Chapter 50: Operation Concluded: The Imperialist
Several days had passed since the flames of the "Skyburner" strike ignited this stellar sector.
The Chunhua territory, once a cradle that nurtured a proto-god-making civilization, had now transformed into a boundless cosmic graveyard radiating the lingering warmth of death.
The Chunhua Ancestral Nest Star: This former cradle world no longer existed; it had completed its final and most thorough disintegration.
The massive planet, as if crushed by an invisible giant hand, had split into several irregular continental fragments burning with crimson magma, slowly rotating, colliding, and cooling in the frigid void.
The former cities, rivers, oceans, living beings—all traces of existence had vanished with that earth-shattering explosion, turning into a cloud of dust mixed with metallic vapor and organic ash drifting through the debris belt. The light of the explosion had long since extinguished, leaving behind only eternal coldness and dead silence.
Other Colony Worlds and Important Planets: Baptized by the "Skyburner" strike, some had their cores pierced by antimatter cannons, others were thoroughly sterilized by gamma rays, swallowed and torn apart by gravity singularities, or had their surfaces plowed by fragmentation rays...
Like toys broken and discarded after play, their surfaces were scarred with colossal impact craters, rivers of lava, charred rifts, and twisted metallic ruins.
Their atmospheres had been stripped away or contaminated, their ecosystems obliterated. The former breath of life had been replaced by absolute death.
Space Facilities and Fleet Wrecks: Orbital space stations, shipyard clusters, defense platforms...
These iron creations, which once represented the pride of the Chunhua civilization, were now reduced to twisted metallic skeletons and floating debris belts, resembling the scattered bones of a rotting behemoth.
The wreckage of the main fleets was scattered everywhere—torn hulls, melted turrets, snapped engine nozzles—silently recounting the fierce tragedy of the moment of destruction.
Space itself was saturated with high-energy particle radiation, electromagnetic turbulence, and fatal debris storms.
However, the "Zero-Out" was not yet complete. What Heyufeng wanted was not merely ruins, but absolute silence—the complete annihilation of any trace of the civilization's existence.
This meant that any lingering survivors had to be hunted down and eradicated.
As the flames of the "Skyburner" subsided and the "World-Cleansing" squads completed their deep demolition of critical facilities, the mission of the Tianyi blockade cluster quietly shifted.
The iron curtain formed by the 550,000-strong army, acting like a ring of death, was not lifted; instead, its perimeter contracted, becoming even more airtight, filtering through any "impurities" attempting to escape like a fine sieve.
Simultaneously, a new, colder order was transmitted via encrypted channels into the mind of every Tianyi warrior:
"The 'battlefield cleanup' directive is issued."
"Objective: Eradicate all residual life signals within the territory."
" Executors: All participating units."
"Method: Unrestricted."
"Time limit: Until life signals reach zero."
The order was cold, concise, devoid of a shred of emotion. Like an invisible decree of death, it announced that any breathing Chunhua creature within this stellar region had entered a countdown to its demise.
In an instant, the Tianyi fleet, which had been suspended in deep space like cold tombstones, seemed imbued with new vitality. Countless hatches flew open!
Hum! Hum! Hum!
Tens of thousands of figures shining with platinum-gold radiance rushed out from capital ships, destroyers, and frigates like killer bees leaving the hive!
Unfurling snow-white wings and wielding swords of thunder crackling with blue-white lightning, they swooped down toward the burning, shattered, and frigid realm of death below like messengers of the Grim Reaper!
Individual cleanup had begun!
Every angel warrior, operating like a precision killing machine, was equipped with a personal life-signal detector.
This device, directly integrated into their neural terminals, could penetrate thick rock strata, twisted metallic ruins, and even a certain degree of energy shielding, precisely locking onto any form of carbon-based thermal sources and brainwave activity.
To the angel warriors, this stellar sector—littered with death and ruins—was instantly marked by countless flickering red dots of varying intensity. Every dot represented a struggling Chunhua life, a target designated for "cleansing."
Desperate Flight and Relentless Hunting:
A few small Chunhua ships and surviving fleets scattered at the edges of the sector, fortunate enough to have missed the initial "Skyburner" strike, scattered frantically in different directions like startled birds after losing unified command.
