"Lord Yang Ying, I am truly astonished," Yafei said with genuine admiration. "I never imagined you possessed such a deep friendship with the Speaker of the Protos Council, enough to persuade him to release all the Burk captives to save my people."

Yang Ying replied, "The development of Protos is unique. Those Burk captives are entirely useless to them; keeping them only wastes space and makes noise. It's better to put them to good use. However, since those Burk prisoners have military experience, their acquisition by the Kusta people will undoubtedly bolster their strength."

"That doesn't matter; the important thing is that my people can return. The defeat of the Kusta Empire is certain; those Burks won't change the outcome," Yafei said, a weight lifted from her shoulders, smiling. "My greatest worry was that the Protos people would refuse to release them. Now that Your Excellency Yang Ying knows Speaker Cass of Protos, the operation to bring my kin home should proceed without a hitch. The Songstar people will never forget the aid the Ziloros provided; naturally, we will pay a suitable price for their redemption, certainly no less than four hundred million Burk slaves and two hundred million native slaves."

Yang Ying said, "Very well, let's take a trip to Aier now while the opportunity is ripe."

"Good," Yafei agreed. She called over a disciple, gave a few instructions for her absence, and then joined Yang Ying on the balcony.

Yang Ying opened a wormhole, and the two stepped inside together.

On the other side of the wormhole was Aier. Upon emerging, Yang Ying made a gesture toward the void and called out, "Cass! An old friend has arrived!"

As his voice faded, a wormhole materialized before them. Cass’s voice came from within: "It is indeed Brother Yang Ying. And this must be Your Excellency Yafei of the Songstar people. Please, come in."

Yang Ying and Yafei stepped through the wormhole Cass opened. On the other side, it led to Cass's mountaintop palace, his personal residence.

The Supreme Council office building on Aier was built in the center of the capital city, but Cass's residence was situated atop a high mountain outside the city, towering above the clouds, overlooking the land where a magnificent palace stood.

Many Level Four entities favored establishing their residences on high mountains, much like the Tibuz family did.

"I have been expecting you both." The hall Cass used to receive Yafei was also golden, but it was a hundred times more opulent and beautiful than the golden hall Yafei had on the Cyclone Column.

"Speaker Cass," Yafei began, sensing that Cass's power far surpassed her own, thinking to herself that he was indeed worthy of having defeated the Slaughter God Loa. "I heard from Your Excellency Yang Ying that your nobles purchased my people from the Kusta people to secure their release."

"That is correct," Cass affirmed. "They are not slaves here. The Songstar Kingdom can take them back."

"Thank you very much for your kind assistance, Speaker Cass."

Following this, Yafei and Cass began discussing the specific details, determining the proper procedures to bring back all one hundred million Songstar people, as well as the Songstar Kingdom's reciprocal gift.

When all the various intricate matters were settled, more than two hours had passed, and the sky was beginning to darken as the sun set.

"We will proceed basically according to this," Cass said, extending a hand burning with purple flame. From the fire, a crystal materialized, shimmering with clarity. It stored the memorandum of their discussion. Cass handed the crystal to Yafei.

"Very well, Speaker Cass. If all goes well, our ships will arrive to escort them within five days," Yafei said after accepting the crystal, then requested leave. "It is getting late; we shall meet again."

Yafei asked Yang Ying if he wanted to leave with her, but Yang Ying declined. Displaying the excellent relationship between the Trann people and the Protos people to the Songstar people had achieved its necessary goal; anything more was superfluous.

Since the death of Karagunis, the relationship between the Trann people and the Songstar people had become incredibly strong—more intimate than a strategic partnership. One could say that as long as Yang Ying did not actively disrupt it, this positive relationship would continue indefinitely.

Yang Ying highly valued the Songstar people as an ally because, regardless of his current military might, it could not negate the fundamental drawback of his faction's short development time. The direct consequence was insufficient prestige to deter the covetousness of others.

If he continued to work entirely alone, there would inevitably be ill-intentioned parties who could not resist probing and testing him, looking for a weakness. Once discovered, they would extend their claws, greedily tearing at him to swallow all of Yang Ying's influence.

The law of the jungle, where profit blinds reason, held true across the universe.

Immense gains often drove people to commit acts they normally couldn't imagine, even ignoring all danger to stake their very lives on a gamble. Yang Ying, even as a Level Four entity, could not change the greed deep within others' hearts.

Having the Songstar people as leaders would save him much unnecessary strife, allowing him to focus entirely on development.

