The Owl Dragon Legion fleets, which had been sailing on at a fixed speed, slowed sharply and at last came to a halt.
And where they stood they formed a triangular defensive position!
"Report — every fleet of the Owl Dragon Legion has ceased sailing and holds where it stands," the adjutant reported to Qin Longcheng.
Qin Longcheng narrowed his eyes at the interstellar holo-table. "Have any of the Owl Dragon Legion's warships entered our attack range?"
"Only a small part of them, on the forward edge, have entered our attack range," the adjutant said.
Qin Longcheng saw through the Owl Dragon Legion's disposition, and gave a cold laugh. "So the Owl Dragon lord means to borrow a blade to do his killing. But this blade is a two-edged one — has he no fear of cutting himself! Pass my order: every warship is to go on standing by where it is!"
"Yes!"
"Put the deep-space telescopes' imagery up for me."
"Yes."
Imagery captured by deep-space telescopes at several positions appeared before Qin Longcheng.
One could see the Owl Dragon Legion's disposition — and even, faintly now, a 'black cloud' behind the Owl Dragon Legion's fleets.
Just so!
A 'black cloud' it was.
The Owl Dragon Legion's fleets were for all the world like a single leaf of a skiff beneath a towering wave, and that black wave was about to come crashing down upon the little skiff with all its weight.
Tick.
Tick.
Time passed, bit by bit.
And soon the leading edge of this black wave 'struck' against the Owl Dragon Legion's fleets, that leaf of a skiff.
Through the video imagery Qin Longcheng could see the Owl Dragon Legion's position drowned under mutated hive-race numbering in the tens of millions, until that leaf of a skiff was by degrees submerged beneath the black wave.
And now, in the video imagery, there was nothing whatever to be seen save stretch upon stretch of mutated hive-race.
Qin Longcheng shut off the video imagery outright and looked to the radar display beside it.
Video could not show the state of the encircled Owl Dragon Legion, but the radar could.
Upon the radar display one could see markers of three colors.
One was black.
That stood for the mutated hive-race.
One was red, standing for the Owl Dragon Legion.
And the last was, naturally, blue, standing for Qin Longcheng's own fleets.
At this hour the small red points had formed a triangular defensive position, and were already ringed about with black; but on enlarging it one found—
that though the red triangular defensive position was hemmed in on every side, it was, of all things, steady as bedrock, without the least sign of being broken through.
"Has the Owl Dragon Legion used interstellar missiles to check the mutated hive-race?" Qin Longcheng asked.
The adjutant shook his head. "Our monitoring department has detected no energy fluctuation from interstellar-missile detonations."
Qin Longcheng knit his brows. He had of course never supposed the Owl Dragon Legion would be destroyed under the mutated hive-race's first wave; but he had thought the Owl Dragon Legion would lean upon interstellar missiles to hold the mutated hive-race off.
And yet, to this hour, the Owl Dragon Legion had not used interstellar missiles at all.
"Marshal, the mutated hive-race have begun to pass beyond the Owl Dragon Legion and come sweeping toward us! It is expected they will threaten our position within 10 minutes!" the adjutant reported in his tension.
"What is there to fear! A pack of mutated bugs, no more. This marshal could make them; this marshal can slaughter them. All warships, make ready for battle!" Qin Longcheng ordered.
But at just this moment, over on the other side, that man standing in the midst of the swarm gave an order of his own, a smile on his face.
"Owl Dragon First Legion, train your guns for me on Qin Longcheng's quarter — full fire! Baixue, 100 seconds from now, open fire for me on the designated strike-zones laid out a moment ago!" Zhao Chen gave his order.
The wolf-girl Baixue was taken aback. She looked at the dark, dense stretches of mutated hive-race upon the line of attack.
With these mutated hive-race swarms blocking the attack lanes, her interstellar missiles would be much reduced in effect.
And in the very next second, every warship of the Owl Dragon First Legion — long since made ready — opened fire in one uniform stroke toward a single direction.
And at this hour, whether it was an interstellar frigate, a destroyer, a cruiser, or whatever-you-please class of warship—
so long as its own guns could reach, every one of them let itself go and hammered away.
Even the T4 Gorgon-class Heavy Interstellar Heavy-Artillery Ships took the stage, leaning upon their dense gunfire to clear the attack lanes for their friends.
And at last, under the Owl Dragon First Legion's covering fire—
the wolf-girl Baixue discovered, to her astonishment, that the attack lanes she had set were, of all things, truly swept clear!
She could see, opposite, Qin Longcheng's fleets arrayed and ready to meet the mutated hive-race.
The corner of Baixue's mouth rose, showing her wolf's teeth.
And the hundred seconds, too, were up at that moment.
"Execute the attack order — all interstellar missiles, launch!"
300 T3 Judicator-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Ships and one T4 Hell-Angel-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Ship opened fire together.
A scene beyond all compare appeared, at that hour, before the eyes of the officers and men of both fleets.
From Zhao Chen's vantage, what he saw was several million interstellar missiles going out like a meteor shower through the breach the Owl Dragon First Legion had just torn open.
"Magnificent indeed." Zhao Chen said it with feeling; this, too, was the first time he had witnessed the Owl Dragon interstellar missile-ship special fleet firing with everything it had.
Chu Xuan was dumbstruck as well, and could not help muttering, "If only our Chu family legion fleets had one too… how fine that would be…"
Lilith, at her side, was rather more composed; she nudged Chu Xuan's shoulder with her own and said teasingly, "Does it look fine? 87 billion star coins a round — you can have one too."
"Kh-kh-kh…" Chu Xuan broke into violent coughing. She had seen these missile ships' launches before, but she had not known the cost figures behind them.
87 billion star coins?
Good heavens above.
That was a few minutes' shooting to spend a whole month's output of the Chu River Star Region!
"Lilith, when a body's happy, don't bring up such dismal matters." Zhao Chen griped from beside them; his fine mood of a moment ago had, at a stroke, had a bucket of cold water thrown over it by Lilith's words.
Lilith folded her arms across her chest, and wore for all the world the look of an aggrieved wife. "To this hour, Baixue's special fleet has fired three rounds. 260 billion star coins spent already. And one further reminder for His Excellency the Commander-in-Chief: the interstellar missiles we have in store are enough for Baixue to play with only two rounds more."
Zhao Chen smiled bitterly. So this was what it felt like to bleed.
It smarted.
And over on the other side Qin Longcheng was smarting too — for he saw the warships of his own forward position covered over, one after another, by the incoming interstellar missiles.
He had long since readied a position of interstellar frigates to intercept interstellar missiles; but there was nothing to be done, the enemy's interstellar missiles were far too many!
A number beyond imagining!
A salvo of above 1 million interstellar missiles — never mind him, Qin Longcheng, no one in the whole history of the Galactic Alliance had ever used such a thing.
There was simply no stopping it!
This single round of missile bombardment alone left his fleets grievously mauled; and most important of all, he clearly grasped that the danger still lay behind.
It was those mutated hive-race swarms!
The line he might originally have used to intercept and check the mutated hive-race was, on account of the missile strike, battered past use — a line in name alone.
Which meant those mutated hive-race swarms could threaten Qin Longcheng's center and rear fleets directly!
The melee had begun in earnest!