Long-term salvation

The engine roars!

Hundreds of engines roared at the same time, hundreds of missiles crossed each other with their tails, and the moment the two sides came into contact, several balls of flames bloomed under the blue sky!

The chaff released by both aircraft groups exploded into a silver waterfall in the air, plummeting towards the sea below along with the wreckage of the destroyed aircraft. The countless metal fragments that emerged from this scattered in all directions like rain clouds, shimmering like stars in the bright sunlight.

Who first pressed the missile launch button is no longer known, but as the missile's tail flame pierced the clouds, the entire airspace seemed to be torn to shreds by an invisible giant. The once clear sky was now covered with spiderweb-like cracks, and the smoke symbolizing death and failure spread, gradually transforming into the dark clouds of war.

"These missile tracks are really obstructing our vision!"

"Then get close and use the machine gun!"

"Drones, drones have been observed being released... There aren't many of them yet. The ordnance giant birds haven't returned yet. They were launched from the ground!"

Nearly thirty pure white drones were released. These mechanical weapons, almost half the size of fighter jets, soared into the sky with a sharp whistling sound, shuttling back and forth between the black smoke of the explosion and the orange-red fireballs - locked, and then fired... it was destroyed.

"Thanks, I owe you one."

"Small matter... New drone at four o'clock!"

The Ossia fighters and the Elgia fighters separated to the left and right and continued to fight.

The mercenaries of the Army Without Borders continued to fight in small groups, quickly invading the fiercely engaged airspace, gaining altitude, launching missiles downwards, and then disengaging, repeating this process. As for the Sun Squadron of the Shilaji Kingdom, they were even more aggressive—they charged directly into the enemy group, using the high maneuverability of their Su-30sm to tear through their formation and isolate them.

Hundreds of shadows rolled back and forth across the surface of the sea. The burning wreckage of the destroyed ship was slowly sinking. The blades of the turbofan engine and the vertical tail appeared and disappeared in the waves. The interference clouds of the foil that had not yet completely dissolved reflected strange colors in the sunlight.

Death squatted on the crest of the wave, looking up and admiring the human slaughter.

"Let them see the courage of the Ergia Kingdom, no, let them see the courage of human pilots!"

"Reorganize, we'll overwhelm them with numbers!"

"Damn it, the IFF (Identification Friend or Foe) system is about to overload!"

Hearing the complaints on the communication channel, Rhode didn't say much. He simply lowered the machine slightly to make it easier for him to aim with his head.

Rhodes's sight quickly shifted, locking onto the enemy fighter planes one by one. When the dozen or so frames turned blood-red, he pressed the launch button for the multi-locked missiles.

The small, highly maneuverable missiles in the vertical launch units of the CFA-44's dorsal and ventral bomb bays were immediately launched. Twelve missiles, dragging long gray-white trails, pierced the battlefield, shooting down the locked targets one by one. Twelve fireballs exploded in the mist formed by the trails, and the shock waves carrying metal fragments spread out in all directions, emitting an even sharper whistling sound.

"Ten targets destroyed... not bad results."

Holding the joystick tightly, Rhodes controlled the fighter to start climbing. He bit the breathing valve tightly, resisting the call from the planet amid the inflating sound of the anti-gravity suit. The next second, the brilliant trajectories of the electromagnetic cannon and the tactical laser crossed each other, instantly destroying the drones on the left and right sides that attempted to attack the CFA-44!

"I can avoid it," Rhodes complained in the communication channel, but he only heard the arrogant snorts of the two old men.

With a helpless pout, Rhode reached out and touched Pickman, then said with difficulty without turning his head:

"Pickman, reload! Reload!"

"Meow."

The missiles fired earlier from the fighter's vertical launch unit were immediately filled, and Rhodes seemed to hear Abigail's complaints... The girl was still on the Alicorn directing others to load missiles, and at the same time cooperating with Weihua, using her own abilities to rescue the pilots who fell into the water one by one.

Hopefully, they won't be startled by this.

The number of manned fighters of the Ergia radicals is decreasing, but the pressure of the battle has not decreased at all for the attackers - the drones launched from the ground are filling the gaps on the battlefield, and those who came to seize peace need to return to replenish fuel and ammunition.

At this point, the battle has spread throughout the airspace centered on the orbital elevator:

The battle in the high clouds had entered its most primitive dogfighting phase. Two F-15Cs and three Su-27SMs coordinated to shoot down several drones, but more mechanical creations were swarming from lower altitudes, weaving a chaotic web of flight paths through the narrow airspace. Even at low altitude, the afterburner flames cast scarlet afterimages through the smoke, as if a god had scribbled across the sky with a blood-stained brush.

