readease Chapter 486: Containment Breach
Chapter 486: Containment Breach
And not a single one had noticed the boarding.
Back on the cruiser, Xu Jian watched the feed come in live.
He gave a small nod.
"Secure them. Stabilize vitals. Bring them aboard for holding. Don’t question them yet."
"And the rest of the ship?" one aide asked.
"Clear it. Then log every data file, system readout, and navigation route you can find. I want to know exactly how they got here."
Xu Qianghua sat alone in the lower wing of his cultivation estate, eyes closed as faint spiritual light drifted around him. The room was quiet. Even the wind outside had stilled.
Then the transmission alert chimed.
It wasn’t loud. Just a quiet pulse from the panel mounted near the corner of the wall. Still, his eyes opened instantly.
He stood, walked over, and tapped the screen.
The message came in clean. No distortion. No delays.
It was from Admiral Xu Jian.
"Report complete. Boarding successfully. No resistance met. Ship logs have been partially recovered and are being forwarded."
Qianghua didn’t reply. He simply pressed one more time, and a data stream opened.
Lines of text appeared across the screen: technical specs, ship integrity, life support status, names of recovered survivors, energy core diagnostics, navigation history.
And then—log entries.
His eyes paused on the first few dates.
They matched.
He scrolled further.
Then stopped cold.
There it was.
The ship’s name. The class. The mission.
He stepped back slightly, breath held.
This wasn’t just some unknown foreign craft.
He knew this vessel.
It was one of the main conquest ships from the Dominion Expansion Fleet. A long-range vessel launched centuries ago by a now mostly hidden race of spacefaring cultivators known only as the Aestari Prime.
Back then, it was said to be one of the strongest exploration-crusher ships sent out across the galaxy.
It wasn’t here to explore.
It was here to take.
His fingers clenched slightly.
He remembered now—his mother had hinted at it, years ago, back when he was still growing.
She told him once about an incoming threat. Not the Zerg. Not rebels. But something worse.
A mission ship from the Aestari Prime. Sent to subjugate Nexera. Quietly. Efficiently.
They weren’t just planning to enslave the people.
They were going to remove the World Core.
Extract it.
That would’ve ended the planet’s evolution entirely.
Qianghua’s jaw tensed. His eyes stayed locked on the screen.
They’d come to drain the life from the world. Steal every bit of spirit energy, every fertile region, and leave behind a hollowed-out husk before returning home like they always did.
And they could’ve done it too.
The ship was powerful, and its crew was trained in suppressive tactics, planetary binding arrays, and world-sealing rituals.
They were exactly the kind of group no one on Nexera could’ve stopped at the time.
Except that wasn’t what happened.
He kept reading.
Then it hit him.
Midway through the logs, everything changed.
The clean reports. The conquest plans. The resource tags. All of it started to fall apart.
There were lines about interference. Unexpected threats. Navigation failures.
And then—the words: "Zerg presence confirmed. Multiple hives. Unknown Queen level. Ambush near southern orbital marker."
His breath stilled.
So that’s what happened.
The ship never got to launch its invasion.
It ran into the Zerg.
He scrolled again.
The battle logs were a mess. Some were corrupted, others left unfinished, and there were gaps. Whole sections were cut off mid-line, but the meaning was clear.
The Aestari ship had ended up in a stalemate.
Not a quick one. Not a tactical withdrawal. A drawn-out, hopeless war in space, stuck in orbit, neither side able to win or escape.
His eyes stayed on the words.
They must’ve fought for days. Weeks, maybe.
And then something else happened.
One line mentioned internal failure. Then another said, "Containment breach." Then came silence.
The last entry was from someone named Renn.
It simply read:
"We’re still alive. Somehow. But the engines are gone. Curvature drive is lost. Power reserves fading.
There is no external help, no way to call home. If anyone reads this message... we tried. And we failed."
Xu Qianghua leaned back slightly.
So that was the truth.
They didn’t retreat.
They didn’t escape.
They got caught.
Fought until they broke.
And now, centuries later, they’d drifted back—scarred, weak, helpless.
His mind was still racing.
This ship, this group, they were once a threat to all of Nexera. One of the hidden reasons why his family had stayed vigilant for so long. And now?
Now they were ghosts. Worn-down survivors. Stripped of everything except breath and bones.
He turned away from the console and walked toward the wide balcony outside his chamber.
From here, he could see part of the horizon. The spiritual mist over the mountains shimmered faintly under the early moonlight.
He didn’t speak.
Didn’t move.
He was thinking.
Hard.
This ship still mattered. The technology on board might still hold secrets—the origin logs, the spiritual framework, the old commands.
And the crew... even in their weakened state, some of them might know things. About the Prime races. About galactic threats. About what else might be coming.
Because if a ship this strong could be reduced to floating scrap...
Then the universe was still hiding enemies far worse.
Qianghua finally exhaled.
He tapped his wrist.
The communicator opened again.
"Admiral," he said.
Xu Jian answered instantly. "Yes?"
"Secure the ship. Do not remove the survivors. Set up containment inside the vessel. No outside contact. I’ll arrive personally within the next few hours."
"Yes, sir."
"And Admiral..."
"Yes?"
"No announcements to the planetary network. No media. No leaks. This never happened."
"Understood."
The call ended.
Qianghua looked at the sky again.
He didn’t feel proud.
He didn’t feel curious.
He felt cautious.
Because sometimes, victory didn’t come with cheers or rewards.
Sometimes, it drifted back like a dead thing from the past.
And he knew better than to assume it was harmless.
Whatever this was...
It wasn’t over.
Not yet.