It was an elegant, sleek ship, its platinum hull gleaming across the starry expanse with a hue more solemn and luxurious than silver. The light of the system's blue star fell across its smooth armor, lending it a profound, mysterious allure that brought to mind the mithril of myth and legend.
The ship appeared above a planet blanketed in toxic atmosphere and filthy swampland, as leisurely and graceful as a white swan. It must have spotted the ugly Leviathan bugs in near orbit, but paid them no heed, just as an elegant swan would not deign to acknowledge the mongrels by the lakeside.
This scene had already been captured in its entirety by the extraordinary eyes of Lady Now, down in the atmosphere.
That was the Qingqiu, built by the Poseidon Shipyard and one of the most famous luxury liners in the entire galaxy. Of course, anyone with eyes knew that for all its supposed status as a liner, it had never once been open to the public. It was plainly the flagship of Princess Rainbow Rose, Amida Berenkest. Those same people also knew that calling it a liner was misleading: it was more like a fully equipped, state-of-the-art research vessel, one that could even serve as a space laboratory.
But nobody had ever heard that this ship could cloak itself or fight!
Lady Now had dealt with the Alliance's true rulers plenty of times. The Serpent Around the World had also infiltrated its military and political leadership, as well as the Standard Shipping Association. Even so, this turn of events had caught her off guard.
She was a cautious Snakehead. She had planted surveillance devices near the gravity well and connected them to the orbital alarms via gravitational waves. If any third party's spacecraft arrived, she should have known