Chapter 590: Battle Through the Wormhole

Spatial wormhole, left sector. This was where the three Yaohan Kingdom fleets were gathered.

Encrypted group chat between the three Star-Annihilator-class ships.

“Liu Shu: No doubt about it. That kid from the Dragonspine Song Family used the Doomstar Race’s ‘Deathstar Descent’ ability earlier.”

“Shen Wei: So that means the first one to step into that secret realm was the Song clan from Dragonspine?”

“Xiao Changqing: Clever kid. Back then, wasn’t the Song Family just a regular sixth-tier house? And he dared swipe the prize right under our noses?”

“Xiao Changqing: Still, no point confronting them directly now. Civilization war’s broken out, and Song Wujian’s strength alone is nothing to scoff at.”

“Shen Wei: Exactly. Judging by his battle with the Serpent Demon Dominator, that ‘Calm-Sea Dragon-Xiang’ is packing at least three gold Sanctum Domain Components. Most likely it’s been enhanced to tier eight—much stronger than the Morningstar Traverse!”

“Liu Shu: The Dragonspine Song Family’s on the rise, but let’s not forget they’re in the wrong here. No need to strong-arm them—we just want a fair negotiation. That’s not too much to ask, right?”

The other two in the chat paused, then spoke up in unison:

“You’re talking about a sixth-tier Timeworld Fruit, aren’t you?”

It wasn’t much of a secret anymore that the Song Family controlled a sixth-tier Timeworld Tree. Back at the Chigu auction, Song Wujian openly brought out a sixth-tier Timeworld Fruit, so news of it spread like wildfire to all the major forces in the Five-Plate Galaxy Cluster.

The only reason chaos hadn’t broken out yet was because Song Family’s current strength was enough—a Star-Annihilator-class ship plus a Three-Eyed Clan Dominion Flagship. Those were more than enough to guard a single sixth-tier Timeworld Tree.

But just because no one dared stir up trouble didn’t mean the other forces weren’t eyeing that Timeworld Fruit. Now that an opportunity appeared, of course the three houses immediately set their sights on it.

After settling their strategy, the three of them quickly reached out to Song Wujian on the wormhole’s far side.

…

Morningstar Kingdom. Song Family of Longji fleet.

Encrypted chat—’Calm-Sea Dragon-Xiang’ group.

“Song Wujian: Just as we expected, the three Yaohan Kingdom Star-Annihilator captains approached me for a talk. They’ve identified that Xiaochi used the ‘Deathstar Descent’ secret art.”

“Song Shiyuan: Since we’ve got the ‘Doomstar Secret Arts Inheritance Stele’ now, it was only a matter of time before that kind of technique showed up. Best to get ahead of the problem and resolve it now!”

“Song Chi: Elder, what exactly are their terms?”

With so few people in this encrypted chat—all core members of the family—Song Wujian spoke freely:

“Each of them wants the right to fairly buy one sixth-tier Timeworld Fruit from us in the future.”

“Song Xingru: That’s it? Nothing else?”

Xingru’s reaction was understandable. The demand was so low she thought she’d misheard.

But to the others in the chat, it seemed perfectly reasonable.

Anyone could see that the Song Family’s momentum was obvious now. As long as nothing drastic happened in the coming war, their future potential would be immense.

Anyone with a brain knew that the only option was to befriend the Song Family—making enemies wasn’t an option.

And as for how the Morningstar Family acted before? That wasn’t hard to figure out.

They also controlled half the Timeworld Tree Sanctuary resources, and assumed their own future looked equally bright. Naturally, they weren’t about to watch the Song Family—right next door—rise up alongside them. They’d tried all sorts of ways to push the Song Family down.

Sorting through his thoughts, Song Chi spoke up quickly:

“The request is fair, but we can’t reveal that we have more Timeworld Trees. Even if we agree, we need to make it clear there’s only one sixth-tier Timeworld Tree, and its growth is extremely slow—secret realm acceleration aside, it’ll be hundreds if not a thousand years before we can sell them more.”

