Chapter 167 Orbital Bombardment

The fleet of small starships broke through the enemy's defensive line, their close-range firepower vastly outstripping the enemy's capacity to defend and recover. Soon, nearly half of the opposing fleet was annihilated, and the remainder, completely disorganized, scattered in all directions, widening the distance between themselves and the Phantasm City warship cluster.

"Do not pursue a retreating enemy!" Vladimir roared into the comm channel. Yet the small-craft fleet seemed to have forgotten its perilous situation, pressing its solitary assault deep into enemy formations.

"They're in danger," Xie Liu said in a low voice after observing the unfolding situation. "Although the enemy suffered heavy losses in the preceding engagement, they haven't reached the point of collapse. Their retreat serves a dual purpose: first, to increase the distance and minimize further losses; second, to lure us into a trap."

"But why would they do that?" Ye Leng asked, bewildered. "Wouldn't it have been better to pull back much earlier? By withdrawing now, they must be sustaining massive casualties of their own."

"As a support-class warship, the Phoenix-class derives its strength not from raw firepower, but from energy arrays and small-craft strike wings. Therefore, crushing their vanguard fleet was to be expected. I could foresee this, and the enemy certainly knew it as well. So why did they continue to engage?" Xie Liu analyzed calmly before arriving at a conclusion.

"This means the enemy had a deliberate plan. They knew their small-craft fleet was no match for ours, so they never expected to defeat us with it. Instead, they compromised, opting to trade the lives of their ships to buy time and achieve their tactical objectives."

Xie Liu's analysis was spot on. Evidently, Vladimir had realized this too. Disciplined and resolute, he issued three or four consecutive orders to the small-craft fleet. However, the squadron seemed utterly intoxicated by bloodlust; it took more than ten minutes of frantic pursuit after his commands were issued before they finally began to slow down.

"It's already too late," Xie Liu said with a helpless sigh, his brow furrowing deeply. "Dealing with this many small craft leaves only one possibility—capital ship fire. At this moment, they've already entered the engagement range of the enemy's main vessels."

Just as Xie Liu predicted, the moment Phantasm City's small-craft fleet halted its pursuit, the Terminator-class warship at the rear slowly swung its prow around.

"All units, execute a rapid about-face! Evacuate the Terminator's fire coverage zone!" Vladimir bellowed from the command dais, his voice echoing across the entire bridge, betraying his profound anxiety.

They were risking not just a hundred small warships, but more than a hundred elite pilots. They had already pushed beyond the maximum range for emergency personnel teleportation. If destroyed by the enemy at this juncture, the pilots would have no way to escape their vessels and would be condemned to die alongside them.

Hearing Vladimir's frantic, angry roar, the commander of the small-craft fleet finally woke up to his perilous reality. He hastily issued an order: "All units, prepare for defense! It appears we've crossed the maximum engagement distance!"

"Prepare to fall back, everyone!" At the command, the flagship began to swing its bow around, moving away from the enemy vessels.

Yet it was all too late. In that exact instant, the ship-mounted batteries of the Terminator had already locked onto the Phantasm City small-craft fleet.

"Fall back, everyone, quickly!" Vladimir shouted in panic. But the order came a split second too late. The moment the word left his lips, thousands of beams erupted from the Terminator, weaving a dense web of light that engulfed the entire fleet.

"It's over!" Xie Liu sighed inwardly. The enemy had struck before their evasive maneuvers could take effect; Phantasm City's fleet no longer had any window of escape.

The web of light swallowed the entire fleet. In a heartbeat, nearly a hundred starships were transformed into raging infernos. The crews inside never even had time to teleport out. Amidst cascading explosions, the burning, uncontrolled hulks hurtled through the void, colliding with one another in a chain reaction of catastrophic detonations.

"Damn it!" Vladimir's face turned ashen. This single wave of bombardment had instantly halved the fleet's strength, shattering roughly thirty starships into debris that fed the blazing sea of fire.

The endless sea of burning wreckage and explosions became the final, tragic movement of this small-craft fleet.

***

It felt like the prelude to utter destruction. The initial barrage was merely the beginning; the enemy's small vessels immediately launched a counter-offensive. Having switched to close-quarters munitions, and bolstered by still-considerable numbers and newly minted ordnance, they instantly reduced another dozen starships to ashes.

"All units, overload power systems! Reinforce shield integrity and hold fast! I am initiating the spatial folding array!" The crew aboard the flagship aligned their coordinates and began driving the fleet forward at maximum acceleration.

The spatial folding array activated, and a rippling wave of light once again enshrouded the surviving remnants of the fleet.

It seemed they might slip through the jaws of death after all. Yet Xie Liu and Vladimir both shook their heads in unison, letting out a weary sigh. It was too late. Everything was already too late.

True to their fears, before the rippling light could fully envelop the fleet, the Terminator-class unleashed hundreds of blinding beams, slamming directly into the flagship.

