Chapter 29 Voyage
After a routine check-in in the afternoon to set reconnaissance and patrol goals, Li Qing picked up the book again and started studying. Occasionally when he got tired, he raised his head to take a look at the situation and chatted with several senior crew members on the bridge.
Most of these senior crew members are NPC humans. Occasionally, there are some players with innate talents suitable to be captains or crew members, but they are not on the ship.
Many people think that they should have a good relationship with the crew and pay more attention to them when nothing happens.
Li Qing felt it was unnecessary.
Ordinary crew members don't need to have any good relationships at all. They are clones, not natural people. They are batches of cannon fodder prepared through genetic technology.
Senior crew members and captains are actually the same. They will die in the same way if the battleship is in trouble. However, they are the senior crew members on the ship and have the most contact with the commander. They usually don't see each other when they look up. It's good to chat and get familiar with each other.
Of course, this situation only applies to ordinary captains and senior crew members. If it is an elite captain with a blue name or above, it will be different.
An elite captain with powerful talents can increase the combat power of battleships very high. Such a captain will definitely be taken seriously and must be taken seriously.
The vanguard fleet had already begun the jump on the second day, but it was not until the fourth day that Li Qing's escort fleet received the order to jump.
For a jump like this, if there is a flagship, the flagship will be wrapped in a force field and the entire fleet will jump together. If there is no flagship, the warship with the shortest jump distance in the fleet will generally be used as the standard.
Half of this fleet is cargo ships, and it is impossible to be equipped with a level five jump engine, but it is not the lowest jump engine either.
When the jump was completed, Li Qing checked the jump distance on the star map and determined that all cargo ships were equipped with third-generation jump engines, with a maximum jump range of 30 light years.
The distance from the transit base to the outpost is about more than 1,500 light years. Considering that the distance between galaxies is variable, this means that it takes 60-70 jumps to reach it.
The cooling time of the jump engine is three hours, which means it will take 210 hours or about 10 days without stopping.
But in reality it’s not that smooth. Most areas can be jumped over directly, but some galaxies cannot be jumped over due to some special anomalies or special geographical environments, especially deep into the Zutar star field, which is covered with thick nebulae. , the jump engine will be greatly disturbed. Low-level jump engines cannot be used at all, and they can only fly through normally.
In the past few days, the fleet has been constantly jumping, and it has been about thirty light years in one jump. It has been relatively smooth and has not encountered any obstacles.
But when they left the transit base and entered the nebula of Zutar Star Domain, Li Qing saw for the first time a substantial layer of gray dust in the starry sky, as if the entire starry sky was covered by a layer of fog. In front of the bridge, you can see that not only the visual range has dropped significantly, but also the radar detection range has gradually shrunk and decreased.
It is worth mentioning that the command bridge of a battleship is not located in the front of the battleship. It is generally located in the middle of the battleship, which is the position of the central core module. It is usually surrounded by many layers, and sometimes there is a small part that sticks out, but they are all covered by thick Thick armor package.
The reason why you can clearly see outside the glass when standing in front of the bridge is because the spacecraft's sensors, including a large number of detection and camera lenses, clearly detect everything around it, and then project it under the huge glass in front of the bridge. , so it feels like the bridge is directly exposed, which is not actually the case.
Like frigates and destroyers, the display form of the bridge is limited. If it is the command flagship of a large fleet, the internal shape of the bridge is round, with transparent glass on all sides. When entering the bridge for the first time, it will give people the impression that the bridge is protruding. The glass bead-like illusion on the hull allows you to see the starry sky in all directions of the battleship.
But in fact, the command bridges of these flagships are hidden deep inside the battleships. It is only possible to see the command bridges unless all the battleship shields and thick armor are broken.
To put it bluntly, the command bridge of the battleship cannot be seen from the outside. The interior is only designed this way to give the captain and commander a sense of flying across the stars.
It looks like there is a cold starry sky outside the thick glass, but in fact there is thick alloy armor outside the glass.
The transition stage is relatively safe, because the landing points are random. Even in the same galaxy, the landing points will be slightly different from the star map. This is slightly different. In the real starry sky, the landing point will be thousands of times. Tens of thousands or even hundreds of millions of kilometers long, even if there are insiders, it is difficult to ambush.
