Galaxy Domination Guide

The situation on Emerald Sea Star no longer required Bai Zhongqi to invest much effort. The Six Towers were melted into glass, and the Northern Continent Kingdom was completely annihilated; in fact, this war did not cause too significant a loss of life. The greatest casualties happened during the siege of Shangduohan Royal Capital, as Xiao Yu deliberately caused destruction.

Since Bai Zhongqi ordered the Star Alliance Army to eradicate the plundering Northern Continent forces, the overall casualties were actually fewer than the Miryua succession war that swept over most of the Northern Continent three years prior.

Just as Bai Zhongqi had predicted, the people of the Northern Continent did not particularly reject those from Iridium Star. They were accustomed to frequently changing lords, and the harsh natural environment meant that if a lord was willing to levy less tax, it was enough to make them grateful.

The new "Kingdom Lord" was practically a philanthropist; after the war, Iridium Star provided relief to the refugees throughout the Northern Continent. By recruiting the landless Northern Continent people for various tasks, offering handsome wages and food, they received a significant response.

The nobility suffered nearly a complete purge, and even though the wealth seized was hardly noteworthy to the people of Iridium Star, when distributed among the vast majority of the poor, it made them feel as if good days had arrived.

Transforming Emerald Sea Star into a "civilized society" would naturally take longer than Earth, and Bai Zhongqi did not have the patience, so he simply left the task to Xiao Yu.

He took with him 351 Star Warriors willing to serve the United Empire from Emerald Sea Star, most of whom were Prophets from the Southern Continent.

Bai Zhongqi did not re-establish the Imperial Stellar Transmission Academy as a management organization for the Star Warriors but instead transformed it into the Stellar Transmission Corps, a military unit directly under the Empire, where he conducted training and other management work for the Star Warriors.

To supervise and control the Stellar Transmission Corps, Bai Zhongqi also put in some effort. The Star Warriors had to wear specially made Tiberius Armor and undergo certain bodily modifications, all of which enabled Bai Zhongqi to effectively control their every move.

After a long stay on Emerald Sea Star, Bai Zhongqi boarded the Sacred Falcon and returned to Earth. With Emerald Sea Star operating normally, Governor Xiao Yu was responsible for the planet's administration while the orbital construction group remained under Bai Zhongqi's direct control, producing various industrial goods and manufacturing new warships for the Star Alliance.

During the journey back to Earth, Bai Zhongqi read briefings on various affairs of the Star Alliance. There was no notion of a supreme leader within the Star Alliance; the governing body was the Star Alliance Council, but the actual leader of the Star Alliance was naturally Bai Zhongqi. He simply saw no need to bestow upon himself a title like President of the Star Alliance.

In the interstellar exploration project, the Star Alliance's Reconnaissance Ships explored two new stellar systems within a few months. The second-closest stellar system to the Solar System, the Barnard Galaxy; and the Luhman 16 binary star system, which Earth's humanity had announced the discovery of only in 2013.

Compared to the discovery of the habitable planet, Emerald Sea Star, in the Centauri Alpha Galaxy, these two systems weren't so lucky.
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The red dwarf Barnard's Star is the fourth closest star to the Sun and theoretically also has a habitable zone. However, Iridium Star didn't find any substantial planets in this system, meaning Barnard's Star was a lone stellar body with a few minor celestial bodies forming a system around it.

The Luhman 16 binary star system is a different story; these two stars are brown dwarfs, unable to sustain hydrogen fusion due to their low mass, and they shine and radiate heat only by converting gravitational potential energy—insignificant compared to main-sequence stars. They are typically referred to as "failed stars," a type of celestial body that falls between giant planets and stars.

In the Luhman system, the people of Iridium Star discovered more than ten planets with somewhat disorderly orbits, which could be developed into an economically valuable mining field.

Bai Zhongqi wasn't discouraged by the lack of new habitable planets because that was the norm in the universe.

The Luhman Galaxy was a dead silence, without even a proper stellar entity, yet some Earth-like planets contained rich fusion materials, which meant that the Star Alliance could establish outposts there, to conduct mining and guard the galaxy.

The discovery of two galaxies did not particularly concern Bai Zhongqi, but what truly caught his attention was the following discovery.

Xu Lanzhou pointed to the image in front of them and showed Bai Zhongqi, "This is from 16 hours ago, captured on a small asteroid with a diameter of only 16 kilometers in the asteroid belt. After processing the image, the system automatically identified artificial traces. When we rescanned it a second time with a clearer camera lens, we found this."

It was a crashed spaceship, not very large in size, at most just over a hundred meters. Judging by the aesthetic standards of the Iridium Star people, the spaceship was horribly ugly, a very unrefined cubic extraterrestrial, with two engines rudely mounted on either side of the ship.

The various components of the ship's structure were very clearly visible, and despite the fact that most of the spaceship was already destroyed, one could still see how rough the crafters of this object must have been.

Xu Lanzhou continued, "We immediately dispatched landing personnel to investigate. This spaceship has crashed for at least a hundred years, and most of its equipment is also damaged. We haven't found any related records. In terms of equipment technology, this spaceship is only equivalent to our technology from over a thousand years ago."

Bai Zhongqi was surprised, "By the looks of it, it seems to be only slightly more advanced than the technology on Earth."

"It's not a warship, but a private ship, without strong armaments. However, we can discern signs of civilization's development from some of the equipment. This spaceship has a fairly advanced biological laboratory, and also is equipped with a warp engine."

Bai Zhongqi's expression became more serious, "A private ship equipped with a warp engine?"

Xu Lanzhou responded, "Yes, Your Majesty. The ship is severely damaged and there's not much we can analyze. But we can confirm that the life pod of this spaceship has disappeared without any signs of damage. It must have been launched before the crash, or after it."

Bai Zhongqi felt a chill, "That means, the pilot of the spaceship survived and is in the Solar System. A hundred years is nothing for some long-lived species. Could the pilot of this spaceship still be alive?"

Xu Lanzhou nodded gravely, "We have reason to make such a conjecture. Through analysis of the ship's construction and patterns, we judge that this interstellar civilization species should also be two-legged upright carbon-based life, but likely not of the Primate Clan. In that case, Earth's environment is suitable for the survival of the vast majority of carbon-based lifeforms.

It's very possible that the spaceship's survivor went to Earth and is still living there."

After pondering for a moment, Bai Zhongqi said, "If the spaceship's survivor came to Earth, they might have had an impact on Earth's development. We don't know whether they managed to return to their home planet. However, it's more likely they did not succeed, or else there would already be official records of alien visits on Earth.

We cannot deduce when this individual arrived on Earth, or even if they did. But after the 1940s, brain worms began entering human society. We can confirm that brain worms are not native to Earth, so could they be related to the pilot of this spaceship?"

He continued reasoning, "It's probably not likely; the technology on this spaceship is over a thousand years more advanced than Earth's, but the brain worms have not shown any technology beyond the times. They even rely on human technological development to provide them with capital investment points. The survivor of the spaceship is a two-legged upright advanced carbon-based lifeform.

With that level of technological advancement, they should have been able to discover the existence of brain worms."

After thinking for a long time with no clear leads, he had no choice but to order continued research into the wreckage of the spaceship. At the same time, he knew that it was almost time to start closing the net on the brain worms lurking on Earth.