Chapter 293: Five-star Admiral

Something happened that no one had expected. Xia Fei actually stopped supplying power to his engine. Actually, Xia Fei had practically devoted all his energy to five major functions of his ship: The proton bomb, the missile system, the target painters, the radar system, and the ever crucial energy-shield system.

Everything else like the propulsion system or any other auxiliary systems were all shut down. At the moment, Xia Fei’s combat strategy was akin to a battle among warriors in medieval times; neither party was willing to retreat or give up. This was a fight in its purest sense, the kind where he boldly gambled with his life on the line.

No one could have imagined such a risky way of fighting would be applied. Xia Fei had always given others the impression that he was shrewd and calculative, yet at this very moment, Xia Fei was like a foolish savage, with a complete disregard for the consequences of his actions.

Xia Fei’s second volley of missiles pretty much struck his target at the same time the enemy’s wave of missiles landed. The two explosions that bloomed into flames appeared at either side of the designated combat area. Xia Fei’s attack appeared to be very weak since he was but one man in the fight, while a beautiful splash of color had been unleashed on Xia Fei’s warship, looking like an exploding star.

The audience stared fixedly at the screen. Even the most optimistic among the crowd refused to believe that Xia Fei had managed to survive that second wave of attack. What they were all interested in was if Xia Fei had managed to eject out in the last minute. If he were to continue refusing to throw in the towel stubbornly, there was no telling how things would end.

“Look, Xia Fei managed to strike down a warship at the very last moment!”

“Yeah, he’s done very well. It’s lucky that he managed to kill one of the warships when facing nine enemies. If I were in his shoes, I would probably choose to get in the escape pod instead of retaliating.”

“Why was Xia Fei targeted by everyone the moment the round began? Could the other participants have already discussed this prior?”

“I doubt that’s the case. The organizers would disqualify them all if this was premeditated. Having worked so hard to get into the third stage, unless they were offered an amount they could not refuse here, no one would actually be stupid enough to violate the tournament rules. Perhaps Xia Fei’s previous performances were simply too outstanding, so he ended up grabbing the attention of all the other participants.”

The audience of course shared varying opinions, while in Sunset Villa, Avril had already gone completely pale. Even a complete layperson could tell how bad Xia Fei’s present predicament was, so what more of Avril, who had stayed up all night learning about machinery?

Back on Earth, Old Porter was bearing a grim look on his face. As a top machinist, Porter spotted some clues and knew clearly what Xia Fei’s strategy was. In his personal experience, Anything Xia Fei did would be risky and insane, no matter what he ended up doing.

As for how it would end, Porter was not in the least bit confident to make such a call. That was because this sort of unconventional warfare event not only tested the participants based on the modifications they had done on their warships, but also challenged their operation expertise.

The more complex the tactics employed, the more refined and precise the warship had to be operated. This round had already gone well beyond the goal of testing the warship’s performance and was now a test of Xia Fei’s ability to adapt under extreme conditions.

*Whoosh!*

While the audience was paying close attention to Xia Fei’s fate, his Kestrel-class frigate came blazing out from the sea of flames to where the enemy warships were.

“Heavens! Xia Fei managed to survive that second wave of attack. He’s really done it this time!”

“That’s impossible! How could a Kestrel-class frigate be able to survive such an attack twice? If the first time was sheer luck, then what was the second time?”

“Look, he’s accelerating in the direction of the enemy ships. Could he still be risking his life?”

“His hull has clearly been damaged, yet Xia Fei is still on the attack? Does he really think that he’s kissed by lady luck or something? He’s practically committing suicide!”

Everyone was reeling once again. The enemy ships were down to eight from the original nine; meanwhile these ships were now sparsely packed together after Xia Fei had lured them for some distance, and he was rushing forward to close the gap between them.

The pilot for warship no. 79 was a middle-aged man with the nickname of Baldy. His pate sported short, brown hair, and though he was not too old, the signs of defeat were already obvious to all; it would not be long before this man became completely bald like his father.

These nine participants had all taken Li Mo’s money, and Baldy was the one who had the most experience among them, having participated in the three Golden Finger Cups prior, which was why he had been elected as the commander at the last minute.

He already knew that he lacked the strength and capability to win in this intense tournament—something he had very clearly known after working so hard for so many years. That was why he had decided to abandon all hope this time, choosing instead to take the money Li Mo offered, which would ensure that he would not have to worry about his living expenses for his entire life. Even if he could not attain glory, he would at least have a mansion and a woman to call his own, as well as anything else he could dream of.

