I Am The Swarm

“But we must first eliminate the Swarm’s forces first; otherwise, victory will be even harder to achieve,” The man who was trying to mediate the fight changed the subject.

“Exactly. Although we don’t know how many troops the enemy has sent over, it’s definitely far more than what we see now,” another officer concurred. “According to the observation instruments in the debris fields, the enemy warships are continuously gathering outside the star system. If we don’t seize the opportunity to destroy this vanguard, it will be much harder to deal with them once reinforcements arrive.”

Everyone nodded in agreement, even General Masai remained silent.

He understood this point too. But based on the enemy’s behavior in the T85 Star System, it felt highly suspicious that they would rush into battle without waiting for their forces to assemble completely. It seemed like a deliberate sacrifice.

No matter how he looked at it, this army appeared to be courting death. Masai couldn’t believe the enemy wouldn’t recognize such an obvious flaw in their strategy.

Yet he couldn’t discern any tangible benefits the enemy could gain from this approach, leaving him feeling deeply conflicted.

“But we still haven’t figured out what exactly they are! Those tentacle creatures—are they their warships, their primary forms, or something else entirely?” Masai made a final effort to resist.

“Precisely because we don’t know, we need to fight this battle! We need to capture some specimens for research,” Alcer said impatiently.

Although Alcer’s tone was sharp, Masai didn’t retort.

In truth, Masai knew Alcer was right. Without engaging in battle, they would never understand their opponent. It was a vicious cycle.

Masai sighed quietly, feeling a touch of desolation. Perhaps, as Alcer suggested, the previous war had sapped his courage.

Seeing Masai’s listless demeanor, Novaul tried to reassure him, “Don’t worry too much, Masai. You lost last time because you didn’t understand the enemy. While our understanding is still limited, we’ve gleaned some countermeasures from the data your team collected during that battle.”

“First, regarding their speed. After detailed analysis, we’ve concluded that their large combat units rely on some kind of launch mechanism to reach the battlefield quickly. Once they decelerate, they’ve never again reached their initial speed. Otherwise, during the interstellar engine activation phase, they would have caught up with your fleet, and the expeditionary force wouldn’t have made it back.”

“Although our ships are also slow without interstellar engines, we still outperform them in this aspect.”

Novaul paused, observing the crowd’s attentive expressions before continuing, “Additionally, we have certain advantages in long-range attacks and supercomputing technology. So far, the only long-range weapon they’ve displayed is the electromagnetic railgun. Among space weapons, this is considered relatively slow—not in rate of fire but in projectile velocity, which is much slower compared to beam or energy weapons.”

“We’ve developed specialized detection instruments based on this principle. While they are still in their early stages and struggle to detect small railguns, the massive energy buildup required for their large combat units ensures their railgun projectiles achieve higher speeds and ranges, making them easier to detect. The moment these projectiles are launched, they can be tracked. With the coordination of our AI and supercomputing technologies, calculating their trajectories is relatively straightforward. If our ships maintain a consistent cruising speed, there’s a significant chance to evade these attacks.”

“As long as we avoid their large-scale railgun strikes, their smaller railguns won’t pose much of a threat to our ships.”

The speaker, Novaul, was a Vice Admiral and the commander of the Second Space Fleet.

“I agree with Novaul’s assessment. If we maintain the proper distance, it’s possible to wear them down without sustaining losses,” added another Vice Admiral, Hamis, commander of the First Space Fleet.

From their statements so far, it was evident that all three fleet commanders of the Space Fleet were in favor of engaging in this battle. The basic decision had already been made; the focus now was on how to fight.

General Masai began racking his brain, trying to recall the details. Although more than thirty years had passed since that war, this life-altering battle was one he often revisited in his mind, contemplating various strategies.

He was the Riken most eager to defeat the Swarm.

“What about their small and medium-sized combat units?” Masai asked, continuing to raise questions—not to cause trouble, but to share his concerns.

“Based on our observations, their small combat units lack any long-range attack capabilities,” Hamis responded. During the previous war, Swarm larval bodies had infiltrated the Riken fleet, engaging in close combat. Seventeen of these larvals had even breached the interiors of their warships.

As a result, the Riken had extensive footage and data on the larval bodies. Even when warships exploded, most of the relevant data had already been transmitted. This information was later analyzed frame-by-frame by over ten thousand staff members and technical teams, leading to this conclusion.

“As for their medium-sized combat units, while they have demonstrated long-range attack capabilities, they don’t use them often. This suggests a possible connection to their energy supply system,” Hamis explained. “The enemy’s large combat units can fire their electromagnetic railguns continuously, likely due to a unique energy supply system.”

“However, this system might either be too large or too complex to manufacture, meaning it is only installed on large combat units. Their small and medium-sized units seem to use a different energy system. This system appears to have limited energy storage, forcing them to use it sparingly. Since the Swarm is a unique biological civilization, we’ll need to capture specimens for research to confirm the details. But based on our analysis, this hypothesis has a confidence level of at least 90%.”

“The defeat of the expeditionary fleet was largely due to our fighter squadrons engaging in dogfights with the enemy—a situation that played directly to their strengths. This not only squandered our advantages but also forced our forces to hold back firepower to avoid friendly fire, triggering a series of cascading failures.”

“If we leverage our strengths properly, we can adopt a kiting strategy. Our warships can kite the enemy’s large combat units, while our fighters kite their small and medium units. By matching forces accordingly—capital ship versus capital ship, fighter versus fighter—we have a very high chance of victory.”

After finishing, Hamis turned to Masai, waiting to see if he had any further questions.

Masai largely agreed with Hamis’ assessment. He also believed that the decision to engage the enemy in close-quarters dogfights during the previous battle had been a grave mistake. Thus, he wasn’t angered by Hamis’ critique but instead focused earnestly on considering other potential issues.

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