Stellaris from the Automata Era

The only fleet that can affect the output is the defending fleet.

Of course, although this method is relatively safe and will not cause equipment loss, due to various factors such as altitude, distance, and wind direction, orbital bombing is a strike over a larger area.

The point of impact of a single firepower may result in an error of the distance between provinces.

So it is certainly impossible to run a safe distance relying solely on human legs.

11b and the others immediately realized this after countless beam weapons and explosive missiles broke through the atmosphere and the tree people's anti-aircraft firepower network landed.

In an instant, they all gave up the pointless running and instead lay on the ground with their heads in their hands to defend.

However, when an explosive fell and exploded about ten meters away from them, 11b immediately couldn't hold it anymore.

She immediately sent the most urgent communication message to the commander: "You are about to hit friendly forces!"

Of course, this bombing should not stop because of 11b's communication.

Anyway, the humanoids all have new bodies as an option for resurrection. Exchanging the materials of a few humanoids for silencing the enemy's air defense in an area is a big profit no matter how you look at it.

Therefore, the bombing continued, and only after everything calmed down did it return to the initial condemnation phase mentioned above.

"So you called for a fire strike from the fleet after just one look?"

"You can't blame me for this! Who knew they'd say 'Orbital bombardment is ready, you have three minutes to evacuate'? They didn't even think about who could evacuate in three minutes!"

7b naturally had to try her best to refute it. She had to establish the necessity and correctness of calling for the bombing.

"And when we sneaked in this time, we found that the tree people were capable of resistance. It's obvious that there should be a well-trained army stationed here. This should be a military base!"

"Wait? Why are there still resistance from the Tree People when you sneak in? Shouldn't they be unable to see you?"

11b decisively caught 7b's grammatical error, and as she expressed her doubts, 160d also cast a scrutinizing gaze at her.

However, the remaining humanoids seemed to be accustomed to it. Obviously, as members of Team 7b, this was not the first time for them to experience their captain's style.

"Of course, it's because they discovered me, and they didn't want to pretend they were blind. I had no choice but to kill all these ungrateful witnesses and continue to sneak in."

"That does sound reasonable." 11b nodded after hearing the explanation. After all, it was a covert operation. Killing all the witnesses and continuing to hide one's whereabouts did not seem to be a big problem with the explanation.

But 160d soon raised another point: "But before the orbital bombardment, we heard a different explosion. Senior 7b, could it be that your infiltration failed and you're now attacking and destroying them?"

"How can I explain it? It's not quite an attack. When we were dealing with the witness, there was indeed a lot of noise. It was mainly because our Iai technique wasn't reliable enough."

——Why does it sound a bit awkward?

11b and 160d were confused for a while. Iai and the others knew something about it. This came from the name given to a certain sword skill by humans in the old times.

YoRHa's internals actually have a wide range of applications, the most outstanding of which is the 2b of the same model. One of her Iai charges can even cut through reinforced concrete buildings (see episode 11 of the animation for details).

But I didn’t expect that 7b and the others were even more outstanding, and the Iaijutsu they slashed out even had explosive special effects.

"All in all, this dive was pretty perfect. After we dealt with the witness, we decisively called for the bombing. The tree people probably didn't have time to react in such a short period of time. They might not have realized that a small group of people had infiltrated the planet to identify bombing targets for the fleet."

"That does sound perfect, so let's get on with it."

Soon a new round of humanoid infiltration operations began.

This time, for safety reasons, they were more careful. After discovering the treeman building complex from a distance, they immediately retreated until they reached a distance they thought was relatively safe.

"Come to think of it, I didn't see it clearly just now. I couldn't see what the buildings looked like or how big they were."

"It's okay. We just need to mark the general location on the map. If we're really worried, we can expand the area a little bit. As for what the building complex looks like..." 7b lowered his head and thought for a moment. "Anyway, it's come to this. We've seen some Ents nearby. Let's just treat it as their army and attack them."

"Wait? Your army standard is just an enemy? I see few of them have weapons, but you consider them army. What if they have weapons?"

"That's a well-trained army!"

At the same time, the planetary commander of the tree people was indeed a little confused after listening to the report.

"The Earth Fleet conducted a exploratory bombing on one of our production areas. Nearly three floors of the remaining personnel were killed, and various equipment was severely damaged. It is estimated that the area's production capacity will drop by 70%."

Listening to the messenger's words, the chief felt no emotion in his heart.

Sacrifice in war is inevitable. The tree people have seen countless blood from their rise to their fall.

Especially the confrontation between civilizations, which can almost be described as "there are no civilians left."

