Chapter 49: Clash of Serpents on Jupiter’s Orbit

“Lord Alum, every time our soldiers board their ships, the humans just blow everything up, taking our warriors with them.”

“Hmph. With bodies that frail, humans are no match for our warriors.”

From Alum’s point of view, humans already know they can’t win. Rather than letting us slaughter them and seize their warships, they’d rather choose self-destruction.

At the very least, they take some Klein soldiers down with them.

“Should we halt our raids then?”

Someone under his command suggested this.

“Stop? Why would we? Just because they blow up their own ships?”

“They’re just a bunch of third-class beings. Even if a few more die, it won’t affect anything. Don’t bother worrying about it!”

Alum had nothing but disdain for this suggestion.

“Sir, the human fleet is circling the planet’s orbit. Looks like they’re trying to swing around to the far side and lose us before making a run for it.”

You really have to admit, Jupiter’s a massive planet.

With a diameter over 140,000 kilometers, it’s eleven times the size of Earth.

It’s so big you could hide thousands of warships on the far side and radar wouldn’t find them.

“How’s the 6th Division doing attacking the human defense satellite?”

“They’ve reached it, but the satellite’s orbit is packed with defensive structures. The 6th Division’s working to clear them out now!”

“Once they’re done, forget orbital drops. Have them open fire straight down from orbit!”

“But Lord Alum, that’s a fully armed satellite with weapons powerful enough to rival a Level 3 civilization. If we go for a direct orbital strike, then—”

“Drop that thought. If humans can blow up their own ships without blinking, what makes you think they won’t do the same inside that satellite?”

“Uh… right.”

“Doesn’t matter if those third-class beings live or die, but there’s no sense in throwing people away for nothing.”

Alum shook his head at last and added another line.

“Yes, Lord Alum!”

“Good. Now, have the fleet stick to the human fleet—stay close!”

“Understood!”

As far as Alum was concerned,

he couldn’t care less what the humans were up to.

He knew that as long as he kept up the pursuit and stayed on the humans’ tail,

there was no way they’d pull any tricks.

Sure, for now, the distance between them and the human fleet was still over 400,000 kilometers—a good half hour to close in.

But that wasn’t a problem; the human lines were a mess.

That meant, even though the humans were finally retreating in some sort of order, there was no way they could just bolt in a minute and have the whole fleet gone the next.

They’d need at least half an hour, no less.

And that meant Alum had a precious window—a chance to close the gap and grab hold of the enemy before they could escape.

——

Meanwhile,

Onboard the Zhulong.

Lin Yu’s special operations unit, being the Federation’s main hammer, was the first to pull back.

The reasoning was simple—

The Zhulong would act as the head of the snake!

As mentioned before, both sides would form two long snakes, chasing each other around the Homeworld’s orbit.

During this, only the snake heads could launch attacks.

So the head’s firepower would directly decide how much damage each side took.

It wasn’t just the Zhulong. Of the four Warstar battleships humanity had left, three had been put at the snake’s head, joining Zhulong in the assault.

Only the flagship, Qiongxiao, sat out.

After all, it carried the entire upper echelon of the Federation Fleet. If anything went wrong, the whole Federation would fall into chaos.

It’s not about whether the high command is brave enough to join in.

It’s that—

They can’t take the risk.

“Now I get what you said before…”

“Which part?”

Lin Yu blinked in surprise at George’s words.

“You said, the more seasoned a commander, the easier they are to predict.”

“Look at today: swap their commander for Andrei, and he’d leave us alone and push his fleet through the Asteroid Belt, heading straight for Earth instead of wasting time chasing us…”

“So the only reason they’re falling into our plan is because their commander isn’t Andrei, but an old-school veteran!”

When the enemy charged at full speed, scrambling to close the distance and lock onto the Federation Fleet’s tail—

George couldn’t help but sigh.

Even though he spoke softly, the Zhulong’s bridge wasn’t exactly spacious.

The ops team on the other side still heard him.

Andrei’s face went dark.

Damn it, George! Of all people, did you have to use me as the example?

Then again…

If it were him, he’d probably do exactly that.

Worries about supplies, enemies at their rear, the unknowns of the Asteroid Belt—

Andrei wouldn’t care about any of that.

He’d just go seize the enemy’s home in one campaign.

That was why George let out his sigh.

Only an experienced commander weighs every angle and makes careful decisions.

That’s something you can predict.

But with a green, untested commander, they just don’t consider everything—

so the choices they make are unpredictable.

Hence why Lin Yu said, the more seasoned the commander, the easier they are to outmaneuver.

Of course, that only works under one condition.

The person doing the scheming has to be crafty enough.

Otherwise, did you really think any random commander could pull one over on a famous general?

Obviously, that’s impossible.

——

Roughly forty minutes later.

The Klein main fleet, minus the 6th Division sent to Europa, had over 2,500 warships now at the Homeworld’s orbit, glued to the Federation Fleet.

The gap between the two was just over 50,000 kilometers—at their current speed, a mere 238 seconds apart.

Both fleets were headed in the same direction, so even at this close range, they couldn’t close it further.

But this distance was well within range of the Klein’s main weapons.

Beams of pale yellow energy, almost fluid yet sharp as lances, rained down on the Federation ships at the rear.

Meanwhile, as the Klein’s last warship slipped into Jupiter’s orbit and joined the others in circling—

The head of the Federation Fleet—

had already looped back around and sunk its teeth into the tail of the Klein Fleet.

Three Warstars, eight battleships, and the Zhulong made up the twelve-ship vanguard.

They unleashed their combined firepower!

If you looked at this from above, you could sum up the battlefield with a single phrase.

It would be—

The Dance of the King Around the Pillar!