The battles between humans and between humans and drones never stopped, and the warnings from enemy radar scans almost never disappeared - burning debris fell to the sea like a meteor shower, and the figures of pilots ejecting to escape were condensed into round black silhouettes by the bright sunlight before their parachutes opened - they looked up and saw that the sky was covered by smoke and contrails, no longer the original blue.

Perhaps only by flying higher can we see the true appearance of the sky.

"Tsk, if I had known earlier I would have brought an electromagnetic cannon too. Although loading vertical launch ammunition is also quite convenient."

Thinking of this, Rhodes took a deep breath, turned the fighter plane slightly, and looked up to observe the situation on the battlefield - the sunlight penetrated the gradually thinning clouds, cutting the battle airspace into a maze of light and darkness, and the huge body of the rail elevator cast a dark shadow onto the sea and onto the densely packed city buildings next to it.

"Little Red Riding Hood, how's the situation over there?" Rhodes asked. "Have you entered the orbital elevator?"

"It'll be there soon! These guys actually set up a tank in the hall... Oh, and Shirako flipped it over."

Red-haired Nikki's voice was a little erratic. She didn't take off in her fighter plane, but instead joined the Ronin force with Shiroko to crush the resistance of the Ergia radicals head-on. Furthermore, they also needed to escort Princess Cosette into the orbital elevator and cut off her external energy supply.

Afterwards, they would leave the team to collect technical information about the orbital elevator. For this purpose, Rhodes also gave them the [Box of Shiting] so that Alona could receive the data smoothly.

"That's good. Take your time. Your safety is important." Rhodes felt relieved. But when he slightly tilted the joystick and was about to rejoin the battlefield, a loud, slightly fearful shout rang out over the communication channel:

"Armament Giant Bird!!!"

The wind seemed to stop at that moment. A massive, pure-white entity stirred up turbulence. Its two pairs of outstretched metal wings pierced through the cloud barrier, drawing all human attention to it. But the next second, the warriors, facing an enemy that outnumbered them by several times, cried out in shock:

"It's not just giant ordnance birds—it's drones! Four of these large, weird-looking drones!"

Four gray-black, low-visibility drones streaked across the sky, their canopy sensors gleaming with murderous intent. Four laser beams swept across the airspace, severing the wings of the fighters that couldn't dodge, sending them into tailspins.

ADF-11Fs! They were equipped with the Ergia Aerospace Agency's Copro flight assistance system and the flight data of ace pilot Michael, and there were even four of them! Furthermore, this modular fighter could detach from its core if damaged, carrying combat data and intelligence for a rapid evacuation... These four drones seemed to constitute a subtle provocation:

The drone is challenging the four strongest human aces of this era!

The Killer Squadrons and Gunnery Squadrons of the Army Without Borders tried to keep up, but they soon discovered that even the maneuverability of their F/S-15s was insufficient—the aircraft could, but not the pilots who flew them—and this, perhaps, was a harbinger of the future.

"This maneuverability...are all the radical drones monsters?!"

"It's biting my six o'clock—Ah! Thanks for your help, Mr. Trigger!"

Listening to the noisy voice in the communication channel, Rhode frowned slightly, and controlled the vertical launch unit to fire several missiles again to drive the drone away.

"Hold steady! The entire fleet must stay away from the enemy aircraft. Continue to fight the manned aircraft and small drones, and then conduct the defensive operations as planned." Rhodes suppressed all his emotions and opened the communication channel connected to the Alicorn. "Helen, have the Alicorn surface and use the electromagnetic cannon to shoot down that giant ordnance bird!"

"understand!"

After hearing this reply, Rhode looked towards the giant military bird "Justice" slowly approaching from afar, and then said to the others in the formation:

"Pxiy, Trigger, Mihaly, Let'sDance."

"Wlico." x3

Chapter 292 Dark Blue (4/5·4K)

The countdown to war began.

When the sunlight cast a silver edge on the edge of the cumulonimbus clouds, Rhodes, whose retina was burned by the strong light, began to count. When he counted to the third heartbeat, the airbag of the anti-gravity suit suddenly tightened between his ribs, and his spine felt as if someone had hit him with a hammer from the tailbone all the way to the back of the head.

The CFA-44 fighter began to climb, following closely behind an ADF-11F.

