The fourth month.
The first T2 Iron-Hammer-class Heavy Interstellar Industrial Ship was completed.
The fifth month…
By this time even the other countries of the Dragon Star Alliance felt a sense of crisis.
Their leaders had noticed too how the Fierce Dragon Kingdom was sparing no effort in its development all this while.
At times, for the sake of development, it even poured in great quantities of resources just to buy more time.
A project that might originally have been finished in a month with a billion invested
now had three billion poured into it outright, with the demand that it be done within a week!
It was the attitude of racing against time.
Fire Lydia stood in the Dragon Palace Starport looking at the starship base under construction in the distance; what she wore now was already the uniform of a Fierce Dragon Kingdom interstellar crew member.
She had handed all her affairs in the Frost Dragon Kingdom to her subordinates and resigned the title of the Frost Dragon Kingdom's Commander-in-Chief of the Navy,
choosing to join the system of the Fierce Dragon Kingdom's Interstellar Academy.
After a spell of study and hard work, she was now a member of the Fierce Dragon fleet,
serving at present as a secretary officer aboard Marshal Chu Xuan's starship.
This was a rare stretch of rest time for her; she was strolling the shops in the Dragon Palace Starport and contacting the ground while she was at it.
"Big brother, how've you been lately?" Fire Lydia looked at her brother Fire Phoenix on the other side of the video window.
Fire Phoenix rolled his eyes at his sister and said, "You ask how I've been? Before, we agreed the two of us would govern this country together. Now look. You've run off to play by yourself and left me here alone. You've got some nerve!"
"Heh heh heh, who told you to be my brother? I thought about it: how can one country hold two grown-ups? Don't they always say two tigers can't share one mountain? That's how they always act it out in the TV dramas too; if I stayed in the Frost Dragon Kingdom, wouldn't my merits outshine the throne, and then you and I, brother and sister, would fight among ourselves? Your little sister here has no wish to be king. So I've handed this great responsibility to you."
——————
A year had passed since that cosmic broadcast was received.
In this year,
the Fierce Dragon Kingdom had opened up five resource planets and one habitable world in all,
launching industry and resource extraction on a grand scale.
The T1 interstellar mining ships and T1 interstellar transports concerned had all been built.
And once the first T1-grade interstellar factory was completed, great numbers of interstellar warships went into production.
At the same time, a T2-grade starship factory was being built too.
Both at once, all to make sure the Fierce Dragon Kingdom, walking two roads together, could go faster.
And with the few T2 Iron-Hammer-class Heavy Interstellar Industrial Ships it had built, the Fierce Dragon Kingdom had come to have thirty T2-grade interstellar warships one after another.
But because of capacity limits,
these T2-grade interstellar warships were not its main starships.
The Nancy Empress was at this moment touring an interstellar warship before her.
Before her eyes a data page appeared, the page for this special interstellar warship before her.
T2 Lion King-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Ship
Ship type: Interstellar missile ship
Tech grade: T2
Hull-armor strength: 130 units – 150 units
Cruise speed: 25 star-knots
Warp engine: Grade-4 warp engine
Hull length: 258 meters
Mass: 150,000 tons
Crew posts: 50
Ship weapons: 50-cell interstellar missile launch-silo, with a matched full load of 500 T2 Lion King-class interstellar missiles
"This is one of the three classes of T2 interstellar warship our Fierce Dragon Kingdom has in service now: the T2 Lion King-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Ship. As the name suggests, this is an interstellar warship that chiefly fires interstellar missiles. It's fitted with fifty interstellar missile launch-silo cells and five hundred T2 Lion King-class interstellar missiles. This warship's strength is its powerful firepower. It can fire a great many interstellar missiles in a very short time, achieving a blanketing strike. This intensity of firepower is often equal to that of a hundred or even three hundred starships of other classes of the same grade. Of course this has its drawback too. That is, once its interstellar missiles are fired off, this interstellar missile ship basically loses its value. Unless it's loaded with new interstellar missiles. And the interstellar missile as a weapon is a consumable: highly destructive, long-ranged, and able to track its target. Every one is very expensive to make. It's even said that the ammunition spent in twenty saturation strikes by one interstellar missile ship could buy another interstellar missile ship of this class."
