A barred spiral galaxy, as the name implied, had a bar-shaped center, with spiral arms extending from both ends of the long bar and winding outward for roughly two-thirds of a rotation, forming a vortex.
This galaxy was somewhat smaller than the parent galaxy where the Successors had begun. Its diameter was roughly ninety thousand to one hundred ten thousand light-years, its average thickness was over two thousand light-years, and it contained approximately two hundred billion stars.
And those two hundred billion stars had caught the attention of a group of organisms from a neighboring galaxy.
Patches upon patches of light abruptly appeared some two hundred light-years away from the barred spiral galaxy. At first glance, it looked as though countless stars had materialized out of thin air along the galaxy's edge.
Appearing along with those "stars" were gravitational waves spreading at light speed. Any planets too close might even be torn apart by such gravity.
As the light faded, enormous structures the size of stars were revealed one after another.
"Voyage complete. The plan can be carried out. Begin."
Centered on the supergiant-mass organism where Perpetuity was located, messenger organisms were released, transmitting information at faster-than-light speeds to thousands of supergiant-mass organisms. After selecting their destinations, those supergiant-mass organisms entered faster-than-light travel one after another.
The invasion plan for the barred spiral galaxy was not complicated. In fact, the Successors had not spent much time discussing it before reaching a conclusion.
The barred spiral galaxy would be divided into thousands of equal regions. Each of the thousands of supergiant-mass organisms would take charge of one region, conceal itself through faster-than-light travel, and continuously spread proliferating Successor individuals until all matter in its assigned region could be used by the species.
This would allow the species to integrate the barred