"We must destroy their core!" Rhodes squeezed these words out from between his teeth. He forced his diaphragm to exert force, his lungs struggling to resist the pull of gravity, but every breath still felt like pouring molten lead. "We absolutely cannot let their combat data be uploaded!"

There were no words in the communication channel, only the same heavy and painful breathing sounds.

The ADF-11F's wing layout displayed devilish agility at this moment, and the blue flames from the vector nozzles drew sharp angles in the air that defied common sense. Rhodes could imagine that if an ordinary person were inside, the entire cockpit would have been covered in them by now. At this moment, he could hear the teeth-grinding metallic screams of his own fuselage as it made sharp turns, and a hint of blood filled his mouth.

After attempting to launch a missile but failing to hit the enemy aircraft, Rhodes saw a pink laser beam streaking through the clouds on the upper left. It was Pixy's ADFX-02 illuminating a drone with a laser, but the drone's excellent maneuverability made it difficult for the laser to continue illuminating.

This slight distraction caused Rhodes to lose track of the ADF-11F in front of him. The next second, he heard the maddening beeping of the missile approach warning device, but the feeling of the hairs on the back of his neck standing up came much earlier than the radar warning.

Without any hesitation, Rhodes pulled the joystick hard to perform a 39 maneuver. The fighter plane dived through a thin cloud mixed with black smoke. The negative G overload made the world in front of him begin to be covered with a faint red layer.

But the alarm still did not stop, as fast as tap dancing.

"Tsk, what a hassle!" Rhode gripped the joystick tightly and performed a rolling maneuver to avoid the drone's laser strafing. "It's still a little short..."

An ominous dark red shone at the junction of sea and sky, but this was definitely not the sunset glow. Instead, it was the smoke and dust produced by the combustion of a European and Western warship after it was hit by the laser of the giant ordnance bird, which polluted the atmospheric refraction. Under this blood-red sky, the contrails of eight fighter planes were entangled into a DNA chain structure, and the contrails that slowly dissipated in the wind were embedded with countless flashes of burning thermite.

"Everyone, use all your strength to destroy the giant bird! Start attacking!"

The giant ordnance bird flew with a strange humming sound, as if a demon was whispering. When Rhodes was chased by the ADF-11F and flew over its head, a circular stream of light lit up above the fuselage of this deadly and beautiful giant beast, and a perfect spherical barrier immediately opened!

An orange-red flash suddenly appeared at the junction of the sea and the sky. Ten cruise missiles, trailing flames, crashed into the energy shield, but turned into black explosion smoke the moment they touched the barrier.

Dozens of air-to-air missiles followed closely behind, colliding with the slightly bluish, transparent barrier, leaving dozens of dirty stains. Two narrower electromagnetic cannon trails followed closely behind, but they only barely penetrated, causing no damage to the giant ordnance bird.

"All missiles were destroyed in mid-air."

"The attack failed! The cruise missile did not reach the target!"

The next second, the roar of an explosion was heard in the communication channel. It was the counterattack from the giant ordnance bird - the laser crossed the sea again, cutting a warship in half. The warship, broken into two pieces, rose up and slowly sank - those naval soldiers had to jump into the sea in embarrassment, and were then rescued by the rescue team organized by Weihua.

"What's going on?! Helen, where is the Alicorn's electromagnetic main gun firing?"

"Commander... the jamming... the calibration drone was shot down! We're sending personnel outside to observe..."

"Don't send anyone, it's too dangerous." Rhodes locked onto the ADF-11F, spun the fuselage, and fired vertical missiles. "Lock onto my fighter signal, I'll guide it!"

"But--"

"Follow my orders."

Rod's tone was calm. He gripped the joystick tightly with his right hand and pushed the throttle forward with his left hand. The G-force brought by the powerful force of the CFA-44 engine immediately pressed him down on the cockpit. The anti-gravity suit tore open the skin at the collar, letting blood and pain escape from his body.

While dodging the ADF-11F, he saw a fighter plane emerging from the clouds, its machine gun sending out a string of golden sparks in the air.

"Trigger! Buy me some time," Rhodes forced the voice out of his throat. He felt like he was shouting, "I'm going to guide the artillery fire!"

There was no response, but the XFA-27 had already twisted its fuselage, fired a string of jamming bombs, and simultaneously fired two missiles in the direction of Rhodes. Amidst the eerie whistling sound, the ADF-11F chasing Rhodes quickly descended and performed a standard roll defense maneuver.

After calculating the route and time, Rhodes flew his fighter plane towards the giant ordnance bird, breathing heavily and trying to keep his voice steady.

