The Counterattack Begins Now

At the center of the White Star's broad bridge viewport hung a grim, ice-blue planet. Through its thin atmosphere, canyons crisscrossed the magnificent nitrogen-ice glaciers, while enormous impact craters covered every inch of its surface like characters in a history book spanning billions of years.

In this direction, the system's star was no more than a small, cold, dim point of light—a dwarf star. Here, Earth's sun was merely one of countless stars in the sky, not even among the brightest.

Compared with the vast, frigid depths of space, stars and planets were the rarest things of all, as precious as flowers in a desert.

Against that icy backdrop, a massive Imperial joint fleet stretched like a brightly lit ribbon between the two horizons of the planet, where pale-blue arcs flickered. Sixteen hundred imposing warships extended forward in ranks and columns, like intersecting points and lines on a chessboard.

The Purifier Protoss fleet lay on the far side of the planet. Millions of drones scattered around their mothership, Cybros, and the fleet, resembling a thin cloud of stardust glittering with bright orange light.

The argument among the Empire's most renowned commanders still rang in Augustus's ears. Yet at that moment, his heart was calmer than it had ever been.

Victory or defeat—the answer would come soon enough.

The outcome of a war depended only on whether you could crush your enemy completely and make sure they never got back up.

"I've said this many times already."

Horace Warfield wore an Imperial Navy general's uniform, with no medals or ribbons visible on it apart from the Imperial Fleet insignia.

When Augustus had first enlisted, Warfield had not yet had so much white in his hair. But he was still far from a feeble old man; beneath the sharp-cut uniform, his muscles