"Spread my orders imdiately: unlock the spatial locks over the capital. Signal our nearby fleets to gather at their maximum speed. We must prepare for the aftermath of the upcoming massacre; we still have many places to visit and many more rotten roots to uproot!"
Hye stepped out onto the grand terrace to find himself overlooking a sprawling tropolis of high-tech spires and grand architectural feats, all contained within a massive, shimring do-shaped defensive shield.
As he was escorted toward the outside, he heard a lot of news about the situation, detailing the latest developnts and the composition of the incoming hostile force.
"At last, welco back to the old days of the apocalypse!"
As the full picture of the civil war ford in his mind, Hye didn’t feel dread. Instead, he began to summon his grand fleet from his inventory. One by one, massive vessels materialised in the sky, casting long, dark shadows over the Elder Council area. He filled them instantly with his legion of warriors.
Hye boarded a massive flagship from the other universe. He positioned these anomalous ships strategically: so to act as a protective vanguard for his main fleet, and others to form a secondary defensive periter around the Elders’ Council building to intercept any stray attacks.
The re thought of fighting both the Toranks and the traitorous Hescos elents—facing enemies who were undeniably stronger and significantly higher in system levels—made his blood boil with a fierce excitent. It had been a long ti since he had been pushed to the brink in a battle of this magnitude.
Against these elite enemies, his technique would be at its most potent. Every high-level warrior he struck down would beco a high-value asset added to his permanent army. That single thought made him wish the enemy hadn’t just brought hundreds of thousands; he found himself wishing they had brought tens of millions.
However, the intelligence reports spoke of an army of several hundred thousand at most. Unlike the Hescos’ leadership, who were visibly terrified by the incoming tidal wave of Toranks, Hye felt a pang of genuine disappointnt.
"Yet, this is just the start," he consoled himself, "Playing on the grand stage with the big boys is always worthy of the effort."
Once his forces were fully deployed in a complex, interlocking formation, he waited. During the tense silence of the countdown, he remained in constant contact with Moth, tracking the countdown to the spatial unlocking.
[In ten minutes!] Moth replied with a tone of forced confidence. [The space lock will be fully deactivated in ten minutes. The enemies are projected to arrive via localised warp in half an hour. Just a warning, Hye: once the space is unlocked, the Toranks can open their own portals to bring in reinforcents. Are you sure you don’t need our help?]
Moth knew such a basic tactical detail wouldn’t have escaped Hye’s notice, but the sheer scale of the risk forced him to seek confirmation.
[I’m depending on it, actually!] The response left Moth more puzzled than before. [Anyway,] Hye continued, [use this chance to bring forth as many of your loyal forces as you can around this spot. Just make sure none of them enters the designated battle zone directly, or else...]
[I know, I know! You aren’t responsible for their fate. I’ve got it!] Moth sighed. Every ti they spoke since the deploynt, Hye repeated the sa chilling warning. He wanted to fight freely, unburdened by the political necessity of allies. He wanted a clear line of fire where anything that moved was a target.
Ten minutes passed quickly. Moth signalled a confirmation through the ssages: [The spatial lock over the capital was officially down.] The sky above the do flickered as the restrictive fields dissipated.
Yet, unlike what the Grand Elder and the rest of the council expected, Hye didn’t make a single move to exploit the opening. He didn’t launch a preemptive jump; he didn’t even adjust his fleet’s position.
"That’s weird," the Grand Elder muttered, watching the motionless icons of Hye’s ships on the central display. "First, he demands we stay out of his way, then he asks for the space to be unlocked, and now that it is... He does nothing. He is a truly eccentric fellow!"
"He must have his reasons," Moth replied, though he too felt the gnawing tension of the inaction. If not for the repeated, fierce warnings from Hye, Moth would have already succumbed to the frantic requests from other loyalist elders to launch their own squadrons into the fray.
Standing behind and watching an outsider take charge and defend the fate of their empire was a bitter pill for the Hescos to swallow. The air in the council chamber was thick with wounded pride and muffled dissent.
If the Grand Elder had not personally vouched for Hye and supported him with such terrifying clarity, the situation would have undoubtedly devolved into the path Hye didn’t want to see.
"We need to use this ti to annihilate those bastards," the Grand Elder said, finally turning his back to the holographic screen that displayed the stillness of the outside world. His voice was like a grinding stone. "Let’s arrange a war eting now! We need to act and hit hard while they still believe they have the elent of surprise!"
The Grand Elder did not plan to join the imdiate skirmish outside the windows; he had placed his trust fully in Hye’s capabilities. From the performance he had watched over the past days, he knew the human possessed the depth to defend the capital—especially with the near-invulnerable other universe ships acting as a shield.
However, defending the capital was only the beginning. It wouldn’t stop the rot, and it wouldn’t save the empire from the cancer within.
Even if, by so miracle, Hye managed to crush the incoming forces, there were still hundreds of thousands of traitors and collaborators embedded throughout the Hescos’ holand. They needed to be extracted and executed with decisiveness before they could mount another coup or facilitate another incursion.
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