Will the kemonomimi encounter Alien Ranch Story?

"There's no other way. If we increase the altitude, the airflow will be too strong, making the launch more dangerous." Ultimately, you can't expect an ideal marching environment like a closed highway on the battlefield.

Air currents, torrential rain, gales, enemy obstruction, adjustments to your own plans, breakdowns and repairs along the way, and even changes in the starting point, along with the choice of supply points along the route, all make it impossible for you to ensure that your friendly forces arrive at the predetermined location on time, just like solving an elementary school word problem.

Not to mention, it's impossible to even maintain an ideal constant speed. Even in a game, this is a very difficult thing. [Not to mention DCS, just try flying in formation with your allies in Ace Combat and you'll understand.]

The rapid-fire cannons at the base of the Sky Throne began to return fire on the heavy anti-aircraft guns. "Boom!"

A magical projectile struck the side armor, causing the thin armor to shatter almost instantly, turning into fragments of metal that fell to the ground. The falling trusses and supports also crushed several Leitanian vehicles on the ground into flattened discs.

"Hurry up, the warships won't last much longer! Rookies, run!" The squad commander wished he had an electric whip to lash these newbies, who were experiencing their first real airborne operation, and make them run.

The training grounds and exercise fields are completely different from what we see now. There are dense buildings, crisscrossing streets, and various hidden or obvious air defense positions. That's not all. The key point is that the enemy's firepower is beating up our warships.

The ship was shaking violently, and explosions could be heard from time to time. Debris kept falling to the ground. The airdrop deck, which had just been opened, was hit by a fragmentation anti-aircraft bullet, instantly killing an entire platoon of people who were preparing to parachute.

A strong gust of air, carrying the stench of blood and some other unidentifiable substance, rushed in through the hatch. Tiny, unidentifiable fragments clung to the goggles, leaving a black streak. In this atmosphere, to muster the courage to rush toward the open drop hatch was a leap as brave as jumping off a rooftop.

"Run! The faster you jump, the safer you'll be!" The sooner you jump, the less attack the warship will receive. At the same time, the less defensive force the enemy will have to react, and the more they hesitate, the faster they'll die.

"Boom!" One of the jet engines was hit, and the entire ship tilted violently to one side. Everyone in the lower deck was turned into rolling gourds. The armored vehicles that had lost their hooks slid to one side. With a loud crash, another half squad was wiped out.

"Jump!" In this situation where jumping would be suicide and not jumping would be waiting for death, coupled with the officer's kicking and pulling, parachutes bloomed in the air.

"Recoil engine OK, ready for deployment!" The floor opened, and the heavy Odin tank plummeted towards the city under the force of gravity, accompanied by dozens of airdrop pods and a company of mobile infantry inside.

"Altitude 2000" "Altitude 1500" "Altitude 500...300 Ignition!"

The eight sets of jet engines fixed at the front, rear, left, and right of the vehicle are ignited. When the altitude drops to less than 10 meters, the jet engines automatically detach from the surroundings.

With a deafening roar, the heavy tank crushed a Leitania truck into scrap metal. Then, the engine started up, and after a brief pause, it rolled over the scrap metal and drove into the chaotic street.

The sidewalks on both sides were filled with terrified civilians and non-combatants fleeing. The Terrans were bewildered by the high-end treatment of being airdropped into a "human-vehicle integrated" system for the first time.

Imagine this: the enemy is right above you and outside the city, your ears are filled with evacuation announcements and alarms, and the distant gunfire is comparable to the New Year. Then, with a loud bang, you suddenly hear an enemy heavy tank next to you. What would that feel like?

Not to mention civilians, even the Leitanian soldiers who were maintaining order and going against the flow to the outer defense zone were shocked. Some of them simply threw down their weapons, turned around, and ran into the civilians.

Using a longsword and crossbow to shoot down a tank? What the hell are you dreaming about?

On the other side of the intersection, a convoy of Leitania trucks and light troop carriers had just entered the intersection when a massive vehicle appeared in front of them, having just rolled over the van that was blocking the intersection and was painted "Penguin Express".

The car in front slammed on its brakes, preparing to swerve to avoid it, but the car behind didn't have time to react and crashed into it. But that wasn't the most terrifying part. The most terrifying part was that the Leitanian soldiers on the truck behind, which was braking, were horrified to see the monster's main cannon slowly turn around and aim at them.

