Forty Millenniums of Cultivation, page 1141
They accelerated to get away from the motherships, in case they were affected in the cruel confrontation of warship cannons versus warship cannons. The tens of thousands of crystal suits constituted a dense array of light spots ahead of the rectangular battle formation, creating the illusion that they were actually a colorful cloud.
Opposite them, in places far, far away, another cloud of light spots that were even more dense and dazzling was rushing at them. Those were their opponents, the attack group of Exos and space shuttles from the Imperium.
Over there, in the communication channel of the Black Wind Fleet, Heiye Ming's voice was echoing inside the ears of every ravenous, roaring Exo of the Black Wind Fleet.
"Brave warriors of the Imperium, noble Immortal Cultivators, and loyal defenders of the civilization of mankind! Look, our enemies are waiting to be killed like filthy swine that's about to be butchered! Do you see their fear? Do you see their panic? Do you see that they are shivering? Let's run and end the pitiful creatures. Don't let them wait too long in extreme fear. Reap and slaughter now! Show the ants at the edge of the cosmos how strong the real civilization of mankind is!"
The two battle formations moved to each other slowly and solemnly.
Different from what many people imagined, the space battle where thousands of starships were involved did not have too many eye-catching tactical changes. It even looked sluggish, slow, and clumsy.
The magnetic interference, spiritual shield, and force field twisting technology made the starships much better defenders than attackers. The accuracy of their attacks was often astoundingly low.
Distance, on the other hand, was also the most unavoidable barricade. With a distance of one light second, or rather, approximately three hundred thousand kilometers, only mystic ray weapons, which attacked at the speed of sound, could hit the enemy instantly. But the greatest shortcomings of such weapons were their efficiency and their long cooldown. One cannon often had to rest for a minute after firing for one minute.
On the other hand, after the enormous starships were accelerated to a certain speed, it would be difficult for them to dodge. When their speed was higher than one percent the speed of sound, even the tiniest turn might seriously wreck the shell or the internal structure of the starship. Even if the starship was fine, the crew members on-board would not be able to bear it. Their internal organs might break apart.
It meant that the starships could either give up some of the speed in exchange for agility, or they could simply abandon agility once and for all and charge forward at their top speed against the enemy's not-so-accurate bombardment!
Chapter 1766: All Cannons Roar, Line Up and Shoot! |
Due to the low accuracy and shooting speed combined with the significant improvement of the starships' survival abilities brought by the new plate armor of composite materials, the multiple airtight gates, the internal defense rune arrays, and the liquid metal maintenance materials—in short, defense being stronger than attack—and because of the shortcomings of the starships that it was difficult for them to turn at a super high speed, the space battles were often in quite a similar form to more than ten thousand years ago when crystal cannons and mystic ray runs were first invented and the training techniques were first taught to the ordinary fighters, giving the ordinary a chance to use the flying swords.
In the embryonic years of the modern Cultivation civilization, crystals cannons and mystic ray guns were all 'new toys' whose accuracy and speed were low and whose power was very suspicious. The flying swords driven by ordinary people were also unsteady and unpredictable, without any precision or damage. The suppressing troops of the demon race who were sent to deal with the human rebellions armed with the shabby weapons often laughed and despised them as mobs.
However, the human rebels soon came up with a brand-new tactic in accordance with the brand-new magical equipment and brand-new troops.
They arranged their troops to be as square and dense as possible. The Cultivator commanders would walk at the frontmost, and everybody would step into the battlefield solemnly and gravely under the rhythmic drumming. The soldiers would listen to the commander's order and march forward against the enemy's fiercest bombardment. They would not launch their flying swords until they were right under the enemy's nose, making up for the low accuracy with the maximum firepower within a given range.
Such a clumsy if not ridiculous tactic soon revealed its shocking power and proved to be a method that only the real fearless, hotblooded men dared use. People of the future generations gave the tactic a very vivid name—line up and shoot!
After tens of thousands of years, the form of war had changed a lot, but the basic principle remained the same. To secure victory, one had to focus the strongest firepower in the shortest amount of time possible and rain as much destructive energy and ammunition on the enemy as possible!
Therefore, once the starships on both parties surpassed a thousand, and they were running at each other without giving in, a 'line up and shoot' in space whose basic units were the enormous warships equipped with giant cannons!
The Heaven's Origin Fleet and the Black Wind Fleet were like two classic armies who were carrying ancient guns, aiming at each other's eyeballs with sharp bayonets, and approaching each other slowly accompanied with the inaudible but still exciting drumming.
The Black Wind Fleet kept its speed within three thousandths the speed of light. It was not a very high speed. Heiye Ming was intentionally slowing down the pace.
On one hand, the shield starships deployed at the front part of the battle formation could only maintain the highest efficiency of the spiritual shield, force field disruption, and magnetic interferential fog at such a speed. On the other hand, he did not want to move too fast. If they and the Heaven's Origin Fleet passed each other, it was very likely that they would be caught in between Wall of Heaven's Origin, the orbit defense system, and the Heaven's Origin Fleet, suffering bombardment from the front and rear.
