The centuries-long stillness harbored by the 'Silent Nebula' turned into the loudest murderous intent in just a single second.
Blocking the front of the ruin was Adrian's Fenrir fleet.
Blocking the rear by forcibly tearing through space was Caligo's Chrome Hound grand fleet.
And caught in between was the Lumina Lip.
Three forces froze, aiming their cannons at each other. Like a taut bowstring, a suffocating tension that felt like it would explode at the sound of a cough weighed down on the bridge.
[Bzzt... How dare you.]
Adrian's cold voice flowed through the public communication channel.
He was pouring out contempt not at Jayn, but at Caligo who had taken his rear.
[This is the Imperial Army's sacred operation zone. Where does a vulgar pack of hyenas dare to intervene? Knowing only how to scavenge for rotten meat, you don't know your place.]
Caligo responded to Adrian's insult with laughter filled with madness.
[Kuhahaha! Sacred? Don't make me laugh, Lord Wolf! Do you think there is an owner of the sky? Whether it's a rat or a treasure, the one who sinks their teeth in and chews first is the owner!]
[I will shut that dirty mouth of yours. All fleet, aim main cannons. We will wipe out the rats in front and the pirate scum in the rear simultaneously.]
[Don't bark and come at me! You prissy bastards! My Hydraulic Axe will take your heads!]
The murderous intent of the two massive forces collided, causing the Aether in the atmosphere to crackle. Vent, listening to that bloody conversation, clicked his tongue.
"This is big trouble. A hungry wolf in front and a mad dog behind. We are completely surrounded. Captain, what are you going to do?"
"..."
Instead of answering, Jayn stared at the instrument panel. Her blue eyes were rapidly analyzing the situation.
The Imperial Army's orderly encirclement. The Chrome Hounds' disorderly intrusion.
At a glance, it was a hopeless situation, but Jayn saw a very minute crack.
"No, it's a chance."
"A chance?"
"Look at their barrels. Adrian's main cannons are turning toward Caligo, not us. Caligo also views the Imperial Army as a bigger threat."
Jayn tightly grabbed Lilia's shoulder at the helm.
"The fleeting moment when two monsters try to bite each other. The one second their gaze shifts away from us. That is our only way to live."
"T-Then..."
"Lilia. Raise engine output to overload. Vent, you slip to the right and disperse their attention."
"Got it. Being bait is my specialty."
Vent lowered his helmet visor and rushed out.
It was then. The prow of Caligo's flagship, Iron Jaw, whose patience had run out, glowed red.
[Die, all of you! Fire!]
Kaboom—!
Caligo launched a preemptive strike. An indiscriminate missile barrage without friend-or-foe identification poured toward the Lumina Lip and the Imperial fleet.
[Intercept! Commence counterattack!]
With Adrian's command, Fenrir's blue beam cannons sliced through the night sky.
Rumble! Boom!
In an instant, the sky was covered in flames. Missiles and beams collided in mid-air, blooming flowers of massive explosions.
A hellscape of pandemonium where roars and flashes paralyzed vision.
Jayn waited for this chaos.
"Now! Lilia, step on it!"
"Hold on tight!"
Vroom—!
The Lumina Lip accelerated with a scream.
Into the storm of pouring shells and lasers, toward the center of that hell, Jayn pushed the ship head-on.
"We are piercing through those flames to the ruin entrance! Break through at full speed!"
*
"Port side! Evasive maneuver!"
Simultaneously with Jayn's shout, Lilia roughly turned the control stick.
Crash—!
The main cannon of an Imperial destroyer swept through the spot where the Lumina Lip had just been.
Even the shockwave passing by made the entire ship scream and lurch.
The lights inside the bridge flashed red, vomiting warning sounds.
"Shield remaining 60%! Rear engine overheat warning! We can't hold out like this!"
Lilia's voice trembled.
The battlefield was literally hell.
House-sized steam-powered harpoons and iron chains fired from Caligo's fleet rushed in spewing white smoke, and the Imperial Army's blue beam cannons trying to intercept them melted the harpoons, holding a massive firework display in the air.
Squeezing through that gap was like walking a tightrope in a rainstorm.
[Bzzt... Captain. 3 o'clock direction.]
Vent's calm and heavy voice came through the communicator.
[Enemy fighter squadron is targeting that engine. I'll shake them off, so just focus on the front.]
"Please, Vent!"
As soon as she spoke, Vent's black fighter, Nightwolf, nose-dived as if grazing the Lumina Lip's side.
Rat-a-tat-tat!
