"T4 Tyrant-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Battlecruiser, close in! Clear away every T3-grade interstellar warship over there, one by one. T4 Paladin-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Escorts, intercept the enemy's attacks!" Marshal Chu Xuan gave two more orders in quick succession.
The T4 Tyrant-class Heavy Interstellar Missile Battlecruiser began bearing forward.
The interstellar missiles left over from the earlier battle came into their own at this point.
Missile launcher after missile launcher opened, and interstellar missile after interstellar missile ignited and launched, flying with tail flames toward the T3 Dax Empire interstellar warships locked onto.
Among these five thousand Dax Empire interstellar warships, all the T3 interstellar warships put together came to barely a hundred.
But
under the wild bombardment of these two thousand T4-grade interstellar missiles,
these under-a-hundred T3 interstellar warships were destroyed one by one, turning into balls of exploding fire.
The sight left that Dax Empire marshal opposite gaping and tongue-tied.
He had known before that the Fierce Dragon civilization had developed T4-grade interstellar warships.
But he had never imagined these T4-grade interstellar warships could be this formidable.
It was beyond imagining.
And at this point, the T3 interstellar battleship he was aboard had also been locked onto by several T4 interstellar missiles from the other side.
Its close-in guns fired all out, trying to intercept these interstellar missiles,
but intercepted fewer than a third of them.
The remaining interstellar missiles all landed on this interstellar battleship.
And so this Dax Empire marshal fell.
As for the remaining just-under-five-thousand interstellar warships, they naturally became lambs awaiting the slaughter,
swallowed up and destroyed bit by bit.
When the Dax Empire's King received this news,
he slumped onto his throne, broken.
In under twelve hours, over eighty percent of the five thousand interstellar warships sent out had been destroyed,
and all the T3-grade interstellar warships destroyed.
"It's over." The Dax King sat on his throne; at this moment he could be said to be desolate.
For he already knew the outcome.
His Dax Empire had already been eliminated from this Trial of the Gods.
If… if only he had not provoked the system the Fierce Dragon civilization was in,
would the outcome have changed?
If… if only his Dax Empire fleets had been able to take the Lanners civilization's system at one stroke,
would the outcome have changed?
If… alas, in this cruel war there were not so many ifs.
On the other side, the Lanners leader soon got this news too.
The Dax Empire's five thousand interstellar warships had raided the Fierce Dragon civilization's system, but been ambushed by the long-prepared Fierce Dragon fleets and suffered heavy losses.
"It's over," the Lanners leader said with a sigh.
Over the next three months,
the Fierce Dragon civilization cleared away the Lanners civilization and the Dax Empire civilization one after the other.
Both these Trial civilizations were eliminated by the Fierce Dragon civilization,
becoming the third and the fourth Trial civilizations the Fierce Dragon civilization had eliminated.
And as a matter of course,
the systems these two civilizations had controlled fell completely under the Fierce Dragon civilization's control.
All at once, the territory the Fierce Dragon civilization controlled had grown several times over.
The Dragon Palace Starport.
"We've now taken over the Lanners civilization's and the Dax Empire civilization's systems. We hold five systems in all. From a single system at the start, it's suddenly become five systems. For a while to come, how we take them over and how we coordinate them will be a huge problem!" Secretary Officer Barbara said gravely. "Even right now, we've already received word that in the several systems the Lanners civilization and the Dax Empire civilization used to rule, because of the fall of these two regimes, no few ambitious forces have popped up at this critical juncture, causing chaos everywhere!"
Zhao Chen said solemnly, "For this situation we have to use two kinds of means at once. One, naturally, is the hard-line means. Publish our Fierce Dragon civilization's notice to these systems: these four systems already belong to the Fierce Dragon civilization, and every planet, every person and every resource within these four systems is under the Fierce Dragon civilization's jurisdiction. Every family power is to submit to the Fierce Dragon civilization unconditionally. Any act in this period that defies the Fierce Dragon civilization's orders will be severely punished, without exception. If any planet tries to declare independence or riots, we send fleets straight in to put it down! Medusa, I'm putting you in charge of this. In an emergency, you may act first and report afterward!" Zhao Chen looked at Marshal Medusa.
A bloodthirsty look came into Marshal Medusa's eyes.
For this approach she was better suited than Marshal Chu Xuan.
She was, after all, cold-blooded by nature.
"Rest assured, Your Majesty; as for those who won't obey, I'll let them know the price of not obeying!"
"What we carry out at the same time is the amnesty policy. Tell those planetary powers willing to accept our Fierce Dragon civilization's administration that we can, to a certain degree, preserve the integrity and interests of their families as they were. But first of all they must submit to us unconditionally. On this we accept no bargaining whatsoever. What we give, they may take. What we haven't said we'll give, they may not ask for!" Zhao Chen said decisively, his expression grave.
"Mm." Secretary Officer Barbara nodded, agreeing with this arrangement too. "Then there's the system of administration for these systems from here on. We're very short of hands. So I suggest a cooperative form of administration: we provide some people, the locals provide some people, and together they form a joint administrative mechanism. Take the Lanners System as an example. First, set up a system-level structure: a system governorate can be established, answering directly to our Fierce Dragon civilization. This system governor must be someone our Fierce Dragon civilization sends directly. A number of deputy governors, some of them our people, others of them locals. That way, letting the locals run their own turf, they'll accept it better too. Then on each planet we can back two or three powers and let those two or three powers administer that planet. And they also have a voice in deliberations at the system governorate. Besides that, our people form a dedicated inspectorate whose duty is to inspect these planets on circuit; any problem can be reported straight up to us. The stance is this: they can still be rulers and enjoy privileges. But they must act within the lines we draw; once they cross them, our Fierce Dragon civilization will strip them of everything we've given them. They must be made to understand that the power and wealth they hold aren't their own, but given to them by us. And since we gave it, then the moment they disobey, we can take it back at any time. Only that way can they understand clearly the roles we and they play!" Secretary Officer Barbara set out the relevant plan of governance.
