Chapter 92: The Aftermath of the Asteroid Impact

Out in deep space.

The Fifth Fleet was hurtling forward at high speed.

Within its formation, the Qiongxiao’s massive silhouette stood out sharply.

But compared to when Lin Yu last left, the Qiongxiao now bore several unwelcome additions.

Two assault corvettes had pierced through the very front of her bow, their jagged hulls sunk deep into the Qiongxiao’s side.

Klein assault corvettes.

And a gaping hole around five meters wide.

Inside the Qiongxiao, especially the corridors where those corvettes crashed in, battle scars littered every corner.

Even now, dried blood remained in great streaks, left untouched.

It wasn’t for lack of trying—those areas had been sealed off to prevent air from leaking out, leaving all cleanup on hold.

Actually, Qiongxiao wasn’t alone; a closer look at the entire Fifth Fleet revealed at least twenty ships still lodged with Klein assault corvettes—or, if not, gaping holes in their hulls from those same impacts.

Worse yet, the fleet was already down five ships.

Captain’s quarters.

“Qingxue, are you sure Lin Yu doesn’t need to know?”

“There’s no need. He’s got more important things he should be focused on. It’s not worth distracting him over this.”

“Alright… Still, what are the odds we’d get caught up in something like this of all things?”

“Let’s not dwell on that. What about that meteorite?”

Mu Qingxue shook her head slightly, then grew serious.

“It’s in storage. Luo Xin—the Qiongxiao’s science officer—is investigating it now. From her initial assessment, as long as we avoid any heavy impacts, what happened earlier shouldn’t repeat.”

“And the damage report?”

Mu Qingxue finally let out a quiet breath then pressed on.

“We lost five frigates. Another twenty-four warships were boarded by Klein soldiers. Total casualties: Three thousand five hundred seventy-three.”

“Nine hundred sixty-eight more wounded. Of those, two hundred seventeen are in critical condition.”

Hearing the numbers, Mu Qingxue clenched her fist hard as she lay back.

Since the formation of the Fifth Fleet, they’d never suffered losses like this.

Not even during the Europa assault had the numbers been so grim.

“Qingxue, as bad as all that is, there’s an even bigger problem!”

“What problem?”

“The Qiongxiao’s main engine is damaged…”

“What?!”

That was about as bad as it gets.

Right now, they were in a running battle with the Klein fleet, and the engines were their lifeline.

If the engines failed and the ship lost speed, the only option would be to abandon her and transfer everyone to the rest of the fleet.

Otherwise, the Klein fleet would catch up for sure.

And now Night Lingwei was telling her the Qiongxiao’s main engine was damaged?

“Luo Xin says we have to keep the engine output below sixty percent. Any higher, and the internal cracks will spread fast and eventually destroy the whole system.”

“There’s no way we can drop speed right now!”

Mu Qingxue didn’t hesitate for a second.

“I told Luo Xin the same, but she warns us—push the engine at full power and it’s guaranteed to fail. A month at best, maybe three if we’re lucky. After that, it’ll be beyond repair.”

“Tell her to do whatever she can to keep things running for three months.”

“Understood. I’ll let her know. You just try to rest.”

Night Lingwei nodded, then stood and left the captain’s quarters.

Left alone, Mu Qingxue’s mind drifted back to everything that happened one day before.

She’d been leading the fleet, focusing fire on dozens of Klein assault corvettes attacking from the rear.

Most of the railguns couldn’t aim that far back, but a few had clear lines of fire.

Targeting the assault corvettes was precise work, since they only had one shot to adjust their course and speed. They couldn’t dodge at a distance.

Early on, this tactic let the fleet pick off some of them as usual.

Everything seemed under control. Same as every other time.

But all at once, the Warstar was rocked by a violent tremor. Mu Qingxue still remembered—the jolt felt like getting rammed by a truck. People all over the bridge were thrown from their seats.

Mu Qingxue included.

Her luck just ran out; she flew nearly seven or eight meters and slammed hard against a console.

She blacked out on the spot.

When she finally woke up, she learned what really happened.

The Qiongxiao had taken a direct hit from a stray asteroid. That bone-rattling shock was the impact itself.

Somehow, their radar had never even detected the asteroid in the first place. No one knew why.

With the fleet cruising at two hundred kilometers a second, and an asteroid smashing in from the side—the sheer force of it was enough to knock the Qiongxiao off course.

The impact unleashed an unimaginable force…

Just seeing Mu Qingxue flung those several meters said it all.

And that was just the start of their trouble.

After the crash, the strange meteorite burst with some kind of bizarre energy, sweeping through the entire Fifth Fleet.

Hundreds of systems went down at once.

Weapons, engines, radar, communications—you name it, it was offline.

Thankfully, short-range laser comms were still working, so at least the fleet could coordinate inside.

A close inspection showed it was mostly small components that were fried. Swapping in the spares would fix things up.

Every ship carried a cache of backup parts anyway.

The only problem was, the sheer volume and tricky placements made for a tedious repair job.

All of it would take time.

At least twelve hours.

The good news: the fleet could still coast ahead on momentum, and the Klein fleet couldn’t catch them within twelve hours.

But those assault corvettes…

With radars, weapons, and engines all down, they were sitting ducks.

Mu Qingxue simply had no options.

The unused assault craft in the hangar could still fly, but…

With radar knocked out, she had no way to predict which ships would be hit, so she couldn’t redeploy heavy drop troopers to defend ahead of time.

That left them on the back foot from the start.

As for how it all turned out…

Dozens of Klein assault corvettes poured hundreds of Klein warriors into ship after ship.

What followed was brutal, close-quarters combat in those warships’ corridors.

Most of the ships managed to repel the boarders with support from the armored squads.

But five frigates, swarmed by two or three corvettes at once, fell before the drop troopers could arrive. Only a handful made it to escape pods.

As for Mu Qingxue herself—

The medical officers found she’d taken several broken bones and even cracked a rib.

Worst of all…

Fractured bones were one thing even the med pods couldn’t fix.

She could only grit her teeth and wait to heal on her own.

That meant she couldn’t set foot on the bridge anytime soon. So when Lin Yu called—

That’s why Night Lingwei had been leading the command instead.