Deep space.
Domania Passage.
As the longest passage within the Rusty Star Nation, it typically saw very few ships under normal circumstances.
Perhaps one vessel would pass through every few months, due to the sheer vastness of interstellar space. While passages do feature numerous rest stops and supply points, a passage connecting 51 star systems could not possibly form a perfectly straight line. Most ships would still opt for direct, straight-line flight paths to their destination system.
The existence of passages served two primary functions.
First, Short-distance travel: facilitating journeys between neighboring star system A and star system B along the established route.
Second, Long-distance travel: spanning hundreds of light-years. Within the passage, specialized acceleration rings were present. After traversing a distance of 100 light-years, even though the passage might wind, the speed achieved after acceleration was significantly faster, making it more time-efficient than a direct trajectory.
Furthermore, rest stops for leisure were available along the route, and remaining within the protected passage helped to avoid attacks from space pirates.
The latter point was actually the true impetus behind the creation of these passages. Within the Federation, there were a total of 17 passages exceeding 3,000 light-years, where the fastest achievable acceleration could surpass 210,000 km per second.
However, most civilian transit involved medium-distance travel, spanning neither just a few light-years nor over 100 light-years, meaning the passages often weren't the most cost-effective option.
Passage operation was naturally not free. Entering a passage required paying a toll, roughly 10,000 Energy Credits.
And at this very moment.
A massive fleet of vessels was navigating within the Domania Passage.
Less than 100 AU ahead, on a top-shaped interstellar space station, an enthusiast observing the surroundings with an astronomical telescope was stunned by the sight.
He quickly shouted to the people on the concourse: "A super huge number of ships are heading this way! It looks like there must be thousands—no, perhaps tens of thousands!"
Everyone across the entire interstellar space station panicked.
With such a large convoy, could this be the enemy forces of the Ynun Star Nation?
"The entire station enters defense mode! Weapons systems, commence charging!"
The Station Master also observed the scene, breaking out in a cold sweat, and shouted loudly.
Just as everyone braced themselves to face an attack, a message was transmitted to the station.
[Attention Benke Interstellar Station: Please activate reception mode. Target customer count: 11.4 billion people.]
This specific type of notification.
This was a prompt only triggered by their own affiliated ships.
The Station Master was momentarily stunned, then observed the approaching fleet again, gradually realizing that the ship designs indeed belonged to the Rusty Star Nation.
"Send a message and inquire what happened. Why are there so many people?"
He instructed his subordinate to dispatch the inquiry.
The distance between the two parties was short enough, and interstellar stations utilized Tachyon communication. The reply from the fleet arrived quickly.
"Station Master, Bmen has been occupied by the enemy. These ships are all refugees fleeing Bmen. The government has abandoned Bmen."
Hearing this, the Station Master sighed heavily.
"Has the war escalated to this stage?"
But his mood quickly rebounded into elation.
"Notify all merchants on the station to open their doors! 11.4 billion people! Think of the sheer spending power that represents!"
Although an interstellar station is called a "station," it does not imply it is merely a structure with a 1 km diameter, smaller than a large battleship.
The reality is quite the opposite.
Interstellar stations serve both civilian and military roles, providing energy replenishment and repair facilities for expeditionary forces.
Therefore, interstellar stations are engineered to store vast amounts of energy and incorporate repair docks.
All these factors ensure that interstellar stations are never small installations.
The Benke Interstellar Station was, in fact, a genuine Star City floating in space.
When no external ships were present, the Benke Interstellar Station functioned as a self-contained society, complete with corporations, shopping malls, and entertainment districts.
The Benke Interstellar Station boasted a diameter of 11,000 km and a height of 6,000 km. It could support a population capacity of 170 billion, with a registered permanent population of 3.8 billion.
This interstellar station could not only accommodate 11.4 billion people but could sustain that entire influx of refugees directly within its limits.
Following the Station Master's order, all 3.8 billion residents of the Star City scrambled into action, preparing accommodations and resources, each eager to extract some form of profit from these unexpected arrivals.
Do not underestimate these refugees; Bmen, being the primary material collection hub of the Rusty Star Nation, was actually its most affluent locale, without equal.
The inhabitants from those core districts were invariably incredibly affluent; their average income alone surpassed that of this remote backwater by more than double.
