96: We're safe—bullshit!

(Received another explosion update from a big handsome guy (book friend),)

(Currently, the debt has reached 11 again)

At this moment, on the outskirts of the Kuiper Belt of Ursa Major V12.22, the battered lucky and a heavily damaged frigate were hovering here.

Directly in front of them floated the wreckage of two Frigates—the patrol squad arranged by Xi Hai, consisting of two unmanned kalilein-class Frigates.

"Report!"

"It seems we destroyed two unidentified Frigates!"

On the Bridge of the lucky, the Radar Operator, whose fingers were slightly trembling, reported with a sigh of relief after pulling up the footage—thank goodness, they weren't those insects.

"Also, judging by our position, we have reached the Kuiper Belt of Ursa Major V12.22!"

As he spoke, he checked repeatedly, and until he had scanned the entire radar screen, he did not find even a single target suspected to be the Swarm.

"No way..."

"No way!!!"

He stared at the screen in front of him with an expression of disbelief, frantically flipping through the data, but he couldn't suppress the smile at the corners of his mouth—"It's real!!!"

"We're safe!!!"

Suddenly, his cracked, shouting voice broke the tense and oppressive atmosphere on the Bridge.

Then, the next second—"Woooooo!!!"

"Woooooo!!!"

"We're safe!!!"

"We escaped!!!"

No one cared about the two armor-piercing neutron torpedoes that had just been wasted; everyone cheered, just like a Chengdu superman encountering a Xiao Nanliang who likes to be a bottom, the boiling sound waves carrying a joyful atmosphere instantly swept through the entire Bridge.

Gulac's tensed body finally relaxed.

He watched his subordinates on the Bridge abandon their posts, throw things around, cheer, and hug each other, but he didn't care about this behavior, which was a serious violation of military discipline—the Defense Force generally didn't assign dedicated Political Commissars, and the captain served as the primary disciplinary officer.

Everyone had just narrowly escaped death and desperately needed a channel to vent; Gulac didn't want his crew to mutiny because they were too emotionally repressed.

Recalling the scene just now, he couldn't help but feel a lingering fear—thousands upon thousands of insects, big and small, long and short, were rushing towards them frantically, while behind them, a bunch of weird things with long bodies and pointed heads kept spraying plasma balls and balls of insects at them.

The main fleet being escorted in the center couldn't react in time and was soon breached by the insects through the defensive fire net; however, the Marine Corps on the Warships were quite capable, engaging in hand-to-hand combat (physically) with the invading insects, stubbornly keeping the insects that boarded the Warships outside the first airtight bulkhead.

Both sides were locked in a stalemate, and the Defense Force fleet, once they reacted, even used neutron bombs with armor-piercing shrapnel to push back the insects' attack and launch a counteroffensive.

But just when the situation looked great, an accident happened—a Warship turned its guns without warning and fired a large number of shells, missiles, and torpedoes at its own comrades—followed by a second, a fourth...

Originally, facing an attack of this level, most of the Warships present could have evaded or intercepted it.

But the various ships were already overwhelmed by the insects hiding in the distance throwing plasma balls. In order to dodge those glittering but extremely lethal little balls, the captains had all chosen to only evade the things that glowed blue. Furthermore, no one expected that in this battle for survival, the attack would actually come from their own teammates!

This led to—when the bombardment from friendly forces hit them, the ships had absolutely no defense. The ammunition that should have opened a path to survival became the last straw that broke the camel's back!

The battlefield changed in an instant. The insects seemed to have seized the moment of chaos in the Defense Force fleet and directly increased the intensity of their attack. Soon, the fleet, which had been barely maintaining its defensive line, was scattered by the dense Swarm.

Watching the number of lost friendly Warships rising rapidly, Gulac couldn't care about anything else. He sealed the airtight doors between the various areas of the Warship and pushed the speed of the lucky to the maximum.

After crushing a large number of insects and carving a long path through the Swarm, the left engine of the lucky finally stopped due to overheating and clogging.

Watching the Swarm and plasma balls rushing over like a tide, Gulac finally lowered his hands, preparing to meet the end granted to him by fate. But at the very last moment, the connection success prompt suddenly sounded on the Warship's rift engine console, giving him a start. What followed was hope—this indicated that he had connected to an unknown Gravity Conduit generator!

Heaven would not let him die!

"Open the Gravity Conduit!"

"We—are charging through!"

At that very moment, Gulac pulled himself together and shouted this sentence at the top of his lungs.

The Gravity Conduit opened instantly, and the rampaging gravitons tore the insects in a straight line into pieces. At the final moment of being hit, the lucky—and a frigate tailing them—shot out like two arrows released from a bow—and subsequently, they arrived here.

Just as they arrived, the radar detected two large targets approaching. In their stressed state, they didn't even think before issuing the order for a full salvo.

Before being destroyed, the other side also fired a series of shells at the lucky.

The result was that after they destroyed these two large targets, they realized they were two Frigates.

"What model were those two Frigates?"

"Does anyone recognize them?"

After everyone had vented enough, the Bridge gradually calmed down, and Gulac asked the question he was most concerned about—had he just brutally attacked his own teammates?

He didn't want to receive an investigation order from a secret inspector.

"Report!"

"No!"

"Those two black heavy Frigates do not exist in any combat sequence of The Consortium!"

"The signal is still disconnected, and we cannot determine the model of those Warships. However, judging by their hulls with no markings or paint, the other party is most likely either smugglers or a private ship."

Not teammates? Then it doesn't matter.

"Captain, if the owners of those two Frigates come looking for us, how should we reply?"

Gulac waved his hand dismissively, "Let them come. We made a mistake due to an act of war. Besides, they even destroyed one of our Frigates! If they dare to talk back to us? That's treason! It just so happens we don't have enough Amnesty Soldiers, right?"

The first officer next to him heard Gulac's reasoning, thought it made sense, nodded, then put away his questions and walked to his post.

"Alright, since we are already safe..."

"Report!"

"An unidentified fleet has appeared at 7 o'clock, 27° bearing!"

"According to the rangefinder... the other side has Battleship-class units!"

"No verification code sent!"

"The enemy—is not friendly!"

Suddenly, the Radar Operator's panicked voice rang out, causing the smiles that hadn't completely faded from the faces of everyone on the Bridge to freeze.

(Alright, I was really sleepy at night, finished typing and thought about exiting to click send, but ended up confirming deletion instead,)

(Now I owe 12 chapters, I promise to restore it to 10 chapters by tomorrow night)

(I will try to release the remaining ten chapters at once during the National Day holiday)