Compared with casualties, it is now more concerned about when the production capacity areas that have just been bombed can be restored.

——No, there is no need to recover.

A 70 percent drop is actually no different from complete failure.

After all, that is not the only production base on this planet. As a resource planet, what they lack is production modules for minerals and various equipment.

Maybe if a production area is bombed, they can recover quickly, but since that area has been exposed, if the earth can be bombed once, it can be bombed a second time.

It is a very foolish choice to focus your energy on an area that can be bombed indefinitely.

If it is the only one, the general officer may try to repair it and urge the workers to quickly resume construction and production in preparation for the next struggle.

But there is no need for this at the moment. After all, compared to the equipment, the remaining people on the planet are more valuable, especially the engineers.

After receiving the message from the mother planet, it has decided to dismiss a large number of highly technical personnel and stuffed a large number of engineers into the transport ships that were originally intended to transport resources so that they can escape safely.

If it could make this decision again, it doesn't know whether it would regret it.

It is undeniable that compared to the workers who have been handed down for a long time and can only perform some simple processes, those talents who have knowledge in their heads and can draw and layout are indeed valuable and are the first targets.

But from the perspective of time, there was actually no time for all personnel to evacuate.

Even though it thought it had done its best, a small number of highly technical personnel were still stranded.

And when the Earth fleet once again stood above their orbit, the consequences of the decision finally backfired.

The planetary shield, which could have lasted for a long time, broke down in less than half a day and could not be restarted. At the same time, the air defense equipment in various places was paralyzed after a round of fire. It was only by relying on the strong production capacity to replace all of them that the equipment could continue to support the operation.

It is true that equipment can be replaced, but planetary shields cannot be repaired and restored to operation quickly with a small number of personnel.

Similarly, if you want to hold the planet for a long time, subsequent maintenance of equipment is also essential, but there are currently no more manpower available.

Not to mention that the production capacity area is so large that it is not enough to rely on workers who can only tighten screws to rebuild it.

After a long pause, the commander gave his orders to the messenger. "Notify everyone to abandon repairs to the production area and evacuate to a safe area immediately."

However, just as it finished speaking, the bark wrinkled slightly, and it called the messenger back, adding, "Tell other areas to produce some confusing equipment to make the Earth in the sky think that something has resumed working."

Being stuck by the Earth fleet is indeed a trouble, and the commander-in-chief still doesn't understand how they found their construction area.

From what the Tree People know, it should be difficult to distinguish vegetation and buildings on Earth from high altitude.

After all, in terms of style, tree people have the characteristics of natural optical camouflage. As long as they stay in the dense bushes, they are at least at the level of Yuegong (no typo) probes.

This is no longer visible from high altitude.

"An Earth ship had made a tentative landing before. Maybe it was just a coincidence." It consoled itself.

For the safety of the production capacity area, there is actually a cluster of air defense facilities dozens of kilometers away. The previous failure of the Earth attack may have roughly revealed the location of some firepower points.

However, at high altitudes, this falls within the range of a blind bomb. If it was intended to attack defensive buildings and it accidentally hit the target, it is indeed a reasonable explanation.

But whether this speculation is true or not depends on what the Earth does next.

After all, if you really want to rely on blind bombing to clear the defense, then it is impossible to hit only one point, but to draw a rough circle and attack all of it.

The fact may be just as the chief thought. After waiting in his office for a while, news of the bombing of the earth came out again.

This time it was a larger-scale bombing, or a strike with a wider spread.

Including the air defense cluster, all the surrounding bushes were given special attention.

"Very good. Although it is just as I guessed, it is not something to be happy about." If it continues like this, the planet's defense network will be razed to the ground. At that time, the Earth can land as if it were an empty land, and then hunt down and kill every citizen on it.

Now the Treeman Chief Officer could only hope that his own fleet would quickly regroup and come to the rescue. "Besides, we don't have much land to begin with. A vital resource planet has been cut off. How anxious are the people up there?"

It muttered to itself.

ps: 7b was originally the E-type YoRHa humanoid. In order to disguise his true mission, he claimed to be a B-type and served as the captain in many descents.

Combat experience: On the eve of the original descent operation plan (abandoned), the team led a reconnaissance of super-large mechanical life forms, but was destroyed and judged to have failed. The mission was handed over to 2b to complete.

On the eve of the sudden death of the Human Parliament, he was ordered to lead a team to infiltrate and eliminate the disloyal humanoid high-ranking officials. After the infiltration failed, he switched to attack and annihilation, and called in a flying device to bomb, which was successful. However, because of the noise he made, he was sentenced to face the wall in the lunar bunker.

