No Forgiving
The commander looked at one of the ex-leading figures and grabbed their collar. He pulled them up and pushed his nose against them before screaming to the roaring top of his lungs. “Fighters! They have Fighters, alright. But what's with all these fucking warships?! They are even blocking bullets and shells! What the hell is this?!”
Boom.
Just then, a shell made its way into the hallways outside, opening the walls of the central command to their left, but the commander still didn't let go of the ex-leading figure. Filled with fear, the ex-leading figure hurried to give an explanation, “Yes, yes, yes. We didn't know! But we can still return and posses everything these idiots know! They are only First Step fools, how could they know? How could we have noticed? If it was sir commander, it would've been a whole different story. Yes!”
“Does that matter now?!” The commander yelled. He pushed the person off and let them fall on their bum before walking to the front of the central command, where his citizen and cultivator personnel feared for their lives. Who would’ve known such an easy walk in the park would end up with that park hiding coyotes?
However, for a repressed and scared as they were, they had enough training to let them pilot or manage a Carrier. They didn’t beg their commander to save them, and kept working their hardest to flee. Meanwhile, the Carrier received more damage as the commander walked towards one of the navigating teams. Just then, a group of missiles made their way in a row from the central command to their port side.
Boom, boom, boom, boom…
The explosions revealed a tunnel leading from the central command to the exterior. The commander could see how the Supreme Battleship on their left was practically a honeycomb. Fire rose from everywhere, leaving nothing of a regular color as a reddish haze permeated within. Some citizens and cultivators came out of whichever hole they found, knelt, and clasped their hands to beg for imprisonment instead of life.
The commander didn’t have time to praise the good anti-chain reaction properties the Carrier had before the scariest unique Fighter of their pursuers closed in. Then, it rapidly finished them all off with only 1 of its machine guns firing at the kneeling people. It was as if multiple machine guns fired one after the other, but it was only 1, which rapidly changed targets, almost instantaneously.
Ta- rararara…
It had circular wings at its sides, a diameter of 1.3 meters, 17 meters long, and the Fighter’s main body a width of 3.5 meters. The Fighter’s cabin 4.8 meters tall, which had 2 floors that the enemy didn’t know about. It had 8 anti-missile turrets, but also 3 of those turrets that could target and flatly crush the bullets and shells sent its way.
All in all, it had 5 machine guns, of which their sharpness and firing rate was the highest of all the other machine gun types.
When it finished firing at the survivors, it turned to face the Carrier. The commander could feel the futility of trying to go against a monstrous machine like this one, but the Fighter didn’t open fire at them. Instead, it threw missiles of equal damage and destruction away before flying off into the sky. Meanwhile, more survivors popped out of the nearly destroyed Supreme Battleship.
“Incoming!” The commander alerted the central command with a rough voice before throwing himself to the side, floating away with utmost speed. The others didn’t have time to react, let alone the citizens. In a second, a couple of missiles made their way to the Carrier.
… boom, boom…
“… Great job, the General will reward you greatly, ace.” The Sect Fighters chatted as they continued firing at the Carrier’s personnel wherever they showed. The enemy cultivators were also sought after and soon dealt with. They had a blast as the enemy was practically in ruins.
Meanwhile, behind them, the 3 Small Fleets that had previously only patrolled every day followed suit, not missing a bit of speed behind their Fighters. They kept firing every now and then, but only when securing the arsenal in the Carrier wouldn’t be highly damaged.
The Supreme Battleship moving beside the Carrier, the sole warship that managed to protect the Carrier for 12 minutes after being chased on the water’s surface, finally stopped moving forth. Its speed remained for a few tens of seconds due to inertia, but it finally began slowing down as the Carrier didn’t, but wasn’t far from being unable to keep moving ahead.
Rapidly, several groups of Squadrons moved towards the Supreme Battleship. Some personnel inside them directly killed anyone who didn’t wear black. Then, they and the others dismantled the Supreme Battleship as a whole. Metal plates and weaponry were taken away. Only the ammunition was left behind, along with its functional resources.
Once the Supreme Battleship only remained in the water as melted liquid and corpses everywhere, some without at least half their bodies remaining, the heavy Fighters retreated.
These heavy Fighters were the Sect’s only and most important heavy-tank Fighters. It has several layers of defense, even in its windows. Its cabin is more like a dome, with the design of a wide, frontal-upwards window. Like the main Fighter, the heavy tank Fighter has double glass protection in their windows.
