Chapter 218: The Federation’s Leap Against Galactic Threats

The first batch of buyers were three Level 3 civilizations from the main spiral arm.

At first, they only meant to buy one, planning to use it to build a seed ship.

With this, if their civilization ever faced extinction, the seed ship could carry the hopes of their people and escape through a jump.

This, in fact, explains why every time a jump engine appears on the black market, there’s a mad scramble to snatch it up.

After all, having one is like giving your civilization an extra life.

But it didn’t take long after those three civilizations brought theirs home before they realized something was off.

It wasn’t a problem with the device itself. Instead, buried inside its built-in drive program was a hidden message.

And when that message landed on the desks of the leaders of those civilizations…

They were all left stunned.

The message said the seller still had more jump engines for sale, and if they were interested, they could contact them through certain methods.

It was a lot like some kind of interstellar classified ad.

Still, no one could just ignore it.

But these jump engines weren’t cheap. Like mentioned before, on those rare occasions when one shows up on the black market, it can go for a price high enough to buy out an entire resource-rich star system in any of the main spiral arms.

That should tell you just how expensive they are.

So even for Level 3 civilizations on the main spiral arm, these aren’t something you can just buy in bulk.

But that didn’t mean it was impossible.

They gritted their teeth and paid for part of the cost with rare resources, and with the rest, they offered up every bit of technology they had that the seller might accept.

Combined, those three civilizations ended up buying nearly a hundred units.

As for Sandik, he wrapped up the deals and immediately started searching for new buyers.

Meanwhile, back with the Federation…

All the different research institutes suddenly had their hands full again.

That’s because those three civilizations went all out, laying out every single technology they possessed in a giant list.

“Pick what you want, give me a price, and if it works for me, it’s yours.”

So the institutes suddenly found themselves swamped with work.

This windfall would no doubt take the Federation’s technology tree to the next level and spark a new round of scientific breakthroughs.

Granted, it wouldn’t be a massive leap, but still—enough for a tech boom, especially in civil tech.

——

Federation Year 260.

With huge shipments of resources pouring into the Federation—not just things missing in the Desolate Star Region, but even resources that were rare throughout the entire Orion Spur.

And alongside those came all sorts of industrial equipment from Level 3 and even Level 4 civilizations.

The Federation had gained immensely from this round of interstellar trading.

More importantly, these supplies weren’t a one-off deal. As long as Sandik kept things running smoothly, the trade would continue.

Still, the Federation’s leaders understood that nothing in life is certain.

If something went wrong with this trade…

That would spell trouble for the whole Federation.

So to prepare for the possibility of an invasion from Level 4 civilizations, Lin Yun had been researching an entirely new subject all these years.

That is…

How to interfere with jump technology.

At this point, the project had already been underway for twelve years.

But it was worth it, because…

The first jump disruption device had been built in the lab, and today was testing day.

If it worked, the Federation would become the only civilization in the galaxy capable of interfering with jumps. Any Level 4 civilization wanting to invade the Federation…

Well, tough luck—they’d have to do it the old-fashioned way, slugging through the interstellar currents, fighting for each star system one by one.

Even for a Level 4 civilization, that kind of situation made it impossible to gain any real upper hand over the Federation.

Because with the Federation’s absolute defensive advantage at the mouths of the interstellar currents—and backed by quantum bombs—they could still one-shot enemy ships protected by energy shields.

In the end, whether or not those Level 4 civilizations could break through, the Federation figured…

Even if they get in, they’ll lose a lot of teeth.

When it comes to disrupting jumps, there are actually quite a few approaches.

If you just want to create small-scale, short-term disruptions, the Federation has been able to do that for a while.

The answer? Quantum bombs.

More specifically, quantum foam bombs. Their explosions wreck the continuity of space itself—after all, you’re ripping open a hole in space when you use one.

So with the right timing and targeting—

That’s enough to interrupt a jump and collapse the tunnel, making any ship inside get lost in a dimensional rift.

Just like before, when the Federation could detect the special energy signature of an approaching jump. As soon as an incoming ship was spotted, they’d fire a quantum bomb and set it off right when and where it mattered.

That way, the jump route would collapse before the enemy ever arrived.

But actually making that work isn’t easy.

The biggest hurdle: from the moment you detect jump energy to the enemy’s arrival, you’ve got at most three to five seconds to act.

That’s nowhere near enough time to deliver a quantum bomb to the precise coordinates.

Unless they just so happen to jump in right next to you…

Obviously, that approach isn’t reliable.

So Lin Yun went another route.

What did the Federation really need?

A large-scale, persistent barrier to jumping—not some limited, one-off trick.

So, two solutions ended up on her desk. One: use gravity field disruption.

Two: subspace disruption.

The first option would mean deploying artificial gravity well projectors, preventing ships from starting their jump engines within a certain zone.

It’s easier to pull off, but it only works at the jump’s origin, stopping ships from leaving—you can’t stop them from arriving.

Meaning you can’t keep them from showing up.

The second approach targeted jump tech’s reliance on subspace by directly interfering with subspace itself.

The principle’s similar to the quantum bomb route, but it’s not as brute-force—more like a clever workaround.

So Lin Yun came up with something called a subspace oscillator. As long as its power input isn’t interrupted, it can run indefinitely.

One of these devices, in theory, could disrupt jump travel across as much as 1.8 light years.

Massive coverage…

Can run continuously…

It’s a perfect fit for the Federation’s needs.

And the best part? The disruption is reversible.

Because while developing the subspace jump disruption device, Lin Yun also designed a system specifically to counteract it.

Jump disruption…

Jump disruption countermeasures…

Just two extra words, but the effect is completely different.

The disruption device—the subspace oscillator—basically…

It shakes up subspace enough to throw enemy ships out of their jump tunnel.

Of course, ‘out’ doesn’t mean back to normal space. It means lost in a dimensional rift.

But the jump disruption countermeasure? As long as you know the oscillator’s frequency, you can tune your jump engine to bypass the interference.

In other words: you can block their jumps, but yours will work just fine!

So naturally, a lot of top brass came to watch Lin Yun’s test.

Because how important is this for the Federation?

Absolutely critical!