When the officer had finished briefing her on the figures of this interstellar warship,
the Nancy Empress was even somewhat curious about the scene of this interstellar warship's saturation strike in real battle.
It must be very dazzling.
"Then how many of this class of interstellar warship do we have now?" the Nancy Empress asked.
"At present fewer than three in service. It isn't that they're hard to build; it's that building too many doesn't actually mean much. Because the interstellar missiles can't be resupplied. On the battlefield, you can't just fire one round, can you? So for now we're mainly building other combat interstellar warships. At present mostly interstellar destroyers and interstellar frigates. Once our T2-grade interstellar factory is finished, we can mass-produce T2-grade interstellar cruisers and interstellar battlecruisers. Even T2 carrier starships and interstellar battleships!"
As the officer said this, his eyes were full of excitement and longing.
"And your crews? I hear your Fierce Dragon Starship Academy has been recruiting crew in great numbers lately; is the shortfall in crew very large?" the Nancy Empress asked.
The officer sighed helplessly: "That's true. Though starships and warships are both ships, and look alike too, in many respects they're not the same. Some veterans from the warships can handle the duties of starship crew after a little training, but some still can't. And at present, as our interstellar warships enter service one after another, training crews has become a big problem. But we've prepared a two-handed plan. On the one hand, we're recruiting crew from the existing navy system for training; those who are suitable become starship crew, and those who truly can't make it go back to where they came from. On the other hand, we're recruiting crew from university students; university students are young and learn fast; selecting the suitable ones among them and adding the training system we've completed, though the training period will be a bit longer, they're young, and there's a very large base of them too; now or in the future, it's of enormous help to us. Walking both steps of the plan at once can ease our crew shortfall for now."
"Your Majesty has truly prepared very thoroughly," the Nancy Empress said with feeling.
The officer glanced at the time and said, "The time for your meeting with our Majesty is almost here; let me take you to see our Majesty first. If you're still interested in all this afterward, I'll bring you back for another tour."
"Very well."
The Nancy Empress nodded.
She followed this officer to a domed office, all floor-to-ceiling glass around it, from which the vast universe around could be seen, and that beautiful Dragon Star too.
In the middle of this office a round dining table had risen up, laid with prepared fine food.
"Welcome." Zhao Chen raised his wineglass and looked with a smile at the Nancy Empress coming in.
"Don't stand on ceremony; we're old acquaintances. Just sit down. Have a bite of whatever. When I talk business, I like to eat as I talk." Zhao Chen sat straight down, picked up his chopsticks, took a piece of meat and stuffed it into his mouth.
The Nancy Empress said nothing more either and sat down across from Zhao Chen.
But she was in no hurry to pick up her chopsticks.
"I've come this time to report on the Dragon Star Alliance's development over this period."
"For those matters, just tell Barbara directly," Zhao Chen said lightly, waving his hand.
The Nancy Empress frowned slightly and asked, "You stepped down early as leader of the Dragon Star Alliance. And you didn't give it to someone from your Fierce Dragon Kingdom, but to me instead. Aren't you worried?"
"Worried about what? Worried you'll seize power? Worried the backyard will catch fire?" Zhao Chen waved his hand and looked at the Nancy Empress with a smile: "So long as my interstellar warships still hang over Dragon Star's head, so long as the Dragon Palace Starport is in my hands, you won't do anything so foolish, will you? Besides, I've always held that you don't use those you doubt, and you don't doubt those you use. Since I trust you, naturally I'll hand this work to you to handle. After all, my people have more important things to do. I truly don't have the time to handle affairs on Dragon Star; at most I check every so often whether the development is up to standard."
