"The Golden Eagle tribe's 10 legion fleets… 30,000 warships. Three hours ago I was still in contact with their commander. How… how could they be annihilated in so short a time!" Elder Ram went on denying the thing without cease.
Pointing at those video images and saying they were all false.
"30,000 warships indeed. Though in quality they were nothing much. If I recall rightly, there seemed to be only 1,000 T3 warships; the rest were all T2-grade. They did not even bring one T4 warship over." Zhao Chen shook his head with contempt, and pointed at those Owl Dragon warships in the image. "This lot of small fry are not enough to stop the gaps in my Owl Dragon Legion's teeth."
Hearing Zhao Chen's words, the Revolutionary Army councilors present were shaken and afraid within.
The Golden Eagle tribe's strength was not great.
Among the twenty great tribes they counted only among the last few; had they not leaned on the Dragon-folk tribe for a backer, ever the Dragon-folk tribe's faithful hounds, they might long since have been kicked off the roster of the twenty great tribes.
But even so, the Golden Eagle tribe still possessed 1,000 T3-grade warships.
Within the Revolutionary Army, setting the Dragon-Tiger Legion aside, the other Revolutionary Army legion fleets had in former days still been inferior to the Golden Eagle tribe's.
And yet this enemy who had once been so thorny to them was, before this Owl Dragon lord, wiped out clean in a bare few hours.
"Happily, I sent only one small fleet of the Fifth Legion — 300 warships. Otherwise, had I sent a whole legion fleet, it would truly have felt like using an ox-cleaver to kill a chicken," Zhao Chen said, as though thankful for it.
300…
300 warships had slaughtered 30,000?
Gulp.
At this moment one could hear no few people swallowing.
Some wished to doubt it.
But seeing in the video image those majestic warships, every one of them without exception T3-grade — and among them, of all things, several bulks larger still.
Those were, plain to see, T4 warships.
This was a small fleet made up of T3 warships to the last hull, and several T4 warships besides…
And thinking again of the Owl Dragon warships' exceedingly strong fighting ability.
300 annihilating 30,000… did not, it seemed, sound so hard to believe after all.
"You said just now that even if you could not win— we could not possibly defeat the Dragon-folk tribe's legion fleets. Yes?" Zhao Chen looked at Elder Ram with narrowed eyes and a smile.
Elder Ram said stubbornly, "Hmph — of course! I grant your Owl Dragon Legion may truly have some ability. But it must be borne in mind that this is the Warhammer! And in the Warhammer the Dragon-folk tribe are the mightiest existence there is. They possess…"
Zhao Chen stopped Elder Ram from going on, and pointed at several other video images. "Then take a good look at these so-called Dragon-folk legion fleets of yours, and see… just… how formidable they are."
And at this moment a new small video window sprang open before Zhao Chen.
"Reporting, Commander-in-Chief — all our warships have entered their designated combat positions," Lilith reported.
"Send me the detailed figures; there is a pack of fools here," Zhao Chen said mildly.
"Yes."
A string of data was sent over to Zhao Chen's side.
Charlotte knew what the Commander-in-Chief meant to do; with Lilith not present, she would take over the work here.
"Midai'er, open the wartime function of the interstellar map here." Charlotte called on her own younger sister to help.
"Let me — I am familiar with this," Hu Xin'er volunteered.
And soon, under the two of them working it, a wartime star chart was laid out before them all.
"Do you see these five points upon the chart?" Zhao Chen pointed at five red marks upon it.
Midai'er looked at the five positions, and her eyes lit up. "These are the five strategic hubs our Revolutionary Army holds at present! These five positions are ground of the first importance. They might be called the vital hubs that link our Revolutionary Army's several strongholds together. Once we lose these five strategic points, our Revolutionary Army in all its places will be like a great dragon torn into four and five! And must certainly be devoured piece by piece by the enemy!"
Charlotte nodded, and in Zhao Chen's stead pointed at these five strategic hubs, upon which there appeared the projections of five interstellar fleets, with the Dragon-folk tribe's banner planted upon them.
"By the intelligence we have. Against these five strategic points the Dragon-folk tribe have dispatched 60,000 warships apiece — 300,000 warships in all. And by our latest intelligence, the total of the Dragon-folk tribe's own directly subordinate legion fleets comes to only 600,000 warships. Which is to say, for this one operation the Dragon-folk tribe have committed half their own military strength. Beyond that, there are several other subsidiary fields, in the charge of several of the Dragon-folk tribe's faithful-hound tribes — some 200,000 warships all told. Seeking to divide our whole Revolutionary Army and break it piece by piece!"
Hearing this, Chieftain Ted and the others turned grave.
"Since General Charlotte is here, she must surely have thought of a means of answering it?" Hu Xin'er looked at Charlotte in admiration, her eyes fairly giving off little hearts.
Charlotte looked toward Commander-in-Chief Zhao Chen with an air of respect. "This time I have asked our Revolutionary Army's partner — and the Owl Dragon lord to whom I, Charlotte, presently swear my loyalty — to send the Owl Dragon Legion here in our support. Against these five strategic points, five Owl Dragon legions have been dispatched — 15,000 warships in all. And what intercepted the Golden Eagle tribe's fleets a moment ago was one small fleet of the Owl Dragon Fifth Legion among them."
Charlotte's words hid nothing whatever of her relation with Zhao Chen.
And as Charlotte spoke, upon the star chart, in the five directions of the Dragon-folk fleets' invasion, there appeared five banners of the Owl Dragon Legion.
And miniature models of the interstellar fleets, with their several numbers besides.
3,000 warships.
"Ha ha ha ha. Ha ha ha ha. And here I thought you and this master of yours had some device. A bare 3,000 warships, and you would hold off the assault of 60,000 Dragon-folk warships. Do you imagine the Dragon-folk legion fleets fight like the Golden Eagle tribe?" Elder Ram said in mockery.
"Whether they can hold or not, look for yourself." Zhao Chen propped his chin on one hand and enlarged one of these several video images.
The starry space, empty a moment before, began to fill with warship after warship — so many that they came to a full 10,000 and more.
And upon the hulls of these warships was one and the same fleet blazon.
Which, come to that, bore some likeness to the Owl Dragon Legion's blazon.
The difference being that this blazon was a dragon-folk figure in profile — a dragon's head upon a man's body.
"The Dragon-folk legion fleets!" someone cried out.
The Black Fox chieftainess's gaze sharpened, and she put it more precisely still. "These are the Dragon-folk Thirteenth Fleet Group and the Seventeenth Fleet Group."