Standing still means nothing if you don't understand where you're standing.
I never suffered from the delusion that a man could survive on strength alone, so I let my instincts guide me toward the gaps in my knowledge and visited every library the imperial capital housed.
What kind of man interests himself in that? Yet, surprisingly, those libraries stayed full of people devouring propaganda, making me question the future of a planet that prefers lies.
Not finding anything useful, I went to General Kreg, and he refused me any help until I threatened to let him rot without healing next time he got wrecked in battle.
As a result, I'm taking a stroll in the Imperial Archive, a towering giant recording history back to the Age of Blood and the first conquests that defined our species.
I stood in the center of the restricted archives, surrounding myself with holographic scrolls that detailed the exact moment every arrogant civilization in this sector finally broke.
Kang slumped against a pedestal dedicated to the First Expansion, his fingers idly flicking through a projection with a look of profound, calculated boredom that bordered on an insult.
"Tell me again why we are still rotting in this graveyard of dead ideas when the galaxy is waiting to be conquered?"
"Because our mission has nothing to do with mindless conquest."
"Yeah... let's just escape from here. We should have done this a day ago."
"General Kreg only managed to secure the final imperial permission codes an hour ago, so shut up."
The lazy bastard spent the last three days begging me to bring him along on a mission that most Viltrumites consider a one-way trip to a shallow grave.
I tried to scare him off with the usual lectures about the love of friendship and the sacred bond of the squad, but when that failed, I resorted to the only language this Empire truly understands.
The power of the fist serves as a universal translator, and I offered him a bet that should have sent him straight to the infirmary for a month.
Our wager stayed simple: if he could stay standing after sixty seconds of me actually trying to hit him, I would sign the paperwork to make him my personal assistant.
I didn't hold back. Actually, I did hold back, but still my strikes carried enough force to crack city foundations, yet somehow the man endured every single blow without backing down.
He looked like a piece of chewed meat by the end of it, his ribs screaming and his face a map of purple bruises, but he stayed on his feet until the timer hit zero.
I realized then that I was scammed again, because a man who can take that much punishment without blinking either is a masochist or hides a level of durability that doesn't show on charts.
He manipulated my own sense of fairness to get exactly what he wanted, and now I'm stuck with an assistant who would probably treat my mission like a private lounge.
"...hey! Glenn"
I didn't turn around to look at him, my focus remaining on a schematic of the Zenith Cluster that suggested the Dead Zone expanded at a rate the Council was too afraid to report.
"Codes, clearances, bureaucracy... the Empire is becoming a retirement home for accountants instead of warriors, and I honestly think I could have walked to the Dead Zone faster than this."
"..."
Kang claimed he would conquer all this without sweating, which made me pause before I returned to my work, looking for anything that might explain the recent failures in the Dead Zone.
I found a few tactical logs that hinted at the Badoon presence, and it was enough to realize the mission was more than just a simple scouting run for the Empire.
I initially felt a throbbing ache behind my eyes as the sheer volume of data from the scrolls regarding the Dead Zone threatened to turn my thoughts into static.
The missing logistics and the endless, redacted reports on fleet disappearances felt like a mental barricade I couldn't punch through no matter how hard I stared.
My mind adapted once again through the passive evolution of my cells, and I realized if I had this brain in my past life, I would have topped any exam nationwide without sweating.
After some time, we finally left the archives behind and ignited our internal propulsion to take flight toward the dockyard.
.
.
.
Ten minutes later.
I stared at the sky above the dockyard and saw a sea of ships larger than towns hanging like predators over a metal floor that vibrated with a thousand engines.
And I didn't even touch the ground before a violent impact ripped through the space.
"Hey man, I think someone is falling on us."
Kang pointed a lazy finger toward the ceiling where a dark shape was screaming toward the deck like a discarded mortar shell.
"I can see that."
A massive shadow loomed over me, and I realized if I didn't move, I'd have the occasion to kiss a Viltrumite ass hurtling backward with enough force to shatter stone.
I swatted him away like a nuisance fly, my palm connecting with his side and sending him spiraling into the hull of a nearby scout ship, which crumpled like paper.
"Damn it, brat, why didn't you catch me?"
"You're not a princess, are you?"
I realized it was Virexa the moment he opened his mouth, and it was a good thing Kreg gave me the squad list and the details on every member, or I would have beaten the old fossil into a pulp.
On second thought, it didn't matter. I would have recognized him anyway, since this was the same man who had the audacity to challenge me a few months ago.
"Old man, why did you run that day?"
"Careful who you're accusing. I don't run."
"…If you want to fight, do it outside orbit, because you can get a death sentence for damaging imperial property in a hangar, and I am not in the mood for paperwork."
Virexa pulled himself from the wreckage with blood leaking from his mouth and his black iron cane bent into a useless hook, but to my surprise, this shameless old man still managed to spit venom with a defiant grin that showed he wasn't done yet.
"Commander Glenn, I was educating a subordinate. There's a difference between a warrior and a loud-mouthed bitch."
"Looks more like you were getting schooled."
Boom!
A second later, a muscular woman with two black ponytails and a face like a stone carving landed beside us with a heavy impact that cracked the metal plates.
It was Carliya the Butcher, a woman known for picking fights with anything that has a pulse, and right now she showed off her bloodied teeth with a manic grin while licking her blood-soaked palm.
"Commander... let's just execute him because he was bragging about nearly killing you, so I thought I'd save the Empire the trouble."
"..."
I could really do that, since it wasn't like I haven't killed anyone, but I wasn't the type to take a life on a whim, as I needed a legitimate reason before I chose to spill blood.
Kang stepped up beside me and surveyed the broken ship and the bleeding veterans with absolute, soul-crushing disappointment as he crossed his arms over his chest like a bored judge.