As the massive fleet approached.
The Station Master was already standing at the Starport, his face beaming with anticipation.
The foremost vessel docked first in the Starport. The Station Master saw a figure slowly disembark from the ship, and his entire body began to tremble.
It was...
He quickly moved forward to extend his welcome.
"Welcome, CEO Miss, to our humble station."
The sudden turn of events left him momentarily speechless for a proper greeting.
Luna, disembarking from the ship, quickly scanned his basic data.
"There is no need for elaborate reception. Just ensure the people on those ships are properly settled."
"They will remain here indefinitely. Many star systems have already been contaminated by the virus. The space station is currently the safest haven."
"Announce this news."
With that statement, Luna walked toward the Star City.
The Station Master did not perceive Luna as arrogant or rude. On the contrary, he felt a profound sense of shared honor simply being near her.
Having a direct exchange with a legendary figure like Luna was something he hadn't even dared to imagine. That single sentence from her would be a memory he could boast about for millennia.
In this cosmic era.
It was exceedingly difficult for individuals' social statuses to equalize horizontally.
Moreover, due to massive population stratification, the disparity between the upper echelons and the lower classes was unimaginably vast.
The immense status gap meant Luna and the Station Master had nothing substantial to discuss. Although Luna enjoyed interacting with ordinary individuals, not everyone knew how to properly communicate with someone of her standing.
This rigid status segregation fostered a perception of arrogance, yet it wasn't truly born from hubris.
Luna entered the Star City.
She casually procured an accommodation unit. Logically, she should not have lingered here, as numerous other matters awaited her attention within the Rusty Star Nation.
However, after departing Bmen, she had intercepted a piece of crucial intelligence.
The origin point of this information was located in the direction of this very star station, necessitating a stop for careful observation.
She retrieved the observation data logs from the star station and began organizing them.
Soon, she uncovered some intriguing images and videos.
These visuals were noticeably indistinct.
It wasn't fuzziness caused by low resolution; each capture contained over a hundred trillion pixels, even far exceeding that figure, making them incredibly clear in detail.
But the blurriness Luna referenced was not related to the stars themselves.
It was centered on an object even more colossal than a star.
She could not identify what it was.
From the captured images, it was easy to mistake the anomaly for an empty void of space.
However, according to the data transmitted to her from the Rice Astronomical Institute—the Rusty Star Nation's premier astronomical academy—they observed that this object was actively moving; it was obscuring certain stars that had been previously visible.
Through rigorous measurement and calculation, this entity was determined to be 170 light-years in length and 102 light-years in width.
These measurements represented only the length and width seen in the two-dimensional video projection. In reality, that 'width' actually corresponded to the object's height.
The Rice Astronomical Institute initially theorized it was an artificial construct.
At first, Luna considered this impossible.
The fundamental laws of the universe did not permit the existence of such gargantuan objects.
It might be an unknown cosmic phenomenon, perhaps some unique energy aggregation.
But after long-term surveillance, the Rice Astronomical Institute ruled out those theories, concluding it must be artificial. Moreover, they leaned toward the hypothesis that it was a living organism rather than a machine.
A creature 170 light-years in length?
This sounded like a tale from One Thousand and One Nights.
Indeed, the researchers themselves were shocked by their own speculation.
Not to mention Luna, the renowned biologist, who received the comprehensive report.
That object was situated in the general direction of the Benke Interstellar Station, but it was not geographically near it. In fact, it was nearly 20,000 light-years away from the Rusty Star Nation's core territory, positioned at the very edge of the Milky Way, or more accurately, above the Milky Way's disk, within the region of the Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy.
This dwarf galaxy is the closest satellite galaxy to the Milky Way, situated only 25,000 light-years from the Solar System and a mere 45,000 light-years from the galactic center.
If one visualized the Milky Way as a flat plate, the Canis Major structure was above the plate, not embedded within it.
The Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy was once a rival to the Milky Way. Billions of years ago, it engaged in conflict with the Milky Way, but our galaxy tore it apart as if crushing an ant.
Consequently, the Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy no longer resembles a true galaxy. It is merely a string of stars forming a ragged fringe, often interpreted as its ruined remnants.
