Sovereign of the Ashes

The aide had served Seedolf for many years and knew well that the marshal likely had other concerns on his mind.

Still, he did not press the issue, only nodding in agreement. “Indeed. Lumiere is far warmer and brighter than the Netherworld Star Domain. This place really is nothing more than a backward, barbaric region.”

“Besides, during the last war, many planets were destroyed. That’s why it feels so desolate, with so few stars and habitable worlds left,” he added.

No matter who won, wars fought on home ground always brought immense destruction to its native lifeforms.

The Netherworld Star Domain had shown its loyalty to the Gallant Federation early on, yet the fighting still wiped out countless worlds.

Of course, those losses were not entirely in vain. The federation compensated the Netherworld species handsomely.

Their legions, led by Commander Blood River Naeverynk, boasted exceptional combat power.

Among the two major civilizations aligned with the Gallant Federation, the Netherworld’s strength far outshone that of the Grand Eye Demon World.

Gazing out at the desolate expanse before him, Marshal Seedolf remained silent.

The shattered planets drifting through space reminded him that the Gallant Federation had extracted the Star Cores from most of them to build more warships.

War, after all, was the fastest way to seize resources and wealth.

So far, the Gallant Federation had plundered nearly a thousand Star Cores from the Magus Civilization’s territories.

Higher-tier warships, forts, and mobile suits all demanded increasingly powerful energy sources.

Those plundered Star Cores were what fueled the Gallant Federation’s ambition to dominate the Astral Realm.

The federation’s aim was to secure the spoils of victory at any cost.

Otherwise, they would not have risked sending their main forces deep into the Netherworld Star Domain, seeking a decisive clash with the Magus Civilization’s legions near the border of Sanoras Star Domain.

Suppressing his unease, Marshal Seedolf issued an order to his fleet. “Keep alert and advance cautiously. Deploy enough recon craft to watch every direction.”

His caution was well known within the military. It was the reason he had rarely known defeat in wars and earned the title of Military God.

He never acted rashly and struck only after carefully considering every possible scenario.

In sharp contrast to Marshal Seedolf’s cautious nature, Marshal Karnoch—the commander of another overlord-class federal fleet—had risen to great fame across the Gallant Federation in recent years.

His relentless offensives and bold maneuvers had seen him drive his fleets deep into Magus Civilization’s territory, breaking through multiple defensive lines that the enemy had painstakingly established.

As his power and prestige within the military soared, Marshal Karnoch also gained countless admirers and supporters across the Gallant Federation.

It was not hard to imagine that, should he ever step away from military service and into politics, his career there would flourish just as easily.

Several major federal conglomerates with military ties had even begun producing documentaries and films about his exploits, further fueling his reputation.

The Invincible Fleet under his command was known in every star domain within the federation’s reach.

With such achievements, Karnoch should have been content. After all, fame and glory were what most living in technological civilizations pursued.

His aggressive tactics had also inspired other federal fleets entering the Netherworld Star Domain, driving them to press forward with similar ferocity.

The war between the Gallant Federation and the Magus Civilization was destined to go down as one of the great conflicts in history.

It would be an era-defining clash that future generations of both civilizations would study and retell for hundreds of thousands of years.

Those who stood at the peak of technological civilizations lived far shorter than the supreme powehouses of cultivation worlds.

To achieve greatness within such a finite span and be remembered for eternity was the ultimate pursuit of every technological being.

In the Netherworld Star Domain, Marshal Seedolf’s overlord-class fleet now advanced at the slowest pace.

The faster fleets, including two overlord-class mobile suits, had already pushed ahead to the borders of the Sanoras Star Domain and had likely clashed several times with the Magus Civilization Army.

At this moment, Seedolf’s fleet had reached the central region of the Netherworld Star Domain, not far from the large-sized world known as the Netherworld.

That world had already suffered devastating damage from earlier wars.

Several battles had even broken out on its surface, leaving vast stretches of Netherworld reduced to lifeless wasteland.

It truly lived up to its reputation as the “home of the dead”.

Before this war, the Magus Alliance had ruled over two large-sized worlds teeming with undead, specters, and other dark creatures: the Netherworld and the Undead World.

Looking at Netherworld Plane on the star map, Marshal Seedolf suddenly said, “The war against the Magus Civilization is one the Gallant Federation must fight and win.”

“The countless large and medium-sized planes under the Magus Alliance’s control could one day supply our federation with entire fleets of overlord-class warships. Their civilization’s immense resources and vast star domains will become the foundation of the Gallant Federation’s prosperity, development, and growth.

“This conflict will decide the rise or fall of the Gallant Federation for hundreds of thousands of years to come. Every soldier, every fleet commander, must give their all to secure victory for our civilization!”

“We stand with the Marshal to forge the federation’s glory!” his aide shouted first, followed by thunderous affirmations from the officers in the capital ships.

Morale within the federation legions was sky-high.

Throughout the entire war with the Magus Civilization, desertion or cowardice had been almost nonexistent. This was, after all, a clash between two supreme civilizations.

The Magus Civilization’s repeated defeats in the Netherworld Star Domain were not really an act. A completely staged defeat would have looked too suspicious.

The Magus Civilization had actually thrown its second and third-tier allied legions into battle against the federation’s elite frontline forces. Combined with a few strategic missteps, defeat was practically ensured.

That was why the federation’s supercomputer reported that the Magus Civilization’s main forces remained intact.

The energized atmosphere aboard the capital ship had greatly lifted Marshal Seedolf’s mood.

Just as his capital ship finished a short-distance space jump, an urgent transmission crackled in from a recon fleet.

A massive horde of Netherworld creatures had suddenly appeared along the flank of their fleet formation.

The marshal raised an eyebrow at the news.