Although the Black Wind Fleet was too strong to be defeated by such strikes, Heiye Ming was too experienced a commander to make such a risky move easily.
For the Heaven's Origin Fleet, the best policy was naturally to accelerate without bothering about anything in order to pass through or bypass the enemy's battle formation so that they and Wall of Heaven's Origin could attack the enemy from the front and rear together.
But they had their concerns, too. The starships of the Heaven's Origin Fleet were smaller, weaker in defense, and simpler in structure. Too high a speed would result in the malfunction of the turning system. Even if they could pass through the enemy's battle formation against the furious barrage, it would not necessarily be possible for them to turn around in time and bite the Black Wind Fleet from the rear.
The agility of the Black Wind Fleet and the proficiency of their pilots were obviously above the Heaven's Origin Fleet. If the two fleets did pass through each other, it remained to be seen who would bite whose rear!
The space battle had only just begun. Neither commanders of the two parties were willing to go all in. In the universal scale, the two fleets were moving even more slowly and cautiously than before, entering the textbook 'line up and shoot' state.
"One light second away from the hostile starships!"
One light second was a very meaningful distance.
It meant that most mystic ray weapons could hit the target in one second—that was, not counting the disruptions of the target's spiritual shield and the interference of the fog.
The Black Wind Fleet had tougher warships and more advanced cannons whose shooting range was obviously longer than the Heaven's Origin Fleet's. But all the cannons remained absolutely silent, not performing any inefficient, random attacks. The warships were simply moving closer like clusters of dark clouds in the most daunting aura as if they were about the drown their enemy.
Since the Black Wind Fleet did not open fire, the Heaven's Origin Fleet and Wall of Heaven's Origin, which was there to provide fire support from the rear, gritted their teeth and kept silent. The two parties simply watched dazzling flames of spiritual energy surging out of the barrels and rune arrays on the enormous cannons, which looked like springs that had been pressed to the limits and limits. They felt that the bayonets were drawing closer and closer to their eyeballs. All the soldiers felt that their hearts were being crushed and squeezed repetitively.
"Ah!"
At a lot of artillery posts, the soldiers of the federation who had never been through such a large-scale starship battle moaned. They would rather stay in the fire of destruction than be tortured by the silence!
When the vanguards of the two parties were only 0.8 light seconds away from each other, the commander of the Black Wind Fleet seemed to have heard the moans of the pitiful creatures on his opposite side and granted their request very generously.
"Warriors of the Imperium, it is time to reap!"
Tens of thousands of pillars of light glowed in the middle of the war fog that covered the front part of the Black Wind Fleet. Like the swords of deities and devils, they covered the two hundred and forty thousand kilometers in the middle instantly and pierced into the Heaven's Origin Fleet!
The Heaven's Origin Fleet, naturally, boasted spiritual shield and magnetic disruption technology, too. Since they were fighting in their homeland, they were even able to deploy a large batch of defensive space torpedoes in front of the fleet that could neutralize the vibration field of the mystic rays. At this moment, a series of enormous light balloons expanded as if they were being inflated. The pillars of light shot from the Black Wind Fleet all dispersed after they hit the balloons, turning into mists that flowed around the fleet!
The colorful, shining mist illuminated the space that the Heaven's Origin Fleet was in as if it were the most splendid paradise. However, one needed only to test the temperature and the radiation around to know how horrendous the 'paradise' was!
The space shuttles and crystal suits that failed to break away from the range of the motherships in time were all shaking like canoes in a tsunami. Some of the less fortunate Exos who were directly hit by the cannons were instantly vaporized even though they were still within the spiritual shield's range of protection, dispersing into smoke. For the crew members inside the starships, despite the protections of the super alloys, the crystalized fibers, and the high-intensity porcelain, and more than ten other different composite armors, they still felt that invisible hammers bashed them hard in the temples and the chest. They almost vomited blood because they were nearly choked!
"Heaven's Origin Fleet, rapid shooting, now!"
The Heaven's Origin Fleet's counterattack began. All the mystic ray cannons, particle cannons, and crystal cannons were roaring. Although the pillars of light fired into space by them were thinner and dimmer than the attacks of the Black Wind Fleet, they were clearly much greater in number. The more than a hundred thousand glowing blades were almost ripping apart the universe that seemed like black velvet!
Once the mystic ray cannons were activated, the destructive beams of light would last ten to sixty seconds. Therefore, the 'line up and shooting' in space looked more like fencing competitions from the age of the ancient Cultivators. The more than a hundred thousand light pillars from both parties were like a hundred thousand spears piercing into each other's body as dense as a forest and would not be retracted even if the soldiers died!
Both parties boasted a defense system of a reasonable intensity. Despite the crazy bombardment of the tens of thousands of light pillars, no significant damage was dealt—at least, not in the first three minutes.
Only the mottled war fog, as well as the electric arcs that were blossoming from the war fog, was telling everyone how powerful the deadly energy around them was!
The two parties shot and pushed forward. After three minutes, the first batch of metal bullets driven by the spiritual and magnetic rails were smashing at each other and dealt a heavy blow to the spiritual shield that was already on the brink of collapse!
