68: But it can be destroyed with a snap of a finger!

Immediately, the Emperor stood on the command platform and announced his choice to the world.

"I would rather be a broken jade than an intact tile!"

"Dongying Island will never surrender! We will fight Eagle Country to the end! We will fight until the last moment, until death!"

The moment the Emperor finished his statement, the Sky Curtain immediately issued a final warning!

[Sky Curtain has detected that the Challenger has made a choice! The Challenger refuses to surrender!]

[Given that the Challenger refuses to surrender, is putting up a stubborn resistance, and refuses to yield to Eagle Country... Eagle Country has decided to use its most powerful weapons to purge Dongying Island! Simultaneously, Eagle Country has decided to wait no longer; the attack time has been moved forward to this very moment! A full-scale military operation against Dongying Island is now underway!]

[All Challengers, prepare to face Eagle Country! This will be the most terrifying combat power of the Raging Sea!]

[...]

The Sky Curtain was about to continue its prompts, but it was directly ignored by the Emperor.

"Enough! Sky Curtain! No need to remind me further!"

"I will deal with my own choices myself!"

The Emperor let out two cold laughs, his entire demeanor appearing extremely deranged.

"Hmph! Is Eagle Country unable to restrain itself? Do they want to attack now?"

"Then I would like to see what Eagle Country's top-tier weapons really are!"

At this moment, Ito Hidekazu suddenly said tremblingly:

"Your Majesty... just after you issued the order for all-out war, the loyalty of the Dongying Island citizens dropped to the absolute limit... I fear it won't be long before they attack the Imperial Garden with force."

Ito Hidekazu thought of the scene of his tragic death at the end of the last dungeon instance; it was this group of Dongying Island rioters who had finally executed him.

"Ridiculous! A group of rioters trying to hinder me?" The Emperor gave a dry laugh.

"Have the Challengers from the nearest Edo Army Base bring weapons here and suppress these rioters with force!"

"Shoot anyone who protests against us!"

"Our rule will never allow anyone to try and shake it! These NPCs in the dungeon are just things Lin Ye set up to hinder us; it's best to clear them all out!"

Hearing this, Ito Hidekazu couldn't help but gasp.

"Your Majesty... this..."

The Emperor's methods were truly too ruthless!

He had been ruthless enough in the last dungeon instance, but he had never ordered the armed slaughter of civilians.

Even so, his punishment had been increased. Now the Emperor wanted to actively shoot civilians; had he completely lost his mind?

Although it was in a dungeon instance, the Emperor's choice still inevitably caused fear.

Ito Hidekazu even wondered how the Emperor would treat the subjects of the Great Harmony Settlement in the real world if the supreme Sky Curtain weren't watching.

The Emperor had no time to pay attention to Ito Hidekazu.

He immediately projected the real-time broadcasts of all military bases onto the light screen and issued final instructions to each base.

"Listen up, commanders of all military bases! Get all our anti-aircraft weapons ready! Be prepared at any time to face the incoming Eagle Country Air Force!"

"Ito-kun! Supervise all military bases. Record anyone who is slack or cowardly in battle!"

Ito Hidekazu could only bow and scrape in agreement. Meanwhile, the Emperor sat in his chair, closed his eyes, and began to clear his mind.

In fact, Ito Hidekazu did not understand the Emperor!

The reason the Emperor chose to resist to the end was not only for so-called glory and the dignity of the Great Harmony, but more importantly because he felt there was still a glimmer of life, even a hope of turning defeat into victory!

This was the strategy he had just thought of.

That was, switching from offense to defense!

If he no longer took the initiative to attack but instead deployed defenses, the situation might be much better than crossing the ocean to attack Eagle Country.

At the very least, he could leverage the home-field advantage of Dongying Island!

The Emperor had a judgment regarding the upcoming Eagle Country offensive.

With this switch to defense, Dongying Island became the defender, and Eagle Country became the attacker.

Eagle Country, now provoked, would only attack Dongying Island with the greatest speed.

For modern warfare, the fastest method of attack is the Air Force.

Whether Eagle Country sent troops directly from its mainland or relied on Aircraft Carrier forces in the Pacific Ocean, their primary tactical move would inevitably be an offensive led by fighter jets.

Their spearhead would most likely be aimed at the major military bases where Challengers gathered.

In that case, the Challengers' defensive works would be easy to set up; just have all the Challengers still at the military bases bring out all their anti-aircraft weapons.

Mortars, rocket launchers, barrage balloons, and anti-aircraft guns!

Together, they would form Dongying Island's perfect anti-aircraft line!

Once any enemy aircraft dared to intrude into Dongying Island's airspace, the Challengers would immediately launch a counterattack. This defensive strategy gave the Challengers the advantage of the first move in the war. They not only had a chance to withstand the Eagle Country's attack but were more likely to deal a heavy blow to the enemy in the clash.

Not to say they could completely crush Eagle Country, but at least they could make Eagle Country lose a layer of skin. With luck, they might even turn the tide of the war.

No matter what, it was better than being one-sidedly bullied!

...

But just as the Emperor was pondering this last-ditch strategy, Ito Hidekazu suddenly shouted.

"Em... Em... Your Majesty!"

"The Hiroshima Kure Naval Base has been attacked by Eagle Country!"

The Emperor was jolted awake from his thoughts! He roared in fury:

"Ito Hidekazu, how dare you disrupt military morale? Do you want to be obliterated?"

He clearly did not believe what Ito Hidekazu said.

From the moment he officially announced his refusal to surrender to Eagle Country until now, less than ten minutes of dungeon time had passed!

In this amount of time, how could the Eagle Country's army have arrived?

No matter how fast Eagle Country's planes and Aircraft Carriers were, they couldn't possibly reach this speed.

