Global Crossing: Empire of Stars, Section 27

Whoosh~

A light suddenly flared in the darkness, then vanished in an instant.

It had come from an immense distance, carrying a powerful surge of energy. It was an Energy Light Spear, the main cannon of a Battleship.

Lin Zhichen was startled and immediately went on alert.

A flash of light from so far away meant this area was already a battlefield. He just didn't know who the combatants were.

He couldn't help thinking of the enormous fleet they had encountered along the way.

The Qinyuan cautiously drew closer. As the distance narrowed, more and more lights became visible to the naked eye.

After all, this was space. A beam of light visible to the naked eye had a localized energy intensity no weaker than the sun's radiance.

And now, hundreds upon hundreds of beams crisscrossed the void!

"My god, that's spectacular!" Link's jaw dropped. No matter how magnificent a fleet battle looked in the Virtual World, it was nothing like witnessing one in person. And beyond that, the beams of terrifying energy he sensed through his Psionics filled him with genuine dread.

As they drew closer, they saw more and more. They didn't even need the gravitation sensors; the naked eye could see stars abruptly flare into brilliance, then quickly go dark.

They were the last glimmers of exploding starships.

Lin Zhichen's Psionic perception worked at full capacity, absorbing information from the battlefield. He remained silent for a long time.

The surging energy constantly disturbed this region of space-time. Compared to the universe, it was insignificant, but compared to an individual, it was as vast as a river of stars.

The Qinyuan was only a Frigate. Even as a Psionic Warship, in a battlefield of this scale it was like a skiff caught in a storm, in danger of capsizing at the slightest lapse.

"There are at least a hundred thousand warships fighting, including more than ten thousand capital ships the size of Battleships. If we count those without Light Spear-type energy weapons as their main cannons, there are even more." Lin Zhichen shook his head. Even he had no confidence he could escape a fleet battle on this scale.

"Big brother, we've been spotted!" Link warned him.

At the edge of the radar, hundreds of tiny dots were closing in at high speed. According to the radar, they were already moving at more than one kilometer per second—far faster than a Frigate.

"Space Fighters." Lin Zhichen understood. "There must be a carrier nearby."

"Big brother, what do we do?" Link asked.

"There must be a full fleet near the carrier. Let's take a look somewhere else first."

The Qinyuan wasn't equipped to fight a carrier. Its three small turrets were all fitted with Electromagnetic Cannons, well suited to fighting warships, but far too weak against fighters. The crew's Master Tier gunnery could certainly hit them, but the slow firing rate would make the fight a painful one.

The Qinyuan traced an arc through space and vanished in an instant. With a top speed of fifty percent of the speed of light, shaking off the enemy was easy.

After several probes, Lin Zhichen soon figured out who the main players in the battle were.

"It's a war between the Pirate and Rebel Army factions. Looks like they're fighting over control of this system." Link curled his lip. "This is already one of the most common spectacles in space."

NPC fleets spawned in a system would fight for control of it early on, according to their respective factions, turning the entire system into territory belonging to either the Pirates or the Rebel Army.

Once a victor emerged, any Monster fleets that spawned afterward would belong to the winning faction.

But that wasn't the end. After the Pirates or Rebel Army came their various bases, each controlled by a different NPC leader. They fought among themselves, too. Once they had wiped out their common enemy, they would go to war again to seize supreme power, until a Pirate King or Rebel Marshal emerged.

It seemed they were still in the first phase.

"If that's the case, we might have an opportunity. It'll take them a while to decide the victor, so they won't have the time to Encircle and Suppress us." Link made a suggestion. "We should take a look at the Asteroid Belt in this system. The terrain there is more complicated, so we should be safe for a while."

"That's an option, but first we need to check the orbits of the planets in this system." Lin Zhichen nodded.

That was the most urgent thing. They needed to understand the broader situation before deciding where to begin.

Carefully skirting the battlefield and the Reinforcement fleets spread throughout the system, the Qinyuan swam through space like a fish.

Exploring a system wasn't difficult. They only needed to use a space telescope from a great distance to determine the positions and types of the planets.

