Munitions Empire

The machine gunner on the spine of the nearby bomber continued to gesture incessantly, seemingly wanting to argue with his comrades here.

But as he continued to make various gestures with his arms, a row of tracer bullets tore through the fuselage of the bomber he was on.

This time, it wasn't bullets from a small caliber machine gun, it was fatal ammunition swept out by a Butcher Fighter's 20mm cannon.

The hefty projectiles splintered the wooden fuselage, and instantly penetrated the gunner who was still raising his hands, his arm instantly detached from his body, flying into the air amidst a mist of blood.

The next second, the bomber that had been hit from below by the Butcher Fighter broke apart at the gunner's position, and his mutilated body, along with the rear half of the bomber, scattered backwards, disappearing without a trace.

The shocked Dahua machine gunner didn't dare to move for a long time, until another Butcher Fighter surged up from below into his field of view. Only then did he realize the fight was still on.

The bomber flying alongside them had only its front half remaining. Without its tail, it didn't immediately crash but instead descended in a stable manner.

The nose gunner turned his head back and was shouting something loudly at the pilot, but no one could hear him clearly.

"If you don't want to die, start shooting!" Seeing his gunner had stupidly forgotten to fire again, the bomber's pilot turned around and shouted a reminder, "Be careful not to shoot straight! It's easy to hit our own men!"

"I, I know!" The gunner, already scared stiff, felt his leather gloves were all sweaty, and despite the altitude of 4,000 meters, it no longer felt cold; he was so hot he wanted to sip some water to moisten his throat.

But it was too late to reach for the canteen at his waist, as a Butcher Fighter drew a circle above him and began a violent dive.

With the roaring sound of its engine that seemed to tear the air apart, the Butcher Fighter closed the distance to the Dahua bomber formation at an extremely fast pace.

In the perspective of the Dahua gunner, the Butcher was charging right at his plane, so he instinctively aimed his machine gun at this significantly threatening target.

"Ah!" He didn't know if he was trying to intimidate the enemy or bolster his own courage as he pulled the trigger while shouting loudly. His gun spat out flames and roared, "Ratatatat!"

Unfortunately, his judgment was seriously flawed as the Butcher Fighter, which had seemed to dive toward him, suddenly rolled sideward, deviating from its original path.

A few tracer bullets flew towards the distance, but failed to touch any target. The diving Butcher Fighter, after shredding another distant Dahua bomber, drifted away, its agility inducing despair.

Although they were unsure how many of their bombers had been shot down, all Dahua pilots were certain that their losses were substantial.

Although there seemed to be only a few Tang Army planes in this piece of sky, the enemy's attacking efficiency was frightening, and the cannon's destruction effect on bombers was so great it was desolating.

It seemed that from the very beginning, the enemy had optimized their approach for attacking large targets, as their fighter jets seemed to be tailor-made to combat large bombers from the design stage.

Regretfully, the bombers of the Dahua Empire, though equipped with defensive machine guns, were never a mature design from the start.

They had only two gun positions, one on the nose and one on the spine, with just two guns for defense that couldn't cover around the aircraft. In other words, the Dahua Empire's bombers had weaknesses everywhere.

This was completely different from the WWII-era B-17, whose defensive armaments were so numerous they provided a terrifying, 360-degree coverage for the bomber. Attackers had to be extremely cautious when engaging a B-17, as they could be easily shot down by the bomber's defenses if not vigilant.

But the Dahua Empire's bombers had only two defensive machine guns, almost null against the Butcher Fighters.

Choosing the right angle, Butcher Fighters could easily cut into the attack line and fire comfortably from a safe place, effortlessly tearing apart the large, seemingly formidable yet completely unarmored Dahua bombers.

One after another, bombers fell from the sky for all to see. Even if not all were observed, those wrecks trailing thick smoke toward the ground proved the losses of this bombing mission.

Although the air battle seemed lengthy, in reality, the conflict had lasted only a brief while.

No one knew whether they had any hope of reaching the target or if they would have a chance to return to the Dahua Empire.

Just as everyone was succumbing to despair, suddenly a different aircraft cut through into the fray.

This plane latched onto a Butcher Fighter that had just dived down, attempting to cut in from the rear to take down the arrogant Tang Army aircraft.

The pursued Butcher Fighter began to swing left and right, trying to shake off the pursuer at its tail. Another Butcher followed close behind to bite back at the Dahua Empire's fighter aircraft.