blogombal Chapter 59 Valkyrie Arrives, a Brutal Battle
Chapter 59 Valkyrie Arrives, a Brutal Battle
Two thousand meters above the acid swamp.
The thick radiation cloud was violently torn apart.
With the roar of massive turbofan engines, the Helios Group's vanguard air wing arrived at the battlefield.
Twelve Valkyrie assault transport planes, painted in dark gray camouflage, formed a standard wedge-shaped attack formation, like a flock of vultures that had smelled blood, lowered their noses, and swooped down toward the military base on the ground.
The flight captain leading the team was named Kyle, a seasoned veteran with twenty years of flying experience.
He chewed gum over the communications channel, his tone relaxed and arrogant: "Attention all aircraft, target confirmed."
"There is no ground-based air defense radar lock signal."
"The wild dogs at the bottom nest probably don't even have anti-aircraft machine guns. Maintain formation, and use the first round of rockets to bomb the ground and flatten the wall."
Kyle has reason to be confident.
On the planet Forge VII, the Valkyries are the rulers of the skies.
This heavy vertical takeoff and landing gunship is equipped with not only a terrifying heavy howitzer, but also multi-barrel laser cannons and Hellfire missiles mounted on its wings. Its armor is thick enough to withstand small arms fire.
In previous crackdowns, the moment Valkyrie's engine started, the rioters would scatter in terror.
Kyle pulled the control stick, and the Valkyrie's massive fuselage began to tilt, its thrust vectoring nozzles deflecting downwards, preparing to enter a dive attack trajectory.
However, what he didn't know was...
Right below him in the base, the roof of a hidden underground hangar was silently sliding open.
……
The base's underground command center.
Bauer sat in front of the control panel, sweating profusely, as the screen displayed twelve red enemy signals.
Although he now holds the powerful weapon Andy gave him.
But after all, he was a tech guy, and it was his first time commanding a real war, so he was still nervous.
"Five kilometers away... Entering the optimal interception zone."
Bauer took a deep breath, his finger hovering over the red launch button.
"Boss Andy said that the enemy's weapons are made of paper... the enemy's weapons are made of paper..."
"Damn it! What am I afraid of if I'm made of paper?!"
After Bauer finished brainwashing himself, he pressed the button hard.
"Raptor, attack!"
……
Ground hangar.
Fifteen irregularly shaped, pitch-black objects, each only the size of a washbasin, were launched into the air in an instant, without any sparks.
Raptor-class combat drone.
They rely on anti-gravity engines, which do not generate reaction force by ejecting material backward, but instead directly create a repulsive field that cancels out their own mass.
This means that they have almost no inertia.
Enveloped in an anti-gravity field, the effects of inertia on them are minimized.
"Whoosh—!!!"
The fifteen drones, at a height of thirty meters above the ground, instantly soared to hypersonic speeds, transforming into fifteen black lightning bolts that hurtled vertically toward the Valkyrie formation at an altitude of two thousand meters.
……
air.
Kyle's radar alarm suddenly went off once, then went silent again.
"What is it?"
He glanced at the radar screen with a puzzled look.
Several extremely faint noises flashed across the screen, moving so fast they seemed more like a system malfunction than an aircraft.
"Captain! Something's coming up from below!"
The wingman's voice suddenly turned terrified.
"Holy crap, that's too fast! Captain, the fire control radar can't lock on!"
Before Kyle could react, the fifteen dark figures had already reached him.
The distance between the two sides was reduced to zero in less than five seconds.
Valkyrie flew using atmospheric aerodynamics.
It generates lift using its wings and changes direction using its tail rudder and thrust vectoring nozzles.
When it wants to turn, it must tilt its fuselage and use air resistance to change its course. This process takes time and space, as well as the necessary turning radius.
Moreover, due to inertia, Valkyrie cannot stop suddenly, let alone reverse directly while flying at high speed.
Once its speed drops below the stall line, this massive iron lump, weighing tens of tons, will fall like a stone.
But birds of prey are different.
It is anti-gravity, does not need wings, does not need lift, and does not even need to consider air resistance.
then……
From Kyle's perspective, he saw a scene that completely defied common sense.
A Raptor drone was hurtling towards them head-on at Mach 2.
Logically, at such high speeds, if it wanted to attack, it would have to slow down or accelerate beforehand, otherwise it would crash.
But that drone didn't!
It suddenly stopped less than twenty meters from Kyle's cockpit canopy.
There was no deceleration process; it was as if I had crashed into an invisible wall, instantly going from Mach 2 to a complete stop.
Kyle's eyes nearly popped out of their sockets. If it were a human driver, their internal organs would have already spurted out of their mouths from that kind of overload!
