CHAPTER 431: CHAPTER 431 THE POWER OF FIREARMS

It’s easy to shift strategic thinking, but it is much more difficult to change the ingrained notions in people’s hearts. This is also true in the military, where the army has always been seen as the big brother, even in the subconscious of many air force and navy warriors.

There’s a very practical issue at hand: the army has the Star Martial Army, but the air force and navy do not. Army warriors have experience in actual combat, having fought the Demon Clan and Exotic Beasts with real swords and spears—something the air force and navy lacked.

Without actual combat, without meritorious deeds, without an inherited unit designation, what do you have to be arrogant about?

So, when the naval first-level alert sounded and was personally broadcast by the Military Region commander informing that this was not an exercise, many warriors still subconsciously believed it to merely be a real combat drill.

"Captain, I didn’t hear who was selected to play the role of the Blue Army. The intelligence work for this exercise was impressive; not a hint of it leaked out."

"Shut up! Didn’t you hear the commander say this is actual combat? An exercise? Drop your exercise mindset! We raise an army for a thousand days just to use them for a moment, and now it’s finally our navy’s debut. Everyone, stay sharp! Just do as we trained. Everyone was adept during practice, and if anyone dares to mess up at the crucial moment, I’ll have your head."

Seeing the captain’s serious expression, the officers immediately fell silent. Yet, one or two still murmured while preparing, "Is there really actual combat? I just can’t believe it..."

Outside the naval port, dozens of trucks roared in. From each truck, scores of agile warriors leaped off. After disembarking, they immediately formed neat rows.

Navy warriors busily working on the various ships in the distance all turned to look. At the sight of these troops’ uniforms, they all stopped in their tracks.

"Star Martial Army? Carrying standard-issue personal weapons?"

"What is the Star Martial Army doing here?"

Soon, they found out: thirty Star Martial Army warriors for every warship, totaling over two thousand on seventy ships. They quickly headed to their respective ships, standing motionless by the rails.

"Eh? It’s not the usual Star Martial Army; it’s the Xuanwu Corps from within the army?" a navy warrior suddenly realized. The Xuanwu Corps deployed, and boarding warships to provide support? Is this *really* actual combat?

They were certain of this because if the navy were merely supporting the Star Martial Army, there would have been no need for such high-level warships. A transport vessel would have sufficed.

Amidst a series of horn blasts, the warships, like giant beasts, set out to sea. From receiving the orders to setting sail, just under an hour had passed.

The naval forces of the Southeast Military Region were located near the border of Modu City and Zezhou Province. Reaching the designated sea area would only take one and a half hours. The order called for arrival at the target location in three hours, but the command from navy headquarters was to arrive in two and a half, half an hour ahead of schedule.

"What’s happening? How come our compatriots in Zezhou Province sent the latest intel that the Southeast Military Region’s navy is massively mobilizing? Could there be an exercise?"

In the basement of a villa, the Demon Clan spy leader was assigning tasks to his subordinates when he was abruptly interrupted by intelligence brought by a contact from Zezhou Province.

"The report says they’re heading toward the sea area east of Modu City. But I was at the base a couple of days ago, and I didn’t see the navy setting up any floating targets. How could there suddenly be an exercise?"

"Could our base have been exposed?" a Demon Clan spy blurted out, shocking everyone in the secret room.

"Impossible!" the red-clothed spy shouted fiercely. "Our base is hidden so secretly beneath the East Sea, and we’re in complete silent mode. How could they possibly discover it? As long as we don’t expose ourselves, there’s no way they could find us."

Meanwhile, the East Sea navy arrived at the designated location. But once there, everyone was dumbfounded. There were no floating targets, no Blue Army hypothetical enemies. Were they planning to shave a layer off the seafloor bed?

After all the vessels were properly aligned, each ship received a set of coordinates: a kilometer below the sea surface. The instructions were to lock all weapons systems that could reach the target and aim.

Seventy warships, plus over thirty submarines, were present. Each warship was loaded with an average of one hundred twenty deep-sea missiles—nearly ten thousand missiles in total. Add to that sixty missiles per submarine.

The deep-sea missiles brought this time were all of the most destructive kind. If Modu City hadn’t been so close, the Southeast Military Region would have considered using nuclear weapons directly.

"The Liaoyuan is locked on—"

"The Roland is locked on—"

"The Zhanlan is locked on—"

As each ship locked onto the target coordinates, the naval commander picked up the microphone with a solemn expression. The difficulty of this mission... there was absolutely no challenge to speak of.

They had been given precise coordinates for a stationary target, with no need to worry about counterattacks. This mission was like an execution at point-blank range.

But the commander couldn’t help feeling solemn, for this was not a drill; this was actual combat. In other words, this was modern weaponry’s debut against the Demon Clan.

For the past fifty years, humanity’s ten thousand years of accumulated scientific civilization had finally begun to flourish. This moment would reveal whether technology could keep the Demon Clan at bay and if human weaponry could inflict significant damage, much like it did against Star Martial Warriors.

"Fire—"

The commander’s order to fire was heavy, as if delivered with suppressed emotions. Almost simultaneously, all the warships pressed their launch buttons. Instantly, the sea surface where the ships were located slightly undulated.

