Thousands of sparks

Chapter 84 Newsail Jump Ambush
Vacations are always short and full of regrets.The source of regret is mainly that the vacation is too short, and the busy work after the vacation is over.

All in all, holidays are a shame.

Du Sande got up from the bed with great regret, washed his face with hot water with great regret, and then drank a full cup of surrogate tea with great regret.

Under the refreshing effect of the surrogate tea, Du Sande walked into the restaurant full of energy and had breakfast with his mother.

"Today you need to attend the meeting of the four committees, preside over a regular discussion, and also consider the "Promoting Education Act" and "Improving the Basic Benefits of Labor" bills that have been passed by the House of Commons." Before eating, Dusand first flipped through the Opened his own work notebook and reported today's itinerary plan to Androni, "At noon you need to have lunch with the leader of the minority party, Mr. Come to visit and expect to meet you at dessert time."

"Understood." Androni nodded, and then asked, "Then what does my little secretary have to do today?"

Du Sande turned over the next page of the notebook, and his face suddenly became bitter.

"I'm going to visit... twelve departments, meet seven regional representatives, and attend four meetings." Dusande said with a sad face, "I have two working lunches at noon today, and I have to meet with the Archbishop of Upper Albin in the afternoon. "

Androni raised her eyebrows, and said with some concern, "It's good that you have enthusiasm for work, but isn't this kind of work arrangement a little too busy?"

With a sad face, Dusand finished the breakfast in front of him as quickly as possible, "I have adjusted your work arrangement, but I don't have my own chief private secretary to take care of these things... I can only see the stitches."

Pure man, although he complains that he is busy all day long, he will still faithfully implement all schedules.Du Sande now feels that the purity of his man is as high as six 9s. He met all seven regional representatives in one go, and by the way, made plans for education reform in three of them.

Not only pure man, but also very capable.

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While Dusand turned into a workaholic, Colonel Dusan at the Naval Command of the Garrison in Newsail was also working hard.

In the past two months, the alliance has increased the frequency and intensity of infiltration into the Newsail galaxy, which made Dushan a little worried.

The Newsail Garrison Navy currently has two capital ships built 20 years ago, four battlecruisers, six large cruisers and 27 frigates.As a garrison navy, the composition and strength of this fleet is completely at the average level of the empire, but it is indeed incomparable with the Imperial Royal Guard Navy Fleet, which has at least [-] capital ships and [-] battlecruisers.

The main duty of the Garrison Navy is to secure the space between the orbits of the two planets around the colony.And their means of ensuring the safety of this large space is achieved through a large number of "observation posts" arranged on orbits.

Observation posts are the main means of early warning for the Imperial Navy. These observation posts are equipped with huge compressed air storage tanks. After each jump to a fixed altitude, steam is released and a huge "reaction" is launched using gunpowder to achieve orbit.

After entering orbit, the observation post can operate in orbit for at least 20 days with its own compressed air reserves, food and water reserves.During these 20 days, the 21 soldiers in the observation post will observe all the movement in the orbit through the optical telescope without interruption.

The Ipsilon mine used by the Confederates seems to be laced with strange impurities, and their ships emit a bright but brief blue light when they complete long-distance jumps.

In the past two months, the alliance's infiltration ships have begun to frequently enter the orbital space near Niusal, and there is even a tendency to move closer to Niusal.

Such a move is very unusual, especially considering that the pressure on the empire's defense line in Bomir is gradually increasing, the Bomir garrison fleet is almost wiped out, and the local defense is fully taken over by the Imperial Guard Navy Fleet. Arrived under great pressure.

Frequent close reconnaissance is often a precursor to a large-scale attack.

It has been a week since the letter asking for more assistance from Olin was sent out, and the officials of the Ministry of the Navy are probably still trying to shirk it—after Bomir was attacked, the commanders of the garrison fleets of the 41 colonial planets may have all died. Submitted a request to enhance equipment to Olin.

Everyone shouted "Wolf is coming", and the cries for help when they really encountered a wolf would inevitably be covered up.

Duchamp sent his adjutant and chief of staff directly to the Olin Admiralty with the report.He asked his adjutant to go to General Horn, who had been promoted to major general, with a personal letter while the Chief of Staff was reporting to the Olin Navy Department.

In the letter, Dushan detailed the challenges and dangers that Niusal is currently facing, and asked Mr. Major General for assistance.

