Abandnda Sector.
Glolo Star Nation.
Godard Stellar Council.
This was a colossal assembly hall standing upon the surface of a star.
Those permitted to convene here were the Glolo Star Nation's top politicians or industry titans with absolute status.
The last time the Godard Stellar Council opened was approximately 7,300 years ago, during a clash with a neighboring state.
Every convening of the Godard Stellar Council signaled war!
Therefore, the Godard Stellar Council was also known as the War Council.
Currently, thousands of ships shuttled throughout the council grounds as countless figures of towering influence gathered here.
They had been summoned nearly a century ago.
Many had arrived at the nearby Star City decades ago. Only now, when the majority had reached the destination, did the council officially open.
The one presiding over this session was undeniably the leader of the Glolo Star Nation, Naminko.
It sounded like a Human name, but it wasn't.
Naminko D'Angelo Fith, that was his full name.
Since founding the Glolo Star Nation here 53,000 years ago, he had transformed it from a minor state into a high-tier power, backed by the Twenty-Eight Nations Covenant and dominating the entire sector.
Figures like him were rare even within the vast expanse of the Human Civilization.
Naminko was of the Lelera race.
His insectoid form, augmented by heavy genetic modification, appeared gargantuan, standing at least 20 meters tall as he sat alone at the head of the assembly.
Below him was a fan-shaped hall capable of seating thousands.
Before long, only a few scattered empty seats remained.
A nearby state minister announced the commencement of the session.
The Glolo national anthem surged through the hall. Its clanging, rhythmic tempo was deafening, stirring a deep passion within every citizen of the star nation.
Some of the elders even wept.
Tens of thousands of years, countless days and nights. Those seated here were all major contributors to the state. Only they truly remembered what they had lost and sacrificed for this star nation.
The music lasted for over ten minutes before fading.
Naminko began to speak.
"Roughly 100 years ago, the Rusty Star Nation mobilized, deploying a fleet of over 200,000 ships into the Yanli Independence Star Nation to engage in war."
The subordinates below had long been aware of this information.
What puzzled them was that this council had been moved forward by nearly a decade.
Something must have changed.
Sure enough, Naminko continued: "Three years ago, we received word from the Ice Crystal Fleet in the Yanli Independence Star Nation. The Ice Crystal Fleet completely annihilated the Yanli Independence Star Nation during that campaign, but in the subsequent confrontation with the Rusty Star Nation's fleet, they were wiped out!"
The first part was a military achievement.
It sent a surge of pride through some of the high-ranking military officers.
But the following sentence caused the atmosphere in the entire hall to freeze.
The audience felt their throats go dry. Their tongues felt heavy and stuck when they tried to move them.
"Wasn't the Ice Crystal Fleet the Dumu Fleet?"
"The Spear of Nation destroyed another kingdom, only to fall at the hands of Rusty."
"Could the rumored CEO of Supernova Technology Corporation truly be that formidable?"
"Rusty did once dismantle the three great star-nations of the Lican Sector, and that was only a millennium or two ago."
"This was the Spear of Nation! The only reason he hadn't made it into the Golden Fleet was his sheer brutality. His strategic mind was easily top-ten within the star nation."
"The enemy must have paid a heavy price as well. The Rusty Star Nation is only a mid-tier power. As long as they suffered significant losses, it won't be an issue moving forward."
A single stone had stirred a thousand ripples.
The majority found Dumu's death simply impossible to accept.
Every celebrated Strategos is forged through a succession of victories across countless conflicts.
Obliteration was a word that was never supposed to reappear in their lives.
"Silence!"
The minister beside Naminko uttered just two words, but amplified through the council's speakers, they hit like a SONIC BOOM, grating on the ears.
The effect was immediate.
The hall returned to a state where a pin drop could be heard.
Naminko continued: "Intelligence reports that the Rusty Star Nation deployed a Tier 2 fleet, commanded by a Director of Supernova Technology Corporation, the former King of Rusty, Giotto."
"Previous intel described this man as a mindless brute, a total failure. Who gathered this data?"
His voice carried an edge of fury.
Dumu is dead.
The destruction of an entire fleet still requires someone to answer for it.
Moreover, this was a catastrophic oversight.
If this was wrong, what of the rest? If other reports are equally flawed, what intel can we trust? This could lead to even greater disasters in the conflicts ahead.
Under his piercing gaze, a man slowly stood up, his body trembling slowly.
"Speaker, based on ten millennia of intel, Giotto is undeniably a total failure. Perhaps he is the Strategos in name only, acting as a mere figurehead while the true commander remains in the shadows."
"During the Triple War, officers like Mingna and Hector showed elite tactical talent, but they vanished afterward. Perhaps Rusty sequestered them specifically to prepare for this invasion."