“Don’t worry, that’s for sure. With only one sixth-tier Timeworld Tree, our power is enough to defend it now. But if word gets out we have more, even the immortal heavyweights will be knocking at our door!”

And so, the Song Family and the three Yaohan Kingdom Immortal Houses finalized a one-off fair trade agreement.

That deal smoothed relations a bit more—Yaohan’s Immortal Houses even proactively invited the Song Family fleet to form an alliance.

But after considering it, Song Wujian refused.

The reason was simple: allying with those three would increase security, but it would mean giving up profits originally belonging to the Song Family.

The point of joining forces with the Chigu Luo Clan in the first place was to strengthen their influence without diluting their benefits. Keeping the fleet safe was actually a secondary concern.

Besides, just factoring in the Omniverse Market Projection Song Chi could summon, plus the Starry Sky Dragon Shark and several seventh-tier Dominator Worms hidden in the family fleet, they had more than enough power to keep everyone safe.

As for running into an eighth-tier Eight-Armed Serpent Demon? Even if they did, using a Market Projection in tandem with multiple seventh-tier dominators would be more than enough for self-preservation. If two eighth-tier Eight-Armed Serpent Demons showed up at once, then even an alliance with Yaohan’s three powers wouldn’t prevent defeat.

…

Time passed. Half a month later.

At the wormhole’s entrance, seventy million warships lined up in two waves, plunging into the passage one after the other.

Forty million ships up front, thirty million behind.

Among the forty million vanguard fleet, there were ten million ships from the Morningstar Kingdom’s Joint Fleet led by the Gold Horn Lu Family, plus another twenty million from Yaohan Kingdom’s various fifth and sixth-tier family fleets, hoping to gamble for high stakes—then a few million civilian ships from both kingdoms.

The second wave of thirty million was mostly made up of those earlier attached to Immortal Houses.

But what no one noticed was that, hidden among the vanguard, there was a 160,000-meter Dreadnought shrouded in distortions.

That Dreadnought moved in the shadows, surrounded by countless warships and with the patrol radars scrambled. Not a single captain noticed its presence.

This Dreadnought wasn’t just any ship. It was a mirror image of the Heavenly Ruin.

Song Chi’s thinking was simple—since it was too risky to send the real Heavenly Ruin, but he didn’t want to miss out on harvesting souls, he’d just send the mirror warship instead.

That way, even if things went badly—like the Eight-Armed Serpent Demons’ defenses on the far side being far stronger than expected, or the wormhole itself being destroyed with some trick—they wouldn’t lose too much.

With the ‘Mirror Image Split’ cooldown at ten years, but both the Timepiece Chessboard and Pusa Zen Seal reducing that dramatically, it’s really just about six months to wait. No big deal.

…

They traveled through the wormhole for days before, finally, the entrance appeared before the vanguard fleet.

The already nervous vanguard slowed to a crawl.

Vanguard fleet command group chat.

“How about this: each side sends a high-grade mobile battlestar plus a million warships to scout ahead. Once we know the situation on the far side, we can all charge through together!”

The one speaking was the Gold Horn Lu Family’s Dreadnought grand elder—the only one of his kind in the Morningstar Kingdom, and now vanguard commander.

Several Yaohan Dreadnought captains nodded in agreement.

“Sounds good. But your kingdom only sent one group—just the battlestar, then, but a million ships isn’t enough. We need two million.”

After some discussion among the Morningstar Gold Horn Lu and their allies, they pulled another million warships from the civilian fleets.

The Yaohan Kingdom, with over thirty million ships split among three groups, contributed three more mobile battlestars and three million ships.

So, four high-grade mobile battlestars would take point, with four million warships right behind, charging straight for the wormhole’s exit.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

No sooner had the four battlestars surged out of the wormhole than they were hit by an overwhelming barrage from every direction. The ships and battlestars at the front were instantly engulfed in a web of deadly fire.

No surprise—the Eight-Armed Serpent Demons had clearly prepared for this on the Chipan Galaxy side.

The starry expanse by the wormhole was packed tight with Heavenly Serpent warships. No matter how many ships emerged from the tunnel, they’d be hammered from every side.

Inside the wormhole, the vanguard’s group chat lit up.