The Nightwolf's machine guns breathed fire, scattering the formation of the Imperial interceptors.
"This rat!"
The Imperial pilots scattered in panic. Vent didn't miss that gap.
Digging into the enemy planes' blind spots with a bizarre maneuver that seemed to ignore gravity, he popped flares.
[This is Nightwolf. 4 enemy planes lured. Vision secured. Break through.]
"Thanks! Lilia, now! Go straight to the ruin entrance!"
The Lumina Lip accelerated toward the needle-eye-like gap Vent had made.
Far away, the entrance of the massive pyramid ruin was faintly visible.
But Adrian Valentine was not an easy opponent.
Looking down at the battle situation from Fenrir's bridge, Adrian's eyes narrowed.
"A simple and ignorant breakthrough. Did you think that would work?"
He lightly tapped the tactical map with his command baton.
"Destroyer ships 3 and 4. Narrow the fire net. No need to sink them. Breaking their wings is enough."
As his cold command fell, two massive Imperial destroyers guarding the ruin entrance turned their heavy bodies.
It completely blocked the Lumina Lip's path like a closing iron gate.
Rumble!
The destroyers' side gunports opened all at once. Dozens of gun barrels aimed precisely at the Lumina Lip.
"Damn it! The path... is blocked!"
Leon shouted desperately.
Zap! Crack!
The Imperial Army's concentrated fire mercilessly pounded the Lumina Lip's shield.
"Kyaa! Shield destroyed! Hull armor hit!"
Lilia screamed. The ship shook violently, and acrid smoke seeped into the bridge.
The difference in firepower was too overwhelming to attempt a frontal breakthrough.
Behind, Caligo's mad dogs were rampaging, and in front, the Imperial Army's iron wall was holding out.
Dilemma.
Watching that desperate sight, a faint smile spread on Adrian's lips.
It was the thrill felt when cutting off all variables and perfectly driving the prey into a corner.
[Give up, Jayn Rumor.]
Adrian's communication struck Jayn's ears again.
[Even that 'Chaos' you brought is powerless before overwhelming 'Order'. There is no hole for a rat to enter anymore.]
"..."
Jayn bit her lip.
The ruin entrance in front was invisible, hidden by the Imperial Army's steel wall.
The shield gauge was blinking red.
Adrian's declaration of victory was by no means a bluff.
The formation of Imperial destroyers blocking the ruin entrance was an iron wall.
They were forming a perfect fire net so that not even a single ant could escape from the Lumina Lip.
But that iron wall was an unbearable provocation to someone.
[Kuhahaha! I told you to move! Can't you hear me?!]
The bridge of Caligo's flagship, Iron Jaw.
Caligo flipped his lid seeing the Imperial Army ignoring them and only targeting the Lumina Lip.
The fact that they considered that tiny rat ship more important than him, the outlaw of the sky, scratched his twisted pride.
"Captain! The Imperial bastards raised their shields to maximum and went into defensive mode! Harpoon cannons and such are all bouncing off!"
At the subordinate's report, Caligo growled, clacking his red mechanical jaw.
"Harpoon cannons? Who said we're piercing with those toys?"
He roughly pushed the lever in the cockpit.
"If they don't move, push them over! We ram them at full speed!"
"What?! B-But if we collide, our ship too..."
"Doesn't matter! Make everyone blocking my path into scrap metal! Prepare for 'Ramming'!"
As Caligo's mad command fell, the entire Chrome Hound fleet began a bizarre transformation.
Massive steel horns and gears popped out from the bows of the rusted ships, and black soot spewed out explosively as engine limiters were released.
[Pierce through! Uraaaah!]
The mad dogs howled and charged toward the Imperial fleet. It was a body slam charge akin to suicide, defying the common sense of artillery warfare.
"W-What is that! Those crazy bastards!"
The captain of an Imperial destroyer shouted in shock. There was no such situation in the Imperial Army manual.
Elegant long-range beam artillery battles were their way. Barbarians rushing in rubbing their bodies with scrap metal like that was a first in their lives.
"Intercept! Stop them from approaching!"
Blue beam cannons rained down, but the Chrome Hound ships didn't slow down even while burning.
Rather, when a companion's ship exploded, they used that debris as a shield to dig in more viciously.
And finally.
Crunch—! Thud!
House-sized 'Steam-powered Steel Harpoons' were fired from the lead Chrome Hound ships.
Dozens of harpoons pierced the sleek armor of the Imperial destroyers and embedded deeply.
"W-We're caught! They are pulling our ship!"
