"Commander! Urgent report from the front!"
The communications officer's voice carried unprecedented panic, even cracking.
"Pioneer reconnaissance ships report! In... in front of the minefield exit, toward Neva Star, large-scale gravitational reactions detected! Starships! Numbers... at least thirty! No, still increasing! Forty... fifty... they... they've been waiting there all along!"
As if to confirm this report.
The flagship "Abyssal Fang's" recently partially restored long-range sensor array finally penetrated the weak interference at the minefield's edge, capturing clear signals.
Right in front of that narrow escape channel bought with the lives of countless Empire soldiers.
In the airspace that should have led to "safe" Neva Star, dense silhouettes of starships were slowly emerging from the planet's shadowy background, like a cold, already sprung animal trap.
The glow of main cannons was silently gathering at the bows of those vessels.
The mocking curve on Jenkins' face instantly froze, then shattered like a broken mask.
He lunged toward the tactical screen, staring fixedly at those suddenly appearing enemy markers that blocked the final escape route, his pupils shrinking to pinpoints.
So... the enemy hadn't forgotten to block the exit.
They had welded it shut long ago, patiently watching him perform his "desperate survival" act inside, thinking himself clever.
Qin Bei Wang... never intended to just chase from behind the minefield.
What he wanted was to complete the final encirclement in front of the minefield.
From the suffocating fleet shadow ahead, a piercing point of light suddenly flared, then expanded and stretched, transforming into a deathly torrent tearing through space!
It was the "Kunlun Mountain's" main cannon! It was actually blocking the minefield exit and had fired without hesitation!
The thick, pale white heavy particle beam, like a spear of judgment, shot straight along the narrow channel the Megalodon Fleet had blazed with their lives!
The beam first engulfed the "Black Shark" fleet flagship at the very front of the channel, which had just panicked upon discovering the enemy.
That battleship's shields evaporated like dew in sunlight, its hull directly pierced through the core, breaking in two amidst the flames of sympathetic detonation.
The beam continued plowing backward without pause.
Several destroyers and reconnaissance ships in its path instantly vaporized, leaving not even debris behind.
Next, the "Tiger Shark" fleet flagship on the flank attempted evasive maneuvers but was grazed by the beam's edge. Half its hull was cleanly sheared off, internal explosions consuming the remainder.
This destructive beam, like a red-hot branding iron, seared a horrifying death trail of shattered hulls and scattered flames through the Megalodon Fleet's remaining formation.
It finally slammed squarely into the bow of the flagship "Abyssal Fang," located in the middle-front of the formation!
The "Abyssal Fang's" thick composite armor faced its ultimate test.
Blinding light erupted, the hull shook violently, its structure groaning under unbearable stress.
The terrifying particle stream frantically eroded the armor, melting deep pits into its surface and scorching it red-hot, but...
It hadn't completely penetrated!
"Bow armor damage at 65%!
Structural integrity remains!
We... we held!"
The damage control officer's tearful report carried a hint of desperate, life-saving joy.
Jenkins was also shaken and staggered, his ears ringing, but upon hearing the report, a fierce light erupted in his bloodshot eyes.
They held! Just a little more time, just...
Before this thought could fully form—
A piercing alarm once again echoed throughout the ship, this time from the rear!
"Rear!
Behind the minefield!
High-energy reaction!
It's... another 'Kunlun Mountain'!
It's behind us!!"
What?!
Jenkins whirled around. On the tactical screen, from the direction beyond the rear minefield where the Pluto main fleet was positioned, another equally terrifying signal source was flashing.
And two slightly thinner but still deadly pale white beams had already torn through the void.
They precisely followed the death channel through the minefield—the path just "marked" by their own ships and corpses—and shot in from behind!
The Kunlun Mountain - Modified!
Qin Bei Wang's flagship!
It hadn't attempted to circumvent the minefield. Instead, it had coldly exploited the "path" the Imperial Fleet had paid for with their own lives, launching a sniper kill from behind!
These two beams plunged into the crowded, still-reeling Megalodon Fleet formation from the rear.
A battleship at the end of the column, preparing to deploy more mines, bore the brunt.
The beams entered through its rear engine cluster, piercing forward along its length. Thrusters, energy pipelines, and ammunition depots exploded in succession along their path, finally exiting through the bow.
Transforming the leviathan into a death torch spewing flames from stem to stern.
The other beam grazed the formation diagonally, slicing a cruiser attempting to turn and evade clean in half.
Its remaining momentum unchecked, it then slammed into the broadside of another nearby battleship, blasting a terrifying pit several meters in diameter with edges flowing with molten metal into its thick armor, triggering violent secondary explosions inside.
Just two shots, from the rear, but due to the narrowness of the channel and the density of the formation, caused even more horrific chain damage and psychological shock than the single shot from the front.
As the main cannons of the "Kunlun Mountain" ships from both front and rear completed their deadly sniper kills, a brief dead silence was followed by utter storm of destruction.
The various capital ships of the Pluto Fleet, having long completed their targeting solutions, firmly locked onto those Imperial starships crammed together and battered within the minefield channel.
Volley!
The heavy plasma main cannons of the battleships, the high-speed railguns of the heavy cruisers, the missile salvos of the destroyers...
Countless beams, projectiles, and missiles, as if drawn by a magnet, converged from both ends of the channel and even from the sides at sparse points in the minefield, forming a torrent of destruction that poured into that narrow airspace!
The remaining ships of the Megalodon Fleet had truly become live targets trapped in a transparent coffin.
A battleship attempted to return fire with its remaining broadside firepower, only to be struck simultaneously by at least five main cannon beams from different directions.
Its overloaded shields shattered into glittering fragments. Its hull was pierced in multiple places, internal sympathetic detonations chain-reacting. A massive explosion tore it into several pieces of burning wreckage.
Another Imperial Cruiser frantically evaded to the flank, attempting to find a gap in the barrage, only to plunge headlong into the edge of the incompletely cleared minefield.
Sensing the metallic mass, smart trip mines instantly detonated. Blinding flames erupted from beneath its hull, shattering its keel and splitting the vessel in two as the halves drifted slowly apart.
More Cruisers and Destroyers, caught in the dense crossfire, saw their shields overload and shatter, armor torn apart, engines destroyed—transforming into silently expanding fireballs or wrecks trailing smoke and debris.
The flashes of explosions rose and fell in succession, merging into a continuous blaze that nearly illuminated the entire minefield passage, as if conducting a cruel yet magnificent funeral of steel.
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