Why would I join the army if I can’t drive a Gundam!

Chapter 198 The Final Battle Against Abaoakun (Part 1)

"Hmm, not bad, Wagner, I like it!"

In the Enterprise's locker room, Markarius, who was putting on his pilot's uniform, was surprised that Captain Paul understood him so well. After he gave the order to prepare for sortie, the captain immediately played Valkyrie Ride over the ship's intercom.

As the rousing rhythm grew louder, Markarius, having changed into his gear, lightly tapped his feet on the ground and floated to the doorway. To his left, in the narrow smoking room, a group of heavy smokers were enjoying their last moments of pleasure. The smoke they exhaled was drawn into plumes of smoke by the exhaust fan overhead.

After taking their final, ultimate puff, they naturally tossed their cigarette butts into the nearby trash can, then, reeking of smoke, jumped out of the room. After nodding to Markarius, they grabbed the movable handrail on the wall and quickly ran towards the hangar.

Marcarius followed them at a leisurely pace. Through the porthole on the right side of the corridor, he saw the white wooden horse accompanying the Enterprise. At this moment, the assault landing ship had opened the armor on its sides, and the particle cannon turrets deployed below were slowly rising. In front of the deck, two red steel cannons had been ejected, followed closely by two light GMs.

Those were the carrier units of the White Base, specifically responsible for supporting Amuro in combat. After these mobile suits were ejected, the original Gundam, clad in full armor, was also ejected.

After the original was ejected from the cockpit, the machine's head suddenly turned around, and even through the porthole and the cockpit, Macarius could still see Amuro watching him.

Then, he raised two fingers, put them together, and flicked them lightly on his temple as a simple military salute. The fully armored progenitor then swayed his body and released a row of bright heat decoys as a response to Makarius.

Then, the progenitor disappeared from Makarius's sight.

Although he verbally wished he could kick the Thirteenth Independent Fleet into the Jupiter Sphere, Green's body ultimately obeyed and included the Thirteenth Independent Fleet, which he hated, in the First Combined Attack Fleet.

This fleet was reorganized by the Federation forces for the attack on Abaoa Fortress. It brought together the Federation's First Fleet, Fourth Fleet, Fifth Fleet, Ninth Fleet, and several other independent units, making it much larger than the fleet that attacked Solomon Fortress.

But that's not all. The First Attack Fleet is only the Federation's frontal offensive force. The Second and Third Fleets are currently gathering in the opposite space of Abaoa, which is close to the direction of Kimmi Island. However, they will not be involved in the battle immediately because they have more important tasks.

That is, when the First Fleet launches a swift attack, the Second and Third Fleets can take advantage of the Zeon forces' attention being focused on the enemy in front of them to deploy the Archimedes Mirror!
This solar beam system may lack the power of Zeon's satellite cannon, but it is more flexible, though also more fragile. Unlike Zeon's satellite cannon, which uses a satellite as a base, the Federation's Archimedes Mirror is a device composed of 400,000 fan-shaped systems. Specialized engineering ships and personnel can complete its deployment within a few hours, and once it is no longer in use, it can be repositioned after some time.

This is why the second and third fleets need to be brought to the rear. In fact, not only the second and third fleets, but also the reserve forces on Luna II are still gathering continuously. The Federation high command has made up its mind to take Abaoa Fortress no matter what the cost. Therefore, as long as the war is not over for even a second, there will be a continuous stream of follow-up troops arriving until the fortress is captured.

At this moment, the First Combined Attack Fleet had officially entered the Abaoa space domain. Subsequently, under the watchful eyes of the Zeon forces, the Federation fleet slowly deployed its battle formation outside the Abaoa space's perimeter defense line.

The warship's main guns began to unlock, energy pipes began to supply power, missile safety devices were released, and fire control radar was activated, ready to lock onto targets at any time.

Outside the warship, the cables used to secure the mobile suits on the deck were quickly detonated and released by the crew inside the ship. Then, the Federation mobile suits, now freed from their restraints, leaped up under the pilots' control, detached from the ship, and rejoined their allies.

