Blood Guard: It's All Mine

When the Star Origin arrived near the coordinates, the situation was far beyond Feng Xiao's expectations. There were no piles of pirates like he had imagined, nor was there any chaotic scene of countless pirates firing on one another.

On the contrary, the atmosphere was extremely oppressive.

Starships and warships from the major pirate factions had gathered together. Tens of thousands of conventional warships nearly filled the area within a radius of a hundred million kilometers.

Six powerful starships, each around thirty thousand meters long, stood out in particular, surrounded by more than a dozen main cannons of at least blue quality.

Star Dome-class starships!

But they weren't fighting one another at the moment. Instead, they were wary of another faction.

Feng Xiao and the others could clearly make out the insignia of Blood Guard Starport on their ships.

Four nearly identical Star Dome-class starships stood side by side, with more than a dozen Star-Land-class starships and a large number of elite-class starships lined up neatly behind them.

Although they had only two-thirds as many starships as the pirates, they put enormous pressure on them.

The Alliance Military's starships were equipped with top-notch resources and Star Weapons, and their upgrade paths were carefully coordinated by the General Staff and relevant departments.

In terms of combat power, they could easily overwhelm pirates who had cobbled together an assortment of Star Weapons. Even starships cultivated by major factions would be outmatched at least sixty percent of the time.

The higher the starship's class, the more pronounced the difference.

The six Star Dome-class starships belonging to the pirate factions could probably only hold their own against three Alliance Star Dome-class ships. Add even one more, and the word "hold their own" would become a joke.

The gap in conventional warships was even more obvious. The pirate side had tens of thousands of scattered ships, with a thousand different models and even their own modifications.

Blood Guard Starport's four fleets had more than twenty thousand warships in total. Their technology was advanced, their models standardized, and they were backed by four Small Battle Stars. They were superior in every respect.

At the center of the two forces, ten million kilometers apart, a purple curtain of light—larger even than a planet in diameter—was slowly expanding. It seemed not to have reached its limit yet.

"What do we do, Second-in-Command?

Forget Blood Guard's Star Dome-class starships. Even the four Small Battle Stars they brought could overpower us, couldn't they?"

Inside the largest and most powerful disc-shaped starship in the pirate fleet, a man in a suit looked gravely at the burly man ahead.

One of the standard features of a Small Battle Star was a medium-class planet-destroying cannon, powerful enough to easily tear through the shields of a newly advanced Star Dome-class starship.

Even for old hands like them, a single shot would probably wipe out at least sixty percent of their shields. If the enemy's conventional battleship formations then focused their fire on them, they would likely be left crippled.

For the pirates of the Blood Cloud Sector, that would be practically the same as death. Their strongest fighting force would be crippled, leaving them nothing but easy prey.

The burly man understood their situation, of course. He silently watched the Blood Guard forces in the distance, then fixed his eyes on the curtain of light, thinking over their options.

The three major pirate groups in the Blood Cloud Sector had all risen by relying on spatial worlds. The curtain of light before them was undoubtedly another spatial world.

If they could claim it, the Draenei Pirate Group would become the fourth major pirate group.

But...

Each of the four Blood Guard Starports could basically hold its own against any one of the three major pirate groups.

Though the force before them was no match for a Blood Guard Starport's main base, it was still beyond the fleet they had gathered to defeat.

"There's nothing we can do. We can only wait until the entrance to the spatial world has fully opened before deciding. If we act rashly, we'll suffer heavy losses." The burly man had thought it over, but he still couldn't bring himself to leave.

For a while, the atmosphere grew even more tense.

[Attention, independent starships affiliated with the Alliance]

[The situation is extremely unstable. To ensure the safety of Alliance starships, please join the rear of our allied fleet. Starships of elite class or higher may accompany us into the subdimension for exploration.

Starships below elite class, take note: entering by force will very likely get you torn apart by spatial currents.]

