Author: 唇亡齿寒 / Lips Gone, Teeth Cold
Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/
Chapter 133
“Order the garrison to intercept them!”
“We can’t intercept them, Your Highness. They’re too fast!” Leo was sweating himself. “If the pilots of the Lady of the Night were at Sword Bow A, we might have been able to stop them, but now it’s too late to send reinforcements… Your Highness! They’ve broken through the planetary defense perimeter!”
Alveira’s clenched fists turned white at the knuckles. “What is Winnet trying to say with this? Is he trying to show me that he can also capture my territory through a surprise attack?”
“Your Highness! They’ve dropped bombs!” Leo shouted in alarm. “They’ve dropped two antimatter missiles on the capital of Sword Bow A!”
On the simulation map, a swath of red flashed. The capital of Sword Bow A had suffered severe damage, turning into a dark purple area on the map.
“This… Damn it!” Alveira could hardly believe her eyes. The Royal Fleet had just left Sword Bow A, and now it was under attack by the rebels… and they even dropped two antimatter missiles on the planet’s capital…
“The enemy transport ship has been shot down by the planetary forces, and their flight squadron is surrounded by the garrison!”
With their mothership destroyed, the flight squadron had only three options: surrender, be shot down, or crash due to running out of fuel.
“Your Highness, the flight squadron has surrendered!”
Alveira stared at the flashing red lights on the simulation map, saying nothing. Everything had happened so quickly—in less than a minute, the Royal Fleet’s rear base had been attacked, and the attackers had quickly surrendered. Leo, thinking the Princess had not yet reacted, softly repeated, “Your Highness, they have surrendered… The enemy pilots said they brought a message from Winnet…” His voice was almost a whisper because Alveira’s expression was so terrifying, as fierce as an enraged beast.
“What did the old man say?”
Leo relayed the enemy pilot’s message exactly. “I bring a message from the Duke to the esteemed Princess. The Duke says this is the punishment for the Sword Bow star system that betrayed him. He also says he looks forward to facing you in the Damoni star system.”
After the message finished playing, Leo asked in an even smaller voice, “Your Highness, the enemy pilots have disarmed and are requesting to be treated as prisoners of war…”
“No surrender accepted!” The Princess growled in a low voice. “Shoot them down! Leave none alive!”
“But… But Your Highness, this violates the interstellar convention…”
“They dropped antimatter missiles on a city—did they follow the interstellar convention?” Alveira pointed furiously at the star map. “Since they dared to do this right under my nose, they should have prepared to die! Winnet is trying to cut off my retreat! Does he want to force me into a death match with him? I’m not that foolish!” She laughed in anger. “Leo, announce to the national media: the rebels launched a surprise attack on Sword Bow A, dropped two antimatter missiles, and then surrendered, but Alveira Chabais did not accept the surrender and killed them all! Just announce it like that! I want to see whether more people blame me or spit on Winnet!”
……
On the bronze outer wall of Charon Station, a heavy door spiraled open. The Northern Cross starship carefully maneuvered through the door, with Alois at the helm, more nervous than when piloting a fighter into enemy lines.
Behind the door was a cylindrical passageway, its walls smooth and seamless, as if made from a single piece of metal. Two white light strips embedded on either side illuminated the dim space station.
“This place really feels eerie,” Casper remarked, his tone filled with wonder and anticipation, devoid of any real sense of eeriness.
“Charon Station, named after Charon, the moon of Pluto. In ancient Earth mythology, Charon was the ferryman who transported souls across the River Styx to the underworld,” Joshua explained. “It’s only natural for it to feel a bit eerie.”
Alois nearly pressed the wrong button out of nerves. “Don’t scare me like that!” he shouted. “I might just crash the ship into the wall!”
“Then we’d truly be heading to the underworld.”
After leaving the passageway, the ship entered a vast space. There was no lighting here, possibly to save energy, or perhaps the lighting system had broken down over the centuries. Alois turned on the searchlights, and four beams of white light pierced the dark void. This enormous spherical space took up nearly half of Charon Station. The passageway they had just exited was only a small corner of it. The sphere was filled with countless passageways and platforms, with a large metallic ring suspended in the center—large enough for a battleship to pass through—likely a warp gate.
One could imagine how busy this space station must have been during the peak of Old Earth. Every passage would have seen traffic, with moving platforms transporting people and goods through numerous doors and the warp gate operating 24/7, sending countless ships to the Mars base and the lunar base.
Now, it was abandoned, with nothing left inside but the dust and memories of millennia, and…
“Cerberus, Guardian of Hades, at your service,” the synthesized, inorganic voice echoed again. “Shall I activate the lunar warp gate?”
“Yes,” Joshua replied.
This was a low-level AI controlling Charon’s central computer, more like a sophisticated program than a true AI. It had no self-awareness, no simulated personality, and no emotions. Apart from numbers, it had no concept of time. The return of Earth’s last survivors was, to it, merely the return of a long-absent wanderer. It was a loyal sentinel, still guarding its post after the land and nation had crumbled, because that was its purpose.
Joshua thought of Leo. For an AI, being like Cerberus, Guardian of Hades, wasn’t such a bad fate.
As the metallic ring powered up, it began to vibrate. If the station were filled with air, Joshua and the others would have heard a deep rumble, like the first roar of an ancient beast awakening from a long slumber, shaking the soul.
The center of the ring turned black, impenetrable even by the searchlights. The warp gate had opened, ready to transport light itself.
“Hurry,” Joshua urged Alois.
“Huh? Just fly straight through?” The young pilot was at a loss as he pulled the control lever. Long ago, Earth’s colonists had built countless such warp relay stations across the vast Milky Way, and the First Galactic War had destroyed most of them. After Earth’s survivors reached the colonies, some were restored. But centuries before Alois was born, warp engines were invented, and since then, these ancient relay stations had been abandoned. People could travel the universe more conveniently and had no need for these relics.
Alois, like a novice driver under the scrutiny of an instructor and examiner, carefully maneuvered the ship into the ring. As they passed through the gate, a slight dizziness struck Alois, and everything went black. When he regained his vision, a completely different space from Charon Station lay before him.
Charon had been cold and dark, but here everything was stark white. White warp gates, white walls, white passageways, and white lights. Beyond the pale base was a vast, white expanse of lunar soil.
This was the Moon, the place where humanity first left its cradle and stepped into the cosmos.
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