CHAPTER 231: CH 227 THE FIRST CONTACT AND FEARS OF MINOTAUR ...4

"I’ve sent the information to the other Grand Admiral, Master Kael, just as you instructed," she said.

Kael gave a brief nod, then shifted the topic. "Things are about to take a hard turn. Our newly trained elite recruits aren’t fully ready for independent deployments on their own. But this battle—and the one that follows—should be enough to temper them, to harden both their skills and their minds for the challenges they’ll face regularly."

As he spoke, his eyes drifted over the faces of the officers stationed aboard the frontline battle carriers, as well as those positioned further back in the middle and outer perimeter of the formation. Many remained steady—especially those in the middle layers—but most, if not all, showed cracks under the ceaseless bombardment of the Minotaur Clan’s weapons against their shields. Only a rare few managed to hold themselves truly composed.

The blinding flashes of each explosion, the sheer force with which they tore through space, carved uneasiness into the expressions of many.

It was natural, of course—he expected as much. For most of them, this was their first time on an actual battlefield. And even so—even with that knowledge and acceptance—the flicker of fear and unease in the eyes of his crew across the fleet drew a faint glimmer of disappointment in his own.

Forget it, Kael thought. After all, they were new recruits—even if they were elites who had trained for nearly, if not more than, a hundred years inside the Universal Domain. It was only natural. Experience couldn’t be gained through training alone, could it? Actual combat, where lives were truly at stake, was necessary to carve out the real fruits of their training. Training could only prepare them to cope with situations—not replace the battlefield itself.

For now, however, independent operations couldn’t be entrusted to them. If they froze, even for a single second, the entire formation could suffer. Their ships might be able to defend them during those seconds, but it was not productive at all. In fact, it would harm them more if they developed such dependence.

Just as Kael was about to sink deeper into his thoughts, a voice reached him from the front. Titus spoke, pulling both him and the others back into focus.

"Admiral, it looks like the bombardment from the Minotaur is slowing down... slowly, slowly," he reported.

"Oh? Is that so?" Kael replied, his expression unmoved.

Sentoiry, noticing his tone, added, "It’s not that they don’t want to keep firing, Admiral. But I’m detecting a sharp decline in the energy output of their ships and their battle fortress. It looks like they’ve either depleted a good portion of their reserves for now—or they’re undergoing cooldown."

Kael gave another indifferent nod. "Oh... Looks like both explanations might be right. But I doubt the Star Fortress has consumed much of its true reserves. So cooldown it is. It’s sooner than I expected, but I suppose that’s the result of them disabling the limiters on their weapons to gain higher firepower in short bursts."

This was a conclusion he and others aboard his flagship had already reached: the Minotaur Clan’s sudden, overwhelming barrages were the result of upgraded weapon systems, paired with unknown modifications that didn’t match the old data they had. In fact, much of what they observed was vastly different from previous records.

Still, their analysis suggested that the Minotaur were deliberately surging their weapons to squeeze out greater destructive output—at the cost of shortening their sustained firing duration.

And as for why? Well, it was absolutely clear—their aim was to deal enough damage to disrupt the formation, to cause chaos by delivering a massive blow. If the Minotaur truly thought they could harm us that way, even take down a few of the forward fleet ships, then that was utterly foolish. Where they got such confidence from, I don’t know.

Sigh. Whatever. I don’t care what those Minotaur were thinking. Making such a trade-off...

"It might be, sir," Titus said carefully, "that they thought exactly as you said—taking down a few of us and then using the chaos that followed to buy themselves enough time for their weapons to cool down, while their shields covered them."

Kael gave a slight nod. "It might be as you said. But I don’t care anymore. We’ve seen what we needed to. Let’s finish this and be done with it. We have other places to raid, and we can’t waste too much time here—especially not now, when things are already becoming uncertain."

A faint edge touched his voice as he added, "Though I would very much like to see the faces of those Minotaur when they realize all their bombardments didn’t even scratch our shielding system, let alone anything else."

"That’s what they were expecting to happen... this will be interesting, hehe," Kael murmured. "Have everyone ready to fire the first few shots at these Minotaur forces—in a while."

Meanwhile, aboard another ship of the same design and class as the BC-911 Storm Lancer—different from the one commanded by Captain Wipers—another battle carrier held the frontline, enduring the immense bombardments from the Minotaur forces. This particular ship was under the command of Captain Joshua.

Yes, Joshua—the same Joshua introduced in the earlier Chapters. The one who had always been a massive fan of space and space warfare. He was among those who had joined the Void Fleet right at the start of recruitment, and he had gone on to achieve the highest scores in the current military academy—an institution hastily established to train recruits while the real academy was still under construction back in the Regal Star System.

Now, Joshua stood at the command deck, eyes fixed on the sight before him as the bombardment raged. His voice carried both excitement and a mocking edge as he said, "Hehe... this race is throwing everything they have, yet they can’t even touch us. This is exciting. Finally—finally, an actual battle!"

Just then, his gaze sharpened. "Ohh... looks like the intensity is dropping. Their attacks are growing weaker and weaker. Is that really all the juice these Minotaur ships have?"

Suddenly, the ship’s AI announced loudly across the bridge: ’Order has been given—to prepare and charge up the secondary weapons. Firing sequence will commence in a few minutes upon command.’

Joshua grinned, though a flicker of disappointment colored his tone. "Ohh, so we’re ending this soon, huh? A shame... it wasn’t much of a challenge to begin with. Well then—better to finish quickly and move on to the next star system in our mission. Maybe we’ll find a better opponent there. That would be exciting."

He turned around, his gaze sweeping over the twenty or so officers working below. Then, standing tall at the center of the bridge, he called out, "Attention, everyone! You’ve heard the command from the top. If you’ve enjoyed the fireworks long enough, it’s time to focus. Get those secondary weapons charged and ready. Aim at... hmm, no targeting orders have been given yet, have they? Then simply cycle the batteries and stand by for directions. Now move quickly!"

His bluntness left a few officers momentarily speechless, but most were already used to it. They had served under Joshua’s command for more than ten years inside the simulated worlds where they had trained.

They had served under Joshua’s command for more than ten years inside the simulated worlds where they had trained. His sharp way of speaking sometimes caught them off guard, but it no longer surprised them. With practiced discipline, they returned to their stations, fixing their focus back on the tasks at hand.

A massive—though still relatively modest—amount of energy began drawing from the dual core reactors of the ship, diverted into its weapon batteries. Systems hummed to life: forty-eight dual pulse beam turrets, thirty-two dual turbo laser cannons, and twenty-four gauss cannon systems—all slowly powering up for battle.

And Joshua’s ship wasn’t the only one to receive such an order. Around thirty other battle carriers of the same BC-911 class in the frontline began the same preparations. The rest of the fleet—some 2,570 ships—remained on standby, though this fact was not shared with Joshua or his officers.

It was Kael’s decision. He deemed that thirty of these battle carriers were more than enough to dismantle the Minotaur forces. But just in case, he had also ordered two additional forward-line BC-911s to prepare their main weapons: the Nova-class Super Heavy Pulse Cannons. Those colossal guns would be the first to fire, their purpose singular—bringing down the shields of the enemy Star Fortress.

Meanwhile, on the other side, within the Star Fortress Korvas, its commander watched the fire zone their weapons had carved out. As he observed the devastation, he thought to himself, I hope this is enough to inflict a fair amount of damage and destruction on their frontline ships—enough chaos in their lines to buy us the time we need for our weapons to cool down. That should be happening any moment now... sigh