Chapter 13
Chapter 13
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 13
Chapter Title: Invasion of the Hidden Star System
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The battle was over.
The war was not.
We devoured all the weeds that had crossed over pretending to be a delegation.
We had prioritized destroying anything related to communications to prevent them from calling reinforcements, but they might have gotten word back to their homeworld somehow.
We needed to reorganize our posture as quickly as possible and go devour the rest. Leaving scraps behind wasn't proper etiquette for civilized beings.
There had been a lot of lucky breaks all around. The enemy had allowed our fleet to park nearby to lure us into complacency, they hadn't anticipated the space station moving, and their ships were made of organic material, giving us a favorable matchup.
If the enemy had intended to wage war, they should have gone all out from the start.
The legion must never give them a chance to let the ships be eaten. But were there really two predator species in the galaxy that devoured enemies and absorbed their traits? In a way, their ignorance was to be expected.
Unfortunately for them, this battle had provided more than enough genes.
Grrr...
In the hatching grounds at Lushaka Planet's orbit, space monsters carrying tree seeds were being born. We stuffed the pupae full of organic material, and the creatures grew beyond the size of Space Whales to that of medium destroyers, then rapidly expanded even further to cruiser scale.
They looked far sharper than the simple Space Whales, with massive trees sprouting from parts of their bodies.
They overcame the Space Whale's size limitations by relying on the trees that grew up to cruiser dimensions. The whale genes enabled free navigation through space and provided room for the trees to grow. The trees grew endlessly in that space, coexisting symbiotically with the whale. The tree trunks and blood vessels spread throughout the body supported the strain on its enormous frame.
A single all-or-nothing gamble that bridged the technological gap. Wasn't this why we became predators?
This monster's name... since it grew trees, Tree... Turtle? Hmm, no, that didn't fit. It wasn't a turtle.
Tree shark, then. Let's call it Treegalaon.
Its immense mass and jaws that could chew through ship alloys would surely unleash tremendous power, but compared to a standard imperial cruiser firing lasers and shells from extreme long range, it had clear drawbacks. To bring its massive bulk to bear, it had to get close to the enemy ships.
But it could differentiate itself by moving as a ship without needing any crew.
No crew meant the vast internal space could be used freely. It needed room to store organics for its own consumption, of course, but no matter how much you packed in, it wouldn't fill the belly of something that huge.
And for the legion, what we needed to load was predetermined.
First, we created small flying monsters specialized in mobility and firepower to buy time or strike enemy weak points while the Treegalaons closed in.
We removed the shells from our existing small flyers and gave them acidic spit that could damage mechanical enemy ships. Their small size allowed for mass production in huge numbers. Inspired by sharks and their clingy companions, let's call them Remoras.
Next, we loaded up plenty of Hiraks. It felt like Hiraks—with their ability to devour bark whole and claws and muscles that could pierce wooden plating—would be effective in this war.
With the forces for this war decided, we poured all the organics from the battle and our reserves into nonstop production.
The knight order was surely preparing for war now that their vanguard had been wiped out, but could they prepare faster than a legion where every leader and member moved toward a single goal?
The more time we spent preparing forces, the stronger our fleet would be. Now that we could produce cruiser-grade monsters—unlike before absorbing the knight order's genes—reorganizing the fleet only got better with more time.
But legion production was halted. We were consuming organics at such a rapid rate that taking too long to re-form the fleet would deplete our stockpiles in no time.
Should we restart production now? We didn't even know the enemy's exact numbers—should we conserve strength? The legion wasn't powerful enough yet to afford that luxury.
"Jarvis? What do you think?"
When it's hard to find an answer, just roll multiple heads. They sometimes spit out bizarre suggestions, but considering various options should lead to good results.
"Jarvis?"
No response from Jarvis.
Oh, right.
It hit me anew: the legion was alone.
I spread my hand and slipped the puppets back onto my fingers one by one. The aggressive yet devoted Jarvis, who served as the legion's eyes and ears, went on the most important index finger.
"You called, my Queen."
"Yeah, yeah. Sleep well?"
A leader really needed a secretary.
I reawakened each one—Farmvis, EinsteinaVis, and the rest—and put our heads together to think of the best course.
The conclusion came quickly, really.
Friendship with the knight order was over. The losers would be exterminated, the winners take all. No room to skimp and save for future food production... or the Deneb International Union delegation... or whatever.
We converted all low-combat forces—especially the ones expanding farmlands on Earth—back into organics and reproduced them as war forces. Sorry, Farmvis. I'll earn a ton and buy you something better...!
Assuming we'd enter the knight order's star system, fight, and devour them to restock organics afterward, we left only the bare minimum reserves and dispatched the fleet.
The legion's Treegalaon pack soon arrived right in front of the hidden star system.
Crossing this hyperlane meant entering enemy territory.
No reason to hesitate. Even if I was the galaxy's greatest pacifist, this racist species had crossed the line too far—they couldn't participate in the galactic peace I would build.
The Treegalaons rode the hyperlane, slicing through space as they entered the hidden star system.
The weeds might be waiting in combat formation beyond the hyperlane, so we prepared to attack the instant the space shifted.
What?
It was far too quiet. Quiet enough to mistake it for an ownerless star system, like when we first discovered the hidden planet.
No. Maybe from all the excessive smoking, my spirit had grown sharper—I could sense lingering echoes of psionic waves coming and going from the opposite side of the system.
Several types of psionic waves directed at each other. Probably ships communicating. Meaning they were hiding on the far side of the star system.
You weeds. You'd clearly been stealthily scouting right in front of the hyperlane. If the fleet entering your holy site looked easy pickings, you'd bark about ownership like the first encounter. Disgusting xenos.
As we advanced the monster fleet, sensors picked up enemies riding a hyperlane to retreat.
There were four hyperlanes connecting the holy site to the knight order.
We hadn't visually confirmed the enemy retreat, so we didn't know which direction they'd taken.
Before marching the main Treegalaon pack forward, we sent a few Remoras down each hyperlane.
The monster fleet faded from sight as the Remoras cleaved through unknown space and arrived in the star system on the other side.
The Remoras opened their eyes to take in the view ahead—not the scenery of the next star system, but a laser blazing with eye-searing brightness. All four Remoras turned to ash in an instant.
As expected, the best-case scenario where they dismissed the vanguard's lost connection as trivial hadn't come to pass.
All four directions leading from the holy site were prepared for attack.
But why weren't they concentrating their forces to defend the holy site? Why disperse them so inefficiently?
Was there some reason they couldn't gather their forces at the holy site?
Aha.
Because of their faith, they couldn't bear to see their holy site turn into a sea of fire?
If battle broke out in the hidden star system, no matter who won, the whole system would end up littered with ship debris and monster corpses floating as space junk.
But repelling heretics from the holy site would be the fanatics' favorite scenario. Unless the prohibition against defiling it wasn't voluntary—maybe some external pressure?
I didn't know the exact reason, but if they were imposing a penalty on themselves, that was fine by me.