Chapter 9: Ninth Day of Lying Flat Like a Salted Fish

Lu Yuan: “…”

On the other side, Siming had already quickly finished the novice tutorial. He looked up excitedly. “Let’s play!”

“Starting already?” Lu Yuan raised an eyebrow. “Not going to practice a bit?”

“No need, it’s not like I can master it in a short time anyway.” Siming shook his head. Although the game was contained within a small handheld console, its scale was massive and the controls were quite complex. It was impossible to fully grasp it easily.

And then…

He lost five rounds in a row.

In the first round, before ten minutes had even passed, his fleet had been completely scattered and picked off one by one. It was as if Lu Yuan could see his every move; no matter where he commanded his ships to go, they would end up right in front of Lu Yuan’s cannons.

The second round, the third round… it was the same story.

Whether he tried assassination tactics, resource development, or an all-out offensive, no matter what strategy he used or what formation he adopted, Lu Yuan always secured a swift victory.

By the end, even Goudan’s interest was piqued. He leaned in, eyes darting back and forth between their two screens, narrating Lu Yuan’s operations to Siming in real-time.

Unfortunately…

It was still useless.

Siming felt numb. “You’re just bullying me at this point!”

“I’m not using cheats,” Lu Yuan said, spreading his hands. “On the contrary, you’ve been using Goudan to cheat the whole time.”

Siming painfully tossed the console aside and looked up to protest.

But he froze for a moment.

A rare hint of a smile played around Lu Yuan’s eyes. His usual air of lazy decadence had receded slightly, yet that occasional, sharp killing intent was also absent. His aura was peaceful, carrying a strange, gentle tranquility.

Siming’s frustration suddenly quieted.

“But…” He suddenly laughed. “You made this game yourself. You know the flow and the mechanics better than anyone, while I’m a total novice. If that’s not bullying, what is?”

“So?” Lu Yuan asked.

“Give me a handicap?” Siming suggested with a grin.

“Actually, you’re improving very fast,” Lu Yuan said. “And, believe it or not, I haven’t actually played it much myself.”

This was the truth. It was true he had made the game, but precisely because he had built it himself, he’d found it boring after playing a couple of times and tossed it aside.

“Still, it’s not out of the question. Tell me, how do you want me to handicap myself?”

“Two against one.” Siming blinked. “I’ll lead two fleets against your one.”

“…” Lu Yuan paused for two seconds, quickly catching his meaning, and smiled. “Sure.”

In the game, each player commanded a single fleet. The starting fleets were identical: a standard combat unit composition including a Mothership, a Command Ship, frigates, destroyers, Star Destroyers, supply ships, mecha mobile squads, and so on.

However, during the game, players could manufacture any type of ship except for the Mothership.

In other words, if a player was given enough time, they could stockpile a second fleet in addition to their starting one.

Starships meant firepower and combat strength. Two fleets against one seemed like a blatant cheat on the surface.

But in reality…

In this game, the most critical factor was always command.

Since it took an hour to manufacture an entire fleet, Lu Yuan wasn’t in a hurry. He smilingly sent a scout ship to Siming’s territory to “supervise,” watching as Siming commanded his little soldiers to frantically build ships.

The supply mechanics in the game couldn’t be exactly like reality, after all. In real life, how many supplies a fleet had depended on the wealth and resources of the backing nation and the nearest habitable planets. In the game, supplies were provided based on time.

At set intervals, the metals, food, medicine, and other items in the inventory would increase. These resources could then be used to replenish the soldiers’ stamina or build warships.

Siming built his ships with great enthusiasm—after being slaughtered several times, he was finally feeling the joy of gaming again.

Even though there were no intense battle scenes yet, watching his fleet grow larger and larger was genuinely satisfying. Base-building and farming games remained popular precisely because they possessed this unique charm.

It was stress-relieving.

Halfway through, Zhu Rong came over to tell Siming to return, but he refused.

“After this round!” he said firmly.

Thus, an hour later, under the watchful eyes of Lu Yuan, Goudan, and Zhu Rong, Siming finally finished building his second fleet.