This might not be the best plan, but it was surely the plan best suited to the Fierce Dragon civilization right now.
"Mm, we'll go with this plan. Barbara, you're directly in charge. If you need the fleet's help, just contact Medusa directly."
"Yes."
Zhao Chen called up another interface: "Since we've finished with the question of governing these systems, next is how to quickly develop, use, integrate and absorb these systems' productive capacity."
Secretary Officer Barbara looked at a data sheet and reported, "We've converted all present output value uniformly into the star-coin currency system. Take our Fierce Dragon System at present as an example. Our Fierce Dragon System's output value is now two billion star coins a year, and still rising at a sustainable growth rate. And of the several systems we've gained, the Lanners System is the largest in territory and richest in resources; when the Lanners civilization was developing this system before, the highest annual output value it reached in a single year was an astonishing ten billion star coins. That is also why the Lanners civilization, with just a single system of its own, could stand up to the Dax Empire civilization with three systems. The annual output value of the Dax Empire civilization's three systems put together was only thirteen billion star coins. And behind that high output value of the Dax Empire's lay a system of slavery and heavy oppression."
"That is to say, so long as we can restore these systems' productive capacity, our Fierce Dragon civilization's annual output value can break twenty-five billion star coins!" Zhao Chen's eyes lit up.
The cornerstone of a civilization's development was in fact output value.
The higher the output value, the more interstellar warships could be built, and so the more powerful the military strength one had.
Without enough output value, all this was nothing but empty talk.
And the Fierce Dragon civilization now, in the Trial of the Gods, was different from the Fierce Dragon civilization before.
The "rules of the game" in the two settings were not the same.
Before, the Fierce Dragon civilization could rely on the technology and products in its hands to earn resources from every power, a speed of earning resources dozens of times faster than its own development, and so feed itself back quickly.
But now, in the Trial of the Gods,
the other Trial civilizations would never cooperate with you, let alone trade.
So one's own state of development was extremely important.
"We need to set up a dedicated development department, mainly responsible for these systems. Not only to develop these systems' mineral resources, but to build up the local commercial systems too. Only that way can our whole operation run fast. If we just carried on with that system of the Dax Empire's, it could burst out with decent productive capacity in the short term. But once problems arose inside, they'd be big trouble. We still need to build a virtuous cycle," Zhao Chen said gravely.
Secretary Officer Barbara nodded and said beside him, "On this I've already begun making arrangements. I've had Secretary Officer Shuixian take charge of setting up a Fierce Dragon civilization all-systems development department: Secretary Officer Shuixian in charge, with me supervising. We'll make sure each system's total output value rises every month at a rate of at least two to three points, and that annual output value over the first three years rises tenfold on average! By the present situation, within three months we restore the other four systems' production capacity to their former heyday. From there, within the next year, we raise the means of production everywhere to the T3 technology level; that way our total output value can be raised to at least two hundred billion star coins! And so on: within three years, it can be raised to twenty trillion star coins! Of course, the precondition is that our technology can also rise steadily."
Zhao Chen nodded in satisfaction; this rate of growth was quite impressive.
"Then what about interstellar warship production?" Zhao Chen looked at Annie.
Chief Engineer Annie, who had been slacking off all along, sat up straight at once on hearing herself mentioned.
She said with a serious expression, "According to our plans for the future, in the time ahead our Fierce Dragon civilization will officially retire all T2- and T1-grade means of production completely and upgrade across the board to T3 technology, including docks, starports, interstellar industrial ships and so on, striving to enter the T3 tech era within a year. And we'll build five shipworks, one in each of the five systems. These will be the foundation of our Fierce Dragon civilization's starship industry: five T3 shipworks. By the output figures Secretary Officer Barbara just gave, within the next year we're confident we can raise our T3 interstellar warship output to fifteen thousand a year!"
T3 interstellar warship output raised to fifteen thousand a year.
This rate of development could be called quite astonishing.
Of course, Chief Engineer Annie had made the precondition clear too:
that first, the total output value for the year had to be enough, with enough resources to put into building these interstellar warships;
otherwise all the talk would be for nothing.
And another point was that during this period there must be no harassment or interference from other Trial civilizations,
so that the Fierce Dragon civilization could have a stretch of rapid development.
"Then what will our T4-grade interstellar warship capacity be by then? We can't go on like before, building those few T4 interstellar warships by scraping together bits from here and there, can we?" Zhao Chen asked.
"We've considered that too. Didn't we say our present plan is to build five shipworks, with the minimum standard that all of them are T3-grade? Considering our need for T4 interstellar warships, we can upgrade the T3-grade shipworks in the Fierce Dragon System to T4 grade. That way it can meet both the T4 and the T3 needs. Done step by step, it won't hurt the needs on either side. And by our present reckoning, a year from now our T4-grade interstellar warship output can hold steady in the range of ten to thirty ships. Just how many we produce depends on our needs. After all, over a year our output value is only so much. What goes to T4-grade interstellar warships means our T3-grade interstellar warship output has to drop. It isn't that we can't produce them; it's that we don't have that many resources," Annie said earnestly.
At first hearing, it sounded a bit like passing the buck in advance.
But there was indeed some sense in it.