While Nie Yun was gleefully poaching talent from the Locke Conglomerate, Kloros, far away on the other side of the wormhole, found himself caught in a bind...
"Sir, Lord Kinlock has issued his twelfth mandatory order. We must return to reinforce him immediately." The adjutant looked at Kloros with a troubled expression.
Kloros's face darkened until it looked ready to drip.
Damn it! Where exactly did my plans go wrong?
How... did everything end up like this?
Kloros's earlier fears had come true. After Gold Coin and the Kalon Pirate Gang were wiped out, the pirates of the Shattered Star Region had indeed broken free of his carefully designed cage and become the sole wild card on that battlefield!
Now, the pirates had begun plundering throughout the Locke Conglomerate's territory.
Black Sail, the Madmen, Red Dragon, and the Dragon Cavalry had nearly two thousand warships between them. Attacking from four directions, they tore straight through the Locke Conglomerate's woefully thin defenses.
The pirates had been somewhat cautious at first, but once they discovered that the Locke Conglomerate's territory really was guarded by only a handful of second-line fleets, their first taste of success immediately emboldened them!
They even began splitting their forces to rampage across the territory, attacking two or even three locations at once to speed up their plundering.
Across the Locke Conglomerate's territory, planets fell and cities burned!
In just a few days, all of the Locke Conglomerate's outlying star systems had fallen. The pirates were even showing signs of pushing into its heartland!
Although the Empire's Civilian Massacre Prohibition Order kept the pirates from slaughtering indiscriminately for fear of military retaliation, it did nothing to stop vast quantities of supplies and wealth within the Locke Conglomerate's territory from becoming their spoils.
The moment Kinlock regained consciousness after