Know your enemy before you break them.
The analysis of the Sharkborn continued inside the council hall. Every attendee listened closely as the Mindborn researcher walked through the anatomy of these war-creatures, searching for some weakness, some angle that might turn the tide.
Since the Sharkborn had descended on Planet Kugrage and launched their invasion without so much as a word of warning, Mindborn cities had fallen one after another. Their armies had been pushed back on every front.
If this kept up, the Mindborn Empire would cease to exist. The Mindborn as a people would be wiped out.
Unlike the grim expressions worn by most of those present, one young Mindborn seated at the far end of the conference table looked thoroughly unbothered. He had worn that same casual indifference from the moment the meeting began.
When the researcher noted that the Sharkborn on the table was only the weakest mass-produced soldier the species fielded, the young man let out a sharp snort through his nose.
"Hmph."
The researcher paused, his lecture interrupted by the blatant sound of disrespect.
He looked up and recognized the source of the snort, his pupils tightening slightly before he chose to look away and continue as if nothing had happened.
"When they launch their assaults, they consistently deploy in fish-school formations. They carry no large mech units, but their individual armor is exceptionally durable, and their physical attributes completely crush our front lines."
The researcher chose to look past the snub for a simple reason. The arrogant young man was Vala, the son of the patriarch of the Va Clan, an elite noble he could never afford to offend.
Before uniting under the banner of the Mindborn Empire, the species had existed as a scattered collection of independent tribes across Planet Kugrage. Dozens of separate clans had been spread out across the globe.
The smallest tribes comprised only a few dozen citizens, while the largest scaled up to tens of thousands.
The Va Clan wasn't the largest or most dominant faction during that ancient era, counting only a few thousand members in its ranks. Yet after the empire was formally forged, they became one of the longest-surviving bloodlines in history.
As the old maxim went, the last one standing wins the game.
After thousands of cycles, the tribal lineages that survived the ancient transition could be counted on a single hand. Every single one of these clans now occupied the absolute highest tiers of the imperial administration.
Although the Mindborn Empire stood on the absolute verge of launching its first deep-space starships, it was a civilization where advanced technology and archaic social structures existed side by side.
The empire enforced a rigid caste system that strictly prohibited inter-caste marriage, utilizing these artificial social barriers to permanently lock and consolidate the civilian workforce.
Lineages like the Va Clan were born into absolute governance and leadership, inheriting the reins of state authority by birthright.
渗透 Class profiles dropped below the elite clans were restricted to tasks ranging from manual labor to pure scientific research.
If a Mindborn was registered as a manufacturing worker at birth, he was destined to remain an ordinary laborer for his entire lifecycle, regardless of how flawlessly his performance metrics graded out.
Strangely, this oppressive structure, which completely severed any upward mobility for the lower tiers, never triggered an active rebellion or resentment among the lower castes.
Every citizen operated like a pre-installed screw inside the massive mechanism of the empire, executing their assignments without ever crossing the boundary lines.
This rigid distribution of duties effectively minimized the risk of destructive internal competition and systemic friction, maximizing the overall productivity of the empire to its absolute limit.
Yet it also introduced an irreversible side effect. It completely weeded out any healthy competition within the civilization.
Since the heirs of the ruling clans were guaranteed seats at the high table from the moment their sparks ignited, they held zero functional reasons to exert any effort.
The ruling hierarchy still required a baseline tier of administrative competence to prevent the empire from sliding into a catastrophic collapse, but the results were highly mixed.
Vala possessed decent technical capability, but the common consensus throughout the capital painted him as an exceptionally arrogant and self-centered noble.
To put it plainly, he operated under a massive wave of unearned confidence.
"Based on my diagnostic models, our forces must execute a decapitation strike to fundamentally shatter the Sharkborn vanguard and drive them off our world," the researcher summarized, offering a calculated solution based on the specimen's anatomy.
"If we successfully neutralize the supreme fleet commander in orbit, the drone legions deployed across the surface will lose their operational cohesion, forcing their armadas to retreat from our airspace."
"环境 But their command node is anchored in deep orbit, and their starships refuse to descend into our atmosphere. How do we execute an assassination tactic under those parameters?" someone muttered quietly from the crowd.
The sudden query acted like a bucket of ice-cold fluid poured straight over the assembly, instantly draining the brief surge of hope that had filled the room.
Their processors automatically tracked a far more terrifying reality. A spacefaring civilization would never limit its resources to a solitary armada.
Even if they successfully repelled this specific invasion wing, they would only buy a temporary window to breathe before a larger armada mapped a trajectory back to their coordinates.
Vala seemed naturally unsuited for collective social dynamics, and while the morale of the surrounding officials plummeted, his optics flared with sudden excitement.
"Of course! Why didn't my personal calculations reveal that vector before?"
