Starting from the Planetary Governor

Chapter 1015: Chapter 549

The three Strike Cruisers at full throttle, picked a direction to retreat.

To be honest, their retreat looked quite embarrassing.

The enemy’s firepower was a bit too fierce.

When they had not yet escaped the enemy’s fire range, the firepower of the Retribution-class Battleship and the two combat barges added up to about 2.5 times that of the three Strike Cruisers. After being fiercely attacked, one Strike Cruiser that was targeted, its Void Shield directly overloaded and shattered. The hull also took two shots from the Loyal Rage Macro Cannon.

Fortunately, the Strike Cruiser class is fragile only in comparison with battleships. Compared to a typical Lunar-Class Cruiser, its armor thickness is still superior, so it couldn’t be destroyed by just two Loyal Rage shots.

The hull was damaged, but not fatal; at least it didn’t damage the propulsion system.

This is crucial.

Fighting is definitely out of the question, so now, the best they can rely on for survival and keeping the ship intact is the propulsion system.

The fleeing Alliance Fleet also employed a strategy of spreading out their forces. Several Lunar-Class Cruisers along with some smaller ships chose many different directions to run.

However, for these distractions, the Fury Fleet simply ignored them. Despite having an overwhelming number of ships, they had no interest in splitting forces to hunt, their eyes fixed on the three battlecruisers of the Alliance.

The biggest fish had already been lured out, so naturally, no one wanted to look at the small fry.

Bai Qifan could only find some comfort in the thought that with a dozen or so ships running in different directions, some would definitely survive.

As for the three battlecruisers directly under his command, they did not choose to scatter.

If they split completely in three different directions, with the speed of the battlecruisers, it was indeed possible for one or two to escape. However, just as he did not immediately activate the warp drive sacrificing one or two to escape to the other side, Bai Qifan so far still sought to preserve all three warships.

If they separated while fleeing, the lack of mutual cover might still result in losses.

This was something Bai Qifan did not want to see.

He did not deny stepping into a trap, he had to take responsibility; but precisely because of this, he had to personally lead the troops out of the trap.

The three battlecruisers gradually picking up speed, covering each other, broke out of the firing range of the Retribution-class Battleship with the strongest firepower at the cost of one shattered shield.

Once the Strike Cruiser class revs up speed, the Retribution-class definitely couldn’t catch up.

However, the two flagship combat barges belonging to the two Starfighter Battle Groups of Furyflame and New World’s Torch, were not slowpokes.

Combat barges are rare ships within the Human Empire that only Interstellar Warriors use, serving generally as flagships for battle groups. They don’t follow standard designs but are custom-made according to each group’s needs from friendly and well-connected Founding Worlds.

Some combat barges pursue speed and agility, similar to battlecruisers in this respect; some pursue robust ship structure and heavy firepower, akin to typical battleships; some have tendencies towards carrier design.

Due to their custom build, many of the ships’ performance attributes vary widely. Some powerful combat barges, ready to spend the money regardless of cost efficiency, can even achieve carrier projection capabilities, battleship-level firepower, with decent speed.

Of course, to achieve this, first, the Founding World accepting the custom order must have excellent technical capabilities; on the other hand, such piled-up performance on a single ship certainly has worse cost efficiency than using the same money and resources to build two or even three similar-class ships.

Moreover, combat barges, or all Interstellar Warrior-exclusive ships including Strike Cruisers, have one feature: designated Interstellar Warrior crew positions. From firepower to ship management to communication command, there are dedicated roles allowing the Interstellar Warriors to connect directly like using a genetic neural interface to handle black shell armor.

This way, the ship’s performance can be further enhanced beyond the original hardware baseline.

In any case, human crew’s manual level is definitely not as good as Interstellar Warriors’ direct neural connections.

Furyflame and New World’s Torch’s two combat barges were not taken to such extremes.

Bai Qifan, through brief observation, roughly judged that the performance of these two combat barges was between that of a battlecruiser and a battleship. The firepower was a bit less than that of the Retribution-class, but they also had two X-class colossal cannons; the speed was a bit slower than battlecruisers but not by much, they could at least keep up.

In space, this resulted in a long, see-saw chase.

In the chase, Bai Qifan successfully led the three battlecruisers to another warp point and performed a warp towards the southern part of the star map.