He was the Director of Intelligence, a man of absolute authority in normal times.
Among the thousands seated here, ninety-nine percent feared him.
But in this council, he couldn't summon even a shred of his usual bravado.
"Perhaps?"
"Director Trumah, as the Head of Intelligence, for you to use 'perhaps' twice in a single statement instead of providing a certainty... it seems you've grown lazy."
Naminko's disdain for Trumah was long-standing, especially over the last millennium. They had failed to extract core intel on the Rusty Star Nation, and what little they had was flawed. How were they expected to handle this war?
Trumah was drenched in sweat.
The crux was his inability to argue back.
He lacked the relevant intel and had no idea how many more errors were buried in his files.
Using "perhaps" twice just now had betrayed his total lack of confidence.
"Speaker, I will thoroughly investigate my department and provide more accurate intelligence within 100 years."
"If I fail, I will resign and return to my hometown, never to participate in politics again!"
There was no need for empty boasts now. Issuing a pledge of responsibility would command more respect.
Naminko wanted exactly this answer.
"Do your job well!"
"I don't want a repeat of this."
"Next, the council's agenda is to discuss how to intercept and destroy Rusty Star Nation's Tier 2 fleet this time."
"They are currently advancing from Tar and Mai from Star Nation 28783. We have made many preparations there, but we still haven't secured Star Nation 28783. If Star Nation 28783 receives reinforcements, it could have a profound impact on future plans."
The urgent council discussions didn't last long this time.
It concluded in approximately 4 days, 96 hours.
Hua'a, seated on the periphery, did not participate in the discussions, merely observing quietly.
When asked by those beside him, he offered only perfunctory responses.
As the wealthiest merchant in the Glolo Star Nation, he was primarily driven by self-interest, thus he had few close confidants.
After a few rounds of social rejection, people stopped bothering him altogether.
Once the session concluded, he returned to his ship with his secretary in tow.
Inside the vessel, the tension on his face finally began to thaw.
"The Rusty Star Nation clearly has some teeth. To think the Spear of Nation was buried there so easily."
"I've dissected the battle logs. He overlooked a single, minute detail, and they caught him by the tail," his secretary remarked while trailing behind.
This secretary wasn't actually a secretary. He didn't touch corporate affairs, having been seconded from the space-pirate syndicates.
Space pirates spent their lives raiding. Their combat experience rivaled any star-nation's elite, especially those backed by the Great Pirate Fleets.
The shadow behind Hua'a was a man just as notorious as the Spear of Nation.
Haoifa of the Xero-Spine Syndicate.
A desert cactus has two types of thorns: large ones you wouldn't dare touch, and microscopic bristles as fine as hair, impossible to extract and causing agonizing pain.
Haoifa embodied both.
Across the broader sectors, his infamy far eclipsed that of the Spear of Nation.
"So, how does he compare to you?"
Hua'a asked.
Though Haoifa was a legendary Strategos, his talents were purely military. When it came to reading people or social maneuvering, he fell short.
It wasn't that he lacked the wit for it, but rather that he found such games tedious.
Thus, he spoke with blunt honesty.
"In war, who can say for sure? No one can guarantee a perfect record."
"Giotto catching Dumu's error doesn't necessarily make him superior. It just means Dumu was careless."
"True superiority between two Strategi can only be determined on a balanced battlefield."
"I can't claim to be stronger than either of them. In a theater I'm familiar with, I'm nearly invincible. But war doesn't wait for me to choose the terrain. I'll inevitably be thrust into unknown space, and there, the odds of victory are always in flux."
Giotto had displayed exceptional insight and foresight, which placed him on the same level as Haoifa and Dumu.
At this tier, everyone's win-loss ratio sits at fifty-fifty. Only when the real engagement begins does every maneuver tip the scales in one direction.
Hua'a was satisfied with Haoifa's answer. This calm, dispassionate strategist was his greatest ace.
Had Haoifa given a definitive, arrogant answer, Hua'a would have felt he'd lost his edge.
"Now, the Rusty Star Nation's Tier 2 fleet is an open hand, but no one knows where their Tier 1 fleet is hidden."
"That girl Luna stood before me with absolute confidence, claiming all she needed was a millennium. If you were in her shoes, what would you do?"
Hua'a kept probing.
He wanted to gauge the reliability of his ally.
If Rusty showed any sign of crumbling, he would immediately drop all operations against the Glolo Star Nation.
Haoifa pondered for a moment.
Then, he shook his head.
"It's difficult."
"The Glolo Star Nation is a high-tier power, after all. Rusty is still too weak."
"Winning from a position of weakness, especially when you're outclassed across the board, is nearly impossible even in a skirmish, let alone an interstellar conflict of this scale."
"If I had to identify a potential game-changer, it would be Luna herself."
