"Let’s not get careless! Dragon Base is not to be underestimated!" Mike warned again.
"Don’t worry! This time we’ll definitely take down Dragon Base!"
The Sea Eagle Country Fleet rushed toward Dragon Base at full speed. The patrol boats that had been monitoring them immediately reported the development.
Ji Yizhi glanced at the map and said, "It will take them about six hours to get here. Old Long, you need to hurry!"
Long Zhan nodded. "I understand! But you all need to prepare your defenses, too. At least hold out until I arrive!"
"Don’t worry. The three aircraft carriers are at the base. Blocking their attack won’t be a problem. I’m just afraid they’ll flee!" Ji Yizhi replied.
"Where could they run? As long as our patrol boats are on them, I’ll take them down even if I have to chase them all the way around Blue Star!" Long Zhan replied with a smile.
"That may be so, but wouldn’t that be a waste of time?" Ji Yizhi shook his head. "In fact, we could have dealt with the Sea Eagle Country Fleet long ago. The only reason we didn’t was to avoid wasting time!"
"This time, we need to completely eliminate these threats. Even if it takes a little extra time, we have to finish them off!" Long Zhan replied with a smile. "Besides, this won’t delay the base’s development. After all, development is up to the scientists. It doesn’t have much to do with us combat personnel!"
"Scientists need to be safe, too. How could it possibly have nothing to do with you? The development of the base concerns every single one of us!"
Seeing that Ji Yizhi was about to launch into another lecture, Long Zhan quickly cut him off. "I’m about to engage the United Fleet. Talk to you later!"
With that, he immediately ended the call!
Seeing Long Zhan hang up so abruptly, Ji Yizhi paused for a moment, then shook his head in resignation.
And indeed, Long Zhan was about to encounter the United Fleet.
Those reinforced ships were incredibly fast, their speeds all exceeding one hundred and twenty kilometers per hour.
The two forces were only three hundred kilometers apart, and the enemy was still heading toward Dragon Base.
In less than two hours, the two sides would clash!
"Doesn’t this feel a little strange? Our United Fleet has been here for so long, yet we haven’t seen a single one of Dragon Base’s patrol boats?" someone in the United Fleet wondered aloud.
Theoretically, with how fast Dragon Base’s patrol boats are, they should have spotted us easily by now. But we haven’t encountered a single one, which isn’t normal!
"Maybe their patrols haven’t reached this area yet. Or maybe they saw how many ships we have and didn’t dare get close?"
"Whatever the case, everyone stay ready for a fight!"
"Report! A group of twenty-one ships has been spotted ahead! They’re moving fast, estimated time to contact is ten minutes!" the scout boat up front immediately reported to the United Fleet.
"They’re finally here. Everyone, prepare for battle!" Deline immediately ordered over the channel.
"Don’t be nervous. The fact that they’re coming out to engage us this early means they’re trying to trade space for time. It just goes to show they aren’t confident they can withstand an attack from our United Fleet!"
"Exactly! They must be worried they can’t handle us if we all rush them at once, so they’ve come out to harass us!"
"It’s a mere twenty-one ships. We outnumber them more than ten to one! Nothing to be afraid of!"
Mike, who was livestreaming the event, also saw the scout boat’s report. He immediately issued a warning: "Be extremely careful! If all twenty-one of those are their modified, high-performance ships, we’re in big trouble!"
As he spoke, the fleet led by Long Zhan had already entered firing range.
Without wasting a single word, Long Zhan gave the order to attack!
"Prioritize their capital ships and aircraft carriers!" Long Zhan commanded in a deep voice.
"Yes, sir!"
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Long Zhan’s ships immediately fanned out, beginning to encircle the United Fleet before launching their attack.
Not to be outdone, the United Fleet began to return fire.
But the reinforced ships were far too maneuverable. They would fire a salvo and immediately pull back, moving out of the enemy’s firing range!
The shells fired by the United Fleet only found water.
This was a new tactic Long Zhan and his crews had developed to take full advantage of their ships’ superior performance: weaving in and out at the very edge of the enemy’s firing range!
Of course, this demanded an extremely high level of coordination between the pilots and spotters!
They had been training this tactic constantly, and now they had more or less perfected it.
