Chapter 262: Particle Beam Main Cannon, Not Bad!
After confirming that the critical target was successfully destroyed, the Cangyuan Fleet immediately initiated the warp program according to the original plan.
After half an hour of flight, they safely withdrew to the orbit of a gas giant 300 million kilometers away.
Phew…
Lu Yuan could finally breathe a sigh of relief.
Recalling that scene just now, it was still a bit thrilling!
“Alright,”
He looked at Jubian, his chief scientist who had accompanied him on the expedition.
“What exactly was that main cannon sweeping attack? What kind of weapon is it, and what are the defensive countermeasures?”
“It should be a particle cannon, Executive Officer!” Jubian replied.
A particle beam weapon, huh…
Lu Yuan had some concept of this, but not much.
He knew that particle beam weapons and lasers both belonged to directed energy weapons, and in reality, they often appeared in various near-future themed movies, animations, and games.
Among them, laser weapons already had combat achievements.
A certain small country used vehicle-mounted lasers imported from a certain large country to shoot down many drones from another large country.
But for some reason, in this real Star Alliance universe, although people also valued lasers, very few factions chose to develop and use particle beam weapons.
“The principle of a particle cannon is not complicated,” Jubian continued.
“Generally speaking, it's about placing charged microscopic particles in an accelerating electric field, continuously accelerating them, and finally firing them out. When particles accelerate to one percent of the speed of light, their kinetic energy and penetrating power are already quite considerable, possessing weapon potential.”
“So a particle cannon is also a kinetic weapon, which can be blocked by a kinetic shield?”
“Well—”
Facing the Executive Officer’s question, Jubian looked troubled.
Ye Xing, standing nearby, sighed and gave his old friend an unspoken look of disdain.
“—Please wait a moment, everyone, I need to consult my personal assistant!”
Jubian somewhat awkwardly connected with the Mage who remained on Li Star. “Hello? Are you there, old buddy? I’ve sent you the video footage of the recent battle. Take a quick look and tell us everything you can figure out.”
“Hmm—”
The Mage, the true physics expert of Cangyuan, pondered for a moment and first affirmed the judgment of those on the Xianyang.
“Jubian still has some common sense; that was indeed a high-power particle beam weapon, and it can indeed be seen as a kinetic damage weapon.
It's just that the projectiles have changed from macroscopic metal lumps to a ‘dense soup’ composed of microscopic particles.”
“However, kinetic shields do not have a good defensive effect against particle beams. Their principle dictates that they are best suited for defending against macroscopic projectiles with relatively low energy, like a 7.62mm rifle bullet—that’s the easiest to stop, and no matter how many hit, it’s damage immunity.
Or low-energy microscopic particles, such as a strong wind, meaning air molecules moving at tens of meters per second, can also be effectively blocked.
When facing higher-energy macroscopic projectiles, such as high-speed tungsten rods fired by an electromagnetic main cannon, kinetic shields will be at risk of overload.
And when facing high-energy particles, even if the shield does not temporarily overload, it cannot completely stop them; it can only decelerate the particles.”
Jubian: “So, particle beam weapons come with shield penetration properties, and after penetrating the shield, they can be resisted with armor?”
The Mage: “No, things aren’t as good as you imagine. These high-energy particles also have a very annoying characteristic: they can efficiently penetrate various materials and then release their carried energy within the ship’s internal equipment and human bodies.”
Hiss!
Not only can it penetrate shields, but it can also penetrate armor?
It's truly a mechanism monster! “Then since it’s so powerful, why don’t Star Alliance warships use it?”
It couldn't be because they are kind-hearted!
“I think, firstly, it's because lasers are completely unaffected by kinetic shields, and secondly, the beam divergence effect of particle beams is much more severe than that of lasers,” the Mage explained.
“The diffusion radius of a particle beam is inversely proportional to the relative atomic mass of the emitted particles and directly proportional to the square root of the thermodynamic temperature of the particle beam flow.
Therefore, the best weaponization solution is to use heavy ions as ammunition, such as mercury with a relative atomic mass of 200.59, which is heavy enough and relatively easy to obtain.
Then, reduce the temperature of the particle beam flow as much as possible. The particle beam flow emitted by that ‘Big Squid’ is already close to the speed of light.
Normally, the temperature should exceed 1 million K, leading to severe thermal diffusion; but if the beam flow could be reduced to near absolute zero, such as 0.01 K, the energy density would immediately increase ten thousandfold, making it practically indestructible.”
“That’s easy to say!” Jubian immediately reacted, “Just use the Entropy Zero Element Furnace for forced cooling!”
The Mage: “You’re right, that can indeed be done! But don’t forget, the Star Alliance knows nothing about Entropy Zero Element, and warships still rely on inefficient heat dissipation plates.”
“That’s true too.”
“Moreover, accelerating heavy ions itself is not easy. Of course, as long as these two technical difficulties can be overcome, before acquiring gamma-ray laser technology, particle beam weapons do have the potential to exceed lasers by tens of thousands of times in terms of maximum power.
Because theoretically, you only need to mindlessly scale up the particle accelerator equipment, unlike lasers, which are limited by additional technical barriers of illuminator components and lenses.”