A steady stream of mobile suits converged like a tidal wave, and then, according to their respective orders, they stood guard on both sides of their motherships. Along with the mobile suits, there were also a huge number of iron balls.

Behind the fleet were a large number of Hive-class aircraft carriers. These transport ships, upgraded from the Columbus-class, had ample space, just like the former. At this moment, inside the fully extended hull of the carrier, Swordfish fighters were exiting under the instructions of ground crew and then joining the steel torrent ahead.

After greeting Amuro, Markarius arrived at the entrance of the battleship's hangar. As the electronic door opened automatically, the G3 Gundam, now fully armored, stood quietly in its position. The maintenance bridge on the chest of the mobile suit had been retracted, and the cockpit door was open. It was now quietly waiting for the pilot to arrive.

Macarius lightly stepped onto the ground and then jumped down from the second floor of the hangar. The maintenance officer, wearing a hard spacesuit with a bright yellow vest over it, was already waiting below the aircraft. He then handed the electronic board in his hand to Macarius.

"everything's ready!"

"Thanks, old buddy!"

Makarius nodded and then signed his name on the electronic board. This was a necessary procedure for pilots before each flight. After signing, Makarius sat in the cockpit.

Insert the activation key, press the activation switch, start the mobile suit, then walk out of the maintenance area, step onto the catapult, and then, with a flash of vision, the cramped catapult tunnel disappears, and what appears in Makarius's field of vision are countless friendly signals, and the navigation lights flashing on the warship look like lines floating in space from a distance.

Opposite to those countless points of light was an umbrella-shaped artificial celestial body, its surface and surroundings also shimmering with countless scattered points of light—the light emitted by the Abaoa Fortress and its garrison fleet.

However, the lights in Abaoa were much dimmer than those on the Federation side, and many of them even seemed to flicker, as if they were about to go out at any moment. "Let's begin!"

Greenwyatt's attack order was quite concise, without any rousing pre-battle mobilization. Everything that needed to be said had already been said before departure. Now, the Federation fleet was like a fully drawn bowstring, ready to unleash all its accumulated power.

Then, the first to launch the attack were still the Federation Army's assault boat units. The beam disruption screen significantly weakened the killing effect of the particle cannon, so naturally, it was used more often. However, compared to the tragic battle in Solomon, this time the assault boats seemed a bit rigid. The reason was that the heavy losses suffered by the assault boat units in the Battle of Solomon had shaken the Federation Army's high command. Therefore, all the airships that launched the attack this time were unmanned, and the Federation Army's technicians directly set the flight path and firing distance.

Then, these assault boats will move in the pre-set direction, and once they reach the predetermined distance, they will release the disruptive munitions they are carrying.

Considering the enemy's firepower density and the inflexibility of the autopilot program, the Federation forces, knowing that most of these assault boats would be destroyed halfway, directly used the oldest method: to win by sheer numbers. In fact, because there were not enough assault boats, the Federation forces also brought out the Zeon fighters and spaceships captured from the Solomon Fortress. Then, after Admiral Green gave the order, these ships rushed towards their targets like wild dogs that had been released from their reins.

The Federation forces' attack direction was naturally S and W areas of Abaoa Sky Fortress, but their actual target was not these two heavily defended areas by the Zeon. The Federation forces' real target was N area, which was less heavily defended by Zeon. As long as a breach was made there, the Zeon defenses would be directly breached from the center. Then, by using the Archimedes Mirror to illuminate Abaoa Sky, the Zeon defenses could be completely crushed.

The dense array of signals from the assault boats sent chills down the spines of the defenders. Ordinary soldiers had no idea what those assault boats were carrying. However, soon, equally dense signals came from the direction of the Abaoa Sky Fortress and quickly passed through the Zeon defenses, heading towards the Federation's assault boat cluster.

