Within the ridgeline of the crashed ship mountain, the aliens suffered heavy casualties. The remaining aliens abandoned their fallen comrades' corpses and fled down the mountain in a panic, taking refuge within their shields.
Some critically wounded enemies, still alive, lay struggling on the ridge, no longer possessing the arrogance they had upon arriving on Earth.
Ou Zhanpeng felt a surge of exhilaration. A thought suddenly struck him: the enemy's constant active assaults might not stem from their overwhelming power capable of eradicating humanity. In fact, it was quite the opposite. This was merely a smokescreen, a feigned offensive to mask their inherent weakness, a tactic of advancing by retreating.
From the moment they crashed on the moon, the aliens had become like phoenixes stripped of their feathers, merely lingering on the brink of extinction.
More shells descended. The Hive Shield flickered incessantly. The more impacts it absorbed, the dimmer its light became. Several shield generators on the broken ship's surface burned out from overload, leaving hexagonal voids at their corresponding locations, creating open breaches in the shield.
Terrified, the aliens dared not linger and immediately retreated into the damaged vessel.
The battered shield barely held out until the shelling ceased. But before the aliens could breathe a sigh of relief, swarms of missiles flew over the ridge.
After only a few breaths, the remaining shields completely disintegrated. The rest of the missiles, unhindered, rained down upon the enemy ship in a single wave. Instantly, the mountain shook and the world seemed to sway.
Everyone, whether on the lunar surface or in the fleet, who witnessed this scene, was stunned.
Before the operation commenced, no one believed this round of attacks would achieve such spectacular results. The best outcome they had hoped for was to gather more intelligence about the aliens.
However, the crashed ship, as expected of alien technology, possessed astonishingly high hull strength. After an entire barrage of missiles, it only sustained shallow marks on its surface, showing no signs of damage.
Witnessing this, Tang Haifeng, far from being disappointed, secretly breathed a sigh of relief.
Ammunition had already been delivered to the moon. If they truly wanted to destroy the enemy ship, a few nukes would suffice; there was no need for such a complex maneuver.
But the enemy ship wasn't just the half visible here; the other half was submerged in the Pacific Ocean. Given the aliens' technological prowess, the deep sea might not be able to do much to them.
To preempt any potential issues, the directive from the capital to the fleet was to preserve the crashed ship as intact as possible and to acquire alien artifacts, rather than simply destroying the enemy vessel.
Had Tang Haifeng known the crashed ship was so fragile, he would have proceeded with caution, perhaps testing the waters with only half a magazine. Instead, he had gone all out from the moment they made contact.
The explosions affected more than just the enemy ship; the crater itself was also impacted. Before the smoke had fully cleared, half of the mountainside suddenly collapsed. Rolling dust and rocks, carrying massive boulders, cascaded down like a flood. Various-sized stones struck the crashed ship and bounced high into the air.
Before long, Han Wen had completely buried the damaged vessel, leaving only a broken edge exposed.
However, the entire process felt like a slow-motion replay, lacking a certain visual impact.
"Good opportunity!" Luo Jintang immediately requested to engage, "Commander, let the assault team go!"
"At this moment?" Tang Haifeng, being from the air force, had limited knowledge of ground tactics and was therefore hesitant.
Luo Jintang nodded solemnly, "There's no better opportunity than now."
Entrusting the professional task to professionals, Tang Haifeng decided to trust Luo Jintang. "Very well, issue the order."
On the lunar surface, Xie Yu received the communication and immediately relayed Luo Jintang's order: "All units, listen up, we're going in!"
Ou Zhanpeng immediately boarded an assault craft, and the others swarmed in, clinging to the outside.
Xie Yu patted the hull of the craft twice. Ou Zhanpeng immediately piloted the assault craft into the air, reversing its course towards the crashed ship mountain. In no time, they ascended the ridge and landed on a flat area.
Flying too deep into the mountain base was too dangerous; the ridge was the assault craft's limit.
Hundreds of meters away lay the corpses of the aliens, some of whom were still alive.
Ou Zhanpeng showed no mercy, opening fire without a word, eliminating all remaining enemies.
Xie Yu didn't ask any questions. He called out to the others, and they leaped from the assault craft, each finding cover, looking down into the crater.
As he clearly saw the situation in the crater, he gasped in astonishment.
But he quickly regained his composure. "Bridge, request fire support!"
Luo Jintang was baffled, "The crashed ship is buried by the landslide, what are you requesting fire support for?"
Xie Yu: "I need artillery to blast the enemy ship out!"
"Just a moment!" Luo Jintang didn't commit, but soon, news arrived that shelling was about to commence.
With more than a dozen shells fired, a small-scale landslide was triggered again. Some of the sand and soil that had buried the crashed ship was shaken loose, revealing half of its side hull.
Xie Yu immediately marked over a dozen spots on the enemy ship. "Team One, Team Two, feint attack from the front. All other teams, follow me!"
With that, he was the first to leap down the ridge, sliding into the crater amidst a cloud of dust.
The others followed closely. Ou Zhanpeng was slightly behind. He activated the last two robotic dogs, coordinating with their comrades in the front for a diversionary attack.
Team One and Team Two each found cover. The other teams rushed to the enemy ship, taking out portable laser cutters and began slicing through the miniature turrets and shield generators on the ship's surface.
The former were only palm-sized but possessed formidable power; they were what had shot down the missiles earlier.
The latter were slightly larger, embedded in the ship's surface like scales.
No one knew which ones were intact and which were damaged, but at that moment, they couldn't afford to be picky. They arbitrarily selected one and immediately struck.
Only the two robotic dogs headed straight for the breach, disappearing into the darkness in an instant.
Ou Zhanpeng immediately received signals from the robotic dogs – the interior space of the breach was considerable. The cross-sections of all internal structures were exceptionally flat, clearly revealing passages, compartments, and pipes.
As the robotic dogs ventured a bit further, they discovered that all passages were locked by airtight doors, making further penetration impossible.
Ou Zhanpeng immediately issued a command. A mechanical spider sprang from the belly of a dog and detonated against the door separating the passage, creating a gap over a meter wide.
"Open fire!" The two combat teams conducting the feint attack didn't ask if there were any enemies in the passage. They immediately unleashed a barrage of firepower.
Whether there was anything to hit or not, they would fire first!
Not only direct fire but also various types of indirect fire and self-guided shells similar to the mechanical spiders.
These were incredibly useful, able to automatically avoid obstacles after landing, locate targets, and detonate.
However, in the pitch-black passage, only two brief flashes of lightning were seen before everything went silent.
The two robotic dogs rushed into the passage and disappeared within moments.
Logically, the enemy's silence at this point should have been a good thing. But the soldiers, every single one of them, felt a deep sense of unease.
With the enemy not showing themselves, they didn't know if they had completely hidden and given up, or if they were lurking in the shadows, waiting for an opportune moment to strike, leaving everyone in doubt, with a constant feeling that unseen eyes were watching them menacingly.