Next came the T2 Purple-Rose-class Medium Interstellar Battlecruiser's third volley, fourth, fifth.
At last, under the fifth volley!
The crowd in the spectators' seats, magnifying the T2 Black-Rhino's port armor several times over in the feed, found a wound tens of centimeters long and a few centimeters deep.
"Even… even if it's sturdy, so what? The firepower loadout of a mere interstellar frigate can do nothing to a T2 Purple-Rose. And a frigate's speed can't necessarily catch a T2 Purple-Rose either," Vice-Dean Jia said, keeping up appearances by main force.
"Yes, yes, yes. You're the vice-dean of the Heaven's Glory Academy; whatever you say goes." Vice-Dean Hong wore a deliberately fawning smile beside her, tone all flattery.
The words were plainly needling her.
Vice-Dean Jia's face went dark; she said nothing, and could only use such excuses to persuade herself this battle still held hope.
And on the field just then, the T2 Purple-Rose too noticed something amiss, and began trying to use its speed to keep distance from the T2 Black-Rhino while firing without cease.
Zhou Min simply wouldn't believe that under a mad, ceaseless barrage this T2 interstellar frigate could truly hold up.
T2 Black-Rhino-class Interstellar Heavy-Assault Frigate · the bridge.
"Frontal hull armor overall damage 6%, worst spot 12%; flank hull armor overall damage 3%." The ship's captain reported to Zhao Wan'er.
Zhao Wan'er glanced at the distance between the two ships on the star-map; she'd already learned the T2 Black-Rhino's performance beforehand.
"About the right distance. By my command. Prepare to engage the short-range assault mode! And all hands — brace for impact!" Zhao Wan'er said gravely.
"Yes!" The captain began relaying the orders.
Because the T2 Black-Rhino had been designed from the first with an eye to withstanding a great deal of fire, even collisions, every battle post was fitted with protective measures to keep a soldier steady, so they wouldn't lose balance and be hurt in a ram.
"'Short-range assault mode' engaging… speed climbing!" the captain said.
The red figure standing for the speed began, in an instant, to soar without cease.
The spectators' seats.
Those watching the two ships intently began, all at once, to cry out.
"Good heavens! Look, quick — that frigate seems to have accelerated!"
"That speed's far too fast — a huge jump from before."
"Wait… this speed… this heading… could this frigate be about to ram the T2 Purple-Rose!"
That astonishing thought sprang up in every student's mind.
Ram the ship?
An interstellar frigate meaning to ram an interstellar battlecruiser?
The corner of Zhao Chen's mouth carried a faint smile; a fine chance, this, to field-test the T2 Black-Rhino's hull ram-resistance.
The wildly accelerating T2 Black-Rhino leveled one of the horn-modules at its bow at the flank of that distant T2 Purple-Rose.
"Quick! Speed up! Evade!" Zhou Min, seeing the interstellar frigate closing on her at a rush, shouted in panic.
"Captain… our speed's already at its fastest, and at this range we simply can't evade!" the deputy captain said helplessly. "We should give the order now to brace for impact."
Before the deputy captain had finished, the whole hull rang with a heavy boom.
Very nearly in that instant, everything on the bridge not fixed down went flying; some crew who hadn't managed to steady themselves were lifted clean off their feet and flung meters away.
Zhou Min, seated in the captain's chair, at least didn't fly off.
But at this moment her pupils dilated, watching a plump backside come slamming toward her face from a distance.
That face she'd spent several hundred star coins tending came into intimate contact with that part.
"Mmgh, mmgh, mmgh… mmgh, mmgh, mmgh…"
"Warning! Warning! Warning! The hull's port side has taken a severe impact; the port hull armor is pierced; 13 adjacent compartments sealed off in emergency!"
"Warning! Warning! Warning! This impact has affected the port ship engine; speed reduced by 30%."
"Warning! Warning!…!"
The warning cries on the bridge drowned out Zhou Min's calls for help.
By the time everyone had steadied and begun climbing up from the floor—
—the deputy captain found a 200-catty bridge soldier sitting square in the captain's chair.
"Where's the captain, our young lady!" The deputy captain hauled the fat soldier up and demanded.
"I… I… I don't know…" the fat soldier said.
"I'm… over… here…"
A voice came from the captain's chair.
The deputy captain looked behind the fat soldier — and there was Zhou Min, sprawled limp in the captain's chair, her whole person seemingly crushed, her face above all deformed.
"Captain, young lady… your… your face…" The deputy captain gulped, pointing at Zhou Min's face.
Zhou Min was taken aback; she at once kicked the fat soldier before her aside, summoned up a mirror — and in it saw a face plainly gone lumpy and uneven.
"My face — aaaaah!"
"Warning! Warning! Warning! The hull is under impact! The hull is under impact!"
Another sudden ram; the deputy captain, unable to steady himself, was lifted into the air, his hand instinctively grabbing at something, then plunging hard downward.
When he came to himself and looked, he found he'd pressed Zhou Min's face solidly down onto the captain's chair.
"Aaah, aaah, aaah…" Zhou Min screamed in hysteria.
And the ramming went on without cease.
One blow… hard upon it… another… and again… another…
And each from a different angle, a different direction!
Seen from outside, it was simply a T2 interstellar frigate ramming, again and again, a T2 Purple-Rose that fled with its head in its arms.
The trouble was, it couldn't run fast enough; there was no shaking off that interstellar frigate's dogging at all.
"Warning! Warning! Warning! The hull has lost control… the hull has lost… control… we are ramming toward an asteroid — evade at once! Evade at once!"
Ramming toward an asteroid?
The deputy captain, no time now for the emotionally shattered Zhou Min, at once worked the controls to check the situation.
Through the imagery relayed to the bridge, their ship was ramming toward an asteroid at tremendous speed.
And as for why this was so?
The culprit, of course, was that interstellar frigate.
That interstellar frigate was, at this moment, hard on their ship's rear, using its big black horn to press their T2 Purple-Rose straight into that asteroid.
"Captain! Concede at once! Concede at once! Or our ship is finished!" The deputy captain hurriedly pressed Zhou Min to surrender.
"My face…" Zhou Min was still staring at her face — her surgically altered face.
The deputy captain urged Zhou Min to concede, quick; and Zhou Min now had no mind to spare for winning or losing — that interstellar frigate was simply too terrifying.
Zhou Min at once contacted the arbiter to declare surrender.
The spectators' seats.
The arbiter had only just received the T2 Purple-Rose's surrender, and hadn't yet had time to relay the instruction to the T2 Black-Rhino—
—when, through the broadcast feed, they saw the T2 Purple-Rose slam hard into the surface of that asteroid, throwing up a great cloud of dust.
The T2 Purple-Rose's hull was severely deformed.
And the "culprit" behind it all?
The T2 Black-Rhino, as though nothing whatever had happened, "pulled out" its big black horn, and looked, well-satisfied, at the T2 Purple-Rose it had knocked so thoroughly out of any ship's shape.
Then, without a backward glance, it sailed away from the asteroid.
Everyone stared at that interstellar frigate, 10,000 horses galloping through their hearts.
This… was this truly an interstellar frigate?