Their engines overloaded, their hulls groaning under unbearable stress, they attempted to punch through the seemingly empty deep space.
"Accelerate! Accelerate! Get out of here!!"
Inside the bridge of a scarred Chunhua frigate, the acting captain roared hysterically, his fleshy face distorted by terror.
However, just as they were about to reach the jump point they believed would save them, the void ahead suddenly rippled!
Several white figures materialized out of thin air like ghosts, blocking their path! Wielding their thunder swords, they slashed across the hull like painters applying coats of paint.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
The delicate engine room and bridge of the frigate were instantly torn apart!
A violent internal secondary explosion shattered the hull, turning the fleeing vessel—along with the hundreds of terrified souls aboard—into yet another brief, desolate firework in the void.
Similar scenes played out across all directions of the blockade iron curtain.
Any ship attempting to cross the blockade line, regardless of size or speed, was precisely intercepted and mercilessly destroyed by ghost-like squads of angel warriors or patrol vessels.
Desperate radio distress calls, the dying wails of overloaded engines, the deafening roars of hulls breaking apart—these dying lamentations became the sole and final background music of this silent stellar sector.
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The "Clever Scheme" in the Asteroid Belt:
In the shadow of a small asteroid, a low-ranking Chunhua soldier named Soke was curled up inside a dilapidated single-man motorboat.
It had shut down all active signal sources, gliding through the dense asteroid field purely on inertia, its heart hammering as if it would burst through its chest.
It fancied itself clever, believing that the smaller the target and the better blended into the endless space debris, the safer it would be.
"Almost there... Almost there... Once I pass this asteroid belt, the open zone is just beyond..."
Soke muttered to itself, its small fleshy hand gripping the crude control stick of the motorboat tightly.
Suddenly, it felt a cold sensation on the back of its neck, as if something had landed on the narrow backseat of the motorboat.
Soke stiffened entirely, turning its head with excruciating slowness, like a rusted machine.
Reflected in its expanding, terrified pupils was a male angel face, strikingly handsome yet cold as frost!
The golden-haired, blue-eyed angel warrior had somehow seated himself silently right behind it, as weightless as a ghost!
The corners of his mouth even curved into an elusive, knowing smile of amusement.
"Ah—!!!"
Soke let out the most piercing scream of its life! Extreme terror instantly morphed into hysterical madness!
It snatched up the high-energy cutting rod—used for emergency repairs and fixed to the side of the motorboat—and lunged backward with all its might, thrusting it fiercely! The tip of the rod instantly turned crimson, radiating scorching heat!
Thud!
The expected sensation of piercing flesh never came. The cutting rod, powerful enough to melt tungsten steel, was firmly and completely gripped by a hand the angel warrior casually raised!
The crimson heat failed to leave even a trace on that palm!
The amused smile vanished from the angel warrior's face, replaced by the utter indifference one might show toward a struggling ant.
Soke's final conscious thought was seeing a fist encased in a silver-white gauntlet rapidly expanding in its field of vision...
Bang!
Like a ripe watermelon struck by a heavy hammer!
Soke's fleshy skull, along with its makeshift helmet, instantly burst apart!
A mixture of red, white, and green fluids splashed like scattered paint across the cold hull of the motorboat and the surrounding asteroids.
The headless corpse twitched a few times before going limp.
Out of control, the motorboat veered off and crashed into a massive asteroid, erupting into an insignificant ball of fire.
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The Desperate Family on the Satellite:
On the barren surface of a small resource satellite, a smoking Chunhua civilian escape pod lay wedged at an angle into the hard rocky ground, its hull still burning.
The hatch was pried open with great difficulty, and a Chunhua male named Glenn, wearing the tattered uniform of a junior officer, helped his injured wife, Leia, crawl out laboriously.
One of Leia's legs was bent at an unnatural angle, clearly injured during the crash. Their faces were smeared with soot and blood, and their eyes were filled with the lingering terror of having cheated death... and profound grief.
Their two children had been thrown from their seats during the violent impact of the ship's crash landing and had died instantly.
They didn't even have time to bury their children; they only wanted to escape this hell as quickly as possible.
"Hurry... Leia... Hold on... We have to get out of here..."
Glenn panted, enduring the agonizing pain of broken ribs, trying to drag his wife toward what looked like an abandoned mine shaft at the edge of the satellite.
