Chapter 697, The Last Line of Defense, Battle of Rheadouches (12)
If the Extinction Order has been transported to the ground via a transport ship, it would be much easier to launch from the ground than to survive the layers of obstruction by biological ships and the interception of ground orbital firepower from space.
It doesn't even need to be launched at all, just detonate it directly in an open-air environment, without giving the Zerg the conditions to intercept it.
The estimated detonation time is one month later.
This month is naturally time for the ground troops to evacuate.
The fact that the extermination order would be detonated was not notified to the frontline troops. Only senior commanders such as Salius, Martins, and Xi Rui knew about it.
The purpose of concealing the situation is to avoid panic.
The human troops on the ground are all very brave warriors. However, if the one-month evacuation deadline were known, it would inevitably cause a lot of unnecessary confusion.
Avoid it if you can.
What's more, the insect queen knew that a sky-burning torpedo was coming.
It's desperate, that's right. But it doesn't mean that the controller of this insect nest will give up the struggle.
Interception in the air failed, so destroying it on the ground became the last resort.
There will definitely be a large number of insect swarms. After the human troops shrink and retreat to a certain extent, they will attack with all their strength where the Burning Sky Torpedo is and destroy the Burning Sky Torpedo before it detonates.
At that time, there will definitely still be a need for a force on the ground to hold on for a short period of time when the final detonation occurs.
This unit... unfortunately, is the casualty.
Perhaps at the last minute, Alliance command would inform them of the true situation.
You may not be informed.
But all in all, they are one of the 'prices' of detonating the Sky-burning torpedo.
If he had to pay, Gu Hang would make the decision calmly.
……
The subsequent development of events was basically consistent with Gu Hang's plans, assumptions, and predictions.
The evacuation plan of the ground troops was executed relatively smoothly.
But at the same time, the insect swarm troops are also pressing forward step by step. As the human troops shrink, the insect swarm will soon regain the lost ground.
By the 30th day, there were only about 20,000 human troops on the ground.
The line of defense they held was a circle with a radius of about fifteen kilometers.
The artillery position was jammed in the middle, and there were many bunker firepower points jammed in every direction around it. These were all repaired in the past month by the engineering troops driving construction machinery and working overtime.
At this time, the last transport ship had already left.
Half of these 20,000 people are from the elite Skeleton Division of an alliance; the other half are from the Legion of the Sun's infantry regiment with a glorious history. The order they received was to stay in place and wait for the next transport ship to arrive. The center of the position was where the spacecraft landed.
Their troops are relatively small, and even if they have sufficient firepower, they will still be inevitably overwhelmed by ten or a hundred times the number of enemies.
However, the remaining troops continued to perform their duties with high morale and were bound to hold on until the last moment.
That moment has arrived.
The spacecraft they were expecting to take them to evacuate was nowhere to be seen, but a gap opened in the center of the position, where the space left for the transport spacecraft to land.
The gap grew wider and wider, and a missile, which looked huge to humans and required the largest transport spacecraft to carry it, was slowly pushed up.
Ordinary soldiers and low-level officers may not recognize what this is. However, the senior generals from the Sun Legion and the Alliance Army who stayed behind would not fail to recognize him.
The moment they saw this object, they understood what the upper echelons of the coalition forces were planning. They were abandoned. Their mission was to block the enemy's final attack with their lives. There had never been a transport ship for them, and they were destined to die here.
Faced with this situation, they all made the same choice: silence and business as usual.
They faced one bad news after another on the battlefield with a normal mind, and listened to the loss of battle lines one after another. When faced with inquiries from junior officers about where the ship to pick them up for evacuation is, even though the time has come, they often just respond with "Execute the order and stick to the end."
As for the Burning Sky torpedo, it didn't even need to be completely launched from the temporary silo before the ignition process was started.
……
The ignition procedure was initiated, but the Sky-burning torpedo was not detonated.
Gu Hang clearly knew why: the insect queen was still making her final struggle.
At the critical moment, she removed the suppression of psychic power by the subspace shadow, and two neuroprotozoa began to project psychic power across half the world.
It was this force that stopped the ignition process.
Gu Hang was not surprised.
It's normal for the insect queen to fight tooth and nail.
Something that was already expected.
Temporarily lifting the subspace shadow, not only the neuroprotozoa around the two worm queens were liberated, Gu Hangke was also liberated.
In an instant, his spiritual power also descended to the ground.
The Zerg spiritual power that originally wanted to destroy the Burning Sky Torpedo was stopped by Gu Hang.
But the two neuroprotozoans did not retreat. They bit into each other frantically, entangled with Gu Hang's spiritual energy.
Now, instead, they are stalling for time.
They tried to entangle Gu Hang and prevent him from using his psychic power to directly continue the ignition process.
As long as this goal can be achieved, that's fine.
On the ground, the Zerg army is getting closer and closer, and biological titans have appeared on the battlefield. The remaining small human troops are no longer able to stop them. Given a little more time, they would be able to destroy the Burning Sky Torpedo from the ground and physically.
At that time, the Warp Shadow can be sealed again.
By then, it doesn't matter even if the two neuroprotozoans have been torn to pieces by Gu Hang's psychic energy, they are also a price that the queen can pay.
As for the next time there is a similar crisis, how will the queen deal with it without the neuroprotozoa... That will have to happen next time. It's over this time, let alone in the future.
What's more, humans have withdrawn from the ground. Later, she can go all out to repair, proliferate, and arrange numerous air defense nests to occupy this area again. If humans want to repeat their old tricks and occupy the ground, even if they can do it, they will still have to spend a lot of money. A long time.
If we hold on for half a year, we will be saved.
Seeing the insect queen's final struggle, she was really about to succeed. Gu Hang completely suppressed the two neuroprotozoans and was at an absolute advantage, but the time it took to deal with them was still not faster than the time it took for the insect swarm to overwhelm the human ground troops.
If this trend continues, it will probably end with the biological Titan physically destroying the Sky-burning torpedo.
But at this moment, a roaring thunder bear about the size of a biological titan appeared on the ground battlefield, and pounced, knocking down an insect saint.
Then, giant bears appeared one after another, accompanied by hundreds of thousands of blue heroic warriors, pouring out of the subspace cracks.
They have become the last line of defense against the insect swarm!
————
Better.
sleep
(End of chapter)