But this wasn't an uninhabited region. NPC Monster fleets and lairs were scattered throughout the New Universe's star systems.

At a distance of roughly two light-seconds from a planet, large numbers of warships patrolled space. If a battle broke out somewhere, warships from nearby areas would soon gather there. The entire expanse of space was like an impenetrable curtain, keeping everything at a distance.

Fortunately, the Qinyuan wasn't an ordinary warship. It could always force its way close to a planet before the Reinforcement fleets arrived, completing a basic scan.

Only after twenty days did this unpleasant survey finally come to an end. At least half the time had been spent fleeing Monster fleets. They had been forced to sink hundreds of warships, but never had time to collect the spoils before the Monster reinforcements arrived and chased them all over space.

"We've confirmed that the Dakan System has six terrestrial planets and three asteroids serving as moons. They're moons of Dakan...," Link said, looking at the completed system map and checking the NPC Monster Bases they had discovered along the way.

According to the naming conventions used by the major civilizations of the New Universe's Milky Way Galaxy, once a system's name was determined, its star became the center, and the planets were numbered outward along their orbits. The planet closest to the star was Dakan, and the second was Dakan.

If there were asteroids, they were named after the planet they orbited. The nearest moon was Dakan a, the next Dakan b, and so on.

According to their scans, the innermost Dakan, Dakan a, was directly exposed to the star. High-temperature lava covered the planet, making it impossible for anyone to live there. Naturally, there were very few Monster Bases in that orbit. Their scans had found only a small Pirate spaceport on the side of Dakan a facing away from the star.

It was the same sort of thing as a Space Base in orbit above Earth. But because Earth was a Habitable Planet, its spaceports were mostly commercial ports, with thriving freight and passenger traffic.

This Pirate spaceport, on the other hand, was primarily military. Not only was it much more heavily defended than a commercial port, it also had a Small Shipyard where warships could dock for regular maintenance and repairs.

Dakan was a toxic planet, its surface shrouded in poisonous gas. Any life-form that entered would soon die of poisoning.

No Pirate Base had spawned on the planet itself, and there wasn't even a Space Station in orbit. Perhaps there had been one, but it had been destroyed in the previous battle.

In fact, a spaceport directly exposed in orbit was much more likely to become an enemy target.

Dakan was a barren planet, with Pirate Bases scattered throughout its orbit. It was the Pirate faction's stronghold. There were even numerous bases in the orbit of its moon, Dakan a, occupying almost all the available orbital space.

Dakan was a gas giant. It also had Dakan a, a frozen asteroid, as a moon. This was the Rebel Army's stronghold, and the Rebel Bases packed its orbit so tightly that they almost blocked out the entire planet.

With these two planets as the source of the conflict, the Pirate and Rebel Army factions fought a large-scale decisive battle in the Asteroid Belt between Dakan and Dakan roughly once a year!

"This system is fascinating. Dakan and Dakan's orbits bring them closest to each other about once a year. That's usually when the two sides' great battle begins!"

Link clicked his tongue in admiration. "The Asteroid Belt is the heart of the battlefield, but fighting can break out anywhere in the system. After all these years, both sides have grown to their limits, yet they've remained in balance. Neither has ever truly won."

"You're overlooking one key point: Raidor Fortress is keeping an eye on the entire system the whole time." Lin Zhichen smiled. After their survey, the situation across the entire system had become clear.

If Raidor Fortress were completely unaware of what was happening in the Dakan System, they would be underestimating General Sigrid far too much. In fact, it was likely that she had orchestrated the two factions' long-standing hostility in the system.

As an excellent Fortress Commander, she needed methods like these. Without them, Raidor Fortress probably couldn't have remained so peaceful for so long.

"Big brother, where should we build a base?" Link studied the system map, then mused, "The Asteroid Belt between Dakan and Dakan?

"It's well hidden, and it's also where the Pirate and Rebel territories overlap. They've been fighting there for years, so it's chaotic enough."

"What do you think of Dakan?" Lin Zhichen mused, not answering directly.

