When the Drought-Fiend Sovereign had finished his account,
the Black-God Sovereign spoke up and asked, "So you want us to send legion fleets to support you now?"
The Drought-Fiend Sovereign nodded and said gravely, "It's not that I fear I can't take this Owl Dragon legion fleet. But mind you, the one opposite is the Emperor's Guard Fleet, with the Owl Dragon Emperor in it. We have such a good chance right now to finish off the Owl Dragon Emperor opposite outright, and that's more use than destroying a million Owl Dragon-line interstellar warships. So, to make it a sure thing, I request support from the main fleets."
"Nicely put, but you're just scared, that's all. And the Emperor's Guard Fleet being there, who can promise the Owl Dragon Emperor is sure to be there too? Did you see him with your own eyes? Or did he stop to say hello?" the Troll Monarch said, chuckling.
The Drought-Fiend Sovereign clenched his fists; this Troll Monarch really would not let slip a single chance to sneer at him now.
"Anyway, I've said all I have to say. If you don't believe me, you're free not to send reinforcements. But when the time comes, if the Emperor's Guard Fleet opposite and that Owl Dragon Emperor get away and the chance is lost, don't blame it on me," the Drought-Fiend Sovereign said coldly.
The Troll Monarch meant to sneer a little more, but the Black-God Sovereign stopped him.
The Black-God Sovereign said in a low voice, "Enough. The war is what matters now. Don't bicker among ourselves here. Drought-Fiend has a point. The Owl Dragon Emperor has come fighting into our Devourer Civilization's home universe in person; this is a rare chance for us to kill him outright. That being so, we can send some more reinforcements. Drought-Fiend, how many do you think you need?"
The Drought-Fiend Sovereign said at once, "The more the better, of course; the more there are, the surer it is. And the faster the better too. I think the Owl Dragon Emperor opposite means to make a swift fight of it against me. So if they don't reach their strategic aim in a short time, I think they'll retreat. So our reinforcements have to hurry to get here too. If we have space-jump devices, use them straight away!"
The Black-God Sovereign thought a moment and said, "We don't have many space-jump devices left in reserve. In the fighting before, we used up quite a few rushing support to the star-system battlefields. From here on we can't use them freely; we have to save some. But taking what you say into account, we'll split into two. One force will use the star gates to come to your star system in support. The other will use space-jump devices to reach your star-system battlefield and support you. And to be quicker and more effective, the supporting legion fleets will have to be elite ones."
The Drought-Fiend Sovereign nodded in agreement.
The Black-God Sovereign thought a moment and said, "That being so, let's do it this way. Troll, you lead your Troll Monarch's legion fleet to Drought-Fiend's star system to support him in the fighting, and bring your quasi-T7 Troll Monarch Interstellar Fortress Ship too. With two quasi-T7-grade interstellar warships there, you should be able to hold down the five quasi-T7 Golden-Scarab-class Heavy Interstellar Dreadnoughts opposite, so that we don't lose too many interstellar warships. Besides that, I'll arrange another hundred thousand interstellar warships of the Devourer legion fleets to come by the star-gate route to support you. But that may take twenty-odd hours. And I've also heard that the star gate on your side has been hit and needs nearly twenty hours to repair. But with the legion fleet Troll leads in support, holding out for twenty hours shouldn't be a problem. What do you both think?"
When he had set out his thinking, the Black-God Sovereign looked at the Troll Monarch and the Drought-Fiend Sovereign and waited for their answers.
The Troll Monarch said with a little laugh, "My, my, who'd have thought there'd come a day when this fellow Drought-Fiend would need me to come to his rescue? Since the little fellow begs for help so pitifully, I'll be merciful and support him this once."
The Drought-Fiend Sovereign could have ground his teeth to powder at the Troll Monarch's manner.
But as things stood, there was nothing at all he could do; he could only swallow his broken teeth.
"Since there are no objections, that's how we'll arrange it. Troll, this matter is very important; don't you lose any time over it. I'm asking you: when can your Troll legion fleet reach Drought-Fiend's star-system battlefield, and how many interstellar warships will you send?" The Black-God Sovereign looked at the Troll Monarch.
He probably knew what every one of them was like, too.
So he was nailing all this down now, to keep them from playing more tricks.
The Troll Monarch hesitated a moment, and said, "My Troll Monarch Interstellar Fortress Ship is still in drydock now; starting it up and sailing it out will take at least five hours. How many interstellar warships can I bring? Fifty thousand, say. That's three hundred T6-grade interstellar warships, ten thousand T5-grade interstellar warships, and the rest all T4-grade interstellar warships."
"Five hours?" The Drought-Fiend Sovereign was plainly not very satisfied when he heard how long.