This answer caught Hua'a completely off guard.
"Oh?"
"You think that highly of her?"
"Just because you met her once?"
Hua'a remembered that 'meeting.' In reality, Luna and Haoifa had only briefly crossed paths at his corporate headquarters.
"And the recordings!"
Haoifa added.
He had watched the recordings of the conversation between Luna and Hua'a afterward.
As he spoke, Haoifa's body actually trembled slightly.
"In fact, you saw it too. That individual is confident, confident to the extreme."
"This kind of confidence only exists in those who have never tasted defeat. It is forged by a cumulative lifetime of victories."
"I have it, and you have it too."
"However, both you and I carry the helplessness of our younger, weaker years within us. Deep down, we still frequently brush against that old version of ourselves."
"But she doesn't have that. It's almost like facing a clone with perfect memory implants."
"Her confidence is too overwhelming, abnormally so."
"You might find this laughable, but I believe that for her, defeating the Glolo Star Nation is simply a foregone conclusion."
Haoifa's judgment of character was always precise. Hua'a knew this well.
Furthermore, Haoifa never lied about small matters. He spoke exactly what he truly believed.
And such high praise was something Hua'a was hearing from Haoifa's mouth for the first time.
It was as if...
Perfect!
That was the only word that could describe it.
"Maybe she really is a clone?" Hua'a joked.
He recalled his conversation with Luna.
Indeed, every gesture and movement exuded a powerful confidence, even a sense of absolute certainty.
Thinking back, Hua'a detested Luna's eyes.
That gaze viewing everything seemed to carry an inexplicable contempt.
"No. I've seen clones with perfect memory implants; she isn't like that."
"If a clone were truly perfect, they would inevitably begin to doubt themselves and their surroundings, because nothing around them is perfect. Once doubt sets in, their confidence collapses faster than that of any normal person."
"And the moment they learn the truth, clones go insane. The more perfect they are, the worse it gets."
"She hasn't."
She hasn't.
Two simple words.
Hua'a took a deep breath. "It seems we'll have to see what happens next."
"However, this council session won't be pleasant for her."
"That old man Naminko won't just put a leash on me; he's definitely arranged some backup plans within the Rusty Star Nation."
"I hope our 'perfect' girl can hold out!"
This was the core focus of the council session.
But it was enough to stabilize morale and enough to make the Rusty Star Nation suffer, perhaps even torching their last thousand years of preparation.
This was why Hua'a had probed so much, re-evaluating his partnership with Luna.
Haoifa's words made him hesitate.
But hesitation had a time limit.
Currently, the Glolo Star Nation's Golden Fleet was targeting his space pirates. If he backed off, the Rusty Star Nation would undoubtedly find itself in even greater difficulty.
Hua'a believed this could be the final straw that broke Rusty's back.
He was crucial.
At this thought, a smile touched his lips.
"Perhaps I can squeeze her for an even higher price!"
Greedy Hua'a never passed up an opportunity to harvest gold.
...
The Leviathan Kemu Nebula.
This was a small planetary nebula, born from a stellar explosion over 30,000 years ago.
The surroundings were desolate, its geographic location extremely remote. Practically no ships passed through here, let alone warships.
However, a fleet of over 200,000 ships had now appeared, seemingly materializing from the void.
Rusty Tier 1 Fleet.
Luna had chosen this remote location as a staging ground, partly to resupply their energy.
Every jump into evasion required massive energy consumption. It was impossible to sustain a 200-light-year journey in a single leap, so the route had to be meticulously planned.
Roughly 700 years ago, a band of space pirates had occupied this area. Their scale was small, consisting of only a few dozen ships.
For the sake of this war, Luna had long since erased them and consistently raided any passing convoys, which is why the area was now deserted.
Of course, the isolation was genuine. The fact that ships rarely passed didn't mean they never would. Luna always preferred to leave zero margin for error unless absolutely necessary.
"Commence matter acquisition."
Luna issued the order.
The entire fleet began harvesting the nebula's small celestial bodies.
However, they didn't approach. They used tractor beams to pull large clusters of asteroids toward the ships. Each vessel was equipped with specialized matter-to-energy conversion processors, with intake ports located on the flanks, approximately 20 meters in diameter.
For larger celestial bodies, the lateral cannons would engage.
Since they were essentially stationary in the evasion state and the fleet didn't utilize cryosleep, the orders were executed rapidly.
Toma K stood beside Luna, looking at the floating behemoths in the distance. "Should we deal with those things?"
Luna glanced over.
Massive celestial bodies drifted prominently amidst the nebula, each spanning over ten thousand kilometers in diameter.
Yet, they weren't planets.
Their shapes were extremely irregular, and their surfaces bore leathery textures.
