Chapter 98 Devastating Strike
"Who was the first Ash Priest to attack? And who was the second one to appear? Did Xu Zhuoxing actually make a move?" Qi An asked Tan Fu.
Tan Fu answered clearly: "Yes, I have."
The first Ash Priestess has distinctly female features, suggesting she is the only female among the six crew members, Qiu Yunmeng.
The identity of the second Ash Priest was difficult to determine at the time.
“Old Yao and Yunmeng are both at the Ash level. Yunmeng was the first to engage the humans, and Old Yao went to help him. I ended up far behind,” Xu Zhuoxing replied.
"So it was Yao Yingfa who destroyed a large number of drones, and you also rushed to the battlefield after landing. You took action against those two and protected the ground troops?" Qi An asked.
She felt that, given the circumstances, the ground forces had very little chance of winning.
At that time, humans had not yet been enhanced, nor did they have any awareness of preventing pollution. With two Ash Priests in the sky, every single soldier on the ground would inevitably mutate!
Xu Zhuoxing lowered his eyes, his smile seeming to fade slightly: "I did take action, killing two pilots."
Qi An: "Huh?"
[The two pilots of the first fighter squadron were indeed not killed by Qiu Yunmeng and Yao Yingfa. Before the apocalypse, aerial combat was all beyond visual range; there was no such thing as fighter jets getting close to the enemy for dogfights.]
When Tan Fu was at Xinglei, apart from computer-related subjects, he only learned everything up to the level of an elementary school graduate.
However, despite his photographic memory, he still managed to acquire a mixed bag of knowledge online, making Qi An's understanding of the pre-apocalyptic world laughable.
Qi An wasn't angry, but rather amazed, and pressed for an answer: "And then?"
After the first fighter jet formation was destroyed, the other two standby formations at that airfield did not dare to take off for a while.
During the battle at the landing point, all the drones brought with them were destroyed in one fell swoop, and the soldiers on the ground, including the officers in the field command vehicle in the distance, began to mutate.
The brigade-level command headquarters at the rear, as well as the General Staff Headquarters monitoring this external operation, were caught off guard by the enemy's strength and the unpredictable nature of the battlefield situation.
Seeing that the land encounter was about to end in a disastrous defeat, and that some of the mutated soldiers were leaving the battlefield and showing a tendency to spread outwards.
The third Ash Priestess has appeared.
“It’s Xu Zhuoxing!” Qi An said.
[That must be Xu Zhuoxing!] Tan Fu rolled his eyes:
The third Ash Priestess was identified as soon as it appeared because its face briefly reverted to human form.
Its behavior was strange; when it was first spotted by the reconnaissance plane, it simply stood still at the edge of the battlefield.
Although it was just standing there, a third 'humanoid' creature had appeared after all!
The reconnaissance plane reported the enemy situation, but the frontline commander was struggling with a sudden change and had no troops to send, and had fallen into despair!
But neither the frontline nor the rear expected that at the most desperate moment, Xu Zhuoxing took off and dealt a heavy blow to Qiu Yunmeng, who was trying to destroy the frontline command vehicle!
Three Ash Priests clashed in mid-air!
Although their entanglement lasted only a short time, less than 10 minutes according to the confidential records, it was a precious 10 minutes!
In those precious 10 minutes, the brigade-level command's combat support AI summarized all the information about the entire incident and drew several important conclusions:
The 'mutated' disease can be transmitted from person to person. The mode of transmission is most likely some form of information transmission. The form of information is diverse, including at least sound and images.
The root cause of the infection is the YR-BR-07 specimen.
According to the report from Commander Xu Zhuoxing of 'Nine Heavens', the more specific source is speculated to be the two-dimensional elemental distribution map reconstructed on a computer after the YR-BR-07 mineral was irradiated with X-rays.
Furthermore, the hasty report from the frontline commander stated that they saw what appeared to be a 'humanoid creature' and were extremely distressed after hearing its cries. It is speculated that the information points on the mutants are also a source of infection.
2. The rate of human mutation varies from person to person, which is speculated to be due to the different infectious strengths of different sources of infection or differences in individual resistance.
Despite individual differences, the average mutation rate of 300 soldiers on the front line is 10 minutes, and the rate of infection and "death" exceeds that of all known infectious diseases!
3. The mutated forms and combat abilities of different people are not uniform, but they all show the same aggressiveness towards unmutated humans.
Aggressive and infectious, mutated humans are extremely dangerous and must never leave the battlefield or enter densely populated areas!
4. Human-made firearms can kill mutants.
There was also fighting among the five mutants, and the third flying mutant was significantly stronger than the first two.
In summary, the following operational recommendations are given: Option 1: Replace all manned combat units with unmanned units and transfer command authority to AI to avoid further human exposure to infectious information.
Option 2 involves a direct, indiscriminate, devastating strike on the battlefield to completely halt the spread of the infection!
Tan Fu, tired from speaking, took a breath, which also sounded like a sigh:
In those precious 10 minutes, the General Staff made the decision—to launch a devastating attack on the battlefield!
More than 10 short-range air defense missiles blocked the three Ash Priests in the air, while three ground-to-ground missiles directly destroyed two mutated reinforced companies on the ground, as well as the front-line command vehicle.
After that, the newly transferred troops dropped a large number of white phosphorus incendiary bombs and other explosives on the battlefield to thoroughly clear it.
More than 400 officers and soldiers sacrificed their lives. Of course, the astronauts of the "Jiutian" spacecraft are also counted as victims, bringing the total number of deaths to 436.
Qi An was once again amazed by the country's strength and decisiveness at that time, but then said, "Qiu Yunmeng is still alive."
“Old Yao is dead.” Xu Zhuoxing looked up at the starry sky and said, “It’s been a long time since I’ve thought about these old people and old things. It’s quite sad.”
"Even a devastating blow only killed one..." Before Qi An could finish speaking, Xu Zhuoxing chuckled: "Don't you know how strong the vitality of a six-winged creature is?"
"You didn't kill Qiu Yunmeng today, you only defeated her."
Qi An: "...What?!"
Tan Fu: "What?!"
"You only killed one of its main clones, but it still dealt it a heavy blow, more so than the damage from all those cannons back then."
It won't reappear for at least six months to a year." Xu Zhuoxing rubbed his temples:
"After talking for so long, you should have figured out all the past events related to me by now."
A madman with a split personality, oscillating between lucidity and confusion, between the past and the future.
Let's talk about you instead.
Qi An: "What did you say about me?"
"You didn't struggle at all? Did you never feel guilty?" Xu Zhuoxing's beautiful eyes were fixed on Qi An.
“…No,” Qi An said.
Xu Zhuoxing seemed to sigh, then laughed: "You and your daughter are really..."
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com