The war erupted suddenly, without warning.
Almost exactly a week after Simali contacted the other Lieutenant Colonels.
The war began abruptly and ended just as quickly.
In just six days, the battle was over.
Space X6 fell; the Star Nation alliance suffered over 24,000 casualties, with only 3800 retreating. It was a near-total annihilation.
These 3800 soldiers sealed the entrance to X6, then fled through other passages to other headquarters.
They wouldn't return to their original base.
The intense underground fighting had left every base desolate.
Retreating to their original base meant certain death.
Their stronghold, like the 276th's, was located beneath the base, meaning Federation forces could easily reach them.
"So fast?"
Simali was shocked by the news.
Over the years of war, battles lasted from decades to centuries.
This battle lasted only six days, indicating a major Federation offensive.
"Why so fast?" Simali wondered.
It couldn't be related to him.
He hadn't noticed any changes beforehand.
He must have been right.
Unknown changes had occurred on other interplanetary battlefields, prompting the Federation to accelerate their offensive.
This was both good and bad news.
The good news was that the Federation's accelerated offensive meant a greater chance of reinforcements arriving.
The bad news was equally clear: the Federation would strike with full force.
"Simali, should we pressure the other Lieutenant Colonels now?"
"They'll likely try to consolidate their forces," a Sergeant said, worried about the new enemy threat.
Consolidating sooner was safer.
With major spaces already lost, their remaining hundreds would be easily overwhelmed.
Simali's spirits weren't invincible; the Federation might have countermeasures.
"No, wait a few more days."
"They're desperate now; I want them to come to us."
"That gives us more control."
"Don't worry. Here, the spirits are invincible; possessing them means we have a chance to win."
"For now, we just need to build new power generators."
One power generator in the stronghold, another in the base.
They now had two; the base generator had a higher output.
But Simali felt it wasn't enough; he wanted a larger generator.
Due to resource scarcity on Planet E, the generators were nuclear fusion devices; although small, they were sufficient for a base.
Building a nuclear fusion generator was simple; it would take only one or two months.
Simali thought they had ample time.
He was wrong.
A fortnight later, the Federation launched another offensive; X11 held for only four days.
Too fast.
Unbelievably fast.
Simali couldn't understand why the Federation, possessing such overwhelming force, had engaged in prolonged attrition warfare with the Star Nation alliance.
Less than ten minutes after the previous message, several requests for assistance arrived.
From the other Lieutenant Colonels.
Simali knew they desperately wanted to merge forces, but he decided to wait.
He didn't yet have the initiative.
He hoped the next attack would reach X12.
That would give him room to maneuver.
...
This wait wasn't in vain.
War erupted in X12.
This was expected.
X12 was adjacent to X11 and X6.
The Federation's initial deployment to X12-S4 indicated their intention to attack X12.
The broken communication lines had forced the Federation to attack X11 and X6 first.
Having secured those, the Federation deployed forces there before attacking X12.
After the battle began, Simali received no further requests to merge forces.
Simali didn't care.
He returned to the stronghold.
No one went out; they simply waited for the attack.
After a day of waiting.
"They're here!"
Simali saw the attack alerts on the fortress system.
He quickly ordered energy transfer.
New spirits emerged from his tendril and flew out, just like before.
This time, the attack ended before reaching its peak.
Simali sent scouts to inspect; they found over 2000 corpses.
After their previous failure, the Federation was more cautious, sending more troops.
But against the unknown, superior numbers were useless.
Hearing the casualty count, Simali felt a surge of emotion.
Perhaps it was possible.
He could lead the war!
He could achieve victory!
With the spirits, he possessed the power.
Due to the situation here, the Federation's advance on X12 stalled. The war lasted over 20 days, ultimately resulting in heavy casualties for the Star Nation alliance but forcing a Federation retreat.
X12-S4 attracted attention.
It was the only space that hadn't been compromised.
If the previous victory was luck, what about this one?
Did the Matriarchy star nation possess some secret weapon?
After the battle, new requests to merge forces arrived; Simali accepted.
