere wasn't smooth or symmetrical. It looked like a giant hand had grabbed the earth itself and kneaded it into a grotesque ball of wreckage.
The effect was terrifying.
And fundamentally different from ordinary explosions.
Traditional explosives relied on blast radius. Most people outside the immediate kill zone survived with injuries, shockwaves, or burns. True instant-lethality zones were usually measured in meters.
This was different.
Anything caught inside the gravity field simply died.
No exceptions.
Armor, fortifications, vehicles, reinforced bunkers... it didn't matter. The gravitational distortion tore everything apart indiscriminately.
For someone like Drex Valen, who had already dissected the principles of gravity itself, manufacturing gravity bombs wasn't difficult.
The only reason he limited production was because even he considered them dangerous.
The Dark Elves' black hole grenades worked on a similar principle, although those were even more absurd. After all, those things were capable of killing a Kurse.
Several minutes later, members of the Hellfront Task Force slowly climbed back to their feet.
The squad's communication channel stayed silent for a moment before someone finally spoke.
"...Did we kill it?"
Another operative stared at the floating sphere.
"We probably did. Director Valen said those gravity bombs can generate a gravitational field strong enough to rip apart a hundred-ton object instantly."
Even he sounded stunned by how effective the weapon had been.
Originally, Hellfront's plan had only been to immobilize the Ice Cream Monster for a few seconds so they could finish it with the fusion gun.
Instead, the gravity bomb had apparently erased the problem outright.
No cleanup shot required.
Ten minutes later, nearby S.W.O.R.D. agents arrived in an armored transport convoy.
They intended to haul the massive gravity-compressed sphere back to a S.W.O.R.D. research facility for study.
Alongside them came hazmat teams in sealed biohazard suits, carefully scanning the surrounding environment for contamination.
So far, no virus-based monsters had appeared.
That didn't mean they wouldn't eventually.
S.W.O.R.D. treated every battlefield like the opening scene of an apocalypse movie now. One oversight was all it would take.
Security forces moved through the area as well.
The S.W.O.R.D. Rapid Response Security Division wore black combat uniforms, BladeTech ballistic helmets, tactical vests, and reinforced boots. Most had respirator masks fitted with integrated communication systems.
Their weapons were noticeably heavier than standard military rifles, oversized assault platforms firing high-pressure ammunition specifically designed for anti-monster combat.
Every soldier radiated the same message:
We are not here to negotiate.
Watching the operation remotely, Drex leaned back with visible satisfaction.
"S.W.O.R.D. won this round," he said calmly. "From now on, nobody's going to block our authority again."
The Ice Cream Monster incident had accomplished everything he wanted.
It crippled portions of the global narcotics economy.
It demonstrated that conventional militaries could not reliably defeat Demon-Level monsters.
And most importantly, it terrified governments into recognizing S.W.O.R.D. as humanity's only dependable answer to uncontrollable superhuman disasters.
Fear opened doors faster than diplomacy ever could.
Several international representatives contacted Drex before the battlefield had even cooled.
Every conversation sounded roughly the same.
They wanted stronger cooperation with S.W.O.R.D.
Permanent bases.
Urban deployment rights.
Rapid-response stations in major cities.
No more resistance.
No more political delays.
Drex wasn't surprised.
Afghanistan alone had lost over three thousand tons of poppy harvests during the Ice Cream Monster incident. Nobody even knew the full scale of the marijuana losses yet.
Entire nations quietly depended on the drug trade to survive economically.
Now those economies were collapsing under monster attacks.
Governments that once dragged their feet suddenly became extremely enthusiastic about anti-monster operations.
Exactly as planned.
Then Drex announced something else.
Something that confused almost everyone.
BladeTech Industries was officially being renamed.
Umbrella Corporation.
The old company logo disappeared overnight, replaced by a clean red-and-white umbrella emblem.
The public reaction was immediate confusion.
BladeTech Industries had already become one of the largest corporations on Earth. Renaming a corporate titan of that size meant contract revisions, legal restructuring, international documentation nightmares, and billions in logistical complications.
Some companies even considered exploiting the transition to demand penalties or renegotiations.
Not that anyone seriously believed Drex Valen cared about a few lawsuits.
Still, the decision felt bizarre.
Nobody understood why he would suddenly throw away one of the most recognizable corporate names on the planet.
But Drex simply looked at the red-and-white logo and smiled faintly.
Perfect.
He had considered several alternatives.
The SCP Foundation.
Shinra.
Blackwatch.
But none of them carried the same iconic flavor.
And unlike the original Umbrella Corporation from fiction, his version was vastly more powerful.
Umbrella Corporation had become a true global monopoly monster.
Pharmaceuticals.
Military hardware.
New energy development.
Defense systems.
Biotechnology.
Advanced materials.
Its influence already shaped the direction of entire technological sectors.
Politically and economically, the corporation held enough leverage to influence nations directly while still maintaining an almost spotless public image.
As for how much money Drex actually possessed?
Nobody knew.
Private megacorporations at that scale were financial labyrinths.
After absorbing the Stav Consortium, Drex had effectively multiplied BladeTech's previous capital foundation by ten.
Now he truly possessed wealth comparable to entire nations.
The United States collected more than ten trillion dollars annually in government revenue.
Umbrella Corporation's yearly income had already surpassed one trillion.
And it was still climbing at a terrifying speed.
That number didn't even include assets, liquid capital, subsidiaries, patents, or hidden holdings.
Once S.W.O.R.D. began mass-purchasing War Machines and Iron Mongers through international funding programs, projections suggested Umbrella Corporation's annual revenue could exceed three trillion dollars within the next fiscal cycle.
At that point, the company would become something unprecedented.
Not merely powerful.
Not merely rich.
A civilization-scale entity.
And the orders kept coming.
The United States government formally requested that Drex develop an even more advanced generation of War Machines specifically designed for anti-monster warfare.
The battlefield results spoke for themselves.
Compared to tanks, helicopters, and fighter jets, War Machines and Iron Mongers had demonstrated vastly superior performance against monsters.
The rest of the world noticed too.
Military revolution was no longer theoretical.
It was already happening.
And any nation unwilling to modernize would eventually discover the same truth as the burning wreckage in Afghanistan:
Obsolescence could kill entire armies.