From cannon fodder to sweeping across thousands of stars.

Chapter 221 Amber’s Fangs

"Attention, all Atlas fleets, the special 'dissuasion' operation has officially begun!"

Sitting on the captain's seat of the Hermes, Cleeves suppressed the inexplicable sense of humor in his heart and gave a serious order to start action.

The helmsmen of the five battleships also simultaneously pushed the clocks to the 'forward three' position.

The blue tail of the battleship's main propulsion array is getting longer and longer as the power continues to increase. On the display screen at the helmsman's position, the relative speed value of the same target point is also getting higher and higher.

At the same time that Atlas' fleet began to take action, the commander of the Timler family fleet located in the center of the battlefield also made a decision.

"The entire fleet, adjust the axis clockwise, lock the enemy ships in the right hemisphere, and prepare to start the attack."

"All HCP squadrons are dispatched, and half of the HCPs are assigned to protect the rear hemisphere of their respective battleships to intercept enemy assaults! The remaining HCPs follow the battleships to launch an attack!"

The Timler family's fleet once again fine-tuned its formation and began to adjust the axis of the battleships, aiming the main gun rays at the nine enemy battleships in the right hemisphere.

If the fleet commander at this time is a pure novice, he may make the decision to divide the fleet into two groups and adjust the axis to different hemispheres.

The entire fleet must also rush into the enemy squadron and fight with them within the time these HCP pilots have bought with their lives, and quickly destroy this enemy force with stronger firepower projection.

Soon, the first victim appeared.

As the commander of the Timler family, Ron Schneider would naturally not make such a decision.

This is a very dangerous behavior.

What he could do was to order the HCP squadron to dispatch and rely on the 'deflection field formation' method to block the guns of their warships and protect the fragile main propulsion array.

If it is a fleet that has never undergone targeted training, it will easily become separated into two 'squadrons', and then be interspersed and divided by the enemy fleet in close combat.

But he also knew that after the entire fleet turned to one side, the rear hemisphere exposed to the enemy's guns would become precarious.

Antonio and Raven looked at the frigate that had turned into a huge fireball with heavy expressions.

Especially in this back-to-back situation, if you want to maintain the tightness of the formation, you can only rely on vector nozzles to exert force.

This seemingly safe and conservative approach is actually the worst approach in the eyes of experienced players.

Because the fleet was divided into two groups, it was equivalent to "drifting" in the asteroid belt at this moment.

The sensor images at the rear of the Financial Freedom were quickly projected onto the main screen of the bridge.

However, the two commanders of the combined fleet were more nervous than him.

At the same time, after entering the close range strangulation, this kind of "you are among me, and I am among you" situation will also make the remaining enemy ships afraid to fire easily.
Ron Schneider was very nervous when he made the decision. After all, his decision was based on the safety of all members of the fleet, including his own family.

So now each battleship has its relatively vulnerable sides exposed.

It is a very simple operation to adjust the axis of the fleet uniformly, and it is easy to achieve unified action of the entire fleet.

If the warships in the previous fleet could still use the bow deflection field and main armor plate to withstand the impact of asteroid fragments incoming at high speed.

On the holographic projection platform, a frigate at the end of the fleet formation on the right was marked with a 'red cross'.

This unlucky battleship was a step late due to emergency maneuvers, and was hit by an asteroid fragment about the same size as it at a relative speed of more than 10 kilometers.

Even the most elite fleets in the Federation or Imperial Navy will experience disconnection when the fleets are divided into two groups and adjust their axes in different directions.

But adjusting the axial direction separately is different.

The huge kinetic energy impact directly broke the entire battleship in half. The superconducting battery stack arranged at the rear of the ship exploded, and quickly formed a huge high-temperature plasma fireball that swallowed the entire battleship.

But Antonio had no time to mourn for the crew of this battleship, because at this moment, the fleet's main gun beam had coincided with the location of the Timler family fleet.

"All fleets! Fire freely! HCP squadron and heavy assault module begin the attack!"

The next moment, the United Fleet warship located directly in front of the Timler family fleet launched a salvo.

Dazzling white flashes and beams of charged particles swept across the asteroid belt, intertwining into a beautiful yet dangerous rain of death.

At the same time, the multi-functional launch silos of each ship also began to launch anti-ship missiles one after another.

This kind of weapon used for beyond visual range strikes on the planet has become auxiliary firepower only used in the stage of hand-to-hand strangulation in space.

Launch silos arranged on the top or bottom deck of each ship send these missiles into the upper and lower hemispheres of the battlefield.

With a distance of less than 3000 kilometers, these missiles with too long flight times finally have a place to be used.

