“It’s gamma rays—how is the energy so high? And that final explosion... its power is far beyond a simple nuclear bomb.”
Antimatter missiles are small but have immense thrust. With such a massive energy supply, the power of their curvature engines was far beyond anything Sausage People technology could achieve.
As time passed, more signals were converted into real-time images. The blurred glimpses of the Swarm fleet stirred grim premonitions within the crew.
Unfortunately, the emergency transmissions were severely distorted. The only thing they could confirm was that the survey ship had indeed encountered an alien civilization in deep space.
“The enemy we’ve encountered this time is different from those in the past. This is a true interstellar civilization,” the vice-station manager said, walking over with a heavy heart. “Limited by propulsion technology, civilizations that leave their planet’s surface usually rely on primitive fusion thrust to traverse between systems. But that method is clearly immature. Voyages measured in years weaken the home world’s control over surrounding systems, making it easy for civilizations to fracture due to various complications.”
The Sausage People’s hyperspace technology had only achieved a breakthrough in recent years. But even at six times the speed of light, it meant little to them.
There were simply too few habitable planets in space.
According to their current scans, the nearest habitable planet was potentially thirty-six light-years away, meaning a round trip would take twelve years. And that was only a prediction; even if it met expectations, the environment would likely be far inferior to their home world.
Space was far too empty.
This didn't just refer to the number of planets, but the scarcity of habitable environments for most biological life.
According to the authoritative word of Sausage People scientists, without planetary terraforming technology, a relatively suitable environment would appear in only one out of every ten thousand planets within a habitable zone.
In other words, the Sausage People might not find a second place suitable for survival for tens of thousands of years.
Even if they did, the extreme distance would weaken the connection between the second planet and the first. The lack of communication would inevitably lead to division.
Therefore, the Sausage People believed that any civilization truly capable of long-distance interstellar travel was likely far more powerful than themselves.
The Sausage People's own technology was stuck right at that threshold.
They found that no matter how hard they tried, they couldn't increase their speed. Even though they had developed hyperspace and curvature flight, they were limited by unknown conditions, unable to push past ten times the speed of light.
“A true interstellar civilization?” The station manager’s heart grew heavy. He couldn't deny this view. Based on the intelligence sent back, the enemy that destroyed the survey ship was terrifying. After all, that ship embodied some of their civilization's most advanced technology. Its weapons might not have been the strongest, but its defensive capabilities were superior even to the space station itself.
“Notify the surface.”
The station manager realized the danger, but he didn't realize how quickly it would arrive.
In truth, the most correct choice would have been to immediately begin establishing a defense line for interstellar war against an unknown civilization.
But the manager didn't do that. After some discussion, he simply forwarded the information to the ground observation station.
Half an hour later, the observation station flagged the message as high priority and sent it to the superiors.
The superiors were shocked and held a two-hour meeting, eventually deciding the issue needed to be reported to an even higher level.
Twelve hours later, the top brass finished their discussion and concluded that the threat from the unknown interstellar civilization was real. They began considering ways to deal with the Swarm, holding multiple meetings to debate the specifics.
Two days later, with remarkable efficiency for their kind, the Sausage People passed a resolution to build several state-of-the-art battleships over the course of a year. Simultaneously, they would construct a massive number of outposts within their home system, each equipped with heavy weaponry to repel the Swarm's advance.
By the seventh day, personnel were assigned and boarded a ship for a planet in the outer orbit of the home system to begin construction on an outpost.
To quickly make the outpost combat-ready and allow it to observe the alien civilization, a missile base and three giant electromagnetic cannon launch platforms were transferred to the site and installed that day.
Standing before the massive launch platforms—each a hundred meters tall—the Sausage People workers couldn't help but feel a sense of pride.
That tangible presence and the immense destructive power they represented provided a boost to their confidence.
“The surface says this will be a combat base to deal with the hostile civilization. Once finished, its scale will be the first of its kind. It’ll have over a hundred giant electromagnetic cannons and twenty missile launch pads.”
“So many? It seems the higher-ups are taking this very seriously,” a nearby colleague said, visibly shocked.
“Well, the survey ship was blown up. That happened over ten light-years away. Even if the enemy can find us, it’ll take them a long time to get here. This period is our window for development.”
As they spoke, they had no idea that only a few days later, the Swarm fleet had already exited hyperspace and suddenly appeared in the nearby void.
The faint signals meant the civilization hadn't detected their presence at all.
The Zerg fleet performed a quick scan. They found that the Sausage People had three complete spaceports in the system. The largest was in orbit above the home planet, while the second and third were located near two outer gas giants. These spaceports were equipped with various defensive installations, and their combat capacity far exceeded that of the survey ship encountered previously.
Beyond that, there were numerous smaller bases clustered around the home planet.
As for bases under construction, there were four in total. Three had just broken ground, and only one actually had weapons installed.
“Is this it?”
Aside from the area around the home planet, which looked like a hedgehog, the defenses elsewhere were practically negligible.
“Although it would be easy to destroy them with the main cannons, the resources recovered from the wreckage wouldn't be as good as if we just killed them directly.”
Recalling the energy absorbed from the previous battle, Xia Jin decided to conduct a standard space engagement.
She would deploy the Swarm to seize the spaceports through close-quarters combat before turning her attention to the planet.
In fact, for the Zerg, this type of battle was the most cost-effective.
Rate on N.U.