"Consolidation?"
"Yes, we can do that."
"But I've changed my mind; I want to be the Legion Commander. I don't imagine anyone will object."
Simali's change of attitude surprised some Lieutenant Colonels.
"Wasn't it supposed to be cooperation?"
Simali inwardly cursed their stupidity.
This was just bait, planting the seed of cooperation.
"I've changed my mind!" Simali declared authoritatively.
He had earned the right to do so.
They were the only ones to have repelled the Federation forces.
It was true.
On this battlefield, strength dictated everything.
"You're free to refuse consolidation."
"But I can't guarantee which underground space the Federation will attack next," Simali said, acting like a petty tyrant.
This coercive tactic worked.
Lieutenant Colonels with only a few hundred troops had no choice.
The Federation's arrival meant certain death.
Their agreement forced the larger Lieutenant Colonels to comply as well.
Though their combined forces numbered over 5000.
They doubted they could withstand a Federation assault.
They couldn't.
Survival was prioritized over pride; they chose the former.
...
Inside the surface fortress, Simali leaned against a wall, alone.
Those he'd considered close friends were all dead.
Before him wasn't a strategic map, but a photograph.
He was a Matriarchy star nation clone, not created for war. He lived in a capitalist-influenced region on the Matriarchy star nation's border galaxy.
There, as a clone, he'd found love.
In the Matriarchy star nation, due to the high status of women, common marriages were typically between women, using genetic engineering for reproduction.
The children born were almost always female. In a star nation with hundreds of billions of inhabitants, the annual male births numbered in the single digits.
Finding true love as a clone in such a society was incredibly difficult.
Simali considered himself incredibly fortunate.
But that happiness amplified his suffering.
When the war began, he was conscripted as a soldier—a profound misfortune.
It meant a long separation.
Especially after being sent to Planet E, Simali gave up hope of returning.
But the spirits had given him a chance.
Perhaps.
He might really be able to go back.
...
The Matriarchy star nation forces consolidated quickly.
Three corps had now joined their base; Simali commanded over 2500 soldiers.
He planned to utilize all his forces.
The three Lieutenant Colonels were apprehensive upon hearing Simali's plan to attack the Federation.
"Are you sure we can defeat the Federation?"
"Morale is low; some might surrender to the Federation."
Surrender was unlikely; everyone had internal quark robots.
These robots would kill soldiers instantly upon detecting surrender.
But it wasn't impossible. A high enough reward could tempt some.
If anyone surrendered, their actions would be known.
"What undertaking is without risk?"
"Remember, this is a battlefield, not your comfortable homes."
"We fight, or we die!"
Simali refused passive defense; he wanted to launch an offensive.
Passive defense was easily broken; the Federation could use more powerful weapons.
Modern weapons could easily destroy planets; destroying a small base would be trivial.
The reason neither side used them was to avoid escalating the war.
Millions had died on Planet E over millennia; an average-sized interplanetary war would result in far greater casualties.
Planet E also lacked usable warships; this war required less financial constraint.
War was expensive.
Small star nations like the Matriarchy were constantly losing resources; they relied on the Twenty-Eight Nations Covenant for support.
Small-scale battles were preferable.
The Federation, lacking clone soldiers, also preferred this.
But the Federation's use of advanced personal weapons made Simali question whether they might deploy even more powerful weapons to end the war on Planet E.
The initiative was crucial.
They couldn't give the Federation any time to react.
"Is everyone ready?" Simali asked, looking towards the center of the stronghold.
There, a 10-meter-diameter device sat.
This was their third nuclear fusion power generator.
Through numerous iterations, nuclear fusion generators had become incredibly compact.
But smaller size meant less energy production.
Standard nuclear fusion generators were still large.
This device was a 2-meter-diameter sphere; the rest was the energy storage unit.
It could compress energy, storing over 40 quintillion coulombs—approximately 40 zetajoules.
That amount of energy could power half the Earth for a million years.
All this energy was contained within a small container, continuously recharged by previous fusion generators.
