My empire of stars

A year has passed, and it has been five years since the establishment of the Galactic Alliance.

In five years, the empire's exploration fleet has found more than 1,300 civilizations, and the star systems it has explored account for 3.45% of the Milky Way's area.

Of these more than 1,300 civilizations, 820 have chosen to join the Milky Way Alliance family, while the remaining civilizations have disappeared in the history of the Milky Way due to various "natural disasters".

Because there are so many star systems in the Milky Way and the Empire's fleet is limited, the current territory of the Galactic Alliance in the Milky Way is in the shape of a three-dimensional spider web.

Countless extending "spider webs" connect the civilizations discovered by the exploration ship, and each civilization extends thousands of spider webs outwards. This shows that this civilization has joined the Galactic Alliance and assumed the important task of exploring the Milky Way.

Even so, only 3.45% of the Milky Way has been explored in five years. There are still countless unknowns in the Milky Way waiting for adventurers to uncover.

However, the prototype of the Galactic Alliance has been formed. At present, the Galactic Alliance is already a behemoth that no one can shake in the galaxy.

In a starry sky thousands of light years away from the Galactic Alliance Network Star Field, a mushroom-shaped spacecraft suddenly left hyperspace.

"This is Ark Gemini, call the Empire Headquarters, call the Empire Headquarters!" Dozens of communications were sent out from the spaceship, but all of them were like silence and no one responded.

"We still can't contact the empire headquarters. We have been jumping in this starry sky for decades and still haven't reached the star system."

"We seem to have been making hyperspace jumps in place, and we can't escape from this ghost place." On the bridge of the Ark, Captain Zhang Jianzheng said angrily to himself.

The lights in the bridge are extremely dim. This is because after decades of continuous transition, the Ark requires a lot of energy, and the energy it carries is limited. Without replenishment of resources from the star system, it can only Turn off unnecessary energy consumption to ensure the most basic needs of the Ark, allowing it to operate for a longer period of time.

But even so, decades of uninterrupted jumps have left the Ark's reactor close to exhaustion.

In order to save resources to the maximum extent, Zhang Jian turned off all life-support facilities and lights on the Ark except the bridge. He drove all the crew members into sleep cabins, leaving him alone to guard the bridge.

During these thirty years of loneliness, the only thing he could communicate with was the shipboard artificial intelligence, and his spirit was almost on the verge of collapse.

"Captain, the energy of our Ark can only sustain three hyperspace jumps. If we cannot reach the star system after these three jumps, our Ark will drift infinitely in the universe, and everyone in the dormant cabin will be asleep. Die." The shipboard intelligence appeared next to the captain and warned.

"I hate myself! Why did I take Ark on this road of no return in the first place!" Captain Zhang Jian covered his eyes with his hands as he spoke, and two tears of unwillingness, regret, and guilt flowed from the seams of his hands. .

All this stems from an unknown signal they received thirty years ago.

After receiving this unknown signal from deep space, Zhang Jian ordered Ark to change its flight direction and follow the signal.

But they never expected that following this signal, the Ark would end up in such a weird place. They were trapped in this blank airspace and could not fly out of this area no matter how they flew.

After trying for thirty years, Zhang Jian still did not give up. He knew that once he gave up, the colonists on the Ark would all die because of him.

Six days passed quickly. After jumping out of hyperspace for the third time, the scanning device on the Ark still found no trace of the existence of any star system.

The Gemini Ark has no energy for the next jump, and the remaining energy is only enough to use the dormant cabin on the Ark for one year.

Just when Zhang Jian was about to give up, suddenly several flashes of light appeared in the starry sky in front of the Ark.

"Speed ​​up, let's go over and take a look!" As if a man who was dying suddenly found a life-saving straw, Zhang Jian eagerly ordered to the shipboard intelligence.

Ark's bulky body began to accelerate slowly, flying towards the place where the flash of light just appeared.

After dozens of days of flight, the Ark seemed to have suddenly passed through some barrier. The surrounding scenery suddenly changed. The original boundless void disappeared and was replaced by the wreckage of the spacecraft floating in the sky.

Among these wrecks, there are countless small boats busy. These boats cut useful metals from the wreckage and put them in the cargo hold behind them and speed away.

"Is this?" Zhang Jian suddenly understood. It turns out that this star field requires the spacecraft to fly normally to pass through, rather than jumping into hyperspace.

This must be some kind of protective barrier to prevent faster-than-light movement, and he just led the Ark to jump in place for thirty years!

Looking at the wreckage all over the place, it seems that there are many people who have the same thinking as him, and these spaceships must have exhausted their energy and turned into a pile of scrap metal.

However, the situation of the Gemini Ark is not much better. The long-term high-speed sub-light speed flight has caused the energy of the Ark to bottom out. If Zhang Jian starts the Ark's sub-light speed flight again, the Ark may completely lose its energy.

Just when he was wondering what to do, a huge fleet suddenly emerged from behind the wreckage.

Seeing this fleet, Zhang Jian opened his mouth in shock. The reason why he was shocked was not because the scale or volume of this fleet was beyond imagination, but because the appearance of these spaceships was really...

All the spaceships in this fleet have a roughly similar appearance: the appearance of a mast sailing ship from the late 18th century on Earth!

The original three huge sails of these mast sailing ships are still retained, but the canvas on them has been replaced by ordinary canvas with panels of an unknown black material.

The main bodies of these ships are all made of alloy, but some wood-like decorations are added in some places.

The original positions of the gun ports on both sides of the hull are still the gun ports. Fifty ancient-looking cannons in three rows above and below just stick out of the hull.

At the rear of the battleship, where the sailboat's rudder was originally located, is composed of dozens of propellers of various sizes, which appear to be the main driving force responsible for the advancement of these battleships.

Just like that, under Zhang Jian's shocked eyes, twenty strange and retro-looking spaceships flew around the ark.

"Guests from an unknown civilization, please put your guard down. We have no malicious intentions and we are here with friendship." Zhang Jian suddenly received communication messages from these spacecrafts. A middle-aged man with bronze skin wearing a top hat appeared. In the holographic screen.