The Martial Unity

”That’s precisely why she thinks it’s dangerous,” Siliscia murmured knowingly. ”This place is supposed to be filled with fauna. But there are no major lifeforms here despite the convergence phenomenon. That means something made these creatures not want to be anywhere near here despite that.”

Her expression grew more grim.

”An extraordinarily powerful creature that terrifies them to the core of their being. That is the only explanation.”

Ria nodded with a serious expression.

”We’re dealing with an extremely dangerous threat, most likely. The creatures that we ran into don’t even compare to how powerful the guardian will be. We will need to be at our very peak if we want to get past it.”

She had a feeling that they weren’t going to be able to sneak past them with their stealthy exosuits.

***

Far away in human civilization, a certain spaceship departed from the Strontian Star System. The ship was a standard logistical cruiser, the kind of spaceship that was designed for the transport of space infrastructure and industrial capital, whether it was construction fabricators or, in this case, mining equipment.

What was unusual about it was that it was equipped with a nuclear reactor that allowed an indefinite energy lifespan. Its hull was painted an entirely mundane white and blue, while its structure and design were highly standardized.

It didn’t stand out at all.

It simply departed from the Strontian Star System, a star system at the edge of human civilization. A star system that was about twenty light-years from the Arima Star System, where the Jakarthar Federation was. It quickly passed through transit-related due process, commencing its departure from the star system.

WHOOSH

The moment the spaceship entered FTL, the crew immediately burst into ecstatic celebrations.

”We made it!”

”WOOHOO!”

”I was so terrified, I thought they would catch us!”

”Well done everybody,” the woman standing at the helm of the command room spoke with a booming voice and a wide grin, evidently pleased. ”However, the work is just starting. Don’t forget that.”

Her astronaval attire was messy and mishaped, as if she wasn’t accustomed to wearing it despite being accustomed to commanding a spaceship. She threw the silly hat away as her posture became more relaxed and nonchalant, before ultimately kicking back in her chair and throwing her legs on her table.

”Strehegeld Star System, here we come,” she chuckled. ”If the Gaian Alliance thought they were going to prevent us from reaching a destroyed infected world and all the esoteric matter that comes with it, then they thought wrong. The Seralia Syndicate will get its hands on this esoteric matter, no matter what.”

It hadn’t been easy planning a trip to the Strehegeld Star System. The Gaian Alliance and the Kandrian Empire, along with numerous other lawful state and non-state actors had worked hard to make it very difficult to try and reach the Strehegeld Star System. Massive dragnets, surveillance, and detection systems were in place that automatically reported anybody or any entity that even remotely seemed to be trying to the near the Strehegeld Star System.

Ships that visited star systems near it were tracked with special trackers that the ships were expected to comply with the implementation of. An intricate set of enforcement mechanisms, including prophecy, was deployed to prevent any human from reaching the Strehegeld Star System.

On top of that, the recent and shocking forceful dismantling of the Blood Cult had chilled many individuals who would otherwise consider trying something like that. The Gaian Alliance was generally liberal around most matters domestically. Although more laws had been passed by the General Assembly for things like genocide and other crimes against humanity, it was, for the most part, quite liberal.

But when it came to matters of civilizational security, it didn’t mess around. And since the Strehegeld Star System was now a matter of civilizational security, most sane underworld and black market actors backed off, lest they risked earning the special wrath of the Gaian Alliance and the Emperor of Water.

But there were those, of course, who weren’t deterred.

The Seralia Syndicate, one of the largest Underworld organizations led by the Seralia Family, was one of them. The organization, or Don Seralia, rather, sought the esoteric matter that was prohibited for the time being. As scary as the Gaian Alliance was to many, the greed for esoterics outweighed it this time.

Even at the risks that came with it.

In order to avoid detection, the ship that they had deployed was one that was entirely squeaky clean on paper, entirely legal from the very beginning so that it wouldn’t trigger any alarms. On top of that, they commenced the mission far away from the Jarkarthar Federation, where scrutiny was highest.

They chose an extremely roundabout path to reaching the star system, choosing to reach it from the other side of the star system than the side that faced human civilization. It hadn’t been easy, but they had managed to evade detection.

”We’ll be there in three days. Once we do, we must be prepared to sweep as much esoteric matter as we possibly can and then get the hell out of there as quickly as we can,” the captain said with a serious expression. ”Remember to have all the systems on standby. I don’t want to waste even a single minute the moment we get there.”

She wasn’t worried about aliens as much as she was worried about humans. Three months had passed, and the so-called Arakai Web Civilization had yet to attack humanity, which likely meant that the threat had completely passed, as far as she was concerned.

They were willing to take the mild risk that there were arakai in the Strehegeld Star System still and that going there could jeopardize human civilization. The Underworld was a place where risk was the norm. People who lived within it only grew uneasy when there wasn’t any visible risk, for that was usually the sign that something was extremely risky or outright a trap.

Thus, the Seralia Syndicate made a bid for the Strehegeld Star System.