This generator had a massive power output and used artificial particles, not ordinary ones.
These artificial particles could perfectly fuse and then split back into their original components for recycling.
According to the law of conservation of energy, energy couldn't be created from nothing.
The generator consumed large quantities of other particles for power generation; these particles were cheap, like sand.
The sand, processed by the machine, was broken down into fundamental particles—electrons, protons, neutrons—continuously replenishing the artificial particles.
"Ready, Legion Commander."
"We can deploy at any time."
Simali didn't want to wait any longer.
"Let's go."
"To X12."
Four Warbeast soldiers lifted the device.
Even in mechs, lifting the energy-filled generator wasn't easy.
It looked small but had an incredibly high energy density, weighing over 60 million tons—essentially a small mountain.
They not only had to move it but also use their mechs' anti-gravity systems to keep themselves off the ground.
Otherwise, they'd crush the surface.
The troops left the stronghold and ventured into the darkness.
They took over half an hour to reach X12 through a winding passage.
Compared to their cramped space, this was a new world.
This large space wasn't a collection of smaller spaces but a massive, continuous underground cavern.
It had no end, no clear boundaries of height or depth.
While desolate, with numerous craters on the ground, it didn't feel claustrophobic.
Simali planned to directly attack the marked Federation base.
He'd obtained a map of X12 from another Star Nation to avoid their own minefields.
Otherwise, they might die from their own explosives before encountering the enemy.
As the team advanced, Simali felt a surge of tension and excitement.
Would he defeat the Federation, or would they defeat him?
This battle could be the beginning or the end.
He constantly checked the coordinates, fearing they'd become inactive; he'd been having recurring daydreams of this happening.
Amidst this anxiety…
An explosion killed dozens of soldiers; Simali confirmed they were in Federation territory.
"Target the power generator."
"Let's go!"
...
Lkam stared blankly at the corner.
She sat like that for a long time, until a soldier approached.
"Homesick?"
Lkam was female.
The Federation had gender equality; the number of male and female soldiers was roughly equal.
She was from the Stonecolor race, formerly a part of the Purple Thorns civilization.
She loved Federation history, especially the Federation's war against the Purple Thorns.
The Federation's initial leader, in a position of absolute disadvantage, had used a void star to destroy the Purple Thorns civilization.
This wasn't a legend but a historical record.
Although the Federation later fought the Stonecolor, most casualties were Purple Thorns soldiers stationed on their planet, not Stonecolor.
Therefore, the Stonecolor harbored no resentment towards the Federation.
She had once dreamed of that epic war.
She'd pursued her childhood dream of becoming a Federation soldier.
Over 14,000 years ago, when informed of her deployment, she'd felt excitement.
The initial voyage was similar.
But witnessing her first battle, with millions dying, brought confusion.
It was completely different from the war she'd imagined.
She realized she wasn't a protagonist in those stories but a small, insignificant soldier.
In the war between the Federation and the Purple Thorns, countless soldiers like her had died, paving the way for that great victory.
Fortunately.
She had survived.
But unfortunately, as a soldier, she was permanently stationed on this endless battlefield.
Over ten thousand years, she had been to countless battlefields, eventually arriving at Planet E.
Unlike in space battles.
Interplanetary warfare was impersonal; deaths were merely numbers.
But here, she witnessed each death, the fear a tangible hand around her neck, choking her.
With time, the pain became numb.
The only light in her life were the memories of the Federation.
"Who wouldn't want to go home?"
"But my home is gone; it's been too long."
"I once dreamed of the glory of soldiering, not the pain. Now, I understand."
"War is endless; a soldier's fate is one of two: death or solitude."
Lkam's greatest lesson was the meaning of life.
This was something all soldiers learned.
Because beyond that, they had nothing.
"Why is there war?" she asked.
Another soldier pondered, then shook his head.
He didn't know the answer.
"Perhaps only those higher-ups know why there's war."
As insignificant soldiers, they were merely units on the battlefield, no different from pieces on a chessboard to those in higher positions.
"Don't think about it."