Two more days passed, and finally, the Songstar people mobilized their forces and marched toward the Kusta Empire. The Songstar Kingdom and its allies amassed a combined total of over seven million warships and breached the borders of the Kusta Empire.

Among the twenty-eight sectors of the Orion Arm, the Kusta Empire controlled two major sectors: the Kusta Sector and the Dida Sector. The former was the birthplace of the Kusta people. In the days of the Atlantis Galactic Empire, it bore a different name.

However, during the Great Retreat of the True Humans ten thousand years ago, after centuries of war with many alien races, the Kusta people conquered this sector and renamed it the Kusta Sector.

The Dida Sector was conquered later through a series of aggressive wars. Due to its relative distance from the Kusta political center, many remnants of races previously invaded by the Kusta people still resided there, constantly sparking rebellions that significantly hampered the Kusta people's outward expansion.

The Songstar people’s chosen offensive tactic this time was to defeat them piecemeal, striking the Dida Sector first, where there were ample resistance forces, making the fighting somewhat easier. The primary objective was to draw out and deplete the Kusta Empire's fleet, preparing for the next assault on the Kusta Sector.

If they had attacked the Kusta Sector directly, it being the core of the empire, the Kusta people would have concentrated all their fleets for defense. In that scenario, the Songstar people would have faced a grueling war of attrition. While that path might lead to a swift victory, the Songstar people deeply valued their kin's lives; their foremost consideration in warfare was minimizing their own casualties while maximizing enemy destruction. At this time, the Trann people’s fleet also set out, joining the Songstar fleet entering the Dida Sector. Two hundred thousand Minotaur-class battlecruisers, each equipped with one Level Eight Yamato Cannon and eight Level Seven conventional main guns, were among the highest-performing warships even within the Songstar-organized joint fleet.

After the fighting commenced, just as anticipated, the Songstar joint fleet's advance was very smooth. The Kusta Empire seemed to have abandoned its outer defenses, consolidating its forces, allowing the Songstar fleet to sweep through unimpeded. Within three days, they swept across more than twenty planets, establishing resistance forces to undermine the Kusta people’s rule, with moderately good results.

Meanwhile, the Protoss also began their offensive into the Berkreck Sector. Of the one hundred thousand carrier fleet, ten thousand remained on station, while the remaining ninety thousand were divided into three routes, each led by a Level Four Limit-level Light-and-Shadow Consul. Cass personally commanded the central route, which consisted of fifty thousand carriers, while the left and right routes each commanded twenty thousand carriers.

The Burk resistance proved slightly stronger than the Kusta resistance. The central fleet encountered a frontal assault from a fifty-thousand-ship Burk fleet on the first day.

Over two years ago, Yang Ying had subdued an assassin organization called 'Shadow Blade.' This organization now rarely accepted assassination contracts, having shifted most of its resources to intelligence gathering.

According to intelligence received from the Burk branch, after suddenly losing seventy thousand ships, the Burk people fell into panic. The Burk Emperor had opened the national treasury, throwing money around massively to force arms manufacturers into overdrive, while simultaneously placing numerous war contracts with the Orion Arm Mercenary Guild, hiring top-tier Level Seven mercenary groups to join the war.

Although the main focus currently lay in expeditions toward the Perseus Arm, substantial rewards attract brave souls. When the Protoss began their attack, the Burk people had already reorganized one million warships, preparing to use every ounce of strength to withstand the Protoss assault.

The location of the engagement was within a star system. The second planet in this system was a crucial military supply depot for the Burk people and thus received extremely high attention; the fifty-thousand-ship fleet was already waiting there in full force.

"Charge! Overwhelm them with sheer numbers!" the commander of the Burk fleet shouted his order.

Immediately, the entire fleet surged toward the Protoss carrier fleet.

"Based on current intelligence and some inference, of the fifty thousand Burk ships facing our fleet, twenty thousand are mercenary vessels belonging to over fifty high-level mercenary groups. Another twenty thousand are newly formed Burk fleets, filled with many raw recruits. Only the remaining ten thousand constitute the main fleet, primarily composed of veterans. However, their combat effectiveness has decreased significantly due to the reassignment of many personnel to establish the new fleets," reported a Dark Templar leader responsible for intelligence via a psychic link to Gaberh.

"In other words, they are largely a rabble," Gaberh stated confidently, facing an enemy ten times his size. After observing the deployment of the fifty thousand ships for a moment, he reported to Cass, "Speaker, I have absolute confidence in winning this battle."

"That is expected," Cass replied. "The command of the fleet is yours; I will be right back."

The influence of a Level Four entity on the battlefield was terrifyingly potent, capable of deciding the outcome of the engagement.