In a few brisk motions, as though crushing fruit, Zhao Chen crushed the heads of every bug that tried to close with him.
The two academies' students behind him were all frightened by the sight.
Zhao Chen threw a glance at the weapons crate and pulled out a rocket launcher from within, already pre-loaded with five rockets.
Zhao Chen looked toward several rather large bugs in the distance and, without hesitation, loosed the rockets.
Boom boom boom boom boom.
Fireball after fireball of explosion bloomed; at each blast's center the target's shape could no longer be seen, and the bugs around were caught in it too, killed and wounded grievously.
Then came Zhao Chen's weapons show; he went through every weapon in the crate, one after another.
Under such terrifying firepower, Zhao Chen alone killed several hundred bugs.
And just then, six shuttles landed beside the wrecked ship, their hatches opening.
"Board and evacuate, quick!" A woman soldier in personal exoskeleton combat armor sprang down from one shuttle and began organizing Xue Xiaoxiao and the others to withdraw.
Zhao Chen heard the voice of the one who'd spoken; he knit his brows, turned his head, and looked at that woman soldier. "Chu Xuan?"
The "woman soldier" opened her helmet, revealing Chu Xuan's face. "What is it?"
Zhao Chen stepped forward and pointed at Chu Xuan. "How is it you've come down!"
"I'm a soldier; I ought to do what lies within my power! And you never said I wasn't allowed down." Chu Xuan lifted her chin and gave Zhao Chen a blink.
And there was no denying it — Chu Xuan in the women's-cut personal exoskeleton combat armor had a charm all her own.
"You…" Since Chu Xuan had already come down first and reported after, Zhao Chen had no leisure just now to scold her.
He pointed at Zhao Wan'er and Xue Xiaoxiao beside him and instructed, "You take the two academies' teachers and students and board the shuttles at once; withdraw to the ship first. Wounded and the girls first."
"And you?" Zhao Wan'er looked at Zhao Chen with worry.
Zhao Chen pointed at the people still pouring out of the wrecked ship. "One run isn't enough to carry off this many people; I'll organize the defense here."
Seeing the worry on Zhao Wan'er's face, Zhao Chen instinctively reached out to rub her head — but at this moment his hand-armor was all bug-juice, and he could only sheepishly draw his hand back.
"You go up first; I'll be along soon," Zhao Chen said.
Zhao Wan'er hesitated a moment, then nodded hard, and, heedless of the bug-juice on Zhao Chen's armor, gave it two thumps of her fist. "Brother, I'll wait for you on the ship!"
With that, Zhao Wan'er turned and helped carry a wounded person aboard the shuttle.
The shuttles, laden with people, lifted off again and returned to the ship.
The rest of the two academies' teachers and students went on waiting in place for the next chance to evacuate.
"Commander — a great many 'bug-cocoons' have appeared in the sky and are falling toward your position. From up here the ship can intercept only a portion; please be careful!"
At this moment the reminder from the T3 Blizzard-class Light Interstellar Battlecruiser's bridge sounded in his ear.
Zhao Chen lifted his head and looked to the sky; there, in the cloud layer of the sky on the other side of the T3 Blizzard, flesh-ball bug-cocoons, one after another, bored out of the clouds like meteors.
They plunged toward the wrecked-ship position where Zhao Chen and the others were.
"Mecha squads, mind the sky!" Zhao Chen warned over the comm channel.
"Black-Knight First Squad understood; intercepting with missiles!"
"Black-Knight Second…"
"……"
The Black-Knight mecha squads noticed the bug-cocoons hurtling down from the sky; the missiles on the mecha loosed one after another to intercept these falling flesh-ball cocoons.
Boom boom boom boom.
Fireball after fireball burst in the air; the flesh-fragments produced after the flesh-ball cocoons were shattered fell like raindrops around the wrecked ship, landing even on the faces of the two academies' teachers and students.
It set some students to retching.
"Interstellar combat-mecha of such terrifying combat power…" A teacher who studied interstellar combat-mecha, noticing these never-before-seen mecha models at this moment, couldn't help being awed by these interstellar combat-mecha's fighting strength.
"With a firepower loadout like that, they're already no less than a small T1 interstellar destroyer; only, because of their size, their ammunition capacity can't match a ship's. But they already far outstrip most known T2-grade light interstellar combat-mecha." another teacher marveled.
And just as they were marveling at these black interstellar combat-mecha that had saved them like soldiers dropped from heaven—
—from the hull of the wrecked ship behind them came a great crash; the hull armor was smashed into a dented hole.
It was a flesh-ball cocoon that hadn't been intercepted.
The "flesh-ball cocoon" suddenly unfolded, sprouting several long legs, its shape like a spider's, with a fang-lined mouthpart at its fore.
"This is an interstellar bug-race T2-combat-grade ground unit, the Bug-Spider!" an old professor cried in terror.
The T2 Bug-Spider, its body now fully unfolded, at once sought out its target, soon locking onto a woman teacher; it opened its blood-basin maw and pounced to bite.
At this moment the T2 Black-Knight-class Light Interstellar Combat-Mecha around were engaged in battle and simply couldn't lend support here in the short term; and to fire a missile would catch the two academies' teachers and students around the wrecked ship in the blast.
"Teacher Qin!" Senior Su Lan cried in alarm.
Teacher Qin raised the laser rifle in her hands and fired without let-up, but the laser rifle's pitiful firepower simply couldn't punch through the T2 Bug-Spider's bug-armor.
Suddenly, a figure planted himself before Teacher Qin.
Teacher Qin looked in astonishment at this man before her in personal exoskeleton combat armor; by what Cadet Su Lan had said a moment ago, this was a student of their Northstar Starship Military Academy, come to save them.
"Careful, Zhao Chen! This is a T2 Bug-Spider — ordinary weapons can't punch through its bug-armor!" Senior Su Lan cried out.
Weapons can't punch through it — then let's try a fist!
The next second Zhao Chen's fist swung out, at a speed so great the two academies' teachers and students present could near enough see only the blur of it.
Crunch!
A sound came like a steel plate snapping.
The two academies' teachers and students looked at that man in personal exoskeleton combat armor with astonished eyes.
For at this moment his fist had punched clean through the bug-armor at the T2 Bug-Spider's head, half his arm driven into it.
The T2 Bug-Spider began to convulse without pause, green juice flowing from its mouth and from the wound.
"Truly can't take a hit." Zhao Chen, a touch let down, wrenched this T2 Bug-Spider's head off and tossed it aside like a rubber ball.
As luck would have it, it landed right at the feet of a male student, who gave a shriek and leapt straight up — landing, of all things, cradled in the arms of another male student beside him in a princess-carry; the two stared at each other, dumbstruck…
Bzzz, bzzz, bzzz.
Just then, the stone beneath Zhao Chen's feet began to shake, like an earthquake.
"Careful… there are bugs boring an underground bug-tunnel!" Teacher Qin cried out on reflex.
But soon a professor cried in terror, "This… this isn't the stir of a bug-tunnel… bad… under our feet… under our feet… there's a big fellow!"
Beneath one T2 Black-Knight's feet a giant beast's horn suddenly appeared; the horn sent the T2 Black-Knight flying heavily, and it crashed hard to the ground.
Then a giant beast fully 20 or 30 meters tall appeared before them all — a giant beast like a great beetle!
The T2 Black-Knight's bulk, set before it, looked like a child before a grown man.
"That's a bug-race T3-grade ground combat unit — a T3 Thunder-Beast!"