The world hustled for profit, and dangling such huge benefits would surely move quite a lot of people. Li Mo managed to convince all these men, for they were motivated by greed, into doing his bidding without much effort at all.

If the Association of Machinists were to ever learn of all this, they would permanently lose their right to participate in future tournaments, but so what? They had all already gotten paid, so why would they care if they could be a machinist after?

Besides, even if they killed Xia Fei, none of them would be handed over the authorities and dealt with. Every participant had already signed the indemnity clause, so their fate was left to the gods. In any case, it was very common for people to end up dead in such events. There was no evidence that could clearly point Baldy as the culprit. Even Li Mo would use his influence and money to settle everything, and this was something he had guaranteed before.

Baldy, who had truly not expected Xia Fei to survive that second wave of attacks from them, had already given the command for everyone to resume the free-for-all after. Everyone had done exactly as instructed so as to not arouse suspicions from any spectators. After all, nine participants ganging up on a single participant was hardly glorious. If they started to fire at one another after taking down Xia Fei’s warship, that would also be too obvious, and even a fool would be able to tell that there was something afoot.

“Continue to attack and keep it up. Make sure we take him down. Spread out; don’t gather together. We are too close together and might very well accidentally damage one another!” barked Baldy these orders. Their communication signal was being transmitted over an encrypted channel that the organizers would be unable to listen in on.

This was also considered one of the loopholes for this event that they were exploiting. The organizers had provided the participants with plenty of freedom, so the usage of an encrypted channel was not considered going against the rules.

Spread out?

It was already too late for them to do that. Xia Fei had been waiting for this moment the entire time, and there was no way that he would let them get away successfully.

“The hull has sustained forty-one percent damage, structural integrity dropped by nine percent. This ship is now in code orange,” the cool female voice reported.

“Have the energy system operate at full capacity and immediately replenish the energy-shield system and the power of the proton bomb,” Xia Fei ordered. He had completely disregarded the orange warning lights flashing on the control deck.

Phantom already knew that there was no way to stop Xia Fei once his madness took over, so he decided to just shut up and silently pray to the spirits for protection and such. Xia Fei was giving his all at this moment, and trying to get in a word edgewise to him now would just interfere with the young man’s judgement. Phantom figured that it was better to keep his mouth shut and quietly watch the situation unfold, for he believed that even though Xia Fei was someone who took plenty of risks, he was not a fool who did not know his limits; he must have his reasons for everything he just did.

The greatest disadvantage a missile attack had was the need to reload after every volley fired. Furthermore, there was the substantial flight time required. Baldy assumed that there was no way Xia Fei could evade their attack, which was why he had given the order for the other participants to lock onto one another after. This was all so they could give off the illusion of chaos, so by the time Baldy realized that Xia Fei had survived and moved to issue another attack order, with the fire control system and the target lock-on requiring a few seconds to make the necessary adjustments, Xia Fei had already piloted his ship to them and was now in their midst.

“Don’t attack as you wish; if he’s carrying a disruptor bomb, it will instantly scramble your lock-on system!” Baldy anxiously relayed these orders when he saw that Xia Fei was already right before their eyes.

His worry was not unfounded. A disruptor bomb emitting out a signal shock could throw all missile-locking systems into disarray. Though the missiles were able to repair themselves after suffering from such a shock, it would require more time, and given the proximity they shared, these missiles might not have the time to accomplish their adjustment before they ended up exploding on their warships. He wanted for them to attack only after they managed to increase the distance between themselves and Xia Fei so that their side could avoid any losses.

Baldy and his pack did not attack, but Xia Fei did not let such a chance slip by. Two volleys of missiles were successfully fired, ruining another ship with the help of the target painters.

They saw Xia Fei’s warship blast out an allied ship of theirs and then seemingly moved to distance himself from them, but this was when Xia Fei, unexpectedly, changed his course, and using the inertia from that prior propulsion to do an emergency about-turn. His frigate was now charging back anew and was heading right toward them.

“Attack, attack! Immediately launch your attacks!” Baldy exclaimed in realization. It turned out that Xia Fei was trying to keep the fight locked in close range by leveraging on their mentality to avoid friendly fire.

“Even if he’s downed two of our warships, this is still a seven-versus-one fight! Victory will surely be ours!” Baldly bellowed.

*Whoosh!*

Twenty-eight missiles were launched the instant the command went out, flying right at Xia Fei’s frigate, exploding dead center on it.

“So he didn’t install any disruptor bombs! This is our win for sure,” Baldy exhorted with glee.

