The wreckage overlapped with no gaps.
Thus, the moment five thousand warships warped in...
Spatial overlap occurred.
Over four thousand warships forcibly merged with the wreckage.
A battleship's bridge fused with half an armor plate from another battleship.
The people inside the bridge, before they could even see their surroundings, were impaled by that half armor plate.
Flesh and metal became one.
A cruiser's engine room overlapped with three pieces of debris.
The engine overloaded and exploded outright.
That cruiser blew apart from the inside the instant its jump completed.
A destroyer fared even worse.
Its entire hull overlapped with a five-hundred-meter-long wreckage keel.
The keel pierced through from the bow and exited from the stern.
That destroyer writhed in the void like a fish skewered by a giant metal rod.
Then it exploded with a deafening roar.
Fewer than five hundred warships survived.
They discovered in horror that they were trapped in a metal graveyard.
And at that moment, the jump interference device activated.
They wanted to flee, but escape was impossible.
The Swift fighters waiting outside swarmed in.
Those surviving warships were harvested one after another.
Bridge of the battleship Ares.
A massive piece of starship wreckage directly embedded itself through the viewport's location.
It was too large.
So large that it completely claimed half the bridge.
Those who had been standing there vanished without a trace.
At the seams, blood continuously seeped out.
Drop by drop.
Converging into a thin stream.
Trickling down along the wreckage's edge.
Within this wreckage, half of a body was fused to the debris.
The other half of the torso seemed to have melted into the starship wreckage.
Become one with the metal.
That person was still alive.
He looked down at his missing other half, his eyes filled with confusion.
Then he realized.
He tried to move.
That slight exertion caused his other intact half to directly detach from the fusion point.
It fell to the floor.
As if cleanly split down the middle.
Organs exposed.
Blood gushed forth.
The scene was more gruesome than any horror film.
On the bridge, some crouched down, clutching their heads.
Some began to retch, or even cried out loud.
The younger soldiers with weaker mental fortitude could no longer hold back.
They hugged their heads, crouched in corners, and wailed.
General Slate stood before the command console, staring fixedly at the embedded wreckage.
At the still-dripping blood.
That half-body lying on the floor.
Those soldiers weeping with heads in hands.
His heart twisted in waves of pain.
A pain not from being struck.
But a tearing pain from within, ripping outward.
He murmured, his voice unbearably hoarse.
"Could it be..."
"That the starships that warped here earlier..."
"All turned into wreckage?"
Yet the scene outside the window was the answer.
Endless starship wreckage as far as the eye could see.
Dense and packed.
Layer upon layer.
Like a metal graveyard suspended in deep space.
A terrifying image surfaced in Slate's mind.
Those subordinates.
Those fleets that warped here before him.
They met the same fate.
Fused with wreckage.
Eliminated in despair.
Not even leaving behind complete corpses.
His lips trembled.
He wanted to say something.
But nothing could be said.
At that moment, a torpedo suddenly appeared outside the viewport.
Trailing a blue tail flame, it headed straight for the bridge.
Slate's pupils contracted sharply.
A face flashed through his mind!
Rockwell.
Damn Rockwell.
His lips moved, and with his last ounce of strength, he roared.
"Damn Rockwell..."
"I shouldn't have trusted you!"
Before he could finish speaking,
the torpedo struck the viewport.
The bridge of the Ares was instantly blasted into ruins.
Fifteen minutes later.
Jump Point Z-78.
This airspace had returned to calm once more.
Bridge of the Kunlun Mountain-modified Battleship.
Qin Bei Wang's gaze fell on the system star chart only he could see.
Red dots were moving rapidly.
Two mother-class fleets.
Over eight hundred starships.
Were heading at full speed toward Jump Point Z-78.
His brow twitched slightly.
Eight hundred warships.
And he currently had only a little over a hundred ships at his disposal.
Although he had just executed another brilliant ambush, wiping out five thousand Imperial warships, his own fleet had not emerged unscathed.
Eight hundred regular warships were not like those five thousand unfortunate souls trapped by wreckage.
This was a truly formidable fleet.
If they were caught...
Qin Bei Wang shook his head gently.
It wasn't necessary.
He shifted his gaze away from the two red dots, continuing to scan the star chart.
Then, his pupils contracted slightly.
On the navigation route from the Bushman Star System to the Savannah Star System.
More red dots.
Dense and numerous.
Were moving slowly.
Over ten thousand in number.
The system's analysis results popped up beside the dots:
[Enemy Ship Type Analysis]
T5 Emperor-class battleships: Confirmed 587
T4 Knight-class heavy cruisers: Confirmed 1365
T5 Monarch-class interstellar carriers: Confirmed 31
...
Qin Bei Wang's breath hitched for a moment.
Ten thousand ships.
Not civilian-converted military vessels.
But genuine front-line main forces.
Mostly T4 and T5-class warships.
This was the Empire's true core strength.
Qin Bei Wang surmised that this was likely the reinforcements the enemy had dispatched to support the front line.
This only strengthened his resolve to retreat.
Qin Bei Wang gave the order to the communications officer.
"Relay the command."
"The entire fleet..."
"Retreat."
Not long after.
On the outskirts of Jump Point Z-78.
Two mother-class fleets, comprising over eight hundred warships, slowly entered the airspace.
On the bridge of the flagship Banshee battleship.
Commodore Victor Ashton stood before the observation window, staring at the scene outside the viewport, utterly stunned.
His mouth hung slightly open.
His eyes were wide with disbelief.
It took several seconds for him to find his voice.
"This..."
He paused, his throat dry.
"What is this place?"
His adjutant beside him was equally dumbfounded, murmuring,
"Commander... this is Jump Point Z-78..."
Ashton turned sharply.
"Of course I know this is Z-78!"
He looked back out the viewport, his voice trembling with disbelief.
"But how could it be like this?"
Outside the window lay wreckage.
Endless wreckage.
Layer upon layer, dense and sprawling, stretching as far as the eye could see.
Shattered bows.
Twisted hulls.
Melted armor plates.
Scattered, floating debris.
They piled together like a metallic mountain range suspended in deep space.
Ashton instinctively rubbed his eyes.
He wondered if he had come to the wrong place.
Perhaps the coordinates were off, leading him to a decommissioned starship scrapyard.
But the tactical screen clearly displayed:
Jump Point Z-78.
His voice was hoarse.
"No... it's only been seven hours..."
He paused, then continued.
"How did it end up like this?"
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