Chapter 14
Chapter 14
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Translator: MadScientist
Chapter: 14
Chapter Title: Ambush in the Holy Star System
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The Knight Order dispersed their forces across four star systems.
They seemed dead set on avoiding battle at the holy site while refusing to allow any intrusion into their territory from any direction.
The question now was how many troops to deploy to which star system.
Defeating them piecemeal was basically a foregone conclusion. Without knowing the enemy's exact fleet strength down to the last ship, it made no sense not to exploit this handicap.
However, no matter which system they headed for, all their forces would have to pass through the holy site at least once to reach any other. And with the fleet waiting right in front of the hyperlane, it wouldn't take long to arrive at the combat zone.
There was also the option of looping back through the rear star systems I hadn't scouted yet, but that would take even longer than going through the holy site. In the meantime, the attacked Knight Order fleet would likely be wiped out.
The Knight Order knew that too, so they would probably compromise to some degree.
That meant the main fleet needed forces to buy time while it devoured the enemy's fleet.
The enemy's ships relied on long-range batteries. Whether lasers or solid projectiles, they needed distance to unleash their full power.
But jumping through hyperspace via hyperlane to move between systems meant starting combat in close quarters with the monster swarm waiting right in front.
Exploiting that, countless Remoras had been left behind in the holy site star system. Far smaller than drifting asteroids—too tiny to even observe from the holy planet—an immense number of them waited like a fog at the system outskirts, right in front of the hyperlane.
Small and specialized in damaging enemy ships, the Remoras would dodge the enemy's guns and focus purely on stalling.
As a typical empire, the Knight Order couldn't have drastically redesigned their ships in such a short time. So their structures were expected to be much like those devoured in the previous battle.
They would buy even more time than last battle by more easily targeting and wrecking vital spots like batteries and engines, steadily eroding combat power.
With the Remoras left to hold the line, the Treegalaons advanced into one star system. Before long, fleets from the other three systems began pouring into the holy star system.
From the destroyer-class wooden ship that led as vanguard for scouting, waves of horrified psionic thoughts radiated out at the Remora swarm that filled its entire field of view.
The moment the Knight Order's ships tore through space, the Remoras launched their immediate assault.
No time to eat. To keep the Remora swarm alive longer and buy the Treegalaons time to annihilate and feast on the enemy, they had to inflict maximum damage before the full enemy fleet crossed over.
Kyaaaak—!
Boom! Boom—!
The Knight Order's batteries instantly belched fire and light.
Overwhelmed by the sheer spectacle, the knights fired wildly without proper aim. But in a scene packed solid with targets—no filler, just meat—it turned even them into dead-eye marksmen.
Follow-up fleets crossing the hyperlane saw the chaos and joined the fray at once.
Ziiiiing—!!!
The energy, accumulated through the fierce light of the star Alhamra beating down on the Knight Order's homeworld Nualalkaima, sliced through space and magnificently incinerated the Remoras in its path.
Vanguard small ships and destroyers couldn't cope properly with the Remoras and were losing combat power one after another. But as multiple mid-sized cruisers—the backbone of the Knight Order fleet—unleashed their firepower, countless Remoras vanished clean as if erased by a rubber.
While other Remoras were wiped out by beams, a few closed in to damage the cruisers. But not only the cruisers' main beams but the barrage from their numerous secondary batteries blocked the approaches.
As the Remora numbers plummeted, focus shifted to the Treegalaon swarm.
Had they failed to anticipate monsters matching the size of their own main warships? They'd only ever spotted scout fleets of small flying beasts, after all.
The moment Treegalaon crossed hyperspace into the next system, it swallowed a small ship ahead of it whole. To a Treegalaon now blatantly colossal enough to call a giant monster, the small ship was just a light bite-sized morsel.
It then charged straight for a cruiser, the linchpin of the enemy fleet's firepower.
The enemy cruiser promptly fired an energy beam, punching a massive hole through Treegalaon's body. But the symbiotic tree inside reacted instantly to the host's peril.
Burning the body's organic matter for fuel to spur rapid growth, the tree reconnected blood vessels and stems at the wound site to seal it, then began slowly covering the skin with wooden bark.
When a follow-up laser beam struck the bark, it burned through and pierced it—but unlike the first shot that had bored straight through Treegalaon's tough hide to the other side, this one stopped at the bark.
Confirming that, changes rippled through every Treegalaon individual at once.
They furiously burned their organic reserves to accelerate the symbiotic trees' growth, starting to cloak vital areas first in wooden bark armor.
