Chapter Summaries

Tang Xiao reviewed Operation Zero, a plan to draw Imperial forces toward Fondor before striking Coruscant and killing Palpatine. The strategy depended on weakening the Imperial fleet and exploiting its need to reclaim lost markets, but its first major problem was that the Kingdom of Dawn had only one Novalith Cannon.

• Tang Xiao reviewed Operation Zero’s three objectives: wear down Imperial fleets, pull defenders from Coruscant, and raid the capital through The Nexus Route.
• Sefrans Tann advanced through the Outer Rim toward the Imperial 12th Legion while Lieutenant General Tom Vance and General C attacked the 13th Army; General Grievous attacked Mimban as a base for an assault on Kashyyyk.
• Tang Xiao’s plan relied on the Empire’s noble-controlled corporations pressuring Palpatine to reclaim the Outer Rim and Mid Rim markets, forcing Imperial fleets into battles where Sefrans Tann could divide and destroy them.
• After drawing the Empire’s attention to Fondor, Sefrans Tann would join Tang Xiao and use The Nexus Route instead of the Stargates to strike Coruscant.
• Tang Xiao identified the first problem with the plan: the Kingdom of Dawn had only one Novalith Cannon.

Tang Xiao weighed whether to postpone Operation Zero as the delayed assault on Klatooine and a single Novalith Cannon left Fondor Planet under mounting Imperial pressure. He was then confronted by an unexpected visitor: Master Luminara Unduli.

• Tang Xiao reviewed Ling Liang’s report that only the Hoth Novalith Cannon was ready, leaving the bombardment of Fondor Planet weaker than planned as Darth Vader gathered an Imperial fleet there.
• Ling Liang warned that Sefrans-Tann’s campaign was behind schedule and urged pressure on other fronts to keep the Empire from concentrating its forces.
• Tang Xiao ordered Helmut Zemo to convene a Supreme Military Council to consider recalling Sefrans-Tann’s Second Task Force and postponing Operation Zero.
• Glosse Shelbia reported that an unusual visitor had come to see her and deferred the matter to Tang Xiao.
• Luminara Unduli appeared on the hologram, and Tang Xiao recognized the elderly visitor from their encounters during the Clone Wars.

Luminara Unduli visited Darth Malthael to warn him about Darth Sidious and offer a partnership centered on rebuilding the Jedi Temple on Ilum. She proposed that the Jedi teach younglings there, with some graduates allowed to serve on Dawn Star Planet if Malthael provided the rebuilding resources and did not lead them into darkness.

• Darth Malthael prepared to have Luminara Unduli killed after she appeared in Glosse Shelbia's office, but she said she had come to save him.
• Luminara warned Malthael that Darth Sidious posed a threat, prompting him to hear her out.
• Luminara revealed that the Jedi had concealed Ilum's coordinates and confirmed that Malthael's search for the planet was on the right track.
• Luminara proposed rebuilding the Jedi Temple on Ilum and opening classes focused mainly on non-combat training.
• Luminara offered to let graduates serve on Dawn Star Planet if Malthael did not lure them into darkness, then demanded that he provide the resources to rebuild Ilum.

Darth Malthael agreed to Luminara Unduli’s request for support in rebuilding the Jedi Temple on Ilum, but her warning made him realize he had misunderstood Darth Sidious’s priorities. He searched forbidden manuscripts for answers and began to fear that the Galactic Empire’s defeat might actually benefit Sidious.

• Darth Malthael agreed to provide the New Jedi Order with what it needed to rebuild its Temple on Ilum.
• Luminara Unduli warned Darth Malthael that Sidious was a Sith Lord before he was Emperor and promised the Jedi would help resist the Empire’s Northern Territory attack this time.
• After ending the transmission, Darth Malthael panicked, rushed to his Dark Altar, and searched forbidden manuscripts.
• Darth Malthael realized that he had treated Sidious as an emperor whose fate depended on the Galactic Empire.
• Darth Malthael began to suspect that the Empire’s defeat could free Sidious from the constraints imposed by powerful noble families.

Darth Malthael suspected Darth Sidious was deliberately destabilizing the Force to trigger a Force Storm and become the only surviving Sith. He entered seclusion to seek a way to kill Darth Sidious before the fleet attacked Coruscant in one year.

• Darth Malthael searched Darth Pregas and Darth Tenebrus’s writings and found a theory that extreme imbalance in the Force could cause a catastrophic Force Storm.
• Darth Malthael connected Darth Sidious’s exploitation and the deaths of billions to the possibility that he was deliberately provoking a Force Storm to become a One-Man Sith.
• Darth Malthael sent Helmut Zemo and Ling Liang a message telling them not to awaken him before the fleet attacked Coruscant.
• Darth Malthael destroyed his communicator and entered seclusion to study the Dark Side and death, vowing to kill Darth Sidious in one year.

