I Am The Swarm

“We must destroy them in one decisive blow. Prolonged attrition is not an option,” Hamis said with a furrowed brow.

“It seems we’ll need to use that,” Novaul replied gravely.

“Haha! It’s about time. Why hesitate? Weapons are made for moments like this!” Alcer laughed heartily.

The three highest commanders on the front line reached a consensus, and the orders were quickly dispatched.

To simultaneously strike at the dozens of battlefields across Planet Raze, over a hundred warships stationed in orbit gradually opened the missile silos on the lower sides of their hulls.

Towering missiles, 35 meters tall with a diameter of 7.6 meters and cone-shaped tips, emerged from the silos. Each warship launched at least two of these massive projectiles.

The missiles accelerated steadily as their fire-control systems activated, locking onto their designated targets with assistance from the warships’ artificial intelligence.

Minutes later, hundreds of miniature suns ignited on Planet Raze. Unlike incendiary bombs, these suns burned relentlessly.

These were the Riken’s newly deployed nuclear weapons.

This new generation of nuclear weapons utilized a significantly more potent structure and formula. In addition to the energy released from nuclear fission, the outer shell of each missile was coated with radioactive materials. The high temperatures from the fission reaction initiated a second fusion process, unleashing even greater energy.

The Riken had perfected the underlying theories of these weapons long ago. Although they had previously manufactured such weapons, their immense destructive power, extreme danger, and storage challenges led to their decommissioning.

After the unification of the Riken, there was little need for such armaments—until the emergence of the Swarm.

Compared to the 200-megaton nuclear devices the Riken had previously detonated in the Neighboring Star System, these new weapons boasted a staggering yield of one gigaton.

When hundreds of these superweapons detonated simultaneously, the absence of an atmosphere to generate shockwaves did little to diminish their devastating impact. The sheer power annihilated everything within dozens of kilometers of each detonation site.

At the epicenters, within tens of kilometers of the blasts, everything—whether rock, dust, metal, ground-based cannons, or the Fungal Carpet—was vaporized into nothingness. All that remained were massive, hemispherical craters.

The hundreds of miniature suns burned for an extended time before finally extinguishing, leaving Planet Raze riddled with craters. The once-persistent purple-gray patches that had so troubled the Riken vanished without a trace.

Gazing at the now-scarred surface of Planet Raze, Hamis sighed softly.

Hearing the sigh during their video call, Alcer quipped, “What’s this? Feeling sorry for our enemy?”

Hamis shook his head. “I just didn’t expect it would come to this.”

Truth be told, this new type of nuclear weapon was far less sophisticated than the energy-beam main cannons. Yet Hamis found the weapon deeply unsettling—not because of its power.

Alcer, a staunch believer in the philosophy that weapons were meant to be used, understood Hamis’s concern. He fell silent briefly before murmuring, “Don’t overthink it. Focus on the present. If we can’t survive now, there’s no future to worry about.”

When Godzilla unleashed its “atomic breath” on the Great Dawn Planet, its yield barely reached tens of kilotons. Yet even from another star system, the Riken had been able to observe the event through their instruments.

Thus, the Riken were acutely aware of the dangers posed by such weapons.

Each spiral galaxy contained hundreds of billions of stars, suspended in the void. Among them lay countless civilizations of varying levels, each hidden within their own star systems, oblivious to the others’ locations.

But an abnormal fusion reaction was akin to broadcasting a civilization’s coordinates. It was an open invitation to any nearby civilization capable of detecting such energy waves.

When the Riken detonated hundreds of 200-megaton nuclear devices in the Neighboring Star System, their aim had not only been to hinder the Swarm’s pursuit but also to expose the coordinates of the Swarm’s home star system.

If the event drew the attention of civilizations of a similar level nearby, causing them to investigate and create trouble for the Swarm, it would give the Riken the breathing room they desperately needed to regroup and develop. This outcome would be ideal.

However, such actions also carried significant risks, such as attracting more advanced civilizations. After eliminating the Swarm, those civilizations would likely turn their attention to the Riken next.

In that case, the Riken could only hope that the Swarm was strong enough to buy them some time for development.

Even though it had been decades since the last nuclear detonations, the danger could not be entirely ruled out. If a civilization’s travel speed remained below the speed of light, it would be entirely normal for them to spend decades—or even centuries—en route.

Perhaps, right now, one or several civilizations had already been drawn by the last nuclear explosions and were on their way to investigate.

This time, however, the nuclear detonations on Planet Raze were on an even grander scale.

If Godzilla’s atomic breath was akin to lighting a match in the dark, and the Neighboring Star System’s nuclear blasts were like setting off a firework in the night sky, then this nuclear event was equivalent to firing a flare into the darkness—one bright enough to overshadow the fireworks entirely.

If there were spectators drawn by the “fireworks,” they would undoubtedly shift their attention to this “flare” and come to investigate.

The problem was that the location of this nuclear event, Planet Raze, was a planet in the Riken’s home star system.

This posed a significant risk.

But as Alcer had pointed out, if alien forces from the T85 Star System were to seize Planet Raze, they would establish a foothold in the Riken star system. Coupled with their mysterious and unpredictable technological systems, the Riken would likely face certain defeat.

As a vanquished civilization, what future would there be to consider?

Thus, the Riken had no choice but to focus on the present.

Fortunately, after paying such a steep price, the persistent purple-gray patches, which clung to the planet like parasitic maggots, were finally eradicated from Planet Raze.

The Riken refused to believe that any of the alien monstrosities could still exist within the vaporized, hemispherical craters left behind.

Thanks to the design of the newly equipped nuclear warheads, which reacted with their radioactive materials in a secondary reaction, the explosions left no lingering radiation zones. Compared to previous iterations, these were remarkably “clean.”

Without the complications of high-radiation areas, there was no need for additional radiation suits, allowing reconstruction efforts on Planet Raze to commence swiftly after the battle. According to forward Lookouts, the Swarm’s next wave of forces had already begun amassing near the asteroid belt on the outskirts of the Riken star system. The Riken needed to restore all—or at least part—of their defensive infrastructure before the Swarm’s next attack.

Massive transport ships and utility vessels streamed in from within the star system, delivering enormous quantities of engineering equipment to Planet Raze. Mining facilities, smelting centers, and ground-cannon production plants were rapidly constructed across the planet.

Once the initial setup phase was complete, a steady flow of components was transported to various locations on the planet. Airships carrying intelligent engineering machinery shuttled back and forth, assembling the components piece by piece.

Meanwhile, in the planet’s orbit, vacuum smelting facilities and shipyards were also taking shape.

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