111: Chapter 111 Operation Begins: First Step – Clearing the Defense Zone

The roar in the distance was like muffled thunder, rolling across the gray-green horizon.

When that Ultralisk, standing over 1,500 meters tall, rose from the edge of the horizon, the atmosphere of the entire Planet G-77-3 seemed to tremble.

It wasn't fear; the trainees participating in the trial had long since seen this ultimate Zerg ground unit in simulators and war history footage. It was simply the fear of giant creatures, something engraved into their genetic instincts.

On the survival battlefield of Edge Star No. 7 that Li Yuan had experienced, the final kill of an Ultralisk relied on sniping from orbital ship cannons and the beam saber of a white emperor mecha equipped with a small fusion engine, which was powerful enough to cleave mountains.

For the vast majority of trainees who had not yet stepped into the 4th Rank, they basically did not possess the ability to break through the defenses of such a behemoth alone.

The Ultralisk disturbed this time was at least 180 kilometers away. According to the battlefield situation map synchronized on the terminal, it was located at the edge of the Seventh Defense Sector. Between it and the Thirty-Second Defense Sector where the Li Yuan Squad was located lay the defense sectors of five entire squads—three mountain ranges and a corrosive plain covered in creep—so it wasn't Li Yuan's turn to worry about how to deal with this behemoth yet.

The base construction had entered the right track.

Under the command of Chen Jingyi's [Daoyan Military Nexus] talent, tens of millions of engineering robots, like an ant colony with collective intelligence, assembled the modules sent by the landing pods with near-terrifying efficiency.

Metal skeletons rose from the ground, composite armor plates nested layer by layer, and energy pipelines quietly spread underground.

Chen Yao stood at the highest point of the command center, her hands pressing down into the air. Matter within a radius of several kilometers was like an extension of her limbs—discarded packaging materials automatically decomposed and reorganized into spare parts, and excess building materials flew precisely to the locations that needed reinforcement, to be welded and reinforced by engineering robots.

This steel fortress, temporarily named "Forward Base-32," was growing at a rate of 30% expansion in area per hour. The pale blue joint shield was continuously stacking, and it was currently sufficient to withstand the fire of ordinary warships.

But Li Yuan's gaze did not linger on the increasingly sturdy fortifications.

He stood on the newly completed western wall, his fingers unconsciously tapping a certain rhythm on the alloy railing.

The Ultralisk's roar in the distance had ceased; a behemoth without command did not have much desire to attack. It lay back down among the hills formed by the creep, leaving only the outline of its mountain-like bone spurs on its back, looming faintly under the pale light of the planet's two moons.

"Energy!" Collecting energy to help Elia break through to the 4th Rank was the main goal the three of them had decided on together before. And as for the source of the energy, one had to mention the abnormal phenomenon discovered after the space battle earlier.

In that space battle where they repelled the Zerg pursuit, the wave of collective rank-ups that occurred after the fleet collected Zerg remains was like a key that opened up a new understanding of the energy cycle of this world.

The Zerg bodies contained a certain high-purity energy that could be directly absorbed by living organisms—or, in the words of Customer Service Miss, it was "residue of divine life force purified by Zerg flesh."

This should be the main source of energy causing the collective rank-ups, and it was also, as it currently seemed, the most likely method to solve Elia's predicament.

An hour later, a combat meeting was held in the main conference room where the floor had just been laid.

There were no holographic projections, no long-winded strategic deductions. The plan took shape quickly.

Step One: Clear the remaining Zerg units within the defense sector and establish a safe buffer zone.

Step Two: Collect Zerg biomass, verify the energy enrichment effect, and accumulate "fuel" for Elia's breakthrough.

Step Three: Conduct radial reconnaissance outside the defense sector to determine the distribution of Zerg within a 50-kilometer radius.

There were no objections. For one thing, in the trial plan, in the near future, the fleet group would allow a certain number of Zerg to land on this planet to provide the effect of a real combat trial in a real combat situation.

On this planet, which was just one step away from the front line, any hesitation could cost one their life. Being caught in a pincer attack by Zerg from both space and the planet—just thinking about it, one knew it wasn't a good idea.

On the other hand, Li Yuan directly shared the observed phenomenon of energy enrichment caused by Zerg corpses with the core members of the squad.

Chu Xinghe leaned against the wall with his arms crossed and nodded upon hearing this—the Blazing Dragon Federation military had long had research reports on "post-war energy enrichment zones," but most were classified.

Chen Jingyi pulled up some declassified data from the database, confirming that in areas where there was large-scale Zerg death, psionic concentration would experience a brief peak.

Sai Wei's reaction was the most interesting. The young man from the Olympia royal family frowned, recalled carefully for a few seconds, and then suddenly realized: "So that's where the concentrated energy liquid supplied by the royal family comes from..." He had only ever been exposed to the purified and packaged finished products since he was a child and had never delved into the source of the raw materials.

...

When the expeditionary sequence finished assembling on the east side of the base, even the knowledgeable Chu Xinghe couldn't help but exclaim.

"Good grief, are we going to clear the area or just steamroll it?"

Sunlight pierced through the thin atmosphere, spilling onto the steel array, reflecting a cold luster. Imagination requires rationality, but reality does not.