After wiping out most of a Leitanian platoon with a single shot, the coaxial volcano cannon unleashed a barrage of bullets, instantly vaporizing the overturned armored personnel carrier along with the Leitanian soldiers inside who were still trying to rescue their comrades.

Aside from those that landed successfully, some of the airdropped units landed in rather comical locations. For example, there's the Odin tank that's currently stuck on the roof of a building, having smashed through three floors, with half of its front track wedged into the exterior wall.

The crew racked their brains for a long time but still couldn't figure out how to drive this thing down. They could only use it as a fixed turret here, but the gun depression was not enough, so it could only shoot at long distances and not at close range.

In addition to infantry, mobile infantry, and various airdrop vehicles, the upper deck cranes of the Sky Throne were continuously releasing more airdropped cargo containers containing supplementary equipment and supplies for the paratroopers. Then, they raised the ship to a higher altitude in advance; if it stayed any longer, the experimental warship would be smashed to pieces.

The underestimate of Letania's defensive firepower halved the time it took for the Sky Throne to be dropped.

Moreover, it was unable to provide long-term, sustained fire support as planned, and its fuel consumption was even faster than expected, forcing it to withdraw ahead of schedule and retreat to its own territory outside the city.

In other words, the airborne troops need to hold out for at least two days before they can receive reinforcements, and the original Throne airdrop support has also been delayed due to heavy rain and thunderstorms.

However, there is some good news: the Letanians have never experienced airborne operations before, and they are now more panicked than the Kazdel paratroopers.

Especially since the Kazdel people themselves didn't know where they would end up, the Letanians were even less certain.

When some Leitanians rushed over, mistaking the airdrop pod for a supply crate, only to find a light tank and several motorized infantrymen gathered nearby staring at them in disbelief, these Leitanian light infantrymen didn't even have time to say "Holy crap" before being overwhelmed by the fierce vehicle-mounted firepower.

Chapter Sixty-Seven: Airborne Operations

Chapter 67

The siege warfare on Terra is very different from that on Earth. Cities on Earth are almost at the same level as the ground, with extensive roads connecting them. Cities themselves are only one level, and even including subways and air-raid shelters, they are no more than two levels high.

When ground troops advance, they can rely on artillery fire or precision strikes to destroy the target's defenses and then drive the convoy in directly, but this is not possible in Terra.

Terra has only two ways to siege a city. The first is to use landships to level the height difference between the upper deck of the mobile city and the ground. The troops preparing to attack the city can rush up the city platform along the deck and drawbridge of the landship, just like attacking city walls in ancient times. The landship is used as a tower.

The second method involves infiltrating with elite individual soldiers and squads, much like Rhodes Island's attack on Chelbonog. They seize control of the intersections and ramps leading into the city, then unlock the ramps and elevators to allow their follow-up troops to enter.

However, regardless of which option is chosen, the attacking side will have to face the maze-like underground shopping mall and lower deck, as well as the various levels of gates completely controlled by the defending side, in order to fight their way up layer by layer and enter the core city and upper deck.

Not only in mobile cities, but also in field command posts and most of the positions, they are deployed using land-based ships and mobile fortresses.

Therefore, when launching airdrop attacks on these targets, they must never be dropped outside the city or in open areas.

That means you need to rely on scattered paratroopers to carry out the siege mission with light weapons and a small number of heavy weapons, while the defenders don't even need to do anything. All they need to do is raise the ramps of the entrance and exit passages, and then the paratroopers will be riddled with light and heavy weapons of all levels on the defensive decks that are as high as the city walls.

This is why Terra, despite having jetpacks and low-altitude aircraft similar to helicopters, hasn't developed tactics like rappelling or airdrops. You have to rush over to the top of the enemy city and drop them down, and once you land, you can only move around on the upper decks, making it difficult to penetrate to the lower levels.

The integrated airdrop of personnel and vehicles is too technically challenging for the Terrans. Without heavy weapons and heavy vehicles, paratroopers are almost always rendered incompetent upon landing.

Therefore, Terran paratroopers are mainly equipped with jetpacks to jump from land-based ships onto the decks of target urban areas, and then coordinate with friendly forces in other areas to carry out three-dimensional strikes.

To conduct airborne operations on Terra, you first need a vehicle that can withstand increasingly powerful anti-aircraft fire and hover over target cities to drop personnel and supplies. This first requirement eliminates all units on Terra.