"Maximum engine output! Shake them off!"
But it was too late. The thick chains connected to the harpoons were pulled taut, and the two massive ships were dragged toward each other.
[Collision Warning! Collision Warning!]
Craaaash—!
With a roar as if the sky was collapsing, the rusted ship of the Chrome Hounds rammed straight into the side of the Imperial destroyer.
The rotating gears on the bow ground up the Imperial Army's cutting-edge alloy armor like paper.
"Aaaagh!"
Due to the impact, the Imperial bridge became pandemonium. But that wasn't the end.
[Board them! Take the wolves' heads!]
Taking advantage of the gap where the ships were interlocked, Chrome Hound pirates jumped onto the Imperial ship riding the chains.
Barbarians holding axes and iron pipes captured the deck and began slaughtering the crew.
The noble war was over. That place was now a slaughterhouse where blood and oil splattered.
"These... vulgar beast bastards...!"
Watching this disaster from Fenrir, Adrian trembled in fury.
His perfect formation was being forcibly torn apart by the body slams of those ignorant beasts.
A huge hole was punched in the solid encirclement.
It was chaos.
The wave of uncontrollable disorder that Adrian loathed the most.
And beyond that wave, Jayn was smiling.
"Right... this is exactly it."
Watching the crumbling Imperial destroyer and the steel fragments being ground by gears, she gripped the control stick tightly.
"Those mad dogs opened the main gate wide open. Now! We go into that hole!"
Jayn's shout rang through the bridge.
The place she pointed to was the maw of hell.
The temporary gap created by the Imperial destroyer pierced by Chrome Hound harpoons exploding and tilting sideways, tangled with Caligo's rusted ships.
That narrow passage where rains of burning steel poured and broken chains whipped the air was the only way out.
"C-Crazy! You want us to pass through there?!"
Lilia screamed, but her hands were already pushing the control stick all the way in.
Vroom—! Kaboom!
The Lumina Lip accelerated with a scream.
Pouring debris pounded the shield, but Jayn didn't blink an eye.
Her gaze was fixed only on the beyond, on the entrance of the ancient ruin opening its black mouth.
"Block them! Don't let that rat escape!"
Adrian, watching this from Fenrir's bridge, shouted.
At his command, the Imperial interceptor squadron circling the outside of the encirclement nose-dived to bite the Lumina Lip's tail.
Rat-a-tat! Woosh!
Beams and missiles fired by the interceptors grazed the Lumina Lip's rear dangerously. One engine was hit and spewed black smoke.
"Rear engine hit! Speed is dropping!"
"Damn it, we're almost there...!"
Leon shouted desperately. At this rate, they were about to be shot down before even reaching the ruin entrance.
It was then.
[Don't worry. I'll shake off the rear.]
Vent's calm voice came over the radio.
"Vent?!"
[Go first, Captain! Don't worry about me!]
The pitch-black machine, Nightwolf, brushed past above the Lumina Lip.
Vent jumped into the front of the Imperial interceptor squadron.
"This crazy... does he intend to commit suicide?!"
The Imperial pilots were horrified.
Vent performed a 'Cobra Maneuver', bending the machine vertically at a distance just before collision, and dug between the enemy planes.
Kaboom!
Two interceptors exploded from the mines Vent scattered. The enemies' eyes were completely stolen by his dazzling maneuver.
"Now! Lilia!"
The fleeting time Vent bought.
The Lumina Lip passed through the wreckage of the burning destroyer as if grazing it, and finally entered inside the ruin's barrier.
Whirrr—
Dark blue darkness swallowed the ship. The noise outside was cut off like a lie, and the cool air of the ancient ruin wrapped around the ship.
"We're in...!"
Lilia took her hands off the control stick, breathing roughly. But it was too early to be relieved.
Outside, the war was still continuing. And the two predators who missed their prey had no intention of giving up.
[All fleet, enter inside the ruin.]
Adrian's eyes glistened coldly.
[We were ordered to hunt them down, even if we must tear the sky asunder. I will follow them to the ends of hell and bring back their heads.]
On the other side, Caligo also burst into mad laughter, clacking his red mechanical jaw.
[Kuhahaha! Tag is over! Everyone charge! Chew them up inside there!]
The Imperial Army's sleek assault boats and the Chrome Hounds' brutish scrap ships rushed toward the ruin entrance with a roar.
The stage changed. From the open blue sky to a closed ancient labyrinth where one cannot know an inch ahead.
Jayn clenched her fist, looking at the passage stretching into the darkness.
"Come, monsters. Let's see the end here."