Perhaps they could hide there, perhaps they could find another ship...
However, they had barely staggered a few dozen meters.
Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!
Three white figures descended from the sky like meteorites, forming a perfect equilateral triangle that firmly surrounded them!
The slight gust stirred up by their folding wings blew away the dust on the ground.
Glenn's heart instantly plummeted into an icy abyss.
He recognized these figures! These were the white demons who had brought destruction!
"No... Don't..." Leia hugged her husband's arm in terror.
One of the angel warriors stepped forward expressionlessly, moving with lightning speed to grab Leia's arm, roughly yanking her away from Glenn!
"LEIA!!!"
Glenn's eyes split at the corners, and he lunged forward.
Thud!
A hard mineral rock struck his left knee like a cannonball with pinpoint accuracy!
"Ahhhhh!"
The excruciating pain of shattering bone made him scream, dropping him to one knee on the ground!
The blow had been delivered by another angel warrior, whose face wore a look of nearly cruel banter, as if toying with prey caught in a trap.
"Run! Glenn! Run!" Leia screamed desperately, struggling.
Enduring the agonizing pain, Glenn fought to stand up. He couldn't leave Leia!
Thud!
Another rock flew through the air, this time striking his right ankle! He collapsed to the ground again, dust choking his nose and mouth.
"Ugh... Ahh...!"
"No... Please..." Glenn raised his head, his eyes filled with tears, terror, and a humble supplication, pleading hoarsely in the Chunhua language.
He couldn't understand the angel's language, so he could only place his hopes on the most primitive form of mercy.
However, the three angel warriors surrounding him maintained cold, unmoving gazes.
They didn't even wear translators—for dust destined to be cleared away, there was no need to understand its whimpers.
The angel warrior holding Leia seemed to grow slightly impatient with Glenn's entreaties.
The thunder sword in his hand repeatedly plunged into Leia's back, pulled out, and plunged in again!
"Thud! Thud! Thud!"
"Now, a slash to its neck!"
Swish!
A flash of blue-white lightning cut through the air!
Leia's screams abruptly ceased.
Her beautiful head (though genuinely hideous in Glenn's eyes) flew high into the air, her face still frozen in worry and fear for her husband. Her headless body slumped softly, and hot blood gushed from the severed neck, staining the gray rocky ground.
"Ah—LEIA—————NO!!!!!!!!"
Glenn emitted a heart-rending, inhuman shriek! The ultimate grief instantly overwhelmed his fear and physical pain!
Like a wounded beast, he unleashed his final reserve of strength, crawling frantically on hands and knees away from the angels! He had to get away from here! Away from these devils!
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Hard rocks rained down with pinpoint accuracy!
His other knee... his pelvis... his shoulder... Every precise strike was accompanied by the crisp snap of breaking bones and Glenn's even more piercing screams!
Every time he struggled to lift himself an inch, he was ruthlessly beaten back down! Blood gushed from his wounds, leaving a glaring dark-red trail behind him.
Finally, he could crawl no further.
Every bone in his body felt shattered, and the excruciating pain consumed all his consciousness, leaving only a rattling, bellows-like gasp in his throat.
He collapsed onto the cold rocks, watching powerlessly as the three white grim reapers walked toward him with unhurried strides.
The faint crunch of boots stepping on gravel sounded like the drumbeats of death in his ears.
Desperation washed over him like an icy tide. In the final moments of his life, a wave of humiliation, contempt, and utter devastation—akin to a dying flare—surged within him.
Just as the angel warrior closest to him bent down, seemingly to check if he was entirely dead—
"Roar!!" Glenn mustered his last shred of strength, abruptly drawing an energy dagger used for cutting ropes from his waist and stabbing it fiercely toward the angel warrior's lower abdomen!
This was his final resistance! Even if it only splattered the other with blood!
Yet, to the angel warrior, his movements were as slow as a frozen picture.
Swish!
The blue light of the thunder sword merely flashed!
Glenn's arm, still clutching the dagger, was severed at the shoulder!
The severed arm, along with the dagger, flew out and landed in the dust not far away, its fingers still twitching slightly.
"Ah—!!!"
Glenn screamed inhumanly, the intense pain nearly causing him to faint.
Yet this was only the beginning.
