Zhang Ruowen had never imagined that in the mere five minutes their sonar system was knocked offline, ten steel King Crabs would climb onto the destroyer's deck.
Even though the Reef possessed ample firepower, its 150 mm naval gun could hardly fire upon itself.
The same went for the point-defense systems and torpedo tubes; against the King Crabs standing right on the deck, they were utterly useless.
Looking at the 20 mm cannon barrels aimed straight at the bridge, Zhang Ruowen knew the battle was lost. Choosing not to offer meaningless resistance, he led the officers and sailors aboard the ship in surrender.
They would be sent to the prison on Anle Island to await legal trial.
Watching the South Sea Alliance sailors board the deck to disarm them, Zhang Ruowen stood in silence for a moment before turning toward the massive steel crab standing nearby.
"May I ask a question?"
Having captured such a massive vessel, Midnight Chicken Slaughter was in an extraordinarily good mood. "Ask away," he said decisively.
"...How did you manage to get so close to us in such a short amount of time?"
He knew all about the Alliance's King Crab armor. The Northern Federation General Staff had conducted detailed studies on the Alliance's gear, and had even developed magnetic limpet mines specifically designed to counter frogman tactics and individual power armors.
As far as he understood, the Alliance's King Crab possessed great agility but lacked cruising speed. Underwater in particular, its swimming speed could not even match that of a mutant.
This expanse of sea was immense. Claiming they had been lying in wait directly beneath the ship from the beginning would be an absurd coincidence, and at such close range, no amount of camouflage could fool active sonar.
There was only one plausible explanation: they had maintained acoustic silence in an area with poor sonar resolution, then rapidly surged toward the Reef after the EMP strike hit.
Yet given their speed, that should have been physically impossible.
Zhang Ruowen could not wrap his head around it.
Midnight Chicken Slaughter chuckled. "What's so hard about that? Just slap together a giant underwater thruster and ride the thing holding on tight. Problem solved."
Back when they fought mutants outside Coral City, they had encountered a similar issue.
Because the King Crab's underwater cruising speed was too slow, once separated from their ships, operators had to wait for friendly vessels to retrieve them, unable to pull out of the combat zone or make rapid redeployments on their own.
Mounting a huge propeller directly onto the King Crab, however, would make the entire frame far too bulky.
Responding to player demand, the Alliance Logistics Department had opened a tender, seeking solutions from the industry.
In the end, Goblin Tech won the bid. Brother Mosquito had solved the problem with a budget of just ten thousand silver coins.
The approach was dead simple: take a high-capacity battery pack and a propeller, package them into something resembling an oversized firecracker, and let the King Crab hold onto it with both arms.
When going into combat, they just cast it aside, picking it back up to relocate after the fighting was done. It was as cost-effective as it was practical.
After listening to the Alliance's method, Zhang Ruowen froze for a moment, then gave a bitter smile.
"I see."
It truly wasn't complicated; he had simply overthought the matter.
They had not lost unfairly.
"Speaking of which, I've got a question for you too," Midnight Chicken Slaughter suddenly said, looking at the wryly smiling captain.
Zhang Ruowen replied, "What question?"
Midnight Chicken Slaughter glanced toward Sandbar Island. Black smoke was drifting slowly along the shoreline—the aftermath of the 150 mm naval bombardment.
Looking closely, however, the shells had not landed inside the urban area, but had struck the open ground beside it.
"Did you miss on purpose?"
Zhang Ruowen remained silent for a long while before speaking slowly.
"The people living there are my compatriots, after all."
***
Just as the entire crew of the Reef surrendered, the battle on Sandbar Island drew toward its close.
The last hundred mutants wearing specialized exoskeletons were cornered inside a suburban cannery. Sheltered behind the factory's walls, the tables of attack and defense had completely turned.
Across their fierce, vicious faces, a trace of panic finally broke through, impossible to contain.
A mutant missing an ear walked up to the thousand-man commander, panting heavily as it lowered its raspy grunt. "Boss, these humans... are hard to deal with."
The mutant it addressed as boss bore an equally grim expression, the thick armor over its chest caked with shredded flesh and blood.
Some of it was its own, while some belonged to the humans.
Before boarding the landing ship, Zhalas had told them that only weak, useless trash lived on this island, and that once ashore, they could do whatever they pleased for as long as they wished.
Yet upon hitting the beach, it discovered reality was nothing like promised.
The people here were not in the slightest inferior to the ones encountered in the northern mountains. If anything, they were far fiercer, more ruthless, and considerably better trained!
