Ch.534Grand Cross. (2)

Of course, since that warning wasn’t only visible to me, other users also started scrambling to avoid it.

Naturally, the current users had no way of knowing just how powerful the main cannon—the Grand Cross Cannon—actually was.

Users who could escape the range on their own moved their fleets out of the area.

Other users, with the perfectly sensible thought of “Why take damage unnecessarily?”, made the patriotic decision to use their once-a-month emergency base teleport.

In various ways, they prioritized evasion, focusing first on surviving this unknown main cannon attack.

But as always happens in life, some users chose to walk a different path.

The “strongholds” that were forcibly included within the firing range, which was so incredibly wide, were in a particularly difficult position.

—————————————–

<Central Stronghold Alliance Official Chat Room>

<Notice: Beware of Bombardment>

-[Damn these random elements]

-[What should we do? There’s even an explicit warning message]

-[What can we do? Just activate the base barrier and endure]

-[Using stronghold and base barriers should let us scrape by somehow]

-[Dock all fleets at the base, or put them in the stronghold’s internal docking facilities]

-[Yeah]

—————————————–

Since fleeing might mean losing their strongholds to other users who were like packs of wolves, many decided to rely on their stronghold’s defenses and their base’s virtually invincible barrier.

Still, these cases at least had the solid backing of a “stronghold.”

They had something to believe in, so they could reasonably be categorized as “normal.”

But the real problem wasn’t these “stronghold” users, but rather the users consumed by madness.

—————————————–

<Public Anonymous Chat Room>

<Everyone please use polite and proper language to maintain etiquette.>

-[Hey, what’s with those idiots keeping their fleets inside the bombardment range?]

-[I told you to avoid it, why are you still there?]

-[We have fleet barriers and Super Dreadnoughts!]

-[You crazy bastards]

—————————————–

These were the users who seemed to be shouting “Oh, Grand Cross Cannon? Try me if you dare!” with their entire bodies, boldly parking their fleets right in the middle of the bombardment range.

Of course, these users also had their own reasons to be confident.

Unlike other ships that users had acquired so far, they had “Super Dreadnoughts” with insane durability.

And though its presence was somewhat subtle, they also had the “fleet barrier” that could withstand fleet-level bombardments when activated.

—————————————–

Title: Real-time lunatics in the central sector.jpg

Author: Anonymous

Content: [Fleet bombardment range on minimap.jpg], [Fleet with Super Dreadnought firmly positioned within bombardment range.jpg]

Are they real men?

They’re trying to endure by activating fleet barriers and positioning Super Dreadnoughts covered in armor enhancement equipment at the front

Comments:

-[Real men indeed]

-[I heard they covered it with armor enhancement equipment and still had space left to add Xenovia shields]

-[In terms of pure defense, it’s almost stronghold-level]

-[Impressive]

-[We are living in the age of real men]

—————————————–

As these users’ bold actions were broadcast in real-time on the gallery.

For users in other sectors and surrounding areas, this was a perfect opportunity to observe the power of the “Grand Cross Cannon” without doing anything.

Other users were planning to dive deep into the fortress if the cannon’s damage turned out to be weaker than expected.

==========

But after three days had passed with all users’ attention focused on this situation.

-Whoooosh…

Finally, before the users’ eyes, the “Grand Cross Cannon” that had been mentioned so often that everyone had memorized its name was fired.

—————————————–

<Public Anonymous Chat Room>

<Everyone please use polite and proper language to maintain etiquette.>

-[Lolol now I’ll show you my awesome defense]

-[Lol]

-[Oh shit]

-[We’re fucked]

-[Shit runnn]

-[Wtffffff]

-[Holy shit]

-[Wow]

-[Wait, what did I just see? Where did the fleet barrier and Super Dreadnought go?]

-[Insane]

—————————————–

For the user fleet that had been so confident.

As the gamma-ray explosion energy fired from the Grand Cross Cannon’s muzzle literally “engulfed space” as it approached, they immediately activated their fleet barrier to “endure.”

But the moment they were swept up in the energy torrent.

The fleet barrier, which was sturdy enough to withstand fleet-level bombardment for quite some time, popped like a soap bubble without maintaining its form for even a second.

With the fleet barrier gone, the Super Dreadnought that was supposed to protect the fleet behind it had its barrier forcibly removed in less than 0.1 seconds.

The Super Dreadnought’s frontal armor, which had been excessively reinforced to the point of being comparable to a stronghold’s outer armor, melted and evaporated instantly like vanilla ice cream placed in front of a heater.

And while the frontal armor was melting away, the rest of the ship was no better off.

As the Super Dreadnought was instantly shredded into something resembling “S Dr_dno_t,” the user panicked and tried to force an emergency fleet recall as quickly as possible, but…

As mentioned above, the “fleet barrier” and “heavily reinforced frontal armor of the Super Dreadnought” only lasted 0.9 and 0.8 seconds respectively.

By the time the user pressed the button, the Super Dreadnought had already evaporated, leaving only parts of its propulsion system.

Similarly, the fleets positioned behind couldn’t withstand the power of the Grand Cross Cannon for even a second before exploding one after another.

Naturally, users were absolutely shocked to see the “highest level” of defense they could currently muster being breached in less than 5 seconds total.

Of course, it was only natural that user fleets would be physically weaker than “strongholds.”

But everyone secretly wondered if the fixed strongholds, which were designed to be in place from the beginning, might withstand the bombardment.

Especially the “Fluxas Interstellar Fortress,” a level 5 “fortress stronghold” belonging to the Central Stronghold Alliance, which further reinforced this belief among users.

They thought that with both the base barriers of docked users and the stronghold’s own formidable walls, it would withstand the bombardment with plenty to spare.

Some users even said, “If I had known, I should have fled there and bought some time!” showing how users believed, knowingly or unknowingly, that a level 5 stronghold could withstand that insane bombardment.

But when the Grand Cross torrent finally reached Fluxas.

-KWAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!

Fluxas’s powerful defense turrets and various external protrusions like hangars instantly fused with the outer armor plating.

Even the massive armored hatch forming the main gate couldn’t withstand the crazy energy, twisting and melting before allowing massive amounts of energy to flow into the fortress interior.

This contributed to turning all the facilities inside the fortress and the “defense fleets” into something resembling well-done roasts or melted sugar residue.

Of course, even the users’ bases docked outside eventually had their base barriers broken, resulting in all of them being roasted.

And this same scenario played out with slight time differences across territories of various factions and even in Humanity’s domain.

Users suddenly understood why the usually half-hearted operations team had specially inserted such explicit warning messages this time.