Beyond the Angel Line, the Order hive-race could be seen coming on in vast array, a dense black mass of Order hive-race sweeping toward the Angel Line.
"First estimate: ahead of our line, within six hours' travel, Hive Motherships number about 10,000,000. Among them are ten T5 Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Motherships."
In the Angel City Fortress's command room, the adjutant looked nervously to Commander Haina.
This was the first real battle for their Angel City Fortress, so even its high command were in truth uneasy and tense at heart.
Now that the enemy was right before them, with the wind filling the tower before the mountain rain, there were scarcely any who could keep a calm heart.
But just then the adjutant noticed that her mermaid commander's look was very calm; in her eyes not a trace of worry or tension could be seen,
as though she were facing an ordinary simulated battle.
"Pass the order to every fortress main gun, fortress orbital heavy gun, fortress energy rapid-fire gun, and every other weapon unit: no one attacks without my order. First let some of the bugs across the way come in!" Commander Haina gave her first order.
The adjutant passed it on at once.
"All interstellar fighters and interstellar drones in every department, make ready and wait for my order to launch at once!"
"All missile launch units, enter pre-launch stage."
"Every Star-Vault-Sentry-class Interstellar Unmanned Guard Ship squad, go to your combat posts on my order and stand by!"
"……"
When Commander Haina had given these instructions, she turned her gaze to another electronic window before her.
On that electronic window were the Owl Dragon Empire fleets now within the Angel City Fortress's range, and those about to arrive within it.
As yet no Owl Dragon Empire fleet had reached the interstellar fortress.
But three were already standing ready to support; it was only a matter of time.
With everything arranged, all that remained was to wait for the enemy to draw near.
Starship Southern Heaven Gate · bridge.
Bridge, it was called, but it was more like a Star Gate control room.
"The fleet is in transit," the adjutant reported at her side.
"Mm." Jiang Xiaoni glanced at the controls, then went on watching the relayed picture of the battlefield.
By her hand there was even an electronic notebook, open long since.
This was a habit of hers.
She knew her gift did not match others', so she would record every battle and play it through again and again, until by degrees she grasped its essence.
And this battle was, beyond doubt, a textbook defensive battle:
to block and wear down more of the enemy's main strength at the smallest cost,
to lessen the pressure on the northern hive line behind.
Time passed, little by little.
Perhaps no one within the Owl Dragon Interstellar Empire would ever imagine that, in a stretch of the stars so far from the Owl Dragon Interstellar Empire, a battle bearing on the Owl Dragon Interstellar Empire's very fate was breaking out.
Commander Haina fixed her eyes on the holographic interstellar holo-table before her; at last those Order hive fleets had entered the range she had in mind.
Because the weapons the Angel City Fortress used were all large, there was no need to shrink them to the size limits of an interstellar warship, and so their range suffered nothing on that account.
Therefore these fortress weapons could, for the most part, be said to have quite terrifying range,
far beyond most interstellar warships of the same grade.
"Three enemy T5 Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Motherships have entered the range of our fortress mega-cannons. Super Angel fortress mega-cannons, lock on to those targets and destroy them without fail!"
"Fortress orbital heavy guns, fire at will; destroy every Order hive unit within range!"
"Fortress energy rapid-fire guns, concentrate on the T3-grade Hive Motherships and the like, and on any high-mobility enemy target attempting to rush our fortress; secure the fortress's safe zone!"
"Fortress secondary guns, fire at will; destroy every target you can reach!"
"Fortress close-in defense system, activate, fully automatic defense; secure the interstellar fortress."
"First echelon of Angel-Hunter interstellar fighters, launch. Your chief task is to protect the Star Gate, and to clear out any hive-race combat units the enemy slips in. Combat time twenty minutes; after twenty minutes, the second flight echelon rotates in!"
"First squadron of Butterfly-Angel interstellar drones, launch. When necessary, make suicide attacks on high-value targets the enemy hides behind its lines! All other combat units, stand by in place!"