In Vala's view, the Mindborn Empire stood as the absolute supreme powerhouse of the sector. What did an alien fleet or a horde of Sharkborn drones matter if he personally led his elite household guard to crush them in a matter of micro-cycles?
These ancient politicians simply excelled at fabricating panic, boosting the threat metrics of the enemy while systematically diminishing the resolve of their own warriors.
"Sufficient, everyone," an elderly Mindborn sitting at the head of the oval table spoke up, his voice cracking with age.
"I will transmit the minutes of this council to the Pontiff without alterations. Our session concludes for the cycle."
"Please clear the hall."
The elder operated as the Archbishop of the High Order, serving as its solitary high prelate.
The internal architecture of the High Order followed a peculiar blueprint, as the localized bishops managed the individual cities while the Archbishop directed all daily administrative affairs as the practical anchor of the church.
Yet sitting directly above the Archbishop's administrative tier was a single supreme authority: the Pontiff.
The role of the Pontiff was filled by none other than the Emperor of the Mindborn Empire himself.
As a fully integrated state church, the sovereign ruler of the empire simultaneously held absolute ownership over the crown and the spiritual authority of the High Order.
Of course, the title of Pontiff functioned primarily as a symbolic figurehead to consolidate the legitimacy of his rule, serving as a political implement to preserve societal control rather than a literal spiritual node.
Whenever the Emperor required a policy shift but navigating the formal imperial courts proved entirely too tedious, the High Order served as the perfect alternate channel.
The administrative loops of the state palace were crowded with red tape, whereas the church handled decrees with extreme efficiency.
This dynamic was obvious from the assembly itself. Given that the attendees included young-generation representatives like Vala, the actual strategic tier of this meeting was remarkably low.
It functioned primarily as an open forum for the Emperor to harvest raw perspectives, granting the younger generation a stage to showcase their metrics before the Archbishop compiled the data for executive review.
The council formally concluded, and Vala was the absolute first to exit the chambers. He boarded an oval fighter craft featuring a smooth, aerodynamic hull, launching out of the Holy City of Nikasa.
A small escort wing of identical starfighters immediately locked into a defensive escort formation around his vessel.
This unit comprised the Windfeather fighter, the most common atmospheric deployment unit fielded by the imperial air wings. It was a basic hovering platform possessing limited offensive capabilities, packing a solitary twin long-barrel ion cannon as its primary weapon module.
Yet despite its mediocre specifications, the Windfeather remained the absolute vanguard of the imperial air corps.
The Mindborn air command had only been established a short duration ago, leaving their armadas with almost zero heavy combat platforms capable of holding the line against deep-space threats.
Historically, the empire's military research had focused its resources entirely on mechs and conventional surface armaments.
Their engineers had developed over a dozen unique mech configurations, including lightweight tactical exo-suits that could completely insulate an infantry unit from the explosive force of long-range artillery barrages.
Similarly, they had successfully pushed the advancement of automated smart weaponry to a massive scale.
Their assembly lines had birthed an endless array of automated machine-gun turrets and swarm drone wings packing a rudimentary tier of synthetic logic, allowing the hardware to independently identify targets, verify an enemy's deactivation status, and calculate the optimal millisecond to launch an assault.
Meanwhile, once the council chamber had completely emptied of its attendees, the Archbishop smoothed his grey robes and pulled a uniquely configured communication module from his sash to route the logs directly to the high palace.
"Phew."
Completing the data transfer, the elder let out a heavy sigh of exhaustion.
The empire was currently facing an absolute survival crisis, and he could only hope these perspectives would provide some practical utility to the Pontiff's grand strategy.
Miles away, deep within a monumental palace anchoring Menlo, the capital city of the Mindborn Empire, a quiet murmur echoed through the throne room.
"A decapitation strike?"
The voice carried a brief note of calculation before settling into absolute clarity. "A logical angle."
The Windfeather fighter didn't require a long flight duration to reach its destination, bringing Vala smoothly over a massive citadel rising from the central plains: Pan-On City.
Pan-On City served as the ancestral stronghold of the Va Clan, and stating that the entire fortress had been constructed purely by the resources of their bloodline was an absolute truth.
The interior coordinates housed the most elite military asset under the clan's direct authority: the Seventh Va Corps.
The imperial military doctrine relied heavily on integrated combined-arms operations, pooling various specialized units to form a massive legion. However, because their engineering assets focused almost entirely on localized mech technology, their heavy combat vehicles were severely limited.
Outside of standard infantry troop transports and heavy static artillery batteries, their lines contained zero large tracked armor units.
The Windfeather settled smoothly into the airspace above Pan-On City, clearing the automated security filters before slipping down toward the hangars.
At this critical junction, although the front lines of the war hadn't physically breached the central core coordinates of the empire yet, every imperial soldier operated under a permanent maximum alert status.
They had finalized their preparation subroutines for absolute warfare cycles ago.
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