Admiral Gillard-Perine’s Imperial fleet defeated the Geth at Dorin Planet and destroyed the factories that had turned the world into a killing ground. He then led his forces toward Glee Anselm, aiming to threaten the Malarian Alliance’s heart at Ansion Planet and open a route to reinforce Thrawn.

• Gillard-Perine sent 150 Imperial-class Star Destroyers into the Dorin system, where they destroyed more than 110 Geth Dreadnoughts and hundreds of smaller ships over two days.
• Gillard-Perine brought in the main fleet, and the Geth retreated from Dorin Planet.
• After scanning the ruined planet and seeing its factories and Corpse Puppets, Gillard-Perine ordered the fleet to bombard and destroy the Geth installations.
• Gillard-Perine left several dozen Victory II-class Star Destroyers to continue bombarding Dorin Planet and led the main fleet toward Glee Anselm.
• Gillard-Perine’s plan targeted the Malarian Alliance because its location limited Admiral Mar Tuuk’s ability to support it and could give the Empire a route to reinforce Lieutenant General Thrawn.

Admiral Gillard Perine seized control of Glee Anselm Planet after its governor surrendered, then interrogated her about the Malarian Alliance and the Geth. When his advance force tried to clear the hyperspace route to Ansion, it sent a distress signal.

• Gillard Perine arrived at Glee Anselm, where Governor Darsana surrendered without resistance.
• Furious at the planet’s survival amid the Geth’s destruction of Dorin, Gillard accused Darsana of colluding with the Geth and threatened to bombard the planet.
• Gillard ordered Darsana and senior planetary officials to board his ship, arrested them, and questioned them about Ansion’s defenses and the Geth fleet.
• Darsana reported that the Malarian Alliance had its own fleet and had blocked the hyperspace route with Interdictors, while she knew nothing of recent Geth movements.
• Gillard sent an advance force to clear the route, and on September 20 it transmitted a distress signal.

Admiral Gillard-Perine suspected the Geth distress call was a trap and sent the Imperial fleet through two seasonal hyperspace routes instead. His Fleet A was forced out of hyperspace by Interdictors and found itself facing a thousand Geth warships.

• Gillard-Perine refused to send reinforcements to the advance force, believing the Geth had faked its distress signal.
• Gillard-Perine ordered the fleet to split into two groups and advance through the seasonal routes, with all warships sent directly rather than using another advance force.
• Fleet A entered a seasonal route with Gillard-Perine aboard the Leveler, but an Interdictor forced the fleet out of hyperspace.
• Gillard-Perine ordered the ships into combat, and the radar officer confirmed that one thousand Geth warships were present.

Gillard Perine led the Imperial fleet against 1,000 Geth warships ambushing them along a hyperspace route. His Perine Ring formation held firm despite the enemy’s overwhelming numbers, and the battle continued as reinforcements joined the fight.

• Gillard Perine realized the Geth had likely positioned fleets along all eight hyperspace routes, suggesting at least 8,000 warships lay in ambush.
• The Geth attacked with 1,000 warships, and the Imperial fleet answered with powerful Turbolaser fire that destroyed more than a dozen Geth frigates.
• Gillard Perine formed the Imperial-class Star Destroyers into the Perine Ring, protecting their engines and placing fighters inside the formation to intercept attackers.
• Imperial reinforcements joined the expanding formation as TIE fighters and bombers fought Geth warships across the battlefield.
• Imperial Turbolaser fire breached a Geth Dreadnought’s shields, allowing TIE bombers to destroy it with Proton Torpedoes.

Gillard Perine's fleet fought a decisive battle against a massive Geth force across three battlefields, inflicting heavy losses before the Geth withdrew. Convinced the victory gave the Empire a chance to press its attack, Gillard ordered three days of rest and resupply at Gler-Anselm Planet, unaware that Admiral Mal-Tuk's fleet was turning back.

• Geth reinforcements brought their force to nearly 10,000 warships and clashed with Gillard Perine's fleets on two hyperspace routes and at Gler-Anselm Planet.
• Gillard Perine's forces formed Peren Rings and fought the Geth for seventeen hours, destroying more than 3,000 enemy ships while losing seventy capital ships and over 200 smaller vessels.
• Gillard Perine worried that the Geth could field similarly large fleets elsewhere and considered whether to retreat or continue toward Ansion Planet.
• Fleet officers urged Gillard Perine to pursue the victory, arguing that the Geth fleet had been crippled and Ansion Planet would likely offer little resistance.
• Gillard Perine ordered his fleet to return to Gler-Anselm Planet for three days of rest and resupply, while Admiral Mal-Tuk's fleet turned back.