In reality, that was skin, biological hide.
Those drifting masses were the carcass of a creature.
The Leviathan Kemu Nebula was named after it.
It was a bio-weapon developed by a former star nation. More accurately, a bio-engineered warship.
The Old Federation had made significant strides in this field, but as resource acquisition improved, bio-engineered warships gradually returned to being a niche interest. After all, they were merely products designed for "cost-effectiveness."
Now, the Federation was an ultra-wealthy powerhouse.
But for star nations, it was different. Bio-engineered warships represented a viable technological path for low and mid-tier powers.
The Leviathan Kemu was born of this.
The star nation that created it hoped to turn it into a planet-class bio-engineered warship.
They succeeded.
However, bio-engineered warships had no advantages beyond cost. When the Glolo Star Nation began its expansion, even with a planet-class warship like the Leviathan Kemu, the creator nation was utterly crushed.
Of course, the thing wasn't entirely useless.
Without the Leviathan Kemu, that star nation would have collapsed even faster.
A gargantuan bio-mass.
It was no wonder no one had touched it in tens of thousands of years.
In this era, biological matter was the least valuable commodity. Using it for energy conversion was considered a waste of time due to its low efficiency.
The previous band of space pirate had actually tried to harvest it, calling it "flesh-ore," but the profit margins were so abysmal they were forced to abandon the venture.
Even from a great distance, its form was clearly visible. Luna marveled at the creative capacity of these star nations.
This was precisely why she had encouraged the establishment of star nations in the first place.
If there were no external threats, Luna would actually prefer to see more star nations rather than having them integrated into one.
"Forget it. Let it be a testament, a proof that the nation which birthed it once existed."
The thing looked massive, but its interior was composed of a lattice-like cellular structure. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been able to support such an immense volume.
Its density was only one-hundred-seventieth that of a typical planet. Placed in water, it felt like it would take flight rather than just float.
After all, the density of ordinary planets usually ranges from 3.5 to 8. Only some smaller asteroids fall below this, like the moon at 3.3, or Pluto, which is less than 2. Larger planets like Earth have a density of 5.5.
The Leviathan Kemu's overall density was roughly 23 kilograms per cubic meter, lower than that of some foams.
One could say even water was scarce within it. It was mostly composed of man-made particles even less efficient than hydrogen.
Those particles lacked the conventional structure of electrons, nuclei, and neutrons.
That was why the conversion efficiency was so abysmally low.
The Tier 1 fleet certainly possessed the equipment for profitable conversion, but it was far too time-consuming.
"Yeah."
"It's a true wonder. I've heard there's a Leviathan Graveyard somewhere in Chötons territory."
Toma K had rarely seen a behemoth of this scale.
Even the Chötons Bio-World was significantly smaller by comparison.
However, Chötons had its own Leviathan Plan.
The ties between Rusty and Chötons were relatively tight. During his time in Sheltondine, Toma K had heard rumors. Chötons had a branch there, but it was tiny, consisting of only a few thousand people. It would be useless in a war, so it remained largely forgotten.
There was no way Chötons would cross thousands of light-years to aid Rusty.
Luna, naturally, understood far more than Toma K.
The Leviathan project was Chötons' plan to sell massive bio-engineered warships to star nations, an idea inspired by the original Leviathan.
Chötons' bio-technology was undeniably superior to that of the previous star nation, and their project had seen some success, yielding several Leviathans.
However, they eventually discovered that these gargantuan Leviathans couldn't be delivered via super-symmetric matter displacement. They had to be cultivated on-site, just like a Chötons Bio-World. The revenue was lower than a Bio-World, while the overhead was significantly higher.
As a result, they directly terminated the hundred-odd Leviathans they had created. Finding that the carcasses weren't even worth recycling, they simply let them drift, creating that Leviathan Graveyard.
Later, ironically, it evolved into a tourist destination. Several small Star Cities, housing hundreds of millions, were built atop those Leviathans. Over ten millennia, they actually managed to recoup their initial investment.
The Tier 1 fleet's refit and resupply period lasted three months.
It wasn't that they didn't want to stay longer, but the fleet was moving at high velocity. After three months, they would have cleared the nebula.
The Leviathan Nebula was the midpoint of their journey, meaning the Tier 1 fleet was halfway.
However, this was their final resupply.
The closer they got to Abandnda, the higher the risk of exposure.
An increasing number of interstellar probes would be monitoring the cosmos without blind spots. They needed to reach their destination in one final sprint, which is why they had diverted to the Leviathan Nebula to refit.
In truth, it wasn't even on their direct linear flight path.
While traversing the Leviathan Nebula, the fleet passed nearly skin-to-skin with a Leviathan fragment. Luna felt a sense of pressure as she gazed at the behemoth.
