At two in the morning, the engine room of the *Polaris*.
Ou Zhanpeng exhaled softly and activated the radio. "Ling Xiao, are you ready?"
Ling Xiao's lazy voice came through the headset. "Been ready for ages!"
"Be careful yourself." Ou Zhanpeng switched frequencies. "Bridge, Assault 007 requests disengagement!"
"Assault 007, disengagement approved. Good luck to you both." The voice from the bridge was sweet and gentle, a balm to the spirit.
"Thanks!" Ou Zhanpeng replied as the hangar bay doors slowly opened, revealing the vast, distant, and boundless starry sky.
The assault craft glided out of the ship, the cosmos expanding before them, with the desolate lunar surface appearing below.
It was his first time observing the moon from such a close distance. He had always thought it looked small before, but now, up close, it was far larger than he had imagined.
Habitually, he scanned his surroundings. Apart from the *Polaris* right beside him, two battleships from the First Fleet were visible in the distance, along with the assault craft and aerospace fighters that had arrived with them.
One heavily damaged and unrepaired battleship, two training ships, eight assault craft, and over forty aerospace fighters – this was their entire combat force.
Pathetically thin.
Suddenly, Ling Xiao's voice, filled with bravado, boomed over the radio: "Human safety is in our hands!"
Ou Zhanpeng's face darkened. This kid, his chuunibyo was acting up again. Still, the nonsensical declaration managed to lift his somber mood somewhat.
Ling Xiao's teasing voice followed on the radio, "Fatty Ou, how are you? Nervous?"
Ou Zhanpeng rolled his eyes. "What's there to be nervous about? We just wait for the outcome."
The assault team wasn't the main force; they were the last resort, only to be deployed if the enemy ship landed on the moon and all other options failed.
"Look at you, so carefree!" Ling Xiao grumbled indignantly.
"Carefree? Then what are you?" Ou Zhanpeng immediately shot back, but then he immediately realized something. "Hey, Ling Xiao, aren't you the one who's nervous and using me to relieve your stress?"
"Who are you talking to? Am I the kind of person who gets nervous? Hmph!" Ling Xiao stubbornly denied it, his lips pouted high.
Ou Zhanpeng chuckled, his gaze shifting towards their target.
At that moment, the enemy ship and the human battleships were on opposite sides of the moon. From his vantage point, the enemy ship was barely above the horizon. A slight descent, and the two sides would be separated by the moon.
The image in Ou Zhanpeng's eyes suddenly magnified, and in an instant, the half-section of the enemy ship was brought right before him.
The half-destroyed battleship was partly obscured by darkness and partly illuminated by sunlight. Its severed edge was as clean as if cut with a knife through butter, yet he couldn't find where its propulsion system was.
It was packed with details.
After observing closely for a while, Ou Zhanpeng suddenly realized something was wrong. The next second, the image in his eyes rapidly retreated, and everything returned to normal.
A hallucination?
Definitely not. The strange anomalies he remembered from waking up were still vivid. He knew he had undergone some special change, but he couldn't figure out the cause and effect, let alone control it actively.
He blinked hard, feeling like a fool who had taken the wrong medicine, desperately trying to focus his attention on his eyes. But no matter how hard he tried, his vision remained unchanged.
After a few attempts, Ou Zhanpeng deflated.
It must be the wrong method, but what should he do?
He secretly fantasized: If only I could turn into Superman directly, I'd be the envy of that idiot Ling Xiao!
It was strange, but there were always people who shouldn't be mentioned. As Ou Zhanpeng was lost in his wild thoughts, he heard Ling Xiao's voice in his ears: "Hey, aren't we all ready? What are we waiting for?"
Ou Zhanpeng replied irritably, "Waiting for you, it's not like we're consummating a marriage, why are you so anxious?"
"How can I not be anxious!" Ling Xiao retorted righteously. "Being in limbo like this, I'm restless!"
Ou Zhanpeng felt just as uncertain, but he couldn't tell Ling Xiao that. He could only offer some comfort. "I think it should be soon."
Ling Xiao's interest immediately piqued. "Why do you say that?"
"The enemy ship doesn't seem to intend to land. I think there might be a few reasons: one, they plan to defeat our fleet before landing, to eliminate any future worries; two, they are scanning the moon's conditions to find a suitable location for development after landing; or three, they are using a gravity assist maneuver to accelerate away from Earth."
"Away? No way?" Ling Xiao didn't like thinking, but he wasn't stupid.
The first two points were easy to grasp. Even if this hastily assembled fleet were annihilated, various countries would quickly organize another one.
However, once the enemy ship left Earth's vicinity, it would be beyond humanity's current capabilities to pursue.
At that point, they would either have to let the aliens develop freely on Mars or other planets, or expend considerable manpower and resources to build more advanced ships for an expedition to other planets.
A drain on national resources and an endless military buildup. It was feared that before they could eliminate the aliens, the countries themselves would be bankrupted by the immense expenditure.
"How venomous their intentions are!" Young Master Ling declared righteously.
Just as Ou Zhanpeng was about to speak, he suddenly saw several hatches open on the *Polaris*'s port side. He immediately became excited. "It's starting!"
Before he could finish speaking, three warships simultaneously opened fire. Missiles, neatly arranged in the launch tubes, sprang out of the ships like soldiers on parade, accelerating towards the rear with blue and white exhaust trails.
That's right, towards the rear.
War was never simply a head-on collision; it was a comprehensive competition of equipment, tactics, and will.
At this moment, both sides were in orbit around the moon. Firing head-on would be a pursuit, essentially chasing the enemy ship's tail. The distance would be greater, the time longer, and the relative speed slower, giving the enemy ample time to react and a low probability of being hit.
Circling the moon for half a week and attacking from the rear meant a head-on engagement. Although the possibility of interception was greater, the relative speed would be faster, the reaction time shorter, and thus the chance of hitting would naturally be higher.
The three battleships fired over a hundred missiles before stopping. Next was the patient wait.
The alien warship showed no change, as if it hadn't noticed the human fleet's actions.
The missiles automatically shut off upon reaching their predetermined speed, continuing their flight by inertia. Only when they captured the enemy ship's trajectory did they re-ignite, adjust their angle and direction, and accelerate towards the target.
Ou Zhanpeng instinctively clenched his fists.
The enemy ship remained motionless. However, as the missiles approached a certain distance, they suddenly detonated without warning, as if an invisible barrier had appeared, blocking all the missiles.
Tang Haifeng remained expressionless, as steady as a mountain.
The first wave of missiles was merely a probing attack; they hadn't expected to do anything to the enemy ship from the start.
"Defensive range: 280 kilometers!" the relevant personnel immediately calculated the enemy's firepower data.
Tang Haifeng immediately issued a new order: "All ships, attention! Maintain a two-second interval for continuous firing. Use every weapon you have!"