This waiting was a torment to Consul Ernest.
He paced back and forth within his office.
While his adjutant and subordinates set men to contacting those eight legion fleets without cease, and received without cease the word that they could not be reached.
And perceived that something was wrong.
Suddenly Consul Ernest straightened up and looked at his adjutant. "Convey my order at once: every Holy Radiance expeditionary fleet upon every line is to halt all military action. Any presently engaged are to withdraw from the field at once, and upon reaching a safe place, await my next order."
Hearing the Consul's words, the adjutant was frightened. "My lord, we are at present fighting shoulder to shoulder with the Warhammer coalition, and in the Black Tiger Star Region theater above all. Once we unilaterally halt military action, that will certainly affect—"
"I care nothing now for what it affects. I know only this. The Holy Radiance Empire's interests are the first consideration!" Consul Ernest said gravely, a bloody color in both eyes.
"Yes… yes." The adjutant gulped, and went to hand down the order.
And at this point, at last, came a piece of 'good news.'
"My lord Consul, we have reached one interstellar warship among those eight legion fleets you required!" the adjutant said excitedly.
"Put it straight through to me!" Consul Ernest instructed at once.
A video window presented itself before Consul Ernest, and opposite was a captain with a panicked look upon his face.
"Con… Con… Consul, my lord." The captain hemmed and stammered, with nothing of a senior officer about him.
"What is the situation on your side now?" Consul Ernest demanded.
The instant the captain opened his mouth, his feelings broke, and he fell to weeping outright. "It was… it was too terrible! That starship… no! That is a behemoth. It loosed a horrifying violet-gold beam that destroyed outright every interstellar warship it struck! And it… it can even traverse sideways; it was for all the world like a keen sword, sweeping across the starry heavens. And our… our interstellar warships were torn to pieces. Too terrible! Too terrible!…"
The captain went on and on recounting the wretchedness of that hour.
Consul Ernest had no mind to hear it, and asked directly, "What is your loss situation!"
The captain, hearing this, was taken aback, and then said in still greater terror, "Of our legion fleet, 3,000 interstellar warships… only our one… survived… I was an interstellar supply ship at the very rear of the legion fleet… As for the loss situation of the other legion fleets I do not know… in any case… in any case not a few ships got out."
Consul Ernest's body stiffened.
Near 25,000 interstellar warships… and not… not a few ships got out?
In a bare few minutes, 25,000 Holy Radiance interstellar warships were simply gone?
Though he had witnessed that scene with his own eyes.
Still, before hearing definite word, he had cherished a hope.
And this hope was shattered.
Even as this captain said, there might yet be a few interstellar warships that had survived.
But set against that total of 25,000 interstellar warships, what were those few surviving ships?
This might fairly be called annihilation entire!
And apart from a few rounds of attack upon that mysterious giant ship's star shield, they had inflicted no substantive damage upon that giant ship at all!
Collapse!
At this hour even this Consul's own feelings were near collapse.
From all these accounts, a rough judgment had already formed in his heart.
Which was that the Owl Dragon Legion already possessed a T5-grade interstellar warship.
If it were not a T5-grade interstellar warship, there was simply no explaining that mysterious giant ship's formidable combat ability.
To annihilate the Sacred Wing Legion's 3,000 elite interstellar warships entire, and then to annihilate 25,000 regular legion-fleet warships entire!
Upon one interstellar warship alone, so terrible a combat ability.
Apart from a T5 interstellar warship, was there any other possibility?
And what now stood before this Consul was the greatest question of all.
Which was… just how many of these terrible behemoths the Owl Dragon Legion had in hand.
After a moment's silence, Consul Ernest linked directly to the supreme commanders of every theater and handed down his order.
Every Holy Radiance expeditionary fleet was to cancel its present operational mission, withdraw from the Warhammer Interstellar Commonwealth at full speed, and fall back to the Holy Radiance Empire.
Do not ask the reason; carry out the order at once.
This was the order Consul Ernest handed down.
And the decision he had made.
——————
On the other side, though Zhao Chen and the rest had looked for great things from this T5 Hades-class Interstellar Dreadnought.
When it truly appeared before their eyes, the shock within them could not be described at all.
"So this is the Sword of Hades?" Xiong Xiangxiang exclaimed.
She too had some simple material on the T5 Hades-class Interstellar Dreadnought, chiefly given her by Zhao Chen so that she might the faster train the crew it required.
She had known there was such an attack mode; but to witness the effect upon the spot was hard to credit all the same.
"Report. This 'Sword of Hades' attack is complete; 52% of core stored energy consumed. Core stored energy now stands at 16%. By our reconnaissance, apart from some 10-odd enemy ships that lay outside our 'Sword of Hades' attack range, the remaining enemy ships have all been annihilated by us." A subordinate reported to Captain Xue Xiaoxiao.
Xue Xiaoxiao's eyes brimmed with excitement, and her breast rose and fell without cease.
This was the great gun she had sought!
One shot, and 25,000 interstellar warships swept away!
Even that T4 Blue-Eyes White Dragon-class Heavy Interstellar Armored Battleship she had loved best before had no such terrible capacity.
Xue Xiaoxiao watched that super-cannon retract slowly, return to its place, and the hull's hatches close slowly over it!
This was the gun of her dreams!
Large, and mighty, and able to sustain its output — and most important of all, it moved!
She loved this Hades-class Interstellar Dreadnought to death, and resolved that she would spend her life aboard this interstellar warship.
In life a person of this Hades; in death a ghost of this Hades.
"The Sword of Hades belongs to the sustained-output type of energy cannon, and during sustained output it can traverse besides. As it did just now — sweeping across a whole swath outright. But the duration sustained and the distance traversed both increase the energy consumption. There are two further defects. The first is that while this weapon mode is in use, the Hades-class Interstellar Dreadnought cannot itself move. The second is range: within range it can destroy anything; beyond range there is nothing to be done."
Annie played the expositor beside them.
The Hades Domain and the Sword of Hades were the two trump cards of this T5 Hades-class Interstellar Dreadnought.
Zhao Chen understood now why only one of this interstellar warship could be built.
Because it truly was too strong.
And the 'Hades Matrix Core,' the important technological core of the T5 Hades-class Interstellar Dreadnought, was the foundation of all of it; Zhao Chen even suspected this was no T5-grade technology at all!
It furnished this T5 Hades-class Interstellar Dreadnought the energy it required; and without so mighty a heart—
there would be no driving this terrible behemoth at all!