Cataclysm: Undead Dragons and Zero Empire

The flames of rebellion spread rapidly across the outer star sectors, and Wilder 4 was one of the first planets to respond to the uprising.

When Governor Cyrus received the supreme order from Envoy Karen, delivered by Colin, the governor, who had spent his entire life on Planet Wilder IV, did not hesitate for a moment.

The towering flames above the nest city had burned through the perpetual yellow-green haze, illuminating the dim lower and bottom nests as bright as day.

Governor Cyrus officially and publicly announced that the Wilder system had broken away from the Board of Governors' jurisdiction, refused to pay any taxes, and complained that the planet's food was being sold at prices far below market value.

He consolidated the armed forces of the entire planet, including the gangs and the lower classes that were launching an attack on Midnest, and even the border fleet stationed on the outer edge of the star system, which had originally come to observe and suppress the lower-class rebellion, announced that they had joined the rebel camp under the leadership of their captain.

However, the rebellion in the Wilder system was merely a small ripple in a storm that swept across the entire outer sector.

Just as Karen had predicted, when the first flag of rebellion was raised, the marginal sectors that had been suppressed for countless years by the mountains of high taxes, trade monopolies, and racial oppression imposed by the Board of Governors instantly ignited into a raging inferno.

Initially, the Foundation's headquarters monitoring system only showed a few scattered alarm lights. The board of directors scoffed at this, thinking it was just another disturbance in the outer star sector, and casually ordered nearby fleets to suppress it without even holding a formal board meeting.

In their eyes, rebellions of this scale had occurred countless times throughout the Foundation's long history of rule, and each time the outcome was nothing more than a fleet's arrival and a thunderous suppression, resulting in a sharp decrease in population, and then the matter would be settled.

But this time was different. Things developed beyond their expectations. The scale of the rebellion expanded wildly at an unbelievable speed, catching the board of directors off guard.

One colony after another declared their independence from the Board of Governors, one sector after another raised the flag of rebellion, and one garrison after another turned against the Board of Governors.

The fleets sent to suppress the rebellion either defected upon arrival at the target star system and joined the rebel camp, or they were surrounded and annihilated by a rebel fleet that outnumbered them several times over on the way, and could only send out increasingly frequent distress signals.

"Absurd! Utterly absurd!"

At this point, the board of directors finally convened an emergency meeting, but they still refused to believe that the rebellion that swept across the entire edge sector was a spontaneous act by the lower classes and a culmination of accumulated contradictions.

They stubbornly believed that the rebellion must be backed by other dominant civilizations within the galaxy.

It must be those rivals who have always coveted the Foundation who are supporting the rebellion in these peripheral sectors, trying to shake the foundation of the Foundation's rule and seize its territory and resources while the Homborian Consortium is suffering heavy losses.

Suspicion grew wildly in the Golden Hall like weeds. They knew their old rivals' ways all too well, and this drastic measure was indeed in line with their usual style.

When they were besieging the Undead Dragon, the several overlords in the galaxy were still allies fighting side by side. However, when news came that the Humborian Covenant had been severely damaged, they no longer cared where the Undead Dragon that had caused such destruction had gone, and their status as allies instantly turned into that of rivals.

The struggle for supremacy across the entire galaxy is imminent. Even with the danger of the undead dragons returning for revenge, they all want to take a piece of the pie from the Boros Global Foundation.

This assessment was quickly agreed upon by the board of directors, since in their eyes, the peasants in those remote star systems simply did not have the ability to organize such a large-scale and organized rebellion.

Thus, with the approval of the rotating board of directors, the board issued the highest-level war order, commanding the Foundation to enter a state of full combat readiness, with all main fleets immediately assembling in the border star system to closely monitor the movements of other dominant civilizations in the galaxy and be ready to respond to a full-scale war at any time.

The entire war machine of the Boros Global Foundation roared into action, more than any rebellion in the outer sectors had ever prompted such a massive mobilization.

