Terrible fire from the heavens rained down upon the sea.
Colonel Yelisia’s orders received the resolute execution of all officers and soldiers aboard the Claw Fierce Tiger.
Twenty minutes, five rounds of firepower, what does that mean?
It was roughly equivalent to a full-force bombardment by the Quintet, minus the firepower of the high-caliber Wrath of Loyalty and Hot Hammer.
One hundred Scalpel Missiles, about half of what the Quintet would launch in one volley; one hundred hits from the Defender Kinetic Cannon, actually slightly less effective than the Scalpel Missiles, but could arguably be considered about the same.
While the total firepower was much less, the key point was that the target area for the Quintet back then was much larger.
Back then, there was an entire urban cluster with many pre-war buildings remaining, which objectively provided cover for those Green Skins, making the firepower cost-effective ratio quite low.
But here, the space was small.
Two kilometers long, one kilometer wide, at most the size of a village town, the firepower that came down packed a considerable punch for each unit of space.
Matins sat aboard the Wind Falcon, silently watching.
In fact, he couldn’t see much.
When the first round of strikes hit, the sky was filled with smoke, flames, and the sea platform, especially the Central Spire area, was densely covered.
With the experience and vision of a battle group leader, he could fully judge that the intensity of the current strikes was far more than necessary.
Technically, he could’ve been the real man who doesn’t look back at explosions now.
But in reality, he couldn’t.
The current firepower against this complex of buildings was enough. But nobody could guarantee whether it could deal a fatal blow to the Demon Engines and Great Unclean Ones hidden in the deepest part of the buildings.
This was Matins’ greatest uncertainty.
He had witnessed the strength of a Great Demon.
Although the ones encountered today, compared to that world destroyed by the Plague Demon, were much weaker—otherwise he would have been slashed with a single blow.
But even so, he was still worried.
Mainly because the memories of the past sieges were just too terrifying.
A Great Demon capable of withstanding battleship bombardments with its flesh… Truly killing one, even with several battle group champions working together, was exceedingly difficult. Perhaps only those legendary warriors chosen by The Emperor could manage a one-on-one victory?
But the champions chosen by The Emperor… Such top-tier warriors who could bear this title and power were scarce, with only one having emerged in the entire history of the Phoenix thats spanned thousands of years. Certain battle groups with a shorter history might never have had such a warrior from their founding till now.
Therefore, he was reluctant to leave.
He made an effort to eat a lot of nutrition paste and synthetic starch, replenishing the essential energy his body needed. The evolved superhuman organs of a star warrior: iron stomach, rapidly digested the food, converting it into energy.
Although it was not guaranteed, who knew if a desperate battle would ensue later?
He needed to keep himself in as good a state as possible.
Matins had already decided that after the orbital bombardment, he would go and investigate the effects of the firepower in person.
He hoped the effects would be good.
Twenty minutes passed quickly, and after various booming explosions, when the smoke cleared, the Wind Falcon took them back over the sea area.
The sea platform had changed beyond recognition from its original appearance.
Those pipelines, storage tanks, and sea surface structures had been almost completely destroyed by the terrifying firepower.
Enjoy new chapters from empire
The undead within the tanks were now physically liberated.
Those Aberrant Beasts and Cultists who had previously survived could certainly not have lived through such an onslaught.
But these were not what the crew of the Wind Falcon were focusing on.
Matins gazed at the central building of the sea platform, which had been completely demolished. The surging seawater had already filled that area.
Just by looking at it, there was no way to tell anything.
He ordered the Wind Falcon to descend.
The Special Forces elites of the Tenth Expeditionary Force couldn’t help much with what was to come, so there was no need for them to go down either.
Matins, with his three battle brothers, left the Wind Falcon and jumped onto the sea platform, now completely unrecognizable.
The main structure here had already been destroyed by the orbital strike and was slowly sinking. More and more water was flooding in, and at the current rate, in no more than thirty minutes, the support structures below would lose all effectiveness, and the entire sea platform would completely sink to the seabed.
But this did not affect what they were going to do next.
Matins led his team through a blasted, water-filled breach into the sea platform.
As star warriors, their training, of course, was to cope with all kinds of combat environments in space. The life support systems of their power armor allowed them to operate in the strong acidic seas of some planets, let alone the ordinary seawater of Rage Owl Star.
And after switching to underwater combat mode, several tons of metal could still move in the water, though not as conveniently.
After entering the underwater environment, they spent some time finding the original battleground.
The process was tough; the previous bombardment had completely destroyed the structure here. Trying to locate the original spot was like navigating a maze, compounded with the task of breaking through obstructions.