After all, each fragment was the size of a planet.
Compared to many megastructures, it was small, but this was biological. The feeling was different.
Luna hadn't returned to the Federation in a long time, but she knew through various channels that interstellar organisms back there were growing increasingly gargantuan. There were nearly hundreds of millions of them for every square light-year. On any interstellar journey, one was bound to encounter some, including beasts exceeding hundreds of kilometers in length.
But these were just passing thoughts.
As long as the threat of the Connectors remained, Luna wouldn't return.
Just because she couldn't see the Connectors didn't mean they weren't there.
A top-tier civilization possessed wormhole technology.
To them, the distance between human civilization and the Galactic Center was negligible.
While Luna pondered the Federation, Toma K's thoughts were on Giotto.
"I wonder how the Tier 2 fleet is doing over there," he muttered, a flicker of anxiety crossing his face.
Could Giotto really handle a burden this heavy?
The old lack of confidence began to surface once more.
"Giotto will manage. Don't worry," Luna replied.
Objectively, she had more faith in Giotto than Toma K did.
Luna could have split off an avatar to assist him, but she chose not to. Partly because she trusted the man Giotto had become.
If he couldn't even manage this, she would have to consider more drastic measures, like cutting these two loose and operating solo.
She had brought them along because of the Unknown Civilization, but overall, Rusty's true resurgence was meant to ensure the internal stability of the Human Civilization.
In the grand scheme, the personal issues of Giotto and Toma K were secondary.
But if there was a way to achieve both, who would settle for just one?
Luna's mindset had shifted since several millennia ago.
Time does that.
A normal person might change their mind several times a week as their ideas evolve. No one can draft a permanent solution on the first try.
It's like drawing a straight line on a piece of paper. A one-centimeter line is easy. A meter takes more effort. But ten meters?
A ten-meter stretch of paper inevitably involves others, and with more players in the game, a perfectly straight line becomes nearly impossible.
The scale of a task is directly proportional to its duration, and time attracts irrelevant variables.
By now, Luna's objective was to seize control rather than letting Giotto and Toma K lead.
She might use this window to step from the shadows onto the main stage.
To engage in the coming war as a public figure.
Of course, that identity wouldn't be 'Leader of Mankind,' but something similar to what she held now.
And such a figure would require a legendary origin story.
Standing beside her, Toma K watched Luna intently. He could sense the shift in her, especially the parts directed specifically at him.
The absolute certainty in her voice filled him with a sudden urgency.
It wasn't that she trusted Giotto blindly.
It was that he had to succeed.
If they didn't prove their worth soon, they would be discarded like scrap.
The figure before him would do it, and was perfectly capable of it.
Even though he still didn't know who Luna truly was.
...
Lican Sector.
Tar and Mai.
Simplified Route 4.
The fall of the Yanli Independence Star Nation left the Tier 2 fleet without a safe harbor in the area.
After annihilating the Ice Crystal Fleet, the Tier 2 fleet pivoted, abandoning the star system they had once clung to as a lifeline. Instead, they struck out directly onto Simplified Route 4.
This was the sole corridor leading to Star Nation 28783.
Minor powers like the Yanli Independence Star Nation lacked the resources to construct genuine interstellar transit lanes.
Even Rusty's own Domania Passage was only initiated after integrating the Dragon Star Nation, the Multi-Mind Star Nation, and the Obsidian Shield.
By then, Rusty was already a mid-tier star nation, no longer a minor power.
States like the Yanli Independence Star Nation, now vassals to Rusty, were all similarly diminutive, typically possessing only a few dozen to a hundred star systems, most of which were merely for resource extraction.
Simplified Route 4 spanned 28 light-years but featured only six acceleration rings, capable of boosting ships by 13,000 kilometers per second.
And that was under optimal conditions.
However, the Ice Crystal Fleet had sabotaged two rings within the Yanli sector of Simplified Route 4, reducing the Tier 2 fleet's acceleration to a meager 8,000 kilometers per second. Better than nothing, but barely.
Utilizing what momentum they could, it took the Tier 2 fleet 90 years to traverse the distance from their starting point to Star Nation 28783.
Giotto's worst fears didn't materialize.
Star Nation 28783 remained intact.
Deep in interstellar space, massive glowing numbers, illuminated by lasers, flickered in the distance.
Even from light-years away, those digits were clearly visible to the naked eye.
Unsurprisingly, a typical star nation wouldn't do this. But Star Nation 28783 wasn't typical. Its most prosperous industry wasn't manufacturing, technology, or virtual worlds—it was tourism.
Even within the vastness of the Human Civilization, such a thing was rare.
A star nation built entirely on tourism.
Of course, it was also tiny.
The entire nation consisted of only 25 star systems, all inhabited, but most housed only one or two small Star Cities.
