Charlotte departed a second time and went back to the Warhammer Interstellar Commonwealth, and carried Zhao Chen's meaning back with her.
This game of chess that was the Warhammer Interstellar Commonwealth was about to enter its second stage.
And at the same time, word of a very weighty sort reached Zhao Chen's side too.
Zhao Chen looked at Lilith.
Lilith opened an intelligence file. "This comes from a T3 Silver-Rat-class Light Interstellar Stealth Scout Ship we sent out; what it was charged with looking into was how matters stand at present between Qin Xiaotian's people and the Holy Radiance Empire. In the latest close investigation, they did turn up some threads and traces after all. By the leads we have to now, there has lately been established over in the Snow-Swallow Star Region a new starship-manufacturing group, by the name of the Light-Swallow Group. The line of business it chiefly handles is likewise starship manufacture and production — and it has taken on, at a single stroke, the great bulk of the imperial military's procurement orders as they now stand. And it is willing besides to take starship orders from certain interstellar powers on good terms with Qin Xiaotian! By what we've been able to verify, the volume of starship supply has widened several times over what it was before the civil war!"
Zhao Chen knit his brows slightly. "At a time like this, Qin Xiaotian has the means to set up a starship works, and can go on supplying starships without a break. Where does he come by the raw materials? The resource capacity inside the territory he controls within the Starlight Empire's borders can, at the very most, meet the wants of those interstellar fleets under his own hand. But to try to meet the wants of the greater half of the Starlight Empire, and widen it several times over besides! That is simply not possible! There is only one possibility behind this — that the Holy Radiance Empire has established contact with them in private already, and furnished help to who knows what degree!"
Lilith nodded. "Yes. And that is the direction of our investigation as well."
"Then has it been made clear whether interstellar warships are being carried over from the Holy Radiance Empire in any great number? If they were furnishing warships outright, the carriage of thousands upon thousands of interstellar warships could not go wholly without a sound — not even in Qin Xiaotian's Snow-Swallow Star Region." Zhao Chen said it with his eyes narrowed.
"Not finished warships. To this point we've found no finished interstellar warship of any kind from the Holy Radiance Empire flowing over to the Starlight Empire's side," Lilith said.
Not finished goods.
Zhao Chen said then, "Then it should be half-finished goods — or else the components for them!"
Lilith nodded, and pointed at one passage in the intelligence file that had come up. "By the intelligence our investigation has turned up: the Snow-Swallow Star Region shows no lead of any direct traffic with the Holy Radiance Empire. But our people thought — since it isn't direct traffic, then it may well be indirect; and so they looked into the destinations, out and back, of every interstellar trade fleet entering and leaving the Snow-Swallow Star Region. And the beginnings of something did indeed come to light. Within the space of the last quarter, one neutral interstellar power's interstellar trade traffic with the Starlight Empire has increased dozens of times over outright! And on the Starlight Empire's side the busiest of all in that trade is the Snow-Swallow Star Region — eight parts in 10 of the ships going and coming have all been putting in to the Snow-Swallow Star Region!"
"What place is it?" Zhao Chen asked.
Lilith spoke a name. "The Stellar Alliance!"
"The Stellar Alliance?" Zhao Chen remembered that back in his time at the Northstar Starship Military Academy he seemed to have heard this name.
It was the name of an interstellar power.
When the Galactic Alliance was founded, besides the three empires there were in fact no few small neutral powers in existence.
And one of the better known among them was the Stellar Alliance.
Lilith now called up the data bearing on the Stellar Alliance as well.
"The Stellar Alliance was founded a very long while ago, and back when the Galactic Alliance was first being founded, the Stellar Alliance was among those who joined. The Stellar Alliance is rather a special case in its nature: they are in interstellar trade chiefly, and that on account of the interstellar position they hold, which lies in the region where the three empires meet — very well suited to interstellar trade. Add to which that their own interstellar territory is poor in native resources, so the three empires pay their existence no great heed. On the contrary, certain black-market dealings have need of an existence such as the Stellar Alliance. And so the three empires have turned a blind eye to it."
Zhao Chen nodded; he had had dealings with such matters himself.
The Eden Grain-Trade Group he had built up, for instance, went chiefly by this very route. Had it relied purely on the Eden Grain-Trade Group setting up trade routes of its own, that would likely have wanted several years.
So A-Na, who had the Eden Grain-Trade Group in her charge, had taken the advice of Li Yaqi and Red Rose and gone straight to the Stellar Alliance to look out partners there.
Using the resources those partners already had to hand to carry on the selling of the grain.
Which, of course, also granted by default that those partners might mark the price up no little at the point of sale to the end buyer.
But this was, for the Owl Dragon Legion as things stood, the fittest method of selling there was, and the most sparing of both time and cost.
"To this point, the interstellar powers that have joined the Stellar Alliance come, by the latest tally, to as many as 109. Some of these powers are very small — some without so much as a single planet to call their own territory. Some powers are very vast, and may hold several star systems for their home base. But to the Stellar Alliance, the size of an interstellar territory is not of much account; what matters most is the resources they hold in hand. Within the Stellar Alliance there's a saying that runs: there is nothing they daren't buy, and nothing they daren't sell!" Lilith said.
Chu Xuan, off to one side, cried out, "That puts me in mind of something — a few years back, I think it was, my grandfather had partners over in the Stellar Alliance too. And at the time they actually wanted to ask to buy T4 Boreas-class Heavy Interstellar Battleships off us!"
"Did you sell?" Zhao Chen asked.
Chu Xuan rolled her eyes. "That's top-tier technology; there was no taking it out to be sold, of course. Were it not that we stood on good terms with the royal house at the time, and the royal house furnished us with military materials year in and year out, we'd never have sold the T4 Boreas-class Heavy Interstellar Battleship to the royal house either. Who could have thought that we'd now have fallen out with the royal house altogether."
And thinking of all this, Chu Xuan came to regret that she had not had her grandfather install some backdoor program or other in those T4 Boreas-class Heavy Interstellar Battleships sold to the royal house.
Just as Zhao Chen had done the dirty on Qin Ming this time.
But no one would have thought matters would run on to this point; the Chu family had never harbored any thought of treason all along, and had been loyal to the Starlight Empire to the bone.
Otherwise, back when the Mechanical Race threat still stood, the Chu family could never have garrisoned the border as uncomplainingly as it did.
"To this point every lead points to the Stellar Alliance — but our people give it as their view that, with the means in their hands, investigating the Stellar Alliance clear to the bottom will want more time. The best way would be for our Owl Dragon Legion to send someone of the upper ranks to make contact with the Stellar Alliance directly, in the guise of commercial trade." Lilith looked to Zhao Chen.
Zhao Chen nodded. This was indeed, perhaps, the finest means of getting at the intelligence.
"The Stellar Alliance… it doesn't seem we have any connections of our own in among them." Zhao Chen scratched his head.
"Isn't there one right under your nose?" Chu Xuan looked at Zhao Chen.
"There is? How is it I don't know of it?" Zhao Chen was taken aback.
"Do you not know the standing of that interstellar battleship captain of yours — Xue Xiaoxiao?" Chu Xuan said.
"Xue Xiaoxiao?" Zhao Chen had known there might be something behind this girl, but never in the world had he imagined it would be tied to the Stellar Alliance!