The Almighty Ring

“Transport 1, ready to deploy!”

“Transport 2, ready to deploy!”

…

The green light signaled and all the Androids’ eyes lit up. The transport ships that the Androids were in had only just flown over the North Pacific Ocean when they were given the signal to deploy. The hatch door opened wide and all the Androids took off in an orderly fashion.

“Z9 Special Assault Team! You are now clear to intercept enemy targets!”

This Z9 Android was no different from your average Z8 Android. The only difference between the two models was an additional wing pack attached on the backs of Z9 model Androids. The packs were not designed by the Chinese military but were taken out from the alien aircraft carrier Jiang Fei had given them. These packs, that were retrofitted on the Androids, were drones.

What made them so special was their flight engine. Unlike a traditional thruster, these alien drones used Anti-Gravity engines that allowed aerial flight. These drones had very little power and if used properly, would require repeated resupply from the aircraft carrier. However, if their on-board weaponry was not used, their flight time would be extended exponentially.

Not only did the drones provide flying capabilities to the Androids, they also granted the Androids better movement in the air and on the ground. Attack and defense would be a breeze with their increased speed.

Retrofitting the drones onto the Androids was no easy task but it was still achievable. The engineers and mechanics of China’s military were smart enough to make the drones into a flight-pack. Unfortunately, that was all they could do. To reverse engineer the drones was completely out of their league as human technology could only do so much.

The American Radar technology was good but not good enough to detect anything smaller than a standard Unmanned Aerial Vehicle measuring roughly at 5 meters across and 5 meters in length. The Z9 and Z8 Androids were built to look like humans, hence, their height was maxed out 200cm max. Their cross-section area was too small for even the best radar system the enemy had. The Anti-Gravity engines these Androids were using did not emit any form of heat. Hence, when the Americans detected the dropship, they had failed to notice the Androids deploying out of them.

“Look! They slowed down and turned around! Hah! They are running away! They saw us and decided to call it a day!”

“Well, time for us to chase them!”

The American Naval fleet dispatched their own fighter jets and sent them out to destroy the Chinese dropships.

Turning away from the enemy would leave one’s back exposed to attacks. It was a chance that the Americans would not want to let go.

“Seeking authorization for weapon safety release… Approved.”

“Seeking authorization to destroy enemy aerial combat vehicle… Approved.”

“Activate weapon system. Target enemies and destroy them!”

In less than a minute, the Android aerial fleet was only 10 kilometers away from the enemy. The leader requested permission to start the war and obtained authorization just as quick.

“What’s that…? I see… several faint lights…”

“Raptor 1, I don’t see anything. Over.”

“Raptor 2, it’s dead ahead… I can’t tell—!”

Before the pilot of Raptor 1 could even identify what the blinking light was, a powerful beam of condensed particles was fired and his fighter jet was destroyed. The particle beam weapons that the Androids were firing were all set to the lowest power output. Their current targets were normal humans and their typical Earth-based technology. If they could go lower on the power settings, they would since Earth-based technology was too weak to be used against the particle beam weapon.

One by one, American fighter jets were shot down by the Androids. The particle beam weapons fired compressed particles at almost the speed of light. The enemy pilots could only see the gathering of the particles but would never be able to dodge the incoming beam attack. Even if they could, their fighter jets would not be able to evade it.

“Echo 1 to Central! We are under attack!”

“Echo 2 to Echo 1! We need to move!”

“Whiplash 1 to Central! Negative on bogey! It almost seems like they are invisible!”

“Get out! The lights are coming again! GET—!”

…

More than ten fighter jets in several different formations were destroyed. That was just the start. Right then, the fighter jet pilots were utterly confused at what they were facing. The closer the Androids got to them, the faster they would be destroyed. The worst part was they could not even lock on a target! Without one, the only weapons they could use to shoot blindly were their on-board machine guns. Compared to the Androids’ particle beam weapons, their machine guns were akin to soap bubble toy guns.

The Central Command of the American Navy had no clue as to how they were to deal with an invisible and unknown enemy. In response to such a threat, they had sent out more fighter jets to provide reinforcements. Unfortunately, all the reinforcements that were sent in were destroyed all the same. In less than a minute, more than a hundred American fighter jets were destroyed.

“How can this happen?” Halsey grunted, pressing his hands on his forehead to ease the headache he was having after he had received the bad news from the frontlines.

“Dammit!” he roared. “Are we being fooled? What is it about China not having powerful weapons? We look like retards fighting against an enemy that we cannot even identify!”

The man was talking about news and information gathered from spies in China. They had been informed that China had never been able to produce any powerful aerial weaponry due to poor power-sourced technology and engineering failure. Halsey had deduced that the news provided by the spies were fake since they were currently being attacked by something that they could not even look at, right after they were trying to chase the Chinese dropships.

“Commander! The Unknowns are coming for us!” cried one of the crew members that was working on the computers.

“Will someone get a hold of our fighter jets in the air? How is it that up till now we are still unable to even see the enemy?! Have our boys in the air fire in the general direction!” Halsey roared. He had to assume the worse. Right then, they had just lost their cavalry. The only target left in the enemies’ radar would be the aircraft carrier. Even though the aircraft carrier was heavily armed with guided missiles and AAM, they were rendered useless if there were no targets that were locked on. The “stealth fighters” of China were too good to be tracked. The best chance Halsey had was to wait until they obtained optical images of his enemies before he could use the missiles.

“Commander! I’ve found their carrier!”

“Let down the rain!” cried Halsey. If he could not attack the fighters, he could at least disable their carrier ships.

Missile silos were opened and guided missiles were launched. Even the submarines that were supposed to be hidden had surfaced to sea level to unleash their payload. In several seconds, pillars of smoke filled the sky as missiles soared. Their target was Qin Tian’s Navy fleet.

Qin Tian’s fleet of ships comprised of only ordinary ships that could be easily tracked via satellite positioning.

“Sir, we have incoming missiles,” said the operator to the ship’s commander.

“Release the drones,” he replied. Qin Tian’s ship was being targeted but the orders to release the drones were given by one of the smaller “unimportant” ships that were out further in the sea. Given their position, they were better at intercepting enemy missiles or even ICBM. The drones that the commander of the ship had ordered to release were alien drones, similar to the ones that the Z9 Androids were using as their flight-pack. Unlike them, these drones were tasked to do one thing, intercept and disable incoming missiles. They were so small that they could fit inside a shoebox. They were all equipped with high-intensity laser weapons that could destroy missiles simply by igniting anything volatile inside the missiles.

BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!

Explosives filled the sky as the missiles exploded close but within a safe distance from the Chinese fleet.

“Nice one!” cried Qin Tian when he saw the explosion far away. Although he had known the existence of the drones, he had never witnessed what they could do. When he heard that there were missiles coming toward their direction, he was a little worried. However, the man sat down and sipped on his chai tea happily as he received confirmation that all the missiles were intercepted by the shoebox-sized drones.