Chapter 1: Separation
"My name is Nana, and I'm a survivor of Laupa's Ore Star, the Federation Army's LPTSD0713 number, and I now broadcast all asteroids in the mine on full frequency. The planet has fallen, the invaders are creatures never seen before, they are ferocious and blood-loving, they can extract energy from ore crystals to speed up their reproduction, and you must not underestimate their intelligence, the commanders of those creatures are extremely cunning.
My name is Nana, and I'm a survivor of Laupa's Ore Star, a federal army number LPTSD0713, and now broadcasts all asteroids in the mine on full frequency. I'll travel through the asteroid belt to Kannada, and I'll be playing this broadcast along the way, and I'll be carrying out the mission given to me by Commander of the Federal Third Fleet, Quill Saveras, to destroy and consume the ore crystals so that more people can live like me. If you hear that, destroy or consume the local ore as soon as possible, and tell more people to do so, and then leave the mine."
Speaking of this, the girl paused, and then said, "The Federation fleet is trading our lives for time, please cherish it"
After Nataya recorded this passage, she adjusted the radio short-range radio station to the asteroid belt whole territory broadcast mode, which is an inefficient information channel that works so well under extreme conditions.
When the asteroid-wide broadcast sounded, Nataya put on her backpack again and walked out of the communication hall of Xinghai Mining's Lapa headquarters, where she found the maintenance warehouse according to the commander's instructions. Sure enough, there were two mine commuters parked there with rainproof cloths, and when the rainproof cloths were opened, you could see that the engine compartment of one of them was still open, which should have encountered an invasion before the maintenance was completed, while the other ship was labeled with a "maintenance completed" note, and the date of the next maintenance was also marked on it.
"It's finally time to get out of here" After Nataya removed all the locks and cables of the commuter machine, she pushed aside all the shelters and boxes in front of the commuter in the maintenance warehouse. After a long time, he finally cleared a road to the square.
When the golden power armor dragged the commuter to the main square of Xinghai Mining, Nataya once again experienced the embarrassment of being drained of her physical strength. After climbing onto the commuter plane, she didn't even have the strength to take off her power armor, so she sat directly in the cab, opened the cuirass, and let the dwarf peas jump out.
"Sister, where are we going?" Orlando asked, helping Nataya with her unloaded backpack.
"Kannada, a safer place than here, a place where you can live...
Nataya jumped out of the power armor and started the commuter machine, and the familiar blue light of scanning was immediately confirmed, "Private LPTSD0713, please confirm this route" A star map appeared.
The design of the commuter itself is relatively small, with a chubby body, short wings, and a cornerable plasma engine that supports vertical lifting. Commuters without crankshaft engines are largely impossible to sail over medium and long distances, which are often light-footed. However, in the asteroid mining area where the navigation environment is complex and the crankshaft acceleration is basically impossible to use, this short-distance vehicle is extremely practical, with low construction cost, low operating cost, low maintenance cost, and high safety, which is simply a treasure of the enterprise.
"Target Kannada" After Nataya chose the destination, the intelligent system began to calculate, and an electronic tone imitating a mezzo-soprano replied "Since all the energy replenishment ports in the asteroid belt are currently offline, the route from Laupa to Kannada is optimized as follows: starting from WD101, passing through twenty-three ore sites, LS7781 through the gravel area, and entering Kannada. All the areas along the route are rich in minerals, and the reserves of high-energy gas and ore crystals are relatively rich.
Nataya looked at the map of the crooked route that crossed the entire asteroid belt and made a final confirmation. Not only to replenish fuel, but if you can consume or destroy the ore crystals in the rich ore area along the way, it can be regarded as delaying the pace of these bugs.
A low-cost commuter machine can't be almost perpetual like a power armor with a miniature reactor. The plasma engine is good at everything, but it is more sensitive to fuel consumption and reserves, and high-energy gas is still more valuable in the civil affairs star, after all, the micro reactor cannot meet the needs of large civilian vehicles and war weapons, and the large reactor is not equipped except for the largest warship ---- starship of mankind, no one dares to install it... How many people dare to carry a nuclear bomb on their backs... However, the presence of high-energy gas almost everywhere in the mining area has reduced the cost of this consumption and storage to almost zero.
But it was peacetime... Fortunately, Nataya doesn't have time to dislike the commuter and need to refuel along the way, as long as she can leave.
"The route has been confirmed, take off now, the first stop target: WD101, Martha Mine, the flight time is about four hours and thirty minutes, I wish you a pleasant journey"
After a slight vibration from the cabin, the commuter slowly rose into the sky. It was the first time in so many days that Nataya had looked at the settlement beneath her feet from such an angle. Black organic matter covered more than half of the soil, the former star port, and the reloading project port were all wrapped around all kinds of black blood vessels-like biological limbs, and the most central area of black organic matter, under a raised sarcoma-like thing, all kinds of wriggling bugs and eggs were nearby, densely packed.