What he had not thought of, though, was how Xia Fei’s Kestrel-class frigate was like a tenacious cockroach that just would not get destroyed; it barreled out from the intense flames again, bearing plenty of battle scars.

“Damage report,” Xia Fei said brusquely.

“Hull has sustained sixty-nine percent damage; structural integrity dropped by twenty-seven percent. It is strongly advised to release repair nanites immediately and begin hull repairs.”

“Send the repair nanites. Completely devote the energy system to recharging the proton bomb and energy shield.”

The emergency lights onboard the ship had already turned from orange to red, an indication that the ship was already nearing the limits of catastrophic failure.

The spectators were going wild. Xia Fei was going up against his enemies in a one-versus-nine scenario, destroying a third ship after evading five waves of missile fire from the enemies. Even if the match were to end here, Xia Fei had already set a remarkable record that perhaps no one would be able to top in the years to come.

Xia Fei did not seem to be willing to just end it there, though, for he was still preparing a renewed assault.

Aside from shock and excitement, what these people wanted to know the most was how Xia Fei had been able to evade the wave after wave of attacks. No one could even imagine how a Kestrel-class frigate was able to demonstrate a defensive capability that could rival that of a cruiser. Could Xia Fei have installed some super equipment?

...

The battle situation began to develop in a direction that Baldy had never expected it to. Xia Fei’s warship had suffered substantial damage by the time he took down the forth warship; black smoke could be seen billowing from his frigate, accompanied by the occasional fiery glow.

Baldy was greatly encouraged by this. Though he had not exactly won this battle gloriously, what mattered was that it was ending. Since he had already accepted Li Mo’s bribe, why would he still care about his face? Face was something that needed not be considered when there was no need to have it around.

Alas, he was mistaken. He was still unable to penetrate Xia Fei’s defenses even after sending wave after wave of attacks. To be precise, he simply was unable to penetrate through Xia Fei’s energy shield.

The firepower of five people was completely incomparable to that of nine. It was almost less than half. In this first wave of missiles, Xia Fei’s energy shield got reduced until it was under five percent, and Xia Fei retaliated by taking down one of their comrades, so they were now down to four. The second wave had him losing seventy-nine percent of his energy shield, and Baldy again lost yet another fellow participant.

...

When all that was left on the battlefield among his allies was Baldy alone, the firepower he possessed was no longer enough to cause any substantive damage to Xia Fei. It was as if Xia Fei’s energy shield was an ocean that could never be drained, only requiring a handful of seconds to recuperate back to full after suffering damage.

“Focus everything on firepower; I want to blast this man mercilessly to smithereens!” Xia Fei rumbled in a deep voice.

At this point, the control deck had already been completely engulfed in smoke, and a good portion of his onboard equipment had already given out; his air-filtration system was ruined, and the breathable air in deck was starting to become frighteningly scarce.

A volley of missiles accurately homed in on Baldy’s warship no. 79. Meanwhile, the man was still going about his ineffectual retaliation. It was not that he did not want to retreat; he had already failed, so if he were to make a last-minute attempt to flee, what he would face was not just the loss of his right to participate in the tournament in the future but also Li Mo’s wrath.

“Another volley.”

*Fwoosh*

Another set of missiles found their target. Due to the target painter on Xia Fei’s ship having already been destroyed, Xia Fei needed three consecutive volleys before he managed to destroy Baldy’s warship.

Baldly lightly pushed the ejection button and his escape pod shot out, leaving the soon to explode warship behind.

“I’ve fought till my warship’s completely destroyed; surely, Prince Li couldn’t blame me, right?” Baldy had just lost, yet he acted as relieved as if he had just been granted amnesty. Holding out for that long had long since left him feeling mentally exhausted.

His escape pod was like a round sphere, the distress light on the top of it flashing repeatedly as he drifted in space.

Baldy squinted his eyes and looked from the small porthole, and in that instant, his entire face went pale.

He saw that Xia Fei’s warship was accelerating at high speeds for his escape pod, a long plume of flames trailing behind the frigate.

Baldy did not even manage to let out a scream as Xia Fei’s warship crashed into his escape pod.

His escape pod was of course not made of thick plating as what a warship would have, and it was of a small size as well. This ramming from Xia Fei caused Baldy’s escape pod to shatter upon impact, much like a chicken egg that had come into contact with a hard rock.

*Whoosh!*

Another escape pod was ejected out. Xia Fei was seated in this pod, glancing out into the starry sky as he lit himself a cigarette.

.....

