Mechanical soldiers descended layer by layer, blasting through collapsed concrete walls and incinerating obstacles in their path.
Gradually, the bodies of Gant soldiers began to appear. They were charred black by missiles, curled into small masses that, at first glance, resembled black cats huddled in the ruins.
Shattered mechanical equipment also started appearing by the walls. Numerous devices, once forming an assembly line, had been blown apart. Crates of night-vision goggles, recoil springs, and rocket launchers lay scattered and destroyed. This seemed to be an underground arms factory, producing weapon components and infantry equipment.
The number of bodies increased, as did the burning supplies, plunging the surroundings into darkness.
"Report, no survivors, repeat, no survivors!" the mechanical soldiers' voices quickly reported.
"Withdraw!" ordered an officer from the combat command center.
The mechanical soldiers rapidly retreated from the ruins, returned to their spacecraft, sealed the hatches, and ascended into the sky.
A mere minute later, whistling rockets rained down on the location, the concentrated explosions kicking up vast clouds of dust.
Military spacecraft immediately flew towards the direction from which the rockets had come, followed by deafening air-to-ground bombardments, hundreds of bombs dropped like a scattering of flowers.
Concurrently, other mechanical snow leopards began locating enemy camps.
Over ten airborne units, deployed to the tropical region, moved swiftly. They first launched burrowing missiles towards their targets, followed by military spacecraft and mechanical soldiers arriving on-site to finish off any remaining enemy troops with gunfire. After the combat concluded, they quickly ascended, allowing lurking Gant army units in the vicinity to provide suppressive fire before flying back to drop more ordnance.
A new round of war had begun.
However, there was no sense of tension in the combat command center.
The officers were relaxed, calmly issuing combat orders, more at ease than during regular drills.
The reason was simple: the current situation was a complete rout of the Gant army; the two sides were not on the same level at all.
Gant soldiers had to find ways to keep warm, or they would freeze to death. Jiang Ye's forces deployed in the area consisted entirely of mechanical soldiers, operating normally even in temperatures of minus fifty to sixty degrees Celsius.
Gant soldiers were holed up in fixed bases, passively taking hits, while Jiang Ye's forces, aboard high-speed spacecraft, were elusive and unpredictable.
The Gant army's firepower was considerably weak and lacked intelligence. They either missed Jiang Ye's forces or were unable to penetrate the shields of Jiang Ye's spacecraft.
In contrast, Jiang Ye's firepower could level a Gant base with two missiles, leaving nothing but rubble.
This was what it meant to be utterly dominant.
Jiang Ye watched for half an hour, finding it uninteresting, and turned to leave the combat command center.
There was nothing to see; the enemy was pathetically weak.
...
A week passed quickly.
The snow in the tropical region began to melt, forming widespread floods.
The floodwaters spread across 48 cities in Gant territory, carrying various debris, animal carcasses, branches, and leaves on their vast surface.
During this week, Jiang Ye's forces, airdropped into the tropics, completed 185 combat operations, annihilating two divisions of the local Gant army.
Among the engaging Jiang Ye forces, only one small spacecraft was shot down, with a loss of twelve mechanical soldiers.
The exchange ratio was terrifyingly favorable.
A heavy blizzard and a week of fighting had shifted the mindset in many regions.
The number of surrendering Gant soldiers and Gant civilians began to surge.
Within a single weekend, four cities declared their surrender, and vast numbers of refugees, dragging their families, headed towards the border lines seeking protection from Jiang Ye's forces.
Along the border between the tropical and temperate zones, the number of fleeing Gant civilians also increased dramatically.
Day and night, scattered Gant civilians crossed the border, escaping into Jiang Ye's controlled areas.
These escapees included ordinary civilians as well as Gant soldiers who had abandoned their weapons.
Jiang Ye's forces guarded the border, receiving them, providing food, medicine, and medical checks, and arranging for their relocation to the rear.
During medical examinations, special attention was paid to the shoulders, palms, and soles of the feet. For soldiers, these areas would develop very distinct calluses or bruises.
Those identified as soldiers were not sent directly to the rear but were gathered in prisoner-of-war camps for interrogation.
To demonstrate humanitarianism, the term "prisoner-of-war camp" was not used. Instead, it was replaced with "shell shock convalescent home," as many Gant soldiers suffered psychological issues after bombings, commonly known as shell shock.
In the convalescent homes, prisoners were required to participate in morning exercises, have conversations with doctors, read propaganda books, and write book reports. After a period, if a doctor deemed a prisoner safe and not a terrorist infiltrator, they would be granted civilian status and sent to the rear.
One week after the fighting ended, the number of escapees not only did not decrease but surged again.
On a single day, over ten thousand people crossed the border.
Border personnel were soon overwhelmed, reporting and requesting reinforcements.
Especially in some special border locations, where staff numbered only over two hundred, but a thousand people arrived in a single day. Including those still in the convalescent homes, there were over eight thousand escapees in total.
With an average of one staff member overseeing forty individuals, the sheer number of captives made everyone uneasy, and many staff members nervously carried handguns.
The beds in the POW camps also quickly filled up. Many latecomers had to sleep on the floor in the corridors, and within a couple of days, the corridors were also full.
Jiang Ye reviewed the reports and immediately dispatched troops to the border to assist in receiving the escapees.
A total of fifty thousand reinforcement troops were mobilized, including twenty thousand construction workers to build more border checkpoints and convalescent homes, and thirty thousand soldiers for maintaining order and transporting supplies.
Among these thirty thousand personnel, only one thousand were veteran Jiang Ye army soldiers; the other twenty-nine thousand were troops incorporated from Wheeler Star.
The veterans served as officers, ensuring that the incorporated soldiers did not cause trouble. Simultaneously, they trained the incorporated soldiers during their work, aiming to make them more reliable as soon as possible.
These veteran soldiers held significant authority. In emergencies, two veterans together could execute any incorporated soldier who caused trouble.
An officer suggested that the primary pressure on the border was the convalescent home POW camps. With the increasing number of escapees, expediting the release of people from the convalescent homes and sending them to the rear would directly alleviate the pressure.
However, Jiang Ye immediately rejected the proposal. The explosive growth in the number of escapees made him slightly uneasy, suspecting that the Gant army might be using this as a ploy, infiltrating spies to carry out terrorist attacks and disrupt the rear.
After all, the regular Gant army currently lacked the ability to break through, so they could only resort to other tactics.
Within two days, the daily number of escapees increased to twenty thousand.
Jiang Ye's unease intensified, and he ordered the construction of diversionary outposts.
These diversionary outposts were located three kilometers in front of the POW camps. They were simple border guard stations, equipped with five mechanical soldiers, automatic weapons, and, most importantly, bomb and toxin detection devices.
The duty of these mechanical soldiers was to conduct preliminary checks on the escapees preparing to cross the border, ensuring they were not carrying bombs or any form of plague.
Only after the inspection would they be allowed to proceed.
This was to prevent escapees from carrying bombs and weapons to crowded areas for terrorist attacks.