"Dakan?" Link froze for a moment. Then he noticed Dakan a orbiting Dakan and immediately understood. "You mean attacking the Pirate Base there directly? It's well hidden, but wouldn't that put the Pirate faction on alert?"

Monster NPCs had certain traits that set them apart from ordinary Intelligent Life. For example, no matter how fiercely they fought each other, they were remarkably united when it came to dealing with Intelligent Life: they would join forces to drive out any Natural Person.

According to information on StarNet, some factions had tried to develop quietly and then wipe out both sides in one decisive strike. But the results had always been less than ideal.

"That's not the same. If you take a close look at how those factions developed, you'll see that at first they weren't subjected to a full-scale assault by either side. They faced only small-scale harassment. But as they continued to grow and encroach on the territories of both factions, that was when the two sides launched a full-scale Encirclement and Suppression."

Lin Zhichen stroked his chin with a smile. "We're setting up a base here for the sake of secrecy and peace and quiet. Do you think we're really going to carve out territory right under Raidor Fortress's nose?"

Link nodded. If that was the plan, it was certainly possible.

At the very least, establishing a foothold on Dakan meant they wouldn't have to worry about the major powers inside the Federation making a grand show of attacking them. The Pirates and the Rebel Army would be the first obstacles they'd have to get past.

"Come on, let's take a look at Dakan first." Lin Zhichen did what he'd decided to do and swiftly turned the Psionic Warship Qinyuan around, heading toward the inner system.

After shaking off four or five pursuing Monster fleets, they drew ever closer to the star. Through the porthole, a blazing sun loomed nearer, its intense light illuminating the entire Qinyuan.

"B-big brother, slow down! Don't go crashing into it!" Link felt the pull of gravity growing stronger and the light growing brighter, and couldn't help feeling panicked.

It was a pressure that weighed on him mentally. As the sense of danger drew closer, it was like a blazing sun appearing in his Mind World, making him tremble.

"You really did advance too quickly. Your cultivation hasn't stabilized yet." Lin Zhichen smiled. The Qinyuan traced an arc through space, circling the star. Soon, a distant lava planet came into view.

Because it was so close to the star, the planet looked bright red from afar. Its surface was covered in boiling magma.

A much smaller dwarf planet revolved around Dakan. Against the backdrop of the sun, the two red planets were almost invisible.

The closer they got, the clearer Dakan became. Some dark shapes appeared in the background, still too distant to make out.

Lin Zhichen knew they were Space Bases orbiting the planet.

"Not good!" His sense of danger suddenly intensified, like a man-eating beast had fixed its gaze on him. A shudder ran through his entire body like an electric shock.

Fortunately, he had never let down his guard. The instant he sensed danger, he changed course with a thought and drove the Qinyuan into Sublight speed in barely a second, sending it arcing through space.

A second later, a hundred or so beams of varying sizes cut through space, completely enveloping the spot where the Qinyuan had been.

"Whew..." Link let out a deep breath. Only then did he relax. For that brief moment, he had sensed the breath of death.

"That was quick." Lin Zhichen sighed. He had already seen a huge swarm of Pirate warships pouring out from the two lava planets and charging toward the Qinyuan.

"Big brother, there are Space Fighters!" Link warned him.

Now, in the light of the star, hundreds of tiny dots appeared in space: sunlight reflecting off the fighters' metal hulls.

"There are Battleships, too." Lin Zhichen maneuvered the warship into another drift, tracing an arc as several Light Spears cut through space and vanished into the darkness.

"There are probably more than a thousand warships. They have Battleships and carriers, a full complement of warships, and plenty of firepower."

He quickly got a rough idea of the Pirate fleet. The Qinyuan traced an arc, accelerating to fifty percent of the speed of light in an instant, then abruptly slowing to one times the speed of light three seconds later.

In those three seconds, it crossed hundreds of thousands of kilometers, breaking through to the rear flank of the Pirate fleet.

After using radar to calculate the distance, they launched a Sublight Assault, reaching a key position in an instant and striking.