Counterfeit Hero

A carrier is not just a mobile airport carrying fighter jets; its true role is a combat platform integrating command, electronic attack, long-range strike, and logistical maintenance. It signifies a more powerful offensive force, a wider battlefield coverage radius, and richer tactical variations. On this web-like Freedom Channel, a carrier capable of splitting and slipping into small jump points is even more a cornerstone for the bandit army’s growth and expansion.

To modify the carrier, just the design plans alone went through dozens of iterations. The blueprints and data for each plan would fill an entire single-occupancy living cabin if printed on paper!

In the end, the plan was finalized. The entire carrier was divided into six parts. Each part had independent energy, propulsion, firepower defense systems, and fighter jet launch ports, retrieval channels, and hangars. These six parts were further divided into six ships each. The joints had sealed armor and accessible gates. When combined, they could form a unified space.

The advantage of this design is that each of the six parts of the mothership has survival capabilities, and even if one part is lost, it doesn’t affect the combination of the mothership. Once thoroughly disassembled, the massive mothership can become thirty-six individually fast-moving ships that can disperse and escape, increasing their survival rate significantly over that of a slow-moving typical carrier. It can also traverse small space jump points, making it suitable for operations in the Freedom Channel.

The downside, however, is that building such a carrier requires an enormous amount of resources.

During that period, the First and Second Fleets of the bandit army went on a rampage along the Freedom Channel! One was the infamous ”Shattered Ghost,” and the other was the notorious ”Redbeard Pirates.” These guys would rob anyone they encountered. The First Fleet exclusively targeted the Western Alliance’s vessels and the Free World’s fleets, while the Second Fleet wouldn’t even spare the commerce groups and breakthrough ships of the Fei Alliance countries.

However, even during that time, when the entire Freedom Channel was filled with lifeboats from fleets robbed by the bandit army, and base ports were stacked with various ships waiting to be dismantled and smelted for alloys, the resources acquired by the bandit army were still far from meeting the needs for the carrier’s modification. Therefore, under Chekov’s command, the bandit army began targeting pirate groups and space station repair docks.

This bunch truly are natural bandits.

The list in Chekov’s hands was nothing short of a record of life and death. Within a few weeks, six pirate groups had their lairs overturned, and over a dozen pirate fleets were cornered into surrendering in obstacle zones. These pirates, piloting modified civilian ships, normally relied on speed and weapons like mixed cannons to bully civilian vessels, but stood no chance against the attacks of the bandit army fleet.

Many docks and space stations occupied by various forces were also cleared and changed ownership.

When Fatty miraculously led the bandit army’s ground forces to win the Mars ground campaign, the bandit army’s space fleet also completed the plundering and occupation of one-fifth of the space stations along the Freedom Channel.

Standing by the porthole, watching the quickly shrinking constant star, Fang Xiang let out a gentle sigh.

Thinking about the battle the bandit army fought on Mars Planet, it still felt like a dream to her.

Under that Fatty’s leadership, what Fang Xiang had always ignored as the bandit army’s ground forces, managed to win neatly and beautifully against overwhelming odds.

When the base was in jubilation, a group of Saleria officers couldn’t believe it was real.

Fang Xiang and the officers locked themselves in the war room for repeated simulations of the ground battle. Even knowing the outcome, the process of simulation left these graduates of prestigious military academies dumbfounded.

After leaving the war room, these proud officers all became fervent admirers of Fatty.

As for Fang Xiang herself, she had no choice but to reassess the combat capabilities of this mixed army once again. The formidable potential shown by those civilian Mech Knights made her increasingly hopeful about the future of this force.

After this battle, the bandit army not only harvested a large amount of urgently needed machinery, ship parts, and metal raw materials, but also took over nearly 1,400 ships of various sizes combined from the Northern Alliance and other forces. Although most of them were small, broken civilian spacecraft, cargo ships, and low-level escort ships, this windfall still dazzled everyone at the base.

As the spoils, new recruits, researchers, and skilled technicians continuously streamed into the base from Mars Free Port, and as the bandit army’s logistics department, now plentiful in resources and personnel, turned into a massive entity integrating research and manufacturing, Base No.1 and No.2 had already expanded twice under the frantic operations of the logistics department, with even more plans constantly being put on the agenda.

Fang Xiang could no longer sit still.

This is a group that creates miracles; what she needed was to participate, not to observe!

So, she stood here now. To execute a task she had deliberated over for a long time—robbery!

Since the Battleship and carrier modifications weren’t usual, Fang Xiang boarded a just-modified cruiser, the [Magic]. This was her first sortie. [Magic] would join alongside [Magic Cube], leading twelve modified armed merchant ships, twenty escort ships, and four electronic reconnaissance ships, toward a target Chekov had long been watching—Space Station 106.