When she took stock of how many humans were on her chosen planet, Crossed Antennae thought they may have significantly undershot their population targets. There were almost as many humans here as void ants!

Well, that wasn’t actually true, it was just a lot of humans. But there was certainly more human biomass than what the void ants made up. Estimates indicated almost a million humans amassed on the planet, replete with ships to ease their journeys. Crossed Antennae truly hoped this was the most significant population of invaders on any of the border planets, and while she thought it should be, other locations might have surpassed it depending on timing.

She wasn’t focused on Bounty, despite that being her first world. It was too close to the midpoint between the Exalted Quadrant and the Trigold Cluster for either side to focus on Bounty as one of the border systems.

There were still a few more years for the last people to show up, though she suspected most of those who could be here had already arrived by the latest batch.

She and her people had been keeping careful tabs on the humans. They had a few cities plopped down around the planet, targets upon which the void ants were now converging- they could only move so fast, after all. Fortunately the humans would be leaving plenty of places to hide, and they had food nearby. The void ants could consume some small portion of it to supplement what they brought with them as they traveled. The planets only had very basic nutrition available, but it covered the entire surface.

The humans were farming more, probably finding it impractical to supply such large armies for many years at a time simply via shipping. They were… terrible at it. Oh, sure, they produced enough staple foods to feed their entire population but that didn’t make them any good at the process. Crossed Antennae had seen good farming on Akrys. Care taken to make each plant produce as much as it could- and to not simply slather the area with energy hoping things would grow. Most of that energy would be wasted, not finding its way into the plants. Otherwise, she wouldn’t mind so much.

More humans might be on their way, but it wasn’t terribly likely. In this particular group, there were a dozen Augmentation cultivators. Maybe ten thousand were Integration cultivators, which would be a serious issue for any planet they attacked if they had a balanced fight. Nowhere had thousands of Assimilation cultivators. But of course, the battlefield wouldn’t be balanced.

Any upper realms cultivators wouldn’t be able to recover their energy, nor would they be able to fight at full power. They could adapt to ‘lower energy’, but they simply wouldn’t be as effective after that. Except for natives, but the majority of the armies simply couldn’t be native to the lower realms- the remaining nearly one million who were below Integration had been born in the upper realms. Probably most of the Integration cultivators, too, instead of going through Ascension.

Their numbers and total fighting power were still alarming, but optimally every single one of these fellows- starting from the top- would die in transport. Not that the lower realms was counting on that. It was impossible for the void ants to solve all of their problems, and while they were especially potent against human cultivators, void ants could be defeated by proper tactics- or just squashed.

Crossed Antennae was willing to bet that whatever ship she ended up on would be cleared out, though. Technically, all of the others were betting their lives as well, but they were individually weaker.

She had tried to use her authority as queen to force her four weird guards to go to other ships. Their skills would be helpful, with their various abilities. But they insisted they have a proper royal guard retinue, and that the other royal guards could go wherever she desired instead of the four of them. She couldn’t argue with that. So with five of them, they could definitely take down a ship.

Not that she would be foolish about it. She had assigned to herself a small contingent of ten thousand, enough to create a few combat formations to more efficiently assault the humans. From now on everything was about stealth and timing, as killing humans in confines of ships would be much easier than chasing them down across far fields- or into the skies, given that only a small portion of void ants could fly.

There was now a communication blackout with the rest of her people on other planets. The training they had received would have to be sufficient. She had to trust them. It was surprisingly difficult, but she didn’t really have a choice.

Hopefully the lower realms was doing well with their own preparations.

-----

Once more, Anton visited Xicil. He figured it wasn’t too burdensome to cause everyone to flee inside once every few decades… right? Okay, it was a massive disruption- but it was unlikely they needed the labor. The planet was doing great.

It seemed that they had rearranged how they grew crops. To Anton, it almost looked natural now. They were limited in their selections given the arid nature of the planet, but they had a wide variety of plants with the core of their production being cactus and succulents. They were no longer placed in clear rows, which would be inconvenient for harvest but perhaps better conceal them from observers. Anton had slowly noticed a small change in style, but they seemed to have ramped up and finalized it just recently. Perhaps their people sensed the shift in the tides.

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Anton left just a simple message in the same area before, in case they hadn’t noticed. “The Tides of the World shift. Keep safe. I will return after the end of the cycle, and hope to speak to someone, but will respect your wishes if you choose to remain isolated even after that time.” What else could he say? “We have detected no invasion forces on a path that would bring them here, but cannot completely deny the possibility they will come.”

