Chapter 591: Breakthrough in the Starfield: Alliance and Pursuit

All at once, every warship on the Torch Human side in the Tianpan Galaxy was swallowed up by the four-layered Eight-Armed Serpent Prison.

What Song Chi had suffered alone before was now pressing down on every captain and even more intensely. This time, it was a seventh-tier Eight-Armed Serpent Prison—stacked four times.

As soon as the main fleet burst out of the spatial wormhole, the Heavenly Ruin was right back in the thick of things. In the control room, Song Chi instinctively reached for the Timepiece Chessboard’s ‘Time • Chessboard’ ability.

With it being a multi-colored mythic part, if he burned all three hundred twenty-four remaining Timepieces, Song Chi was certain he could tear through the fourfold seventh-tier prison above. But once he cooled off, he immediately abandoned that idea.

True, the Timepiece Chessboard, strengthened to level 80, was that powerful. But he couldn’t forget each Timepiece used took a year to regenerate. All three hundred sixty? That’s three hundred sixty years. Even with Zen Seal’s internal time acceleration, it would take decades to recharge.

Even decades might not be enough. The Pusa Zen Seal is just gold grade, after all, and its cooldown reduction for mythic parts is heavily cut. As for the Chessboard itself, the current cooldown is already after reductions.

So unless things got truly desperate, he wouldn’t risk spending all his Timepieces.

Instead, he trusted the Star-Annihilator Captains of both kingdoms had their own contingency plans.

After all, even as a Dreadnought Captain, he knew all about the Serpent Demons’ signature move—the Eight-Armed Serpent Prison. No way the Star-Annihilator Captains hadn’t prepared for it.

Sure enough, the Yaohan Kingdom’s Fenglang Juxu Star-Annihilator made the first move, proving Song Chi’s hunch right.

“Eight-Armed Serpent Prison—this is exactly what I’ve been waiting for.”

A chill, nearly terrifying calm came from inside the Fenglang Juxu. Before the surrounding serpent demon Sovereigns could react, a vast surge of black light exploded from the Star-Annihilator’s core, rushing outwards.

“Black Demon Domain! As expected! Liu Shu’s brought out the Liu Royal Family’s legendary black domain component!”

Song Wujian’s voice chimed in on the encrypted group chat.

Instantly, the chat erupted with interest.

Black Demon Domain.

A supreme black-grade domain component.

The key details packed into Song Wujian’s words had everyone’s curiosity firing.

Still, they all knew this was hardly the moment to pry for more, so no one pressed for answers.

Their eyes swept the surrounding starfield, and soon a few of them spotted something.

As the so-called Black Demon Domain rapidly expanded, the barriers of the fourfold Eight-Armed Serpent Prison above began to show cracks. Clearly, this supreme black component’s domain power was something out of the ordinary.

But even so, despite its eighth-tier might, the Black Demon Domain still couldn’t completely tear through all four layers.

In the end, it took the combined efforts of several other Star-Annihilators from Yaohan and Morningstar Kingdoms. Whether unleashing eighth-tier gold domains or seventh-tier ones, the layered domains finally shattered the fourfold Eight-Armed Serpent Prison overhead.

With the oppressive force vanishing from the ships, Song Chi seized the opportunity. Controlling both the Heavenly Ruin and its mirror warship, he simultaneously triggered the Divine Thunder Cannon’s ‘Ten-Thousand Sigil Violet Lightning Prison’ trait.

An instant later, over twenty thousand violet thunder sigils appeared in the densest clusters of Serpent Warships, followed by a roaring outbreak of lightning in all directions.

Once every sigil had finished detonating, Song Chi glanced over at the Soul-Devourer Sacrificial Altar.

Current soul-devouring progress: Stage Two, 8%.

As expected, the full-blown dual lightning eruption had given the Soul-Devourer another big leap forward.

But he wasn’t done yet. After the lightning onslaught, Song Chi rolled out the Quantum Sword Array, the Black Hole Singular Burst, and other wide-area attacks. The ships’ secondary batteries never let up, wiping out endless numbers of Serpent Warships.

Finally, after relentless assault by the Tianpan fleet, the Serpent Demons’ forward line in the Chipan Galaxy collapsed. Their ships scattered, splitting nine ways and falling back with their Sovereigns.

Meanwhile, encrypted chat buzzed between the Star-Annihilators.

“We can’t let them get away. If they scatter, splitting our forces later will be a nightmare. Cleansing the rest will slow to a crawl.”

“Pursue!”

With every captain watching, seven Star-Annihilator ships shot skyward, splitting up in groups of two, two, and three to chase down the three rear Serpent fleets.

Soon, many Torch Captains saw energy collision warnings from three locations lit up on their patrol radars.

Clearly, all three strike teams had caught their prey.

The violent clashes lasted around half an hour. When all seven Star-Annihilators returned, they’d brought two seventh-tier serpent demon Sovereign corpses with them.

The only group that didn’t bring back a Sovereign was Morningstar Kingdom’s two-captain team.

Within the Song Family’s encrypted group chat aboard their Star-Annihilator ship:

“Song Wujian: That Rosetta Morningstar is still a Silver Torch Seed. Her flagship’s combat power barely counts as above average—one look, and the serpent demon Sovereign petrified her ship. One-on-one, Calm-Sea Dragon-Xiang couldn’t stop them from fleeing.”

“Song Shiyuan: Silver Torch Seed—expected, really. The Morningstar Family’s only seven thousand years old. They don’t have our kind of fortune.”

As he spoke, Song Shiyuan shot a glance at Song Chi and Song Yan. The implication was clear—they were the exceptional ones.

