Global Game: Developing a Knight Clan-Chapter 227 - 186: The White-Hot First Battle, a War of Attrition is a Foregone Conclusion
The commanders in the Human Alliance’s warzones all roared at once!
And so, in an instant, the area surrounding the Star Gate—one hundred fifty kilometers in diameter and less than three hundred meters above the ground—was engulfed by a dense barrage of explosions and flames.
At the same time.
A massive number of machine cannons had been densely deployed directly beneath the Star Gate.
The rate at which these large-caliber, multi-barrel machine cannons unleashed their firepower was astonishing.
Over one hundred thousand large-caliber machine cannons, positioned beneath the Star Gate, frantically unleashed a torrent of fire into the sky above it at a rate of nearly ten thousand rounds per minute each.
In one minute, they could unleash over a billion rounds.
The sheer volume of firepower was enough to make anyone’s scalp tingle.
For the first wave of preemptive attacks, the Human Alliance had, without hesitation, hammered the Star Gate itself.
As a result, the moment large numbers of Flying Mantises emerged from the Star Gate, they were instantly turned to ash.
The large-caliber bullets and missiles even shot through the Star Gate into the Taven Insect People’s world.
In a mere instant, the area around the Star Gate on the Taven Insect People’s side became a meat grinder of flesh and blood.
However, in that same horrifying instant of casualties, the High Tier Insect People began to move.
A hundred High Tier Insect Beasts were seen to suddenly undergo Elementalization, transforming into black-gold beetles nearly five hundred meters long.
These beetles, their bodies rippling with terrifying Magic Barriers, soared into the sky and charged toward the Star Gate, braving the artillery fire.
Simultaneously, on the Insect People’s side, a massive number of Magic Rockets were also unleashed toward the Star Gate.
As both sides exchanged fire, massive explosions could be seen and heard intermittently rocking the ground in both worlds—on Blue Star and on Green Saturn.
After all, the Star Gate had a diameter of one hundred fifty kilometers.
An area of nearly eighteen thousand square kilometers was the battlefield.
On such a vast battlefield, even if it were possible to maintain constant fire coverage, the consumption of resources would be astonishing.
Even the multi-barrel machine cannons, rocket launchers, and so on required time to cool down and reload; they couldn’t fire continuously.
Therefore, the Human Alliance only managed to achieve near-indiscriminate saturation fire across the entire battlefield for the first ten minutes.
But after ten minutes, they had to switch to point-to-point or face-to-face precision strikes.
"They’re coming! The big ones are here!!!"
"Quick! Prepare the electromagnetic pulse! Also, precision fire with the Electromagnetic Cannons! Let’s test their mettle!"
"Drones, spread out! Target and attack the flying units with precision from outside the first defense line."
"Also, don’t let these flying Otherworld creatures get to high altitude! Keep them suppressed!"
"Comms!!! Comms, request permission from high command to conduct a test fire of the orbital cannon!"
"At the same time, ask high command when to detonate the pre-planted non-nuclear hydrogen bombs! We need to ensure these behemoths are all taken down at the first defense line, immediately!"
"Also, prepare the bio-chemical dirty bombs!!!"
"..."
The eight defense lines and eight warzones established by the Human Alliance had now all entered a state of high-intensity command.
From the commanding generals down to the staff officers, communications soldiers, and even the drone operators, every single person was extremely tense.
After all, this wasn’t a human civil war.
They were fighting a civilization from an Otherworld; it would be strange if they weren’t tense. For the Human Race, the enemy was full of too many unknowns.
"ROAR!!!"
"Damned Otherworld creatures!"
After a High Tier Beetle led a group of Insect People out of the artillery-saturated area, it was suddenly struck square in the head by a direct hit from an Electromagnetic Cannon.
The Electromagnetic Cannon broke through its Magic Barrier, but when the projectile finally hit its head, it only managed to daze the creature for a moment.
This was a Tier Seven Insect Beast.
But even for a Tier Seven, its overall constitution was already terrifyingly robust.
Unfortunately, in the very instant it roared in anger, it was quickly engulfed by a new round of artillery fire.
At this point, the best option for the Insect People and Insect Beasts presented itself.
Yes.
The High Tier Beetles that had charged out this time couldn’t withstand round after round of the terrifying artillery baptism either.
Not to mention, they couldn’t even see a single human figure within nearly two hundred kilometers.
All they could destroy were the massive numbers of automated weapons the Human Alliance had deployed near the Star Gate.