The rest of its body is separated into 4 domes, of which 3 are much larger and wider than the cabin. It doesn’t have aircraft-ish shape, as 1 front is at the center, 2 at its sides, and the ‘main’ dome, which is the cabin-like dome, at the front. It has 2 smallish engines at the back, with a protected module specifically for them. Its total length amounts to 44 meters and a maximum width of 19 meters at the center, while the front and rear are 9.5 meters wide.
Each dome is 6.5 meters tall, with 2 compartments, one above and one below, taking up 1 meter for storage and maintenance purposes. It has 16 anti-missile turrets and 4 of those turrets that can target and block bullets and shells. It has 13 machine guns and 1 artillery gun of slow firing rate. It is much slower, but could be used for quick transportation and assault, like just then.
It didn’t take long for the Carrier to finally stop moving ahead. It meant that the people in charge of it were all finally taken down. Their radars also no longer showed any objective to unalive or to destroy. That’s when more heavy tank Mosteklo Fighters moved forth, whose path was opened by the LD main Fighters.
The Carrier slightly sunk, but a few Frigates far ahead from the rest of their Small Fleets launched what could be torpedoes otherwise. Some cloudy plastic bubbles lifted the Carrier from below, bringing it into up surface. No enemy attempted to escape. If someone had, they would have been neutralized.
If any enemy was awake and knew how many locking machine guns with specialized targeting systems were surrounding the Carrier, they might’ve dropped unconscious at once. Either way, the Mosteklo Fighters stopped near the floating Carrier, which had fallen sideways.
Citizens couldn’t float, but the gravity array formations allowed them to move for 200 meters below the Fighter’s altitude level. These were only about 20 to 50 meters away, so it wasn’t a problem even if they jumped down without array formations.
Before starting salvaging the Carrier, the troops looked for survivors while the Frigates’ crew members stepped into the Carrier to help them out. A few minutes later, as Todoro slowly floated down onto the Carrier, a group of crew members and troops held a peak First Step cultivator.
Behind them, more soldier units brought carcasses. Some brought divided heads whose halves were barely recognizable. Todoro slightly frowned, but this frown eased as he recognized them with his nature reading. As he floated onto the Carrier’s side, Pretieta and Saon finally caught up with him and stared at the trophies.
“This is their commander, Rear Admiral.” A trooper said as he held the enemy commander’s right shoulder brusquely. The commander had no more Power Energy to force his way out. He used it all up to protect himself until the firing stopped, luckily.
When he saw the trifling Obsidiafying realm cultivation base of most of his captors, he wanted to laugh at his dogshit luck. However, they retrained him without an ounce of Power Energy in their bodies. Their mere bodily strength was above his. One of them was enough to kill him now.
However, they weren’t stupid. They moved the enemy commander in group, just in case. Furthermore, one of them did something to the enemy commander’s body, penetrating his vertebral column from behind. At first, the enemy commander thought it was a needle or rapier, but no body weight vibrations came from whatever stabbed him.
Nevertheless, he felt his energy slowly spreading elsewhere, stolen by something else as he remained weak. Then, he thought it was a finger, which was somehow storing his energy away. However, when he finally looked down, he looked at a tool that looked like a disc hovering in the air 2 meters above the floor, 4 inches tall and about a hand’s size in diameter. It ejected vein-like black tendrils that connected to his captors’ medallions or emblems.
When he realized that his Power Energy was being eaten by his captor, the enemy commander was flabbergasted. Because it didn’t seem like they needed to refine it to make it theirs, or even making it their Power Energy alone. He felt their bodies were being nourished!
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Furthermore, he understood that something this bizarre could only be extremely dangerous for the user, but it wasn’t the case here. If one’s Power Energy was poisoned, chaotic, or deviant, it might only take a little less to nourish their bodies, not less or even hurt them.
The realization struck the enemy commander, who remained impassive until Todoro appeared before him. He tried to struggle, but as he was amidst breaking his arms, Todoro lifted his chin and said with downturned eyes. “Name. Organization. Reasons… And you will die without dishonor.”
“Heh,” the enemy commander ceased struggling and looked at Todoro. “You know from where I come from? Then stop dilly-dallying and release me! You should at least know to let everyone know of your great achievements and pass on the message. I’ll do it for you.”
Pretieta frowned in disgust, with Saon remaining neutral as Todoro’s calm voice slowly echoed. “No need.”
“What?!” The enemy commander was taken aback. He rapidly thought of something and urged, “I’m from a powerful organization! We might not own a Region, but we will soon. Yours! If you don’t want to see your homes turn into battles after we leak this information, you better find a thigh to hug onto. We won’t ruin your home, all we would need is resources. We’ll ensure everything is safe and clean, we won’t touch anything else.”