“Getting even one Star-Annihilator Captain is lucky. Scoring a golden-tier fire source rare as a Supreme Black Oddity? That’d be unreal.”

While people whispered and speculated, everyone’s focus soon turned back to the aftermath of the battle.

After this fight, the two kingdoms of the Tianpan Galaxy had truly secured their foothold here in Chipan.

A month later, after much debate, the decision was made. The Morningstar Kingdom’s Dragonspine Song Family’s Dominion Flagship would remain at the wormhole passage, forming the core of a starfield defensive line.

That perimeter was built to the highest standards and was formidable on its own. With a seventh-tier force watching over it, no one would have to worry about their rear lines again.

So after discussions, it was settled—the Song Family’s Dominion Flagship would stand guard.

A Star-Annihilator ship served as an absolute force suppressing all other fleets. Each was crucial to the coming campaign in Chipan.

The Song Family’s Dominion Flagship did have seventh-tier combat strength, but it couldn’t match a true Star-Annihilator’s speed, agility, or power. That made it the perfect choice for holding the rear, guarding against threats.

Of course, the decision wasn’t made lightly. No matter how you looked at it, the Dominion Flagship was still a seventh-tier powerhouse. Forcing the Song Family to post it at the rear meant giving up a valuable asset—they were far from happy about it.

Song Wujian fought hard. In the end, everyone agreed—the Song Family would get ten percent of all spoils from the upcoming sweeps and cleansings across Chipan Galaxy.

With that settled, nearly two hundred million ships split into seven fleets, each heading out in a different direction.

…

Southwest Chipan Galaxy—Nanling Star Domain.

After splitting up, the Song Family headed southwest.

By the time their fleet reached Nanling, they found another force already waiting for them.

This new fleet also boasted a Star-Annihilator. With more than twelve million ships, they matched Song Family’s numbers almost exactly.

Right away, the Song Family’s senior staff couldn’t help but marvel in the group chat.

“No wonder they’re an ancient House with over twenty thousand years of heritage. The moment they return to the Immortal Houses, they pull together a fleet this size!”

Compared to the Song Family’s amazement, the subordinate captains were brimming with curiosity.

“Pretty sure this is a brand-new fleet. Never seen them before.”

“Looks that way. They have a Star-Annihilator on their side too. Where did they come from? Are they competition or allies?”

Soon, a Zhulu-class Cruiser Captain from the Song Family spoke up to clear the air:

“No worries. They’re our strategic partners—the Chigu Luo Clan from Goldenplate Galaxy!”

Hearing that, Song Family’s lesser-informed clansmen and the subordinate captains all had their eyes light up.

After surviving the last starfield war, every captain knew just how frail individuals were in these battles, where casualties ran in the millions.

Just in the last two showdowns alone, Song Family’s entire fleet had lost over a million ships. Frontline cannon-fodder like the Gold Horn Lu Family and the Eagle Family had it worse. Word was, their combined fleets of twelve million had dropped to only eight million—a third lost.

With a new ally boasting over twelve million ships and two Star-Annihilators holding the line, everyone knew no serpent demon would risk challenging them in the upcoming cleansing campaign.

That meant survival rates would soar, and battle deaths would plummet.

While the fleet captains below cheered at the new alliance, Song Family’s Star-Annihilator encrypted chat had its core members focused on something else entirely.

“Xiaochi, if you’ve made up your mind, go for it. Those remnants of the Doomstar Race have only been lurking here in Chipan for a few hundred years. They must have plenty of treasures left—definitely worth investigating.”

“But is one Mirror Warship really enough? The Doomstar Race used to be an advanced civilization. Even in decline, they’re sure to have some scary trump cards.”

“How about sending Xiao Yan with you?”

“I agree. Let Xiao Yan go too. Take a Dominator Worm along, and don’t forget a Market Projection Token—that should be safe enough.”

“Settled then. Now that we’ve joined up with the Luo Clan and have two Star-Annihilators, Xiaochi, you still have a Market Projection Token left, plus the Starry Sky Dragon Shark and two Dominator Worms. Even if you end up facing an eighth-tier serpent demon, we might just have a shot.”

…

Their current discussion focused on the Doomstar Race survivors from the initial Yaohan Kingdom expansion campaign.

Back then, they’d caught a batch of Doomstar clansmen in a secret realm, but that was just a portion. Those ones only had a handful of gold oddities. The best treasures had already been sent away with the elites.

The Song Family elders had never forgotten about those.

The Doomstar Race’s civilization had a history of hundreds of thousands of years—their accumulated heritage was at least as rich as the Torch Human Civilization itself. Especially since their Sovereigns had never been extinct, just imagine what an advanced civilization could amass over so long.

As far as the Song Family was concerned, what they’d seized during the expansion barely made up a quarter, maybe even less, of the Doomstar Race’s true trove.

So they’d gone to great lengths trying to track down the escapees.

For example, they’d deliberately let some fourth- and fifth-tier Doomstar survivors go, marking them with tracers, hoping to follow them back to the elites.

But in the end, that tactic failed. Every major power that joined the expansion used similar tricks. The Doomstar escapees wiped out all tracking marks without exception.

The only reason Song Chi was confident now was because of the Destiny Compass part.

When they planned back then, the Song Family had managed to gather plenty of Doomstar blood and bone. Using the Destiny Compass he got centuries ago, Song Chi quickly pinpointed the Doomstar survivors’ hideout.

But they’d waited until now because the survivors were holed up deep in Chipan’s core region. Back then, the Song Family was nowhere near strong enough to sneak past the serpent demons’ control.

Now that war had broken out, there was nothing holding them back.