That blurred image originated within the Canis Major Dwarf Galaxy, yet it appeared so immense. Even observed from nearly 20,000 light-years away, its sheer size caused it to dominate the view, akin to observing a one-meter-tall child from a distance of 100 meters.
Luna carefully compared the video and photographic data, discovering that the object was indeed in motion.
Moreover, this movement was a recent development.
Approximately 4,000 years ago, preceding this observation period, all records from Human Civilization had failed to detect any motion from it.
Luna searched through numerous historical documents and found a potential explanation: the difficulty inherent in communication between distant star systems. If photographs of the same target were gathered from various star systems, some images would show fewer stars, others more.
This was purely an effect of perspective.
After all, Human Civilization was already a powerful entity spanning thousands of light-years, with its furthest explorations exceeding ten thousand light-years.
Even when two star systems, separated by over 1,000 light-years, observed the same target in images and videos, and after cross-referencing, could quickly confirm it was an object, no one had flagged its movement.
Not even Ayla.
Perhaps it was because Ayla had too many complex data streams to process, leading her to overlook these seemingly minor anomalies.
Regardless, this constituted a monumental discovery.
This entity must originate from some exceptionally powerful Civilization.
But what exactly was it?
The only entity Luna could conceive of that would possess this kind of critical information was one.
That was the Bwarm.
The Bwarm star nation had, by this time, attained the status of a Milky Way-class star nation.
Luna had heard that the Bwarm star nation had verified traces of over 10 Type 2 Civilizations, alongside more than 100 Type 1 Civilization sites, and nearly 400 Type 0 Civilizations.
The Bwarm star nation had engaged in conflict with certain Civilizations. By utilizing the Swarm's super-strong reproductive capacity and leaning on Human Civilization as their technological backbone, they continuously harassed several higher-level Civilizations, initiating wars that even prompted Luna to advise them to exercise greater restraint.
In fact, this was still within the Bwarm star nation's jurisdiction. The Swarm had undergone several divisions over tens of thousands of years. Some factions of the Swarm had already migrated to more distant sectors. Without exaggeration, half of the Milky Way might now bear the footprint of the Swarm.
This was something Luna had anticipated long ago when she engineered this species.
This was also one of the Swarm's inherent objectives.
Perhaps the Swarm had also reached the Canis Major Dwarf galaxy.
Thus, Luna could directly procure intelligence from that location via the Swarm.
Luna immediately transmitted information to the Federation, instructing them to initiate negotiations with the Swarm to purchase this data.
In this manner, several months passed.
Luna's previously persistent sense of urgency intensified severalfold due to the appearance of this blurred image.
"The dimensional war is approaching; all sorts of monstrous entities are emerging."
"These Civilizations that may have developed for millions or tens of millions of years—I don't know what their ultimate objectives might be."
Luna formulated several conjectures.
But she dismissed them all. She had never directly encountered these Civilizations and could not grasp their unique ways of thinking.
When confronting an opposing Civilization, she could deduce their intentions from a rational perspective, though this was often a matter of necessity. As the conflict progressed, she could revise her initial judgments.
But in this current situation, relying on her own assumptions was purely speculative guesswork.
Yet, there was no alternative. Human Civilization had, by this point, managed contact with too few Civilizations, especially those offering in-depth exchanges; truly, only the Flyer Civilization.
Regarding the top-tier Civilizations residing within the Milky Way's core, they remained entirely unknown.
Especially since the entire galactic core was shielded by an optical membrane, preventing external observation of the interior.
The Swarm was reportedly nearing the galactic center but encountered certain impediments.
The inner region of the galactic core seemed to have formed a highly developed entity, with the deep space area filled with countless complex machinery. Any attempt to approach the interior resulted in immediate destruction and slaughter.
Under normal circumstances, Human Civilization would certainly have sought contact with them, but the dimensional war had severely disrupted that plan.
Observation of the blurred image would have to await the Swarm's official report.
Luna was already prepared to depart this interstellar station.
In these past few months, she had also received distressing news from within the star nation: Giotto was in grave trouble. The previous incidents involving the Grand Steward and the Jimin Corporation had nearly cost Giotto his life.
He had successfully razed the Jimin Corporation branch, and subsequently ordered a relentless manhunt for the Grand Steward who had narrowly escaped.
Now, the immediate crisis had stabilized, but the virus continued to give him no respite.