"This is the body of that fat brain worm... It's ugly," Nataya pouted. "Yes, it's ugly," Orlando echoed as he lay to the side, chewing on a sausage.
As the commuter continues to rise, the blinding sunlight shines on the portholes, making it impossible to open your eyes. Suddenly, the intense light became dim, and then dimmer and dimmer.
"Huh" Nataya raised her head and turned her gaze to the sky, she saw an extremely shocking scene.
In the sky, where no clouds could be seen, dense black insect swarms flew from the eastern sky towards the settlement, gradually blocking the sun's light. From time to time, a thick energy beam pierced out from between a group of insects, and more than ten seconds passed, and there were still no flying insects in the position where the energy beam was penetrated, as if a black stall had been scalded with a hole. Before the hole could be filled, it would be pierced again by another beam of energy in another area.
"That's, the starships of the Third Fleet," Nataya looked at the behemoths that were passing through the atmosphere behind the swarm... "One, two, three... Wow, there are more than a dozen, sister, look, these big guys are so powerful! Orlando cried out excitedly as he chewed on the sausage.
"Don't drop the things in your mouth, I'm not going to clean it up for you" Nataya didn't reply to a word, her most disgusting thing is that the dwarf bean is blindly excited when he eats, because when he is excited, the things in his mouth are easy to leak out, and the most disgusting thing is that sometimes the dwarf pea will pick up the food that has leaked on the ground and eat it...
"It seems that they have also found brain worms" Nataya had already seen that the starship that had broken through into the atmosphere this time seemed to have a clear goal, the huge hive on the ground.
Sure enough, the starship formation that crushed the flying insects into the atmosphere flew straight towards the hive, and as they flew, they could see the starship's main gun muzzle flashing with flickering light caused by energy storage.
Just when the starship formation was approaching the worm nest, more than a dozen main guns fired out in a salvo, instantly blowing up the worm nest on the ground into mud, and at the same time, the starship that had broken through the atmosphere also opened the ejection hatch, and hundreds of X-type air fighters flew out of the starship and began to attack the wriggling insect eggs on the ground and drive away the flying insects that approached the starship.
"Kill them!" Orlando muttered and shouted loudly, before the words fell, Nataya suddenly became nervous for no reason, "No" Nataya clearly sensed the mental power of the fat brain worm, and it seemed that it was not affected at all, and the original location of the nest worm revealed a large empty hole, and countless eight-legged insects with a thick pipe crawled out of the hole, and began to drill down to the ground near the entrance of the cave one after another, stabilizing his body, and then aiming the tube on his back at the fleet in the sky.
"It's a trap!" Nataya banged on the porthole and shouted!
At this moment, the starships of the Third Fleet seemed to have heard Nataya's exclamation, and at the same time threw a large number of light bombs and white phosphorus bombs, filling the sky with light and heat. The hundreds of fighters that seemed to be preparing to dive turned around in the air, dropped almost all the mounted bombs, and then flew back to the ejection bay one after another.
The sky is lit up, all the insects have lost their target, if someone simulates the insect swarm at this time, using a thermal imager and an infrared sensor, he can only see the sky full of heat sensing and red light... It seems that the Third Fleet has gradually adapted to the way the swarm fights.
As the starship formation walked away in style, Nataya was very happy, because she had almost felt the anger of the fat brain worm from the fluctuations of mental power in the sky... At this time, the electronic tone prompts "A one-way radio message from the Third Fleet has been received, is it playing?" β
"Play," Nataya replied in surprise.
A flirtatious voice came from the loudspeaker, "This is the seventh starship formation of the Third Fleet, I'm Captain Seaver, Seaver Ossery." Although this escort was relatively successful, don't think that we are here for you. General Quill said the bugs had prepared a trap for us, so here we are, hahaha! How's that, is this cheap to take advantage of beautifullyγγγγγ β
Nataya's head is full of black lines... This man ...
Then, Captain Syver's tone in the text message lowered. "Nana, we haven't been able to break through Laupa's near-star defense line for a landing operation, and we can't follow you into the asteroid belt... Our soldiers of the 7th Formation, all from there, that is our hometown. Laupa is too miserable, don't let the tragedy repeat itself in the asteroid belt, we will clear the invaders here as quickly as possible, the landing force has already been gearing upγγγγ I'm here, on behalf of the Seventh Formation and the survivors of the asteroid belt, salute you!~ Smack!"
As the sky rises in height, it gradually darkens, and that kind of black is not hopeless, and the universe is always dotted with endless light in the darkness.
Nataya's commuter aircraft and the seventh formation of the Third Fleet are already flying farther and farther in two different directions.
But it was the first time that Nataya's heart was so close to another group of people.