Commander Haina's orders were all given.
The whole Angel City Fortress had now formally begun to operate.
And began to bare its fangs at the enemy.
First and most striking were the fortress's super Angel fortress mega-cannons, of which there were ten in all.
They sat on every side of the fortress; because of their great size, their angles of fire were sharply limited, and that was their one weakness.
And now the three super Angel fortress mega-cannons on the battlefield side slowly turned, bringing their huge muzzles to bear on the three T5 Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Motherships across the way!
"Fire!"
The three super Angel fortress mega-cannons fired at almost the same moment; terrifying crimson balls of light shot out like shells.
Every low-grade Hive Mothership and hive-race combat unit in their path was swept clean away.
Though the hindrance of these low-grade Hive Motherships and hive-race combat units offset, to some degree, part of the energy of the three fortress mega-cannon shots.
When at last they struck the three T5 Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Motherships across the way, the effect was still quite plain.
One Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Mothership was most unlucky: struck full on the head, its whole head caved in, leaving only a great crater from the blast.
That meant this Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Mothership had for the most part lost its ability to fight.
The other two Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Motherships were rather luckier; but though not killed on the spot, their bodies too had taken tremendous damage.
From far off, a terrible arc-shaped wound could be seen, as though some great whale had had a mouthful of flesh bitten straight out of its flank by who knew what.
The bones within could be seen, stark and white, enough to make one's scalp crawl.
The attack on the three Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Motherships plainly enraged these Order hive fleets, and they charged faster still.
Even over the radio channels, strong surging fluctuations could be felt from them.
Had the Hive Princess been here just then, she would likely have said.
These Order hive-race are very angry, very furious; they want to tear apart everything they can reach.
But today, this Angel City Fortress before them would be the line they could not reach across!
The Hive Motherships across the way began to release their hive-race combat units, in a dense black multitude.
Even the Owl Dragon legions, with their tremendous computing power, could not now reckon how many hive-race combat units there were in this star region.
But no matter how many hive-race combat units there were.
None could get past the Angel City Fortress's terrible net of fire.
The 20,000 fortress energy rapid-fire guns, firing almost without pause, formed a vast net of fire; any hive-race combat unit entering it was reduced to ash in the blink of an eye.
And for hive-race combat units of higher grade, or Hive Motherships,
there were naturally other, more powerful weapons to deal with them.
The 1,100 fortress orbital heavy guns and the 200,000 fortress secondary guns, for instance, though both kinds of weapon fired at intervals.
Against these hive-race units before them, they were still quite enough.
"How are the fortress's energy piles running?" Commander Haina looked to an important fortress information panel beside her.
On it were a full hundred energy piles.
These hundred energy piles were the heart of the whole Angel City Fortress.
In peacetime, these energy piles kept the Angel City Fortress running.
In wartime, they would supply those machines of war with the energy they needed to fight.
Of course, these energy piles were not inexhaustible; they had to consume stockpiled raw materials.
Once those raw materials were used up, the energy piles would run dry as well.
It was the same principle as feeding a fire with kindling.
That was also why Zhao Chen had specially placed the T6 starship Southern Heaven Gate on the Angel Line: on the one hand, support fleets could be sent here at any time to assist in the fighting.
On the other, and more important still, it could supply the Angel City Fortress in an unbroken stream with the energy consumables it needed.
Only so could this fortress of war keep running.
"Everything is running normally. At present each energy pile's supply rate is only at 30%. Nowhere near the supply load standard," the adjutant said at her side.
With these energy piles' supply, it was not only a matter of consuming energy consumables.
There was also the matter of the supply rate.
If certain super-large weapons, and industrial facilities such as the docks, ran at high frequency and high load, the supply rate would run past saturation, and the energy piles would be overloaded and the like.
If the overload went on for long, it could do the energy piles possibly permanent damage.
