Chapter 196: Images of War

Words : 1621 Updated : Sep 27th, 2025

The aging red giant that had now become a black hole would continue on its orbital path around the galactic core, maintaining its original trajectory and cycle. In truth, whether it had become a black hole or not made no difference to the rest of the Milky Way’s stellar systems, because its mass remained unchanged. It was like a tiny stone abandoned in a dark corner, unnoticed and forgotten. No one would ever know what kind of colossal and earth-shaking events had once taken place around it. This was the first event, and Xiao Yu didn’t devote too much thought to it. But the second event he cared about deeply. A battle between civilizations of this scale might very well provide him with unexpected insights. Due to the extreme distance, by the time the footage of this war reached Xiao Yu’s observation instruments, most of the details had already been lost. As a result, he could only observe the war on a macro level. The location of the battle was within a sparse star cluster. This particular cluster had a diameter of more than one hundred light-years. Even by galactic standards, not just on the periphery but within the galaxy itself, this was an enormous cluster. It contained at least several hundred stars and was rich in interstellar gas. The massive battle took place right within this cluster. Xiao Yu observed several stars on one side of the cluster suddenly vanish from view, and then, after a period of time, reappear without warning. “That must be Taihao’s body blocking their light,” Xiao Yu speculated. As that shadow advanced, Xiao Yu witnessed another breathtaking scene on the opposite side of the cluster. Several stars there suddenly brightened by several dozen times, as if a candle flame had transformed into a bonfire. Moreover, their brightness increase followed a certain rhythm, seemingly amplified by some unknown effect. In Xiao Yu’s eyes, the entire scene resembled two invisible forces slowly approaching one another. On one side was Taihao, capable of blocking starlight. On the other, the Sweepers, capable of magnifying it. Eventually, the two forces collided at the center of the cluster. Because of the extreme distance, Xiao Yu could only observe the battle from a macro perspective. He saw dozens of stars at the center of the battlefield enter a state of extreme instability. Their luminosity fluctuated in bizarre patterns, sometimes increasing by thousands or tens of thousands of times. At their brightest, they outshone even the moon as seen from Earth. At their dimmest, they became completely invisible. To better observe the ongoing war, Xiao Yu deliberately reduced the speed of his fleet, allowing him to receive and analyze the signals more clearly. Ten years into the battle, Xiao Yu saw one star suddenly flare in brightness, its luminosity surging by hundreds of thousands of times in an instant. This was the greatest spike he had seen since the war began. Furthermore, the star’s shape ceased to be a singular point of light and instead transformed into an irregular, jagged plane. “A star explosion...” Xiao Yu murmured, his thoughts involuntarily drifting back to Tianyuan IV, which had been destroyed by the hands of the Guardian Alliance. This star had met the same fate as Tianyuan IV. Under normal conditions, it should have evolved into a white dwarf. But struck by calamity, it was forced into a premature death, an explosion so total that not even remnants remained. This kind of anomalous supernova explosion wasn’t sufficient to form a neutron star or black hole. It was a genuine, thorough obliteration, a shattering of mass. Under the violent shockwaves of the blast, the star’s entire substance would be ejected into interstellar space. Amid the remnants of that star, the titanic battle still raged on. Xiao Yu didn’t know the precise methods of warfare being employed, but based on the effect this conflict had on its surrounding environment, he could infer its overwhelming intensity. “They appear to be evenly matched... neither side can overcome the other,” Xiao Yu surmised. “It seems... the Sweeper Civilization also possesses relevant Four-Dimensional Space technology. Otherwise, logically speaking, even a Neutron War Star should be powerless when confronted by an attack from a higher dimension. The Sweeper Civilization truly deserves its reputation as a super civilization that suppressed the Guardian Alliance for tens of millions of years.” From this fragment of interstellar war, Xiao Yu was also able to make some speculative deductions about the elusive Level 7 Civilizations that lay beyond Level 6. “First of all, I can confirm that the Sweeper Civilization has not reached Level 7. The Neutron War Star must be the result of some kind of serendipitous discovery. Judging from the behavior of both Taihao and the Sweepers, it seems that the key to breaking through into a Level 7 Civilization lies in the concept of space. However, that other Taihao Civilization, the one that imprisoned the Earth girl, appears