Beastmaster of the Ages

The two divine astralships of Skywolf had come at the perfect time. The first, the Greenvoid Abyss, had taken on the brunt of the celestial orderians on behalf of the alliance, giving them a chance to retreat, while the second ship went straight for the celestial orderian homeland. Both of them had come at the same time, but their paths had diverged toward the two poles of the sun.

The Greenvoid Abyss was at the south pole of the sun. It would still be good if Sovereign Greenvoid and his subordinates hadn't left the ship, but they had, and they’d paid for their mistake with their lives; not that it could really be blamed on them. Tianming had gone to Violetglory, a similar heliacal-class world, and even he felt that Orderia's sun emperor was far more than one would expect from this world.

As for the second divine astralship, its crew was far more careful. Perhaps they had managed to learn about Greenvoid Abyss' fate through some means before the Divine Sun Palace returned. Though they found it hard to believe, the crew quickly returned to the ship and used it for bombardment. This ship was even more powerful than the Divine Sun Palace and Greenvoid Abyss and it took a mere four hours for it to render hundreds of millions of casualties among the celestial orderians.

Though they were the strongest faction on the sun, a large portion of their populace was still made up of mortals with no astral physiques, who weren't able to endure the astralship's bombardment at all. Too many people were vaporized before they even knew what was going on.

As most of the troops had been sent to the south pole of the sun, the troops that remained in the celestial orderian base could only defend against Tianming's Ninedragon Imperial Tomb at best. Faced with a complete divine astralship that was even more powerful than the Divine Sun Palace, their defensive formations crumbled in almost no time, exposing the weak and the old to danger. They could do naught but evacuate like the Myriad Solar Sects.

At that time, word of the sun emperor killing Sovereign Greenvoid hadn't reached them yet, so Skywolf believed they had achieved their strategic objective of scaring the celestial orderians. Rivers of blood flowed through the north of the sun. That was the true goal of Skywolf's divine astralships. Unfortunately for Sovereign Greenvoid, however, he’d run into the sun emperor, who was fighting Tianming, and had crashed the party, only to end up decapitated. As such, Skywolf had only managed to fulfill half of their objectives. When they finally got wind of what happened, the second divine astralship switched to careful bombardment before ascending beyond the flaming clouds after wreaking enough havoc.

Before they left, they announced to the tired celestial orderian defenders, "Skywolf will descend upon you in due time! You’ll give everything you have to us as a tribute and protection fee. If you do, Skywolf will protect this world for a million years and nobody will dare to invade it while you’re under our guardianship!"

Their cold laughter reverberated throughout. The celestial orderians knew what that 'protection' really meant. Once their nova source was taken away, Orderia would become a dead world, and people naturally wouldn't want to invade it. The celestial orderians didn't expect they would turn from the hunters to the hunted while they were waging war against others.

Before the sun emperor returned, everyone there suffered from an oppressive mood. Yin Chen reported everything that had happened, including the myriad disasters that befell the celestial orderians. No matter what, the normal folk living in celestial orderian territory were innocent. However, guilt and innocence would no longer matter once Skywolf truly exterminated the sun. The casualties wouldn't just be a paltry hundred million. There was no sense talking about morality to hunters from the cosmic aether. Morality and ethics tended to lose relevance on cosmic scales. Might made right, and only the groups that possessed the most nova sources would reign eternal. Like many factions that roamed the cosmic jungle, that kind of behavior was baked into the genetic essence of Skywolf.

"The death of Sovereign Greenvoid might be funny, but it doesn't change the fact that Skywolf is much more powerful than the celestial orderians. They probably won't make a mistake like this a second time." It would be understandable if it was just the first, since even Tianming had done the same.

"The second divine astralship should be under the control of another sovereign-class figure. Skywolf is a binary star system with one large and one small star. The smaller star is about equal to Violetglory, while the larger one is three times larger than the sun. I wonder how many sovereigns they have...." Violetglory alone had two sovereigns and two divine astralships. Based on that, Tianming estimated Skywolf to have five or more sovereigns, which was far from a small number. "We still have a few more months."

The chaos caused by the second divine astralship forced the three hundred million celestial orderian troops to retreat, allowing most of the ten billion folks at the Myriaddragon Mountains to retreat. Without anywhere to go, all they could do was scatter and hide. Thankfully, the celestial orderians didn't have any other elites apart from their three hundred million, so they would be far from enough to hunt down the scattered remnants of the Myriad Solar Sects. Unless the totemancers could afford to send tens of billions of troops down, there was relatively little risk for the surviving members of the Myriad Solar Sects.

Before going to the Sky Palace, Tianming had another issue to deal with. The Northdipper Swordsage, Ninesun Martial Lord, Frost Empress, and the others stood before him, speechless at seeing the green light that rapidly healed his body.

"Tianming, tell us! What should our sects do? Where should we go? Should we fight to our deaths, buy time, or surrender?" the Northdipper Swordsage asked.

"Will you listen to me?" Tianming asked after some thought.

"I'll do everything you say, no matter what. You've proven yourself time and again in this war. If it weren’t for the sun emperor having too many tricks up his sleeves, we would’ve won," the Frost Empress decisively said.

"Are you joking? Who would we listen to apart from you? You're our only hope, young man," the Northdipper Swordsage said with a shrug.

"We'll do what you say. You're the core of the Myriad Solar Sects," the Ninesun Martial Lord said.

"Alright." Tianming was quite grateful that they still had so much faith in him despite the loss. From now on, he would have to bear the responsibility for all his decisions. If he won, he would deserve the credit, but if he made a mistake, the lives lost would be on his hands.