Boom! Boom! Boom! Boom!
Four artillery shells landed one after another around the raider city, kicking up massive waves of dust and smoke.
“Direct hit!”
Inside Deep Blue’s cockpit, Wei Ran, with his sharp eyes, spotted the black smoke billowing from the raider city and reported excitedly.
“Well done.”
Jiang Zhixu gripped the handrail tightly, his gaze fixed intently on the battlefield.
This was the first time he had witnessed the entire coordinated process between the helmsman and the gunners.
Almost the instant the gunner requested permission to fire, Wei Ran and Sun Cheng reacted immediately, executing a slight turn to create an extremely precise firing angle!
The Skilled-level gunner didn’t disappoint. Out of the four shells fired, one scored a direct hit.
Through the binoculars, they could see thick, rolling black smoke rising from the impact point on the enemy city, igniting something that burst into a raging fire.
Repair mech-arms frantically dumped buckets of water onto the blaze, while slaves, faces etched with panic, scrambled with makeshift tools to patch the breach.
“Tell the gunners not to spare the resources on my account! Keep firing!” Jiang Zhixu decided to strike while the iron was hot.
Immediately, the two cannons on one side of Deep Blue roared to life again!
But this time, the enemy had time to adjust, and both shells missed their mark.
As long as ammunition was plentiful, a Mobile City’s cannons could fire continuously.
However, no one was that extravagant.
A Level 1 iron ore resource point could only yield between one thousand to five thousand units of iron ore at most. The smelting ratio from iron ore to steel was roughly 10:1, and a single artillery shell required 10 units of steel.
Not to mention the gunpowder needed—gunpowder was a strategic resource used to make many things, making it even scarcer!
Typically, a battle of conventional intensity would only allocate ammunition for ten to twenty shells.
Artillery was, in truth, a decisive weapon.
So, aside from cannons, did Mobile City combat just involve staring each other down?
Of course not!
At this moment, the raider city, having taken a hit, slowed slightly. Then, a massive elevator platform was revealed at its base, creaking open.
On the platform were five off-road vehicles, each mounted with a heavy machine gun!
Their tires roared, spinning freely before accelerating the moment they hit the ground, quickly reaching speeds of up to a hundred kilometers per hour and leaving their own Mobile City far behind.
Dogfight!
This referred to close-quarters combat when a battlefield reached a stalemate.
Vehicle teams were the most crucial element in a dogfight.
Because these teams usually carried a city’s most advanced heavy weaponry, like heavy machine guns and rocket launchers!
Once they gained a positional advantage, their mobility made it easy to target and destroy the enemy’s tires or treads, turning the opponent into a sitting duck!
Even if they couldn’t gain an advantage, they could at least hamper the enemy’s offensive tempo.
Like now—if Deep Blue continued its charge toward the raider city and ignored these vehicles, it would certainly eat the full brunt of the vehicle team’s first assault!
“Brother Jiang?” Wei Ran looked to Jiang Zhixu.
Jiang Zhixu hesitated for only a second before shaking his head decisively. “We can’t engage them in a dogfight. Have that Apprentice gunner fire to harass the vehicle team. Meng Guolong, keep aiming at the enemy city. Keep firing!”
Using artillery against a vehicle team was akin to using an anti-aircraft gun to swat a mosquito.
This tactic was considered extravagant in any city.
Because dogfights themselves were a product of mutual compromise under conditions of resource scarcity.
But thinking of their City Lord’s miraculous talent, everyone present—including the two gunners below—accepted the order without hesitation!
“Yes, sir!”
Thus, the combat vehicle team members, who had been waiting in the deployment bay ready to risk their lives, received orders to stand by.
“What’s going on?”
The one who spoke was the combat vehicle team leader, Wang Haoran.
He looked utterly confused.
Naturally, such an important position as combat vehicle team leader was also held by one of Jiang Zhixu’s trusted confidants.
However, Wang Haoran hadn’t yet been informed about Jiang Zhixu’s talent.
A team member beside him said, “Maybe Brother Jiang is worried we’ll just throw our lives away for nothing. After all, we lack experience, and our equipment is poor.”
Hearing this, Wang Haoran glanced around. Three dilapidated off-road vehicles came into view.
They were rundown, each topped with a light machine gun, and the ammo boxes didn’t hold many bullets.