They attacked from the upper and lower hemispheres of the battlefield, making the already complaining air defense commanders feel as uncomfortable as eating arsenic.

"The port side anti-aircraft firepower is too weak! What is the anti-aircraft team doing?!"

The air defense commander of the Timler family fleet, the destroyer Thunderfire Sword, was sitting in the virtual cabin, anxiously looking at the several HCPs breaking through the warning circle in the upper hemisphere and the anti-ship missiles catching up at a faster speed.

"Apply for shipboard control personality to intervene in air defense operations!" The air defense commander connected to CIC's communication, hoping to use these powerful shipboard AIs to help guide the target.

"The application is rejected. The current shipboard control personality has reached the computing power occupation threshold. If the computing power is redistributed, there is a risk of downtime."

"boom!"

Before the tactical operations officer finished speaking, the entire battleship was enveloped by a violent explosion.

When the air defense commander came to his senses, he discovered that communication had been interrupted, and only the words 'signal lost' were left on the virtual screen.

There is only one scenario in which this situation occurs for direct communication within the ship.

That means the entire CIC has been praised.

The frightened air defense commander hurriedly opened the three-dimensional model of the entire ship, and sure enough found that the bridge and CIC were shrouded in red light.

A heavy-duty anti-ship missile, which arrived first, luckily broke through all close-defense weapon interceptions and hit the top armor plate of the battleship almost vertically from the zenith direction of the upper hemisphere.

This heavy anti-ship missile launched by the light cruiser USS Financial Freedom not only has a huge charge, but the warhead is also designed specifically for the multi-layered armor plate structure of the warship.

Just one shot sent everyone on the bridge and CIC into the sky.

The large hole blasted by the anti-ship missile also allowed the inert helium filled in the ship to find a 'vent'.

The large amount of gas ejected turned this place into a super-large 'vector vent'.

The out-of-control battleship plunged towards the lower hemisphere of the battlefield, exposing its fragile hull.

"It's over. Madam, children, I love you."

The air defense commander only had time to think of this thought.

The next second, a jet of heavy metal particles hit the battleship's middle hull, which was not protected by a deflection field.

The surging heavy metal particles violently tore apart the outer armor plate, and were then shunted away by the internal armor of the multi-layer composite structure. A large number of sandhole-like pores appeared on the hull structure.

But this 15 megajoule attack still directly broke the titanium alloy structural frame inside the battleship.

The battleship that was punched through finally disintegrated into two pieces after struggling for a moment.

Although the fusion reactor and superconducting battery stack were not detonated, the two hulls still rolled irregularly.

In this case, even if there are other survivors on the ship, they have actually been sentenced to death.

The combined fleet's counterattack not only killed the destroyer, but also blew up another frigate on the spot.

But they themselves were not feeling well, because the two light cruisers of the Timler family fleet also began to exert force.

Led by these two light cruisers, other warships of the Timler family also followed the light cruisers' shooting targets and began to focus fire.

The light cruiser's dominating firepower on this battlefield directly disabled the deflection field generators of the two destroyers.

The concentrated fire attack that followed directly sank the two destroyers that had no time to maneuver to the rear of the friendly ships.

The entire battlefield began to set off 'fireworks' at a faster speed than before.

Ships were constantly being hit, either bursting out with a series of flames, or being transformed into a 'cosmic ghost' with everyone on board in a larger ball of flames.

But more often than not, those HCPs and heavy assault cabins, like moths to a flame, waltzed with the enemy's attempts to intercept the HCPs amidst the intensive anti-aircraft firepower.

Then in this universe, it turned into a ball of ashes swallowed up by a plasma fireball.

When the battle entered this stage, the commanders on both sides knew that there was no possibility of stopping.

Fleet hand-to-hand combat is not like conventional shooting or raiding combat, where one can exit the battlefield relatively calmly.

When dozens of warships began to fight at close range in this chaotic asteroid belt, both the fleet commanders and their crews and pilots were all red-eyed.

There is only one way to end the battle, and that is to use all your strength to kill your opponent and become the last person alive.

Just as the battle entered its most intense stage, the tactical information coordinators of both sides' flagships almost simultaneously reported a message that made the heartbeats of the commanders on both sides stop:

"Zenith direction! Unknown battleship detected, number 6!"

"A heat source emitted from an unknown warship was detected. The infrared signature is determined to be HCP. The number is 17. It is approaching at high speed from directly above the fleet!"

"Wait, this action is indeed HCP, but how is it possible in such an asteroid belt!"

The tactical information coordinators of the flagships of both sides looked at the heat source performing inhuman maneuvers in the chaotic asteroid belt on the screen in front of them, and their voices changed.

"The first aircraft is approaching at three times the speed of the following aircraft!"

(End of this chapter)