The total population was around 6.7 billion—less than Earth's population hundreds of thousands of years ago.
However, the transient population exceeded ten billion.
Tourism alone couldn't sustain a nation. The influx of people, and the various activities that were illegal elsewhere, were the real economic engines here.
Giotto summoned an officer who had previously visited the sector to assess the situation.
"The Yanli Independence Star Nation has fallen. There's no reason Star Nation 28783 should be untouched. If the enemy is hiding there, where would they be?"
Giotto knew the Ice Crystal Fleet had invaded the Yanli Independence Star Nation and was aware of several Glolo Star Nation military outposts in the area.
Yet, strangely, their reconnaissance of Star Nation 28783 had yielded zero progress.
Considering this was the heart of the entire Lican Sector, there was no way the Glolo Star Nation didn't have designs on it.
The Lican Sector resembled a swallow in shape.
Rusty held the swallow's wings, tail, head, and parts of the torso.
Star Nation 28783 occupied the remainder of the torso, sitting dead center in the sector.
If one were to deploy not from Aerosendia, but from the Justi Sector, the former Saintees star nation territory, Star Nation 28783 was the closest objective, a mere dozen light-years away.
The summoned officer, Nanoxa, was actually a former citizen of Star Nation 28783 who had moved to Rusty for various reasons. That was ten millennia ago.
He hadn't been back in ten thousand years.
But a place like Star Nation 28783, he suspected even another hundred thousand years wouldn't change a thing.
He offered an answer Giotto hadn't anticipated.
"Everywhere!"
"Other than that specific method, they have absolutely no chance of controlling Star Nation 28783."
"Oh?"
Giotto was surprised by the response.
"Strategos, have you reviewed the files on Star Nation 28783?" Nanoxa inquired.
He seemed to want confirmation of this before continuing.
Giotto nodded.
As Strategos, he naturally had to assess the local situation. Star Nation 28783 was so small that its data could be absorbed in a single glance.
"Anyone who sees the data on Star Nation 28783 would assume it's an incredibly easy place to invade."
"But it's not. Unless you've lived here for a while, you won't understand the granular details. You'd only have the superficial experience of a tourist."
"It's chaotic here."
"I've never seen a place more chaotic. Unfortunately, it happens to be my home."
"I lived here for over 7,000 years. Those years are memories I'd rather forget. Star Nation 28783 is a fractured realm."
"It hides countless shadow emperors. Every street is partitioned. There is no political institution here in any true sense. If you try to dig deep, you'll find either a void or a tangled mess."
"Absolute control is impossible. The social environment is as complex as a root system; even if the Glolo Star Nation embedded itself here for ten thousand years, they'd still be scratching the surface."
"There was an old saying: 'Even a server becomes a slut in Star Nation 28783.' It's widely circulated, and outsiders take it as a joke. But the real meaning behind 'slut' here is 'going into heat.' A server in heat is a server that's overheating."
"Within the shadows of Star Nation 28783, even a server can't keep things orderly."
"I know of at least twenty distinct factions. They possess the greed of space pirates, but they don't raid the stars; they harvest wealth through black-market supply chains."
"The Glolo Star Nation enemies can't control this place, but if they truly hide in the corners of this Star Nation, it will be a massive headache for us."
"Strategos, my advice is to bypass this place. This is a battle of alleys, and an army in the alleys cannot threaten an air force."
Nanoxa was implying something specific.
He was suggesting that if Giotto truly wanted absolute control, he should act like an ancient air force bombing a city; the enemies hiding in the alleys would simply perish.
This was a test of whether Giotto was cold enough, as cold as the enemies they had faced before.
Nanoxa didn't know Giotto's inner thoughts, so he merely made him aware of this option rather than stating it directly, to avoid giving offense.
Having undergone specialized training, Giotto immediately grasped the core of the message.
Was he a good person?
Of course not!
Furthermore, Star Nation 28783 was essentially a black-market den; god only knew how many atrocities occurred there.
Star nations generally have broad ethical and moral standards, but for Star Nation 28783 to sustain such a business and still attract visitors, one can only imagine the reality.
Star Nation 28783's most famous attraction was blood-sport games.
People were kept in an environment to slaughter one another, with the survivor receiving a prize.
Slaves were held here, stripped of all human rights.
In most star nations, even clones possess basic human rights. Mistreating a clone is, at least legally, a crime. While there's plenty of room for manipulation in practice, it remains illegal.
But here, countless things were done with utter impunity.
"In that case, we destroy it."
He felt no inner conflict.
Comparing his own life to the lives of others, especially a crowd of criminals, the choice was clear to anyone.
As for 'good people' among the bad?
They didn't exist here.
A good person might exist in a pile of bad ones, but they never lived long.
