Li Wuji seemed to have fallen into a weird world of nightmares.
The cabin walls around and the precious paintings on the wall were suddenly stretched to a place far away, as if they were ten thousand meters away from him, before they were suddenly "bounced" back to him and even shot into his eyes.
Extending his hands, his hands were like blossoming flowers. From the fat to the veins to the nerves and the bones, they were all visible, but he could not feel any pain at all. It was completely against the fundamental law of the three-dimensional world.
The deafening explosion was not just made of soundwaves but also flowed around him in the form of glamorous colors, roaring and corrupting his soul that was exposed outside of his brain!
It was not easy for Li Wuji to gather a part of his clear thinking ability and understand the status that he was in.
He and "Eternal Spring", his flagship, were tearing apart the four-dimensional space and performing a space jump. They were in a certain state of "superposition" between the three-dimensional and the four-dimensional space.
However, the space jump did not work out. His starship and even his fleet were all bounced back mercilessly.
It was like a high-speed train that hit an iron wall brutally.
No, it was even more miserable than that.
It was because they were not bounced back because of any problem with the space jump unit or any other malfunction, but because the wormhole that they tore apart was blown back by the barrage of thousands of cannons!
They had been ambushed by the enemy during a space jump. It was a standard "attack when they were halfway through". It was the most terrible nightmare that every starship commander did not want to encounter!
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
BOOM! BOOM! The deafening explosions congregated into a flood that flooded every pathway of the starship, collapsing and swallowing everything they saw on their way — the Crystal Suit, the space shuttles, the turrets, the arsenals, and the panicked Immortal Cultivators.
As a powerful person in the four Kurfürst families, Li Wuji's fleet was equipped with the most advanced and sophisticated starships in the entire Imperium. The defense of his flagship, Eternal Spring, was only slightly worse than that of the general flagship of his family. It was an out-and-out "super warship".
Under normal circumstances, Eternal Spring alone could deal with more than ten hostile starships without any escorts. It could even resist the super firepower of a space fortress and fight the enemy head-on.
But a starship that had entered the space jump state was a whole different matter.
No matter how dense the alloy plate armor was, how powerful the spiritual shield was, and how thick the interference magnetic field was, it was meaningless for a starship in the four-dimensional state.
The so-called four-dimensional expansion was equivalent to flipping out all the internal organs. Then, no matter how tough the armor was, what was the use?
When the enemy hiding in the dark suddenly tore apart the camouflage of the darkness and launched the most violent firepower at the jump fleet that was "crossing the river", it was no longer a surprise attack or a war, but a naked slaughter.
Eternal Spring and its owner, Li Wuji, were finally completely bounced back to the three-dimensional state.
However, the damage caused by the violent explosion and severe interference was irreversible.
"Ah …"
Li Wuji looked at his hands in bewilderment. Because of the heavy wounds when he was bounced back to the three-dimensional state from the four-dimensional state, the space ripples were flying freely inside the starship like sharp blades without thickness. There was no telling how many Immortal Cultivators they had reaped outside, but they had also cut off three of his fingers and half of his ear. His blood spurted out crazily, dyeing the delicate, pure white wool carpet on the ground into a mess. He felt both disgusted and painful.
That was not all.
Because his personal chamber had the most thorough protection, the violent quakes of the space ripples did not cause much damage.
He could not imagine what a gory picture it would be outside, especially near the engine compartment of the space jump unit.
"How did this happen?"
Li Wuji's face was pale, and his forehead was covered in cold sweat. He was completely confused.
Every most idiotic starship commander should know that, while space jumps were the most important technology for human beings to conquer the universe, it was also the most vulnerable, unprepared, and vulnerable moment for every starship and even every passenger on the starship to perform a space jump. It was the out-and-out "gate of hell".
Therefore, the space zone with the most stable space must be chosen, and the jump must be performed only when there were no enemies nearby.
If possible, it would be best to make sure that the destination of the jump was also supported by their own people and guided by a large space gate. Only in such a way could anything go wrong.
Although the commander of Li Wuji's fleet was not a "famous general" that awed the Imperium, he was still an expert who had received decades of training in military academies and a hundred years of battle commanding experience.
The jump point that he chose was the most stable traditional jump point near the Blue Sky Market. All the starships coming and going from the Blue Sky Market would probably choose to jump from there, and there had never been any problems.
All the warships that belonged to the Business Alliance of Ten Thousand Sectors in the Blue Sky Market had been destroyed or disarmed. They were absolutely incapable of flying out to attack them.
Were they space pirates?
