Space was sealed off again. Ou Zhanpeng, with a blank expression, commanded, "Disengage from the battlefield. Let's go!"
The Starship accelerated away, but Ou Zhanpeng remained standing there, his eyes fixed on the planet where the mushroom cloud had yet to dissipate.
The Blackhorn fleet went berserk. Disregarding everything, they launched their most ferocious assault on the Starship.
"Forget about capturing warships, damn it all!"
The Starship fired smoke bombs. Under the cover of the smoke screen, it flew away at an increasingly rapid pace.
The Blackhorns pursued furiously, but their warships were much slower than the Starship. They couldn't catch up by conventional means. If they stopped the space blockade, they feared the Starship would escape. Caught between a rock and a hard place, they didn't know what to do.
It was known that the Blackhorns were one of the top powers in this sector, with formidable technology and a ruthless disposition. They were the kind of people no one dared to provoke.
In the past, as soon as space was blocked, it would be the Blackhorn warships' turn to perform. It was the first time they had experienced the embarrassment of being unable to catch their target, forced to fire continuously in the hope of holding the Starship back.
However, the reflective shields were too formidable, and the Starship did not merely take hits without retaliating. The shear cannons kept firing, slicing Blackhorn ships in half out of nowhere.
The Blackhorns were in a quandary, unsure whether to pursue or not. The entire fleet, from top to bottom, was shrouded in an intense, oppressive atmosphere, with many Blackhorns not daring to even breathe deeply.
On the Starship, the scene was completely different. The soldiers were cheering and extremely excited.
But they soon noticed Ou Zhanpeng's expression was not right. He stood there quietly, looking at the pockmarked planet without a word.
The cheers and discussions gradually died down, and the bridge eventually fell silent.
Ling Xiao sidled up to Ou Zhanpeng, watching the planet with him. "What's wrong? Pity the Blackhorns, regretting it?"
In war, the most brutal tactic was to exchange blows.
The Blackhorns had already obtained Earth's coordinates, and they could launch another attack at any moment.
However, after the Starship destroyed this planet, the situation had shifted from a one-way street to a mutual exchange.
Ou Zhanpeng twitched the corner of his mouth. "An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Although I've always believed that war shouldn't involve ordinary civilians, I'm not so saintly as to sympathize with the enemy."
"Then why are you just standing here doing nothing?"
"I'm just thinking that this is only the beginning," Ou Zhanpeng said with a complex look. "If the Blackhorns retaliate, what do we do?"
It was no secret that the Blackhorns coveted the Starship. As long as alien civilizations with similar ambitions existed, the Starship's journey of conquest would not stop.
"What else can we do? Meet force with force, respond to circumstances as they arise, take it one step at a time!" Ling Xiao was quite optimistic, but he immediately showed a bitter smile. "We came out too early. If we had developed for a few more centuries, we wouldn't be in such a passive situation."
"Yes, if only we had developed for a few more centuries..."
"How about we go back immediately?"
"Go back?" Ou Zhanpeng sighed and said no more.
Ling Xiao keenly sensed that Captain Ou seemed to be hiding something and wisely shut his mouth.
No matter how curious he was, he wouldn't ask in front of so many bridge officers.
"Report!" A voice interrupted their conversation. "Our ship has disengaged from the blockade zone and can initiate jump!"
"Understood!" Ou Zhanpeng, fearing it was an enemy ploy, didn't rush to open a wormhole. Instead, he flew further away, establishing a safe distance before leisurely departing.
Thus, this chase finally came to an end.
However, the Starship did not travel far. It appeared at the edge of the Blackhorn star system and, after exiting the wormhole, immediately hid behind an asteroid.
Ling Xiao seemed a bit puzzled. "Aren't we going back?"
Outside the ship, there were celestial bodies of various sizes. It seemed that the edges of every star system looked like this, littered with dirty snowballs.
"It's not time yet," Ou Zhanpeng manipulated the holographic projection. "We are too weak. We must not show any mercy or weakness to the enemy. We must hurt them, even kill them, until they no longer dare to lay eyes on Earth."
Ling Xiao was stunned. "We only have one warship. Even if we were made of iron, how much could we achieve?"
Ou Zhanpeng sighed. "Besides the Starship, do we have any other presentable warships? If the Starship doesn't take on this burden, who will?"
Ling Xiao looked astonished. "No, can't we go back and continue developing our technology? With the support of the Starship Base, it would take at most a year or so..."
Ou Zhanpeng pulled him closer and said in a voice only Ling Xiao could hear, "The Starship Base has reached its limit."
"What?" Ling Xiao was dumbfounded.