Thus, under the Human Alliance’s remote artillery barrage, more than half of the beetles had their Magic Power severely depleted and immediately began Drilling Ground.
However, how could the Human Alliance not have anticipated this?
Therefore, as soon as a beetle was detected by ground-penetrating radar or even sonar, pre-planted high-explosive bombs buried at various depths in the ground immediately detonated, sending mushroom clouds rising into the air.
The terrifying explosions and shockwaves sent countless Insect People combat units flying.
But from within the Star Gate, vast numbers of Insect People continued to charge through the artillery fire.
Among them, parasitic, centipede-like Insect Beasts unleashed by the Insect People had already swarmed in, densely packed.
These small parasites were too small a target and weren’t easy to kill.
But once the Human Alliance launched its bio-chemical dirty bombs and even poison gas shells, the entire Star Gate Territory quickly became a death zone for ordinary Insect Beasts.
The battle raged on.
Every moment, the Insect People suffered massive casualties.
Although the Human Alliance maintained zero casualties for the first half-hour, the Insect People were no fools.
Under the protection of a few Tier Nine units, some Insect People units finally broke through the Human Alliance’s first unmanned defense line.
Naturally, the Human Alliance had already made arrangements for this.
After all, in a war between civilizations, it was impossible for either side to commit all their forces from the very beginning.
Besides the fact that the battle area was too small, both civilizations had to consider the possibility of being wiped out in one fell swoop.
Therefore, this battle was destined to be one of attrition.
And the Human Alliance was fully prepared for it.
Beyond the first line of defense was the second, which was built around the naval fleet and land-based cities.
This was also the final line of defense.
According to the Human Alliance’s plan, the battlefield with the Insect People had to be contained within the Arctic Circle and the surrounding twenty million square kilometers.
Afterward, the Human Alliance would continuously wage a war of attrition against the Insect People.
Casualties were inevitable, but there was nothing to be done about it.
After all, in a war between civilizations, even in a Demon World, it was difficult for a single person to quell the conflict instantly.
Not even Lince, at his current stage, could do it.
’After all, if the Insect People split their forces, and I had to deal with each one, wouldn’t that just exhaust me to death?’
’So, from the very beginning, I dismissed the idea of blocking the Star Gate and killing the Insect People myself.’
’Besides, it’s not like the Insect People are going to line up and wait for me to kill them.’
’Not to mention, if a few more Saint Tier or Demigod beings showed up, I definitely wouldn’t be able to divert my attention to other areas at will.’
’And that’s not even considering what happens once the Star Gate is open.’
’The Insect People actually possess mature Space technology that Blue Star lacks.’
’Meaning, once the Insect People have a precise spatial anchor point, they can rapidly construct a Small Teleportation Array.’
’Although these ’small’ Teleportation Arrays can’t transport things too far from the Star Gate’s vicinity...’
’...they can open up passages anywhere within a radius of several dozen to nearly a hundred kilometers, both in the sky and underground.’
’Then, relying on these new gateways to continuously infiltrate various regions of Blue Star and build new Teleportation Gates would be all too easy for the Insect People.’
And right now, the Taven Insect People on the other side were secretly doing just that.
They were setting up many of these Teleportation Arrays underground.
Therefore, as long as the Star Gate remained open, it would be useless for Lince to just guard one end of it and kill the insects.
There were too many potential entryways; Lince would never be able to block them all.
Thus, the key to this war was to get behind enemy lines, disrupt them, and kill as many of the Insect People’s Strong Persons and their ruling class as possible.
However, after the Human Alliance falls back to the second and final defense line, they will surely have many "gifts" waiting for the Insect People.
Nukes would be unavoidable.
As for the radiation, Blue Star had already entered the age of a Low Demon World; they could just clean it up slowly later.
As for dropping nukes from the very beginning, the Human Alliance felt it was inappropriate.
This was because at the start of the war, both sides would surely be on guard against weapons of mass destruction.
Therefore, even if they were going to use them, they would wait until the war of attrition began, then use nukes for a surprise attack wave.
They could even break through and drop some in the Arctic Circle, or even on the other side of the Star Gate.
But this would require the cooperation of high-end Players, and even Lince’s Saint Tier Giant Dragon form.
On the other hand, the Insect People were in no hurry to send out their Saint Tier beings either.
After all, Saint Tier beings were very precious, so this initial probing was essential.
Moreover, once more Teleportation Gates were opened, the surprise attack power of Saint Tiers would be indispensable. Thus, the Insect People were also holding back, preparing for a major push.
In short, looking at the current situation, it was still unknown who would emerge victorious.
