Volume 15 Gray Fog Forest Chapter 754: Indiscriminate Bombing
Since the Gray Mist Forest can control mechas... then, can it also make the crashed warship... move again?
Although Ke Lan couldn't see anything because of the dense tree canopy and the gray fog that blocked out the sun, the strong sense of crisis in his heart was like a bottle of Coke thrown into Mentos.
"Run! Let's leave this place quickly!" Ke Lan shouted to everyone without thinking too much.
"What's wrong?" Ivan looked at Ke Lan, who looked anxious, with some confusion. "Didn't we win the battle? Besides, there's no sign of the surrounding Wuqimu coming closer?"
"The enemy is right above us! Battleships! The two battleships that crashed in the gray fog forest!" Time was running out, and Ke Lan could only talk about the most important things.
Fortunately, the teammates were all smart people and understood what Ke Lan meant in an instant - everyone's faces changed drastically, and Ze Luo directly raised his hands and concentrated the strongest defensive power directly above, forming an invisible dome like a protective shield.
The next second, countless shells and missiles tore through the thick fog, passed through the treetops, and rained down towards Ke Lan's location like a torrential rain! !
Continuous explosions sounded above everyone's heads. Fortunately, Ze Luo created a vacuum layer under the dome in time to isolate all sounds from the outside world. Otherwise, those with lower levels of enhancement in the team might have their eardrums shattered.
"What should we do now? Are we just going to keep moving forward despite the heavy bombardment?" Thirty-three asked Ke Lan loudly, "It's just a frigate and a high-mobility support ship. Without supplies, even if the ammunition depot is full, this firepower won't last long."
"I think so too. Perhaps we just need to survive these few rounds of bombing." Ivan raised his head and looked at the purgatory-like scene above the dome. "Even if the mist vine can repair the damaged parts of the battleship, it can't replenish the ammunition of the battleship at any time, right?"
"No." Before Ke Lan could speak, Ze Luo, with an expressionless face, rejected the proposal first. "I have checked the information Ke Lan brought back. In addition to live ammunition weapons, the high-mobility support ship also has four high-rate cluster laser cannons and 28 pulsed laser close-in defense cannons for air defense. The firepower is not very strong and will not pose a threat to us. But the other 'Shaojiang-class' frigate is not an ordinary Shaojiang-class frigate, but a heavily modified 'Shaojiang modified' with a unique special number SX-016.
"In order to meet the firepower requirements of that mission, this 'Shaojiang Kai' was even specially equipped with a plasma cannon that is currently only equipped on cruiser-class warships. Although this plasma cannon is only a prototype and although this cannon is likely to have been damaged and cannot be used...but——"
The three-no girl who had spoken a long paragraph in one breath took a breath and continued, "As long as the prototype plasma cannon can still fire, you will definitely die - I can't block the gray fog and block that level of energy attack at the same time. The energy attached to the ultra-high temperature plasma is enough to tear the space barrier."
She didn't say "we" because even if Ze Luo was hit directly by the plasma cannon, she would not die... But the same would happen to others. Even if they were just touched by the aftermath of the plasma explosion, the whole person would be vaporized instantly.
Previously, the Spark had only used the minimum power of its plasma cannon to bombard the fusion body, but even so, the entire block was destroyed in an instant. And now... if the plasma cannon of the "Shaojiang Kai" hanging over Ke Lan and the others could fire, it would probably not adjust the output power to the minimum.
Moreover, the target of the Spark was the fusion body, and Ze Luo and Ke Lan only needed to withstand the aftermath of the bombardment at that time... But now, the "Shaojiang Modified" has already locked onto the entire exploration team.
Under the bombardment of the maximum- power plasma cannon, all Ze Luo could do was to protect himself.
"The problem is that we can't run away even if we want to! Plasma cannon... even if it's just a prototype plasma cannon, its range is dozens of kilometers, enough to hit from the core area of the Gray Mist Forest to the edge area beyond the red line. All we can do is pray that the cannon has been completely damaged and cannot be used..." Thirty-three said angrily.