"Opening the spacetime bubble requires a very special kind of energy, and there wasn't much left. After opening the spacetime bubble several times, it's almost all used up. We can't continue to develop technology like before!"
Having said that, Ou Zhanpeng released Ling Xiao.
The latter was dispirited, as if his mind was clouded by phlegm, and kept muttering, "How could this happen? How could this happen?"
Ou Zhanpeng patted Ling Xiao on the shoulder and continued to manipulate the holographic projection.
A side hatch of the warship opened, and a robot flew out of the ship, slowly drifting to the front side of the warship.
A projection of the warship's side hull appeared before Ou Zhanpeng. The outermost armor was painted with the ship's hull number.
Captain Ou wiped it away with his hand, and the robot immediately erased the hull number.
Ling Xiao, having regained his senses, was astonished again. "What are you doing?"
"Nothing much," Ou Zhanpeng replied. "Making some necessary preparations!"
As he spoke, the hull number was completely erased. Then, using his finger as a pen, he drew a striking skull in the air on the side hull.
Ling Xiao immediately guessed his intention – he was going to cast aside all burdens and resort to any means necessary.
"It looks bare, let's add a bandana!" he said.
Ou Zhanpeng moved his fingers, adding a stylish Caribbean bandana to the skull's bald head. With a few more strokes, he added two dripping scimitars with extremely dangerous curves.
"All done!" Ou Zhanpeng clapped his hands. "Let's get to work!"
A wormhole was opened, and upon entering the star system, a Blackhorn ship became a victim of the shear cannon, silently splitting into two halves.
Without the base's support, the shear cannon's range was greatly reduced, but a starved camel is still larger than a horse. Its range still far exceeded any known weapon.
Ou Zhanpeng's idea was to command the Starship to conduct guerrilla warfare, eliminating the Blackhorn forces through attrition, ideally driving them back to the Stone Age... Guerrilla warfare or surprise attacks were both classic military tactics. Ou Zhanpeng was merely applying them effectively, bringing classic tactics to space.
Given enough time, the Starship could kite and annihilate the entire Blackhorn fleet.
After losing another Blackhorn ship, the Blackhorns immediately realized it was related to the Starship and scattered their fleet to search for any sign of it.
Half an hour later, the Starship was not found, and another Blackhorn ship was cut in half without warning.
This time, the Blackhorns could no longer sit still.
In a head-on confrontation, they could tolerate the loss of more warships, but the Starship had not even appeared, and their warships were suddenly destroyed. What kind of weapon was this? What kind of means?
The Blackhorns considered themselves advanced, but compared to the technology used on the Starship, they were worlds apart.
No wonder the higher-ups were so concerned about this warship, and no wonder they had tried every means to obtain it!
At this moment, the greedy Blackhorns even had the thought of secretly studying the Starship if they managed to capture it, and then using its technology to overthrow their masters.
But they only thought about it; they wouldn't dare to do it.
When the Starship destroyed the third enemy ship, the Blackhorn fleet finally couldn't bear it. They immediately gathered all their warships, opened a wormhole, and prepared to disengage.
The Starship couldn't monitor where the wormhole exit would be, but without the Octopus Ship, it was clearly impossible to fly directly to Earth.
This gave Ou Zhanpeng a great deal of room to maneuver, and he didn't have to worry about the enemy taking their anger out on Earth.
Therefore, just as the Blackhorn fleet was about to leave, the Starship deliberately revealed itself, appearing near the planet.
What followed was a relentless bombardment of the planet. The seismic waves destroyed the middle and outer rings in one fell swoop, and then the shear cannons cut the falling ring segments into suitable sizes, sending them plummeting towards the planet's surface.
This was much more convenient than bombing the planet with mushroom bombs—mushroom bombs also had costs, and not insignificant ones. Every one saved was a gain.
Strike where the enemy does not expect, attack where the enemy must rescue!
Their ancestors had provided a solution thousands of years ago. If Ou Zhanpeng didn't know what to do, their ancestors' coffins would be shaking!
The Blackhorn fleet had already opened the wormhole, but facing the Starship's cruel retaliation, the fleet was unable to leave.
They regrouped and aggressively charged at the Starship.
But why would Ou Zhanpeng engage in a head-on battle? The Starship immediately slipped away, continuing to kite and systematically destroy the Blackhorn fleet's combat strength.
Never had they encountered such despicable tactics. The Blackhorn fleet's commander was driven to the brink of madness!
He regretted it to his very guts—why did they have to provoke humanity? Why did they have to sneak attack Earth?