Baldy was dead, no more than a few scattered lumps of flesh drifting out in space after that collision.

Several minutes later, a spaceship from the Association of Machinists came to collect Xia Fei’s escape pod, heading straight back to the tournament’s chief referee office.

With a participant dying in this round, there was no choice but to put the tournament on hold. Everything would only resume after a thorough investigation was made.

...

The Alliance Military, the high ranking Chief of Staff Pine Williams ignored the commentators’ commentary. He shut off the screen and stood up, taking out a notepad from his office desk and used a pencil to jot down some lines before he lightly chewed on one end with his mouth as he read what he wrote.

Many people would do some inexplicably minute actions when deep in thought. It seemed that this was a common trait humans innately shared.

Some would massage their temples, while others would habitually light a cigarette and slowly let it burn. Meanwhile, Chief of Staff Williams had the habit of using his teeth to bite the head of a pencil. This was an old habit of his and the amount of pencils he had chewed on from young until now might even fill more than his office’s space.

In any case, the Chief of Staff was always in deep thought. It was an open secret that he would break several pencils a day as a result of his chewing, and the more cheeky men had even given him the nickname Pencil Killer.

Williams’s head sported short, red hair, which was unique to his family. The fiery and bright color was akin to a lit flame in a dark night. His forehead had a tight set of seventeen wrinkles, each of incredible depth and texture, as if they had all been carved prominently by a sculptor.

The last name Williams had a long history in the Alliance. From way, way back, the Williams family had been known to produce very resourceful and wise military commanders. They mostly served the military as staff officers or fleet commanders, and this had already gone on for many dozens generations.

It was said that the Williams family all had the unique features of red hair and forehead full of stress lines. The more forehead lines, and the brighter their hair color, the higher their IQ.

According to historical records, the person who had the most stress lines in the Williams family was the great-grandfather, Denton Williams. The man had a shocking twenty-nine stress lines on his forehead, and his hair was redder than the midday sun.

Unfortunately, it seemed that this Denton Williams had been too clever and had become disillusioned with life early on, so he chose to fly a dilapidated warship into a blackhole, ending his life at the tender age of twenty-seven.

Though Pine Willians did not have as many lines on his forehead like his ancestor, and his hair was not overly explosive, either, the achievements that he had attained would leave plenty of his ancestors embarrassed. He was the Chief of Staff for the Alliance Military, calling him a high-ranking powerhouse of the Military Triumvirate would not be inaccurate. His importance in the military scene could be better described as all-encompassing, influencing well-beyond the confines of Alliance army. Furthermore, he was only fifty-three years old, the youngest in the Military Triumvirate with a limitless future ahead.

Jotted down on his notepad was an analysis of the tournament. This was also a habit of his, writing down what he thought whenever he felt that he was faced with something he had trouble analyzing so that he could break it down one by one, slowly eliminating the uncertainties until he derived a final answer.

The tip of his pencil scratched upon paper once more, quickly, and as the words lessened, a clearer image gradually came into his mind before a smug smile appeared on Pine Williams’ face.

That was when the clear beeping of his communicator sounded. Williams picked up the call and saw that the call had come from the other member of the military triumvirate, the Chief of Navy, Admiral Layton.

“Have you gotten your conclusion?” Layton asked.

“Yes,” Williams softly answered.

“Great. Come to my office and tell me your analysis. I’m thinking of having an argument with you over this,” Layton said.

Pine Williams furrowed his brows lightly. He and Layton had been arguing for almost twenty years. They had been going at it ever since they met in that staff officer joint conference, and now that the two of them had become two of three pillars in the Alliance Military, their bickering had carried on as well.

Layton loved arguments. He seemed to argue for the sake of arguing. Even something like how many sugar cubes were there in a coffee or whether what should be used was Britannia resin sugar or Millenstein coconut sugar was among his topics of argument.

There was a joke, which went like: There were two economists having a meal in a restaurant. The waitress asked what they wished to eat, only for the two to answer at the same time, “It doesn’t matter what we eat. What’s important is for us to get the bill as soon as possible so that we can argue over the pricing.”

Layton was just like those two economists; he was the sort who would be uncomfortable if he was not arguing over something.

“The last time you won an argument was 749 days, 15 hours, and 22 minutes ago. I do believe that you won’t be winning this time, either.” Williams chuckled.

Layton retorted, “Don’t think you can be proud just because you’ve won 197 times. Let me tell you something: Even if you have a thousand or ten thousand wins over me, you won’t be able to stop me from arguing.”

Williams shrugged. “I really believe you because you’re the most stubborn person I’ve ever met.”