"Newsall is currently the only manufacturer of motor vehicles in the empire. As far as I know, Dusand and his partners are still improving the gas engine." ", Duchamp also directly disclosed the "research progress" of Dusand and Polina in the letter, "The power and operation stability of the new gas engine have made great progress, but it will take some time before it is put into mass production."

The meaning of this sentence is obvious, "Your Excellency, your big toy has a new DLC, but the development team is about to be blown away! If you still want this DLC, hurry up and save people!"

Asking for help is definitely required. As the commander of the garrison fleet of the Imperial Navy, Dushan needs to do more than just asking for help.

Under his command, the garrison launched a daring active ambush mission.

According to the observation of the lookout post, the approaching reconnaissance of the allies is very methodical and regular.While it's hard to estimate when they'll complete the jump, the scouting fleet is doing the jump reconnaissance from the perspective of the Newsail ecliptic.

According to the research and judgment of the staff department, the other party should be trying to detect the level of orbital defense of Newsail.They seemed particularly interested in the starport and the observation post orbiting Newsail in synchronous orbit.

Observation posts in other areas are generally pure observation equipment.But Newsale's style is different.

The main gun barrel of the capital ship needs to be replaced after firing [-] rounds, and the replaced barrel is usually directly treated as waste and sent to the colonial planet or other scrap metal dealers for recycling.

But Duchamp was not such a character.He collected all these barrels and had them welded directly outside the observation post.

The size of the observation post is not small, coupled with dense optical observation equipment and a sharp-edged appearance... At least from a distance, the observation post with a welded barrel looks like an orbital fort on a track.

Although the gun barrel was simply welded to the observation post, it was basically useless waste.But it can't stand its appearance. It seems that even the alliance's reconnaissance fleet was frightened.

And Duchamp was going to take this opportunity to give a "big gift" to the allies.

The two battleships cannot move, their targets are too big, and once dispatched, they are easily spotted by the lurking allies.The same goes for battlecruisers - they have less armor than capital ships, but the guns are of the same class as capital ships.Although the streamlined lines make their projected area about the same as that of a large cruiser at the correct angle, they are theoretically more survivable.But Duchamp still wasn't going to take the risk.

He dispatched four large cruisers and eight destroyers.The fleet of twelve ships will lurk into the allied reconnaissance area calculated by the staff, and then try to capture an allied reconnaissance ship.

This is a battle plan with a low success rate and extremely difficult execution.In the era of sailing ships, capturing the enemy's ships was a very dangerous task.Team-hopping operations mean that navies with ship advantages need to leave their ships, enter the narrow and unfamiliar environment of enemy ships, and fight with each other at close range.

When it comes to guns, everyone is equal.Jumping gang combat is equivalent to breaking away from the protection of the ship's armor and giving up the use of large-caliber main guns to attack.This will greatly weaken the combat capabilities of naval soldiers, and may even cause heavy casualties in the process of attacking enemy ships.

But Duchamp still decided to plan and execute a gang-jumping operation in the age of sail in the context of interstellar travel.

He needs to obtain enough intelligence to judge whether the alliance has regarded Nusaar as an optional target for the next operation.

Today is the day of execution.

"Your Excellency, Commander, found the flash!" Since Dushan needed to be tied up with a rope to avoid floating in mid-air due to weightlessness, it was difficult for Dushan, who was sitting in his seat, to grasp all the "information" quickly.Therefore, a large group of junior and middle officers gathered in the command room.

Different officers are responsible for different specialized details.The battle command room of the garrison fleet is located inside the star port, protected by six layers of armor that is one yolk thick.The external intelligence collection of the combat command room is mainly completed by receiving light signals, and after the signals are translated, the messengers pass them into the combat command headquarters through layers of thick and narrow airtight doors.

Such an order is inefficient, but at least safe.

The staff officers and secretaries are responsible for conducting sand table deduction and layout in mid-air based on the information received by the messengers.This work often requires the staff to float in mid-air to adjust the model, so it often happens that after the staff completes the arrangement, they float in mid-air and have nowhere to use it. In the end, they can only be pushed by other staff to reconnect To the ground things happen.

And in the war room, in order to ensure that everyone's time would not be wasted by such a stupid mistake, each of these staff officers would wear a long belt.

Other combat staff officers will continue to judge and analyze the battlefield situation based on intelligence, and will also add consideration of natural celestial bodies in the research and judgment process.

