On June 20, 835 of the Commonwealth Calendar, above New Tennessee, the largest agricultural planet in this distant star region, the orbit that had once been crowded with weather-control satellites and orbital hydroponic farms was now filled with violent, searing energy residue.
This was energy that could eat people alive.
The wreckage of warships and fragments of agricultural space stations were drawn by the green planet's gravity, drifting through orbit and forming a cosmic-age mountain of corpses and bones.
A certain Marshal Yu, still wandering through the Abyss Nebula, had made a misjudgment. He had originally thought that the first major battle after the Emperor's fall would be fought in the chokepoint system at Shanhai Pass.
If not at Juyong Fort, then somewhere nearby.
But in the end, it had taken place in the New Tennessee system, more than two hundred light-years from the Shanhai Corridor—and over three days earlier than he had estimated.
The smoke of battle had yet to fully clear.
The orbital space station that represented the Empire's rule over the system had been blasted apart by its own guns, reduced to oversized space junk.
The turret arrays that had once formed a defensive fire net in the near orbit of the primary planet, New Tennessee III, had become wreckage, still drifting slowly. But flashes could still be seen here and there on the green planet's surface: fighting was still underway below.
In fact, the Blue Star Commonwealth's ground forces had already landed there.
As for the Imperial fleet that should have been protecting the skies above the planet, King Soren's fleet was now in space beyond the reach of the planet's gravity. They certainly had not routed; they were retreating while fighting, and all their warships still moved with astonishing discipline.
But whatever the case, the