-----

Some time later, Anton found himself on Azun. The tiny star had been hugely influential on the course of his life, affecting both his encounters and his cultivation. If he had not come to seek the neutron star, they would not have met many of their eastern allies. It was also possible there would still be a strong presence of the Trigold Cluster further east and closer to the border. While the Shining Cooperative would have ended up at war with them still, without the support of the Lower Realms Alliance it would have been a hard fought war, perhaps ending in a stalemate.

Varghese and In’istra. Aipra. None would have been part of his life without Azun.

The star itself was quite amazing as well, with astonishing density that had shaped Anton’s techniques. His abilities to make use of gravitation and magnetism were mainly due to Azun- though he had to admit that Weos’ star had provided him his first guidance on the former.

Should they have reached further, to try to find more oppressed by their enemies? No, the Alliance would have been stretched too far and too thin. They were even now still building up the strength of their longer branches. Maybe with another six centuries, they would expand their total domain- if that was even necessary. Though Anton had no doubt that there were many planets unduly controlled by the upper realms even now, so it was still a worthwhile cause. But they could only do so much, and they had to consider their own survival.

Anton reached down and scooped up pieces of the neutron star. They were far beyond his capability to lift naturally, it came only due to his connection. Since Anton could be called upon to fight both masses of enemies or single powerful opponents, different techniques would be necessary for each. Gravity might be the best tool in his arsenal for groups, unless they happened to come in on metal ships.

He could employ gravity directly, drawing things in. However, Anton had other ideas. It wasn’t really the style of technique he usually went for, using energy on its own. From the beginning his style had grown from the bow, and he felt that was still appropriate.

Previously he had practiced various sorts of techniques. He could indeed create a wave of gravity that followed his arrows, but it was a bit too indiscriminate. Anything he shot past would feel the effects, potentially drawing them in. That meant long circuitous routes around his allies, and while Anton didn’t mind such displays he didn’t want to be forced into a particular method.

An arrow imbued with his energy could carry it to a certain designated point then release it, drawing in everything around it. This would allow him to target the core of an enemy fleet without making his assault as obvious. If he simply used his energy, it was like a wave of power sweeping over the surroundings. Like that, while the attack would still register as dangerous, most wouldn’t expect the spread of that danger until too late.

Then there was another method, meant for targeting individuals. While Anton might have liked to do something like collapse an enemy in on themself, by the time he managed to reach their body there were any number of more efficient ways to kill them. Instead, he used more esoteric methods that only had the essence of gravity.

This was to create an arrow that could strike someone and pin down their position to a point in space. It was somewhat relative to Anton’s perception, and the extent of what he could actually do depended on the power he used. He could even lock someone into their current movement trajectory, for a few moments, preventing changes to their acceleration with a sort of ‘weight’. The important part was that he did not need to pierce their defensive energy, at least not completely. His attack could attach to it instead.

The weaknesses were that it could be overpowered, especially if he left it to passive control as he focused on other shots. But it never hurt to have another tool in his arsenal.

Anton practiced, shooting arrow after arrow from Azun’s surface. Sometimes, he let its gravity bind his shots, fighting against its power. Other times, he allowed them to fly free of its influence, streaking off into the galaxy to reach whatever point he pleased… within a certain number of lightyears, of course.

An odd thing, that. Once, Anton’s world had been Dungannon and within those confines, his family farm. The woods were part of that as well. At that time, the range of his bow had been measured in the low hundreds of meters, and the world around him had been just as limited. Not that it had been bad. It had suited him for his entire life.

Slowly, everything had expanded. He joined the Order of Ninety-Nine Stars- at the time- and improved his abilities. He began looking at international politics and learned Horizon Shot. His archery allowed him to influence the broader world, and as his power grew he went from nations to continents to the whole planet. Long ago, he had gone from the planet to neighboring systems. Now he felt himself watching over a good slice of the lower realms- though Anton understood them to be expansive enough that he might never reach the end of them if he chose to travel as far as he could. He wasn’t sure how far the dominion of humans had spread… but he was content with his slice of the world. It simply happened to be larger now. And whenever outside forces intruded upon him, he would be ready to face them. That was the one thing he regretted from his ‘first’ life, believing himself safe where he was. He’d almost been right, but almost was not sufficient.