From cannon fodder to sweeping across thousands of stars.

Chapter 531 The mantis stalks the cicada
As the onboard broadcasts of each warship sounded, all the people in the garrison fleet began to move.

Needless to say, the crew members who were already on duty at their respective combat positions. Those who were taking turns to rest in the rest area or eating in the cafeteria immediately threw down the energy drinks or tableware in their hands and ran straight to their respective combat positions.

The crew members who were catching up on sleep in the crew cabin according to their shift schedule immediately got out of their sleeping bags when the combat alarm sounded, put on their cabin work clothes and connected their personal combat terminals, while nimbly rushing towards their standby areas.

Since the semi-automated fleets of the Federation Navy are still under construction, the garrison fleets authorized by the autonomous governments of these galaxies are naturally inferior in this regard, so the number of crew members on the garrison fleet warships is still relatively large.

However, the fact that there are so many crew members on a warship does not mean that there are really so many positions that need to be operated at the same time. Most people are actually responsible for the same position together with several other people.

The space fleet is similar to the navy of the past in many ways. Every time it leaves its home port, whether for cruise, routine training, or exercises, it takes a very long time.

The shortest ones last at least one or two weeks, while longer missions lasting half a year are common.

Human energy is limited, and in a closed space battleship this energy will be consumed at a faster rate.

Therefore, most of the combat positions on the ship are on a rotation system, and the worst is "three shifts". Some positions that require higher energy and concentration from the crew even have four or five shifts.

When a warship sounds a combat alarm, the crew member on duty will generally continue to be responsible for the work at the current position, while others will be on standby and take other auxiliary work. Once a crew member on duty dies, the next person in the same team will immediately take over his work.
But even so, because the weapons of warships are relatively powerful, it is common in fleet battles for enemy ships to attack and cause damage to warships, and in turn, all crew members at several combat positions to be killed.

Especially for damage control teams, it is not uncommon for entire teams to be killed in battle.

This is also the reason why the Federation thought about developing an unmanned fleet in the beginning.

As long as the intelligence and computing power of the shipborne control personality are strong enough, a warship can continue to fight under the control of the shipborne control personality as long as it does not disintegrate directly, and the "combat resilience" of the entire fleet will be much higher than that of a manned fleet.

However, after Lilith "waved her hand" and took away three unmanned fleets, the Federal Navy had to seal up the remaining unmanned fleets and began to develop in the direction of "semi-automatic fleets".
However, the garrison fleet of the galaxy autonomous government is still a bit distant from these new technologies, and the crew configuration is also that of a conventional manned warship.

Fortunately, the autonomous government has not relaxed in terms of crew training. Although there are a large number of newly recruited soldiers in the entire garrison fleet, they are still very calm in the face of combat alerts. Everyone is doing what they should do according to the requirements engraved in their bones during training.

When the main force of the garrison fleet under Kimmel completed the axial adjustment and began to increase the power of the main propulsion column to accelerate, in the hangars of each warship, the HCPs that were incorporated into the first wave of attacks before the war also entered the final stage of preparation.

"Subcritical reactor self-test completed! Output power stable!"

"Self-check of the entire machine's circuit system and superconducting battery completed!"

"Weapon unit self-check completed! External assistance inspection passed!"

"Deflection field generator activated, instantaneous test completed!"

"The rapid test of the blue-green laser communication and neutrino communication units has been completed. There is no abnormality in the communication channel!"

"Plasma propulsion array self-test shows no bad pixels, external visual inspection completed!"

"Electromagnetic muscle bundles and electromagnetic joints have been activated and are operating at normal power!"

"Online inspection of the control system. Attention, pilot, please follow the instructions of the maintenance personnel!"

Amid the background sound of the motors spinning and the tightening and expansion of electromagnetic muscle bundles, the HCPs on the hangar maintenance table began to follow the movements of the maintenance worker holding the light stick in front of them and performed some small test movements as specified on the checklist.

Soon, the indicator lights on the preparation tables turned from 'yellow' to 'green', which meant that the HCP on the preparation table had passed all pre-attack inspections.

"All systems checked, all control of the aircraft is handed over to the pilot."

The maintenance officer in charge of directing the self-inspection turned and ran away for a distance, then turned back and saluted again.

"Good luck, Lieutenant!"

The HCP, which had completed the loading of weapons and equipment according to the fleet battle configuration, quickly walked down the maintenance platform. Then, mirroring the pilot's movements, it raised its mechanical arm and saluted in return, then walked towards the attack waiting area without looking back.

