Chapter 744 - Past Battles

The surrounding images began to retreat rapidly. The battles that had happened before replayed in front of Qin Yi.

The dead soldiers came back to life one by one, and the overwhelming swarm of insects dispersed like a receding tide. Everything returned to its original state.

Qin Yi took a deep breath. These images strengthened the memories in his mind, allowing him to clearly understand that some seemingly correct decisions made under the premise that ‘all soldiers are rational people’ could actually be completely wrong.

Qin Yi gently tapped on the control panel’s screen once he was ready. The waiting troops started moving again.

This time, Qin Yi was even more focused. He did not dare to miss out on any details.

Qin Yi recalled the consequences of making a decision before and checked the data provided by AEEIS.

With the help of AEEIS, every unit and even every soldier’s state was quantified into a constant fluctuating data.

For example, different soldiers would have different statistics such as their morale, degree of tension, and fear at the beginning of the battle. During the battle, the rate of change would also be different.

The current state of the army could be displayed after combining the values of all the soldiers in the army and some complicated calculations.

Sometimes they would be in high morale, sometimes they were in low morale, and sometimes they would complete collapse. Once their morale completely collapsed, Qin Yi could do almost nothing apart from giving orders for the troops to retreat, because other orders, whether it was attacking or defending, might not work.

While commanding the battle, AEEIS would occasionally remind Qin Yi to make some key decisions.

For example, there were multiple zones fighting at the same time. Now that a small team had discovered a certain Zerg nest, AEEIS would directly give Qin Yi a hint after determining the importance of this event. Qin Yi would be able to prioritize his command for this event.

When a team called for reinforcements or supplies, Qin Yi had many options as well. He could transfer troops to reinforce them, he could keep his mouth shut about the reinforcement requirements, he could lie that reinforcements were coming, he could also tell them the truth.

Behind every choice, there would be a message marked by AEEIS, helping Qin Yi to judge the possible consequences of making this decision.

For example, if a team whose morale was on the verge of collapse received news that ‘reinforcements were on the way’, their morale would rise temporarily. On the other hand, if they knew that there would be no more reinforcements, their morale might collapse instantly. There was also a very small chance that they would launch suicidal attacks to eliminate more Zergs.

The consequences of every choice could be checked, and the probability of certain possibilities was extremely low. Qin Yi could not possibly try.

If he told them the truth, the chances of their morale collapsing would be more than 90%, and the chances of them triggering the fighting spirit of the soldiers in a desperate situation would be less than 10%. It would be very foolish to bet that the probability was less than 10%.

In this battle, Qin Yi did not completely follow the instructions given by AEEIS. Sometimes, he even deliberately rejected these data in his heart.

That was because most of the time, he had to make decisions that went against his conscience. For example, he had to give up and sacrifice a team. In order to let them continue to hold their ground, he had to tell them that reinforcements were arriving.

Qin Yi instinctively resisted such a behavior. Therefore, he would still insist on telling the truth even if it did not affect the situation much.

However, it was undeniable that Qin Yi began to rely more and more on the data provided by AEEIS during the battle.

That was because the data was very useful.

Qin Yi gradually realized that under such chaotic battlefield conditions, the command method originally used for ‘rational people’ would not work. Instead, it would strictly follow the data analysis provided by AEEIS. In the end, it would achieve the most acceptable result.

Qin Yi began to pay more attention to data and AEEIS’ opinions on some less important decisions.

That was because, compared to the critical battlefield, the actions of these marginal battlefields and small groups would not affect the overall situation. Qin Yi did not expect them to become the small probability of ‘seed explosion’. He only hoped that they would not collapse too quickly and achieve a relatively acceptable result.

This time, Qin Yi successfully won this battle.

After quickly reviewing the entire battle, Qin Yi quickly entered the command for the next battle. He was pressed for time and did not have much time to think about these difficult decisions.

Qin Yi was becoming better at commanding according to AEEIS’ data and ‘overall thinking’. His results were also steadily improving.

Qin Yi’s improvement was very obvious from the beginning when his troops were defeated to now when he could work hard to control the losses and win the battle within a certain range.

Every time he won, he would watch the soldiers cheer, and the number of casualties reported by AEEIS decreased. Qin Yi felt comforted, and his emotions became numb.

He felt as if he had gradually become an emotionless commanding machine. He very nearly became numb towards the feelings of the individual soldiers, and able to coldly but accurately make the choices most beneficial to the overall battle.

