Chapter 911

Chapter 911

As Anton grew more familiar with the area around Naewu, he found that his time to bind to additional stars was much reduced. Instead of taking two or three years, he managed to do the same in one or two for the rest. In total, he bound a formation of seven stars covering the vast majority of the cross sectional area that he had been guarding. Along with the others, Anton managed to continue to snag the various deliveries.

Even though there didnt seem to be anyone the shipments were for, they didnt want them to end up in the hands of the remaining portion of Trigold Cluster individuals in the lower realms. It might give them problematic ideas. More than that, studying everything they found was turning out to be quite useful.

It had taken a couple decades to really get the research going, but they had discovered the mechanisms through which stars were being destabilized. This was mainly from salvaging the ships that assaulted Naewu and Egnos, though they did catch two shipments of components meant to be added to yet further ships.

One of the facets involved injecting ascension energy into stars from the lower realms. Since the energies were incompatible, the ascension or upper energy breaking down disrupted local stars. There was more to it than that, including weapons formations to augment their efforts, but that was the basis of everything.

There were similar techniques meant for destabilizing planets, intentionally disturbing tectonic activities and the like. With planetary barriers already in place, such weapons hadnt had a chance to be used against them. They did perform a single test on a remote planet not suitable for life, and the results were quite a bit less spectacular than the destruction of a star. The source of this content nov(el)bi((n))

As a whole, the planet actually remained intact- the catch being it was held together only by gravitational forces as it split and cracked. The result was ultimately extreme earthquakes over its entire surface. Catastrophic enough to kill the majority of the population of both humans and animals, including potential sea life, but not as extreme as the results with Zunroses star. Then again, the free energy contained within a planet was significantly less than a star, so even a chain reaction only spread so much.

It was still terrible, of course. The Lower Realms Alliance carefully dismantled the weapons responsible, keeping the information about how they could be made secret. Nor did they reveal the information about various doomsday weapons to the general populace as it could only cause panic. Simply acknowledging their existence was enough, and that they were developing countermeasures to prevent anything like what happened to Zunrose within their own systems.

After some time, Anton came to the conclusion that the Trigold Cluster had to know that most of the weapons were inefficient. While there might be some practical if horrific reasoning in destroying a star- specifically because they might be less well defended than populated planets- the tectonic destabilizers required a large enough fleet that they could most likely conquer most planets normally. Especially since they would have to have broken through all barriers around a majority of the planet to even begin, and it wasnt a quick process.

It was possible that the upper realms didnt actually know if everything they sent even worked. There had been some implications that they were using the lower realms for experimentation. And unfortunately, they had likely received successful news about one of the worst successes.

As for the various biological and chemical weapons, those were studied as well for counter methods. Obviously the best defense was to never let them be deployed, but some only required a very small payload to make it down to a planet to cause huge amounts of destruction. Especially anything that was able to grow and reproduce, though those either tended to take longer to cause damage or were extremely obvious, both of which provided opportunities to fend them off.

On the subject of reverse-engineering functionality, access to multiple planets of formations and especially communications arrays allowed for an in depth study of the capabilities of the Trigold Cluster, or at least what they specifically shared with the lower realms. Along with that was a project intended to capture transmissions, especially those directed at the upper realms.

There was no certainty that the Fearsome Menagerie and the rest of the faction on the winning side of the civil war wouldnt be looking for some way to get a dangerous advantage despite the ceasefire. The basic understanding of their disapproval of Zunroses destruction was that it harmed their own people, not some sort of moral stance against destroying stars and killing billions. Though perhaps better diplomacy might clarify some of those details.

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Over the course of approximately a decade, the number of packages passing through the cordoned off area began to decrease, eventually stopping entirely- most likely they stopped being sent when it was clear they were being intercepted. It was just that the particular methods were on a very long time lag, so they couldnt suddenly retrieve what was already out there.

There wasnt any indication that the remaining faction had arranged for more aid from the upper realms, but they still wanted to guard the area for some time. At the very least, it would force them to range much further afield- at least fifty or so lightyears beyond their borders- if they tried to have something redirected elsewhere.

Though personally, Anton wouldnt have expected them to trust anyone in the upper realms at the moment, regardless of which sect they were from. Though on the other hand, Anton could kind of hope that the Fearsome Menagerie and the sects associated with them here in the lower realms were having a scuffle with the Twin Soul Sect and Void Scrying Sect in the upper realms. Having them killing each other would save quite a few lives in the lower realms.

... And youd risk everyone for those people?

On paper the number of lives saved is many more than those lost, Catarina said. Anyway, the partial option would push people towards the borders of our region, which would either result in them going above or below us. Or alternatively, along the border with the lower realms, which we wouldnt want to bring into prominence right now.

Couldnt it also push people more towards the inner border? Closer to the center of the galaxy? If the spherical distortion Im thinking of is correct, anyway.

Well, yeah, but that would bring people closer to the Everheart System. Nobody would go that way.

Pretty sure tens of thousands of fools do every year, Timothy countered. And I might be underestimating that by a long shot.

Thats just people from our alliance hoping to win it big. The Trigold Cluster has a bit more involvement since the direction is skewed towards them from the center, but the Exalted Quadrant sends a great number of people there as well.

... Thats a lot of deaths.

Eh, Catarina shrugged. Even if tens of millions of people die, its still less than the natural deaths of one planet. And like nearly half of those who go to the Everheart System survive.

Id assume its a carefully calculated amount, Timothy said.

Same here, Catarina said. But Everheart never likes to admit anything in plain language. Or communicate with me in particular unless its entirely unrelated to formations.

Hes still worried youll surpass him? Timothy shrugged, Well, I can see why.

More like the risk of that is too high for him. It might not be that much, realistically. And Im around five centuries and an insane amount of replicated projection experience behind.

Im surprised you havent done something like that yourself, honestly, Timothy admitted. I mean, Im aware there are pitfalls but youve seen the biggest risks and know how to counter them.

The problem is projections arent really capable of true originality. So most of the experiences they produce will be hollow. Id prefer to spend the same amount of resources on larger experiments I can manage with my own hands. Well, and the hands of thousands of other real people tirelessly working out the minute details.

Timothy nodded. Honestly, he understood her wild and over the top plans. He was also worried about their future security. It was just that his methods involved training individual people to defend their alliance- large numbers of individuals, but still. Vast formations that could suddenly make them completely safe well, that wasnt his area of expertise. But in his opinion, it was like trying to build up a single Domination cultivator. No, perhaps that wouldnt even be a proper comparison. A single cultivator that surpassed even Domination. And that would take both more time and resources than they could have, if it was even possible. The same as some of these grand formations that Catarina went on about.

But even if those particular things didnt happen, Timothy knew that it was still time well spent. She and the others would learn things. And just like he was probably never going to train himself or anyone else to beyond Domination, each step of the way was important to reach that theoretical realm. It wasnt like one could go directly from Body Tempering to Life Transformation, after all.