Hmm…
Hearing these words, Lu Yuan found it hard not to be tempted.
The power of electromagnetic cannon weapons, frankly speaking, is somewhat bottlenecked at the current stage due to the constraints of accelerating rail ablation.
Continuing scientific research is not impossible, but the input and output are a bit disproportionate.
If he could obtain a sample of a high-power particle main cannon and thereby unlock another tech tree, hohoho!
The picture is too beautiful to look at!
“Understood,” Jubian nodded, “Then why can the particle beam be deflected?”
In fact, as an engineering doctor, he already knew the answer to this question; he was just asking it for other players without a science and engineering background.
“It should be refraction, right?” A player whispered, “Watching Gundam really pays off, isn’t this the Genesis satellite cannon from Seed Destiny?”
“You fake fan! It’s already been said that Genesis is a gamma-ray burst; the cannon that can be refracted is called Requiem!”
“Whatever, you don’t need to be so clear about Gundam stuff—”
“The principle is very simple,” the Mage said, “The particles accelerated in a particle cannon must be charged particles, and they will turn when they encounter a lateral external electromagnetic field.
The unknown vessel you blew up can actually be seen as a floating external cannon barrel for the ‘Big Squid’s’ main cannon. In actual combat, it would obviously bend itself to a certain angle as needed, allowing the particle beam to accurately enter from the tail, bend after being energized, and then exit from the head, achieving curved obstacle-bypassing strikes.
Of course, before the final launch, the particle beam also needs to undergo a neutralization step. What is finally emitted are neutral, uncharged heavy atoms, so the receiving side no longer needs to think about using an external electromagnetic field for deflection defense.”
Oh~
Now, everyone understood.
Turns out, it wasn't that miraculous!
Pure basic physics, no mysticism.
Is this the charm of physics, this joy of unraveling secrets?
“Understood! Thanks, assistant brother, for the Popular Science! So, one last question, why is there such a dazzling beam of light in the atmosphere when the particle cannon fires, but not in space?”
The Mage: “That’s even simpler. The particle energy is so high that it directly causes nuclear reactions in the nitrogen and oxygen atoms it collides with.
If you remote-sense it now, you’ll probably detect the nuclear fusion products sodium and tritium in the atmosphere.”
Goodness—
What a weapon full of violent aesthetics!
Lu Yuan liked this thing more and more in his heart.
Whether man or woman, the pursuit of a stronger cannon is almost a biological instinct!
He walked to the large screen by the porthole, resting his chin, pondering for a long time.
“I plan to try to capture that ‘Big Squid’.”
Hearing this, players on all seven warships instantly perked up, exchanging smiles.
The Executive Officer thought of the same thing as us!
“This is an extremely difficult combat mission. Our warships will most likely be completely unable to defend against the enemy’s main cannon fire, or can only hold out for a very short time.
However, the good news is that the ‘Big Squid’ has now lost its ability to fire over obstacles in a curve, so as long as we don’t expose ourselves within its line of sight, we can avoid being targeted by the main cannon.”
“But, if we are going to capture it, close-range contact is inevitable.” Ye Xing also fell into deep thought.
“I’ve got it! Listen—this idea might not be particularly mature.”
Lu Yuan: “It’s fine, just say it. We can all discuss whether it’s suitable or not.”
Ye Xing: “Okay! Everyone should be familiar with Dou Shou Qi, right? It’s the smallest mouse that can eat the elephant.”
This gaming genius still retained his unique intuition and keenness.
“So I’m thinking, would sending in a landing party for a special seizure operation be more effective than directly sending the fleet to press forward?”
His few words stirred up a thousand waves.
“I believe Ye Xing’s plan is highly feasible!”
Caoyuan walked to the nautical chart table and operated it to display a holographic 3D image of the planetary topography.
The crowd gathered around.
“Look, everyone! Most of the buildings on Ruins Star are in a semi-collapsed state, and the preservation gets better the further down you go.
The city streets in the near-surface area are still largely obscured by buildings, like extremely deep and narrow canyons!”
“This means that units operating within them can evade radar waves—” Lu Yuan murmured.
“Exactly! Executive Officer, I assure you, as long as the First Battle Group can successfully land, they will surely be able to open a path and approach the enemy undetected from the surface.”
“I also agree that airborne operations are feasible,” Xian Yu said.
“As long as we use the planet’s curvature for cover and land below the horizon where the main cannon can’t reach. Of course, we also need to clear the nearby airspace of Dark Sun warships and fighters beforehand.”
Lu Yuan nodded.
“Then it will be a joint operation between the First Battle Group and the First Air Squadron, with the fleet providing fire support from a distance—”
He looked at the people around him, seeing dozens of fiercely burning flames in their eyes.
On the other six warships, players listening to the discussion audio from the Xianyang also felt their heartbeats uncontrollably accelerate.
“Alright! Let’s proceed with this plan, everyone prepare! Speed is essential, otherwise, as time passes, more and more Dark Sun fighters will return from surrounding space stations, increasing the uncertainty of this operation.”
“Understood!”