In a single fraction of a second, the flagship's shields collapsed. The next moment brought the shrieking terror of bursting armor and tearing hull plates. Despite boasting the strongest shield reinforcement available, the flagship was instantaneously transformed into a roaring fireball, leaving zero margin for survival.

The rippling barrier dissolved the moment the flagship was destroyed, robbing the doomed fleet of its final chance at evacuation and trapping them on the periphery of the battlefield.

"There are no more chances," Xie Liu murmured. Without the support of a capital ship, even a cluster of small starships could pose no threat to a dreadnought under these conditions.

Vladimir's expression grew pitch-black. He had been well aware of his fleet's flaws and had ordered their retreat well in advance, only for their commander to disobey, resulting in this catastrophic outcome.

"Deploy the tractor beams. Rescue as many as we can. Prepare all drone turrets to provide cover fire." Vladimir was not a man given to idle complaints; he swiftly formulated a new course of action. Saving the entire fleet was impossible; his only remaining option was to salvage whatever personnel he could. Beyond the hardware, the pilots themselves were the true elite of Phantasm City.

"Is there truly nothing we can do?" Watching his faction's starships being systematically slaughtered, Ye Leng looked at Xie Liu with deep anxiety.

Xie Liu merely shook his head. "I am powerless. Combat of this magnitude transcends the level where an individual can intervene. The outcome of the battle has already been sealed; I can change nothing."

Xie Liu spoke the truth. A clash between capital ships went far beyond the sphere of personal intervention; his hands were entirely tied.

"Just watch. I refuse to believe Vladimir made no preparations. That simply isn't his style." Xie Liu shook his head, watching as green beams extended from the Phoenix-class warship, locking onto the surviving small starships and dragging them away from the combat zone.

"Tractor beams can alter the position and velocity of target objects in a short timeframe. Vladimir timed their deployment perfectly, but..." A profound look of worry filled Xie Liu's eyes. He knew the inherent weakness of tractor beams: once activated, they had to interface directly with the ship's shields, severely degrading shield integrity.

Sure enough, the battered and burning Gryphon-class, having re-stabilized its position, immediately swung its formidable weapons array toward the Phoenix.

"It's mimicking the Eagle-class tactic—dropping shields to channel all power into the main guns. Vladimir is in mortal danger." Xie Liu gripped the hilt of his sword tightly, betraying the intense anxiety gripping his heart.

Vladimir was acutely aware of the enemy's intent, yet he lacked any immediate defensive recourse. He gave a slight, helpless shake of his head and sighed softly before speaking to the figure standing behind him. "I must ask you to handle the rest."

"Consider it done." A gentle-mannered woman stepped out from behind Vladimir and walked forward onto the bridge.

Franny slowly raised her hands, taking aim at the burning Gryphon-class in the distance.

***

An ear-splitting roar echoed from the Gryphon-class as its primary beam weapon unleashed a devastating blast straight at the warship carrying Vladimir.

Yet, inexplicably, the void itself began to warp. The enemy's attack struck right before the Phoenix-class, ground to an unnatural halt, and then dissolved into nothingness.

"What just happened?" Ailu, who had braced herself for the Phoenix to be pierced through, stared in utter astonishment.

Xie Liu, however, knew precisely what had transpired. A faint smile touched his lips as he noticed Ailu's stunned expression. "There are very few in Phantasm City capable of reaching this level of mastery, but as it happens, I know one of them."

"With her here, the vessels of the Special Alliance have no hope of piercing the Phoenix's shields," Xie Liu said with absolute confidence.

"Though it's equally unlikely that Phantasm City's warships will destroy their battlecruiser," Ailu countered, perhaps stung as a soldier of Phantasm City seeing her side's vessels routed.

Her assessment was fair; the firepower of a single Eagle-class was simply insufficient to crack the defenses of two hostile capital ships, and even the addition of the Blaster and Moon-wheel classes would change little.

Xie Liu, however, disagreed.

"I believe Vladimir has a plan. Deploying your Special Alliance warships here was never a wise decision to begin with."

"Impossible," Ailu retorted, only to be struck dumb by the sight that unfolded before her eyes.

At the height of the fiercest exchange, a beam of light connecting heaven and earth plummeted from the infinite expanse of the starry sky. Piercing the cloud layers, a hundred-meter-thick pillar of concentrated energy slammed directly into the shields of the Terminator-class.

*Boom...*

The cataclysmic shockwave shook the heavens. After trembling for a fraction of a second, the Terminator's shields shattered violently. The gargantuan energy pillar punched straight through the breached defenses, setting the entire dreadnought ablaze.

"What is that?" Ailu's eyes widened in disbelief at the sudden turn of events. Xie Liu merely smiled, raising a finger to point skyward.

Far away in an orbit a thousand kilometers above, a colossal warship hung silently in the void, its hull shimmering with latent power.

"Orbital bombardment. Something only a main capital ship can pull off," Xie Liu said with a grin, as if everything had unfolded precisely according to plan.