Chapter 1785 - 1017: Reclusive

Chapter 1785: Chapter 1017: Reclusive

After the cataclysm occurred, Chaos became much more active than in the past. Among them, there were certain special enemies marked as arch-enemies by the Death Angels. They never publicly acknowledged it, but Gu Hang already knew of their existence, and they appeared more frequently.

Internally among the Death Angels, they are referred to as ’Fallen Angels,’ reportedly traitors among the Death Angels.

Gu Hang knew about this very early on due to the rebellion incident involving the Oath of Remembrance Battle Group, he even communicated with the Death Angels about it.

The pursuit of Fallen Angels is a top priority for the Death Angels, with a significant portion of their efforts focused in this area.

Expanding occupied territories?

For the Death Angels, it is far less important than hunting down the Fallen Angels.

Honestly, Gu Hang was dissatisfied with this. But in the past, he had no justification or ability to command the Death Angels to do anything.

And after the New Empire was established, there was at least a moral standpoint, but the Death Angels remained quite independent and rather unruly.

If they hadn’t accepted the inclusion of Original Casting Interstellar Warriors—delivered through coordinates provided by the Death Angels via small ships, amidst high risks—Gu Hang would have nearly suspected there was something wrong with this nascent battle group.

Currently, it appears they have little risk of corruption; they have been non-compliant for many years, not a chronic issue that needs immediate resolution. Moreover, the area they control, which is the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain, is still far from the spearhead of the Dark Side Expedition, under the more conservative pace of the Alliance’s expedition. It may still take decades to reach them, a far-off prospect.

Under these circumstances, the New Empire’s policy is to continue to tolerate the situation with the Death Angels, even to the extent of providing support to help them maintain control over the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain.

Stabilizing a third of a Cosmos Domain is also a good thing, preserving more resources to avoid future reconstruction efforts once the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain peacefully reverts.

However, when Gu Hang learned about the connection between ’weapons’, ’keys,’ and the Death Angels, he became extremely concerned about the current situation of the Death Angel Battle Group.

Unfortunately, these arrogant first legion Interstellar Warriors have always been used to independence. They refuse to give up the territory they’ve opened up in the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain, unwilling to abandon the over two thousand worlds under their control, and even more unwilling to abandon their numerous leads on hunting down Fallen Angels.

In reality, having them give up the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain and move the Giant Stone Monastery towards the Alliance isn’t very realistic.

They would have to move the Giant Stone Monastery across an exceptionally long stretch of fallen territory, where the conditions are completely unknown. It would be better to honestly stay in the already stabilized Absolute Night Cosmos Domain rather than being ambushed or raided halfway.

Unfortunately, it’s not entirely stable.

A very powerful Calamity Fleet captured the continuously moving Giant Stone Monastery, which by rights should be difficult to pinpoint. This Calamity Fleet plunged the Death Angels’ fleet into a bitter battle, even launching a significant number of Chaos Starfield Warriors into the interior of the Giant Stone Monastery, engaging in fierce hand-to-hand combat with the Death Angels.

The battle line once reached a stalemate.

At the critical moment, the Alliance’s forces arrived; a fleet from the Blood Angel Subgroup came to the battlefield to assist them.

The reason the Alliance’s forces were able to arrive was due to a previous Alliance exploration fleet, enduring a perilous journey without the guidance of Thunder Torch Tower’s light and at great loss, reaching the Absolute Night Star Domain.

The mission of this exploration fleet was to investigate the current situation in the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain and establish substantial contact with the Death Angels, determining their true attitude towards the New Empire.

Additionally, they brought some Original Casting recruits cultivated from the Death Angels’ Genetic Seeds.

The Genetic Seeds originate from the Genetic Seed Bank on Mars.

Across the long history of the past, every legitimate battle group was required to submit their Genetic Seed taxes to Holy Terra. These Genetic Seeds were stored in two banks on Mars and Holy Terra. While not infinite in quantity, conducting large-scale, legion-level army constructions was not a problem.

The Death Angels’ Genetic Seeds are certainly among them.

The Death Angel Battle Group accepted these new recruits, accepted the assignments from the Central Empire, acknowledged the rule of the New Empire, all of which were good news, fulfilling the exploration fleet’s primary mission.

However, beyond this primary mission, they had another task to complete.

After informing the Death Angels, they stopped on an ordinary planet to utilize their equipment and construct a Veil Spirit Gate.

This Veil Spirit Gate was not large. Its purpose was to directly transport more and larger Veil Spirit Gate apparatus from Comoros.

This method was far better than the exploration fleet carrying a large Veil Spirit Gate apparatus over. On one hand, the installation equipment for large Veil Spirit Gates is also quite big and would significantly occupy the exploration fleet’s storage space. On the other hand, its value is remarkably high, and the exploration fleet’s journey across long distances to the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain is full of high risks, losing many ships, and even inherently carries a non-negligible risk of complete annihilation. Putting such valuable, scarce, and challenging-to-manufacture large Veil Spirit Gate equipment on the ships was too risky.

Using small Spirit Gates to transfer large Gate installation equipment was a much more reliable approach.

Since then, the Alliance established two large and one small Veil Spirit Gates within the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain, inside the territory directly controlled by the Death Angels.

The Death Angels were aware of this, but did not intervene.

This indirectly demonstrated their ’loyalty.’

And when the Giant Stone Monastery was subjected to fierce attacks from the Calamity Fleet and plunged into a bitter battle, the Blood Angel Subgroup that managed to arrive in time did so through the Veil Spirit Gates’ system.

Their arrival helped the Death Angels stabilize the situation. Subsequently, Dante arrived with a main unit of the Angel Expedition Army, tipping the scales of the war and helping the Death Angels completely defeat and annihilate the invading enemy.

They received the Death Angels’ gratitude, but were also politely asked to leave.

The reclusive Death Angels did not wish for anyone to uncover their secrets, not even the allied forces that saved their lives.

Gu Hang had previously warned them about the so-called ’keys’ and the special nature of the Giant Stone Monastery, specifically cautioning them that Chaos would attack them, again and again, without regard to the cost and with relentless perseverance.

They appreciated the warning yet continued to maintain a distant attitude.

Until now.

The intelligence network that the Alliance established in the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain detected that the Death Angels, without informing the New Empire Central, had assembled over thirty subgroups, totaling more than twenty thousand troops, and a massive fleet, marching grandly towards the other half of the Absolute Night Cosmos Domain that was not under their control.