94 The Great Cleansing

The whole of the main continent now belonged to humanity. It was a new frontier, filled with vast amounts of untapped resources. There was a great quantity of arable land. If it were all cultivated, then it would produce a staggering amount of agricultural product, enough to support many times the current population.

There was also a great deal of mineral resources. Ordinary resources like coal, iron, copper, and tin were in great abundance. Deposits of gemstones were also discovered such as diamonds, rubies, and sapphires. There were also more exotic resources like uranium and tungsten. The uranium in particular was the first to be exploited.

The uranium that had been obtained from the singular mine was very limited, and if they were limited to that then they wouldn't have been able to build any more bombs. However, with the wealth of uranium mines now available, they now had the capability of building many more nuclear bombs.

Already, settlement was beginning as families would be sent to build towns and cities in the new land. The population was booming due to the excess of food and the government programs to encourage childbirth. As a result, there was enough extra people to begin the settlement program.

With the settlement of people, there was also the building of infrastructure. Roads, bridges, and rails were built to link the new regions together so that people could move from place to place. The cities began to grow upwards as concrete structures began towering in the sky.

As humanity began to slowly take over the continent, one final enemy remained, holed up in the far west. Atop their fortified floating islands, their home was basically impregnable. Although many of the surrounding floating islands had been taken, the twelve remaining major islands had resisted attempts to assault them. Planes and ships were unable to make it through the air defenses.

Fortunately, the threat of the Sky-Sea people was minimal as they were confined to a small area. Their situation almost resembled that of humanity prior to the recent war, a race driven back to the very edge besieged by an enemy far stronger. However, it was for this reason that their existence posed a great threat. Humanity had managed to flip the tables from their inferior position, what is to say the Sky-Sea people won't come upon a stroke of supernatural fortune.

It was for this reason that the remainder of the Sky-Sea people continued to cause worry to humanity. They had to be eliminated, yet an assault simply wouldn't work. It was a frustrating situation.

Eventually, a plan was created to finally designed to destroy the Sky-Sea people. It would rely on a new piece of technology that would need to be developed - the missile.

While planes and ships were both too slow and too large of a target to get past the air defenses of the islands, it was possible for missiles to make it through. In each missile would be a nuclear bomb. With the nuclear bomb, even a single missile would be enough to destroy the city it hit.

The development of missiles was not easy. The particulars of rocket physics were quite complicated, leading Roland and Steven to spend many weeks working on to solve equations to properly map out the trajectory of the missiles. Then, test missiles were created loaded with dud bombs that had the same size and mass as the nuclear bombs. These missiles were tested to see whether they did indeed follow the predicted path.

Even after the basics had been nailed down, there was still more work that had to be done. After several missions, the distances between the islands was finally mapped out. With this information, they could now correctly calibrate the missiles to fly from one island to another.

After the particular parameters of a missile and the angle at which it would be fired at were determined, each of the twelve different launch vectors were tested. There were vast amounts of empty land and in this area massive firing ranges were constructed. Various markers were set up to show the various distances of heights. Once a missile was fired, Lightning would fly around the expected impact zone and see whether the missile did indeed land near where it was supposed to.

The tests had expended dozens of missiles, but finally it was done. All preparations were complete for the final attack on the Sky-Sea people.

Twelve nuclear bombs had been made and they were loaded onto the twelve missiles. Each of the missiles was taken to an island close to their target. The missile launch pads were set up and the missiles were all aimed at their target.

The day of the attack had finally come. It was a good day with clear skies and almost no wind. Roland, Steven, and Zero were gathered on an island. Next to them was a radio transmission device which would send out the signal to all of the islands to begin the launch. All of the missiles would be launched simultaneously.

"This is it", Roland said. "With this act, humanity will be the only race left."

"It is a day that we had all been waiting for", Zero said. "For so many years humanity has fought and all of that is coming to a conclusion now. All that we have worked for has been waiting for this point. The end is finally within sight. This is the final blow to secure humanity's survival."

"We have come a long way", Steven said. "In the beginning this had seemed so far. Through our struggles, we have finally made it to this point. It is time to finish what we started."

Roland turned on the radio. "All units, prepare to launch. 3. 2. 1. LAUNCH."

All at once, twelve streaks began flying through the sky. The missiles soared through the air as they approached their targets. One by one, bright flashes of light lit up the sky. As a dozen mushroom clouds rose into the sky, it was done. The war is over.