Just three of them could lock down an entire street, and three squads were enough to surround their whole company of a hundred. Once ashore, the mutants had scurried like headless flies through the streets, finding neither human females nor the helpless trash Zhalas had spoken of.
"What do we do now?" another mutant muttered, unconcealable terror trembling in its voice.
Just as the heavy silence deepened the dread, a black canister roughly the size of a beverage can was tossed in through a window, clattering across the floor.
Before the mutants could react, the canister burst into a brilliant crimson flare, spewing blinding sparks and thick, billowing white smoke.
Terrifying memories instantly flooded their minds, twisting every face in horror.
White phosphorus!
It felt as though they were back in the caves of the Ten Peaks!
These bastards... were from the Alliance!
At the very instant of their shock, the crackle of gunfire and a hail of incendiary grenades surged into the breach alongside the blossoming flames!
The battle erupted violently!
A dense storm of bolter rounds poured down like torrential rain upon the mutants in the factory, churning up a hurricane of blood and gore.
"Roar!!"
A mutant centurion roared, firing a rifle grenade toward the doorway.
The blast's dense smoke and shrapnel engulfed the figure barging through the entrance.
A flicker of wild triumph crossed the centurion's face, but before it could howl in celebration, a figure towering like an iron pillar strode straight through the smoke and stepped across the threshold.
The figure wore streamlined power armor and held a massive bolter in hand, radiating a chilling, razor-sharp killing intent.
Even through the visor of the helmet, the centurion could feel the lethal menace bearing down from that gaze.
It opened its jaws, intending to shatter the terror in its chest with a roar, but the moment its mouth parted, an incoming bolter round punched straight through its cheek.
*Boom!*
A metallic jet blasted through its skull, painting shredded flesh and brain matter across the wall behind it.
Having dispatched it effortlessly, the armored figure immediately shifted aim to the next target and pulled the trigger, providing cover as his teammates surged into the plant.
"...Head didn't grow back. Not the aberrant strain from Broken Blade Mountain—just the regular variety."
"Whatever they are, just wipe 'em out!"
"Clear the compound. Leave none alive."
"Copy that!"
Clad in Dragoon power armor, Lao Bai personally led eleven players outfitted in Xiaguang power armor straight into the paper mill.
The thunder of bolters echoed throughout the building, mingled with the roars and agonizing wails of the mutants.
Twelve against a hundred, yet the outcome was never in doubt—it was a completely one-sided massacre.
Against mutants, the Alliance never took prisoners, and they pulled no punches.
After a futile bout of stubborn resistance, the last centuria was completely annihilated.
With the fighting on the island concluded, Lao Bai received good news from Midnight Chicken Slaughter: sailors from Anle Island had boarded the destroyer Reef via speedboat.
According to cached data retrieved from the communications terminal, the Anle Island fleet had successfully pinpointed the North Island fleet's coordinates. They relayed the data to the Alliance Air Force while simultaneously committing all three of their nuclear attack submarines.
Two Thunder fighters that had recently touched down at Port French Fries scrambled once more, rocketing toward the coordinates provided by the Anle Island fleet to paint targets for the land-based missile launchers on Ring Island.
Unfortunately, the enemy was not foolish enough to sit idling in one spot waiting for Alliance planes and submarines; they had already relocated.
Considering the old coordinates might be a fresh trap, General Li Minghui conferred with the Alliance forward command and ultimately called off the pursuit, pulling back the three submarines.
After all, those three attack subs were the South Sea Alliance's greatest trump card, and they could afford no mistakes.
Besides, the spoils from this battle were already bountiful enough. On top of the converted freighter landing ship, they had managed to capture a Federation destroyer. There was no need to gamble over marginal gains.
Presently, the Northern Federation had only four ships left: one battleship, one cruiser, and two destroyers.
The South Sea Alliance boasted one cruiser and three destroyers—four surface combatants in total—plus three nuclear attack submarines.
Furthermore, the submarine aircraft carrier currently under construction was nearing completion, and the Meissner effect armor—the ultimate bane of electromagnetic railguns—was about to be fitted onto their cruiser!
Before long, they would be able to orchestrate a final showdown to drive Zhalas and his lackeys completely out of the Southern Sea. There was no reason to squander their strength right now.
Once the operation concluded, Fang Chang led personnel into the island's interior to soothe the anxious residents, while Lao Bai and the brothers of his corps swept the battlefield.
Across the entire engagement, ten players were killed, two seriously injured, and twenty suffered light wounds.
Equipment losses amounted to fourteen Type 5 exoskeletons and four Type 6 exoskeletons.
