Chapter 263: Heroic Raid
In the Minjiang’s hangar, two Sailor players floated, using magnetic boots to stand on a high maintenance walkway, looking down with interest.
“This is an all-star lineup! Look, all the big players from when the server opened are here!”
There was the always reliable Prairie, the unerring Dan Ta, the legendary “Good Mr.” Ma Lou who killed with a smile, and Ye Xing, the Chief Investigator known as the “Hand of Cangyuan.”
Of course, there were also the first-tier players whom newcomers dared not approach.
Guo Li Cheng, in her blood-red armor and rumored to be blessed by the Blood God, called out, “Come on, everyone, gather around!”
Engineer Black Smoke slowly floated to the center of the crowd.
“After discussions with the staff department, we need to land by air drop 300 kilometers away from the Big Squid.”
“That far?”
Hearing this number, Dan Ta’s eyes went dark.
As a hardcore shut-in streamer who might not leave her apartment once a week in reality, long-distance raids were never her hobby.
“It’s not far. If we get any closer, the drone swarm circling the target will definitely discover us, and the operation will basically be ruined.”
“Alright—this is really troublesome.”
“After landing, you will explore your own paths and try to traverse the ruins within a day to reach the designated combat location.”
“The difficulty is that you need to stay on the ground level of the streets the whole time and never show your heads,” Prairie reminded. “This really tests everyone’s tactical skills and fatigue resistance.”
“And we still don’t know the exact state of the surface of Ruins Star,” Engineer Black Smoke added.
“You need to stay vigilant at all times! Always be ready to face any sudden threats!”
“Um, I have a question,” Guo Li Cheng raised her hand.
“Does the Big Squid also have a kinetic shield around it? Won’t we be blocked outside?”
“According to our assessment, even if a kinetic shield exists, it would only defend the top and sides,” Prairie said. “In the near-surface area, there should be gaps, and it wouldn’t be a 360-degree wrap, otherwise the Big Squid’s movement and standing would become very difficult.”
“That seems to make sense—.”
After thorough discussion and confirmation of the mission procedure, the carrier-based aircraft on alert on the periphery of the Cangyuan Fleet began to return to their respective affiliated warships in batches. Players unloaded the missiles that were not used up in the previous battle from the main bomb bays.
Subsequently, Engineers installed 6 newly printed racks in the bomb bays of some of these fighters; 3 were used to secure power-armored marines, and 3 were used to hang their main and secondary weapons.
20 minutes later, the fleet initiated warp again, arriving at a 10-kilometer high orbit in the blind spot of Dark Sun’s main cannon.
Lu Yuan looked down at Ruins Star, lost in thought.
If I were Mr. Sang, what would I do now?
The Big Squid has lost its indirect fire capability, and it seems it can only move by walking, unable to fly.
He should also be well aware of its weaknesses: poor mobility and poor visibility.
Therefore, the first choice must be to establish vision. He will definitely order the remaining three warships and the returning fighters to circle the area!
The owl’s stealth ability is excellent, but this mission must be foolproof. Once discovered, losing the element of surprise will drastically increase the failure rate.
Lu Yuan picked up the communicator.
“This is Executive Officer. All ships prepare to approach the target point from the horizon, provide fire support, and create a landing zone for the marines!”
He looked at Prairie.
“Release the remaining decoy drones. Release all stock.”
“Yes!”
The Cangyuan Fleet brought a total of 1000 decoy drones this time. 400 were consumed in the previous battle, leaving enough to perfectly disguise 8 targets, or roughly disguise 55 to 60 targets.
Releasing them all at once means this will be an all-or-nothing battle, success or failure hinges on this one move!
Inside the office, Mr. Sang received bad news one after another.
“Report! Two more of our warships—just accelerated and fled the battlefield, and about a third of the fighters are also fleeing! Should we shoot them down?”
—“No need.”
Mr. Sang closed his eyes in pain.
After all, they were just a group of company employees and pirates. If they didn’t run now, when would they?
And were they just fleeing for their lives? No, not just fleeing for their lives, but betraying and abandoning him, going to set up their own factions.
A very sad fact was that he could currently only rely on the giant war mech to hold this planet, and as for the remaining sole flagship, it was powerless to go out and conquer those defectors.
Mr. Sang took a few deep breaths, trying to calm himself down.
Even now, his limbs were in a cold, numb state.
He knew that Cangyuan was developing extremely fast, but he still underestimated Cangyuan’s ability to absorb new technology.