The Black-God Sovereign knit his brows, not very satisfied with the time either.
The Troll Monarch could only shrug, looking helpless, and said, "What can I do about it? I can't conjure my Troll Monarch Interstellar Fortress Ship out of the drydock from thin air."
"Five hours absolutely won't do," the Drought-Fiend Sovereign said straight out.
The Black-God Sovereign thought a moment and gave his view: "Five hours is a bit long, true. Let's do it this way. Troll, you don't need to move your whole legion fleet over at once. Move part of it over first. Didn't you just say you could move fifty thousand? Fifty thousand is fine. Then send forty thousand interstellar warships over in support now, and once your Troll Monarch Interstellar Fortress Ship is out of drydock, bring the remaining ten thousand interstellar warships to support the battlefield. Would that suit you both?"
Hearing the Black-God Sovereign's view,
the Drought-Fiend Sovereign nodded at once and said in agreement, "I have no objection; that arrangement will do."
With forty thousand interstellar warships in support, nothing too serious would go wrong on his battlefield in the short term.
Then, five hours later, when the Troll Monarch's flagship reached the battlefield, they could wipe out the Owl Dragon legion fleets in one push.
Hearing this arrangement, the Troll Monarch knit his brows slightly, but put forward no objection.
In his heart, true, he would have liked to see the Drought-Fiend Sovereign and the Owl Dragon Emperor fight it out between them while he reaped the fisherman's profit.
But that was not something he could do too openly.
And besides, now that the Black-God Sovereign had spoken up, it was not his place to say anything else.
"Then that's settled. My forty thousand interstellar warships should reach the battlefield in about half an hour. And that half hour isn't me dragging my feet. These forty thousand interstellar warships are going into battle; they have to make some preparations, don't they?" the Troll Monarch said.
Preparations had to be made; everyone knew that.
But whether there was any padding in the Troll Monarch's half hour was something only the Troll Monarch himself probably knew.
The Drought-Fiend Sovereign had no objection to it either.
Half an hour was still no problem.
However strong those five quasi-T7 Golden-Scarab-class Heavy Interstellar Dreadnoughts were, they could not win an absolute advantage on the battlefield within half an hour.
"Then it's settled," the Drought-Fiend Sovereign said.
"Don't worry, I won't let you down. You, though, don't go failing to hold out even this half hour. When the time comes, I won't have the time to spare for collecting your corpse." The Troll Monarch did not forget to get in one last jab.
Only then did the council of the three Sovereigns come to a close.
The Drought-Fiend Sovereign opened his eyes and swung his fist hard.
He swore: "That bastard Troll only knows how to kick a man when he's down. With space-jump devices, that fellow's forty thousand interstellar warships could be sent over in fifteen minutes at most. And he says they need half an hour to prepare. Hmph. The swine. I'll find a chance to settle this score with him later!"
When the Drought-Fiend Sovereign had vented his anger, he looked at the battlefield as it stood.
This video council had taken only a few minutes from start to finish.
And now, on the battlefield, the interstellar interceptors and interstellar drone swarms sent out by those five quasi-T7 Golden-Scarab-class Heavy Interstellar Dreadnoughts had pressed up to the front of the Drought-Fiend Sovereign's legion fleet behind the "golden downpour."
And by now the golden downpour was plainly not so terrible as before.
By the look of it, the terrible fire of this quasi-T7 Golden-Scarab-class Heavy Interstellar Dreadnought could not be kept up for long.
But the attacks still raining down were still terribly heavy.
"Have we recorded any combat data on the interstellar interceptors and interstellar drone swarms under that quasi-T7 Golden-Scarab-class Heavy Interstellar Dreadnought opposite?" the Drought-Fiend Sovereign asked.
A subordinate stepped forward at once and said, "The staff department is analyzing it already. These are some of the combat images gathered so far, and some simple analysis data. Please look them over first."
The Drought-Fiend Sovereign looked at the several combat images before him.
The interstellar interceptors could be seen to be astonishingly fast, almost a match for a T6-grade interstellar cruiser, and they could also put on short bursts of speed.
With speed at the T6 grade and a hull only the size of a T4, their bursts of speed were naturally astonishing.
The weapons they carried were rapid-fire guns, very fast-firing, with T6-grade power. Taken all together, these interstellar interceptors could just about count as quasi-T7-grade interstellar warships;
that is, they reached quasi-T7 level in certain respects.
As for the interstellar drone swarms, there were about three million drones, with fighting power solidly at T6 grade, and astonishing defense.
By observation, the interstellar drones were made of a special alloy, and even after losing their star shields they still had quite astonishing defense.
So their fighting power was considerable.
These two together had fighting power equal to over a thousand of the Drought-Fiend legion fleet's interstellar warships.