"Didn’t I specifically say to stay in formation?!" Pact demanded. "Were my commands not heard by all? And wasn’t the fleet on level one alert? Then why the hell were the shields offline?! Damn stupid, useless bastards..."
Exterminator remained silent. All the high-level officers of the Hegemony did the sa. They had indeed received the orders... yet none had followed them.
"Speak! Damn it, speak! What happened? Cat got your tongue now, huh?!"
Like a fire-spitting beast, Pact vented his anger, not even paying attention to the battlefield—which was rapidly getting worse.
Exterminator finally stepped in.
"Commander, this can be discussed later. Now is not the ti. Trouble is at our doorstep, and our focus should be on that—not on ’what ifs.’"
Its tone was blunt. Direct.
But instead of calming Pact, it only fueled his anger further.
"You stay out of it, Exterminator! The three old fossils can handle things for a few monts—that’s more than enough ti for to deal with these idiotic fools!"
Turning toward the AI of his fortress, Pact roared.
Exterminator, unfazed by his roar, responded or rather reported with sothing else calmly: "Super Annihilation Cannon is charged and ready to fire, Commander."
"Oh? Is it?" Pact reacted imdiately. But before giving the order, he glanced at his subordinates.
"After this battle, if you survive... I’ll make your lives hell if you don’t give a damn good reason for disobeying my command."
"What about the targets?" he asked, closing the comms channel as he turned back.
"We have locked onto their frontline ships, Commander. They are the most densely grouped. As for their flagship—it is too far behind, flanked by others. It cannot be directly targeted."
"No worries." Pact waved it off, studying the battlefield map. He quickly agreed with Exterminator’s analysis.
"Pass my orders. Have both flanks join this attack. Target the human fleet from both sides. Wipe them out quickly—we need to cut our losses."
"Load antimatter annihilation missiles in slots 1 to 500. For 501 to 1000, load graviton plasma missiles."
Pact selected multiple targets on the battlefield display. In his mind, after the bombardnt from the fortress’s main cannon combined with fleet-wide saturation fire, their defenses would break—and a missile barrage would finish them in one decisive strike.
"As you command, Commander," Exterminator replied, imdiately relaying the orders.
Within minutes, everything was prepared—charged, loaded, and ready.
To which Exterminator confird: "All weapon systems are charged, locked, and loaded, Commander."
"FIRE!" Pact roared, without even blinking.
At that mont, the cone-shaped fortress’s frontal section had already opened. From within it, an enormous single-barrel cannon erged.
Its barrel glowed with dark red energy.
At the sa ti, thousands upon thousands of weapons installed across the gigantic battle fortress lit up in a similar glow, all charged and ready to fire at any mont.
With Pact’s order, all of these weapons roared at once. Their charged energy shot forward with a thunderous boom, rushing toward the enemy.
From the annihilation cannon, a massive, thick beam of destructive energy erupted and surged toward its target, sending shockwaves throughout the fortress. The cannon’s barrel held steady, stabilized by powerful stabilizers and thrusters.
"Eat this, you human bastard..." Pact muttered, watching the thick beam tear across the battlefield toward the human fleet.
But before it could even reach halfway—Pact saw it. Barely.
The void human ch suddenly appeared above the First Elder, Bell... and kicked him, sending him hurtling straight toward the beam fired from their own Super Annihilation Cannon.
"NOOOO!! What—what are you doing?!" Pact scread in terror as he watched Elder Bell collide with the beam.
In that instant— An explosion erupted.
A blazing, sun-like sphere appeared, consuming everything at its center.
And it consud Elder Bell as well.
Before Pact—or anyone else in the fleet, heck, even the other two Genesis Law Realm beings—could react, they watched as the human ch appeared right behind Elder Hawk. In one swift motion, it plucked the ch’s wings as if they were nothing and hurled them toward Elder Lion, who had just recovered and stood up—
Only to be struck again and fall back onto the ship’s hull, damaging it even further.
anwhile, Elder Hawk—oblivious to everything else—was suffering far greater pain. The ch body was essentially a part of him, as he had rged with it. His screams echoed as the damage tore through him.