Peering at Lu Yuan’s screen, Siming saw the small scout ship perform several short-range warps to return to its Mothership. He then asked Lu Yuan to show him the rest of the map to confirm that Lu Yuan had indeed done nothing for the past hour. Only then did he confidently pick up his console and shout, “Start!”

Lu Yuan nodded and switched his perspective to the Command Ship.

On an interstellar battlefield, headquarters were usually located within a Command Ship.

Compared to the massive Mothership, which handled manufacturing, repairs, and supplies, the Command Ship was a smaller target with higher maneuverability. Hidden among the frigates, it was nearly impossible to hit directly, making it easier to weave through the battlefield and maintain an overview of the entire engagement.

Furthermore, compared to other standard warships, the Command Ship was packed with communication equipment. Countless signal officers worked there, receiving intelligence from various ships, encrypting and transmitting new orders from the commander, and decoding enemy signals to analyze their next moves.

“Actually, on an interstellar battlefield, the greatest challenge a commander faces is the time lag.”

Lu Yuan intended to guide Siming so he could have a better gaming partner sooner, so he explained while he operated.

“A stellar-scale battle can span several light-years. Even with communication ships constantly warping between local sectors to maintain contact, there will be a gap of tens of minutes to several hours between a unit sending intelligence and receiving new orders.

“In other words, a qualified commander-in-chief must be able to use intelligence from tens of minutes ago to predict the situation tens of minutes into the future and issue orders accordingly.

“And those orders must be accurate. Usually, when a commander-in-chief needs to step in, it’s because the local sector commander can no longer handle the fight—meaning the local battle has already been lost or is on the verge of collapse. Once an order is wrong, recovery becomes extremely difficult.”

“In this game’s simulated planetary battles, the command transmission time is shortened, but it still takes a few minutes. A few minutes might not seem like much, but it can be a massive hindrance.

“The captain of an ordinary warship usually lacks a strong grasp of the overall situation. If they had it, they would have been promoted to commander long ago. Consequently, without a commander’s direction, ordinary warships tend to act in ways that are either rigid or impulsive. In the game, this manifests as highly programmed behavior.

“A real local conflict would likely last several days, whereas a single game round only takes a few hours. Because of this, that few-minute time difference translates to a few seconds of delay in the game.

“That is why you lost so quickly in the previous rounds. I can predict your movements, so I issue my orders in advance. It is effectively as if I have no latency while you do.

“You must have noticed this issue yourself. You have been trying to change your tactical approach to prevent me from predicting your moves. However, while being unpredictable can sometimes be an advantage, it can also hide underlying problems.

“There were some formations I did not predict, not because they were beyond my imagination, but because they were flawed.”

Siming felt a jolt of alarm. His movements faltered as he frantically reviewed his own deployments…

“Ah!” Zhu Rong suddenly cried out. “133.5, 281.9, 46, and 78.2, 176.3, 29… and…”

She called out two sets of coordinates.

Siming realized the danger at the same time and scrambled to pull back his defenses.

“Yes, exactly.”

Lu Yuan’s tone remained calm and unhurried. He even set down his handheld console and glanced at Zhu Rong with a hint of surprise before turning back to Siming.

“A few minutes, or a few seconds in the game, may seem short, but it is enough time for a Star Destroyer to Warp three times and penetrate deep into enemy territory through a breach.

“If you fail to predict my maneuvers and don’t reinforce your weak points in advance, you only realize you need to counterattack once you actually see my Star Destroyer… You might even forget to hurry up and flee in your Command Ship…”

He looked toward Siming’s screen.

There, Lu Yuan’s Star Destroyer had already punched through three weak points in succession, appearing abruptly in the airspace above Siming’s Mothership.

This was the most heavily defended area of Siming’s entire formation.

However, ordinary frigates were ultimately unable to stop a Star Destroyer’s suicide charge. The Star Destroyer dropped all its shielding, weathering the concentrated fire of the frigates to dive straight toward the opposing Mothership’s fuel depot.

A dense, continuous bombardment from the main cannons tore open the Mothership’s outer hull. The burning Star Destroyer, on the verge of total collapse, crashed into the massive fuel depot. A sudden explosion of golden-red fire erupted, consuming the entire screen.