169: Chapter 169 Joint Operation, Objective Set

As the morning light shed its last trace of chill, the alloy doors of the Chen Family's underground command center slid open silently.

Chen Wuwang stepped inside, his boot soles clicking crisply against the metal floor like the falling gavel of a command.

He said nothing and walked straight to the central sand table. His Mechanical Prosthetic Eye flickered with blue light, automatically pulling up the residual neural synchronization data from yesterday's mecha test drive—

That curve, stabilized above 82%, was still slowly drifting in the air.

Chen Xiaodao followed closely behind. His mechanical left arm shimmered with a pale blue luster after cooling down. His breathing was steady, but his eyes were startlingly bright.

He knew that yesterday's jump, flip, and landing weren't just the end of a test, but a beginning of sorts.

Aelia stood at the edge of the star map projection area, her wings half-spread. Her fingertips lightly tapped the floating panel, and layers of encrypted star tracks unfolded before her.

She didn't look at them, but her voice reached them first: "How high can the new mecha fly? Can it withstand the radiation of the asteroid belt? Don't tell me you plan to use a piece of scrap metal that hasn't even been to space yet to intercept a Zerg smuggling ship."

"It could already understand my sword last night."

Chen Xiaodao replied directly, his tone devoid of boasting, only filled with certainty. "I don't need it to fly high; I only need it to keep up with my thoughts."

Only then did Aelia turn her head. Her gaze swept over the boy's face and landed on his mechanical arm. "I believe in your resolve, but machines break. The Zerg won't wait for you to fix it before they strike."

Chen Wuwang walked to the sand table and swiped his finger. A 3D model of the po xu type-2 sprang up, superimposed with a distorted energy fluctuation trajectory.

"This isn't a mission where we just ram in with brute force," he said. "We won't move unless necessary, but when we do, we must seize their lifeblood."

He looked up at Aelia. "You have the routes, and I know their habits. The question now isn't whether we can fight, but whether you're willing to hand over the intelligence—completely."

Aelia arched an eyebrow. "And the conditions?"

"A thirty-seventy split of the spoils," Chen Wuwang said. "You take seventy percent of the liquid assets; we only want the core modules and navigation logs. Additionally, command will be shared during the operation, with each of us holding a veto power."

"Thirty percent?" Aelia sneered. "Just for intelligence on a smuggling route? Do you know how many Star Credits this information is worth?"

"I know," Chen Wuwang nodded. "But it's only worth that much because this route will close in three days. The Zerg hive is relocating its base, and this shipment is the last batch of transit supplies. If we miss this, the next time we see them will be face-to-face on the battlefield."

Aelia's pupils constricted slightly. She said nothing, her fingertips sliding rapidly across the panel to bring up a set of encrypted frequency records.

A few seconds later, a hidden star map slowly emerged, marking three intersecting undercurrent channels.

"This is level-two intelligence I intercepted from the Northland Merchant Alliance," she lowered her voice. "Two of them are decoys, specifically designed to lure pursuers into asteroid explosion zones. The real channel is hidden in the shadow zone of the abandoned asteroid belt. It opens every three days, with a window of only two hours."

Chen Xiaodao leaned in for a look, his brow furrowing. "This path is too narrow. A spaceship can't get in. We can only rely on a solo assault."

"Is that why you're so eager to be the vanguard?" Aelia glanced at him. "Being hot-blooded is good, but don't go throwing your life away."

"I'm not going there to die," Chen Xiaodao stared at the sand table. "I'm going to cut off their claws. Just give me thirty seconds to break in, and I can hack into their navigation hub and make the entire fleet slaughter each other."

"How will you get in?" Aelia asked.

"Crawl," he said. "Like a swordsman walking at night, sneaking along the shadows of the asteroids. While they activate the channel through the resonance beacon, I'll be waiting behind them."

Chen Wuwang looked at the sand table, his fingers lightly tapping the surface, one by one, as if calculating the rhythm.

A moment later, he pulled up the Family's patrol logs from the past seven days and imported the residual energy waveforms captured during the mecha's night patrols into the System.

"Every time the Zerg pass through, they release a low-frequency vibration," he pointed at the data stream. "The frequency is around 0.7 Hz, lasting for forty-seven seconds. This isn't a coincidence; it's their fixed procedure for opening spatial folds."

He enlarged the waveform and compared it with the opening times provided by Aelia; they matched almost perfectly.

"This means..." he paused, "we can predict the exact moment they will appear."

Aelia was finally moved. She pulled up the three suspicious points again and simulated the passage process one by one.

At the first two locations, the energy waveforms became disordered as soon as they entered the channel, clearly triggering trap counter-mechanisms. Only at the third location did the waveform transition smoothly, perfectly matching the data Chen Wuwang had extracted.

"You win." She put away the Star Map Device, her tone no longer testing. "The real channel is here. Three days from now at noon, they will leap out from the shadow zone and stay for twelve minutes to conduct the cargo transfer."

Chen Wuwang nodded and pressed his palm on the sand table's control button. The entire Void Realm map instantly reorganized, marking the optimal ambush positions, retreat routes, and interference nodes.

"The plan has three steps," he quickened his pace. "Step one: I will lead a team to lurk behind the D-7 Asteroid Core and cut off external communications. Step two: Xiao Dao will cling to the rear of the transport ship from the flank and plant a virus program to disrupt its engine synchronization. Step three: Aelia, you will activate interference beacons on the periphery to force them into an early warp jump—leaping in an unstable state will result in loss of control at best, or being blown into fragments at worst."

"I need air cover," Aelia immediately chimed in. "Once they detect an anomaly, they will certainly counterattack. My frigates can hold off the main firepower, but you need to ensure the assault team completes the mission within eight minutes."

"No problem." Chen Wuwang looked at Chen Xiaodao. "Are you ready?"

The boy didn't answer but instead walked directly onto the tactical platform and plugged into the sand table System.

Three assault paths were instantly generated: one for a frontal assault and two for stealthy infiltration.

He pointed to the second route and broke it down in detail—how to use micro-thrusters to jump across three floating rock bodies, how to silently adhere to the hull in a zero-gravity environment, and even simulated emergency counter-actions if discovered by patrolling Drones.

The simulation ended, and the entire System determined a success rate of 68%, higher than the standard for conventional raids.

Aelia watched for a while and finally nodded. "Fine, I accept this vanguard."

"Then it's settled." Chen Wuwang withdrew his hand. The light of the sand table dimmed but did not turn off. "Operation code name: 'Broken Thorn.' Execution in three days. Everyone is on standby; wait for my further notice."

He turned to leave but then stopped, looking back at Chen Xiaodao, who was still on the platform.

"Remember, you are going there to cut off their path, not to throw away your life."

"Understood." The boy stood straight, his gaze sharp as a blade.

Aelia put away her terminal, her wings slowly folding. She whispered, "I hope your mecha really can understand human speech."

No one responded.

The air went silent for a moment.

The light spots on the sand table were still slowly rotating, reflecting on the three faces like unextinguished war flames.

Chen Wuwang brushed his right hand over his Mechanical Prosthetic Eye, his brow slightly furrowed as his thoughts jumped to the next stage of deployment.

Aelia stood still, her fingertips unconsciously stroking the edge of the Star Map Device.

Chen Xiaodao still stood at the edge of the platform, the cooling light on his left arm blinking slightly like breathing.

Who had not left.

The meeting had not officially ended.

The target was locked.

The battle had yet to begin.