As for the power armor suits, they sustained only minor scrapes that did not even require repairs.
Objectively speaking, the exoskeletons designed by the Northern Federation for the mutants packed a punch, proving far superior to the makeshift scrap armor the mutants cobbled together themselves.
"Holy crap... this caliber must be twenty millimeters." Picking up a rifle that stood over half a man's height off the ground, Killing Dagger gauged the muzzle with his thumb and clicked his tongue.
Though styled like an assault rifle and using a classic stamped-metal receiver, the weapon could hardly be called a firearm anymore. By caliber and firepower alone, it was practically an autocannon.
Catching the heavy rifle tossed by Brother Killing Dagger, Kidney Fighter turned it over in his hands before propping it against the wall alongside the rest of the captured weapons.
"Aside from the mutants themselves, only strength-build brutes could probably even handle this monster."
"What interests me more is their exoskeletons..." Crouching beside a mutant corpse, All Good Names Are Taken By Dogs examined the steel plates strapped across the body.
Armor plating roughly two fingers thick formed the breastplate. Facing the rounds fired by the bolter, this fellow had actually tanked four direct hits!
As for the other pitted indentations that had failed to penetrate, they looked like hits from rifle and machine gun fire.
Clearly, the vast majority of bullets striking their torsos had been deflected, which was precisely how they had managed to charge through the beachhead machine gun fire and push into the urban sector.
Had they been aquatic mutants or the Gray Wolf Army of the Xilan Empire, they would likely have perished before even touching the shore.
In truth, from the moment the Alliance's transport planes executed their preemptive landing and deployment, the outcome had been decided.
Along the coastline, forty iron crabs that had been lurking offshore crept onto the beach one after another.
Popping open his amphibious personal armor, Midnight Chicken Slaughter leaped down and strode briskly toward the urban area. His appearance—completely covered in welded steel plates—gave the guards helping clear the battlefield quite a scare, making them think the mutants had returned.
This guy looked far more terrifying than any mutant; probably nothing on him was flesh and bone except his head.
"Quite a haul, brothers!" Midnight Chicken Slaughter grinned at the pile of military gear spread across the ground.
Unsealing his power armor helmet visor, Lao Bai shot him an exasperated look. "A bunch of junk. Ordinary people can't use any of this gear."
Killing Dagger stroked his chin thoughtfully. "It wouldn't be hard to mount them on fixed pintles, but the ammo doesn't match our twenty-millimeter rounds... Yeah, thinking about it that way, it really is a white elephant."
All Good Names Are Taken By Dogs nodded. "The most valuable parts are the batteries on those exoskeletons. Even though they also use solid-state hydrogen storage, the energy density of their design is notably higher than our current issue models."
Crawling Model Worker exclaimed, "Damn, the gear mutants get is better than ours!"
Piltover Paratrooper cursed, "Race traitors! Fucking human traitors!"
Xiao Xiao Xiao Bookworm muttered, "...Why does that sound so weird coming from you?"
While the players were brainstorming how to salvage the spoils, Fang Chang arrived at the center of the island and met the survivors pitching tents.
Overlord transports had air-dropped tents, sleeping bags, and other pre-packed survival supplies across the island.
Over seventy thousand evacuated residents were packed into an area of just a few square kilometers. Tents huddled shoulder to shoulder, leaving the open ground so congested that paths had disappeared and barely any walking space remained.
Lacking meticulous prior planning, Police Chief Dumen had been run ragged, leading his men about putting out metaphorical fires, only for the situation to remain a chaotic mess.
Fortunately, their friends from the Alliance had arrived to take charge, finally bringing stability to the area.
Listening to the distant rumbles of artillery and gunfire, amid the cries of infants in the camp and the noisy squabbling of the crowd, the survivors wore looks of anxiety and dread.
Once the sounds of gunfire and shelling finally ceased, some began moving restlessly, eager to head back to their homes.
At the entrance to the shelter zone, a crowd of survivors gathered before the checkpoint, looking at the guards and Alliance soldiers standing watch.
"Sir, is the war over? When can we go home?"
"My baby needs a diaper change and nursing, there's no room here at all..."
"Damn it, someone took a dump in my tent!"
Seeing several guards beside the checkpoint look toward him at a total loss, Fang Chang sighed and raised his right arm, shouting, "Quiet, quiet! Please listen to me!"
The voice booming from his helmet's external speaker overwhelmed the clamor, silencing the unruly crowd.
Once the commotion died down, Fang Chang continued in a calm, patient tone.
"The fighting is over, but we cannot let you return to your homes immediately—"
"Why?!"