The three angel warriors seemed provoked by this insignificant resistance into a certain... interest?
Or perhaps, an instinct requiring the complete crushing of any defiant will.
They did not kill Glenn immediately.
The next few minutes became the most excruciatingly painful period of Glenn's long life!
Hard boot heels trod upon his shattered kneecaps, slowly grinding...
Cold sword tips stirred within the wound of his not-entirely-numb severed arm...
The stinging heat of energy burns left charred marks across his intact limbs...
Acting like master anatomists and cruel children alike, they systematically destroyed Glenn's body using the most primitive and painful methods possible.
They savored his face, distorted by extreme pain, and the unmelodious, rattling gasps escaping his throat.
Finally, when Glenn's fire of life was completely extinguished amidst endless pain and humiliation, his body had been twisted into a bizarre, bloodied shape unrecognizable even to another Chunhua being, lying quietly beside his wife's uncooled, headless corpse.
The three male angel warriors glanced down happily at their "work," as if they had merely stepped on two cute bugs.
Unfurling their wings and giving a slight flap, they transformed into three streaks of light, surging toward the next red dot marked by the life detector.
In their wake remained only two broken corpses and the dead silence of the satellite surface.
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The Omnidirectional Cleanup:
The battlefield cleanup executed by the angel warriors resembled the most efficient sanitation and the coldest sterilization procedures.
Acting in squads or individually, leveraging their formidable mobility and life-detection technology, they penetrated every corner of this realm of death:
Spaceship Wrecks: Thick armor plating was cleaved open by thunder swords as easily as cutting cans.
Engineers trembling in the deepest power compartment? A flash of blue light, and their heads parted from their bodies.
Civilians praying in escape pods? Pod and occupants alike were blasted into fragments by energy impacts.
City Ruins: Burning skyscraper skeletons, collapsed residences, clogged sewers... The life detectors acted like invisible searchlights.
A family of three hiding behind a load-bearing wall? Vaporized through the wall by high-energy rays.
Wounded soldiers hiding under abandoned storefront counters? Their skulls crushed underfoot by a descending angel warrior.
Caves and Underground Bunkers: Natural karst caves, abandoned mine shafts, deep military shelters left behind... None could escape detection.
A group of survivors attempting to scrape by on underground water sources? Silently eliminated by pumped-in neurotoxin.
Technical officers hiding at the lowest level of a core-monitoring station? Their necks snapped by infiltrating angel warriors using primitive hand-to-hand combat skills.
Floating Rafts: In the frigid void, life rafts drifting on residual oxygen and weak propulsion stood out like fireflies in the dark.
The angel warriors couldn't even be bothered to approach; a distant, precise energy pulse turned the raft and the desperate Chunhua people crammed inside it into cosmic dust.
This was a war without battle cries, without charges, without evenly matched confrontations.
It was a unilateral, efficient, and coldly ruthless extermination cleanup.
The absolute generational gap in technology and power rendered any form of hiding, resistance, or even humble begging a futile and laughable struggle.
Much like ants encountering a fire truck.
Every discovered red life dot was extinguished within a brief moment by the blue-white lightning or energy impacts representing death.
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The Tianyi Supreme Command Headquarters Command Room:
On the massive star map, the red regions representing the Chunhua territory had long been covered by vast expanses of cold gray, symbolizing "destroyed" and "no life response."
At this moment, within this gray zone, countless tiny blue dots were moving rapidly, flickering, and then vanishing.
Every disappearing blue dot represented the eradication of a life signal.
Chief of Staff Lucifer's cold voice ticked off the final countdown like a precise clock:
"Report! The residual life signal cluster of the 'Broken Fang' star system (approximately 1,200 units) has been cleared by 'Scavenger' Team 7! Confirmed zero omissions!"
"Report! Weak cluster signals (approximately 80 units) detected in the deep bunkers of the 'Rotting Marsh' industrial ruins; 'Hunter' Team 12 has breached the area and is conducting cleanup... Cleanup complete! Signals vanished!"
"Report! Scattered small escape pod signals (3 units) discovered in the outer asteroid belt of the G-7 star system; remotely destroyed by patrol vessels!"
"Report! Deep-space detector network scan... Core area of the Chunhua territory (within a 10-light-year radius of the Ancestral Nest debris belt), life signal density: approaching zero!"