If they couldn't capture the Prismatic Nebula, at most they wouldn't receive their master's reward, which made little difference to the Blackhorns.
Now, the vast Blackhorn fleet was being led around by a single human warship. Half the fleet was destroyed, and their home planet was blown to smithereens, looking like a mess.
Both the fleet and the planet, all Blackhorns hated the Starship to death, but they couldn't do anything about this warship.
The Starship completely controlled the initiative on the battlefield, while on the ship, the atmosphere was completely different. All participating officers and soldiers were beaming with joy. Even the officers and soldiers from the Lin Zhou and Qin Zhou, who had lost their warships, cast aside their grief.
In hindsight, this battle had three key turning points.
First, it was shattering their possessions, abandoning the Lin Zhou and Qin Zhou, and going it alone with a lightened load.
Second, bombing the planet, it gripped the Blackhorns by the balls, forcing the Blackhorn fleet to be unable to disengage.
Third, and most importantly, was the flexible application of tactics.
At this point, the planet, having endured two bombardments, finally came to its senses. The ground anti-air defenses desperately intercepted the falling orbital ring segments, and at the same time, a large number of spacecraft departed the planet and flew into space.
Some of these spacecraft were unlucky and were destroyed by falling debris before they could even escape the atmosphere.
But the Blackhorns could no longer care about that. Their only thought was to leave this nightmarish place as quickly as possible.
Having evaded two rounds of air raids was already incredibly fortunate. If the Starship were to launch another air raid on the planet, their survival would be uncertain.
The departure of a large number of Blackhorn spacecraft did indeed cause Ou Zhanpeng considerable trouble. Several warships even managed to escape.
This was quite interesting, as it indirectly showcased the relationship between the Blackhorn military and civilians.
Ou Zhanpeng seized an opportunity. The Starship suddenly appeared amidst a group of civilian spacecraft. Seismic waves and thermal rays were unleashed simultaneously. In just a moment, a large number of Blackhorn spacecraft were destroyed.
Ou Zhanpeng had initially thought that letting these civilian spacecraft go wouldn't matter much; they should just focus on the Blackhorn warships.
Letting the civilian spacecraft leave could also help spread information about the situation here, perhaps deterring some unscrupulous individuals and reducing trouble for humanity.
However, everything has two sides. It was also possible that the Blackhorns might fall into a frenzy and gather a large army to retaliate against Earth.
Therefore, Ou Zhanpeng changed his mind and decided to do his best to eliminate the enemy, regardless of whether they were warships or civilian spacecraft.
At this point, at least two-thirds of the crew on the Starship believed that the Blackhorn warships should engage the Starship at all costs to buy time for the civilian spacecraft to escape.
But the actual situation was that the Blackhorn fleet completely disregarded the lives of the civilian spacecraft!
Now, even the slowest person could see the relationship between the Blackhorn military and civilians.
Regarding this, everyone's attitude was surprisingly unified: contempt and disdain.
If they didn't even care about the lives of their own civilians, what kind of army was this? No matter how advanced their technology, they were just a makeshift outfit!
Nearly an hour later, all the civilian spacecraft on the planet had been evacuated, and the Blackhorn fleet had also managed to escape completely.
The planet was engulfed in smoke, with thick plumes of smoke rising everywhere.
"Are we still bombing the planet?" Ling Xiao asked.
Ou Zhanpeng looked conflicted. "Technically, we should cut the weeds and dig up the roots..."
"Then cut the weeds and dig up the roots!" Ling Xiao said fiercely. "Do you expect the Blackhorns to show mercy?"
Ou Zhanpeng sighed. "Let's bomb it!"
Since they were in geostationary orbit, many segments of the orbital rings remained outside the planet. What the Starship needed to do was to push them towards the planet, delivering the final blow.
Ou Zhanpeng knew clearly that this wouldn't completely destroy the planet, but it would severely damage it, achieving the purpose of deterring the Blackhorns.
Even bombing the planet with countless mushroom bombs, turning the entire planet into glass, might not achieve complete destruction.
Unfortunately, he didn't know the locations of the Blackhorns' other planets, otherwise, he could have played a bigger game!
However, after destroying so many spacecraft, those were all valuable resources!
The Starship immediately entered cleanup mode, beginning a comprehensive sweep of the battlefield.
Not long after, outside Earth's atmosphere.
A wormhole quietly opened. The startled human fleet immediately became alert and sounded the battle alarm.
But no warships appeared from the wormhole. Instead, various strange objects of different sizes and shapes suddenly floated out.
Only the technical personnel at the Starship Base's eyes lit up. "Quick, quick, that's jump equipment, get them back quickly—"