The United Fleet found that their shells couldn’t hit the enemy at all, while the enemy’s shells were striking their ships with pinpoint accuracy!
Furthermore, the enemy’s shells were exceptionally powerful. A single hit caused severe hull damage!
"They’re just too nimble!"
"How are their shells so powerful?"
"Fuck! Two of our ships have been hit in the engine room! They’re dead in the water!"
"Same here!"
They had only ever heard that Dragon Base’s high-performance ships were formidable. Now, experiencing it firsthand, they finally understood just how formidable they truly were.
"Everyone, spread out and advance! We have so many ships that it’ll take them time to pick us off one by one. If we can just get closer, we’ll have a chance to land a hit!" Deline urged over the channel.
Without hesitation, the fleet followed Deline’s orders and charged toward Long Zhan’s position.
Seeing their maneuver, Long Zhan curled his lip. ’How naive.’ "Maintain distance and keep attacking. Everyone, pick up the pace! The Sea Eagle Country Fleet is still waiting for us!"
"Yes, sir!" the crews responded.
The battle that followed was completely one-sided.
Despite its numerical superiority, the United Fleet was being utterly dominated by Long Zhan’s twenty-one ships.
"It’s over! All of our ships have taken hits!"
"Their ships are just too advanced! We can’t hit them at all! We’re just sitting ducks out here!"
"I can’t take it! I’m pulling out! From now on, count me out of any battle involving Dragon Base! They’re completely unbeatable!"
"I want to retreat, but I can’t even do that! I’m raising the white flag!"
Soon, some of the ships raised white flags, while a few others tried to flee.
"Surrender immediately! For any who attempt to flee, we will hunt you to the ends of the earth and drag you back!" Long Zhan broadcasted.
"Don’t be afraid! They only have a handful of ships! If we scatter, they can only chase a few of us!" one captain said.
The words had barely left his mouth when a swarm of patrol boats appeared, tailing them from a distance.
"It’s over! We’re being tailed, and we can’t shake them!"
"Just surrender! We can’t beat Dragon Base!"
"We can’t win, and we can’t escape! Mike, you idiot! You’ve doomed us all!"
By this point, Mike was already commanding his own fleet to retreat.
He hadn’t expected the United Fleet to be defeated so quickly, nor had he imagined Dragon Base possessed so many modified ships.
"All those aircraft carriers, and they still lost?" Mike’s brow furrowed.
An aide beside him said resignedly, "Against ships that nimble, an aircraft carrier is more like a sitting duck."
Mike sighed. He knew that all too well.
"Dragon Base has truly risen. There’s nothing we can do to stop them now."
"So, where do we go now?" the aide asked.
"To the other side of Blue Star, of course. As far away from Dragon Base as possible!" Mike replied with a helpless tone. "Let’s just hope Dragon Base doesn’t chase us that far."
Meanwhile, within the United Fleet, the Lvzhi Fleet had not yet given up and was still trying to escape.
This was mainly because Deline knew that if his Lvzhi Fleet was captured by Dragon Base, their fate would be grim.
Just then, a high-speed object suddenly appeared on their aircraft carrier’s surveillance radar!
"Report! A high-speed unidentified object is closing in on us fast—it’s already made impact!"
The report wasn’t even finished when a massive explosion rocked the Lvzhi Country’s aircraft carrier.
BOOM—
Deline lost his balance and was thrown to the deck by the force of the blast!
"What the hell was that?" Deline demanded immediately.
"I think we were just hit by a Torpedo!"
"A Torpedo? Where was it fired from?" Deline asked, frowning.
"From under the water, it looked like!"
Deline froze.
Just then, the spotter shouted again, "That huge, oblong object we detected earlier—it’s closing in on us fast!"
"Damn it all! Do the evolved creatures also kick you when you’re down?" Deline cursed.
But as the massive object drew closer, the radar image grew clearer. The spotter realized with a shock that it was a submarine!
"Captain, it’s—it’s a submarine!"
"What? That’s impossible! No submarine would dare submerge in these waters now!" Deline yelled as he rushed over to the radar console.
Looking at the image generated by the radar scan, he saw it was unmistakably a submarine!
Deline was utterly dumbfounded.

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