Soon, the first wave of ejection aircrafts assembled, and the two aircrafts at the front of the queue also stood on the lifting platform. When receiving the official attack order, these lifting platforms will send the aircrafts to the electromagnetic catapult track on the external deck.

It was at this time that the sound of the ship-wide broadcast sounded again.

"All ships, please enter a combat readiness state. Close the airtight doors of all compartments and prepare to evacuate the air. The ship's energy is being reconfigured. Gravity maintenance in non-essential areas is closed and inert gas is being injected."

Following the announcement on the radio, the gravity inside the hangar quickly disappeared.

However, the HCPs have activated the electromagnetic adsorption devices on the feet, and all the tools in the hangar are strictly placed in accordance with the requirements and fixed in various ways, so there is no situation where things are floating around.

The maintenance personnel who had fastened their safety ropes in advance floated up quickly, but the safety ropes behind them, which integrated the oxygen and power transmission lines, were also tied to fixed points in advance as required.

Although there are also many new recruits in this garrison fleet, all of them have undergone a lot of training in a zero-gravity environment, so nothing has gone wrong for the time being.

Under this state of 'zero mistakes by all', many pilots and maintenance personnel even had the illusion that the garrison fleet might have entered the 'first-class federal navy'.

But only those veterans who have survived high-intensity combat know that the current smoothness and "zero mistakes" in a non-combat state do not mean anything.

The real test begins only when the fleet and the enemy officially engage in battle, and the warships begin to perform various emergency evasive maneuvers amid the enemy's main gun salvos and HCP's surprise attacks.
-
Between the garrison fleet and the unknown target in the G9 area, there is a rubble belt composed of countless rock fragments of various sizes.

This area seemed like a corner forgotten by time, with dim light and suffocating silence.

Huge pieces of rubble floated slowly in the dark space, like giant icebergs hidden under the water. Occasionally, a few smaller fragments reflected a hint of cold light under the faint starlight.

But in this seemingly dead airspace, a tiny piece of gravel suddenly hit an air wall while floating. The distorted light and shadow showed a long and thin shadow at this moment - this was an 'eye' secretly arranged by Major General Kimmel.

A modified reconnaissance ship with a modified appearance that removed as many unnecessary protrusions as possible.

If you look closely, you can see that a large number of nearly transparent carbon nanotubes are scattered radially with the reconnaissance ship as the 'center'.

At the end of these carbon nanotubes, which are as short as a few hundred meters and as long as several kilometers, are connected lightweight combat probes, an invisible network covering the entire gravel belt, waiting for any target that accidentally enters this "forbidden zone".

Although the main body is just an ordinary reconnaissance ship, after being modified by Atlas during the "honeymoon" cooperation period, the performance of this reconnaissance ship in all aspects, especially in concealment and reconnaissance, has been greatly improved.

On the bridge with the lights turned on, only the dim red light vaguely illuminated the general layout of the bridge, and on a low-brightness virtual screen next to the captain of the reconnaissance ship, a composite image of the main force of the garrison fleet was displayed.

Watching the actions of the main fleet, the captain of the reconnaissance ship said:
"Our fleet has completed the axial adjustment. The general and his men seem to have determined that the target on the V6 side is the Atlas fleet observation team. Have they found any abnormalities in their surveillance of the targets in the G9 area?"

"Captain, the surveillance of the target area is limited at the current angle. The long-wave radar is keeping an eye on the unknown target group. The other party seems to have been maneuvering along a certain route. Judging from this feature, it does look like a decoy formation with corner reflectors. However, due to the influence of the Great Rubion, other observation methods have not yielded any results for the time being!"

The crew member in charge of air surveillance of the observation group responded immediately, then paused for a moment and added:

"Based on the target's current trajectory, the target in the G9 area will begin to leave the influence range of the Great Rubion in about 20 minutes."

The captain of the reconnaissance ship nodded after hearing this: "Understood, continue to monitor and report any abnormalities immediately. We are the most important insurance for the garrison fleet in this direction. If we can report any abnormalities immediately, we can buy enough time for the main force of the garrison fleet to react."

Looking at the huge rubbles around him, he couldn't help but sigh in his heart that Major General Kimmel was actually more cautious than most people in the fleet thought.

In his opinion, this gravel belt not far from the 'scheduled departure zone' is an extremely suitable area to set up a 'secret sentry'.

So when the garrison fleet began to be on alert for the 'scheduled departure jump zone', he secretly ordered this modified reconnaissance ship to lurk in this rubble belt and provide early warning in multiple directions.

And now, Major General Kimmel's arrangement seems to have really played a key role.

"Report! Unknown targets in G9 area are moving! Captain, this may not be a bait."

(End of this chapter)