Before he could finish, an anxious voice interrupted him.
It was a mother clutching a child. She wore pajamas and her hair was in disarray, clearly having fled her home in a desperate rush.
The infant cradled in her arms whimpered and cried, whether from hunger or sheer fright from the earlier explosions.
Understanding her feelings, Fang Chang explained patiently, "This is for your own safety. Those creatures were man-eating mutants. They had no intention of fighting a counter-insurgency campaign; they came to loot, burn, and slaughter everything, and they certainly didn't hold back during the fighting.
"We need to sweep the urban area for explosives, especially anti-personnel mines and unexploded grenades... Those brutes neglected weapon maintenance. While such devices are mere toys to us, they are lethal to you. A single small mistake could take out your entire family. Are you certain you want to head back right this second?"
Halfway through his explanation, the crowd fell completely silent. No one interrupted him again.
The people here were well-educated after all. While not as submissive or easy to manage as the survivors in Port Golden Gallon, they were reasonable.
Furthermore, nobody wanted to gamble with the lives of their families.
The mother frantic to nurse her baby and the survivors squabbling over tent swaps all quieted down.
Of course, their grievances remained real. Resolving those issues was precisely the duty of Dumen and his fellow guards.
Pausing briefly, Fang Chang continued, "In addition, we must ensure no straggler mutants are hiding in any homes. You wouldn't want to walk through your front door and be met with a nasty surprise, would you? Now, please return to your tents. We will address your concerns one by one."
Under his persuasion, the crowd gathered before the checkpoint finally dispersed, and the guards standing watch let out a collective sigh of relief.
The night seemed to regain its tranquility.
Gazing toward the city and the smoke curling around its perimeter, the guard standing at the checkpoint could not help but reminisce about the past.
The era of Shelter 70 didn't seem so bad after all.
Though most of the power and wealth had rested in the hands of the shelter residents, people had at least been fed and clothed back then. They hadn't suffered through life without water and power, nor had they been dragged into a war that wasn't theirs.
The young man could not resist murmuring a complaint.
"Why... why does misfortune always chase us down? Is it wrong to just want to live our own lives?"
Overhearing the lament, Fang Chang thought for a moment and remarked casually, "That's only natural. Because... you didn't care."
The guard froze, staring at him in bewilderment, unable to fathom why he would say that.
How could they not care?
They cared about their fate more than anyone, whether in drafting that common constitution or in taking up arms for it now.
When Zhalas wanted to deploy North Island troops to Sandbar Island to 'protect' their families in their stead, they had risen up without hesitation.
Yet Fang Chang continued, "...Whether it was Zhalas or Li Minghui, as long as it didn't disrupt the peace on Sandbar Island, you didn't care... Am I right? Until it finally started hurting, wasn't that what every single one of you thought?
"From your perspective, choosing your constitution or choosing Zhalas are both viable paths. The difference is merely whether you hold your fate in your own hands, or hand it over to someone you trust. Neither choice is inherently wrong, but the problem is that you treated your own fate with indifference, thinking whatever happened was fine... In that case, you have to be ready to suffer the bitter consequences of indifference."
Clearly, the survivors of the Southern Sea were less hardened to hardship than those in Bolo Province. The moment Zhalas lifted a little finger, they couldn't endure it.
Yet that was not necessarily a bad thing.
Intuitively, enduring hardship seemed harder than enjoying comfort, with the latter appearing much easier. In reality, however, many things were counterintuitive.
"I'm not mocking you, just answering your confusion. We're glad you chose to stand with us, and we will never let you down—after all, the Administrator watches over us all... Besides, cheer up. At least your homes are still standing, and you'll be able to go back in a couple of days."
Looking at the silent young man, Fang Chang gave him a comforting pat on the shoulder, handed the post back to his captain, and left the checkpoint to attend to other matters.
***
On the official website of *Wasteland Online*, during peak login hours, an unexpected announcement suddenly appeared on the forum.
[Southern Front Progress: The Southern Sea front has fully advanced to the central region. Southern front players, please keep up the momentum and push to land in Haiya Province soon to link up with our northern forces.]
Yaya: "Holy crap... the speed at which you guys uncover the map is insane! ((((;°Д°))))"
Makabaka: "+1, Yaya hasn't even left the newbie village yet. (Funny face)"
Yaya: "??? What the hell, I've traveled far from home too, okay?!"
Tail: "Whoa whoa whoa, Brother Fang Chang is so fast! I feel bad for Miss Dolly!"
