The construction inside the energy shield lasted only half an hour. Half an hour later, a familiar feeling surfaced in Hawk's mind, as if a strange unseen force began to pervade the universe. Hawke saw that countless sparks began to appear above his ship, some of the shells of ships that were moving too fast began to turn red, and even a few village-class ships exploded instantly because they could not withstand the energy.
This phenomenon was very familiar to Hawke. Because, Hawke had already experienced it once.
"This is ... force field coverage ah ... Moreover, the intensity is stronger than the flagship class ship that was destroyed in ε Eri c ... No wonder ... It must be that this time the force field overlay apparatus was so huge that there was no ship to carry it, that's why the Lucca civilization divided it into several parts, mounted it separately on top of different ships, and then, put it together on the surface of ε Eri a ... "
This time the force field coverage was all at the point of 150,000 kilometres at least. It was five times stronger than the flagship-class ship that was destroyed before.
Within the force field coverage, Hawk's combat power would be reduced by at least half, which had been confirmed at the ε Eri c battlefield.
This was unacceptable to Hawke. Who could accept such a frenzied attack, which had levelled the situation to a stalemate, and then suddenly his side's strength was weakened by half?
The situation, for Hawke, had reached its most dangerous point.
"Must, must immediately knock out this force field covering apparatus ... otherwise, I'll be dead." Hawke thought anxiously, his huge computing power came into play and immediately produced a plan.
"USS New York! The USS Washington! Two City ships, each leading ten thousand ships, to break that energy shield and take out the Force Field Generator!"
Hawk gave the order quickly.
The massive fleet of 20,000 ships instantly sped up and quickly broke away from the battlefield, arriving above the energy shield laid out on the ground of the ε Eri a in just a few minutes.
Hawk was not worried that these ships drawn out would cause his side to be weakened. The reason was simple: the Lucca ships were not going to sit back and watch the force field generator get destroyed, they were going to pull their strength out to guard the energy shield. Hawk even had a small idea, hoping that if the Lucca civilisation pulled their ships out, he could use the opportunity to break out.
Even if the Lucca civilisation did not pull out its ships and attacked itself with all its strength, Hawke would not be afraid. According to Hawk's estimation, if he attacked unhindered, he could destroy the force field generator within three minutes, while it would take at least 20 minutes for the Luca civilisation to finish him off. In other words, if the Lucca civilisation ignored the force field generator and attacked at full force, their fleet could destroy the force field generator and then come back in a leisurely manner. This time difference ensured Hawke's safety.
Sure enough, just as Hawke had predicted, as Hawke drew out 20,000 ships to attack the Force Field Generator, the Lucca civilization also drew out its forces - about three thousand ships - and went after them all the way.
The ε Eri a battlefield, was divided into two. On one side was the war between encirclement and counter-encirclement at the site of Hawke's flagship, and on the other, the war between destruction and counter-destruction at the energy shield, above the force field generator.
Twenty-three thousand ships, just over a hundred kilometres above the ε Eri a, were engaged in a fierce battle. A certain pattern emerges in the size of the ships according to their proximity to the ε Eri a. The further they are from the ε Eri a, the greater the distance.
The further away from ε Eri a, the larger the ship, and the closer to ε Eri a, the smaller the ship. In near-Earth orbit, the village and country class ships dominate. Large ships cannot get so close to the ε Eri a because of their mass and size, and have to fight thousands and thousands of kilometres away.
On the ground of the ε Eri a is a huge energy shield covering tens of thousands of square metres and hundreds of metres high, inside which the force field generator is constantly emitting a deadly force field. On top of it, there were countless ships that were constantly tangling and killing each other.
Hawk manoeuvred one of the county ships and saw an opportunity to send an energy blast towards the energy shield, which hit the shield in a fraction of a second.
But this prefectural ship, however, was caught by the enemy ship and was hit by dozens of energy shells at the same time. Immediately, its ship shell was shattered and lost its power system, and began to drag a roll of thick smoke as it fell towards the ground. The moment it made contact with the ground, it exploded with a loud bang, blowing a large crater in the ε Eri a ground.
It was a microcosm of warfare, a scene that was happening in dozens and hundreds of places at once.