These trees, called "Mother's children" grown on Nualalkaima, had spent lifetimes bathed in Alhamra's light, granting them resistance to kindred weapons.
Just as Earth trees grown under sunlight don't shrug off concentrated solar beams unscathed, Mother's children couldn't perfectly tank laser fire either. But to grow massive enough to form cruiser hulls, they demanded vast energy, greedily sucking up all nearby Alhamra light. That trait lent superior protection compared to Treegalaon's own hide.
The legion didn't grasp the nitty-gritty details but confirmed the bark's effectiveness against enemy weapons right then and adopted it.
Plus, the enemy's already-quartered fleets started out inferior to the legion's main force. That let them seize total dominance and devour the foes.
At that moment—confirming the quartered enemy fleets lagged behind the legion—it became crystal clear.
This Knight Order would make perfect fodder for the snowball the legion planned to roll. Thanks to these arrogant fools, the legion could sprout wings and soar.
They immediately put the organic matter gained from devouring the enemy fleet to use, prepping for the next clash.
First, the spawning mothers in the Treegalaons' bellies produced Remoras. Designed for seamless troop replenishment even mid-battle, they quickly restored numbers.
They also began reinforcing the Treegalaons' bark armor. The hasty wartime expansion had obvious limits in coverage and toughness, but with Remoras buying time, they had to gear up for the fight ahead.
As the Remora swarm reproduced, before the stalling pack in the hidden system was fully mopped up, the final Remora's view caught the enemy fleet prepping hyperlane transit for the main fleet showdown.
The decisive clash between main fleets loomed right on the horizon.
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Taaluma, second vanguard captain of the great Bahilila Holy Knight Order, commanded the war against the vermin race.
In the past, the Order had never dared approach the holy site lest they offend the Great One. But when an alien race tried expanding into it and the Order repelled them without so much as a peep from the Great One, the Knight Commander deemed it tacit approval for expansion and ordered colony seizures at once.
The first vanguard captain—first sword of the Order—was entrusted with the role and led a fleet beyond the holy site to conquer the bugs.
Since they'd initially tried diplomatic contact at first encounter, the approach began disguised as an embassy.
Gauging the enemy's power from the fleet scale they brought in response to the aggressive movements, the vanguard captain would judge on-site.
After the vanguard captain headed into enemy territory, word came back: enemy fleet weak, proceeding with conquest via combat.
Up to then, the Order buzzed with confidence in successful expansion.
But contrary to expectations of quick follow-ups after the "weak fleet" report, a month passed, then two—no reports, no comms. By the third and fourth months, the Knight Commander finally roared in fury.
The first vanguard captain, unable even to mop up bugs he'd called weak, was excommunicated. The second vanguard captain received full authority and began battle prep.
The Order issued mobilization orders, commandeered resources, and churned out warships.
Recently, surpassing engine tech limits had enabled launching even larger "children of the Mother" into space, yielding brand-new ship classes.
As fleets readied along the border, scouts watching the holy site reported the enemy striking first.
Unlike the first captain's "weak" assessment, it was an enormous fleet.
Previously, to avoid defiling the holy site, fleets had anchored at the border. But with the enemy's massive scale confirmed, they now argued for concentrating everything at the holy site to face them.
This view was shot down at the Knight Order council. Other vanguard captains questioned the second's fitness for forgetting the holy site's sanctity and the Order's might, pressuring him to yield command if he feared battle.
They had no answer to "What if the bugs defile the holy site?"—proof they relied on the Great One's power, not true faith, but scrambled for personal power. Truly unfit for the Order.
As the debate dragged, the bugs inevitably crossed the hyperlane into Order space. Amid it all, he rooted out power-hungry rebels, space-tossed their corpses, and moved to exterminate the bugs at the holy site.
After torching all the flies stalling at the holy site, they hyperspaced full of vim to mop up the remnants. But the bugs they faced up close were utterly grotesque.
The sight of Mother's own children entwined and growing with those vermin was the most revolting scene Taaluma had witnessed in centuries of life.
Unable to hide his rage—his mind cracking open, psionic energy leaking—Taaluma ordered total annihilation.
Staking his rank as second vanguard captain, he'd wipe every last bug from existence, he seethed.
That was before witnessing the enemy's horrific monster shrug off Alhamra's light—and rip the entire side off a mid-sized cruiser in one bite.
For the first time in his life, Taaluma felt his sap run cold.
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