Chapter 103: Fire Across the Stars

Tumelo brimmed with confidence.

Over sixteen hundred warships spread out in a massive formation and surged forward to attack.

A lot of people actually misunderstand the spacing between ships in interstellar warfare, thinking two warships are much closer than they really are.

That misconception mostly comes from the way it’s shown in movies and TV shows.

But in reality, for navigation safety and the need to maneuver during battle, things are very different…

Most of the time, two warships will stay at least a hundred kilometers apart. With speeds like these, even a slight course change—say, a single degree—can send a ship veering ten kilometers off in just a few seconds.

Without enough room, collision accidents are almost guaranteed.

And with warships moving at high speeds, if two ever crash…

It’s pretty much total destruction. No one walks away from that.

So, as soon as Tumelo gave the attack order and the whole fleet shifted into battle formation—

The formation was so vast it could rival half the size of Jupiter.

On the other side, the Sixth Experimental Fleet with its nineteen ships—while each was a heavy cruiser between the Klein’s medium and large ship classes—still looked downright puny by comparison.

They seemed almost insignificant.

“Report! The Klein fleet has closed to 1.8 million kilometers. Velocity, 202 kilometers per second.”

Three hours later—

“Fleet, fire all main guns!”

“Yes, Colonel!”

Seventy-six massive main guns roared from the nineteen warships. In just six seconds, their blasts tore across 1.8 million kilometers and slammed right into a handful of smaller enemy ships.

But at this angle they could only hit the enemy fleet’s bows.

No matter the civilization, the front of a warship is always the most armored, the toughest spot to crack.

Plus, at extreme range, ion beams lose a good deal of power.

So, the results weren’t as dramatic as when they saved the Qiongxiao before.

Still, it was fine. After all, with 1.8 million kilometers between them, the Klein fleet would have to close to 500,000 kilometers before they could fight back. That left 1.3 million kilometers, more than enough for the Sixth Fleet to get off nearly two hundred salvos.

Maybe they couldn’t wipe out the entire enemy fleet, but taking down around a hundred small ships? That was doable.

Watching the tactical starmap, seeing more than sixteen hundred red dots for the enemy Klein ships slowly dim with every volley, it was hard not to feel a little awe.

In just ten minutes, these nineteen ships—

Had already destroyed twenty or so enemy ships. And that was with the ion beams weakened by range.

Back when I led over fifty ships, we fought for a solid five hours…

And only just managed to take out a hundred or so Klein vessels.

And that was at close range, with quite a few lost to suicide ramming tactics.

It’s clear that once warship weapons go fully energy-based, battle strength doesn’t just increase a bit—it jumps to another level.

When the Intelligence Department interrogated Klein captives, they mentioned it before.

Every level a civilization climbs in the universe is a leap, not a step. Each tier can utterly dominate the ones below.

Seeing it now, that’s no exaggeration at all.

With the same numbers, a fleet of Zhulong-class warships could utterly crush the enemy.

Even Mu Qingxue couldn’t help wondering—

What does that make humanity now?

Which tier have humans actually reached?

From a colonization standpoint, humans are still solidly first-tier.

But on a pure technology scale, they could almost be considered second-tier.

Yet the Zhulong-class warship might even just barely reach the very edge of third-tier standards.

Honestly, it’s all kind of wild.

Still, even if that’s true, it’s not like humans can mass-produce Zhulong-class warships.

The real limiting factor for energy weapons is still energy itself.

Humanity only has three power sources capable of sustaining a Zhulong-class warship—accidentally acquired during experiments—plus another thirty-two Zero-Point Modules the Klein took from some ancient alien ruins.

So until humanity solves the problem of large-scale zero-point energy production—even if every module goes into warships—

They could only build thirty-five ships, tops.

——

Time ticked by fast as the Sixth Experimental Fleet kept pounding away unopposed.

About an hour and a half later—

The Klein fleet had pushed to within 500,000 kilometers of the Sixth Experimental Fleet.

Suddenly, thousands of assault corvettes launched from the enemy ships.

Seeing a move like that made it obvious just how determined Tumelo was.

He meant to take all nineteen human warships in one swoop, leaving them absolutely no chance to escape.

At the corvettes’ speed, the last 500,000 kilometers would take just over twenty minutes to cross.

Tumelo figured that, no matter how strong these nineteen ships were, there was no way they could destroy all 3,000-plus corvettes in that short window.

He didn’t even think taking out a thousand was possible.

Still, just to be safe, Tumelo sent out every assault corvette he had—3,217 in total.

As for Lin Yu—

He kept his cool and issued fresh orders.

“Ignore the assault corvettes. All secondary guns, focus fire on the main Klein fleet!”

“Yes, Colonel!”

Once the enemy reached 500,000 kilometers, it wasn’t just the Klein who could shine—the Zhulong-class warships were about to show their teeth too.

Nineteen ships, not just seventy-six main guns. Now all 3,192 ion-beam secondary guns joined the fight.

Tumelo was totally thrown by Lin Yu’s strategy.

Give up intercepting the assault corvettes and attack the main fleet instead?

What kind of logic was that?

Didn’t humans know that letting more than 3,000 corvettes close in would spell game over?

That just didn’t make sense! Not at all!!

No matter how he looked at it, Tumelo couldn’t figure it out.

Until, with zero interference, over 3,200 assault corvettes shot through to the last 100,000 kilometers.

At this rate, in just a few more minutes, they’d reach those nineteen human warships and unleash hell.

Tumelo was already imagining what it would be like to seize all nineteen, these near-third-tier human warships, completely intact.

But then—

Right then—

A blinding white light burst out, flaring into a sphere more than 10,000 kilometers wide.

It was as if a second sun had erupted out of the darkness, so dazzling it hurt to look at.

“What in the world is that!?”

Even tens of thousands of kilometers away, the blinding light was painfully clear to the naked eye.

Tumelo shot to his feet, eyes wide with shock.