Admiral Gillard Perine launched an attack on Ansion Planet, aiming to capture the Malarian Alliance’s strategic center before Admiral Mar Tuuk could reinforce it. After a day of brutal fighting, the Imperial fleet had nearly overwhelmed Ansion’s defenders when sensors detected massive hyperspace-jump fluctuations.

• Gillard Perine judged that Mar Tuuk would need at least seven days to reach Ansion, so he placed defenses along the route and planned to seize the planet first.
• On September 23, Perine divided his fleet into eight formations and sent them toward Ansion Planet; the first formation arrived the next day and found the planet shielded and defended by Alliance and Geth warships.
• The Imperial fleet attacked, while the Alliance defenders fought fiercely and the Geth fleet tried to outflank the Imperial Star Destroyers and strike their vulnerable rear sections.
• After four hours of battle, Perine believed his fleet would win and demanded Ansion surrender, but the planet refused.
• After another day of fighting left Ansion’s defense fleet near collapse, a radar officer reported massive hyperspace-jump fluctuations to Perine.

Admiral Gillard Perine discovered that Mal Tuuk’s Commerce Guild Fleet had arrived behind Ansion Planet and launched an immediate attack on the Imperial fleet. Mal Tuuk ordered his forces to strike before the Imperials could regroup and told the Geth to flank them from behind.

• Gillard Perine detected massive hyperspace fluctuations behind Ansion Planet and ordered his fleets to halt and turn toward the new threat.
• Mal Tuuk’s Commerce Guild Fleet emerged behind Ansion Planet, with the Endless-class Super Carrier Neimoidia leading its arriving forces.
• Gillard Perine identified Mal Tuuk’s fleet and was stunned that it had arrived from a direction he believed was a dead end.
• Mal Tuuk ordered the Commerce Guild Fleet to attack immediately and directed the Geth to flank the Imperial-class Star Destroyers from behind.

The Commerce Guild Fleet attacked the Imperial fleet under Mal-Tuk’s command, and Gillard Perine discovered that its cruisers gave it far more firepower than its capital-ship count suggested. The battle continued as the Imperial commander faced a fleet full of unfamiliar warship designs.

• Mal-Tuk ordered the Commerce Guild Fleet to attack before its reinforcements arrived, while Geth and Malarian Alliance forces maneuvered around the Imperial flanks.
• Gillard Perine ordered a probing engagement and sent the Light Cruiser Squadron back to counter the Geth ships, avoiding the inflexible Peren Ring formation.
• Scans revealed the Commerce Guild Fleet had 200 Minotaur-class Heavy Cruisers, more than 1,000 Light Cruisers, and several other powerful cruiser designs.
• The Minotaur-class ships fired Yamato Cannons, battering the Imperial-class Star Destroyers’ Deflector Shields as the Commerce Guild Fleet attacked from four directions.
• Gillard Perine recognized the fleet’s unfamiliar scaled-down battlecruisers and exclaimed in alarm at the Separatists’ designs.

Admiral Gillard Perine recognized that Mal Tuk's upgraded Commerce Guild Fleet could match his Imperial force, and he ordered his ships toward open space while considering retreat. Mal Tuk halted his pursuit because his fleet could not risk heavy losses and its reinforcements were delayed, leaving Gillard to wonder whether the fleet was waiting for them.

• Gillard Perine saw that the scaled-down Kohl-class battlecruisers carried powerful new weapons and realized the Kingdom of Dawn was upgrading its warships.
• Gillard ordered his fleet to leave Ansion Planet's gravity well, accepting that he could not achieve his strategic objective.
• Mal Tuk considered pursuing the Imperial fleet but stopped when his tactical robot warned that his cruiser-heavy force could suffer substantial losses.
• Mal Tuk asked a Chiss Skywalker about reinforcements, and she reported that the Entanglement remained too chaotic for passage.
• Mal Tuk recalled his ships to Ansion Planet's gravity well and wondered how Gillard Perine would react to his deliberate show of weakness.
• Gillard learned that the Separatist fleet was not at Old Mantell and suspected Mal Tuk was waiting for reinforcements.

Admiral Gillard Perine withdrew to Glee Anselm Planet to refit after fighting the Separatists, then faced Mar Tuuk’s full fleet when it arrived. The two forces began a massive battle around the planet’s spaceport.

• Gillard Perine ordered the Imperial fleet to withdraw from Ansion Planet to Glee Anselm Planet and prepare for battle.
• The Imperial fleet seized Glee Anselm Planet’s spaceport, and Governor Darsana supplied the fleet with fuel, food, medicine, parts, and other resources.
• Mar Tuuk’s main fleet arrived with the Malarian Alliance defense fleet, bringing its capital ships to 250 and joining thousands of other warships.
• Mar Tuuk attacked in a Claw Formation while Gillard Perine formed a defense around the spaceport.
• The fleets clashed in a battle involving nearly ten thousand warships, engulfing Glee Anselm Planet’s surrounding space in explosions and wreckage.