Feng Xiao received the message and froze, then shrugged helplessly.

It seemed his plan had fallen through. He had completely forgotten that Blood Guard Starport was also within the Blood Cloud Sector and could detect the spatial fluctuations too.

He piloted the Star Origin into the designated area. Hundreds of independent starships that had also detected the spatial fluctuations and come to investigate were already there.

Of course, most of those who might have detected the fluctuations had not come. Caution was the first rule in the universe.

There weren't many people like Feng Xiao, who wanted to be an adventurer and court danger everywhere.

[Hey, brother, are you a first-generation starship?]

A nearby, veteran Star-Land-class starship more than ten thousand meters long suddenly sent him a message.

[That's great. I'm a second-generation captain. If someone hadn't found me a Star Weapon that restored my normal Star Point gains, I probably wouldn't have reached Star-Land class.

Even so, without a captain's talent, I probably won't get past Star Dome class.]

Hearing the slightly youthful but resolute voice in the message, Feng Xiao looked over the starship's well-maintained specifications.

A capable rich kid.

But why was he talking to me?

Feng Xiao wondered warily.

[Yeah. I'm envious of your family background too, brother. It's not easy for us to make progress.]

Wang Hao looked toward Feng Xiao and then nodded in understanding.

[Do you also have Mystic Azure Armor?]

The five-sided starship, which looked formidable, suddenly asked.

[Huh? How did you know?]

Feng Xiao asked in surprise.

But the other party didn't reply.

Feng Xiao's brows drew together.

Mystic Azure Armor was only a blue-quality Star Weapon, one of the three Star Weapons Dad had given me. He'd specifically asked about this blue shield, so he must have seen the Fierce Star Main Cannon and Titanium Steel Armor.

If so, he should know Dad.

And since he'd started the conversation by telling me he was a second-generation starship, that Star Weapon that restored his normal Star Point income probably had something to do with Dad.

Otherwise, there'd have been no reason to bring it up.

Was Dad his benefactor?

Though Feng Xiao had more or less figured out why, he stayed on guard. It was only a guess, after all.

Rumble!

A strange tremor sounded directly in Feng Xiao's mind. He turned to look at the curtain of light.

The enormous purple curtain had fully formed, and endless purple mist poured out of it, radiating dense dimensional energy.

As they watched rocks and even large amounts of shredded vegetation drift out, the Blood Guard high-ranking officers all grew solemn.

Lifeless objects and plants could pass through, but high-energy constructs—Star Weapons—had to withstand the spatial currents.

Suddenly, thousands of conventional warships from the pirate side surged forward, charging madly toward the purple curtain as if it held endless treasure.

"They're not stopping them?"

The captains of the six Star Dome-class starships paled slightly as they realized what was happening. They immediately ordered their ships not to approach the curtain.

Thousands of pirate warships then rushed into the curtain one after another, and the atmosphere fell quiet again.

Seconds later, twisted alloy wreckage began to appear among the rocks drifting out. They were unmistakably the warships that had gone inside.

Even the most intact wreckage was twisted like a DNA helix.

"Daring to enter a Natural Space Gate without a powerful enough shield. That's pirates for you."

The lieutenant colonel in charge of the operation remarked, his face full of scorn.

Then the four Small Battle Stars advanced in formation with the four fleets. Three-quarters of the military starships turned toward the curtain.

The pirate side immediately fell into an uproar, but seeing Blood Guard's orderly forces—and the quarter of the military starships that had stayed behind—they didn't dare act rashly.

With four Small Battle Stars and a Star Dome-class starship, they could still crush the pirates even with three-quarters of their fleet gone.

"We're moving too."

Feng Xiao glanced back at the pirate armada, silently committing the appearance of some of their starships to memory.

He was sure the pirates would find a way to get inside eventually. They might not have many ships, but they would pose a serious threat.

The Star Origin quickly charged into the enormous curtain of light alongside the other independent starships.