It was absolutely impossible. All the warships of the space pirates were docked in the docks of the Blue Sky Market dutifully and monitored by the other half of the Kurfürsten's fleet. Li Wuji's side did not notice any anomaly at all!
A third force other than the space pirates and the Business Alliance of Ten Thousand Sectors suddenly attacked them?
That was too absurd!
The universe was too vast, and the journey was too long. Technically speaking, there was no such thing as "sudden attack" at all.
Li Wuji's starships could scan the waves of spiritual energy of the starships within hundreds of thousands of kilometers nearby. If a fleet was coming at them aggressively from millions of kilometers away or even further away, how could the commander of his fleet not detect it and perform a space jump under such circumstances? Wouldn't it be suicide?
Eliminating all the impossibilities, there was only the most absurd and terrifying possibility left.
Li Wuji suddenly felt that his mouth was dry, and his heart seemed to have fallen into a bottomless valley.
The only possibility was that there was indeed a hostile fleet, but it was not coming at them aggressively from millions of kilometers away but ambushing right next to them.
To be more exact, it had been ambushing them in the stable space near the Blue Sky Market that was most suitable for a space jump.
Turning off the power units, retracting the spiritual shield, keeping the communication silent, and even reducing the artificial gravity and the air circulation inside the starships to the minimum, trying not to spread out the slightest spiritual wave.
If such a silent fleet had kept such a state of rocks and scrap iron in the past few days or even longer, it was indeed possible for them to avoid the scanning of Li Wuji's fleet under the cover of the meteoroid belt outside of the Blue Sky Market.
However, however, however —
"How can there be such an insane tactic?"
Li Wuji screamed in incomprehensible pain.
If such a tactic was to be carried out, the enemy had to arrive at this place and set up an ambush several days in advance. In order not to release too much spiritual waves, the living environment on the starships must be extremely harsh. Chances were that the temperature was below freezing, and the air was filthy, too. Everybody had to wear the Crystal Suit and the internal circulation breathing mask and endure the sufferings for days and nights with their iron will.
The mysterious and silent fleet was like a killer that had been hiding in a swamp for days and nights. Holding their breath, constricting their pores, and even suppressing their heartbeats, they were waiting for an opportunity, an opportunity to slit their throat …
Li Wuji discovered in pain that he seemed to have fallen into a fatal trap.
The mysterious enemy who boasted such a tenacious will and powerful control over the fleet was definitely not a common business team or a pirate gang that had been ambushing in this place in secret. There was only one prey that was worth such a price for them.
It was exactly him, Li Wuji, Marquess Yongchun!
"My lord, my lord!"
The adjutant's desperate screams echoed outside of the door.
Before Li Wuji agreed, the adjutant whose face was covered in blood and snot barged in.
Li Wuji looked around and grabbed the collar of the adjutant through the embroidered handkerchief on the tea table, before he shrieked, "Don't panic. What's going on exactly?"
"No. A mysterious fleet appeared out of nowhere. It seemed to have jumped out of the meteoroid belt nearby and launched a fierce attack when we were performing a space jump!"
The adjutant shouted at the top of his voice, "We're screwed. Our fleet is all screwed. Most of the starships have been deformed by the space ripples and lost the ability to attack, defend, and even move. The remaining starships have lost their command and become loose sand!"
"A * shole!"
Had it not been for the blood and snot on the adjutant's face, Li Wuji would've slapped him to death. "What do you mean by 'lost command'? What was the captain doing? Raise the spiritual shield now and gather the remnants that are still moving! A starving camel is still bigger than a horse. My fleet is one of the best at the peripheral worlds of the Imperium. Even if we are attacked halfway through the space jump, who is certain that they can swallow my remnants? "
"No. There is no way to raise the spiritual shield or send any message to other starships!"
The adjutant said, almost in tears, "Our control system and even the entire tactical network have been hacked and sabotaged by the enemy!"
"What!"
Li Wuji felt that his head was dizzy. He shrieked in the most earsplitting voice, "How is it possible? The combat ability of Eternal Spring is the best in the entire Imperium. The dynamic defense system was activated immediately after we set sail. The passwords of all the entrances changed more than a hundred times per second. Who could've hacked our battle network in such a short time?"
"It wasn't hacked just now."
The adjutant cried, "When we were anchored in the Blue Sky Market for maintenance and fuel injection, the battle network of Eternal Spring was connected to the database of the Blue Sky Market and collected tremendous business secrets and information of the Business Alliance of Ten Thousand Sectors. It must've been then that somebody snuck in and left a 'backdoor' in our system.
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