Book 10: Chapter 25: Bonds

“Captain…” Fuyutsuki called out, but didn’t say anything more, only looking somewhat anxious.

“Fuyutsuki, rest assured, we Apostles have the guidance of the Star Projection! Please trust my judgment!” Robin nodded at her with a smile, making the beautiful deputy’s expression ease slightly.

“Robin, come with me!” Qin Lun threw a glance towards Robin and led her away from the bridge.

“You probably know what I want to talk to you about?” Reaching a quiet spot, Qin Lun frowned as he looked at her.

“I know!” Robin hesitated, then said with a bitter laugh, “Sister Kelly always criticized me before for lacking confidence, being good at planning but poor at making decisions, suited to be the deputy leader of a strategy unit, not the one calling the shots. But I’m always afraid… afraid that my wrong decisions will lead to deaths or injuries among my comrades.”

“So even when Fuyutsuki questioned your scouting abilities earlier, you didn’t argue back, leaving the decision to me?” Qin Lun turned around and stared at her, sneering coldly. “Being both the Apostle Leader and the ship’s highest authority, you’d rather endure the questioning of a native and your deputy officer than make a decision!”

“What do you know? If it weren’t for Sister Kelly’s insistence, do you think I wanted to be this Leader, or partner with someone like you!” Robin suddenly paled, unable to stop herself from crying out. “Besides, you’re better than I am, why not let you make the decisions?”

“Since you know what kind of person I am, then you should realize I won’t be responsible for the lives of the other members!” Qin Lun sneered and stepped forward, pressing almost against Robin’s chest, his eyes locking onto hers.

“Now listen to me carefully. If we run into trouble down on X-352 and you can’t react promptly aboard the Advancing… don’t blame me for abandoning the others. You know I would do it. Given Lost’s current state, even Kelly couldn’t threaten me afterward!”

“Alright, I understand!” Robin’s pretty face flushed deep red, her high chest heaving violently as she glared furiously at Qin Lun.

“Excellent!” Qin Lun’s gaze instinctively flicked towards the glimpse of pale skin and deep cleavage visible at the neckline of her uniform. He suddenly flashed a mischievous grin, saying in a suggestive tone, “Nice.”

“You… jerk!” Robin glanced down and then glared, stamping her foot in angry embarrassment before spinning around and stalking off.

Watching the beautiful Leader’s swaying figure recede, the smile slowly faded from Qin Lun’s face, returning to his previous expression as if nothing had happened. Yet almost immediately, he felt a stir and called out softly, “Who’s there? Show yourself!”

“Young master… i-it’s me!” From a quiet corner of the corridor, a hunched-over servant appeared with an awkward expression. “I arrived before you, and this was a dead end… I didn’t have time to avoid you…”

“Frank! What are you doing here? That last fight was intense. Why not rest?” Qin Lun raised an eyebrow, looking at him questioningly.

“It’s… nothing. Just bored in the cabin, came out to look at the Star Void,” Frank murmured, a shadow passing over his eyes.

“Bored? Not playing a few hands with the others?” Qin Lun’s eyes narrowed slightly as he tapped his temple. “I see… Homesick?”

“N-no, it hasn’t been long since parting from Sif and Didi!” Frank turned his head away, avoiding Qin Lun’s gaze.

“You know I’m not talking about home at Devil’s Horn!” Qin Lun sighed softly, moving over to lean beside Frank, his own gaze empty as he stared out the corridor window at the cosmic Star Void. “After all this time… still not used to an Apostle’s life? Or is Devil’s Horn still not giving you a sense of belonging?”

Frank remained silent. After a long while, he finally asked, “Young master… can we… can we ever go back?”

“Go back? What for? What is there left worth missing? You know Young Master Wellington, the real Wellington Stan… he died the moment I crossed over!” Qin Lun knew exactly where the hunched servant meant, his face becoming impassive as he replied. “Poor Katharine died too. Apostles cannot return to Historical Plots they’ve experienced. All that remains there now are your grave, my grave, Katharine’s grave… and three rotting corpses that barely resemble human bodies!”

“So we can’t go back?” Frank’s eyes grew distant, showing a hint of redness, his voice bitter. “Young master, you shouldn’t say that…”

“What should I say then, Frank Stan? Are you blaming me?” Qin Lun felt a wave of irritation, his tone unusually harsh. “If I’d left you in that world, you’d be nothing but decayed bones by now. Being an Apostle isn’t good? With all these thrilling, new experiences… you don’t need seals to make you forget all the unpleasant feelings!”

Frank lowered his head, his voice calm. “Yes, young master. It was I who overthought it.”

“Frank, the kind of person I am… you should see it clearly now. If you don’t want to stay by my side any longer… then go. The promise I made back then… still stands.” Qin Lun took a deep breath, his voice cold.

“Young master, I never thought that…” Frank looked up in shock, only to find Qin Lun had already turned and walked away, leaving him feeling completely at a loss.