“Mn,” Todoro exclaimed before lifting his right hand. His index finger and thumb formed a pincer as the enemy commander felt his body losing control. His veins wrung, and his heart palpitated one last time before stopping beating. The enemy commander felt his mind wander as his eyes pulsed, seemingly wanting to come out of their sockets. ‘What is this presence? This mighty will! I’m only suffering a Soul attack, but it feels like my body was intruded by his Power Energy… So… wrathful!’
The enemy commander only felt his mind losing vision, not feeling anything more besides the suffocation of dying by asphyxia as his organs ruptured from the inside. He couldn’t see what those around him did. His eyes fell off like thick spaghetti as his fingers broke each other, not knowing what to do from the pain.
Then, the enemy commander’s body twirled in the ground as his head split open, followed by his chest, which spasmed until it ruptured 7 holes the size of a baby’s head and all the mushed organs leaked out.
The troops and crew members nourishing their body with the enemy commander’s Power Energy had already stopped, having stored enough for their next break time. They looked at Todoro before he slightly nodded at them. They punched their left chest a bit before walking away.
The citizens walked to their respective Mosteklo Fighter and were pulled up by the gravity array formations. The cultivators directly floated upwards, bringing one or two with their hands or by their arms’ embrace. Then, they returned to their warships
When the Squadrons returned to their Flotillas, they used the warships’ gravity array formations and their own to not use Powerful Stones up, keeping themselves semi-attached to their Flotilla overall.
It was normal for the enemy to believe every warship had dozens of personal Fighters, when they were just the Flotillas’ Squadrons. Even a Frigate would at least have a Flight, but it was only for emergencies or drastic situations. However, the Squadrons were the warships’ personnel Fighters’ big brothers, always out and fighting with their structures and pilots’ lives in the line.
Beep. “The only way for the world to know the Forbloffende Traes Sect, truly know it, is by knocking at their doors.”
Suddenly, Heian Ciemnosc’s voice emanated from the Rear Admirals’ medallions. They widened their eyes before slightly trembling. Naturally, this wasn’t because Heian Ciemnosc spoke to them, but because of the words he was about to say. If everything was perfect.
“Again. What are you waiting for? First Step Small Fleets have my, the Sect Master’s permission, to deliver the enemy the punch back. Remember, all military forces must honor the Sect and punish those who tarnish it.” Heian Ciemnosc’s voice cut off after that.
The Rear Admirals looked at each other. At first, it was serious and apprehensive, but still excited. But then, Pretieta smiled, and the ‘husband’ and father could only melt. They smiled at Pretieta’s dazzling smile before rushing to their Carriers. They couldn’t waste any time.
… The core mainland Regions were suddenly surprised with a new piece of news. One of their Fourth Step organizations actually listened to a few words of seemingly ‘refugees’ from the Vrida Region. It was rumored that a Region war broke out in the abandoned island Region in the middle of nowhere of the ocean of no one.
The news were already curious enough, but it wasn’t all. Not soon after news of the Vrida Region’s Region war and the Fourth Step organization formally announced their desire to aid a weak 1* Region from disaster, helping them manage that poor land for them, more news came in.
“Hahaha, did you hear about the Godly org who wanted to go find gold? I haven’t heard any of it!” - “Yup. Guess their risk-gain was more risk than gain. I wonder if they’ll grow angry with the Region after finding out there was nothing?” - “Naah. What makes me wonder is how the island Region managed to convince a Fourth Step Region.” - “Must have been nothing true.”
“If Godly orgs were that easy to fool, wouldn’t all 1* Regions mobilize Godly orgs however they can? Hell, they could even make the mainland go to shit, provoking wars between Godly orgs from nothing.” - “True. That’s actually stupid and scary, sigh.”
If there was one thing the world knew what to do in situations of peace where the only battles were taken out as duels in Large Cities; be it inside the ownerless land or the 1*, 2*, and 3* Regions, it was to discuss it.
However, a few months after the news became a thing of the past and was only used to escape from a heavy, failure, or tragic day while drinking. A voice suddenly reverberated throughout the northern Region with shore borders to the empty chasm full of ocean. The voice came from nowhere else but their south.
“I, Sect Master Darkness of the First Step organization, Forbloffende Traes Sect, have been assaulted by an organization from a core mainland Region. My ruling Region, the Vrida Region, was put in danger and shame when unknown enemies wanted to cross our territorial waters and assail us. We have defended against the enemy, but that won’t be the end of our response.”
