Chapter 112: Unpredictable Moves

Chu's determination was not easily shaken.

Just as Yan Xia had said, the fleet was launched, and Chu witnessed it sailing into the starry sky, disappearing among the countless stars of the Milky Way.

After a long moment, Chu received a message.

"Manager, it's done."

Chu finally averted his gaze and flew towards the source of the message, not far away, within the region of the Civilization Federation.

The area of the Civilization Federation had undergone thorough modifications over thousands of years. Here, not only were there towering skyscrapers, but also gaps between each building, filled with cultivated flowers and plants. Chu did not appreciate this combination of architecture and plants; he believed that simplicity was best.

After passing through a forest path lined with blue-purple trees, Chu arrived at his destination.

In an open space stood a rectangular building, 20 meters high and 40 meters wide.

Its exterior was adorned with numerous intricate mechanical structures. On top of the rectangular building was a 15-meter-wide "lid," which served as a signal receiving and transmitting device, but it was only an auxiliary function. The information transmitted from this building was carried by fast-speed carriers.

Fast-speed communication device.

Chu had always coveted this technology.

It was too important and precious, so when Chu gained control of Yan Xia, he almost simultaneously sent life forms to take complete control of this location.

The message Chu had just received indicated the completion of the decryption of the received information.

Over a decade was not enough for Chu to fully decipher the fast-speed communication technology. They didn't even know what fast-speed carriers were or how they could surpass the speed of light.

Chu thought that if they could decipher it within 500 years, it would already be considered extremely fast, and it would most likely take 1,000 to 2,000 years.

Chu entered the interior of the building, which was surprisingly small compared to its massive exterior.

"What does the transmitted information mean?"

Floating inside this cramped space was an Olive Branch civilization life form. It seemed like Chu was the only one there, but due to the shared consciousness of the Olive Branch civilization, there were billions of individuals within the shared consciousness working on decrypting the received information.

This was an extremely challenging task, and in the initial stages, they could only rely on guesswork.

These billions of individuals had gone through countless trials and errors to finally decipher the message.

"The content of the message is that we have completed the assembly of our army and are heading towards Xingcheng along the Cosmic Silk Road. The feint attack on the Silk Civilization seems to have worked, leading the Olive Branch civilization to believe that we are also attacking the Silk Civilization."

"But what we didn't expect was that we had already made contact with the Silk Civilization. We plan to eliminate the Olive Branch civilization because we are both aware that for the Olive Branch civilization to survive the Holy Grail plan, they must obtain advanced technology to achieve rapid civilizational advancement, and the fastest way is to acquire the Silver Heart civilization technology that we possess."

"Yan Xia, how are your preparations? Have you managed to create class conflicts within Xingcheng?"

After hearing this, Chu fell into deep thought.

Chu was considering the authenticity of this information.

If Yan Xia had anticipated being captured, then this message was highly likely to be a deception aimed at Chu.

If it was a deception, what was it meant to mislead Chu about?

"Should we send a fleet to the Cosmic Silk Road, Manager?" the Olive Branch civilization life form asked.

Chu didn't think it was necessary.

"Sending a reconnaissance ship to observe the Cosmic Silk Road will suffice."

"We don't believe the Civilization Federation would be so foolish. You should know that even if we join forces with the Silk Civilization, it is impossible to defeat us at this stage, unless we are given tens of thousands of years of development time."

Sending a fleet would be overly cautious, and Chu felt that this might be what the Civilization Federation wanted.

They wanted to disrupt Chu's rhythm.

Besides this, Chu couldn't understand why the Civilization Federation would send an army, unless they wanted to provoke conflict.

However, 206 years later, Chu received a message from the reconnaissance ship sent to the Cosmic Silk Road, reporting the arrival of a large number of ships at the SC-48 star system.

Chu was astonished. According to the information received, the fleet's scale exceeded ten thousand ships, which was definitely the configuration of dozens of fleets. Was the Civilization Federation really planning to declare war on them?

Moreover, could the Silk Civilization have arrived so quickly?

Unless the Silk Civilization had sent battleships to Xingcheng thousands of years before they accepted the war.

Was that possible?

Chu still believed in the strength of Xingcheng.

"Our reconnaissance ship has been shot down, Manager. The Civilization Federation has shown hostility towards us. Should we retaliate?"

A document was produced after discussions within the shared consciousness cluster, outlining a plan to attack the Civilization Federation directly through the Cosmic Silk Road.

Chu only read the first paragraph and didn't want to continue.

If it were that simple, why would Chu have been negotiating with the Civilization Federation all this time?

Chu could have directly sent a fleet to destroy the Civilization Federation thousands of years ago, but he didn't do so because he wanted to control the entire Civilization Federation.

An incomplete Civilization Federation controlled by the Olive Branch civilization would be of no value. Only a complete Civilization Federation would be like a wild horse running free.

Moreover, could they really wipe out an interstellar civilization in one fell swoop?

At least, the current Xingcheng was incapable of such a feat. The universe was too vast, and the speed of the Civilization Federation's battleships was not much slower than Chu's. This meant that if the core layer of the Civilization Federation wanted to leave, they could do so at any time.

Especially with the Civilization Federation's mastery of fast-speed communication technology, Chu would be at a complete disadvantage in terms of information compared to a Level 2.1 civilization.

Attacking the Civilization Federation would require a much longer-term plan, at least 5,000 years or more.

The war plan provided by the shared consciousness cluster was aimed at destroying the Civilization Federation's main body, a barbaric and violent approach that didn't consider the benefits the Olive Branch civilization could gain.

This was a meaningless offensive strategy.

"No, they are just testing and provoking us. What we need to do is disrupt them."

"With a fleet?"

"If you observe carefully, you'll see that these so-called battleships are too small. We can only call them ships. Although there are many of them, they are just there to make up the numbers."

Chu noticed an issue. After analyzing the "battleships" in the video, he found that the largest one was only 1,200 meters long, like a toy.

Chu became more certain of his judgment; the Civilization Federation wanted to provoke Chu to achieve some goal.

What was that goal?

What could make the Civilization Federation risk everything and provoke a powerful enemy?

"Manager, they have crossed the line. We must retaliate, or they will become more and more audacious."

The shared consciousness cluster was extremely annoyed by Chu's judgment, even though Chu's authority had increased. However, Chu did not have complete control over the shared consciousness cluster, which was a fundamental difference.

"Your idea is wrong. A worm would not provoke us without reason. They must have a sinister purpose."

"We just need to ignore them. They can't possibly continue targeting us."

Chu used his authority to temporarily suppress the shared consciousness cluster.

However, 83 years later, another unexpected event occurred.

A massive attack was launched towards Xingcheng, catching Chu off guard. Although the attacks were not painful, they still made Chu extremely angry.

Chu estimated that the Civilization Federation had learned that Yan Xia was under control and believed that both civilizations were doomed, which was why they dared to launch the attack.

Chu could no longer tolerate this and had to eliminate them.

Chu was furious because all of this was outside of his plan.

Moreover, the Civilization Federation life forms within Xingcheng, led by Yan Xia, also started a rebellion.

Nothing was going according to plan.

This made Chu even angrier, as if someone had deliberately overturned the chessboard he had carefully planned, rendering all his previous efforts futile.

However, for Yan Xia, this was only the middle game, and the chess match was far from over. It was just that the Civilization Federation had taken a more proactive approach.