Therefore, the early reconnaissance is actually just a formality. The real possible danger is in the star field near the outpost.
Time passed by during the jump. On the ninth day, the fleet jumped to the location again. Li Qing saw the reconnaissance channel light up and turned on the projection to reveal a young man wearing the uniform of the expeditionary force. He had introduced himself once before. His name is Lu Qing, and he is a member of the Tianhe Lu family. He said expressionlessly:
"The fleet has arrived at the scheduled location. There are many star systems that cannot even enter at sub-light speed. At the same time, this star field is occupied by a super large pirate group called Lester. We have now entered the edge of their sphere of influence. From now on At the beginning, the reconnaissance team cheered up and expanded the reconnaissance range to at least one million kilometers. Signing in every half hour means safety, and timeout means that something will happen.”
After releasing the task, the man's projection disappeared. Li Qing opened another branch channel with only two people and said to Li Min:
"We still divide according to the previous division, I am in front and you are behind."
"Okay."
The two destroyers quickly broke away from the team and flew into the distance.
The arrangement was the same as when he first set off, but this time he did not dare to set up a patrol with the main fleet. Instead, he turned on the spacecraft sensors to the maximum, scanned the surroundings continuously, and even personally synchronized the radar scans scanned by the sensors in front of him. Observe with the crew manning the radar sensor.
In space, the radar scan is centered on itself, and the scan image is a huge sphere composed of small lines, with itself in the center of the sphere.
"Beep beep beep!"
A crisp alarm sounded, and a red light lit up somewhere on the right edge of the scan. He immediately looked over, and nineteen light spots emerged.
He immediately pressed his hands on the radar scan and stretched it to the left and right. The radar scan was immediately stretched and expanded. The nineteen light spots turned into the outlines of nineteen warships composed of countless rays. After a closer look, he immediately recognized it. It is a pirate cruiser, two pirate destroyers, and seventeen pirate gunboats.
"Go around to the right and pause after a thousand kilometers."
The fleet immediately issued orders, and the battleship trembled slightly. The changes in the destroyer could be felt from the changes in the radar scan.
The warship circled an arc to close the distance between the two sides, and included all nineteen light spots in the scan. Feeling that there were no other warships behind the nineteen pirate ships, Li Qing breathed a sigh of relief and ordered:
"Send the radar scan back and continue the radar scan."
In less than half a minute, Li Qing received the order from Lu Qing, who commanded the reconnaissance force in the large fleet:
"Continue to observe for a quarter of an hour. If there is nothing abnormal, give up the observation and return to the team."
"Okay."
Turning off the communication, Li Qing ordered his men to continue observing from a distance.
Although cruisers are one level higher than destroyers, and normally the detection range of level five sensors is further than that of destroyers, there is no need to count on using advanced radars for pirate ships. The characteristics of pirate ships are that they are messy, and they like heavy firepower, strong armor and light shields.
To put it bluntly, pirate ships like various modifications to enhance their firepower and armor, but their shields are generally weaker than those of conventional warships.
In addition, the levels of various functional accessories of the pirate ship are not high. From the reactor to the jump engine thruster, etc., the average level is lower than that of the player configuration.
He kept a distance and observed for a full fifteen minutes. Until he left, the nineteen pirate ships did not find him, let alone a huge caravan millions of kilometers away.
After that, the caravan kept driving normally. It seemed that it had no intention of jumping or entering super-light speed. The reconnaissance fleet stayed in the distance and encountered some large and small pirate fleets from time to time. Occasionally, Lu Qing would mobilize several pirate fleets at the same time. A reconnaissance ship goes to a certain place for reconnaissance.
It can be seen that they are quite familiar with this place, as if they already know where the danger is.
Li Qing obeyed the instructions honestly and went wherever he was told, but while performing the task, he carefully wrote down Lu Qing's instructions. This was all experience in commanding a large fleet, although it was only experience in reconnaissance.
Although I only have two ships now, there will always be a time when I will command a huge fleet in the future. I can accumulate some experience now so that I will not be overwhelmed by it when the time comes.
