Chapter 2114: The First Group of Elites Take the Stage
At Thanos's order, a medium-sized battleship next to the warship entered Earth's atmosphere and swiftly approached Wakanda.
In order to cover this battleship, more dropships and a large number of fighter planes entered the battlefield ahead of it, putting more pressure on Earth's allied forces from both the ground and the air.
Luke, who had just crippled the ground troops, felt that what he had done was useless.
The tycoon, who had been acting mighty in the air for a while, was also forced to use wild maneuvers to avoid the explosive firepower.
If it wasn't for the fact that his body was now different thanks to Luke's Chi Refining Technique and Life 1, he would've thrown up after this series of movements.
However, Tony didn't complain. Instead, he announced on the comms, "Thanos's fleet has finally entered the battlefield. Is everyone ready for the party?"
It was a pity that the Ursa Minor kids team wasn't allowed to chat on the main channel unless they were reporting something important.
The Avengers and the Justice League knew that Tony was boosting morale, which was the same as when Knight had taken the initiative to attack earlier, so they didn't say anything.
On the other hand, a lot of "yeah" emojis flooded the private chat.
In the sky, the medium-sized battleship quickly stopped.
Then, a group of figures flew out of the ship toward the battlefield.
Unlike the four generals, these hundreds of figures were all wearing different types of armor. They were tall, short, fat, thin and colorful, and had cold and hot weapons.
The cannon fodder fighter planes near them launched some probing attacks, but were blown up in seconds.
Seeing that these alien troops in armor were extraordinarily strong, Frank immediately stopped the "players" from being taken down meaninglessly.
"Stay alert. They're probably coming for us," Frank warned coldly on the main channel.
Sure enough, this alien force that was 372 members strong headed straight for the superheroes.
Before they approached the battlefield, they had already split into several dozen teams to surround Luke and the Avengers.
Luke smiled and murmured to himself, Not bad. It would be better if they had done this sooner.
Thanos wasn't doing this to add fuel to the fire.
On the contrary, if Thanos revealed all his trump cards right away, Luke would laugh like crazy.
It might be laborious to deal with an opponent without any trump cards, but it definitely didn't take much brainpower.
As for Thanos's method of going slow and steady to gradually crush the enemy, that was the most difficult situation to deal with.
That was because Earth's army would definitely lose if this continued, and it would be hard for Luke and the others to find a chance to behead the leader.
Based on the current progress on the battlefield, Thanos's army was still maintaining its rhythm and hadn't really been led astray.
Luke's side had yet to be defeated either, and had a good chance of counterattacking.
In the face of more than 300 alien elites, some of the reserve members of the Justice League finally took action.
Just now, they had only been providing firepower support; there was a group of close-combat superhumans who had yet to move.
At that moment, it was their turn to protect the core Avenger members and Knight.
These members were close combat combatants, but that didn't mean that they couldn't use long-range weapons.
If Angel, a pure close combat expert, could deal brainless damage with the help of the shooting support system, so could these people.
Different from the Battle of New York, their A.I. systems communicated with the main computer.
Thus, this gunfire formed a more complete net of firepower around some of these elite alien soldiers, though some slipped the net - it was impossible to lock down over 300 targets.
The rumbles never stopped as the 300-plus elite alien soldiers closest to the superheroes were bombarded.
To the close combatants' astonishment, only a dozen or so people were shot down in the end. Even then, they didn't look like they were dead, and could still control their landing.
Seeing this, Steve immediately gave a new order. "A and B teams, focus your fire on this alien troop. C team, send 30 people to kill the injured. The rest, provide backup and take those soldiers down."
Frank needed to focus on overall command, and Knight was keeping an eye on things.
Steve was better at small-scale battles, so he had the authority to command the reserve members.
Hearing the order, the members who were firing gave up on attacking the ordinary ground troops and turned around.
This barrage was over ten times fiercer than before. In an instant, more than 30 targets were critically damaged and fell out of formation.
Observing the effects of the two earlier attacks, Knight suddenly said, "Be careful. A large portion of these alien soldiers have superpowers."
There had been strong mental fluctuations from several of these alien soldiers, and they were several times stronger than that of ordinary Earthlings.
Based on Luke's experience, it wasn't hard for someone with mental fluctuations like these to use hypnosis or telekinesis.
The armor provided by Luke had a mental defense function, and there was no need to worry about being hypnotized.
If the other party used telekinesis to help them move, however, there was nothing to be done.
Moreover, some of these alien soldiers evinced other types of superpowers when they were bombarded; it was just that it was impossible to determine the effects of these superpowers for the time being.
When Knight spoke, he aimed the two Gatling guns at the alien troop.
No matter what superpowers these aliens had, there was nothing wrong with testing them out a few more times.
Compared with the dense barrage from the reserve members, Knight's shots were more focused.
He fired dozens of energy bullets at several targets. Luke observed them one by one, and his brain worked quickly to discover several problems.
He immediately warned, "They all have anti-energy defenses. Ordinary physical bullets are basically useless on them. Three appear to have superpowers that block all attacks, and six appear to have mental abilities. I've already tagged them."
On the virtual screens of the reserve members and the Avengers, the three guys with superpower blocks were bright red, and the six people with mental abilities were light red.
Steve immediately followed up with new orders. "Abandon these two groups for now and focus on the other targets."
At that moment, the alien troop finally right in front of the Avengers.
The first to be unlucky was Rhodes, who was firing wildly. He was hit in the back by a pudgy alien with a chain mace, and was sent spiraling to the ground, creating a huge crater in the grass.