“No good. If we keep this up, we’ll be lucky to last ten minutes, let alone establish any defense.”

“Agreed. The only way forward is to somehow break into the cluster of Heavenly Serpent warships a million kilometers out. Only by tearing open the formation can we turn this fight around.”

While everyone was debating options, the Gold Horn Lu elder spoke up again:

“I’ve got a mass teleport component that can send ten thousand ships at once, but if you want to smash through billions of enemy warships with that, ordinary ships and Torch Battleships won’t cut it—you need cruisers, at least.”

“And let me be clear: since my Lu Family’s providing the teleport piece, we’re sitting this one out. The ten thousand slots are for you others to divvy up.”

After more debate, allocation was settled. Except for the Lu Family, every force at the scene sent hundreds of elite clan members or more—among them, plenty of Zhulu-class Cruiser and Battleship Captains.

Outside, the four mobile battlestars had already seen two blown to pieces, and more than a quarter of their four million leading ships had gone down.

“No time left. Everyone get ready—if we don’t go now, there won’t be anyone left to soak up fire!”

With that call from the Lu elder, the ten thousand chosen warships quickly converged around his flagship.

The next instant, intense spatial ripples surged through the wormhole.

And just moments later, all ten thousand ships vanished from the tunnel—followed by a sudden commotion on the outside.

Looking out, they saw that a full ten thousand Torch Battleships—no smaller than cruisers—had been precisely teleported deep into a massive cluster of Heavenly Serpent warships a million kilometers away.

Immediately, the millions of serpent ships in that zone erupted into chaos.

The Torch Battleships, already prepared, instantly unleashed their full arsenals.

Even as they activated their hull armor defenses, those ships with long-range area bombardment launched everything they had.

In no time, nearly a million serpent warships got dragged into the spiral, causing huge disruption.

Seeing their chance, the three million plus remaining ships in the wormhole all received orders from command.

“Attack!”

Vrrrmmm!

Over thirty million warships surged out of the wormhole at once. As soon as they emerged, they unleashed every area-of-effect bombardment component in their arsenal.

Song Chi didn’t miss the chance either.

His mind linked to the mirror warship, he swept the field for the densest concentration of serpent ships—then, without hesitation, fired up the Divine Thunder Cannon’s ‘Ten-Thousand Sigil Violet Lightning Prison’ on the mirror vessel.

In a flash, countless purple lightning sigils gathered in the region packed with nearly ten million Heavenly Serpent ships.

The moment those serpent ships realized the danger and tried to dodge, more than ten thousand lightning sigils erupted at once.

Amidst the thundering blasts were shockwaves of spatial collapse—the very signature of the Black Hole Evolution Layer’s ‘Black Hole Collapse.’

As the twin catastrophes hit, all the way back on the Heavenly Ruin, Song Chi’s dual pupils glowed as purple light danced in his eyes.

Soul-Devourer Sacrificial Altar

Current soul-harvesting progress: Stage two, four percent.

No wonder—just that one devastating barrage pushed the altar from ninety-two percent of the first stage to four percent of the second. That speaks volumes for how many Eight-Armed Serpent Demons had just been wiped out.

Before he could process it, Song Wujian’s voice came through.

“Just got word—the vanguard has broken through to some degree and is fighting the serpent fleet. Commander Wang says we can move out now!”

A few days later, over a hundred million ships from the two kingdoms arrived at the end of the passage.

Watching the fierce battle raging outside the wormhole, the commanders of both kingdoms quickly issued the order to charge.

The longer the fight dragged on, the clearer it became that the Torch Battleships were losing ground. They outmatched the enemy one-to-one, but the serpent warships just had the advantage in overwhelming numbers.

So the main fleet had to enter the fight fast—only then could they lock down the strategic outpost, staying both offensive and defensive.

Boom! Boom!

Once the main fleet joined, human morale soared. But as the high command pressed for a breakthrough, several seventh-tier Serpent Demon Dominators made their move.

They didn’t hold back. At once, they unleashed four layers of eighth-armed Serpent Prisons, trapping nearly two hundred million Torch Battleships in a massive net.