Luna needed to assist Giotto in handling this situation. Once the virus threat was neutralized, other pending matters could proceed.
Before leaving, Luna took a brief tour around the interstellar station, sampled some local delicacies, pointed out several management deficiencies to the station master, and then, seeing that the 11.4 billion populace had gradually begun to acclimatize, she boarded a ship and exited Benke Interstellar Station via the Domania Passage.
This voyage lasted for 71 years.
She finally returned to the Supernova Technology Corporation headquarters.
At this time, the entire headquarters was engulfed in chaos.
Countless personnel rushed about like ants agitated on a hot surface. The headquarters resembled a frantic street market, with thousands upon thousands of people arguing incessantly, the resulting noise overwhelmingly deafening.
But the moment the ship docked at the Starport.
The instant Luna stepped off the vessel, the entire headquarters fell into absolute silence.
At that second, all personnel displayed expressions of immense relief.
Luna had returned; they finally had their leader.
Now, everything that had transpired seemed trivial in Luna's presence.
Their confidence in her was even greater than Luna's own.
"What are you all staring at? Get back to work."
"Next order of business!"
Luna addressed the assembled personnel sternly.
But not a single staff member offered a complaint. On the contrary, they plunged into their duties with heightened enthusiasm. Plans that had been debated for decades were finalized and unified within mere minutes.
...
Upon returning to headquarters, Luna immediately began tackling the virus contamination.
Lacking advanced virology technology, they could only resort to the most primitive solution to eradicate the infection: formatting.
All equipment detected carrying the virus would be wiped clean, and the system completely reinstalled.
Since some viruses could potentially embed themselves in obscure sections of the chips, remaining unaffected by a standard format, all data storage devices also had to be destroyed and replaced.
This imposed an extreme strain on the Rusty Star Nation's financial reserves.
Fortunately, Supernova Technology Company had amassed substantial profits from its previous ship trade ventures, enabling it to sustain this massive expenditure.
Luna, stationed at headquarters, would not personally wield a scrubbing tool. Her primary role was to stabilize morale and then integrate the cleanup efforts, thereby making the virus eradication process marginally more efficient.
After concluding these internal restructuring tasks, Luna immediately shifted her focus to other pressing matters.
A war had concluded, and 362 years had passed since their departure.
All production lines at the headquarters' void-class starship factory were complete, and an additional production line had even been expanded. This facility could now produce 35 void-class vessels every century.
Adding this to the peak output of 170 ships every 100 years from the other headquarters, the total production capacity now reached 205 vessels per century.
Originally, this output was deemed sufficient.
However, because the war had erupted, Luna had directly committed the previous 2,000 void-class ships to destruction.
Luna suddenly felt that starship production was inadequate.
She immediately formulated a thousand-year strategic plan.
Her goal was for the combined output of the two factories to reach 500 units within 1,000 years.
And following that initial millennium plan, she would devise another, requiring the total fleet count of void-class ships to hit 10,000 by that subsequent time mark.
2,000 years.
This was the maximum timeline Luna had allotted. But in reality, 2,000 years was likely just enough time for Flaorse and the Ynun Star Nation to fully recover their strength.
By then, it would usher in another ferocious round of combat.
No one knew what new strategic advantages their adversaries might possess.
Therefore, Luna's 2,000-year blueprint was not solely focused on them.
Based on the experience of this recent conflict, a fleet of 5,000 void-class ships was deemed sufficient to inflict heavy attrition upon the enemy.
Although the foe would undoubtedly be on high alert following the initial war, the true advantage of void-class ships lay precisely in their stealth: as long as they remained unseen, the enemy would have no indication of their arrival.
A thief might have a thousand days, but a vigilant guard has none. Even contemporary military doctrines struggled to enforce such perpetual vigilance.
Perhaps the enemy would establish a military installation on Bmen with a stable energy source, and only then would Luna dispatch void-class ships for direct assault.
Otherwise, in the context of deep-space fleet engagements, void-class ships offered little defensive capability.
The target of 10,000 warships was actually preparation for the next major offensive campaign.
Luna's initial strategy involved invading the Ynun Star Nation. Now, the dynamic had reversed, costing her 2,000 void-class vessels, which severely disrupted her desired operational tempo.