"Even if the plasma cannon cannot fire, the battleship still has a way to break through this dome." Ke Lan's mind flashed back to the scene of the "Qilin" colliding with the Leviathan and himself manipulating the "Aguna Tor" to crush the prophet's double. He said in a deep voice, "The opponent can choose to use the ship's hull for physical collision. Regardless of whether the energy shield generator on the battleship can still operate normally, such a large mass of the ship should not be able to be stopped by the space barrier, right?"
"I can't stop it." Ze Luo said frankly.
"We can't outrun it, and we can't stop it. Are we just waiting to die?" Thirty-three looked around and said, "If it doesn't work, we can split up and run. There are only two warships in total, and there are seven of us. It can't be chasing us in seven directions at the same time, right? As many as can survive are the best!"
"There's no need for the warships to pursue. As long as we're out of Ze Luo's protection range, a single shell will scatter our ashes... Moreover, escaping separately in the gray fog forest... Isn't this exactly what the 'will of the forest' wants to see?" Ke Lan said.
"Then we have to do something, right?" Sanshisan glanced at Ke Lan, vaguely feeling that this young man, who was nearly 20 years younger than him, seemed to have come up with a solution. "Standing there and waiting to die without doing anything, this is not your style."
"Offense is the best defense." Ke Lan showed a somewhat crazy smile on his face, "Since the native creatures in the Gray Mist Forest can shoot down these two warships once, then we can shoot them down a second time."
"Shoot down a battleship?!" Thirty-three was stunned for a moment, then he laughed, "It's crazy, but I like this suggestion!"
"What did you say?" Mo Jue was dumbfounded. "That...that's a warship! And we can't even see them now, how can we shoot them down?"
"Just jump up." Ke Lan turned to Ze Luo and said, "Ze Luo, you will be responsible for defending against the artillery fire above your head. In addition, use some of your strength to push the blasphemer off the ground."
After that, Ke Lan took a short run and then jumped onto the top of the Blasphemer mecha. He grabbed the two pull rings on the external armor that were specially used for people to climb on, and patted the cockpit under his feet: "When Ze Luo lifts the body to the highest point, directly turn the anti-gravity device and the thrust to the maximum, and try to get out of the foggy area. The first time is mainly for reconnaissance, and then attack after locking the target."
"Understood." Valentina nodded and closed her eyes.
"When this round of bombing is over, I will push you up." Ze Luo's voice was directly transmitted to Ke Lan and Valentina's ears through the air, "I have studied the firepower configuration of these two warships. You can have a gap of 16 seconds."
"Okay, the timing of jumping will be entirely up to you, Ze Luo." Ke Lan nodded and increased the strength of his hand holding the pull ring.
Valentina took a deep breath and completely integrated her senses with the Blasphemer mecha.
"Now, get ready!" Ze Luo's voice sounded in Valentina's ears again.
Although she closed her eyes, the surrounding scenes were all transmitted to her brain through the fleshy tentacles that were directly connected to the nerve center. She could clearly "see" that the space under the feet of the Blasphemer mecha began to change. The space first collapsed slightly, and then rebounded violently, like a trampoline, throwing the Blasphemer into the air.
This effect is somewhat similar to the "gravitational slingshot" that is often used in interstellar travel.
The crown height of the Mist Tree at this depth is about two hundred meters. The thrust provided by Ze Luo to the Blasphemer Mech can only catapult the body to a height of about one hundred and fifty meters. When the ascent speed begins to approach zero, the Blasphemer Mech's own thrusters and the additional rocket thrusters installed on the external armor simultaneously eject dozens of meters long tail flames, forcibly pushing the body to climb again.