to have chosen the soul as its breakthrough direction, not space. Does this mean that, upon reaching the peak of Level 6, a civilization must choose a primary focus in order to evolve further? Perhaps space... or energy... or time... or soul...” “This classification might even be how various types of Taihao Civilizations are distinguished. For example: Type C Taihao, Type D Taihao, and so on.” As he speculated, Xiao Yu continued analyzing the distant, flickering battlefield unfolding hundreds of light-years away. The real-time war footage was already being broadcast inside the Eternal Kingdom, where more than two thousand Luka scientists were simultaneously conducting their own studies and assessments. The stalemate between these titanic forces persisted for a full ten years. Then, Xiao Yu observed something new, an unidentified object suddenly appeared from the direction of the Sweeper Civilization. Its arrival caused immediate chaos across the sparse star cluster. Stars that had been peacefully orbiting along their tracks suddenly veered off course. “Immense gravity?” Xiao Yu guessed. “In that case... this must be the Neutron War Star.” Neutron stars come in multiple types. There are ordinary neutron stars, but if they emit intense radiation, they become pulsars. If they possess extreme magnetism, they are classified as magnetars. Magnetars and pulsars are both forms of neutron stars. Neutron stars are effectively invisible, much like black holes. The difference is, black holes are invisible because they trap light; neutron stars, meanwhile, simply don’t emit visible light. Their surface temperatures are unimaginably high. According to the blackbody radiation principle, when a temperature surpasses a certain threshold, an object emits most of its radiation in the form of X-rays. As a result, Xiao Yu could not see the Neutron War Star in the visible spectrum. But while it was silent in visible light, it roared in X-rays. The radiation from this Neutron War Star was so intense that it dimmed the entire hundred-light-year-wide star cluster around it. With the appearance of the Neutron War Star, Xiao Yu observed from a macro level that the darkness representing Taihao was being gradually overpowered by the light representing the Sweeper Civilization. The region of darkness shrank rapidly. “Taihao must have broadcast a spatial distress signal at this point, summoning the Guardian Alliance to join the battle. And the Guardian Alliance, in turn, summoned more than 500 Level 4 and higher civilizations to the fight. That’s what escalated this war into one capable of shaking the entire Milky Way Galaxy.” And sure enough, events progressed just as Xiao Yu had predicted. Some time later, he began to observe countless flickers of light converging on the star cluster. He knew each of these flickers likely represented a vast and powerful fleet. Each fleet might contain tens of thousands, or even millions, of ships. But from such a vast distance, the engines of those ships appeared only as dim star-like glimmers. These fleets, representing all of the Milky Way’s elite forces aside from the Sweeper Civilization, had a dramatic impact the moment they joined the fray. Xiao Yu saw that even the Neutron War Star seemed forced to withdraw for a time, and the region of darkness representing Taihao suddenly expanded, almost overtaking the territory held by the Sweepers. But the tide did not hold for long. Several years later, Xiao Yu witnessed the Neutron War Star collide head-on with Taihao. At that moment, the Neutron War Star vanished from his instruments. Neither visible light nor X-rays could detect it. “It must have entered Taihao’s body... The decisive moment of this war has arrived,” Xiao Yu thought. Of course, he already knew the final outcome. But to witness it unfold in real time, even from afar, filled him with overwhelming excitement. “Taihao’s body is a semi-Four-Dimensional structure... What kind of tactics can the Neutron War Star use in such an environment?” Xiao Yu quietly wondered, imagining the epic clash hidden from view. The Neutron War Star had entered Taihao’s body. The battle between them was now taking place unseen. Meanwhile, the colossal fleets of hundreds of civilizations continued their struggle against the Sweepers’ conventional forces. Throughout the war, Xiao Yu counted at least eighty stars that had suffered collateral damage—unwilling victims of the chaos—exploding and disintegrating into nothingness. This brutal conflict raged on for more than thirty years. And for those thirty years, the Neutron War Star remained hidden. The region of darkness that represented Taihao also remained still and silent for that duration. Then, after thirty long years, Xiao Yu once again detected powerful X-ray emissions. The Neutron War Star had returned. And with its return, the black region representing Taihao’s presence violently shattered, fragmenting into countless shards, scattering in all directions.

Chapter 196: Images of War

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