Admiral Mar-Tuk sent the Commerce Guild Fleet’s massed forces against the Imperial fleet, while the Kingdom of Dawn’s unconventional ship composition shaped the assault. As Gillard Perine struggled to contain the charging cruisers, Gler-Anselm activated its defenses and explosions erupted inside Imperial Star Destroyers, leaving the battle suddenly transformed.

• Admiral Mar-Tuk deployed the Commerce Guild Fleet in a four-pronged Claw Formation, using Undertaker-class Light Cruisers as the vanguard and other ships for missile and support fire.
• Ling Liang had previously rebuked Nute Gunray and San Hill for building excessive numbers of Undertaker-class and Osprey-class ships, then sent experts to oversee the development of newer destroyers and modifications.
• The Undertaker-class cruisers charged through heavy Imperial fire, while Gillard Perine ordered his Light Cruisers forward to block them and protect the Imperial formation.
• Gler-Anselm activated its Planetary Shield, and its orbital and spaceport defenses opened fire on the Imperial warships.
• Transport ships that had delivered supplies from Gler-Anselm self-destructed inside the hangar platforms of Imperial-class Star Destroyers, causing violent explosions.

Glee Anselm’s governor, Darsana, revealed that her surrender had been a trap, briefly disrupting the Imperial fleet before Gillard Perine restored order. The Imperial fleet resumed fighting the Separatists, but more than fifteen hundred Undertaker-class Light Cruisers had reached its formation, leaving the battle in a dire state.

• Darsana’s sabotage damaged two Imperial warships and threw the fleet into confusion, giving Admiral Mar Tuuk an opening to order his forces to charge.
• Gillard Perine confronted Darsana, who said she had risked everything to resist the Galactic Empire’s discrimination and exploitation of the Nautolans.
• After Darsana was knocked unconscious, Gillard Perine ordered her imprisoned for trial and directed the fleet to ignore Glee Anselm and focus on the Separatists.
• Gillard Perine’s ships destroyed more than four hundred Undertaker-class Light Cruisers, but over fifteen hundred reached the Imperial formation and their reinforced armor let them press the attack.

Admiral Mar Tuuk’s Reaper-class Light Cruisers disrupted the Imperial fleet with close-range fire and remote repairs, allowing the Commerce Guild Fleet to press its attack. Gillard Perine ordered a retreat, but the Geth fleet appeared behind the Imperials.

• Reaper-class Light Cruisers charged into the Imperial formation, using Nanobots to repair damaged ships and Ion Rapid-Fire Cannons to attack at close range.
• A group of ten Reaper-class ships breached a Victory II-class Star Destroyer’s shields, forcing its captain to withdraw.
• Admiral Mar Tuuk ordered the Reaper-class formations to keep charging and firing despite losses.
• Gillard Perine judged that continuing the battle would cause severe Imperial losses and ordered his ships to disengage and retreat.
• A radar operator reported that the Geth fleet had appeared behind the Imperial fleet.

The Geth fleet warped behind the Imperial fleet, turning the battle into a pincer attack and forcing Gillard Perine to order a retreat. Luminara Unduli and two Jedi prepared to strike the Empire alongside the Kingdom of Dawn and the Commerce Guild Fleet.

• Gillard Perine learned that more than 2,000 Geth warships had appeared behind the Imperial fleet and ordered his ships to turn and attack them.
• The Geth revealed that Luminara Unduli had guided their precise warp voyage aboard a specially prepared Dreadnought.
• Luminara Unduli accepted her fighter and ordered the Geth to follow the plan to destroy the Galactic Empire's fleet.
• Mal Tuck declared the Imperial fleet trapped and summoned two Jedi Knights to join the attack.
• The two Jedi told Mal Tuck they had already watched the battle, and he demanded that they prove their sincerity by acting.

Ferus-Olin and Jax Pavan launched with Viking fighters as the Commerce Guild Fleet began its final assault on the Galactic Empire’s fleet. The battle intensified on the front and rear as both sides fought to the death.

• Ferus-Olin and Jax Pavan confronted Mal-Tuk before leaving to prepare their fighters.
• The chapter recounted Ferus-Olin’s history of seeking revenge and Jax Pavan’s role in uncovering proof that Palpatine was Darth Sidious.
• Ferus-Olin and Jax Pavan launched their Eta-2 fighters from the Neimoidia alongside two squadrons of Viking fighters.
• Mal-Tuk provided the Jedi with support as Commerce Guild warships and Geth fighters joined the attack.
• Commerce Guild ships unleashed a layered assault on the Imperial fleet while Geth forces struck from behind.