"Your Majesty, every word I say is true. Please come and see," Ito Hidekazu said aggrievedly.

The Emperor hurried to the light screen to check.

In an instant, his whole body froze in place, and his feet couldn't help but tremble again!

His expression instantly solidified!

In the projection on the light screen, the Hiroshima Kure Naval Base was no longer the steel forest of the past but had been reduced to a pile of ruins!

The sky was covered by billowing thick smoke, and not a single ray of sunlight could penetrate!

In this chaos, everything was gradually disappearing along with the thick smoke.

On the ground, not a single intact patch of grass or soil could be seen.

Amidst the mess, there were craters from explosions, burning wreckage, and vehicles destroyed beyond recognition everywhere.

Bodies of Challengers lay in pools of blood or hung from broken branches; blood and dust mixed together, creating an inescapable mist of blood.

"How is this possible?!"

The Emperor's breathing became incredibly heavy. He couldn't believe his eyes at all, but the incredibly real scene before him forced him to believe.

The Hiroshima Kure Naval Base had really been completely destroyed by Eagle Country!

The Sky Curtain glanced at the dungeon backend; another large portion of Challengers had disappeared in the dungeon, and the number of dungeon participants plummeted once again.

The Hiroshima Kure Naval Base was the largest military base on Dongying Island, and it had the most Challengers. Excluding the previous naval forces, there were still a hundred thousand Challengers here.

As a result, not one of those hundred thousand people remained; they were all killed in battle!

The number of dungeon Challengers had now plummeted to less than 400,000!

"Why! Why on earth is this happening!"

"How can there be such a fast method of attack?!"

At this moment, the Emperor could not understand at all how Eagle Country had done it. His thoughts were in disarray, completely unable to focus.

In less than ten minutes, Eagle Country had destroyed Dongying Island's largest military base in the blink of an eye?!

The Emperor forced himself to steady his mind and refocused his gaze on the light screen.

If his deduction was correct, after Eagle Country dealt with the Kure Military Base, the next target should be the Maizuru Military Base.

He didn't dare to hesitate for a second and immediately shifted his gaze to the broadcast screen of the Maizuru Military Base. He wanted to see what kind of thunderous methods Eagle Country used to achieve this.

"Listen up, everyone at Maizuru Military Base! Set up your anti-aircraft formations! Eagle Country's next target should be you."

Just as the Emperor finished his command, the screen belonging to the Maizuru Military Base on the light screen shook violently!

In the footage, within the military base, alarms suddenly blared, and red warning lights flashed frantically.

Before various vehicles and personnel could fully react, an incredibly bright arc appeared on the distant horizon! It was like a meteor streaking across the night sky, blinding and shocking!

A missile, trailing a long tail of fire, dived toward the military base at extremely high speed.

After that moment of silence, a deafening roar suddenly erupted.

This sound wave was so powerful that even the Emperor and Ito Hidekazu, thousands of miles away, could feel its shocking power, as if the sound waves reached their inner ears and almost tore their eardrums.

The shockwave generated by the explosion was as turbulent as raging waves, spreading out at an alarming speed. The buildings around the base were instantly destroyed by this terrifying force, turning into countless fragments!

The high temperature, like a scorching sword of fire, swung ruthlessly, consuming all combustible materials.

That fire was as red as blood, hot and violent, reflecting a deep red across the world.

In this raging fire, billowing thick smoke rose, like a giant black dragon spiraling and howling frantically in the sky. It rolled and spread, almost obscuring the entire sky!

The rows of military vehicles and equipment originally neatly arranged in the base were now scattered all over the place, some even thrown hundreds of meters away, leaving deep marks where they hit the ground.

Some even vanished into thin air in the high temperature! Not even a trace of residue was left.

Wooooo!

The sound of the wind was like sobbing and wailing, intertwined with the screams of the Challengers on the battlefield, forming a tragic symphony.

This was not just the sound of the wind; it was more like Eagle Country's ruthless mockery of Dongying Island.

The sky still echoed with the tremors of the explosion, while the earth trembled incessantly from the shockwave! It was as if it were recounting its helplessness and fear.

The Maizuru Military Base, which had been orderly just a second ago, was now a living hell! Just like the Kure Military Base, it had been reduced to ruins.

And in the dungeon backend, the numbers were constantly jumping, plummeting by another 50,000 people! Only 350,000 Challengers remained in the dungeon!

"What is this? Can someone tell me!"

"What kind of weapon is this?! What the hell kind of weapon is this again?!"

The Emperor smashed the wall hard. The tiny bit of fighting spirit he had managed to muster was cruelly extinguished.

Ito Hidekazu gasped and said haltingly:

"Your Majesty, perhaps I can make a rough guess. During the first dungeon instance, I seem to have seen Lin Ye use something similar..."

"Back then, he used something like a tracking shell to crush my fleet. At that time, his shells could hit a distance of five nautical miles."

"Looking at it now, that shell back then was just Lin Ye testing the waters... Based on this timing, these two shells must have been fired from the Eagle Country mainland; otherwise, it would be impossible to complete the strike in such a short time!"

Ito Hidekazu didn't even believe his own words; it was simply too ridiculous.

Dongying Island and Eagle Country were separated by a vast ocean. Could there really be shells that could fire that far? But with all this reality before him, this was the only way he could explain it.

Immediately, the Sky Curtain provided a definite answer.

[Sky Curtain Prompt: Since a Challenger has guessed the basic principle of the Eagle Country's weapon, the Sky Curtain can provide a simple explanation as a dungeon hint so that Challengers can perform corresponding defenses.]

[Due to the Challengers' resistance, just now, Eagle Country used the Hypersonic Intercontinental Missile AGM-183 ARRW against Dongying Island!]