Finally, the Heaven's Origin Fleet could not take it anymore. The spiritual shields of some of the starships were unable to persist, and the super alloys and the strengthened porcelain layer embedded with defense arrays were all pierced through by the mystic rays. Explosions were echoing everywhere. Fireballs were rising at a visible speed like hideous tumors. Wherever the 'tumors' reached, hundreds of lives were instantly burnt into ashes. Broken limbs and miscellaneous items on the starships were spurting out through the holes and drifting in space, either vaporized immediately or turning into cold dust!
Even so, as long as the crystal warehouses did not happen to be hit, those starships would immediately spray out tremendous gel and liquid metal to repair the damaged cabins.
In the meantime, they were still launching counterattacks without reserve, trying to throw out more javelins of light before they were completely shattered into pieces!
The same scene was happening on the Black Wind Fleet's side, too. Although their technology was more advanced than the federation's, there was not a crushing advantage. The dense barrage of the Heaven's Origin Fleet and several of the giant cannons on the Wall of Heaven's Origin that were on the planetary level still caused some nuisance for them.
The outcome of a battle in space could not be found out quickly. At such a moment, it would be the tenacity of the two parties, the strictness of their battle formation, the commanding abilities of the leaders, and the performance of the starships that were in competition.
However, in many cases, the most critical decisive factor for the battle was—
"Warriors of the Imperium, march and kill!"
"For the federation!"
With the pale universe as the bridge, in the middle of the hundred thousand spears of flames, the space shuttles and the group of Exos from both parties, like two colonies of infuriated bees and two surging iron torrents, crashed into each other brutally ahead of their warships!
Chapter 1767: Bai Xingjian's Anomaly! |
The high combat ability and survival ability of the Exos and the major contrast of the solidness of the starship's shell and the vulnerability of the starship's interior were the reasons the melee battle of the crystal suits was so important.
Both the shield starships that were responsible for defense and the arsenal starships that were responsible for attack, after accommodating the enormous spiritual shield and disruptive force field generators and the warehouses of crystals to power those behemoths, would have barely any room to keep more Exos.
Besides, even if tremendous Exos were deployed inside the starships, the overwhelming spiritual energy that was unleashed after they were engaged with the enemy would cause serious damage to the starship, too.
Therefore, it was quite troublesome if the hostile Exos invaded the starships on one's own side. Before the intruders were annihilated, it would be easy for them to destroy more than fifty percent of a starship's combat ability from inside!
Besides, although the Exos seemed to be equipped with nothing but their crystal suits, they could be carrying Cosmos Rings. Who knew what kind of dreadful weapons they could retrieve from their Cosmos Rings?
Once such Exos snuck into the engine compartment, the warehouse of crystals, or the ammunition warehouse without alarming anyone, a tiny crystal suit might be enough to blow up an entire starship, which had been proved repetitively in the ten thousand years of history of war.
Therefore, the outcome of a battle, to a large extent, did not depend on the mutual bombardment of the cannons but on the passionate collision of the Exos. If the groups of Exos on one side could invade the enemy's starships against the barrage and destroy the enemy's spiritual shield and warehouses of crystals and ammunitions, or even march to the bridge directly to perform the 'decapitation strategy', the giant cannons on their side would have a better chance to bring out 120% of their capabilities!
If the mutual bombardment of the giant cannons could be compared to the 'line up and shoot' in the classic wars, the competition between Exos would be 'charging with bayonets', which was more gory, thrilling, demanding but also more epic!
When the two torrents of steel and light collided, thousands of fireballs and electric arcs burst out from the middle of them.
No sound could be heard in the vacuum, but the soundlessness only added to the cruelty of the battlefield.
The chainswords were ripping apart flesh and blood, the vibration sabers were shattering bones, and the high-heat axes were burning internal organs to ash. Blood was swallowing blood, and bodies were dragging bodies. Blood red flowers were blossoming slowly like deadly poppy, only to be obliterated into nothingness after they touched one of the hundred thousand spears of flames thrown out by the warships!
In such an enormous and such a gory battle, in the vacuum hell where hundreds of thousands of Exos and space shuttles were engaged in a fierce fight, Cultivation, level, and techniques mattered little.
Even an expert at the peak of the Core Formation Stage such as the Rabid Dog, when watching thousands of destructive light pillars smashing at him and the bleak universe turning into absolutely darkness under the contrast of the dazzling brightness, felt the insignificance of himself as a human being and the rage for such insignificance!
"I'm going to kill you!"
The Rabid Dog was pushed here and there by the broken limbs that were flying quickly in the battlefield. The screams and moans from the communication channel were too disturbing, so he simply turned off the intermittent communication and drove the power rune arrays of the Night Devil, his crystal suit, to lunge at the area where the Exos of the Imperium were densest. The dragon-slaying saber in his hands unleashed a whip-shaped aura more than ten meters long, and he slashed it on an Exo of the Imperium who was wearing a black mirror crystal suit brutally!
The mirror crystal suit of the Exo boasted a very higher defense ability, but it could not resist the Rabid Dog's vitality that had been burnt to the maximum. The saber and the shield were at an impasse briefly before the saber pushed down unstoppably and cut the Immortal Cultivator in half!