For example, in this ambush gang battle, the ambush fleet sent by the garrison fleet needs to enter the asteroid belt one day in advance, manually capture a batch of asteroids, and then use steel cables to tie them together to form a concealment.

This is a very difficult project, but fortunately, the engineers of the Navy, wearing heavy mining gas-tight suits, completed the work in time.

Now, a large net has been laid, and it is waiting for the allies to deliver the goods to the door.

"The location of the flash has been locked, and there are still 1.4 light-seconds away from the scheduled ambush site."

However, the position where the opponent appeared was not very ideal.

1.4 light seconds, which means a distance of about 18 miles.This distance seriously exceeds the firepower projection capability of the Imperial Navy.

The most powerful large cruisers in the fleet are equipped with 19-inch guns with a standard charge of 1070 joles per second.Fired from this distance, it takes 28 seconds for the shell to fly to the position of the Confederate scout ship.

In other words, at least 77 hours later, the shells can hit the target.

"Continue to wait." Duchamp issued an order, the position of the allies is too far away.Now even if the fleet is allowed to make a leap, it is completely impossible to achieve the intended combat goal.He must continue to wait.

Half an hour later, the Confederates made the second jump.

"There are still 1.1 light seconds to the scheduled ambush site."

The third jump occurred an hour later, "0.4 light-seconds from the ambush site."

Duchamp asked the deputy chief of staff at the side, "How different are their trajectories from your estimates?"

"At present, it is still within the expected range." The deputy chief of staff clamped his monocle, and then began to look at the calculation report in his hand, "In the next three jumps, the allies will be the closest to the ambush position. The current calculated closest distance is about 420 miles."

At this distance, the 19-inch artillery can hit the enemy ship about 10 minutes after it is fired.

"I hope your calculations are accurate." Duchamp turned his attention to the sand table being adjusted again. In the sand table deduced by the staff, there was a red ball that was particularly eye-catching.And around this sphere, twelve warships formed a hemisphere.

"For the fourth jump, it is estimated that there are still [-] miles away from the ambush point!"

Figuring out where a ship capable of interstellar jumping will be next is a near-impossible task.

Epsilon Ore is surprisingly easy to use—just heat it.

All Ypsilon ores need to be processed into a straight cone shape.After heating the Ypsilon ore that has been processed into a straight conical shape to 780 grams (the same definition as Celsius), this magical mineral will be 1000 times its volume and the same shape as the "jump space". All the matter in it, together with itself, "jumps" to other places.

The direction of the transition is the extension direction of the ray from the center of the right-angled cone bottom circle to the high point.

If there is no artificial processing, the transition direction of the Ypsilon Mine will be impossible to estimate.On the other hand, the circular Ypsilon ore transitions completely randomly. It seems that only after being processed into a right-angled cone shape can the transition direction of this ore be completely controlled artificially.

The distance of the transition is related to the length of time the mineral maintains a high temperature of 1785 degrees.

Maintain 1785 degrees and heat for 1 second, and the jump distance is about [-] miles.

After the heating is stopped, the temperature of the Ipsilon ore will naturally drop by five degrees.After cooling down to 1780 degrees Celsius, the jump will start instantaneously - at the same time the temperature of the ore will drop back to 20 degrees in an instant.

Whether in water, in a vacuum, or with other fuels.The temperature of Ypsilon ore will never exceed 1785 degrees Celsius, nor will it fall below 20 degrees Celsius.Its heating rate is related to fuel, but its cooling rate is a constant "momentary disappearance".

The Empire has discovered and used Ypsilon Ore for more than 400 years, but no one has yet figured out why the ore has such inexplicable properties and functions.

When not heated to 1785 degrees, the appearance of Ypsilon mine is similar to that of ordinary quartz stone.During heating, its green color will gradually fade and turn purple.

Due to the influence of processing accuracy and ore purity, when performing a long-distance jump, the ship often needs to stop in the middle of the jump, then correct its position, and then make a short-distance jump to reach the target.

Predicting the opponent's action mode means that the staff department has calculated the processing accuracy and shape of the Ypsilon ore used by the opponent, and based on this, calculates how many transition adjustments the opponent needs to make when reaching the best observation position.

The staff estimated the movement trajectory of the alliance ships as nine jumps, and the ambush location they arranged was just after the alliance scout ship completed the sixth jump.

　The last chapter was numbered wrong, I just found out...

　　I have already left a message with the editor, and it is estimated that it will be corrected within the 3rd.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)