"Grandfather? Still no word from Zhao Chen's side?" In a video window, Chu Xuan was asking this very question, her whole face anxious.
Chu Changhe opened his mouth, but in the end said nothing.
Chu Xuan understood what her grandfather meant.
She bit her red lip lightly, then said with resolve: "I'll lead the fleet to the Azure Star Region — I'll go find Zhao Chen!"
"No! Before Zhao Chen left, he specially charged us — whether our Chu-family legion, or the North Wind legion, or the Imperial Princess Fleet-Group, none is permitted to leave the zone it's charged to defend! No one knows just what plot and scheme that fellow Qin Xiaotian is turning over behind this!" Chu Changhe stopped her.
Chu Xuan retorted: "Zhao Chen hasn't contacted us at all now — that means he's met danger. He's helped us so many times; even this civil war, but for his Owl Dragon Legion stepping forth, our Chu family couldn't possibly have today. Even if you won't let me take the Chu-family fleet to find him — fine! Then I'll go myself! Even if I fly a shuttle-craft alone, I'm going!"
Chu Changhe looked at his granddaughter's emotion-lost expression, and sighed within — this granddaughter of his had earlier said she and Zhao Chen were nothing to each other, the two of them clear and clean.
And now his granddaughter would even brave the Azure Star Region alone for Zhao Chen; to say his granddaughter had no Zhao Chen in her heart — beat him to death and he wouldn't believe it.
But given his granddaughter's present state, he knew her temper; once it was a thing she'd decided, no amount of persuasion would avail.
Unless he put her under house-arrest this instant.
And even under house-arrest, she'd find some way to slip off and find Zhao Chen.
"Report — word has come from the Owl Dragon Legion!" a comms soldier suddenly cried out.
In that instant, Chu Changhe looked at this young comms soldier, and felt — how was it this lad looked so very pleasing to the eye?
"Quick! Patch it through to me!" Chu Changhe commanded, and at the same time looked to his granddaughter: "See — here's word come from the Owl Dragon Legion after all. I said it — that lad's got a tough life, nothing would happen to him."
"Enough chatter — quick, see just what the situation is!" Chu Xuan rolled her eyes, then urged her grandfather; her whole head was truly full of nothing but Zhao Chen now.
Above all, at the moment she'd heard Zhao Chen was out of contact, she'd felt as though half her life had gone from her.
Watching his granddaughter so, Chu Changhe could only shake his head, and sigh: "Truly — got herself a sweetheart and forgot her grandfather."
"One more word out of you, and see if I don't wait till you're asleep next time and shave your whiskers clean off!" Chu Xuan threatened without ceremony.
At this, Chu Changhe at once behaved — for this dear auntie had truly done such a thing before; back then his subordinates, seeing it, had one and all been holding in their laughter.
So he'd ordered the whole lot of them to shave their whiskers clean off!
Back to the matter at hand.
The comm from the Owl Dragon Legion connected.
Zhao Chen appeared in the video window.
"Zhao Chen!" Chu Xuan couldn't hold it in for a moment, and called out Zhao Chen's name outright; and when Zhao Chen looked at her, even her ears went quite red.
Chu Changhe looked at this pair of young ones — that was it?
So fine a chance, and she couldn't be a bit more forward?
He'd taken the measure of it: this lad Zhao Chen was an iron-clad blockhead, and his own granddaughter thin-skinned and stiff-tongued; at this rate, for him to hope to hold a great-grandchild — who knew what year of the monkey that would be.
By the look of it, he'd have to think of something.
"Chu Xuan's there too? How stand your defense-lines everywhere — Qin Xiaotian hasn't made trouble for you?" Zhao Chen asked.
"What's your situation, lad — going out of contact all of a sudden, worrying Xuan— worrying us all half to death. I also hear some unidentified fleet-power attacked the Owl Dragon System? Just what is all this about?" Chu Changhe asked.
Zhao Chen recounted to Chu Changhe and Chu Xuan what had happened — including the hive-race fleet and the Leviathan-Monarch-class Hive Mothership.
"That's roughly the situation. By the look of it now, this shouldn't have been an operation aimed at my sister's Imperial Princess Fleet-Group — it was a fishing trip. I'm the big fish Qin Xiaotian wanted to hook; only, worse luck for him, his rod wasn't sturdy — never mind hooking me, he near enough finished himself off. The Owl Dragon System's situation is basically stable now, no great losses," Zhao Chen said.
"That lad Qin Xiaotian actually has the technological means to control Hive Motherships? And a quasi-T5-grade Leviathan-Monarch-class Hive Mothership besides? No wonder the lad dared kill Qin Ming and take the throne himself. By the look of it, this is his trump card," Chu Changhe said, knitting his brows: "It seems now that for us to assault our way to the Imperial Capital Star won't be a simple thing. The more so as Qin Xiaotian still holds many things we don't know of — for instance, that long-range troop-projection means akin to your T4 Lucent-class Interstellar Jump-Ship. If we don't get clear on these, and press all our strength to the front, what if Qin Xiaotian pulls a home-raid on us? Even if we used your T4 Lucent-class Interstellar Jump-Ships to strike straight at the Imperial Capital Star. We don't know just how much hive-race fleet Qin Xiaotian holds; you projected under 200,000, and you did kill no few this time, but there were over 100,000 — what if… I say what if… Qin Xiaotian still has more? And that Leviathan-Monarch-class Hive Mothership you gravely wounded — that's a quasi-T5 Hive Mothership; if there's a second, a third. Act rashly, and we might well spoil things by our own cleverness, and hand the enemy an opening!"
Chu Changhe was most cautious, but what he said was not without reason.
That they'd dared bare their arms and go at Qin Ming outright was because they knew clearly how much of a stake Qin Ming held.
But Qin Xiaotian?
Besides what he'd now displayed, who knew whether he still held other trumps in hand.
Interstellar war was a grand gamble — and a grand gamble one could not afford to lose.
Chu Changhe dared not be less than cautious.
Zhao Chen nodded: "I understand your meaning; in fact it's part of my thinking too. In the present situation, we can't act rashly — but neither can we do nothing. So my thought is this: within our own grasp, we wage a localized war. Keep probing just how many trumps Qin Xiaotian holds; and taking that time, I can go on expanding my Owl Dragon Legion and readying more combat resources."
Chu Changhe nodded; this was his thinking too.
He found he admired this lad Zhao Chen more and more; did he not know it impossible, he'd even suspect Zhao Chen was some grandson of his own, lost outside.
"All these plans of yours I can agree to, but I have one request."
"Speak."
"I hope Chu Xuan can join your Owl Dragon Legion, and learn at your side."