But this is just the beginning.
next second.
The stationary drone suddenly shifted twenty meters to the right, flashing directly into Kyle's blind spot on the flank!
Right-angle maneuver!
This is the domineering nature of the anti-gravity engine; by simply changing the direction of the repulsive field, it can instantly change direction at any speed and in any direction.
For Valkyrie, who was still bound by gravity and aerodynamics, this mobility was nothing short of sorcery.
"He's to my side! He's to my side!"
Kyle frantically pulled the control stick, trying to steer the heavy Valkyrie around.
However, the aircraft's hydraulic control surfaces were too slow to respond, and the fuselage had too much inertia.
By the time he turned his aircraft around, the drone had already flown right behind him.
"Boom boom boom boom boom!!!"
The Raptor drone has opened fire.
The twin-mounted rocket launchers spewed flames.
However, this caliber of explosive projectile is not intended to penetrate heavy armor.
Several high-explosive missiles precisely penetrated the air intake of Valkyrie's massive turbofan engine.
"BOOM—!!! BOOM—!!!"
The missile exploded inside the engine.
The precision turbine blades were shattered, and the fragments swept across the entire engine compartment as they spun at high speed.
Valkyrie's left engine instantly spewed out a plume of black smoke, which then turned into a fireball.
Losing power, Valkyrie began to spin violently and plummeted toward the ground.
But this is only the first one!
Fifteen Raptors weaved through the bulky Valkyrie formation like butterflies among flowers!
They don't need to circle and dogfight; they just need to fire, flash, and fire again!
"Damn it! Damn it!"
"What kind of monster is this?!"
The remaining pilots tried to spread out and retaliate with machine guns and laser cannons.
But their turret rotation speed simply can't keep up with the Raptor's movement speed!
Often, the moment the gun barrel turns, the target is already overhead.
"Pour them with missiles!"
A pilot desperately pressed the missile launch button.
Several Hellfire missiles flew out, trailing plumes of flame.
But instead of hitting the drone, the incident was so close that it also affected a friendly aircraft nearby.
……
"No, we can't play with them anymore!"
In the underground command center, Bauer anxiously watched the chaotic enemy aircraft on the radar.
"These drones are expensive, don't let me damage them!"
"All missiles, fire!"
Bauer issued the termination order.
While still hovering in the air, the Raptor drone simultaneously released the pylons on its abdomen.
"Whoosh—!!!"
In an instant, ten miniature shaped charge armor-piercing missiles were launched simultaneously.
The missiles seemed to have eyes, locking onto the wing roots of every Valkyrie, specifically the main spars.
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"
A series of small fireballs exploded in the sky; although the explosions were not loud, the effect was extremely terrifying.
The Valkyries that were still struggling suddenly had their wings cleanly severed, as if they had been cut off by an invisible giant sword.
Without the lift provided by the wings, the heavy fuselage instantly became scrap metal.
The remaining eight Valkyries lost their ability to fly at the same time.
They tumbled and spun, crashing heavily into the acid swamp with desperate screams.
"Thump! Thump! Thump!"
Huge splashes of water rose dozens of meters high.
The acid quickly flooded the cabin, and even if any pilots survived the crash, they would be melted by the strong acid within minutes.
three minutes.
From the moment they made contact with the enemy to their complete annihilation, it only took three minutes.
Helios's proud vanguard air force failed to mount a decent counterattack.
That's it, that's all.
……
"This...this is it?"
After belatedly realizing the fact that the enemy formation had been completely wiped out, Bauer felt his throat go dry and his mind go blank.
As he anticipated, this should be a tough battle.
He was even prepared to sacrifice more than half of his drones and, in the event of a defeat in the air battle, to activate the ground-based anti-aircraft guns for a desperate fight.
After all, that's Valkyrie!
But now?
What did he do?
He pressed two buttons, one for attack and one for launch.
And then the battle ended?
The extreme sense of unreality left Bauer feeling not the joy of victory, but rather a deep sense of absurdity and fear.
……
at the same time.
Dozens of kilometers away, inside the command vehicle of Helios' main force.
Zeman was holding a cup of coffee, ready to enjoy an aerial massacre of the bottom-nest wild dogs.
Suddenly, the noise on the communication channel stopped abruptly.
Immediately afterwards, all friendly signals on the radar turned black.
"Smack."
The coffee cup fell to the ground, splattering brown liquid everywhere.
Zeman's weathered face wore an expression of utter disbelief.
"Where...where's my plane?"
Zeman rushed to the radar in a daze, his voice filled with disbelief.
"Where are my entire squadron, twelve Valkyries?!"
"They were just there a moment ago! Such a huge bunch of planes! How could they just disappear like that?!"