Three days later, all fighting on Iron Shield Star came to an abrupt halt.
Whether in the southern deserts or the northern snowfields, every ongoing and impending war ceased.
An entire planet ravaged by artillery fire became eerily quiet.
This was because the Inquisitor's flagship had emerged from the Asteroid Belt hidden near Mandeville Point and sailed toward Iron Shield Star.
The appearance of a Lunar-class Cruiser put all the planet's nobles on high alert.
They were not afraid of the Lunar-class Cruiser itself, but of the Inquisition it represented.
The Inquisition was known as the space imperial guards, elegantly called the court's hawks and hounds, and ranked first on the list of those hated by man and dog alike.
The two noble factions of Iron Shield Star feared the Inquisition interfering in their civil war, and feared even more that it would support the other side. Thus, they temporarily halted the war and chose to wait and see.
Even more anxious than Iron Shield Star's nobles were the Imperium and Adeptus Mechanicus forces.
The current civil war on Iron Shield Star was essentially a struggle between local powers for control of the planet's government. When neither side could defeat the other, they sought outside help.
In the end, the two outside forces—the Imperium and the Adeptus Mechanicus—could not defeat each other either, turning the conflict into a drawn-out mess.
Inviting a god was easy; sending one away was hard. Even if Iron Shield Star's local powers wanted to stop now, neither the Imperium nor the Adeptus Mechanicus would allow it.
Both the Imperium and the Adeptus Mechanicus wanted to seize this Thousand-Mech World and use its formidable armaments to control the defenses of the surrounding star region.
Both the Imperium and Adeptus Mechanicus forces wanted Iron Shield Star, but