Warhammer begins in 2026

With the battle here temporarily over, Huang Feng arranged for Dorn and Perturabo to be in charge of the fulcrum defenses across the entire galaxy, and had the Fourth Legion specifically oversee the infrastructure construction. The expeditionary fleet was finally able to take a breather and slowly cruise forward.

The flagship tea room was quiet and peaceful, a rare moment of tranquility. Huang Feng and Su Jinyu sat facing each other, playing chess. Neither of them was in a hurry, their moves steady and deliberate.

Su Jinyu was aloof and silent during the game of chess, making each move decisively and efficiently. Huang Feng casually placed his piece, seemingly relaxed, yet his eyes still held a calm and composed air of complete control.

Just as the two were playing chess, a commander of the Imperial Guards strode in, his attitude respectful, and immediately reported the latest reconnaissance findings.

"Sir, deep space scanning has detected an anomaly! There's a very strange and peculiar region of space at the edge of the star field. Space is severely distorted, time flows erratically, and all instruments are malfunctioning. There's no subspace contamination or alien fluctuations; it looks like an area left over from the golden age of human technology."

Huang Feng paused for a moment as he placed his piece, then immediately understood what was going on and raised his hand to let him continue.

She immediately sent a small team in to scout ahead. The team went in and circled around, and soon returned safely, but everyone's expressions were extremely strange.

"My lord, the people inside are all pure-blooded humans, there are no monsters or mutations. But this area is locked down by an ancient time weapon, and time inside and outside is completely unequal. Tens of thousands of years have passed in the outside world, experiencing a long dark night, and civilization almost perished and restarted, but the people inside feel that only a hundred years have passed."

Huang Feng instantly understood.

This is a time-weapon war zone left over from the great war between humanity and the Iron Man during the Golden Age. Back then, when humanity and the Iron Man AI were locked in a fierce battle, they developed a super weapon specifically designed to manipulate time, disrupting the enemy's computational timeline. After the war ended, the weapon wasn't shut down; it directly locked down time across the entire star system, incidentally trapping an entire human council outpost.

The stronghold was inhabited by the powerful families and high-ranking officials of the old council. While the outside world underwent tremendous changes over the past millennia, they lived a resentful hundred years, still holding onto power in the stronghold generation after generation, their minds completely stuck in the Golden Age, still believing themselves to be the rightful rulers of the galaxy.

Huang Feng feared that a rash attack would cause spacetime to collapse and destroy the precious ancient technology, so he was pondering a safe exploration plan.

After listening to all the reports, Su Jinyu, who was playing chess nearby, had a hint of curiosity in her eyes and took the initiative to speak.

"This time distortion zone is very special, and it's also a war zone left over from the Golden Age. I'll personally lead a team to take a look. There's no need for a large-scale operation; an elite fleet will suffice. I'll stabilize the spacetime force field and thoroughly investigate its details."

Knowing that Su Jinyu was composed and ruthless, Huang Feng nodded in agreement, tacitly approving her actions.

Su Jinyu immediately accepted the order and led the team directly into this strange time distortion zone.

Once inside, everyone was greatly disappointed.

I had assumed this would be a top-tier war zone from the Golden Age, brimming with advanced technology and deadly weapons, but all I saw was junk. Various time-manipulation turrets, time-space interference devices, and weapons designed to counter Iron Man were all rusted, completely unusable, and utterly unusable.

To put it bluntly, the problem lies with the time weapon itself. Years of disrupted time acceleration, rewind, and lag have worn down the structure and core of all the equipment, rendering it completely unusable and beyond repair.

However, it wasn't a complete loss. Deep within the base lay a vast collection of STC templates from the golden age, with a wide variety and extremely high value.

Unfortunately, these templates are also locked by time turbulence, and the data keeps going back and becoming disordered. They can't be parsed or generated, so they're completely unusable.

After figuring out the whole situation, Huang Feng personally entered the scene and used the power of the Black Stone Origin and the Black Eagle Banner to suppress the chaotic spacetime.

The dual supreme order forces suppressed all the chaotic fluctuations, anchoring the spacetime coordinates bit by bit, and forcefully stabilizing this chaotic flow of time.

Before long, time in the entire area stabilized completely, the internal and external flow rates became uniform, and there were no more chaotic spacetime distortions.

Once things stabilized, they should have obediently handed over and submitted, relinquishing STC technology. Instead, the council family leaders in the stronghold all became incredibly arrogant.

They've been trapped here for a hundred years, living a comfortable and peaceful life, long since out of touch with the outside world, their minds completely stagnant. They have no idea about the long dark night, the destruction of civilization, or the restart of the Great Expedition; they're still living in the old dream of the Golden Age.

In their eyes, they were the legitimate human nobility, hereditary rulers of this star field, holding supreme status. Huang Feng's expeditionary fleet, on the other hand, was seen by them as a ragtag rebel force, a low-level rabble, emerging from a remote star field.

This group had a very clever plan in mind: first suppress this foreign fleet, then find an opportunity to take control of the ships, use their forces to leave this spacetime region, return to the core of the galaxy, and continue to be the supreme rulers.

To put it bluntly, it's about being overly arrogant and unable to see reality.

At this moment, all the family's high-ranking members in the hall were harboring incredibly greedy schemes.

In their eyes, they were the legitimate ruling aristocracy of the Golden Age, born to control human territory and wield the reins of civilization. This stronghold was merely their safety net; they desired much more.

For a century, trapped in the cage of time, they had grown accustomed to a life of absolute power and dominance, and everyone had become extremely arrogant due to the influence of power. They simply did not believe that human civilization outside had changed; in their ingrained understanding, the Golden Age would forever be at its peak, and the Parliament would forever be supreme.

In their eyes, the expeditionary fleet led by Su Jinyu was nothing more than a group of lucky, scattered mountain soldiers and separatist rebels. Without official recognition from a legitimate parliament or authorization from ancient laws, their legitimacy was completely illegitimate.

Everyone was determined to not only drive Su Jinyu's fleet out of the stronghold, but also to take the opportunity to swallow up this formidable fleet.

They reasoned that if they could control these foreign soldiers and use the fleet's power to break out of the spacetime distortion zone, they could return to the vast galaxy. Then, relying on their ancient noble status and the legitimacy of the council, they could easily gather the forces of humanity across the land and regain supreme power over the entire human civilization.

As for Su Jinyu and her group? In their eyes, they were nothing more than tools that could be used, recruited, and discarded at any time.

Even though their stronghold's weapons are now completely destroyed, they remain completely unfazed, blindly confident to the extreme. They believe they possess ancient knowledge and have sealed away STC technology, giving them a foundation far beyond what these lowly soldiers in this chaotic world can match. Given time, they are confident they can rebuild their military and reshape their fighting force at any time.

To put it bluntly, this group of people are living in their own dream of power. They are arrogant, ignorant, and greedy. From beginning to end, they are thinking about seizing power and taking the top spot. They never thought that they had already been completely abandoned by the times.