"This is not going to work." Hawke's heart grew secretly anxious. Within the coverage of the force field, the attrition rate of his own ship had increased dramatically, and if this continued, it would be somewhat difficult to last for four hours, not to mention eight hours.
"What to do? What can I do? What powers are left that I haven't used?" Hawk pondered anxiously, and suddenly, Hawk remembered a little something.
"Shit, an air attack won't work, so let's attack on the ground! In the various construction bases on the ground, I still have at least tens of millions of robots sealed up, and with the help of various mechanical devices, they also have some attacking power! Good! That's you!"
Immediately, Hawke gave the activation command for the ground bases, and countless robots that had been sealed into storage began to wake up, like a resurrected zombie, and came out of their graves.
Some came out of the planetary engines, some came out of the Central Research Institute, some came out of the equipment processing plant, some came out of the foundry, some came out of the mining base ...
Countless robots from all over the world, coming together because of the same goal.
These robots begin to set off towards the force field generator. Because they were spread all over the ε Eri a, only two million robots could arrive within half an hour. After half an hour, the rest of the robots would arrive one by one.
And so, on the ground of ε Eri a, an astonishing scene took place.
The vast number of robots formed a huge army. These robots were of different shapes, from welding robots, whose oxygen tanks and lances on their backs served as improvised weapons, to metalworking robots, whose high-strength milling cutters served as weapons, to underground mining robots, whose high-speed waterjets barely served as weapons, to transport robots, which served as vehicles to carry the army of robots forward quickly, and countless robots, according to their own functions, form an oddly shaped army.
The gravitational force of the ε Eri a is less than that of Earth, and Hawk's technology, more advanced than in Earth's time, so that these robotic armies move forward at an astonishing speed of a thousand kilometres per hour, and in ten minutes the first, three hundred thousand robots reach their destination.
A thousand kilometres an hour is an incredible speed for ground movement, but it is negligible compared to the thousands of kilometres per second of a space ship. The force field generator, therefore, has no effect on objects like them that move at low speeds.
This is an advantage, but the disadvantage is equally obvious. These robots are extremely fragile and basically defenseless. An ordinary bullet could disable them and their attacks would be weak. But they win in sheer numbers.
Often, a stray bullet coming down from the sky can take out dozens or hundreds of robots, and the wreckage of a downed ship, falling to the ground and exploding, can take out hundreds or thousands of robots, but there are still a thousand if you take out a hundred, and ten thousand if you take out a thousand, and the last thing Hawk needs is robots!
Of the 300,000 robots that arrived in the first batch, there were less than 100,000 left at the moment. However, the wilderness was littered with droids, either on foot or in transport droids, constantly replenishing the area, driving and killing all of them.
The first, 100,000 robots braved the gunfire and immediately began their busy work. Instead of foolishly going for a direct attack on the energy shields, they started ... punching holes in the ground.
That's right, punching holes in the ground. Hawk could be sure that the energy shield couldn't envelop the underground. Then, going into the shield through the tunnel was a viable option. Even, Hawke could go through the tunnel and come directly under the force field generator and destroy it directly.
Inside the energy shield, there were a hundred Luca ships, but what could they do to the enemy below the ground? Fire a cannonball? What if they hurt the force field generator by mistake? Send an army to fight? But even an idiot knew that it would be the most foolish thing for a biological civilization to send a living army to fight a mechanical civilization's robots in close quarters.
Hawk seemed to be able to sense the panic of the Lucan civilisation in the face of this situation. Hawk saw that the Lucca civilisation had detached several hundred ships and started to block the army of robots on the ground.
A few dozen kilometres from the force field generator, a Luca Country-class ship, was firing energy blasts at the hundreds of thousands of robots below.
The droids had been deliberately spread out over a distance and scattered forward under Hawke's command, so the energy cannonballs were really not very effective. A single energy blast could only destroy a few hundred robots within a few hundred metres radius at most. This number was not worth mentioning compared to the huge number of robots.
Moreover, in all directions, there were ant-like robots everywhere, covering millions of square kilometres of ground, how could this robot frenzy be intercepted by only these few hundred ships?
Facing the ε Eri system in the sunset, on the black and bumpy ground of ε Eri a, countless robots, like warriors on an expedition, were marching on!