Lu Qing was born in the Lu family of Tianhe, which was a more powerful military leader than the Li family in Qinghe. It is not clear exactly where Lu Qing came from, but he was able to become a leader in this large team composed of hundreds of noble family members. His command is enough to illustrate his excellence.
Time passed by slowly. Although Li Qing remained vigilant, he couldn't help but relax over time.
At a certain moment, the communication channel suddenly opened, and before he could react, he heard a huge roar and a slight tremor coming from the channel.
Lu Qing's projection, who was located in the center of the light screen, had a gloomy face and shouted an order:
"Everyone shrinks the reconnaissance range to 500,000 kilometers, braces oneself to increase the frequency of reconnaissance, and informs me immediately if there is any abnormality."
He did not explain that the sound of shelling just now was obviously at least a large main gun level. If they could hear it through communication, it must be an attack directly attacking his warship. This made Li Qing extremely surprised. You must know that Lu Qing At this time, even the center of the caravan can be attacked, then.
He immediately sent a message to Li Lie to inquire. About ten seconds later, Li Lie sent back a message:
"Just now, a large pirate fleet rushed directly to the fleet, and it has already fought with the main force, but don't worry too much, you can still cope with it."
Li Qingqi said:
"Why did the pirate fleet rush over directly? Did you get the news in advance?"
"No, it's just that the reconnaissance on the other side made a mistake and missed a few pirate ships. The news about the fleet was leaked."
"Uh"
"By the way, don't make such a mistake. I have invested most of everyone's assets in this trip. I have invested more than 7 billion star yuan. If anything happens, I will be held responsible according to the responsibility. It will not be easy in the future." .”
"I'll pay attention."
Li Qing clicked his tongue. Fortunately, all his supplies were stored in the universe in his hand, otherwise he would have been nervous and worried.
Next, he asked Li Lie about the battle situation there every half hour and got a general idea of the situation there.
This pirate fleet that rushed over came from the Lester Pirate Group, with eleven battleships, hundreds of cruisers and destroyers, and nearly two thousand pirate gunboats. It was not a small scale, and it was obviously prepared.
It is a pity that the escort fleet is stronger. Not only is the fleet stronger on paper, but the quality of the battleships is also higher. They are basically equipped with level four and level five. The most important thing is that the fleet commander is powerful.
The commander of the fleet is Yu Yuefei. This beauty of the Yu family not only possesses the purple epic command talent, but also awakened psychic powers. The two abilities are superimposed, and the bonus to the fleet is ridiculously high. Under her command, there is no one. It took a while to easily defeat a similar number of pirate fleets.
It was a pity that Li Qing was not at his headquarters and did not witness the fierce battle. He only intercepted a few fleeing pirate gunboats and saw blood.
After the battle, Lu Qing directly transferred the player who made the mistake back in the channel and replaced him with a destroyer.
Although there is no punishment, being transferred in front of everyone is not only very humiliating.
The key point is that most of the fleet belongs to wealthy families, and most of them are children of nobles. If this matter spreads, it will definitely affect their reputation. Reputation is very important to children of nobles. This punishment is comparable to a fine of billions. Even more serious.
No one asked for mercy, and no one dared to ask for mercy.
Not talking about rules and regulations, let's just say that no one is sure whether it was a mistake or if someone was let in deliberately. After all, it is a material worth up to 2.8 trillion yuan, and no one can guarantee whether someone may have other ideas.
You must know that although the Lester Pirate Group is just a force dominated by NPC natives, that was before. Now with the establishment of the outpost, this pirate group has become a force that players can join to open the reputation system.
This means that players can join this pirate group, open up reputation, and
For pirates, successful robbery is the most direct way to increase reputation. The stronger the target of the robbery, the higher the value, and the more reputation will be improved.
As for such a huge caravan, once the robbery is successful, not only will it gain a high reputation, but the caravan's supplies of up to 2.8 trillion star yuan will also make ambitious people rich overnight.
Even if you can only get a part of it, it will still be a staggeringly rich amount of money, and someone will definitely take this risk. (End of chapter)