Lateran might have large airships that could barely meet the requirements in terms of load capacity and loiter time, but their defensive capabilities would still be no match for anti-aircraft fire. Moreover, the airships were so large that no one could miss them, and their load capacity was only barely up to standard.

The second condition is that the paratroopers need to have sufficient force and supplies to hold out in the city.

However, Terra's city-layered structure also has an advantage: the slums and urban-rural fringe areas, which have the largest populations, the most densely populated areas, and the most complex terrains, are all located on the lower decks, while the upper decks are only a horizontal distance from the enemy's core area.

Moreover, given the usual practice of siege warfare, the enemy's main defensive forces are located in the outer and lower areas.

After all, these areas are the hardest hit by land-based ships boarding and jet assault troops infiltrating, and are also the main areas of defensive artillery emplacements in urban structures.

If you land on the upper deck, the enemy garrison won't be able to arrive immediately to encircle and annihilate you, and you might be closer to the enemy command post than to their guards.

The downside is that the upper deck has a high building density, and as an affluent area, it has extensive security and guard facilities.

Although the number of troops stationed there is not large, their quality and equipment are generally very high. Moreover, once they land, the enemy's core urban area control forces, who are under direct threat, will immediately attempt to separate the city. For the paratroopers, time is of the essence.

"Boom!" The airdrop pod crashed heavily into the ruins. This airdrop pod, which was converted from a civilian container of the Covenant, felt terrible, like stuffing a person into a washing machine and then throwing them down from the sky.

Chloe shook her head vigorously, finally regaining focus. "Catch!"

A teammate pulled a rifle out of the airdrop and tossed it over—a standard, older-model Supporter rifle with four ammo pouches hanging on its side. He casually removed the pouches and hung them on easily accessible attachment points, then checked the weapon's condition. "Click!"

"Where are we located?" The Sarkaz communications mage in the group paused for a moment, seemingly trying to confirm some information through the Demon Lord's network.

"The nearest squad is less than 60 meters away from us..." The neural link directly marked a clear blue outline in Chloe's eyes.

Meanwhile, enemies identified and detected by the opposing squad are marked with red outlines, while important civilians and neutral units are marked with yellow outlines.

They didn't have a detailed map of the city, but the squads and paratroopers scattered throughout the city formed a small information network through the Demon King Network, operating with the Sky Throne as the relay server.

In other words, the terrain and enemy/ally data detected by each person are quickly refreshed on the server and then updated in the mind of each Sarkaz communications warlock, who then promptly shares this information with everyone in the team.

"Our mission is to capture the city control node at the end of Granar Avenue to prevent the enemy from severing the connection between the core city and other areas."

In that case, the paratroopers would be left dumbfounded, facing a sheer drop like a cliff, being mobbed by the enemy's firepower positions. This thing is even more effective than a moat.

"We will meet up with other squads along the way. Our mission is to control point A-3. Control points A-2 and A-1 are the responsibility of other units."

The operational plans of each squad and command post have been sent to every soldier's mind via the network.

It can be said that everyone clearly knows what their goal is, what they need to do, where the nearest friendly forces are located and how far away they are, and what their status is.

Of course, it also knows the hostile targets in the vicinity marked by friendly forces. Although this target identification is not real-time, but rather like an afterimage, simply put, even the Demon King Network has a delay in processing and forwarding.

Therefore, the enemy and friendly markers detected are all from 30 seconds to 1 minute ago. However, this is more than enough to provide battlefield information guidance.

"Do you all understand?" Kolo looked at his three teammates, who had also roughly digested the information. "Ander, you lead the charge, and cover each other." For motor infantry wearing power armor...

When they advance in squads, most of the Leitanian non-heavy infantry have difficulty stopping them.

Their armor can ignore attacks from light weapons below the level of a city-breaking crossbow, and melee attacks are even more absurd. What a joke! Is it that the electromagnetic rifle in full-automatic mode with a rate of fire of 850 rounds per minute is not powerful enough, or that the under-barrel shotgun is not powerful enough to make you think this way?

However, when encountering units equipped with Ursus siege crossbows and Letanian fire mage staves, you still need to take cover. One hit won't be fatal, but the second or third will take you down.

"Also, remember to wear your helmets. There was a message from the mind network just now: Romanov from Easy Company had his head blown off by a Leitanian militiaman. This isn't our city, so all the markers aren't very accurate..."

To be precise, this mental labeling is a rather subjective thing. In other words, if a soldier has no hostile intentions or does not realize that the other party is a disguised soldier or militiaman, he will most likely label the other party as a civilian or neutral unit.