"After the war on Planet E, we can request leave."
"Maybe we can go home."
"Even if there's no home left."
"Honestly, I envy the Star Nation; at least they have hope."
They had none.
He remembered his first lesson in the Federation military: how to endure solitude.
After passing the tests, they all received a single sentence:
Eternal life is a curse!
Now, he finally understood.
"I…" Lkam started to speak.
[Warning! Someone triggered a mine in cb1288 sector!]
Almost every Federation soldier received this alert.
Her face changed; she began assembling her troops.
Federation soldiers were far more disciplined than the Star Nation alliance; within three minutes, all soldiers were assembled.
"Everyone heard the warning."
"The Star Nation alliance dares to attack us."
"They think stopping us means victory."
"Deploy! Let them see the true gap between us," the Federation Legion Commander ordered.
The Federation soldiers moved swiftly towards the mine detonation point.
The camp's weapons were fully prepared for the first volley.
Countless metal rods, of varying lengths, flew towards the target, rapidly deploying in flight, embedding themselves in the ground.
Upon impact, these rods quickly expanded into 20-centimeter-diameter snow-white spheres, resembling cotton balls.
They gently pulsed.
Numerous tiny objects scattered into the air.
These objects flew towards Simali's troops.
A surface appeared before the first soldiers they contacted.
[System authentication failed; identified as enemy.]
Instantly.
The soldier's mech liquefied.
Their exposed flesh wouldn't kill them underground, but it was excruciatingly painful.
There was no air; the surroundings were filled with communication interference. Without a mech, it was like being trapped in a vacuum chamber with a speaker blasting noise directly into your eardrums.
It felt like that.
Fortunately, modern humans had high pain tolerance.
He was the first, but not the last.
The mechs of numerous soldiers began to liquefy; these mechs were liquid, their structure maintained by energy.
"Something's in the air, likely electron viruses!"
The electron viruses were attacking the mech systems, causing paralysis.
Simali was startled.
Could the spirits stop this?
He didn't know.
He was channeling energy towards the coordinates.
The spirits would soon emerge.
But the viruses were a raging storm, unstoppable.
The mech on his body also liquefied.
Now he understood his comrades' swift defeat.
Against these, what could their energy weapons do?
Fortunately.
The power generator itself wasn't affected by the electron viruses.
"Hurry! Hurry! Hurry!"
Simali's eyes were bloodshot.
If this continued, they'd be annihilated.
It was absurd.
His plans were almost ruined by a virus.
Summoning the spirits wasn't omnipotent; he still didn't fully understand the mechanism.
With the energy input, the coordinates on Simali's tendril saturated, and the spirits were summoned again.
They rapidly flew forward; the electron viruses had no effect on them.
Simali breathed a sigh of relief.
"Engineering crew, neutralize the electron viruses!"
Several artificial humans disintegrated.
They transformed into countless tiny mechanical entities, resembling insects swarming the mechs on the ground.
The Matriarchy star nation's engineering crew consisted of these artificial humans.
These artificial humans resembled normal individuals; they possessed intelligence and intellect comparable to ordinary humans, but were actually composed of tiny mechanical components or other materials.
True artificial humans, on the other hand, were created using chemical structures, lacking organic flesh.
In the military, the engineering crew managed and repaired military equipment; their computational power was dedicated to this task.
If an engineer couldn't repair something, they would submit a report—either requesting more personnel or declaring the equipment irreparable.
This was crucial.
Repairing some equipment could cost more than creating a new one.
The complex nature of modern war machines made accurate assessments difficult for ordinary individuals.
Attempting repairs only to discover later they were impossible resulted in significant financial losses.
A nuclear fusion generator, for example, had a value of several million energy credits.
It wasn't the fusion reactor itself that was expensive, but the energy storage unit.
A single war could result in tens or hundreds of billions of energy credits in unnecessary losses.
This was why.
The Star Nation alliance commonly used engineering units.
Especially the weaker star nations.
Stronger star nations generally used servers for powerful computations.
Weaker star nations lacked sufficient computing power.