2,000 years was the absolute maximum production window Luna could tolerate for this phase. After that period, she needed to swiftly subdue the Ynun Star Nation within 500 years; only then could they advance to the subsequent stage of their long-term plan.
Void-class ships were not the only priority requiring construction.
This war had also exposed numerous deficiencies in the existing void-class vessels, necessitating updates and modifications to adapt to more intense future warfare.
Various weapon systems constructed using evasion materials required enhanced power output, including the DataNodes. A new generation needed development, one possessing superior computational capacity.
These were all essential, albeit incremental, upgrades.
"In short, they won't grant me any respite."
"I still have to spend such a long time confined here."
Luna was beginning to feel somewhat disheartened. More critically, Toma K had vanished following the last royal family incident, leaving her without anyone to effectively share Luna's immense burden.
Neither Toma K nor Giotto could be completely relied upon for all strategic endeavors.
She also resolved to expand the personnel serving on the executive board.
Just as Giotto and Toma K had previously recruited her, she intended to select new individuals and offer them equity shares.
Luna now deeply regretted one specific action.
That was, after assuming the role of CEO, she had dismissed the "Divine" unit that had been assigned to monitor Giotto and Toma K.
The reason was simple: she truly could not extract any actionable intelligence from it.
But at least that unit possessed underlying capabilities and could have assisted in alleviating a significant portion of her current pressure.
"It seems I need to dispatch some Divine personnel here immediately. Otherwise, given the Rusty Star Nation's current combat strength, achieving a total sweep will be exceptionally difficult."
Luna's decisions were typically rendered with swift finality.
Approximately 100 years later, five "Divine" entities arrived at the Rusty Star Nation.
Luna immediately assigned them to several critical operational roles.
These were officer-level appointments.
While "Divine" units were recognized as versatile and possessing broad knowledge, they had not yet attained the academic pinnacle of a top-ranked scholar in terms of specialized theoretical prowess.
...
Rusty Fourth Fleet.
The Rusty Star Nation maintained a total of 5 main fleets. Each fleet consisted of 2,500 standard ships and 30 heavy warships.
This accounted for 12,500 ships and 150 warships assigned to operational command.
The remaining 3,500 ships and 20 warships formed the central army corps, tasked with safeguarding specific star systems within the core region of the Rusty Star Nation.
Although these core star systems were less economically prosperous than Bmen, they housed nearly 80% or more of the Rusty Star Nation's official bureaucracy and nobility. The central army corps' mandate was the protection of these key governmental and aristocratic figures.
The Fourth Fleet's assigned deployment point was a rectangular military fortress structure, standing rigidly upright like a monolithic monument.
But in reality, this fortress internally housed the equivalent capacity of 2,500 ships and 30 warships.
The upper half of the fortress served as the rest and residential area for the personnel, while the lower half contained the main Starport.
In the upper section of the fortress, within the central command nexus, a female figure opened her eyes. She looked around with a slight hint of disorientation.
"What mission is this again?"
Hyperdimensional Space missions were only revealed upon entering the designated mission world.
As soon as this female regained her bearings, a person situated in a manufactured mech beside her reported: "Fourth Army Commander, an order has arrived from CEO Miss, transmitted from Supernova Technology headquarters, requesting immediate deployment to the Kayata star system."
The female quickly processed the information relayed by those words.
Her designation was Army Commander, serving under Supernova Technology.
No!
She paused, then realization struck. How intensely familiar these terms sounded!
Supernova Technology.
Wasn't this the Corporation that she, Giotto, and Toma K had all jointly founded?
It had been so long since she had last heard that name that she had almost forgotten its significance.
"So, CEO Miss, that must be Luna."
"I truly never imagined this small nation would still be intact after so many years."
In Mingna's recollection, the Rusty Star Nation should have long since collapsed, as the star system region was notoriously volatile. News of a nation being annihilated was almost a decadal occurrence.
And the Rusty Star Nation was inherently a minor power among minor powers, fated for a swift demise.
Thus, Mingna felt considerable surprise.
What shocked her even more was the fact that she could actually return to this place.
She was unaware that this situation was entirely orchestrated by Luna's deliberate maneuvering. If there were "Divine" entities already familiar with the Rusty Star Nation, why would they not utilize them?