Conversely, some armed civilians may also be marked as red hostile units. This requires frontline soldiers to make a second visual confirmation, rather than simply calling in an airstrike and blasting them away as soon as they see a bunch of red units.

Even with these restrictive conditions, the Letanians still managed to defeat them decisively in small-scale battles.

Aside from some funny incidents caused by unfamiliarity with the terrain, such as marking a distance of only 60 meters, only to find out upon arrival that it is actually a 60-meter-wide urban freight canal with a drop of over 15 meters, requiring a detour of at least one or two kilometers to find road signs and city bus maps.

If these issues are disregarded, the Leitanians feel that the other side is more like a local than they are. Often, a Leitanian force reinforcing the command post will be ambushed by multiple squads on the way, and these ambushes are well-planned, clearly communicated, and well-paced.

Typically, the attack is spearheaded by mobile infantry or air-dropped armored vehicles. While the enemy relies on convoys, streets, and buildings to resist, large numbers of enemy troops will begin to move towards the area from the buildings on both sides and behind, seemingly out of nowhere.

Even though Letania was the one with more people, the total number of troops airdropped was less than a thousand, a few Odin tanks and some light armored vehicles, two gunboats, plus some reinforcements airdropped later. With such a small number of people, Letania felt like the one with fewer people.

They are often surrounded and annihilated by local forces with a numerical advantage, while other countries' paratroopers are usually surrounded by locals familiar with the terrain.

As a result, the Letanians discovered that they were the ones who were surrounded. How did these guys manage to communicate with each other? How did they know where their allies were, what they were fighting, and how many enemies there were?

However, this issue is not important to Kolo's C squad. He has already reunited with the remaining mobile infantry of the C platoon and now has two thermobaric cannons as heavy weapons.

However, this is still insufficient for the city control node, which is not far away and is in a defensive state, executing the mobile city block unlocking and disconnecting from its work.

How much longer until Odin arrives?

“In three minutes, they were blocked by a convoy of civilians, and the refugees were fleeing to the lower levels and the core area.”

"Never mind, let's launch a full-scale attack." While waiting would certainly result in fewer casualties, the problem is that once the enemy breaks away from the city and controls the suspension bridge, all the airborne troops will be blocked in the outer city, waiting for the enemy forces emerging from the lower levels and various passages to encircle and annihilate them one by one.

The attacking forces outside the city were delayed again because the rain clouds were moving. In fact, the same was true inside the city; a light drizzle had already begun to fall, and a torrential rain disaster was approaching the city.

Although the natural disaster has released most of its power and is now very weak, it also means that the War Knights can no longer provide air support to the ground, and the attacking forces outside the city will try to avoid being trapped by floods and swamps, thus slowing down their advance.

Therefore, if they take control of the core area, then it will be their turn to carry out the separation operation, leaving the Letanians helpless against the core city. Without the power supply from the core city, the auxiliary power in other cities cannot run very fast, and they cannot abandon the core city.

Putting aside other things, half of the energy and control lines for the city's air defense firepower and urban defense artillery are connected to the core urban area.

Once they capture multiple control towers and the city hall in the core area and disable anti-aircraft fire, they can send the Sky Throne back into low-altitude flight and land in the harbor of the core area before the storm arrives. This would give them another mobile fortress, increasing their chances of defense.

Moreover, the pressure on Letania will become unprecedented, as the defensive firepower against the troops outside the city will be greatly reduced, forcing them to send more troops to defend.

However, retaking the core city area would require a large number of troops, and this "bleeding from both ends" would leave the Letania command in a state of being unable to attend to both.

However, all of this depends on successfully capturing the core urban area before the storm, and the first step is to take control of these separate control nodes.

"How many Dragonfire grenades do we have left?" "We've hardly used any along the way, we still have 40 rounds," the gunner said after checking the ammunition box. "Use them all, use the fire wall to clear a path and provide cover..."

Power armor can ignore the fire caused by Dragonfire Bullets. Of course, being directly hit by a Dragonfire Bullet will result in instant vaporization, but ordinary flames on ignited debris, carbonized road surfaces, and building ruins will be harmless as long as you are not submerged in them.

“Your armor can only last for a maximum of 60 seconds inside. So, keep charging and don’t stop. If you stop, even if the Letanians don’t kill you all, the flames will take your lives!” Kolo raised his rifle and looked at the separation control node ahead.