It was less than a month ago that Li Yuan was still swindling and bluffing to scrape together beam sabers and micro ion cannons for his Light Guardians. Who would have thought that when they actually hit the battlefield, they would be equipped with a heavy armored legion for free.

At the very front of the sequence were five Xingtian-class heavy assault mechas. These behemoths, reaching a height of 420 meters, were the backbone of the Blazing Dragon Federation ground forces. Their armor used a composite structure of Stardust alloy and bioceramics, sufficient to withstand a frontal collision from an Ultralisk.

Each mecha's right arm was equipped with a "Battering Ram" type impact cannon, and the left arm was a switchable "Melt-Cut" beam saber or "Steel Rain" multi-tube rocket launcher. The two "Honeycomb" vertical launch systems bulging on the back were currently loaded with a full 128 ground-attack missiles.

Under the mechas' feet were twenty-four "Black Tortoise" heavy siege tanks. These mobile artillery platforms, over 40 meters long, possessed four pairs of all-terrain tracks. Each tank was equipped with multiple phase-array particle cannons and direct-fire electromagnetic cannons that fired solid projectiles, capable of effectively striking units with high physical resistance or high energy resistance.

Further behind was a mobile formation composed of over twenty "Cloud Soaring" high-speed assault guns. They had high mobility, long range, and mobile firing capabilities, using plasma beams or plasma clusters to strike, with fast fire rates, great power, and long coverage.

And all of this was not even the full extent of this team.

Li Yuan stood on the top platform of the command vehicle, along with the remaining dozens of Light Guardians—that's right, all the vehicles and mechas in front were operated by Light Guardians.

Each guardian had dual small beam cannons mounted on their shoulders, held a "Verdict" high-frequency vibration light blade in their right hand, and had a deployable diamond-shaped energy shield integrated into their left forearm. On their backs, they continued to carry light-cast quivers, which were already filled with 2nd-rank battlefield magic arrows. They served as a mobile defense force.

As for air power...

Ten "Luan Bird II" aerospace fighters streaked across the sky, leaving white contrails under the gray-green clouds. These aircraft, about 60 meters long, featured a variable-sweep wing design, allowing them to freely switch modes between space and the atmosphere. And sitting in the cockpits at this moment were Li Yuan's Light Mages. Their slender fingers slid across the virtual control interface, perfectly fusing the fighter's sensor data with the mages' energy perception, forming a three-dimensional battlefield view.

And beside Li Yuan was the Light-Bathing Battle Spirits, who looked like a beautiful elemental sprite. Wearing light armor and holding a bow with an arrow nocked, its four sprite wings fluttered gently, slowly flying above the legion and scattering points of fluorescence. It looked like a frail archer, but in reality, it was a heavy healer-tank that was despairingly tanky.

After all, this was not the desperate struggle on Edge Star No. 7, nor was it a friendly sparring match in the academy arena. This was a real war rehearsal—

Every squad on this planet had received sufficient war resources, and Li Yuan's Light Guardian legion undoubtedly raised the utilization rate of these resources by several levels.

"It's a pity that the two white emperor mechas were snatched by Luo Lan and Senior Brother Chu." Laya's voice came from the communication channel, carrying a hint of regret.

Li Yuan's hands were always held in a virtual grip in front of him, his ten fingers moving in an intricate rhythm. In the air, visible energy threads were pulled, woven, and solidified—that was the signature skill of a String-Controlling Weaver, forging elemental models and law fragments into arrow shapes, then storing them into space equipment.

One after another.

But Li Yuan's expression did not relax in the slightest.

His gaze passed over his own massive steel array, over the undulating hills covered in creep ahead, and finally fell toward the distant end of the horizon—there, the outlines of Ultralisks had merged with the silhouettes of the mountains, and he did not know exactly how many there were.

The Zerg perception map obtained earlier on Edge 7 slowly unfolded, and the red dots on the map were even denser than on Edge 7. But these were all minor matters. What was more worrying was:

Three million warships.

If the Papal Hall's Great Prophecy Art had already included this massive existence of three hundred escort fleets, totaling over three million warships, into the deduction variables...

Then what would be the scale of this Zerg attack, and would it be just like the plan, with only one Leviathan leaked through to land...

A single Leviathan could carry and command billions of Zerg, so could the tens of thousands of trainees currently scattered all over Planet G-77-3 withstand more Leviathans?

"Big Brother Li Yuan?" Laya's voice pulled him back to reality. The young girl had arrived beside the command vehicle at some point, "Your expression is so serious."

"Just calculating some things." Li Yuan turned around and looked at the team that was all in position.

...

"Attention, everyone."

Chu Xinghe's voice spread through the command channel to the entire sequence.

"Combat objective: Clear the A to D sector areas of the Thirty-Second Defense Sector, annihilate all Zerg units, and collect biomass samples. Luo Lan and I will lead the white emperor mechas as the vanguard to break through the creep nodes, while Elia and Sai Wei provide fire coverage. Li Yuan, your Light Guardian firepower group will complete the clearing work; be careful not to let any slip through the net."

He paused.

"Remember, this is not an exercise. All Zerg encountered—kill without exception."

After speaking, Chu Xinghe's white emperor mecha was the first to move.