The rest of the team were fighters who had joined the uprising. They weren’t afraid to die, but their combat experience was indeed limited.
Both personnel quality and equipment lagged far behind the enemy’s. If they went down now, chances of returning were slim.
Wang Haoran gritted his teeth, turned to his nine team members, and asked loudly, “Are you afraid to die?”
A young-faced boy grinned and said, “Who’s afraid of death after joining an uprising?”
“No battles, no merits! How do we get promoted?”
“What’s death? I don’t want to be a slave anymore anyway!”
The others chimed in agreement.
Many had been slaves not long ago. Now, they were rebels, combat team members, even with their own small rooms in the city’s upper levels. They were already content.
“Alright,” Wang Haoran smiled. “I’ll make a request to Brother Jiang. We want to fight! We can’t let the city we fought so hard to take fall to these raiders!”
.
The message from the deployment bay soon reached the cockpit.
Touched yet somewhat amused, Jiang Zhixu said to Qi Honglang, “Go explain the situation. Tell them to stay calm. It’s far from time for them to sacrifice themselves yet!”
Truthfully, if they had equipment superiority, he wouldn’t mind letting the brothers go down for some real combat experience.
But firstly, their equipment disadvantage was too great. Secondly, the circumstances didn’t permit it—they needed to end this battle quickly.
So, for now, everyone would have to bear with it!
“Understood!” Qi Honglang walked to the side and contacted the lower levels via comms.
On the battlefield.
The raider city’s situation continued to deteriorate.
They were now only one kilometer from Deep Blue. Having deployed five off-road vehicles, the vehicle team should have been able to close in quickly given their speed.
Yet, what greeted them was an unrelenting, seemingly endless barrage of artillery fire!
Deep Blue’s shells weren’t old-fashioned solid iron balls but genuine explosive shells packed with gunpowder!
With that payload, an explosion within ten meters could flip a vehicle. And the Apprentice gunner’s aim was surprisingly accurate!
The vehicle team didn’t dare get close, forced to loiter around eight hundred meters out, seeking blind spots in Deep Blue’s firing arcs, waiting for an opportunity.
Even with such caution, they still lost one vehicle!
Unease was spreading through the raider city.
“How many shells do they have?!”
In the cockpit, the burly man frowned deeply, watching another of their own shells miss its mark.
In reality.
Deep Blue had fired over five times more shells than them, with only that first unexpected hit scoring.
The enemy was expending resources lavishly, but he felt no joy at all!
Because the burly man couldn’t gauge the enemy’s remaining ammunition!
The helmsman calmly took a drag from his large pipe. “One, plus two, plus four, plus twelve… including the six fired at our vehicle team, they’ve already launched twenty-five shells!”
And judging by their posture, they weren’t done!
Hearing this, the burly man was startled.
“No, we have to retreat!”
He never imagined an ordinary Level 1 Mobile City would stockpile so many shells!
That damned old fool, lying with his dying breath to drag them down!
At this moment, the burly man hated the former Deep Blue City Lord who had broadcasted his location.
“Find a way to shake off Deep Blue and withdraw!”
The burly man snarled.
The helmsman asked, “Shouldn’t you contact our allies for support…”
There was a recognized fact in the Wasteland.
Once targeted by raiders, unless a city had special modification components, escape was difficult because Level 1 cities generally had similar speeds.
But the reverse was also true.
Once a raider city was the one being pursued, they couldn’t easily escape either!
That was precisely the current situation.
Hearing this, the burly man immediately countered, “We can cooperate when hunting prey together. But now that we’ve taken a hit, if other raider cities find out, we might become the prey!”
Their alliance was formed solely for hunting prey; its binding force was weak.
They could amicably share a prey’s carcass but would never watch each other’s backs!
Asking them for support now carried too much risk.
“But…” The helmsman pointed at the relentless rain of shells and said slowly, “Without support, we’ll die anyway.”
The deputy helmsman was skilled, but even he was having a hard time evading.
They had narrowly avoided several close calls already.
Just the shockwaves from the explosions had caused malfunctions in multiple tires, slowing them down.
“Contacting allies for support doesn’t necessarily mean we’ll die. After all, we still have our Level 1 cannon… Allies generally wouldn’t act rashly. Even if they did, at least we could take Deep Blue down with us.”
Hearing this, the burly man gritted his teeth and turned toward the City Lord’s chamber.