Chapter 197: War Preparations

The next month things kept heading towards war preparations. Amidst all this, James managed to kill four more elders with queens, garnishing many artifacts in the process.

Stefanie had already turned into a queen herself, and now his soul room had many women who were enough to stir the entire universe.

As for the assissanation attempts, he stopped them all. He and Rigo had already selected a place suited for all this fighting going on. He chose a far planet where he used it as a base for his future military operations; turning it into a strong military base.

The production of the droids was met with many challenges. The data Rigo had was so old and the terms he used to speak about were obsolete. So, it took almost two weeks only to translate and upgrade what he knew, then everything was kicked fast on the train of production.

And now the army of droids James had was growing exponentially every passing day in tens of thousands!

Yet they were all regular droids, as for the elite ones the production rate was much lower; only a thousand each day!

Despite that James wasn't annoyed, after all his previous number of special droid army was only in thousands.

And now he stood on the base planet, where Islinda sat in front of him with Rigo, Dora, and Luna.

Luna played a great role in this process, as the godly ored produced by the growing mines she kept searching and discovering made the process of producing very advanced special droids possible.

"We are now ready to set off," Rigo said, while adding, "two grand fleets are formed, and the third is now midway to be complete."

"In a month's time we will be able to add three grand fleets to our army," Islinda said, while adding, "despite our treasury being under immense pressure, all the merchants dealing with us are so much excited by this deal."

"They should be," Dora said, "after all we are making sure they won't have a single idle moment."

"What about the intel regarding the Terases race?" James asked, while shifting the topic to the most important thing right now.

He was ready to launch this huge offensive operation, a war that would determine his and his empire fate. During this month, more alarms came to his soul; he knew that tournament was getting closer.

He needed to reign supreme over this grand sector before heading to the tournament. Or else, he would be fighting on two fronts; something he didn't want to see.

"They…" Rigo paused as he hesitated before adding, "something seemed fishy with their behavior."

"Fishy?" James asked, "like what?"

"The terases race is a very aggressive race, using force instead of words in everything. Yet the recent reports coming from our spies there told a different story," Rigo said before adding, "it seems like they have gone sane all of the sudden. They are amassing power and not invading any place around them."

"They aren't expanding?" Dora asked in disbelief, "they have expanded their empire to exceed ours in the past months!"

"Yes, that's the typical attitude of them. Yet right now they are silent," Rigo said.

"Do you suspect they knew about our plans to hit them?" Islinda asked.

"I don't think so," Rigo shook his head, "if such a tip reached their ears, then they would have already started the offense on us before staying there and waiting for our fleets."

James was silent listening to their words. Only one answer came to his mind. "Let's assume they had external help, would that change anything in our plans?" he asked.

And Rigo glanced at him while a picture of that arrogant youth reappeared in his mind. "You don't think… he put hands with them?" Rigo asked, and James nodded.

"That's the only explanation."

"But what for?" Islinda knew what the two were talking about like Dora and Luna. "This race is quite arrogant and aggressive."

"Either by temptation or by using stronger force," James said while adding, "we should expect a brutal fight."

"This…" Dora said before laughing, "plays exactly the way I love!"

"Don't underestimate them," Rigo advised, while seriously adding, "such a brutal mindless race has found a mind to control their actions… this is quite scary!"

"I agree with Rigo," James said, before adding, "we should hasten our plans. The third fleet must finish this week."

"This week… that's hard!" Islinda said.

"But not impossible," James said before adding, "we should be ready for a full out war. Our enemy is preparing as well for us. Going there unprepared will result in risking losing most of the two grand fleets we have," he paused before adding, "borrow fleets from the six powers we have, at least this would cover most of the missing numbers."

"I contacted them…" Dora seemed hesitant before adding, "they want to have a place fixed and publicly announced to share with us their fleet and treasures."

"This…" Islinda paused, before Rigo said: "Fair request in my opinion."

"We would have faced such a problem sooner or later," James said before adding, "start establishing a royal system and find a place for them to be there," he addressed Islinda who just nodded and said nothing.

This was easier said than done! Yet the easiest step here was James; he didn't have a family of his own to fight for their right on the throne. "I will try my best, but this will take time."

"Let them open everything once you start," James said, before adding, "also announce such a system plan to the public. Make everyone know about them being part of our royal system from the start so they will be satisfied."

"There is another condition," Dora said, "they want you to marry a couple of their prime keys' daughters."

Her face showed how much conflicted about this issue. During the past month, she and her sisters in the harem had it tough dealing with the growing sexual appetite of James.

"Make them send whoever they have," James simply decided, "after all I needed to expand my harem for such a long time."

He eyed the three girls whose faces showed a tinge of redness, yet they didn't say a word. They already felt exhausted from being tortured by him. Other girls will be enough to reduce the pressure.

"I have my own list if you want," suddenly Luna said, "they are handpicked by me."

"I also have a list."

"And me."

James glanced at them in a strange way. He thought they would refuse and object fiercely to such requests of him; yet they seemed to be more accepted to what he had in mind.

They also read his mind a long time ago, making him speechless. "Alright," he said, "send them all," he laughed while adding, "also inform Anasta, she must have her own list as well."

"She has enough!" Dora aggressively said, while her face showed how much she regret saying these words to James.

"Just do as I said," he simply ordered, "now go and finish everything, this war will be much harder than we initially thought."

"What if we have interference?" Rigo asked, "shall we go all out war or retreat and regroup?"

"Go all out," James decided without hesitation, "we need to crush any hidden resistance or sources of trouble here."

"That's a great plan," Dora commented in excitement.

"Alright, go and inform me all the time about the progress of the third fleet," James said.

"What about the droids?" Rigo said, as his leader forbad the use of droids in this war.

"Sigh," James shook his head before adding, "form a separate fleet entirely of them. Their mission to act as a sharp weapon to cut any strong resistance anyone of you would face."

"What about the third fleet?" Islinda said, "who will lead it?" she asked.

"I think Rigo has many capable droids he trusted," James glanced over Rigo who nodded. "I will see what I can do."

"Great."

The wheel of war started to condense faster this week. The merchants kept providing more ships and soldiers, while the six forces were satisfied with the arrangement of James.

Finally they let go of all their fleet and opened their treasuries for his needs. This made the third fleet be assembled three days earlier than expected, and even two thirds of the fourth one was almost done!

If not for the small operations they asked for to control all the areas that were already under their protection; the fourth fleet would have been assembled already!

As the three grand fleets were ready, James gathered everyone once more to discuss in detail the process of this wide attack.

On the main cruiser of his, everyone sat and a grand screen hung in the air, showing a detailed map of the entire grand sector.

One fifth was already littered in green, indicating being under their control or about to be. Two fifths were already in blue, referring to the areas controlled by the Terases race.

"As you can see," James said while pointing to the two thirds between his empire and the Terases, we need to be bold and not move to here," he pointed to the line demarcating the Terases empire, "we need to delve deeper and hit them where it hurts."

He pressed a button and the next thing happened was the sudden appearance of a red color in the area which was previously blue. "One fifth will be the battleground of our three fleets," he said.

The eyes of everyone shone brightly before Rigo asked: "Won't that stretch out our fleet? What if we met a hard rock? Who is going to help?"

"Good question," James replied, before adding, "and that's when the fourth grand fleet will jump in to help."