Numerous arrows were already on the way by the time anyone noticed Anton, at which point their engines were destroyed a moment later. Not that the Trigold Cluster had much in the way of proper engines, relying more on mobility formations. But Anton was able to recognize those easily enough, and he just had to break a few important bits. Nothing difficult, if he just synchronized the arrival time of a dozen shots.

Before his assault, Anton had made certain there weren’t any other ships for a great distance. Better for this disappearance to be mysterious… which was why he immediately set around dismantling everything else. The Trigold Cluster was decent with formations, but ultimately the ship’s still fell in the realm of Life Transformation cultivators. As an Enrichment cultivator, Anton still had the power of a late Assimilation cultivator even away from the domains of his bound stars.

Perhaps a full squadron might begin to challenge him, and a coordinated fleet might be able to endanger him- if they could get close, that was. Even if they could slightly outpace him in speed, Anton had a great rate of recovering natural energy and could whittle them down. Then of course there was the question of making instantaneous changes in direction, which was outside the realm of most ships. They’d have to get in range for their cultivators to fight, and most of them weren’t trained to fight in space unaided.

Ultimately, this group clearly hadn’t expected to run into any opposition, so they were woefully unprepared in their reactions. Many didn’t even have their storage bags on them, and those that did found strings and straps severed. Anything they reached for was either destroyed- or their hand was. Anton didn’t have a whole lot of sympathy for the people involved, Void Scrying Sect members, Twin Soul Sect, and some Slithering Serpent Sect as well. The latter gave a bad name to snakes everywhere.

Anton inserted himself into their trajectory, making his way closer. “Cooperate, and all of you will have a chance to live.” That chance was extremely small, especially for the Twin Soul Sect members… but it was something.

This group was much smaller than the raid on In’istra which had multiple ships involved, so he had sufficient energy restricting restraints available. After that was accomplished, he pushed the ship onto a new trajectory, as well as adjusting the path of the container they were coming for.

Then he waited, watching over them while continuing to improve his connection to Naewu. He’d be done in a few months, and that would greatly help his efforts in the area, attempting to find more similar activity. He had already sent off a message about the container a day earlier, and he provided an update. Anton didn’t expect anyone to arrive for at least a month, probably two given that they would have to take a route avoiding the Trigold Cluster’s territory, skirting the northern edge of the border.

The Shining Cooperative would likely arrive before anyone from the Lower Realms Alliance, however. They might cut that time to three weeks, if they pushed it. Anton didn’t want to rush anyone, but someone would probably notice this group never returned… and they might want to do something about that. Anton wasn’t able to bring a whole ship and massive container with him through subspace, so in essence they were barely moving. Close enough for proper scouts to pick up.

And while Anton wouldn’t mind wiping out that second group, prioritizing recovery of the mysterious container was important. He didn’t want to probe too much, just in case he might trigger some reaction. If he was making bioweapons and star destroying devices, he wouldn’t want that to easily fall into enemy hands.

-----

The victory in Egnos had precipitated a sudden shift in the war. Though it did take some amount of manpower to keep the planet secure, that overlapped with the same personnel that were using it as a base of operations for advancement further into enemy territory. And the Trigold Cluster only had a limited number of high population worlds in the lower realms.

With one world occupied by and one destroyed by the Trigold Cluster’s own hand, there were only a few more on either side of the civil war they had sparked- the most important being Xeotov under control of the Void Scrying Sect and their allies, and Kunion with the Fearsome Menagerie and the others. But they would likely fight all the more fiercely because they were on the back foot.

But at least they now had an idea where some of the weapons came from. Flung through the void of space and left to drift for decades, that also meant there wasn’t much hope of rapid adaptation- and if they could cut off more shipments, the Trigold Cluster’s position would weaken even more.

-----

The capture of Egnos came with another major advantage. They had a full suite of working comms arrays. They were less effective than their own, but most importantly they were part of a network. There weren’t a large number of compromising messages in storage, and it seemed they couldn’t spy on messages meant for another destination- though they were working on that possibility.

But even so, having a way to make contact without being physically present was a huge step for potential negotiations. Once they were confident enough in the security of the system, they sent a message to Kunion, asking about their intentions. They didn’t expect to be trusted, but they might at least work towards mutual goals. That was the plan, though they hadn’t gotten an answer yet. Being new to the workings of those particular communications devices, they were uncertain if the transmission could be blocked by the interposed Xeotov, or if the others were simply taking time to respond.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Or perhaps they had no interest in talking to people from the lower realms at all. In which case, letting the two factions bleed each other dry was the best call. But in relation to that came a point of contention. One between the Shining Cooperative and the Lower Realms Alliance, and even within the separate groups. Specifically, it involved how to deal with those that remained, like the population of Egnos.