…

Another battle.

As usual, Qin Yi quickly scanned the battlefield information and formulated a strategy.

However, when he scanned the names of the teams that were on standby, he was stunned.

AS-371-45 Team.

Qin Yi zoomed in and scanned each soldier’s serial number and name.

He saw Xu Kaile, Meng Yu, Zhao Yongxiu, and Wu Shaojun’s names, including himself, Qin Yi, the captain of AS-371-45 Team.

There were so many units in the battlefield. Each unit had its own serial number and name, but Qin Yi had never paid attention to them.

That was because he really could not focus on it. He could not put himself in the shoes of a soldier to think about problems.

This was a large-scale battle. There would be a huge number of decisions waiting for Qin Yi to make every minute. To pay attention to a certain soldier would be irresponsible to all the other soldiers.

However, Qin Yi could not help but feel something when he saw his own team.

The memories that had gradually become blurry during training became clear once again. Qin Yi’s gaze swept across every familiar member. What they were doing now was exactly the same as what he remembered.

AEEIS did not explain much, but Qin Yi knew very well that this should be the video recording of the battle at that time. The battle had now been restored to its original state. However, this time, he was no longer the captain of AS-271-45, but the commander of the battlefield.

Qin Yi’s eyes scanned the figures of every soldier in the AS-371-45 team and the overall figures of the entire team.

Morale, nervousness, fear…

Every statistic was displayed clearly.

The figures of these players were different.

The short and silent Meng Yu had the lowest level of nervousness and fear, which was in line with Qin Yi’s judgment.

Zhao Yongxiu seemed to be very clumsy and liked to look good. He received the most care in the team, but his fear was not very high.

On the other hand, Xu Kaile, who looked optimistic and often encouraged other players, was the most nervous in the entire team.

Qin Yi thought about it briefly and quickly determined the reason for this: Xu Kaile was a meticulous person. In reality, he was under more mental pressure than others. His optimism and enthusiasm were just a facade.

Qin Yi looked at himself again. He realized that his statistics were not as perfect as he had imagined.

His morale, fear, nervousness, and other statistics might be the best in the entire team but he was still far from being a true “rational person”. He was not even the best in the entire fleet.

According to AEEIS’ judgment, he would also collapse in despair. He could not be considered a cold-hearted war machine.

Qin Yi personally felt that the AS-371-45 team was unique from the bottom of his heart. However, it was just an ordinary team from the statistics.

This team was nothing special when compared to other teams carrying out missions.

As to why this team could finally complete the task of finding the Zerg Queen’s Nest…

Initially, Qin Yi thought that it was because of the sacrifices of the other team members, his perseverance, and his luck in escaping death countless times.

However, Qin Yi suddenly felt that these reasons were both reasonable and unreasonable.

From the commander’s point of view, he had another view on this matter.

In fact, the combined fleet had sent out so many teams. Each team had the same combat ability as AS-371-45. Some teams were even stronger.

From the looks of it, as long as the strategy was right, teams would eventually come to the Zerg Queen’s nest. It would have been another team even if it wasn’t Team AS-371-45.

For Captain Qin Yi, such a result was obtained through the sacrifice and bloodbath of all the members of the AS-371-45 team. For Commander Qin Yi, it was a result of precise calculation.

Of course, there could be errors in calculations, and strategies could fail. However, it was obvious that even without the AS-371-45 team, the outcome of this war would not be much different.

Qin Yi no longer paid attention to his team. Instead, he focused on the overall situation.

The overwhelming sea of insects was already brewing. It was like a surging black tide, or like a dark cloud gathering in a strong wind. Every second was precious.

Qin Yi did not say anything. He skillfully operated the control panel and began to direct this battle.

Under Qin Yi’s control, the troops faced the swarm of bugs one by one. Countless soldiers were swallowed by the sea of bugs. The dense firepower suppression blasted deep pits and ravines on the surface of the planet.

Qin Yi calmly made his decisions time and time again. After one formation was sacrificed, a backup formation would be added immediately. The human army and the Zergs were in a deadlock on the vast battlefield, repeatedly competing for strategic locations.

The AS-371-45 team, like the other elite teams, had been sent on a mission to search for the Queen Zerg’s Nest. Elite teams had been exposed one after another, and the Ansible signal had disappeared into the nest forever. However, there were also teams that were constantly moving deeper into the nest.