They might even stop working normally altogether!
So these hundred 'hearts' were vital.
"Watch the running of these energy piles closely. If the supply rate reaches 80%, alert me at once!" Commander Haina said, her look grave.
"Yes."
The Angel City Fortress's battle grew fiercer and fiercer.
On the several thousand flight decks along the Angel City Fortress's flanks, Angel-Hunter-class Interstellar Fighters, ready long since, were catapulted off one after another at great speed, formed up outside in flight formations, and set about their combat missions, chiefly defensive.
And in the Angel City Fortress's belly, through the opened hatches,
the Butterfly-Angel-class Interstellar Drones hanging upside down there like bats were cast down one after another, like insects spreading their wings for the first time, so many and so thick.
Anyone who did not know would have taken them for hive-race too.
So dense that one worried they might collide with one another.
But under the Angel City Fortress's very high-grade intelligent brain, these interstellar drones could carry out their combat missions swiftly.
Some were chiefly for airspace defense.
And some would wait for orders.
Just now, for instance, a T5 Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Mothership, badly wounded, tried to pull back.
At that, a squadron of Butterfly-Angel-class Interstellar Drones swarmed in and made a death attack on this T5 Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Mothership.
In the end, this T5 Leviathan-Sovereign-class Hive Mothership was destroyed!
Besides that, the 30,000 T5 Star-Vault-Sentry-class Interstellar Unmanned Guard Ships stood by, each at its own combat post, ready at any moment to meet these Hive Motherships.
And the Order hive fleets across the way, though they could hardly push far under the opening onslaught.
As the fighting went on, still managed, by the sea-of-bugs tactic, to push the line forward slowly,
and put pressure on the Angel City Fortress's side.
"Interstellar missiles, make ready." Commander Haina watched it all calmly, as though all of it were in her grasp!
……
Rakshasa-Hades-class Interstellar Dreadnought · bridge.
"The battle at the Angel City has been going for ten hours now." Zhao Chen looked at Charlotte, who was walking toward him.
Most likely she had come just now to tell him how those ten hours of fighting had gone.
"Yes. After ten hours of fighting, the Angel City Fortress's outer defense line is still under control. Because the fighting is so fierce, there is no reckoning how many low-grade Hive Motherships have been destroyed. As for T5 Hive Motherships, at least five have been destroyed! Some Order hive fleets have got around the Angel City Fortress's defense line and are still heading on toward our northern hive line. But their numbers have been greatly disrupted. We can expect it to lessen the pressure on our northern hive line a great deal," Charlotte said.
"Has no T6-grade Hive Mothership appeared yet?" Zhao Chen asked gravely.
Low-grade Hive Motherships could not match other races' interstellar warships of the same grade, and fought only by the sea-of-bugs tactic.
But from long experience of fighting the hive-race, and from some hive-race information gained by asking the Hive Princess.
In the later stages of their development, the hive-race's Hive Motherships evolved greatly in fighting ability as well.
Above all where T6 Hive Motherships were concerned.
By the Hive Princess's assessment,
they would certainly surpass any T6-grade interstellar warship known in this universe.
So Zhao Chen and Charlotte were both paying very close attention to whether the Order hive-race had already bred T6 Hive Motherships.
"As yet no T6 Hive Mothership has been found among the Order hive-race," Charlotte said.
Zhao Chen nodded, satisfied, but then said, "The Order hive-race is not like the ordinary hive-race; they have commanders of their own. They are sure to see what we intend, and when they do, their most direct move will be to take our Angel Line outright. To destroy the Angel City Fortress. The pressure on Commander Haina is great."
Charlotte said with a smile, "For now, what we can do is trust her."
Beep-beep-beep.
A window popped open on Zhao Chen's communication channel.
On the other side was Secretary Lilith, who had stayed behind in the Owl Dragon Star System.
"The latest urgent news. In the Judgment Angel star system, the undead host has launched an attack!"