The extreme end of one faction wanted to wipe them all out, but that position wasn’t quite as radical as it sounded. After all, everyone agreed that the members of the Twin Soul Sect had to be eliminated entirely. Why not members of other sects that were just as responsible for destruction in the lower realms?

The debate had come up before, but that was before they had full access to a planet that they had to deal with somehow. The only thing they were able to do immediately was begin freeing slaves. They were generally powerless- at most in the first two stages of cultivation- and of course had no choice about supporting the greater systems.

The task of finding and freeing all of them, more than any other, took the most time and effort of anything else. Even with thousands of ships in their fleets, they didn’t have enough cultivators to smoothly deal with billions of individuals. Their forces represented less than a thousandth of the population- though ultimately, a majority of the fighting power. That was due to their Assimilation cultivators as well as the withdrawal of many cultivators before the attempt at creating a chain reaction of destabilized stars.

-----

Another basement they thought he wouldn’t notice. Another grandmother and a grandson, huddled together with many others. Varghese shook his head. Why did people have to choose the path of death? At least it made the decision much easier.

He didn’t even need to pull out a weapon. No, perhaps it was best to say that he didn’t use a single weapon of his own. Because he did make use of every weapon in the building, all at once. Egnos was his domain, now, and he was only facing a few dozen Essence Collection cultivators and a handful of Life Transformation cultivators. The former died instantly, their weapons pulled from their hands or their belts. Not all metals were inherently magnetic, at least not on the normal scale of magnetism seen in the world. But most used by cultivators were, and the rest could have that property enhanced. Every cultivator fell to their own weapons.

The few Life Transformation cultivators reacted in different ways. One of them ran after managing to block his own spear. That made him live a few moments longer. One woman turned towards the slaves they were guarding, gathering energy for an attack. She was the first of the Life Transformation cultivators to fall.

Varghese hadn’t even entered the building yet, then he stomped through the front door. “Your assets are forfeit,” he said the the managerial woman standing there.

“But-”

“Yes, yes, they threatened you. And if you had come to us, those criminals in the basement would still be dead before they could do anything.”

“Wait,” the woman’s eyes widened. “That was-”

Varghese let the power of the sun flare through his eyes. “You didn’t feel wrong. I have some slaves to go free, but let me leave you with some reminders. You’ll be left with enough to live, and if you try to flee with anything you’re not entitled to, your life will be forfeit. At the moment, we have no reason to take your lives. Maybe warn others about the part where being threatened isn’t good enough.”

Technically, there were some situations where the manager and the others could get away without forfeiting everything, but that was something for the bureaucracy people to manage. Varghese didn’t have any motivation to stop anyone from leaving- there wasn’t actually anywhere they could run to, since they couldn’t get off planet. And while these people were complicit in the crimes, he didn’t get the feeling they were the main contributors so it wasn’t his job.

He entered the basement to see a ten year old kid barely holding up one of the spears. “I-I won’t let you hurt my family!” he said as the door opened.

“Bad choice kid,” Varghese said, yanking the weapon out of his hands. Then he tossed a small blade at his feet. “That one’s both easier to use and better quality.” He looked at the cowering people in the room. “Now everyone line up so I can rip off those stupid slave collars.”

“But-” a woman began to speak.

As the first person to protest she got to be the example. Certainly, it would be a shock to everyone… but Varghese reached out, slicing the collar open. The energy contained with in exploded outward… or at least tried to. But an explosion meant to kill people on that level was easily suppressed. At most, people saw a flash of light, before the material of the collar was tossed aside as a molten heap of slag.

“Next,” Varghese said. “You can go, by the way,” he said to the startled woman. “There’s a few people outside you can talk to that will help you get things sorted out. You’ll be set up with proper food and shelter.”

“How will I know who they are?”

“They’re the only people outside the building,” Varghese said. The youth stepped forward, and Varghese removed his collar without even looking. Ultimately, slavery was impractical for cultivators. They were better off engaging in similar and equally despicable practices, as the expense required to keep people in line grew with the value they could provide, in general. Ultimately, cultivation was required to go beyond a certain level in crafts and the like, so slaves mostly were used as basic servants and manual labor- but again, said manual labor was more efficient when done by proper cultivators.

Though Varghese didn’t let it show on his face, he was teeming with emotions inside. He was aware of how slavery had affected his master’s family in the past, and there were problems on In’istra as well- both from natives and Trigold invaders. This was one area upon which every member of the Lower Realms Alliance had to agree to join, and the Shining Cooperative seemed to support it as well.

Varghese always had an itching feeling in the back of his mind that this was beneath him, that he should be fighting in the war. And then Anton’s voice would always remind him that taking care of people was the most important. This was what mattered. Battle was simply necessary to reach this point where people could be uplifted, and to protect against anyone who wished to stop it.