Age of Cosmic Exploration

Chapter 276: New Combat Jet

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

The creation of the Space Combat Jet Prototype 003 enabled mankind the ability to fight in space. Before it, mankind still relied on 3rd revolution rocket fuel propulsion systems and had no transportation that was suitable for space travel.

The design of the Prototype 003 was an era-defining moment because it meant that mankind had evolved from Earth weapons to space weapons. It was not an exaggeration that ten Prototype 003s were equal to all the fire power of old Earth’s military power. With enough supply of ammunition, the ten combat jets could easily destroy Earth!

Even though the Space Combat Jet Prototype 003s had been around for eight years, its quality was undisputed. Even Yao Yuan had no complaints about it because this was mankind’s most high-end technological marvel that had helped mankind survive innumerable space wars. Even when facing off with the space merchants, who were technologically more advanced than mankind, the Prototype 003s managed to hold their own quite well.

In other words, Yao Yuan too hadn’t thought about upgrading the space combat jets. Therefore, when Bo Li suddenly came up with such a proposal, it shocked everyone. Of course, the first thing they did was wrangle up the related scientists to create a task force to study the proposal for the new combat jets. In less than a week, the task force came up with performance report on the proposed space combat jet.

The Space Combat Jet Prototype 011 retained most of the design ideals of Prototype 003, including its maximum speed, dexterity, and weight. These things were mostly unchanged. The real change was in the energy system and super weapons system.

First, the energy system. Prototype 003’s biggest weakness was on full display when mankind was warring with the mother nest alien and the space merchants, and that was its inability to last during combat. Other than the Red Lightning, which had an internal polymerized reactor, the remaining Prototype 003s relied on normal electricity storage. Even though the system was already Gaussian, greatly increasing the maximum amount of energy storage, it was undeniable that the Prototype 003 exhausted a great amount of energy.

Systems like the creator’s particle vibrator, the ECS system, Gaussian weapons, particle flux accelerators, all of these required the constant feeding of high energy. Therefore, the Prototype 003 couldn’t last long in a space war.

The other weakness was that the fire power of its weapons was too low. Even though the Gaussian weapons were already something unimaginable when compared to old Earth’s weapons, in 4th revolution combat, the Gaussian cannon’s power was greatly lacking. Penetrating other space combat jets’ electromagnetic shields was already an issue, much less the shield of the main ship or battleship. In other words, the Prototype 003 might fare well when facing enemies from below 4th revolution, but they would be in trouble if the enemies were at 4th revolution or higher.

The design ideals of the Space Combat Jet Prototype 011 thus was to improve its energy storage and weapon fire power.

First, in terms of the energy storage, Bo Li suggested using plasmatic energy. Plasmatic energy was the main energy source of the 4th revolution because with the advancement in science, normal electricity, which was high voltage electricity, could no longer provide sufficient energy intensity. For example, warp drive required an unimaginable energy intensity, and this required another better energy source. It was under this situation that plasmatic energy was born.

Using a plasmatic energy generator could increase the energy storage of the space combat jets by ten to twelve fold. This would completely eliminate the problem of lack of energy, but this design had a great issue, which was when the combat jet was destroyed, it would instantly create a plasmatic explosion, melting and killing its pilot.

Of course, in the event of a space war, if the combat jet was really shot down, even without being melted, the pilot would only have a 10 percent chance of surviving. Without the ECS system and electromagnetic shield, the pilots that were ejected couldn’t possibly fight other combat jets with their bare hands now, could they?

Therefore, this issue was practically a non-issue because the improvement in energy storage meant an improvement in the electromagnetic shield’s efficiency as well. If anything, this increased the safety of the pilot. This could be observed from the space merchants’ plate saucers. The only reason their electromagnetic shields were so strong was because of plasmatic energy. Therefore, this design was praised enormously by the group of experts.

Next was the biggest upgrade to the Space Combat Jet Prototype 011, the super weapon system!

Each Prototype 011 would still be using Gaussian weapons, but thanks to the increase in energy storage, they would also receive an additional two railguns and one small cannon. However, these weren’t the super weapon systems, they were only the normal weapon systems. The supposed super weapon system was the combination system mentioned in many of Earth’s sci-fi stories!

Yes, combination!

The eyes of everyone who saw this bulged out. If they were waering glasses, they would be searching the ground for the broken pieces.

In Bo Li’s design, using electromagnetic power as the main conductor, a supposed electromagnetic amalgamation would be formed. Every 3 Prototype 011s could combine with one another using this system. Three jets’ energy systems would be joined and the weapons from the three would be fired simultaneously. The three would combine into one, the main control falling into the hands of the main pilot, forming a unique, large, space combat jet that still possessed the speed and dexterity of the normal Prototype 011.

Such a combined combat jet could form a large Gaussian rail cannon. After three combat jets combined, their collective energy sources could support such a large weapon and was sturdy enough to withstand the blow back.

With the future advancement of technology, the internal weapon system of the Prototype 011 could still be upgraded, like perhaps the combination could carry something as powerful as a Planet Annihilating Rail Cannon or even the Orbit Rail Cannon in the future.

In other words, this conceptual design would solve the issue of the Prototype 003 having less than satisfactory fire power. Furthermore, it allowed for room to grow, because this prototype was only good enough to handle warfare with other 4th revolution space civilizations. It could be upgraded again when mankind entered the 5th revolution.

This was the Space Combat Jet Prototype 011 proposed by Bo Li, a combat jet created for the purpose of fighting any war in the 4th revolution period. According to Bo Li, this prototype could be used until the early 5th revolution. Similar to the Hope, until the technology advanced to the 5th revolution, this would be the space combat jet they would be using.

Of course, with such a good performance, especially with the super weapon system being something ridiculous, the price was also ridiculously high. The average price of one Prototype 011 was triple the price of one Prototype 003!

The Prototype 003 was already pricey. Even though the government didn’t need to import the materials, if converted to old Earth’s USD value, the technology, materials, and manpower would cost about 30 billion USD to 50 billion USD!

Of course, since the Hope already had the technology and the materials, the only cost was the workers, and their salaries couldn’t possibly add up to 50 billion.

However, it did exhaust plenty of valuable materials. If all of the Hope’s production power was siphoned to create the Prototype 011s, it would require about 10 days to create one, but this was with all the production power focusing on creating space combat jets! Which meant that the upgrade on the Hope and production of everything else had to be stopped, so this was impossible.

Therefore, the Space Combat Jet Prototype 011’s biggest issue came from the price of production. Furthermore, the number of Black Star Troopers had greatly increased; it had reached 400 people! 400 Prototype 011s, that would take ages to finish.

The task force’s conclusion was they hoped Bo Li could again repeat what she did for the design of Space Combat Jet Prototype 003, allowing it to be mass produced. To put it simply, to decrease some of its performance to decrease its cost.

However, to their surprise, Bo Li was exceptionally stubborn this time. She rejected that suggestion outright. She told Yao Yuan directly, "In any case, I’ve handed you the proposal and design. My work is done. It’s up to you whether to produce the combat jets or not. The design can’t cut corners anymore; it is as simple as it can be. Before I go, I only have one thing to ask: are human lives more important than materials?"

That silenced Yao Yuan. Just like how it was with the Prototype 003, skimping on the production costs put the troopers’ lives at a greater risk, which rather defeated the point of the combat jets.

Therefore, after the discussion, Yao Yuan signed the production plan for the Space Combat Jet Prototype 011 with gritted teeth. The first batch would create three Space Combat Jet Prototype 011. They would decide whether to mass produce them after testing them out...

It had been seven months since they started idling in space...