…

The small incident between Qin Lun and his two companions did not affect the Advancing’s assault. Taking advantage of the blind spot created by the destruction of the eight Napatha Insectoid patrols, the warship broke smoothly through to just above the planet’s atmosphere. Perhaps the Advancing had made the correct judgment—the Insectoid base on X-352 was merely an empty shell; they encountered no more patrolling bugs along the way.

“Arriving above X-352. Main engines powering down. Engaging synchronous planetary orbit…”

“Captain, main gun room reports: the Type IV Particle Pulse Rail Cannon is cleaned and pre-heated. Target locked. Requesting energy channel approval…”

“Main gun energy charging initiated. Countdown commencing: Ten, nine, eight…”

An independent warship’s main gun typically doesn’t require such a lengthy charge time. However, the Advancing’s cannon was special—originally the main gun of a capital-class space warship—so its firing process was more complex, though its power was equally immense.

“Captain, main gun charging complete! Fire control requests launch permission!”

At the beautiful Captain’s command from the Captain’s Chair, everyone on the bridge fixed their eyes on the warship’s main projection screen.

A massive crosshair cursor on the screen, passing through a super-radar targeting scope, was fixed precisely upon a small blue dot on the planet’s surface—the location of the Insectoid base.

Contrary to the information they’d initially received, the Advancing’s research team had carefully analyzed the data and discovered the base wasn’t submerged deep on the ocean floor as first thought, but lay at the bottom of a huge lake.

Viewed from the air, the lake resembled a full moon, earning it the code name “Moon Lake”. But everyone aboard the Advancing knew that, with the destructive power of a capital ship’s main gun, without any defensive measures by the Insectoid forces, “Moon Lake” would soon become a name lost to history.

Like a submarine, the Advancing’s smooth, rounded front bloomed open like a flower bud, revealing the pitch-black bore of its main gun. Inside, a point of blinding white light swelled in intensity until a torrential beam of energy spewed from the barrel.

The plasma column, nearly a hundred meters in diameter, appeared on the projection screen as dazzling as a miniature sun at the moment of firing, forcing everyone to squint.

The instant the beam struck the atmosphere, a powerful ring-shaped shockwave erupted in space, so immense that the huge warship shuddered violently backward, knocked out of its synchronous planetary orbit, drifting towards outer space. It wasn’t until crew in the engine room delicately adjusted the vector nozzles of the secondary engines that the Advancing regained its orbital position.

Originally pure white, the beam now acquired blazing orange edges due to atmospheric friction. To anyone standing on X-352’s surface, their world suddenly washed in daylight, it would seem as if a second miniature sun had abruptly appeared in their sky.

The colossal particle beam shattered the tranquility of the Moon Lake region. Before the sound even arrived, the lake surface flashed with intense light, sending vast plumes of white vapor skyward. Yet these steam clouds vanished almost instantly, their water molecules broken down again by the super-heated particle radiation.

“BOOM!” The flammable gases produced by the disintegrating molecules instantly detonated, the explosion merging almost indistinguishably with the sound concussion from the particle beam impacting the water into a single, enormous blast.

The sound wave, followed by the expanding explosion’s shock front, swept across the lakeshore like an annihilating wind. Trees and vegetation were blasted away like dry kindling, ignited by the intense heat and burned to oblivion in less than a second.

As for the arthropods in the forest and the aquatic life within Moon Lake, they could be considered lucky. They experienced no pain, as the disaster consumed them before they could comprehend it was happening.

The lake water was vaporized by the beam’s heat; its creatures wiped out entirely. Though high-energy particle beams create less long-term radiation compared to “contaminant-class” weapons, the blast wave and residual radiation would still render this lake region barren, a sterile, man-made wasteland, for centuries.

This immense destructive potential against a planet was precisely why, to certain spacefaring beings, mankind was considered more destructive than the Jannamer.

On the Advancing’s main screen, the original Moon Lake and its surrounding forest had vanished. In their place now lay a crater resembling an asteroid impact. Within this enormous ring-shaped basin, easily over a hundred kilometers across, only one structure remained.

The once menacing Insectoid base on the projection now resembled a crushed bloom after being struck by a heavy club, or perhaps a freshly steamed meat bun exuding waves of scalding vapor. Piles upon piles of insect bodies reduced to black ash were visible scattered around the ruined base.

Qin Lun and the others had guessed correctly. While the Insectoids had established bases on X-352 earlier, this specific base wasn’t military in nature. It was a colonial outpost, recently completed. Apart from some drone castes and scout units, even the protective shielding and defensive turrets were still unfinished.

“With me! Charge! Clean up the remaining bugs!” Qin Lun, who had quietly entered the atmosphere just before the bombardment, wore an excited, fierce grin.

Behind him floated rank upon rank of Bingren Mecha. Everyone was here except for Robin and her two companions still aboard the Advancing: all the Gith Flight Officers and the seven other Apostles. This battle had barely begun, yet it was already entering its mopping-up phase.

Naturally, the crew of the Advancing, celebrating their imminent victory, remained unaware that while they were clearing X-352, besides the Faith which had received word and was rushing toward them, three other fleets were also advancing towards the X-352 planetary system.