"Periphery and subordinate slave zones (included in the cleanup scope): life signal density below detection threshold!"
"Blockade cluster report: In the past 24 standard hours, targets attempting to escape intercepted and destroyed: zero! The iron curtain sector detected no valid spatial jump signals or large-scale material escapes!"
On the star map, the red halo representing life-detection scans was dimming and contracting at a rate visible to the naked eye. The gray zone of death and silence spread like expanding ink, covering the final glimmers symbolizing "existence."
The command room was solemn. Only the humming operation of the star map and Lucifer's cold broadcast broke the silence.
All officers held their breath, witnessing the complete demise of a civilization.
Heyufeng sat immaculately in the main seat throughout.
His black administrative jacket was without a single wrinkle, matching his frost-frozen expression.
His pupils reflected the region on the star map being rapidly swallowed by dead gray.
It was as if the countless disappearing red dots on the screen were not the deaths of countless lives, but merely numbers on a gaming interface.
Time flowed slowly in the dead silence.
Finally.
When the halo of the final large-scale life-signal scan on the star map completely vanished, and the entire Chunhua territory was entirely covered by a uniform, cold, lifeless dark gray.
When Chief of Staff Lucifer's final, emotionless confirmation sounded: "Report, Your Majesty! Final life-signal scan of the 'Zero-Out Operation' complete! Target stellar sector—all regions... Life signals confirmed: Zero!"
Heyufeng's fingers lightly tapped the tabletop for the very last time.
Tap.
The sound was very soft, yet it seemed to draw a cold period to this civilization-eradicating operation that had lasted over ten days.
He slowly stood up.
His movement was unhurried, yet it carried an ease of total control.
He did not cast a final glance at the star map that had turned completely dead-gray.
He offered no commentary on this "glorious" victory.
He issued no new directives to his subordinates.
He simply stepped forward, steadily walking around the expansive alloy conference table toward the exit of the command room.
As he passed Chief of Staff Lucifer, who still stood at attention beside the star map, Heyufeng did not break his stride. He merely lifted his right hand with utter casualness and lightly patted the rigidly braced shoulder of Lucifer's liquid-silver armor.
The touch was light, like brushing away an insignificant speck of dust.
No words were spoken.
Yet this simple physical contact spoke volumes. It signified the completion of the mission and indicated that subsequent trivialities no longer required the personal attention of the Tianyi King.
Lucifer's body gave a slight shiver, and his head lowered further still to indicate absolute obedience and acknowledgment of command.
Heyufeng's figure continued without pause toward the heavy alloy doors.
The doors slid open silently, letting in the bright light of the corridor outside, forming a sharp contrast with the gloom of the command room and the dead-gray star map behind him.
Just as his figure was about to vanish into the light outside the door:
"Attention!"
Chief of Staff Lucifer's deep, powerful voice suddenly rang out!
Clatter!
Inside the command room, every military-clad officer snapped to attention with reflexive precision!
Their burning gazes pursued the departing back that represented absolute power and will!
Immediately following came the uniform, reverent, and fanatical shout, echoing like the most devout hymn throughout the Supreme Command Headquarters command room, and faintly rippling through the still-open communication channels across the newly "zeroed-out" silent stellar sector:
"Farewell, King of Tianyi!"
The voice echoed among the alloy walls, lingering long.
Heyufeng's pace paused at the threshold, but only for an instant.
He did not look back, nor did he reply. He finally merged completely into the light of the corridor outside, vanishing from sight.
The alloy doors closed silently and heavily behind him, sealing inside the officers who maintained their respectful postures and the eternal dark gray on the star map symbolizing total annihilation.
The Zero-Out Operation had reached its definitive end.
The Chunhua civilization—a proto-god-making civilization that had existed for seventy thousand years—saw all its history, culture, knowledge, and bloodline... every trace of its existence thoroughly erased from this vast universe by the will of Tianyi.
What remained was only a cold, absolute silence of dust and wreckage floating in the void, designated as the "G-Ω-7 Edge Dead Zone."
And the Tianyi King, Heyufeng, the supreme dictator, had turned his back, leaving the newly forged death-world behind like a speck of dust flickered from his sleeve.
Such was Heyufeng, the male angel king who practiced imperial dictatorship.