He knew that Executive Officer was a devious fellow, but he hadn’t expected him to be so devious.
The opponent had completely seen through his defensive layout from the beginning, knowing that he had deployed a decisive weapon on the planet’s surface capable of changing the course of the battle.
However, he pretended to notice nothing, pretended to show carelessness and recklessness, and then, with the smallest expenditure and the fewest steps, gradually probed the combat performance limits of the giant war mech. This was indeed a formidable opponent, but it still couldn’t change the huge disparity in firepower!
Mr. Sang forced himself to be comforted.
Yes, I can no longer win this war, but Cangyuan will definitely not be able to conquer this place!
They clearly knew the terror of the particle beam main cannon, but in the previous battle, they did not concentrate their attacks on the drone ships used for indirect main cannon fire. Instead, they diverted some firepower to attack the less threatening fleet, in order to incite internal strife.
So, Cangyuan also knows that this is an unconquerable fortress and can only be disintegrated from within.
Unlike the drone ships, the kinetic shield of the giant war mech has much greater power, and there are dense defensive gunfire, as well as a drone swarm guarding it in the air.
Yes, it must be so! No need to panic!
Under immense pressure, Mr. Sang’s brain was already somewhat in chaos.
“Report! Large number of targets detected on the horizon, approaching very close to the horizon! Quantity exceeds 30!”
He had just felt a little relaxed when bad news struck again.
“Still coming!?”
30 targets? The Cangyuan Fleet couldn’t be of that scale, it must still be fake!
“And this time, the enemy’s formation is very scattered!”
“They want to use this formation to limit our particle cannon’s sweeping fire.”
Mr. Sang forced himself to calm down, doing his best to clear his mind of useless distracting thoughts.
However, the mastermind behind the Dark Sun pirate group, facing an enemy who initiated an attack and whose strategic level was definitely no less than his own, still hesitated.
Do they really think such a thing can be done easily?
Or are they trying to further test the main cannon’s performance…
“Mr. Sang, should we open fire!?”
What Cangyuan sent up must be fake targets, decoys!
So where is their main force? Are they still below the horizon?
I cannot easily open fire on decoys; that would put the main cannon into a recharging state, making it unable to parry the main force that hasn’t appeared yet!
“Mr. Sang, the number of targets has increased—those warships approaching us seem to have each released carrier-based aircraft—”
“Those are all fake, ignore them! When they get closer, just use the laser cannons on the giant war mech to clear them out!”
Mr. Sang was very familiar with the performance of black technology drone swarms.
Disguising themselves as fighter swarms was a very easy task for them. At a greater distance, each drone could perfectly disguise itself as a fighter.
“Detecting high-speed approaching objects! The enemy has opened fire! Mr. Sang, are you not going to counterattack?”
“Shut up! Illusions! They are all just illusions!”
Mr. Sang never dreamed that the golden age technology he had painstakingly excavated and recovered would one day become a huge problem that shook morale.
Precious time passed second by second.
The images returned by the radar also became clearer and clearer.
When Mr. Sang finally saw a large number of targets flying towards him at speeds ranging from a dozen to several dozen Mach, he finally realized that they were not fabricated illusions.
Drones have poor aerodynamic performance and simply cannot fly that fast in the atmosphere.
Those were real shells and missiles!
Damn it…
This batch of targets was mixed with real warships and fighters!?
Didn’t they already understand the power of the particle beam main cannon? Are they… not afraid of death?!
Mr. Sang was greatly shocked and, for the first time since the battle began, felt true, soul-piercing fear, causing him to momentarily forget to give orders.
Fortunately, the advanced autonomous program on the Big Squid could exclude interference from human decision-making errors. When the incoming target group approached a certain distance, it immediately judged them to be real threats and activated the laser cannon array on its back, beginning interception.
For a time, large numbers of shells turned into scorching metal vapor, and the nuclear warheads on missiles were directly ignited by high-energy lasers, turning into giant mushroom clouds rising in the atmosphere.
The appearance of nuclear explosions partially interfered with Dark Sun’s radar operations, causing several missiles to become “stragglers” that hugged the ruined buildings and were only successfully intercepted at very close range.
When the nuclear fireball appeared within 20 kilometers, the Dark Sun pirates completely panicked.
Without waiting for Mr. Sang’s command, the pirates responsible for piloting the Big Squid decided that no matter what, they had to clear the immediate threats and unauthorizedly pressed the main cannon’s firing button.