Since they were firing missiles at an underwater target, there was no stunning visual spectacle, nor could they see the moment each missile launched from its silo toward the target.

At a mere twenty kilometers from the target, missing would be embarrassingly inept. Thousands of missiles, like swordfish in water, streaked straight toward their destination.

In just a few minutes, missiles rained down like showers, striking the seabed just above the Demon Clan base. These missiles were all equipped with burrowing capabilities, not designed to explode upon impact. If they said a kilometer under the seabed, it would be a kilometer!

The seabed above the cavern was quite brittle. While it could withstand the water pressure, it was no match for the assault of the missile warheads. The first missile accurately broke through the top of the cavern, plunging ruthlessly into the base below.

Surging seawater instantly poured in from the breach in the cavern roof, but in that same instant, the missile detonated.

BOOM—

The intense shockwave instantly shattered the culture tanks within a a radius of several dozen meters. The Biochemical Demon Soldiers inside didn’t even have a chance to wake up before being blasted into shreds.

But this was just the beginning.

Immediately after, countless missiles fell.

The Demon Clan base spanned merely about ten square kilometers. In such a compact area, over ten thousand missiles hit their targets with precision. It was like unleashing a six-barrel Gatling gun on a small rabbit, ravaging it non-stop for a full ten minutes.

To say the Demon Clan base was shattered would be an understatement. It was pulverized into a paste.

BEEP BEEP BEEP—

An alarm suddenly blared from the Demon Clan spy leader’s phone. He hastily pulled it out and was instantly dumbfounded. This was an alarm system he had installed at the base. It had no early warning or monitoring capabilities; its sole function was to alert him to return and fix any malfunctions.

But now, the alarm’s code was GG! What did GG mean? Don’t bother coming back; the base is gone...

Could it be...? Instantly, a chilling speculation struck his mind. He recalled the intelligence reports from his compatriots in Zezhou Province two hours ago. Even though I already deduced it was impossible for the base to have been discovered... but why... why did this happen?

By this moment, if he still didn’t realize that the Southeast Military Region’s naval fleet was attacking his base, then all his years as a spy would have been for naught.

"Leader, what’s wrong? Why are you suddenly stunned?"

"Our project, which consumed countless resources and thirty years to complete, the eighth-generation Biochemical Demon Soldier program... it’s over. The base at the bottom of the East Sea... is gone!"

"What? What happened?"

"Impossible! How did humanity find out?"

"It’s true. I will investigate and find out the details. Afterward, the Tianjian Bureau will have a report."

"Reporting to the Commander, all frontline combat missions have been completed. Please give instructions!" At naval headquarters, a Major General saluted the commander and asked loudly.

"Approach with the submarines and assess the battle results."

"Yes!"

An hour later, underwater footage from the submarines appeared. At the target location on the seabed, there was a ruin stretching over twenty kilometers, filled everywhere with blasted debris.

Looking at these fragments, words like ’not a single body left intact’ and ’shattered to pieces’ were the only ones that came to mind. Among the debris were many limb fragments of Biochemical Demon Soldiers.

Even though they were obliterated, not a single intact body could be found. But these fragments clearly told everyone that this place once housed an army of a hundred thousand Biochemical Demon Soldiers, each with an average strength at the Galaxy Stage.

If they hadn’t discovered it first and struck preemptively, these Biochemical Demon Soldiers would have stormed Modu City and destroyed Jade Country’s second-largest metropolis. At the same time, these hundred thousand Demon Soldiers could have turned the eastern neighboring countries, and southern countries like South Mountain Country and Flying Rain Country, to ash and oblivion.

"Combat mission successfully completed! Please direct the strike fleet to return in triumph!"

As the naval commander’s words ended and he gently put down the microphone, intense cheers erupted throughout the command center. No matter how simple this battle had been, the actual victory was substantial.

Annihilating a hundred thousand Demon Soldiers—what a great achievement! The Southeast Navy might not have made a move for decades, but when they did, they secured the biggest military achievement since the modernization of their forces.

Truthfully, even the Star Martial Army members assisting alongside had their eyes turn red with envy. Damn it! Couldn’t you have left a few stragglers for us to mop up? Did you have to be so brutal? One barrage of missiles and they were all pulverized, not even a chance to struggle!

When Wang Lan received the news, he and his team members had just arrived at the entrance to the Demon Clan’s city government office building.

Upon seeing the message, Wang Lan didn’t show much excitement but rather let out a long sigh of relief. Only someone who had personally seen the sheer number of culture tanks there could truly understand the profound shock and worry such a sight would instill. A hundred thousand Biochemical Demon Soldiers... what an endless threat that would have been? And now, it has finally been dealt with.

"Report!"

"Come in!"

Wang Lan and his seven team members stepped into the conference room. Inside, apart from Cheng Jianlong and high-ranking city government officials, were military bigwigs, the Qing Emperor, and Eld Di.

This lineup was so impressive that not only Jiang Xinyu, who had never witnessed such a grand assembly, but even the elites of the S Independent Squad, were trembling with tension.