CHAPTER 141: THE VENUS GAMBLE

A three-dimensional virtual projection displayed the entire solar system.

General Harrier stepped forward, his fingers, covered in fine, silvery-white scales, finally rested on a planet.

It was an extremely bright planet with a very thick atmosphere.

Venus.

The relevant operational plan was quickly reported to Chief Haiwei’s desk. Looking at the operational plan, a slight smile finally appeared on his usually serene face.

"Harrier, you haven’t disappointed me. Since you’ve found the enemy’s weakness, then, go do it."

...

The brutal battle continued. But at this moment, the enemy’s troop movements seemed somewhat unusual.

Tom noticed that a large number of the enemy’s fleets were maneuvering within the asteroid belt.

Within the asteroid belt were four rocky planets. Outside the asteroid belt were four gas giants.

This seemed to indicate that the enemy’s primary target in the next phase would be the rocky planets.

"Why would they make such a deployment? The defensive strength of the rocky planets is clearly greater than that of the gas giants."

Tom did not dare to be negligent and also began corresponding troop deployments.

After completing the initial arrangements, Tom saw that a total of more than 200,000 Bluetoth warships suddenly charged fiercely toward Venus.

"Venus? Is the main target planet Venus? Why?"

Tom couldn’t quite figure it out.

As a rocky major planet, the defenses there were also extremely tight.

A large number of space mines, nuclear missiles, turrets, unmanned warships, and manned warships were stockpiled there, with defensive capabilities no weaker than Earth’s.

Furthermore, Venus could receive support from other planets at any time.

No matter how he looked at it, Venus should not be a soft target.

Although he couldn’t quite understand it, Tom still stood ready, giving his all.

The battle erupted. And it was more intense than any previous battle.

This was no longer the small skirmish from before, but a true, full-scale planetary offense and defense battle!

But this time, there seemed to be one detail that was different from before.

Tom saw that although the enemy was also desperately attacking his defensive forces, their focus seemed to have shifted from warships to another place.

Supercomputing ships!

Those scattered, hidden supercomputing ships, carrying supercomputers and running the strategic version of Goku AI inside, seemed to have become the main target of the enemy’s planetary offense and defense this time!

Tom was slightly startled, then immediately understood, and a grim expression appeared on his face.

His opponent was indeed cunning and an experienced veteran of the battlefield; his intuition was so sharp!

No wonder they didn’t hesitate to waste so many resources in the previous stage, engaging in a chaotic battle with him throughout the solar system. It turned out that the chaotic battle wasn’t the goal; finding his defensive weakness was!

And now, this weakness, which could hardly be called a weakness, was actually found by the enemy!

Venus’s surface environment is extremely harsh.

Due to its overly thick atmosphere and an extremely severe, even runaway, greenhouse effect, the average temperature on Venus’s surface is over 400 degrees Celsius, capable of melting some low-melting-point metals.

Not only that, but Venus’s atmosphere also contains a very large amount of sulfuric acid, which is extremely corrosive. Its atmospheric pressure is also extremely high, more than ninety times that of Earth’s atmosphere.

Thunderstorms, strong winds, acid rain, high temperatures, and even lava flowing across the surface. In such a harsh environment, even Tom’s technological level could not carry out large-scale infrastructure construction on Venus’s surface.

The supercomputing bases, which played an extremely important, even crucial, role in the planetary defense system, were not built on Venus’s surface but instead took the form of supercomputing ships operating in space.

This was unique in the entire solar system. Because, besides Venus, even Mercury, the closest planet to the sun, has numerous valleys, craters, and other places where ground-based supercomputers and land-based air defense bases could be built.

Even on Earth, a large number of supercomputers were built on the ground.

Although no land-based air defense bases were built, planets with atmospheres like Earth, Venus, and Mars simply don’t need land-based air defense bases.

The atmosphere is a natural protective layer. High-speed electromagnetic cannon projectiles, laser beams, shells, and interstellar missiles simply cannot penetrate the atmosphere’s protection.

Originally, it didn’t matter if there were no ground-based supercomputers. Supercomputing ships in space could still fulfill the duty of running the strategic version of Goku AI and coordinating the entire defense system.

This simply couldn’t be considered a weakness.

But...

That was only under normal circumstances.

At this moment, with the enemy consciously searching for and dedicating a large amount of combat power specifically to attack the supercomputing ships, the weakness of space supercomputing ships lacking the natural protective layer of the atmosphere that ground-based supercomputing bases possess was immediately exposed.

Space supercomputing ships are easier to destroy!

Even if Tom had already made supercomputing ships a key protected target, hidden behind numerous unmanned combat forces, this level of protection still could not compare to the protection provided by the atmosphere, a natural protective layer.

At this moment, around the Venus battlefield, more than a dozen supercomputing ships were destroyed in a short period by the enemy, who spared almost no cost.

Although Tom had reserved enough backup supercomputing ships, these ships immediately took over and continued to coordinate the entire unmanned combat system, but these supercomputing ships were also being continuously destroyed.

No matter how many were reserved, the number was ultimately limited.

Supercomputing ships from other planets were too far from Venus, resulting in communication delays, and could not take over the task of coordinating unmanned combat forces from Venus’s supercomputing ships.

Transferring supercomputing ships from other planets?

It was useless. Even if they were transferred, they would still be destroyed.

With a large number of supercomputing ships being destroyed, the operation of the unmanned combat forces, a crucial component of the Venus defense line, clearly became sluggish.

When other supercomputing ships were destroyed, the remaining computational tasks could only be distributed among the remaining supercomputing ships. But individual supercomputing ships have limited computational power, inevitably leading to congestion and lag.

As a result, the unmanned combat system operated even slower, with lower combat effectiveness, and the remaining supercomputing ships were more easily destroyed.

Although each unmanned combat device had the tactical version of Goku AI, which could mitigate some of the losses caused by the strategic version of Goku AI’s inability to operate, it was only a part.

The importance of the strategic version of Goku AI and the supercomputing bases was irreplaceable.

In just a few days, the situation had deteriorated to an almost irreversible point.

The fall of Venus was almost inevitable.

Tom clearly understood what allowing the enemy to have an entire major planet as a logistics supply base meant for the entire war.

His technology was insufficient to carry out large-scale infrastructure construction on Venus, but the enemy was different!

Their technology was more advanced; they had that capability!

But...

"Since I can’t defend Venus, then I won’t defend it! I’ll give it to you!"

Tom gritted his teeth and made a decision: "I will make Venus your tomb!"