However, this war order completely plunged the Foundation into the trap set by Karen.

The fleets of several dominant civilizations began to move frequently in the border star systems, testing each other's bottom line. Trade routes were blocked, and colonies were occupied, instantly pushing the already tense relationship to below freezing.

The entire galaxy was filled with an oppressive atmosphere of impending storm, and the board's order for full-scale war preparedness only added fuel to the fire. Seeing the Foundation's main fleet gathering on a large scale at the border, other dominant civilizations also increased their troop deployments at the border, and the situation instantly became tense.

The pirate alliance, which had almost disappeared under the extermination of the undead dragons, also revived in the chaos. The pirate king gathered the remaining forces and took advantage of the fact that a large number of fleets in the galaxy were tied up at the border and the defense of the shipping lanes were weak. He plundered trade routes and attacked the poorly defended colonies.

Suddenly, war broke out throughout the entire river system, with conflicts coming one after another, and the already fragile peace was brought to the brink of collapse.

The border skirmishes quickly escalated from sporadic probing into large-scale armed conflict.

The Foundation's main fleet was almost entirely tied down in the border star system, confronting the fleets of other dominant civilizations, leaving the defenses of the core star system much weaker, which was exactly the opportunity Karen had been waiting for.

At this point, Karen had finished her mission to the Rost Crystal Federation and arrived at the border between the Foundation and its vassal civilizations.

Upon seeing the construction plan for the City of Ten Thousand Stars, the Speaker of the Rost Crystal Federation agreed almost without hesitation to join Karen's rebellion, offering to entrust Karen with a large amount of rare crystals and interstellar resources from the Federation's reserves.

It wasn't because they actually had any expectations about whether Karen's rebellion would succeed or not, but because they had also seen the astronomical observations of the destruction of the core galaxy of the Homborian Covenant, and clearly knew that the order of the entire galaxy group had collapsed and chaos was about to arrive.

All the vassal civilizations belonging to the Foundation lacked only a leader to raise their voices and an opportunity to overthrow the Foundation's old order, and Karen presented that opportunity to them.

Looking at the battle reports from the front lines about the main fleet's operations in the border regions, and seeing the raging rebellion in the peripheral star sectors, Karen believed that the time was ripe.

Karen, in her capacity as the chief diplomatic envoy of the Boros Global Foundation, issued a manifesto to the entire foundation, officially raising the banner of rebellion.

"There are family members within the board who are colluding with external enemies, betraying the foundation's core interests, leaking military secrets, and attempting to overthrow the foundation's rule, plunging our entire civilization into an abyss of no return!"

"By secret orders from the rotating director of the board, to purge the dissidents within the board and restore order."

In her manifesto, Karen vehemently revealed that several core families within the board of directors had secretly colluded with hostile dominant civilizations within the galaxy. The destruction of the City of a Thousand Stars was also due to these traitors leaking the defense plans, which allowed the pirate alliance's surprise attack to succeed and caused the Foundation unprecedented losses.

At the end of the manifesto, Karen declared her intention to save the Boros Universal Foundation from imminent collapse, calling on all planets and armies loyal to the Foundation to respond and join the fight against the rebels.

This manifesto, a mix of truth and falsehood, precisely struck at the deep-seated contradictions within the foundation that had accumulated over countless years, like throwing a red-hot meteorite into a pot of boiling oil.

Karen's identity was far too special. He was the grandson of the rotating board member of the Foundation and the Foundation's youngest and most prestigious diplomatic envoy. He was undoubtedly in the inner circle of the board of directors, and his announcement was far more impactful than the rebellion in the peripheral sector.

After all, throughout the foundation's long history, there have been far too many instances of families within the board of directors vying for power and profit. Karen's actions, which can be described as "purging the emperor's inner circle," have instantly given countless wavering forces a direction to take.

What was initially seen by the board as a "rebellion at the bottom" has escalated into a massive rebellion that has swept across the entire foundation.