"So this is the elite squad of A-9... I've seen more discipline in a pack of starving jackals fighting over a bone in a gutter than in this majestic spaceship dockyard of the Viltrum Empire."
"Shut it, twig."
"Who are you calling a twig, you muscle... warrior with great physique, madam?"
The moment he even thought about a comeback, the woman closed the distance in an instant, leaning in to sniff him like a wolf about to devour its prey.
"Oh my... I like boys like you. They are fun in bed."
Watching Kang get offended by a woman who can actually snap his spine felt satisfying.
Mostly because seeing my friend finally meet his match in someone this reckless was the only thing that made me smile today, though I was quite concerned about the bed line.
"Commander..."
Just when I thought we were done, a timid and fragile-looking man, for a Viltrumite, appeared through the smoke.
Solvek carried a massive, high-backed command chair over his shoulder with casual ease before setting it down behind me.
"Welcome, Commander... this is Dockyard A-9, and despite the energetic greeting, we are the most reliable unit in this sector, and I will ensure everything is handled with total diligence."
"I'll be your best soldier so you don't need to kill me, and I promise these two are actually useful..."
Before the poor guy could complete his sentence, an intense explosion sounded from the massive space warship, and fire roared into the open space of the hangar.
"Ahem... when they aren't trying to murder each other for no reason... of course, haha."
I wanted to ask him why he brought a massive chair here when we were about to take off into space, but looking at his nervous yet enthusiastic face, I just sat down.
"Don't worry, I won't kill anyone. Why would I do that?"
It didn't matter to me if they destroyed the A-9 space dockyard or the entire substation, but their bickering was getting annoying since we have a mission and they were fighting over nothing like toddlers in a sandbox.
Worse, they hurt themselves too much, like the girl with ponytails who was bleeding from her eye and the old man who couldn't even stand properly.
I didn't want to start a suicide mission with a squad that was already falling apart, so I decided to fix what they were too stubborn to acknowledge.
A second later, a large vortex of energy erupted from me in every direction, creating a tomb-like shield that swallowed the space dockyard.
This was my new ability, Healing Zone.
After months of mending the broken wreckage of the veteran class back in the capital, my healing ability evolved enormously, and now I can stitch together hundreds of lives simultaneously.
The constant adaptation of the mana in my veins meant the power grew stronger every second, making high-class area-of-effect healing possible in a mere fraction.
The light swallowed the dockyard, knitting flesh and bone alike as Virexa's broken ribs snapped back into place and the scars on his face smoothed over into fresh skin.
"No, no, no, I don't care about your damn healing, I don't need my eyes back."
"..."
Virexa scrambled backward out of the light, almost crying like a child, as his sightless eyes twitched while the regenerative power tried to force his vision to return against his own stubborn will.
"I shall remain blind."
"Tch... Commander, should we execute him?"
"..."
Though the old man somehow managed to get away from the healing zone, I wondered why he was so obsessed with staying blind.
"Enough playing around, shitheads."
I stood up from the chair and signaled for the crew to move toward the boarding ramp while the smoke from the explosion was still being sucked out by the hangar's filtration systems.
It barely took a minute before we were standing in the shadow of the deep recon as its sheer scale dwarfed everything around it.
Carliya and Solvek practically puffed out their chests with pride as they showed off the monster they found, while Kang vibrated with electric anticipation.
"Glenn, why does it feel like I've made the best choice of my life..."
"..."
The first thing hitting my eyes was a brutal wall of black metal pretending to be a ship, with a hull layered like scarred armor that had already survived apocalyptic wars I couldn't even imagine.
The second thing dragging my attention was how fiercely uneven it looked, since every plate and welded edge was forged to take a planet-shattering hit and keep killing instead of looking polished or clean.
The longer I stared at the beast, the more it felt less like a mere machine and more like an apex predator sitting perfectly still in the dark, waiting for someone foolish enough to make a mistake.
Soon we were storming the deck of the warship, where I instantly laid down the law by introducing Kang as my temporary second-in-command, with orders that carried the exact weight of my own voice, which only made Carliya's fierce sneer deepen into a look of pure and burning hatred.
Then Solvek and I dropped heavily into the central pilot seats as the massive thrusters roared to life, sending a violently thrilling vibration straight up my spine, even though this colossal beast of a warship didn't actually need our hands to tear through normal space.
In my previous life, I couldn't even begin to dream up this kind of pure adrenaline rush, because I am literally taking command of a monstrous dreadnought to lead a savage crew on a fucking space adventure.
I needed to lock my jaw and force the icy composure of a merciless commander to keep these bloodthirsty lunatics in line, but inside, only I knew how desperately I wanted to slap a giant black pirate flag right onto the hull and go completely wild in the cosmos.
Regardless of the thrill, I brought up the navigation system between us and aggressively locked in the coordinates where the last seventeen elite imperial squads vanished without leaving a single trace behind.
"Just remember this isn't an easy mission, as most of you will die before we even..."
"We will gladly give our lives if it is for the glory of the Empire, Commander sir!"
"..."
"Actually, the Dead Zone in reality is a place that has a plague of Badoon..."
"We will gladly give our lives even if it means..."
"...."
I was utterly speechless because these maniacs possessed absolutely zero sense of timing.
'I wanted to ask where your common sense went, but fine, you idiots, can't you even wait until your superior finishes his motivational shit to clap.'
So I reluctantly just gave the final word.
"Let the conquest begin."
And in the very next second, the thrusters screamed as we ripped through the atmosphere and blasted straight out of orbit into the endless dark.
.
.
.
(End of the chapter)
A/N:
I'm working on tightening the pacing a bit, less yapping, more impact. Let me know if anything still feels dragged or unnecessary.