Giotto issued the command.
The Tier 2 fleet advanced toward the nearest star system.
Even at the system's periphery, a multitude of ships was visible. This area was teeming not only with tourists but also with hundreds of millions of pirates living off interstellar plunder.
This resulted in an exceptionally high concentration of vessels.
Star Nation 28783 saw over 600,000 ship arrivals and departures annually; theoretically, each star system hosted over 20,000 ships.
The entire Tier 2 fleet was roughly of this scale.
As the massive Tier 2 fleet cruised in, the surrounding ships scrambled to get out of the way. The Purple Thorn crest emblazoned on the warships immediately broadcasted their identity.
Rusty!
The undisputed sovereign of the Lican Sector.
Onlookers wondered what such a behemoth was doing, deploying a fleet to a place like this.
Dudley surveyed the surrounding vessels and asked Giotto, "Strategos, shall we destroy these ships?"
The top speed of these vessels was likely only fifty or sixty thousand kilometers per second, not worth the effort to conscript.
Giotto gave a slight nod.
If they were going to destroy it, they might as well be thorough.
Swiftly, the weapon ports on all ships began to rotate, their deep muzzles glowing with lethal intent.
By the time those ships sensed something was wrong, it was already too late.
Lasers pierced through their energy bays without mercy, triggering chain-reaction electromagnetic explosions.
BANG! BANG! Hundreds, then thousands of flashes lit up the void with a blinding brilliance.
The Tier 2 fleet pushed further into the star system.
Within the desolate system sat a Star City shaped like a ring, or rather, a series of concentric circles.
The outer ring served as residential quarters, while the inner ring was a meticulously maintained environment featuring forests, oceans, and mountains, covering a total area of about 10 million square kilometers.
Nanoxa introduced the site to Giotto: "That is 63822 Star City. Their primary business is the flesh trade. However, beyond the conventional variety, they offer another type, culinary."
There are always those with twisted enough hearts to want a taste of the forbidden.
Looking at the ostensibly beautiful Star City, Giotto felt a wave of revulsion. He felt an almost frantic urge to wipe it from existence.
"Don't bother getting close. Just obliterate it."
"Star Nation 28783 isn't large. If we move on to the other systems immediately, will word of this leak out?"
When Nanoxa heard the order to obliterate the city, a faint, dark glint flickered in the depths of his eyes.
He answered Giotto: "It won't. Star Nation 28783 rarely utilizes Tachyon communication equipment. It's unnecessary; no one here conducts business that spans across sectors."
This was even more unexpected.
"Then how did this place ever become a Nation?"
Giotto was genuinely curious.
"Because in its earliest days, it was a normal Star Nation. No nation starts out this way."
Star Nation 28783 once had a glorious history, well, perhaps not exactly 'glorious.' It grew from humble beginnings over six thousand years, but the monarch lacked business acumen, and after its expansion, the entire nation slowly spiraled into decadence.
Power struggles followed.
The king was even assassinated.
The nation crumbled rapidly.
However, because its interior was so small and posed no threat, and because it sat in the central hub of the Lican Sector, no other nation was willing to let a rival seize it. Thus, Star Nation 28783 was allowed to persist.
The warship's main battery charged rapidly.
BOOM! A single blast from the main gun swept through the entire Star City.
From Giotto's perspective, it was merely the destruction of a site.
But within the Star City, hundreds of millions reached the end of their lives in an instant, reduced to ash before they could even process what was happening.
Death was just that simple and natural.
In this era, human life was the cheapest commodity, impossibly fragile.
The fleet bypassed the debris of the Star City and moved toward the sun's surface.
The support ships held position approximately 1 AU from the star, maintaining an orbital flight path.
The warships, meanwhile, decelerated slowly toward the stellar surface to begin energy siphon.
Brilliant ions battered the warships' hulls, and internal climate controls spiked several times over.
The siphoning process was incredibly fast.
Soon, the warships reached 100% saturation, but they didn't stop.
Instead, they began transmitting excess energy remotely to the support ships.
The Tier 2 fleet remained there for five years.
The entire fleet replenished approximately 70% of its energy reserves.
Leaving the stellar surface, the warships began to accelerate, and the support ships pivoted to head out of the star system.
Once they had attained full speed, the support ships began siphoning energy back to the warships. This allowed the warships to perform a second acceleration to match the speed of the support vessels. At this stage, the fleet's total energy stood at 57%.
This was a far cry from the aftermath of the previous two major engagements, where they had been left with less than 10%.
The reason they hadn't pushed for 100% was simply that it was impossible to maintain.
Whether a warship or a support vessel, energy storage units are divided into Primary and Secondary tiers.
The Primary Storage Unit is located at the very stern of a warship, powering the acceleration engines. Because these engines require massive, high-wattage outputs, the Primary unit is inherently unstable and prone to energy leakage.