Layton had his doubts. “I’ve always thought Tai’s the most stubborn person you’ve met?”

“Tai?” Williams laughed. “Tai’s persistent, while you’re just really stubborn.”

Layton waved his hand unhappily. “Let’s not talk about this. I’ll be waiting for you in my office.”

“Okay. Prepare some of my favorite fruit salad with maple syrup, and a Mullis coffee,” Williams reminded.

...

After some time, Williams pushed open the most luxuriously decorated door in the naval headquarters. He saw that Layton was already seated on the sofa inside, waiting for him. He had a microcomputer in his hand, intently reading the information displayed as his finger drew on the projected image.

The coffee on the table still had steam coming off it, and a plate of salad, , as well as a silver jar containing sweet maple syrup, was right next to it.

“To some people, no amount of preparation will be enough.” Williams laughed as he walked over.

Layton threw a glance at Williams and tossed the microcomputer to one end of the sofa. He leaned back and said, “That was a military report. It’s been a few months since those guys in the Death Trio Star Region have been garrisoned, yet the fighting has yet to begin, and the reason’s still unknown.”

...

Williams poured some maple syrup over his salad, the sweet fragrance of the brown liquid giving off a rich aroma.

“Do you wish to argue over the war simulations for the Death Trio Star Region?” Williams asked as he used a ladle to stir the syrup still in the jar.

Layton shook his head. “Not today. Let’s first argue about what happened in that round. I’ll prepare for what’s happening in the Death Trio Star Region tomorrow.”

Williams used a fork and dipped a piece of fruit in the maple syrup before putting it in his mouth, not commenting about what Layton had just said.

Layton could feel his stomach churning when he saw how Williams ate his syrup-covered fruit. He frowned. “Williams, that syrup is ridiculously sweet, upsetting your stomach when you eat it. Why do you like to eat what kids enjoy eating?”

historical

Williams chuckled. “The human brain is the most important organ that we humans can’t do without. Aside from protein, the brain uses plenty of sugar to keep it functional, so people who use their head a lot enjoy eating sweet things. This is normal.”

Layton had already heard Williams say this many times, and he had no wish to continue discussing it. That was because the truth had already been proven that Williams had thousands of reasons as to why he enjoyed sugar so much, and there was no way he could win an argument with him over it.

Thus, Layton turned the topic back onto the issue that he was most concerned with today.

“So? What do you think of the warship duel in the Golden Finger Cup that I sent you?” Layton asked.

Williams nodded. “I’m usually not the type to watch any warship events organized by the Association of Machinists because those participating in it aren’t really combat experts, but this particular match you sent me had gone well beyond my expectations. The course of events was very exciting, with an equally spectacular finish as well.”

Layton burst into a raucous laughter. “Alright, then. Then, tell me, how did Xia Fei win the round despite the power disparity?”

Williams laughed. “You’re the one who wants to argue about it, so you ought to start first.”

Layton was no hypocrite, so he immediately started, “Then, I’ll tell you: It’s because Xia Fei used two medium proton bombs.”

“Proton bombs are unable to generate powerful pulse waves within a sixty-kilometer radius, and participants in the Golden Finger Cup’s warship event were using frigates. That’s why they’ve all been outfitted with light missiles, and the speed and range of such light missiles are fine, but their lethality and plating aren’t worth mentioning. Meanwhile, the pulse waves from Xia Fei’s proton bombs have been enough to destroy the defensive plating of those missiles, causing all the missiles to explode.”

“Due to the speed of the explosion being too quick and how concentrated it was, it’s hard to tell whether the missiles were actually detonated by the proton bombs or they exploded while still a distance away from his ship as opposed to directly landing hits on its hull.”

“I had it checked, and Xia Fei is a speed ability user who has cultivated until the Advanced Star River rank. The reaction time of speed ability users far outstrips that of a common man, and that’s how he was able to detonate his proton bombs with perfect timing,” Layton explained without leaving a single fact out.

Williams nodded as he sent an orange wedge soaked in maple syrup into his mouth. “I agree with that as well. We have no arguments here. Carry on.”

Layton shook his head helplessly. This was the nature of arguments; he had to find a difference in perspective and then propose their opinions accordingly. There was no need to argue if the two parties agree with each other.

Drinking some coffee, Layton continued, “After being subjected to the two waves of attacks, Xia Fei suddenly shut off his engine to divert all the power toward restoring his energy shield and the charging of the proton bomb. That’s because the Kestrel-class frigate does not possess enough to-->>

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