A Federation warship server, for example, had a computing power of 590 quettaFLOPS (5.9 x 10^45 FLOPS).
This is an enormous number.
Earth's total mass is roughly 6 x 10^27 kg; even if converted entirely into grains of sand, the number would be only about 6 x 10^32 grains.
What about the Sun?
The Sun's mass is 330,000 times that of Earth, resulting in approximately 1.98 x 10^38 grains of sand.
The Twenty-Eight Nations Covenant's computing power was constantly being updated.
Warships had an average computing power of about 1/840th that of a Federation warship server.
The Matriarchy star nation was far behind, possessing only about 1/39,333rd the computing power of a Federation warship server.
His computing power was still enormous.
But due to civilizational advancement, the volume of information and data had increased exponentially; data wasn't measured in MB or GB anymore.
A small file could easily be in the PB or EB range.
This increased the difficulty of information processing exponentially.
Many documents used special encryption methods; decoding each character required individual decryption, consuming massive computing power.
Consider an image.
In the 21st century, a few million or tens of millions of pixels sufficed.
But now, an image might require tens of nonillions of pixels. The goal was to magnify images to the point of visualizing fundamental particles.
Computing power was a key indicator of a civilization's strength.
Low computing power meant needing more units to handle tasks, leading to the creation of engineering units.
Engineering units themselves possessed powerful computing capabilities, reaching 3 ZFLOPS (3 x 10^32 FLOPS).
Yet, neutralizing the Federation's electron viruses remained difficult.
Meanwhile, Simali's forces needed close contact with their natural environment.
Fortunately, their genes were modified.
The Matriarchy star nation preferred genetic modification over gene pooling.
Genetic modification didn't transform life into monsters; it merely enhanced existing physical attributes.
Genetic modification wasn't purely genetic; it was a blend of genetic and technological techniques.
It altered the atomic structure of cells to accommodate more electrons, which could be released from their orbitals as needed.
Most were converted into energy through specific organs.
This was a relatively mature form of "magic technology."
Genetic modification didn't increase size and, to maintain stability, avoided extreme changes, limiting the enhancement.
They couldn't endure this environment for long.
"Damn it."
Simali felt his cells trembling, nearing collapse.
The communication interference was intense; his internal quark robots, lacking the mech's initial protection, were failing.
The reduced computing power made his consciousness feel incredibly heavy.
This heaviness was literal.
Humanity had confirmed the existence of consciousness and had been working on ways to increase an individual's capacity for consciousness.
Larger, more stable consciousness was less susceptible to interference.
Humans were now born with quark robots, which helped process greater levels of consciousness.
With the quark robots disabled, consciousness felt like a massive burden on the human body.
This was analogous to a CPU and GPU; the CPU handles calculations, the GPU handles graphics. Enhancements to one might allow both to function at 100%.
One side received an enhancement, but the system was still running a demanding 3A game at 4K resolution; the burdened side would soon crash.
The other side was overloaded, causing the game's frame rate to plummet.
The human body was that 3A game.
They were all being pushed to their limits.
Furthermore.
One side was also responsible for power supply.
Modern human bodies had been modified and required maintenance for stability.
Minor instability was manageable, but combined with a harsh environment, this could lead to a complete system failure.
Simali's forces faced a major crisis.
Everything depended on the engineering crew!
The mechs needed repair.
...
Meanwhile.
Lkam's troops rapidly approached the mine detonation point.
Suddenly, a soldier fell dead.
The entire Federation force became alert.
"Beware of the enemy's unconventional attack," a Lieutenant Colonel shouted, reporting the situation to headquarters.
The Legion Commander at the base ordered the activation of the surveillance equipment, monitoring the troops from all aspects.
This equipment, called "Total System Surveillance," lived up to its name; it could monitor everything.
Light, dark matter, dark energy, antimatter, graviton fluctuations, spatial distortions, and all known artificial particles were monitored.
After activation, the surveillance equipment used computing power to filter out noise and interference.
Clear images of the troops appeared on the monitors.