It's like leaving a phone powered off; you start at 100%, but when you turn it on a month later, it might be at 50% or less.
Primary units are charged just before a warship departs from a Starport; they are never kept at full capacity inside a ship for more than a year, as they lack energy-binding modules.
Whether for a support vessel or a warship, the maximum sustainable operational energy is 70%.
Of course, achieving full acceleration usually consumes over 80% of a ship's total energy, which is then slowly replenished during transit.
For example, at the end of the Yanli Independence Star Nation conflict, the fleet's energy was down to 4%; by the time they reached this sector, it had climbed to 8%, thanks to dark energy collectors.
Collecting 4% over 90 years is meager, which is why stellar replenishment is necessary.
With recharging complete, the Tier 2 fleet moved on to the other systems in Star Nation 28783.
Nanoxa detailed the primary commercial activities of each system.
Every single one was a sinkhole of depravity.
And the customers who frequented these places were even more criminal.
Ultimately, these commercial ventures were a buyer's market; without demand, there would be no supply. Sometimes the buyer is more loathsome than the seller.
Whether to eliminate the Glolo threat, champion so-called justice, or simply vent the fleet's frustration, Star Nation 28783 had to perish.
Star Cities were demolished; ships were vaporized.
In just over 70 years, Giotto wiped out Star Nation 28783.
With a well-planned route, the actual travel distance wasn't that daunting.
Theoretically, being closer to the galactic fringe where stellar density is low, stars are spaced 5 to 6 light-years apart; visiting 25 stars should have taken hundreds of years.
But in reality, these stars weren't that distant.
Even a minor star nation possesses Type 2.3 technology, the peak of the Human Civilization when it faced the Olive Branch.
Moving stars to new positions is a relatively simple task.
The stars in Star Nation 28783 were spaced only 1 to 2 light-years apart.
Even the current Federation prefers to drag peripheral stars into their sectors rather than expanding the sector's boundaries.
This has become a standard engineering phenomenon within the Human Civilization; if a nation can't do it themselves, there are specialized corporations that handle such contracts.
...
Within the Tier 2 fleet.
Aboard the flagship.
Giotto glanced at the star chart.
"Adjust the fleet's heading. Proceed to the terminus of Tar and Mai, the Suso-West Route."
Star Nation 28783 was gone. Giotto intended to continue toward the neighboring Oraned Federation Star Nation.
This was a star nation even more massive than the Yanli Independence Star Nation, possessing 211 star systems in total, quite large for a low-tier mid-state.
"We've burned quite a bit of time. I wonder if the war with the Glolo Star Nation has already broken out?"
Dudley asked with an air of anticipation; he didn't grasp the true timing of warfare.
Giotto did.
At this stage, the first shots likely hadn't been fired.
The Tier 1 fleet's journey to the Abandnda Sector spanned 206 light-years, but that only reached the sector's edge, the border of the Glolo Star Nation.
Luna's objective, however, wasn't to strike from the border. She intended to penetrate deep into Glolo territory, requiring another hundred-odd light-years of travel. The total journey exceeded 320 light-years.
"Don't get your hopes up. If the war starts over there, it won't be what you think. The fleets here will lose their footing."
"They'll act faster, more recklessly. And then we'll be in trouble."
"So we need to eliminate as many enemies as possible before the war breaks out there."
Dudley's face fell instantly.
He had indeed harbored those very thoughts.
But he quickly recovered his composure and reported to Giotto: "The Oraned Federation is the largest among the numerous low-mid star nations in the Lican Sector."
"According to our intelligence assets, the Glolo Star Nation values this place highly. Their primary base is on the nation's border, 22 light-years from our current position."
The distance was relatively short.
"In terms of military strength, the confirmed ship count is around 80,000. The number of warships is unknown, but it's predicted to be no fewer than the fleet we encountered at the Yanli Independence Star Nation, possibly even more."
"An offensive would likely require a slow, methodical strategy."
"Based on the latest intelligence, the Oraned Federation Star Nation is relatively stable internally. Perhaps we can leverage the Oraned Federation to counter the Glolo Star Nation."
"The Oraned Federation Star Nation is vast. If they can be mobilized, it would save us a great deal of trouble."
"However, being a federation-style Star Nation, reaching an internal consensus is difficult."
"Once we arrive at the Oraned Federation Star Nation, establish a channel for me to speak with their leadership. We'll decide on the next step after formal negotiations."
Actually, Rusty had initiated talks with the Oraned Federation long before the journey began, and the process had been smooth.
But nearly 300 years had passed; variables were bound to have emerged, and the finer details needed to be fleshed out.
The Tier 2 fleet approached Tar and Mai.