Yu Lian had always felt that Teacher Yang often seemed more like a literary man. So even though he was a pragmatic practitioner of magic, he insisted on giving himself a veneer of procedural justice that was as natural as the day he was born. He was becoming more and more precious about things.
But to give credit where it was due, when it came to serious matters, he was still very much a soldier. After a brief exchange of insults and consolations, he got straight to the point.
"On January 20, we spoke with the Lone Ranger after passing through the Jingeu system. Lieutenant Piri told me that moving toward the vicinity of the Dawn Boulevard-37 system might lead us to a breakthrough," Yang Xiyi explained.
At this point, although it would still take some time for Yang's fleet to reach the star gate's gravitational range, the communications delay between them was already almost imperceptible.
The so-called Dawn Boulevard was the main route through the Dawn Nebula. It connected the Ring of Miracles, the Commonwealth-controlled systems of Yaochi, Dawn, and Onotia, all the systems the Empire had colonized in its early years, and finally extended all the way to Unity Fortress.
According to the plans everyone had drawn up during their cheerful meetings, every system along this route would have high-power gravitational-wave relay beacons, supply stations, and garrisoned patrol posts. But of course, those had all been hopes for the time before the war broke out.
As for the DL361 system, home to the Eighth Star Gate, it was still four jumps away, and more than thirty light-years in physical distance. Even so, Earth's gravitational-wave beacons had already been set up there.
If they were lucky, Yang's fleet should receive the latest signal and make its way step by