They could even see individual hairs.
And this was with interference.
Without interference, the system could even monitor changes at the particle level.
This was standard equipment on even the lowest-tier Federation warships, among the most advanced.
A warship might cost tens or hundreds of millions; this single device cost more than half a warship.
The Federation, aiming for victory, deployed mothership-level equipment to the planetary battlefield.
The surveillance system clearly showed luminous entities emerging from the dead bodies.
And there were thousands more approaching the soldiers.
"Enemy attack; retreat!"
The Legion Commander decisively ordered a retreat. Those who heard the order turned back immediately.
Several soldiers silently died during the retreat, causing the Federation soldiers to break into a cold sweat.
"Analyze the luminous entities," the Legion Commander ordered. The surveillance system transmitted the data to the surface server for analysis.
The server's strength wasn't its processing speed but its knowledge base.
A typical computer core might contain English; the server contained all languages.
This allowed for a more comprehensive analysis, avoiding a simplistic approach.
The server's computational efficiency far surpassed any other computer; even the closest DataNode server had only 1/100,000th the efficiency; others were far lower.
The efficiency of an engineering unit, for example, was less than one billionth that of the server.
The actual difference was far greater than the raw computing power difference.
To utilize the server's capabilities, the Federation connected it to the underground via cables; these cables were thick and shielded to mitigate interference.
The analysis took only a few minutes.
[The entities are artificial quantum states. No similar entities are found in the database. It is recommended to use quantum weapons.]
The Legion Commander transmitted this to his troops.
He then noticed that in just a few minutes, he'd lost over half his soldiers.
"What in the hell are these things?!"
...
The fleeing Federation soldiers were consumed by despair.
They couldn't see their enemy.
The silent deaths of their comrades steadily eroded their morale.
They used various weapons, to no effect.
The Legion Commander's message was a lifeline.
"Deploy quantum weapons."
At the Lieutenant Colonel's shout, a question arose among the soldiers.
"Do we even have quantum weapons?"
They didn't.
Assuming the enemy wouldn't possess similar weapons, they hadn't been equipped with them.
Quantum referred to the inability to further subdivide fundamental particles.
Personal weapons rarely involved fundamental particles; atomic or molecular weapons were more common.
Even the largest-scale weapons were macroscopic energy weapons.
Hope instantly turned to despair.
These weapons required warships; how could they possibly counter them?
Lkam also fled frantically.
Being closer to the rear, she was now in a relatively safer position, increasing her chances of survival.
Anxiety gnawed at her.
Was she going to die?
Had it come to this?
She pondered.
After receiving the message, she despaired like the others. Quantum weapons? Where would they find them?
They didn't even have strong or weak force weapons.
Suddenly, she had an idea.
Quark robots.
Quarks were quantum particles.
While quark robots weren't as small as quarks, they were far smaller than atoms.
This allowed them to potentially counter other lifeforms on a quantum level.
But she wasn't sure; the deceased soldiers clearly had quark robots, yet they died instantly.
And how could the quark robots attack?
The intense communication interference would paralyze the robots the moment they left the body.
"The mech's energy field might block some interference," she recalled a previous experiment.
With the energy field deployed, the quark robots could regain some computing power.
While still suppressed by interference, they'd be usable.
That was all she could think of.
[Perhaps we can deploy the mech's energy field and use the quark robots outside the body to counter those artificial quantum entities.]
She shared her idea.
Almost instantly, the mechs' energy fields activated.
There was no time to test; everyone was panicking.
It was a do-or-die situation.
Unseen, the spirits attacked the rear of the troops.
They weren't a single entity but numerous quantum particles.
They easily penetrated the mech energy fields, encountering the neatly arranged quark robots within.
These robots, resembling single-celled organisms, resembled an army awaiting their arrival.
Their structure was simple; a central body with numerous cilia.
The cilia had different functions. The primary function of the quark robots was to combine and provide computing power and to use these cilia to stimulate human cells.
Upon seeing the quark robots, the spirits attacked without hesitation.
A quantum battle commenced.