"Helen, listen to my command, the countdown will begin now——"

Rhodes suddenly found that he could imagine Nikki's wrinkled little face, which made the corners of his mouth turn up subconsciously.

"three."

An ADF-11F drone numbered "3" seemed to have sensed Rhode's thoughts. It streaked close to the sea surface, its nose forming an umbrella-shaped mist, only to have its wingtips slice through it. This looked dangerous, but it was actually within the programmed safety level—but humans are crazier than machines!

The ADFX-02 fighter plane, with its right wing painted red, chased after it at an even faster speed, parting the sea surface like Moses, letting the snow-white waves spread to both sides like the wings of a fairy.

Laser focus!

"two."

The ADF-11F drone numbered "2" pierced Rhodes' climbing route from above. Its engines emitted bright tail flames that were enough to leave a lasting impression on the human retina. Its speed was increased to a level that no flesh and blood could resist - but its path was blocked.

The X-02S fighter plane, engraved with the emblem of the Kingdom of Shilaji, came from the side, aiming at the path that the bloodless and tearless machinery must pass. The old but not confused mind discovered the fleeting opportunity from memory and experience, and surrendered the body to the instinct that had been repeated countless times.

Electromagnetic lasing!

"one."

The ADF-11F drone numbered "1" suddenly appeared right in front of Rhodes and right behind the giant ordnance bird. It flew through the turbulence outlined by the giant propeller blades of its own kind and pounced on the human ace in the strong wind. It was then captured by the eyes of another ace. The three claw marks on the tail of the XFA-27 made Rhodes subconsciously think - maybe I should start counting from "one"?

The simplest and purest missiles were launched, singing the siren's song in the humid sea breeze.

Now, as the data flooded through, the drone numbered "1" gave up interception and took evasive action... This was the difference between machines and humans. They were rigid and inflexible, and could not imagine the extent to which humans could sacrifice for victory.

However, Rhodes had no intention of sacrificing himself, so he released the [Angle of Attack Limiter].

"emission!"

The hypersonic shells fired from the 600mm electromagnetic main gun instantly penetrated the energy barrier and cut the giant weapon bird in half from the middle!

Just like it does to its enemies.

The trajectory of the shell, with a faint arc still lingering, cut through the sky like a sharp blade, glancing through the belly of the flipped CFA-44. The silver snake gently touched and then withdrew from the metal body, as gently as a girl caressing her lover's cheek... Rhodes only felt the scythe of the god of death passing before his eyes.

Of course, it's worth it, just because at this moment, the steel is disintegrating -

Supercritical coolant gushed from the breach in the giant ordnance bird's reactor, vaporizing and dispersing the instant it came into contact with the sea breeze. These highly toxic gases swirled along the still-active propeller blades of the shattered wings, igniting and trailing streaks of orange-red fire. This caused thousands of fragments to melt in the flames and fall as a red-hot rain of iron.

Even in the broken parts, the collapse of the structure has not stopped, and the sound is like continuous thunder. When each large fragment is peeled off and falls into the sea, it will splash waves of varying sizes, scaring away all marine life wandering there.

As the CFA-44 flipped back and leveled off, Rhodes heard only bursts of cheers drilling into his ears, which had already begun to bleed. After taking a few deep breaths, he looked around and asked on the communication channel:

"Where is the other ADF-11F drone?"

"…Trigger is chasing it!"

Without hesitation, Rhodes turned the fuselage sideways and immediately saw the last ADF-11F drone numbered "4" rapidly approaching the orbital elevator. It seemed that it was planning to evacuate the battlefield and upload the data - it was planning to enter the underwater tunnel!

If it were allowed to enter the tunnel and Trigger failed to shoot it down in time... This was impossible, but Rhodes had a better solution.

Thinking of this, Rod brought Pickman into his arms and looked into the cat's eyes. After ignoring the cat's expressions like "Humans are so troublesome" and "What do you want to trouble me with again?", he lifted the cat's body and turned it around so that it could see the drone below.

"Can you open a [door] at the entrance of that tunnel? As for the exit, it should be above the tunnel, but in the opposite direction."

The cat yawned.

Soon, Trigger, who was following behind, saw that the drone entered the tunnel and then suddenly appeared from above - the drone's engine power was slightly delayed, and then it forcibly turned the fuselage and rushed into the tunnel again - after repeating this several times, it chose to give up and rushed into the blue sky again, as if it was planning to drill into the middle hole of the orbital elevator.

"You can't go anywhere, especially not 'reality', which is a place you can never reach!"