"You mean the threat from outside? You already have over thirty T2 interstellar warships. Isn't that enough?" The Nancy Empress knew some news, but not very accurately.
"Not enough." Zhao Chen gnawed the chicken drumstick in his hand, but his expression was somewhat grave.
"Never mind thirty; against a rival of unknown strength, three hundred, three thousand, I wouldn't think it enough. The more the better."
"Just how strong is the rival? Even stronger than that rival across the star?" the Nancy Empress asked, and then suddenly laughed and said with self-mockery, "Sorry, I asked a foolish question. If it weren't strong, how could it have made the two of you, about to come to blows, suddenly lay down your banners and drums?"
"Anyway, you need not trouble yourselves with these matters; if the sky falls, there are us tall ones to hold it up." Zhao Chen gave a slight smile.
"Your Fierce Dragon Majesty. Just what are you people?" the Nancy Empress suddenly asked.
Zhao Chen looked at the Nancy Empress: "What do you think we are?"
"I originally thought you were only a country that grew up on some small separate continent, with a band of genius scientists, plus some unbelievable institutions. That was what let you unify the order of all Dragon Star in so short a time. But later, as you brought out more and more things: the space elevator, the Dragon Palace Starport, resource planets, interstellar warships, planetary colonies… and every kind of unbelievable technology. I asked my scientists. Developing normally, this technology would take a hundred years at least, even several hundred. But all of it has happened in a mere few years. I feel as if it's a dream. A few years ago I was still watching propeller planes fly overhead. The me of now can reach a starport in ten-odd minutes and look down on all of Dragon Star. Genius scientists and advanced institutions and ideas alone can no longer explain it at all."
Having heard this,
Zhao Chen gave a slight smile: "Then tell me your guesses."
"Are you aliens?" The Nancy Empress threw out her first guess.
Zhao Chen thought a moment and said, "In a manner of speaking."
"You, and that civilization across the star, and that powerful civilization that may appear at any time: you have some connection with each other, don't you?" The Nancy Empress put forward her second guess.
This one Zhao Chen had somewhat not expected: "How did you guess that?"
The Nancy Empress said, "Because when you found the other civilization, the Fierce Dragon's attitude was very strange: extremely hostile, and the same attitude from top to bottom. Though toward other interstellar civilizations there are factions of every kind anyway, a peace faction and a war faction. What you did could count as the war faction, the kind that thinks every civilization on other planets is an enemy. But you were too decisive. Your decisiveness was as if you knew the other side was the enemy. Normally, on finding another interstellar civilization, even believing the other side to be an enemy, shouldn't one first spy, first prepare, even negotiate on the surface and prepare for war in private? But you didn't. It was as if you knew those means were no use at all. You knew that when you met, there would only be war! It was as if… you were born rivals!"
Zhao Chen looked at this woman before him; she truly was very clever.
Otherwise he would not have chosen her to be leader of the Dragon Star Alliance.
"Some of your guesses are right. But I can't tell you the answer now. What I can say is that at least for now I bear you no hostility. Nor will I harm you, provided, of course, that you don't oppose me. As for the rest, there's no need for you to know." Zhao Chen picked up a wet towel beside him and wiped his greasy mouth.
"No need to know, or not entitled to?" The Nancy Empress clenched her fists.
Zhao Chen thought a moment, then said, "Even if you knew, you couldn't change anything. It's like on the ground. Do you think that if ants knew they were only ants, that above their heads there existed intelligent races like humans and beast-folk, it would change anything for them? At most it would throw them into fear. Rather than that, better to leave them in the world of ants and let them go on living their lives step by step. Perhaps when the world changes one day, when ants can become hundred-meter giants or speak like men, then they can properly explore the truth of the whole world. Empress Nancy, am I not right?"
The Nancy Empress said nothing.
"Is there anything else to talk about? For those matters of government, just tell Barbara. If there's nothing else to talk about, I'll be going. You can stay here and enjoy this good food." Zhao Chen stood up and said with a smile.