Later, as instructor Yoerha, she led combat training in the Koprulu Sector. For unknown reasons, her combat style shifted from artillery fire to swordplay. Overall, she seems to be a shooting type. —By, 7b's resume.

Chapter 321: Calling the Commander Back to Sleep

“It looks like they’re doing pretty good.”

11b Yan Luo, who was far away on Earth, naturally knew what they did.

Sitting in his chair, Yan Luo looked at the report and kept praising it. It seemed that the overall evaluation of Cygnus on the battlefield was indeed not low.

However, perhaps his admiration caused some strange chemical reaction, as Popola, who was standing beside him, did not echo him as usual.

"How is that good?" she sighed. "To forcefully land on a planet that's lost air superiority, to lose a large number of humanoids, and finally have the army commander lead an armed reconnaissance himself, running to the front lines to send a beacon, in my opinion..."

Bobolla paused, frowning, clearly trying to choose the right word. "To me, it's a complete mess."

Even from the literal report written down, Popola felt that it was a great shame and humiliation. It was disorganized, missed opportunities, and extremely poor. It took several attempts to break through the defense circle of a galaxy.

How did they win in this way?

"Maybe you had too high expectations of them, aiming for a quick and easy victory from the start."

Yan Luo curled his lips.

As a humanoid, Popola probably still has higher than normal expectations for her compatriots.

This is like an ordinary worker who has just entered the society. Before being hired, the salary was agreed to be between one thousand and ten thousand, and then his mind directly drifted towards the highest level.

It was not until the actual salary was paid that I realized I was at the lowest level. Naturally, I felt dissatisfied and resentful after such a huge ups and downs.

Bobo La is in this state of mind right now.

"If you were like me and didn't think they would win at first, you wouldn't have such a big emotional swing."

"Wait, if my Lord doesn't think we can win, then what's the point of us going to war?"

"Training." Yan Luo replied succinctly, "Of course, there's also a certain chance of winning. Although this is a bit of a gamble, it seems I won."

His words caused a brief silence. "Of course, it's not all a gamble. I've said it many times before, Cygnus is a strategically important region for the future. Plus, our old enemy (the Ancients) is also there. Whether we capture the system or defeat them, it's a win-win situation."

Popola has always believed that humanoids have an obligation to serve humans, and they need to fulfill both human ambitions and human goals.

Humans are responsible for thinking, and they are responsible for doing, but she now finds that the limitations of the human form make it difficult to accommodate humanity's future vision.

In fact, Yan Luo's next words immediately confirmed her point of view.

"Bobo La, you know, I might be on the wrong track. Compared to machine lifeforms, you might not be suited to handling complex military operations. If I had used the force of machine lifeforms as a spearhead from the beginning, perhaps I could have quickly filled an entire constellation with flags. Of course, that would have been a different story."

"So the adults are blaming us for our incompetence?"

Perhaps sensing that something was amiss in the atmosphere, Yan Luo quickly initiated a heart-to-heart talk. "No, I can only say that mechanical lifeforms have an advantage in terms of force, but compared to you, they have virtually no future."

Bopola knew that the future Yan Luo was talking about had a different meaning. Compared with human forms, the renewal of mechanical life had stagnated for a long time.

This may have a lot to do with the fact that the main perspective is not on their side, but with the rapid growth of various humanoid technologies, it does seem that mechanical life has not made any progress.

In fact, if you think about it carefully, mechanical life forms do not have their own research units. All of their current technologies are partly the legacy of aliens and partly the legacy of the human White Tower.

Basically, they are a patchwork of technologies from both sides.

Perhaps they can make great progress by reversing other people's technology, but their upper limit will be locked.

——No, it’s locked.

Today's round-headed companies are completely dependent on their incredible production capacity to survive, and the size they once had is their biggest advantage now.

In fact, the best state for the earth should be the sincere cooperation between the two sides, with humans using technology to enhance machines and machines using force to maintain order on the earth.

But this requires putting aside the old accounts between the two sides, and it also requires Yan Luo to adopt a tougher approach to resolve the contradictions.

In fact, everyone has some vague ideas about this issue, but no one has ever mentioned it.

"I just thought of this recently, too. But never mind. Let's just take it one step at a time. Just thinking about this gives me a headache."

Yan Luo really wanted to strengthen the humanoid's round head. Even though he had been hitting here and there in recent years, it was mostly out of helplessness.

The Earth's hard power is simply not up to the mark. Whether it is in the Koprulu Sector or Cygnus, it is completely unable to move freely, and has always been playing high-end games.

Faced with this situation, he could only take advantage of every opportunity.

Thinking about it now, it really gave him a headache.