It must be said, mechanical life learns exceedingly fast.
Out of those Machine Race troop-carriers Ah-Yin had brought, squad after squad of Machine Race soldiers boarded those berthed warships, and in the main could drive them away within half an hour.
And after an hour's practice besides, they could bring out that warship's whole fighting strength!
"We have signed a great order this time.
"2,000 trillion star coins.[1]
"Half again above that great order of 900 trillion we signed with the Angel Race before."[2] Zhao Chen watched the warships being driven away one after another, and looked toward Lilith beside him.
Only that this takes in besides the licensing fee for that starship technology, the T5 Prisoner-class Heavy Interstellar Assault Battleship, which Zhao Chen furnished the Machine Race.
Lilith said levelly, "You have signed a great order, Commander; but of this great order of ours we have not yet seen a coin of payment."
Zhao Chen laughed. "The Machine Race is so great a house and so great an estate; and if they truly dare default upon the account.
"Then I shall dare go and collect it myself!"
By rights Zhao Chen would firmly never do business of this kind.
But…
With that quarterly mission's ten thousand task points standing there before him, Zhao Chen is willing to bear some risk.
And he believes besides that the Machine Race will not default.
Though 2,000 trillion star coins is an astronomical figure.
The Angel Race as it now stands would likely find it a very hard business to gather 2,000 trillion together.
But for the Machine Race it is no hard thing.
Within Machine Race territory there are yet great quantities of districts of resource and mine; and were the Machine Race willing to set the rights of working those mines against the debt, Zhao Chen could bring himself to accept that too.
And just at this time he saw squadron after squadron of T2 Lion-King-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Ships sailing out — the chief class among the T2 warships, and a very great share of them.
For though she be a warship of T2 grade, her part upon a field falls not the least behind any warship of T3 grade.
And this vast number of T2 Lion-Kings Zhao Chen dug out of the Northern Goose Group.
For before this Zhao Chen had licensed the Northern Goose Group to produce T2 Lion-King-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Ships as the starships of their escort fleets.
And Li Wei had from that time begun to lay up T2 Lion-Kings in quantity.
And when Zhao Chen came to ask for them, this fellow had of all things laid up a hundred thousand T2 Lion-Kings!
Zhao Chen had not known until he looked; and looking, he had a fright.
And this while Li Wei worked no harm to the Northern Goose Group's productive industry besides, scraping them out little by little from what small surplus of production time there was.
But this time Zhao Chen swept the whole net at one haul.
When Li Wei heard then that Zhao Chen would take away every T2 Lion-King, the look upon him was no less than a man's whose little private hoard, stored up these many years, has been carried off root and nest by his young wife.
But Zhao Chen promised Li Wei that the Northern Goose Group might thereafter produce T3 Judicator-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Ships as the warships of the group's escort fleets.
At which Li Wei's look turned in an instant from overcast to fair, and he packed up all hundred thousand T2 Lion-Kings, with the matching interstellar missiles besides, and sent them off to Zhao Chen.
The T2 Lion-King is a good thing.
But what help is there when the T3 Judicator is better still!
"With these warships to fill up the field, the Machine Race should be able to hold out until the month's end." Zhao Chen muttered it to himself.
For if, when he has put out so great a strength, the Machine Race should still pay grievous casualties, then they are truly an A-Dou that cannot be propped up.[3]
"Commander, there is some word upon the Demon Race."
All at once a communication sprang up before Zhao Chen; it was Charlotte.
Zhao Chen returned at once to his own office and opened the communication window.
"Charlotte, what is the case? Have you found the Demon Race's starship works?" Zhao Chen asked at once.
Whence in the end came those warships the Demon Race has burst out with has all along been a question upon Zhao Chen's mind.
Charlotte said, her voice low, "At present there is no certain word.
"But we have made some discovery.
"When one of our T5 Phantasm-class Light Interstellar Stealth Scout Ships reached this coordinate star system of the Demon Race's.
"She found a particular fluctuation of space.
"And then drew near to observe.
"This is a star system where the traces of men are rare; by certain records of intelligence, this system has no deposit of ore whatever, its one star has already come to its last years, and within the system there has been no record of intelligent life living for many years.
"And yet, when our Phantasm scout entered it, she found several warships upon patrol within this system.
"At which the Phantasm's captain was much perplexed: why should such a star system have warships patrolling it, and there was even found a small military star port besides, where the patrolling warships all lie berthed.
"Yet the Phantasm scout swept this system several days together and found nothing amiss.
"Until, drawing near a certain place, she found an anomalous fluctuation of space."
"An anomalous fluctuation of space?" Zhao Chen was perplexed.
Nothing there whatever, and yet an anomalous fluctuation of space?
"Did the scout not enter that coordinate to look?" Zhao Chen pressed.
"Unluckily, that district where the spatial fluctuation is anomalous lies exceedingly near the military star port, and the lanes entering it are all choked off.
"And upon several neighboring planets counter-stealth equipment has been set up.
"The Phantasm's captain looked it over, and her reckoning is this: the lane is too narrow, and too near the counter-stealth equipment.
"So that even a T5 Phantasm-class Light Interstellar Stealth Scout Ship could hardly pass through," said Charlotte.
"Then is there no way to look into it clearly?" Zhao Chen drew his brows together.
Charlotte shook her head, and went on, "A starship cannot go in; but that does not mean nothing else can."
"An unmanned stealth scouting craft!" It came to Zhao Chen of a sudden.
Charlotte nodded. "Yes.
"The Phantasm's captain ordered an unmanned stealth scouting craft sent out; for its small bulk, the likelihood of its being detected is very low.
"And so it passed the dangerous district smoothly, and came near the coordinate district.
"But then a marvelous thing happened."
"What?" Zhao Chen asked.
"The unmanned stealth scouting craft of a sudden vanished out of the empty air, and its signal was lost," Charlotte said, her face set.
"Vanished?" Zhao Chen was astonished.
Charlotte nodded.
Zhao Chen thought a while. "Not destroyed?"
"No."
"Did it take electromagnetic interference, and the frame be paralyzed?"
"There is no such possibility."
"Then for what cause?"
"I am setting people here to look into this business too, and it is not yet made out.
"And so I thought first to report it to you," Charlotte said helplessly.
Zhao Chen paced back and forth within the office, thinking upon this question.
Vanished?
An anomalous fluctuation of space?
A starship-building base that cannot be found?
Something came to Zhao Chen of a sudden, and he cried out, "A dimensional space? Or rather a folded space? Spatial stealth technology!"