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Chapter 939: Chapter 504, How strong will the Alliance Fleet be after 4 years? Chapter 939: Chapter 504, How strong will the Alliance Fleet be after 4 years? The Empire doesn’t favor aircraft carriers, but Gu Hang has no prejudice against them.

Or rather, he isn’t in a position to be prejudiced right now.

After all, the Zhuge-class is a warship of battleship caliber.

What’s wrong with aircraft carrier types? What’s wrong with being expensive? What’s wrong with not conforming to the mainstream?

The class speaks for itself!

If Gu Hang wants to build a ship of this caliber, it’s unlikely to happen until he amasses another million-grade ten-consecutive draw.

Moreover, just because it doesn’t conform to the main style of the Imperial Navy doesn’t mean it’s weak.

Similar to the previous Retribution-class, the core components of the Zhuge-class also include catapult decks, used for ‘launching’ fighters directly in the enemy’s face.

However, unlike the lighter Retribution-Class aircraft carriers, the heavy-duty star space Zhuge-class carriers can launch more than just three types of fighters of different sizes.

It can catapult patrol ships right into the enemy’s face.

How do small ships defeat larger ships and achieve miraculous victories?

Standing off at a distance and exchanging fire would be like sending waves of sheep to the slaughter, not even able to break through defenses, and with one enemy shot, you’d be completely shattered, both ship and shield.

But if you get up close and personal, that’s a different story. Slow-firing heavy torpedoes are lethal, and the closer the range, the harder they are to intercept.

And if push comes to shove, a patrol ship could just ram into it, which is much harder to deal with than getting bombarded with any shell.

Even push it to the limit, build it excessively, and the Zhuge-class can even launch a destroyer!

Gu Hang actually did the math according to the technical specs, and the largest catapult deck can indeed launch the most commonly used Frenzy Shark-class destroyer of the Alliance Fleet.

The Frenzy Shark is about five to six kilometers long, while the Zhuge-class is even larger than the twenty-one-kilometer Retribution-class, reaching twenty-six kilometers in length. Its hangar and catapult deck retrofitted, it could potentially swallow a Frenzy Shark.

If a Frenzy Shark is actually sent to the enemy’s face, it might be more than just a big scare for a legitimate battleship; there’s a high probability of sending the Frenzy Shark away.

The cost, however, is considerable. It’s bad enough that destroyers are expensive, but the Zhuge-class, when retrofitted to launch destroyers, is an extreme case. To adapt to this, there wouldn’t be room left to house any other combat forces. After launching a destroyer, the remaining space utilization would be too small. Turning combat into a one-hit affair with no staying power is not ideal.

Conversely, what a Frenzy Shark can do, a few more patrol ships could achieve as well.

However, to pair with the carrier’s ship-launching capabilities, the warships that are launched need some special design considerations.

Firstly, there has to be a focus on agility and speed; after being launched, they’re not immediately going into the enemy’s energy shield or void shield. Patrol ships, with their small and agile nature, need to find a better position for offense, or even penetrate into the enemy’s large ships’ shields.

Secondly, firepower must be explosive. It can completely sacrifice the sustainability of firepower and ammunition capacity, as these are pointless; survival time is extremely short, so it’s better to carry something substantial that can deal a severe blow in one go to a larger ship.

Defense can also be forgotten, just give a nominal thought to energy shields and hull armor, and don’t get easily destroyed by enemy interception fire. Otherwise, no matter how well it’s done, it’s still just a small patrol ship, and being sent into the midst of the enemy fleet, no thickness of shield or armor makes a significant difference.

As long as the patrol ship manages to fire off all the firepower it carries, it’s fine by me if it gets destroyed.

Under such a strategic concept, the Alliance will soon standardize a new patrol ship model named the ‘Swordfish-class.’

Simply put, it’s a suicide ship—thin-skinned, fast, and agile, but not durable, lacking even long-distance navigation and Star Realm Tunnel traversing capabilities. Its sole advantage lies in being able to unload all its onboard firepower in a matter of minutes. This firepower includes 8 Sky Cleave Axe Missiles, 4 Scorching East Winds, and two torpedo missiles modified from the Scorching East Wind.

These torpedo missiles have weak armor penetration, but if released at close-range, their hit rate is guaranteed, adept at piercing shields and armor. Most crucially, the explosive power is nearly five times that of a regular L-grade Scorching East Wind missile.

This means, if not intercepted, a single hit could destroy a cruiser; and, if hitting a large battleship, would also inflict severe damage.

From this perspective, a Zhuge-class that can continuously launch 8 patrol ships and thousands of fighters is indeed formidable.

If it came down to a one-on-one confrontation, Gu Hang doesn’t believe that the current flagship of the Alliance, the ‘Firebath Nova,’ could withstand an attack from the Zhuge-class—it would almost certainly be devastating.

Unless both sides have a massive escort fleet, then maybe the outcome could still be uncertain.

However, the construction cost of the Zhuge-class is even more expensive than the Retribution-class; if the cost of those thousands of fighters and eight kamikaze ships are accounted for, the price would nearly reach 80 billion per aircraft carrier.

The construction time is eight years.

Even with the first one benefiting from the Black Box, it would still take four years to complete the first Zhuge-class carrier.

However, considered this way, the Alliance Navy’s strength will see a huge, leapfrogging enhancement after four years.

If all shipbuilding plans proceed smoothly, by then, the Alliance will have five top-of-the-line capital ships. Among the battleship class, there will be the ‘Firebath Nova’ battleship and the yet-to-be-named first Zhuge-class carrier. Additionally, there will be three battleship cruisers, two of which will be the Alliance’s newly built Holy Grail Class; and one is the current flagship of the Yunluo Fleet. Although officially part of the Imperial Navy, in practice the Alliance is unlikely to give up the Yunluo Fleet that it has already absorbed.

It’s a ‘Long Dragon-class’ Battleship Cruiser, whose overall performance isn’t too different from the Holy Grail Class, a bit slower but with thicker armor.

Besides these five capital ships of the battleship, aircraft carrier, and battlecruiser categories, the Alliance will also have around thirty Lunar-class cruisers by then, taking into account the Tianma Fleet, Yunluo Fleet, Alliance Fleet and newly produced ships.

Not to mention the various destroyers and escort ships.

Such a fleet would, honestly, be very formidable.

Gu Hang wonders, four years from now, can the main fleet of the Eastern Cosmos Domain muster a fleet that can stand against mine?

Tie Nu Shi, can you come up with five battleship class vessels?

Err… Probably, but at least the Alliance Navy will then have the capability to engage in a decisive battle with the opponent.

Content with this thought, Gu Hang now only wants to focus on developing quietly.

He wants to fully assimilate the Dragonhawk Star Domain, save money, and exchange time for an improvement in naval quality, which coupled with an increasingly strong land force, and complemented by the Phoenix Battle Group, Sainte-Lys Nun Association, Glory Guards, and Storm Mage Corps… the Alliance will also have a series of high-quality troops at its disposal.

Additionally, with an integrated Dragonhawk Star Domain enriched and strengthened by various blessings from Gu Hang’s Grace Points, he will become the powerhouse of this entire region.

However, the peaceful development time Gu Hang desperately sought did not come.

Merely three months after his return to the Dragonhawk Star Domain, the ‘Princess’s Grand Rebellion’ officially broke out.

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