Chapter 503: Perseverance I (2/2)

They finally flew past the unstable region, but as the fleet advanced further, the pressure on them grew. Ye Chong was forced to assign all remaining 1,300 mech pilots on protection duty. With more manpower, their situation improved slightly, but five hours later, the situation became more difficult.

Ye Chong had no more extra personnel at his disposal.

With only seven more hours to go, they could only soldier on. The rest of the journey would be the most dangerous and hardest part of their flight.

To reduce areas exposed to risk, the starships were positioned very close to each other, but this did not improve their situation by much.

The mech pilots guarding the starships in their mechs were exhausted, and they were beginning to suffer from casualties. Before this, none of the mechs had been reported damaged. Now, as the danger around them increased, they had finally reached a breaking point.

Ye Chong was deeply troubled by this.

The rocks all around them came crashing down on the starships like a heavy downpour. In just three minutes, they lost 50 mechs. It was no wonder Ye Chong looked so troubled. At this rate, they would lose all their mechs in just two and a half hours.

This was unacceptable for Ye CHong.

However, no amount of tricks and strategies were going to save them this time. The fleet members would have to persevere.

Ye Chong decided to step into the field himself. He had no concept of how leaders should not be in the frontlines.

He believed that every bit of effort would push them further towards victory.

Hence, he made his move!

Among the entire fleet, only Xi Qing, Shu and the other students had seen Ye Chong in combat. The rest had never seen Sir Jay fight. Even Xi Qing and Shu had never seen Ye Chong fight with a mech. To them, Sir Jay was their leader, more suited for strategizing.

No one realized that Sir Jay's expertise was in fact not in strategizing, but in actual combat!

When Sir Jay decided to step into the field himself, all of Haskel's crew members were dumbfounded. They stared at their leader in disbelief.

Ye Chong did not give them the chance to object, only turning his back to them and leaving with determination.

When news of Sir Jay's decision came through the comms to the mech pilots who were struggling outside, everyone thought they had heard wrong.

When Ye Chong's Han Jia exited Haskel's Passage 1, the comm channels were flooded with thunderous cheers. Everyone felt their exhaustion evaporated. They were invigorated, they were ready to fight!

Ye Chong did not know how his actions had brought about this boost in morale in his soldiers. In fact, he believed that while he had improved from before, there was still much for him to learn before he could become a true leader.

Ye Chong only hoped that he could do his part in fighting for their survival. That was all.

The beautiful Han Jia danced across the dark outer space that was raining asteroids. Its beautiful body moved economically and with great precision. The mech was fast and powerful, a mechanical wonder to behold.

The mech pilots were surprised to find Sir Jay much stronger than they were. No matter how he asteroids rained on Sir Jay's mech, his agile mech would always be able to avoid the rocks, or used its weapons to deflect them.

Some of the larger rocks became Sir Jay's weapons. He used his mech to change the course of these rocks to collide into other rocks that were coming towards them.

Sir Jay's skillful and confident maneuvers had affected all the mech pilots. The comms channels once again roared with cheers. All the fleet members felt encouraged.

Right then, Sir Jay's mech was not the only one showing off. Beside him was a one-armed mech in blue and white. Its right arm held a Farqua sniper rifle. The unremarkable sniper rifle turned formidable in the hands of this mech.

The unknown mech pilot fought with extreme calmness. His shots never missed. The mech balanced between long range sniping and wide area coverage, demonstrating the skills of a long range mech in this dazzling battle.

The unknown mech pilot worked well with Sir Jay. They coordinated their movements perfectly. Sir Jay adjusted his position accordingly as the one-armed mech went about its near-supernatural shooting spree. The deadly rain of asteroids was no challenge for the two mechs. Shots of thick and thin blue lines fired through the air like a blooming flower, while the small and nimble Han Jia did its petal dance around the shots.

No one knew who the mech pilot in the one armed mech was, just as no one knew that Sir Jay was an ace mech pilot. Only the very first few members of the fleet could guess that the mech pilot in the one armed mech was the other leader they had, the one who never showed their face.

In the end, Shang could not help but interfere in this critical situation.