This is the missile cluster launched from Abaoa Air Fortress. The entire Abaoa Air Fortress is like a volcano at this moment, with wisps of white smoke constantly rising from various parts of its body. That is the scene of the missile launchers deployed in various locations firing at the Federation forces.

Under the barrage of Zeon missiles, the Federation's assault boat formations were also constantly bursting into bright flashes of light. Those were all destroyed assault boats. However, after being equipped with automatic navigation systems, these assault boats were no different from large missiles. There was no need to worry about casualties, and the interception was simply blocked.

To the Zeon defenders, the scene was terrifying. The fearless Federation troops ignored the losses and pressed forward recklessly. In just a few minutes, nearly half of the assault boats were vaporized, but the ships showed no sign of retreating.

In the end, once the assault boats entered the designated launch area and released all the disruptive munitions they carried, the Federation's assault boat group was essentially wiped out. Even those assault boats that were not destroyed along the way continued to advance, only to be intercepted by Zeon's fleet firepower en route.

The complete annihilation of the assault boats successfully created a series of beam disruption screens across the Zeon's firing range. Although these screens could not cover the entire area due to spatial limitations, they still affected the Zeon fleet and fortress firepower. This was because the disruption screens exploded in the areas where their firepower intersected, which greatly reduced their attack power. If they wanted to exert firepower, the Zeon fleet would have to change positions, but then they would be unable to form crossfire with friendly forces.

As the scramble unfolded, the Federation's First Combined Assault Fleet began its advance. The vanguard fleet, consisting of a battleship squadron and a large number of Salamis, under the cover of two mobile suit battle groups, began a forced breakthrough into Sector S.

The number of Zeon fleets guarding this place is very small, but the number of mobile suits is enormous, including the oldest Zaku I to the latest Zaku FZ, as well as a series of Zeon mobile suits such as Rikko Dom and Ogre. Behind these mobile suits is the Dolos-class aircraft carrier named after itself.

In addition to its capacity of nearly two hundred mobile suits, the warship also had eight twin particle cannons. Then, when the Federation forces entered the Zeon forces' firing range, dense particle beams and various firepower attacked the Federation fleet.

Faced with the fierce incoming firepower, the Federation fleet did not back down in the slightest. The Magellan-class battleship squadron, which was prepared to sacrifice itself, charged at the forefront, pouring as much firepower as possible towards the Zeon forces while bearing the brunt of the artillery fire for the friendly forces behind them.

A Magellan-class ship was quickly and severely damaged in a hail of bullets. Several particle beams pierced its hull, and then a barrage of missiles bombarded the ship, tearing it to pieces in no time.

The explosion did not disrupt the other Magellanic ships' operations. These battleships, like ancient heavy cavalry, formed a wedge formation and charged towards the enemy. If a warship was damaged, it would automatically withdraw from the formation and give way to its allies. The damaged warships would not retreat but would continue to chase after the enemy with their broken bodies until the warships were completely destroyed.

The Magellan-class bombardment also inflicted considerable casualties on the Abaoa Sky defenders. Particle cannons flashed, blasting beams at the exposed gun emplacements of the fortress. Then, the warship's missile launchers continuously sprayed out stockpiled ammunition, and every now and then, unlucky Zeon mobile suits would be hit by the dense rain of missiles.

After paying an extremely heavy price, the Federation's follow-up mobile suit battle groups and the Salamis fleet reached the Zeon's formation, and then nearly a thousand mobile suits from both sides engaged in a fierce battle under the illumination of particle beams.

As soon as the battle began, the quality problems of the Zeon forces were immediately exposed. Although there was not much difference in numbers between the two sides, the rate at which the Zeon mobile suits were being lost was alarmingly fast, even forcing the defending commander to immediately request reinforcements from Landrov.

"You've only been fighting for ten minutes!"

"But I've already lost nearly a third of my men, and now the enemy is even closing in on the Dolores!"

"Hold this position! I'll send reinforcements right away!"

(End of this chapter)