“I declare war on anyone who wishes to oppose, at the First Step, me and my forces, from enacting vengeance on our offenders!” Heian Ciemnosc’s voice thundered a little before it continued, sounding calm yet venomous. “I invite any fellow First Step organization or force who wishes to make our road even more complicated. Let’s meet in battle. For I, Sect Master Darkness…”
“… of the Forbloffende Traes Sect…” The calm, soft, and quiet voice seemed to grow a second voice behind it. It was hoarse and dragged-on, seemingly from the depths of nothingness. Just as they reacted and wondered how a First Step cultivator could employ such capabilities, the Region started shaking.
Rumble… RUUUUUUUUUMBLEE… RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUMBBBLEEE~!
As a matter of fact, it wasn’t this 3* Region that was shaking; not just them. The entire Authoritarian Summit Divine Kingdom responded to the voice’s declarations! Just as the extraordinary experts in the Kingdom, also top experts across the world, wanted to stare in the voice’s direction of that little, forgotten Vrida Region. They became startled.
“… give rise to the Forbloffende Traes Sect’s transition from the First Step to the Second Step.”
RUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUMBLEEEEE- SHAKE SHAKE SHAKE SHAKE!
As soon as the words dropped, the world seemed to suffer turbulence. The peak experts in the Divine Kingdom suddenly looked down with a frown before their expressions changed. Their eyes expressed intrigued shock, but their focus went to something else afterwards. No matter how curious it seemed to them, it was something correlating to only a 1* or 2* Regions and First Step or Second Step organizations. Nothing coming from them could pique their desire.
On the other hand, the mainland and island Regions looked at the very core of their Kingdom and mainland zone. News’ information spread rapidly, with some figures understanding what was happening. However, for a First Step organization’s transition to cause this much upheaval— it was inconceivable!
Everyone below those peak experts looked into the core’s direction, waiting for whatever development this entailed. The 3* Region, north of the Vrida Region, and the First and Second Step organizations in the free land around it reacted after the Kingdom seemed to become… thrilled and overlay excited?
“What the… hell was that?!” - “Holy… Lords!” - “Is a- puff! Is a First Step coming to attack the mainland Region? Pfff…” - “Bwahahahaha! How stupid is that?! I’m dying today, hahaha.” - “What, is a Sect going to tell us to fuck off while choosing some enemies from the free land? Seriously, how embarrass-” - “What? The southern shore is sending warning alarms to all First Step forces in the Region. They are being called to defend!”
“What?!” For something like that to happen, the first line of defense in the sea territory regarding that Step must have fallen, meaning a few Fleets patrolling every millionth kilometer away from the shores. Only this way could the 3* shore Regions feel safe against others like them.
Even better, it was all now being destroyed by a First Step organization? How many Fleets did they build? Were they actually rich? Is there something they didn’t know?
However, soon, the answer reached the 3* Region’s people and every other Region in the core area. The just-now notorious Forbloffende Traes Sect’s 3 Fleets rushed to the 3* Region’s sea territory. They didn’t offer any word and immediately attacked once in firing range after the voice declared war. The Region’s defensive forces were alarmed as their patrolling ‘Fleets’ lost communication after barely sending a few images.
All they could see was unique warships with unique Fighters making quick, short work of their Fleets. Before they could meet back at the 3* Region, the subsequent lines of defense were pulverized and salvaged before they could send a distress signal or beacon from their medallions. Those who did were ‘too soon’ and only counted as emergency alarms.
Thus, when the Small Sects showed just a few hundred thousand kilometers near the shores, the organizations in charge of defending the various Steps and moving the Region’s forces were left speechless. Only then did the Region-wide alert go off, starting from the southeast…
The 3* Region rapidly heated up, countless First Step cultivators and citizens from a variety of Step organizations dashed to enlist themselves. A dozen old Fleets were prepared and amidst beginning operations after everything was checked thrice. But then…
“Wait… wait… WAIT!”
From the people supervising the Fleets’ preparation, a Third Step organization leader with crossed arms unfolded them and said while narrowing his eyes. He was just looking at the south, when warships emerged under the dark sky, with black smoke revealing their appearances.
Their striking, sharp yet smooth, black structure with always-motioning aesthetics, and overly large volume startled the organization leader before he realized what was happening. However… it was too late!
Poh poh poh poh poh poh poh poh poh poh poh poh poh poh… pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh pfiuh… ta- rararararrrrrrrarararararararaaaaaaarararararararara…!
…