This is a typical example of a powerful brick flying. The Blasphemer mecha, which is equipped with a large amount of external armor and equipment, has no aerodynamic appearance. However, with the terrifying output of more than a dozen thruster nozzles and the support of the anti-gravity device, the ascent speed of the entire machine suddenly increased by several levels, and in a blink of an eye it has crashed into the tree canopy.
Valentina raised the heavy armor-piercing sword above her head. The energy shield on the sword directly evaporated all the branches and vines that blocked the ascent path, and she managed to open a passage in the opaque tree canopy.
After enduring the high temperature that was high enough to roast a person for nearly ten seconds, Ke Lan finally felt that the surroundings suddenly became brighter - the Blasphemer mecha finally passed through the treetops and the thick fog above the treetops, and leaped into the air directly above the gray fog forest.
The sky was still covered with lead-gray clouds, and the sunlight shining through the clouds onto Alpha Star seemed lifeless... But compared to the dark and depressing forest, the scene here still gave Ke Lan a sense of sudden enlightenment.
This scene was just like the hero and heroine in "The Matrix" who flew a plane through the clouds covering the entire earth in the "real world" and saw the real sun for the first time in their lives... Suddenly, Ke Lan felt as if she had been trapped in the cage-like forest below for decades.
"Our current altitude is 440 meters, 125 meters from the top of the tree canopy, and 30 meters from the thick fog layer." Valentina reported the data collected by the Blasphemer to Ke Lan.
And above their heads, nearly a thousand meters in the air, two warships, one large and one small, were quietly floating there - like those walker mechas, the warships were also covered with thick vines. The hull of the "Shaojiang modified" frigate had even been broken into two pieces, but now it was forcibly connected together by these vines!
Thousands of vines hang down from the bottom of the battleships, all the way down into the thick fog... It goes without saying that these vines are the "organs" connecting the two battleships and the entire gray fog forest, just like the umbilical cord between a baby and its mother.
Ke Lan activated the time stop and carefully looked at the "Shaojiang Modified" frigate. He noticed that a huge hatch had been opened on the belly of the frigate, and a short gun barrel was sticking out of the hatch, aiming at the place where everyone was gathered below.
There are multiple damages on the barrel of this prototype plasma cannon, but these damages seem to be just "superficial injuries" and do not affect the main structure of the plasma cannon.
Ke Lan also saw that one-third of the indicator lights in the charging array on the base of the gun had lit up with a faint blue light, which meant that the plasma cannon had begun charging. Once the entire circle of indicator lights were lit up, the plasma cannon would be fully charged and ready to fire at any time.
"Luckily I didn't take the gamble... If it had been delayed for another two minutes, a ball of plasma with a temperature of several million degrees Celsius would have fallen directly down."
Since it is a prototype plasma cannon, its charging speed is much slower than those plasma cannons currently in service on the Ark Fleet. If counted from the start of the bombing, almost one minute has passed, and the charging progress is one third - that is to say, the firing rate of this prototype plasma cannon should be one shot every three minutes.
"There are three solutions - one, attack the warship directly. The Blasphemer's small plasma cannon charges quickly and can penetrate the warship's armor, but if the energy shield is damaged, the attack effect may not be satisfactory. Two, attack the muzzle of the plasma cannon, which can detonate the charging mechanism in advance, but if the incompletely heated hydrogen ion residue falls into the forest, it will still be a disaster. Three, attack those 'umbilical cord vines', which may cut off the connection between the warship and the gray fog forest and make it out of control."
Just as Ke Lan was struggling to decide which attack plan to choose, he suddenly noticed that the thick fog within a few kilometers around him seemed to be surging violently, as if something was about to come out at any time.
"It's those flying indigenous creatures! They are the ones that shot down the two warships the first time! Now the Blasphemer mecha has surpassed the treetops and is naturally within their attack range!"
Ke Lan was startled and released the time stop. She shouted to Valentina, "Hurry up and get down. We can't stay in the air for too long!"