And then—
He was thrown toward the exploding arc of destructive energy where Elder Bell had been consud.
Before anyone could process that, the human ch attacked again—this ti launching a direct energy strike at Elder Lion, causing the ship to explode as a miniature sun ford at the point of impact.
Seeing how quickly it all happened, Pact couldn’t help but take a deep breath, wiping the sweat that had unknowingly ford on his forehead.
anwhile, the others—slower to react—only now processed the changes on the battlefield. With the three elders missing, they could only stamr:
"What... what just happened...?"
At the sa ti, the attacks launched by the Hegemony fleet finally arrived.
Crown, commanding the fleet, quickly issued orders to neutralize them. The 4th Battle Fleet’s defensive point-defense systems activated and, in rapid succession, took down about 80 percent of the incoming attacks. The remaining strikes were absorbed by the fleet’s shields with ease.
But not long after, another wave arrived—this one even more intense.
Seeing this, Crown frowned slightly. This ti, only 75 percent of the attacks were neutralized—five percent less—and the volu of incoming fire had increased.
She quickly analyzed the data and noted the shield integrity was dropping further.
Knowing she couldn’t let this continue, she issued her next command:
"Mobilize the ch divisions! Form a barrier around the Fortune Ship and provide cover from the incoming attacks!"
"Knight-class chs will defend. Long-range chs will intercept anything that passes through the fleet’s defensive screen. Do not let them touch the ship’s shields any more than necessary."
"As you command, Lady Crown!" the others replied, quickly accepting the order.
Within re seconds, from various battle carriers and even smaller hangars aboard standard ships, hundreds—no, thousands—of chs deployed in rapid succession.
Knight-class and marksman-class chs surged forward, quickly forming a protective barrier around the frontline ships.
The knight chs positioned themselves outside the ships’ shields, while the marksman chs remained within, targeting and destroying any attacks that slipped past the fleet’s defensive batteries. anwhile, the knight chs directly intercepted the heavier strikes that the marksn couldn’t eliminate in ti.
Their shields were made of a special material and chanism. Instead of being blasted backward by the force of incoming attacks, they absorbed the energy and redirected it—channeling it into cannons mounted on their backs, which then fired the energy back toward the Hegemony fleet.
Just like that, the efficiency of neutralizing the Hegemony fleet’s attacks rose to nearly 95 percent at any given mont.
As for the remaining 5 percent that managed to slip through—it wasn’t enough to cause aningful damage. The ships’ shielding systems recovered faster than the rate at which they were being worn down.
Seeing that, Crown nodded with a relieved expression. Her decision had clearly made a positive impact—not just for her, but for everyone present. A bit of the pressure eased across the command deck.
She shifted her focus back to the Hegemony fleet, observing the progress of her forces as they attempted to reduce enemy numbers...
There had barely been any progress.
The Hegemony fleet was either hiding behind chanical defense structures or positioning themselves behind large capital ships. These ships absorbed the barrage of attacks while constantly rotating positions—once one took damage, another would take its place, maintaining a continuous defensive cycle.
"Those chanical octopus constructs have very strong defensive properties..." she said aloud.
"Indeed, Lady Crown," one of the officers replied in agreent. "Because of them, our flanks are not making the progress they should have by now."
"Hmm..." Crown nodded.
"Pass down my orders. Tell both flank admirals to hasten their attacks and take down those octopus constructs with their main cannons as quickly as possible. Leave the fortress to us."
"Also, instruct the ships under central command to divide while maintaining their course. Redirect part of their firepower toward the enemy flanks or their main battleships and battlecruisers—to increase pressure on the Hegemony fleet."
She paused briefly, then continued:
"This battle is one of ti. The longer we take to bring them down, the more danger we put ourselves in. Rember—we are far from ho. No reinforcents are coming for us."
"But the enemy is in a different position. They can receive support much faster."
"So the faster we end this, the safer we all will be... and vice versa."
Her voice hardened slightly.
"And I believe none of you want to be put in a situation where, for the first ti, so of our comrades fall here... bringing sha to our fleet and this battle group."
"...Right?"
"We won’t, Commander!" voices echoed across the central comm systems as many throughout the battle group responded at once.
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