Ye Shi: "Damn, carving a path out of sheer nowhere. Not bad. (Funny face)"
Sisi: "Sorry, my Ah Wei took the wrong meds again. (o__*)"
Fang Chang: "It's fine, I don't mind. Nobody roasts me as brilliantly as my own brothers. Used to it by now. (Side-eye)"
Ye Shi: "Translation: Fang Chang says, 'I wrote that in my little revenge notebook.' (Funny face)"
Tail: "B-b-big brother, I was wroooong... (||°Д°)"
Yaya: "Wait, where is this Sandbar Island anyway? You guys are expanding the map so fast I'm getting dizzy, ya. T.T"
Lao Bai: "Just northeast of Port French Fries! A few hundred nautical miles away. Come on over and visit! Make yourselves at home! (Grin)"
Stop Bullshitting: "Sea fishing map updated! Let's roll, boys!"
Mole: "Eight islands left out of thirteen. We've already cleared the Ten Peaks over here, so you boys down south need to step it up. (Funny face)"
Midnight Chicken Slaughter: "Stepping it up, stepping it up."
Thanks to the breakthrough in the Southern Sea, the players' operational area expanded by yet another island.
Beyond discussing the new map of Sandbar Island, the forum conversations focused primarily on the battle itself.
Life-profession players with an interest in military engineering were particularly keen on analyzing the performance of the Alliance's new weapons throughout the engagement.
While most of the underlying technology was developed by Alliance engineers and technicians, the imprint of their wild brainstorming could be seen across much of the equipment.
WC Really Has Mosquitoes: "Speaking of which, was this the maiden combat sortie for the Thunder fighter?"
Luo Yu: "??? What the fuck, wasn't my flight the maiden sortie?"
WC Really Has Mosquitoes: "Yours doesn't count. Your targets were a bunch of mutants. What's the difference between flying a Thunder and flying a W-2 against them? Your kill efficiency was probably worse than a W-2!"
Luo Yu: "%$#@!"
WC Really Has Mosquitoes: "@Feng Qing @Gui Gui, come out and tell us, how'd it feel? (Drooling)"
Gui Gui: "Ew! Why're you using that emoji?"
Feng Qing: "Well... super fast? And the plasma engine is way smoother than jet engines. Comparing them is like an electric car versus a tractor."
Gui Gui: "Totally! But the top speed doesn't feel that different? Honestly, I felt like the Lingyun fighter's top speed was slightly faster."
Luo Yu: "Makes sense. Our plasma engine tech is just getting started. When steamships first came out, sailing ships blew them out of the water too, but over time the gap widened."
Commander Spring: "Yeah, that's the logic. Plus, atmospheric limitations must be taken into account. I remember the lore mentioning that plasma engines in the Human Alliance era were developed for deep space from the start, while atmospheric craft only ever evolved up to jet engines. Blindly copying the Human Alliance's legacy playbook isn't necessarily the way to go."
Tyrannosaurus Warrior: "Copying the playbook... What are you guys even building? (Sweat)"
WC Really Has Mosquitoes: "Kids shouldn't worry about grown-up stuff, go play your game. (Smug grin)"
Tyrannosaurus Warrior: "I don't even have a fucking helmet... Bro, I'm a student, can you lend me yours for a few days? T.T"
WC Really Has Mosquitoes: "...Well damn, my bad."
Aside from the Thunder fighter, the Dragon missiles from Boulder Military Industries delivered an outstanding performance.
The Sea Dragon, refitted by Shelter 70 engineers with an EMP warhead, disabled the destroyer Reef's radar and sonar in a single strike, creating the pivotal opening for the Jungle Corps' boarding operation.
Furthermore, this marked the very first combined-arms joint operation across land, sea, and air since *Wasteland Online* launched!
While it lacked the raw intensity of the Battle of the Ten Peaks, the sheer variety of equipment deployed and the tactical and strategic nuances involved far surpassed it.
It wasn't just the players who thoroughly enjoyed the operation. Far away on the northern front, Chu Guang read through the complete after-action report and gave a heartfelt praise of his own.
"...Sandbar Island is secured. Deploying a radar station and missile batteries on the island will further constrict the operational space of the North Island fleet."
Inside the captain's quarters of the *Heart of Steel*.
Having finished reading the report, Chu Guang shifted his gaze to the world map hanging on the wall. The red dashed line drawn across the middle of the Southern Sea had now been inked in solid.
Just minutes earlier, great news had arrived from the Anle Island shipyard: they hoped the Alliance Air Force could assist in conducting sea trials for the *Conch* submersible carrier.
The day of the decisive battle was drawing near!
Chapter 762