Just before they entered the warp state, the two combat barges arrived at the warp point with their destroyer groups.

They couldn’t catch up.

After entering the Star Realm Tunnel, Bai Qifan’s heart, which had been tense for days, could finally relax slightly.

Should be safe?

But soon, the navigator conveyed a message.

The enemy hadn’t given up the pursuit.

They followed right behind, also activating their warp drive, entering the same Star Realm Tunnel.

In the Star Realm Tunnel, the two sides wouldn’t fight. There’s no space concept within the tunnel, the ships supposedly in the same tunnel actually cannot meet.

However, this raised another issue: the time to complete the star realm warp no longer depends on the ships’ normal speed or maneuverability but solely on the warp engine’s specifications and efficiency.

The three Alliance-built Strike Cruiser classes used high-quality warp engines. But restricted by the power module of the battlecruisers themselves, not as large as battleships, they had to make trade-offs in normal engines, firepower output, warp engines, energy shields, etc.

In this situation, the material quality of the warp engine is good, but the specifications are somewhat limited.

Generally speaking, the warp engine is important, but it is not the most important. With trade-offs, mono-purpose warp engines tend to have their specifications reduced, sacrificing some performance to save more energy supply for other systems.

This was also done during the design of the Strike Cruiser class.

So, the question becomes, did the two combat barges on the other side, and the Retribution-class that would reach the warp point latest half a day later, also have reduced warp engine specs?

They shouldn’t complete the Star Realm warp before us despite our earlier start, should they?

If that happens, it’s all over.

By then, the enemy, with their Void Shields on and firepower ready, will start scanning, locking, and firing the moment we appear in the real universe, to deliver the most severe blow to our fragile battlecruisers, before they can even raise their shields.

Information searches and probes within the Star Realm Tunnel are not easy. However, no matter how difficult the objective conditions are, under Bai Qifan’s stern orders, the navigation psychics and Star Speech Psychics on the three ships tried all they could to detect and explore the enemy’s situation.

During the approximately two-day-long Star Realm warp, Bai Qifan’s mood fluctuated greatly.

The main reason was the varying reports they received.

At one moment, the enemy’s warp situation seemed problematic, estimated to arrive at the target point a day later than us. But before Bai Qifan could rejoice, the next updated information revised the estimation, showing the enemy’s speed is faster than theirs, causing worry and tension again.

Sometimes, Star Speakers and Navigators would give different situation reports.

Once the warp journey was about to end, the information gradually became unified: both parties should arrive at the destination point almost simultaneously.

Bai Qifan was not very satisfied with this answer.

What does “almost” mean?

How much time is “almost”?

After the warp completion, the time is extremely precious. A difference of five to ten minutes may not sound like much in normal times, but in this golden moment, it is the difference between life and death.

Whoever arrives ten minutes earlier will have the enemy fleet with shields raised by the time they exit.

If it’s ten minutes earlier, not only could the shields be activated, but with the switch to normal engines, there would be ten extra minutes to pick up speed, making it harder for the enemy fleet to catch up.

However, the psychics really had no way to provide a definite time.

Bai Qifan also couldn’t continue to press them.

What’s the point of pressing?

With a knife to their throat forcing them to report a time would just lead to fabrication. Making decisions based on inaccurate information would lead to bigger problems.

He could only prepare for the worst-case scenario.

And at the moment the warp completed, and the ships entered the real universe, this worst-case scenario indeed unfolded.

The enemy ships were right in front of them.

The Fury Fleet’s two combat barges, along with their fleet group, arrived first!

Seeing the figures of those two massive ships appearing on the observation screen in the bridge command center, Bai Qifan nearly faced a cardiac arrest.

But in the next moment, he realized there was still hope.

The enemy ships’ shields were not up!

Only a few patrol ships had their shields activated!

This means the enemy might have arrived only a short while before them!

There’s still a chance!

Standing at the bridge’s center, he clenched his fists tightly.

He remained silent, not issuing any command at this moment.

Because there was no need. Contingency plans were all set in the previous days. At the instant they enter the real universe, the shield system and engine system were already fully operational. Everyone on the ship knew what they had to do and understood it was a race against time between life and death.

If the ship is destroyed, no one survives.

At the critical moment, although the opponent hadn’t activated their shields yet, their cannons fired first, launching a barrage towards the Alliance ships!

The other side chose to prioritize firing systems first!

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