Jamie turned toward the exploding planet’s direction and saw several fighter jets chasing a much larger ship, firing lasers across space without any concern for the nearby celestial bodies.
As the large fighter curved to avoid crashing into another planet, more smaller fighters appeared from behind the system’s host star, surrounding it and unleashing a storm of bullets to tear the ship apart.
Its shields buckled under the concentrated fire, and with almost no room to manoeuvre, it could barely fight back before it was destroyed.
|Wohoo!! Another pirate bastard down! We’re gonna be eating good soon, my boys!|
The booming voice of a deity rang out from one of the ships, followed imdiately by commands.
|Alpha Team, pack up the wreckage so we can cash in the bounties with the Guild! Beta Team, map out our next bounty. Let’s move before the Feds grab them all.|
Jamie frowned at what he heard. If he wasn’t overthinking it, this seed like a repeat of what had happened in the Kyonin Galaxy Cluster.
’What are the odds?’
Sothing about it felt off.
’Is there so kind of intergalactic pirate force strong enough to make rcenaries act together like this?’
Finding the answer was simple for him. With a single thought, he froze space, stopping everything in the region, from the ships to the beings inside them.
He teleported onto the vessel that carried the deity who had given the orders, appearing before the man seated at the bridge’s command post. His eyes moved briefly to the frozen workers, their expressions locked in fear at their sudden immobilisation, before settling on the presud captain.
"You. Explain the pirate situation in this galaxy to . Why are you rcenaries suddenly taking mass action against them now?"
His question ca from the assumption that they were indeed taking mass action, and when he released the hold on the man’s ability to speak, the first words out of his mouth weren’t the ones Jamie wanted to hear.
"W-who are y—"
"Wrong answer," Jamie cut in, snapping his thumb and middle fingers together.
The man’s eyes instantly glazed over, his expression falling blank as the light of awareness faded from them.
"Now, answer my question."
Jamie had given him the chance to speak with free will, and since he hadn’t taken it, Jamie resorted to the other thod—one that left no room for resistance.
The man began speaking, his tone flat but his explanation detailed, recounting everything he knew without hesitation.
"I’m not a rcenary, and I’m not even from this galaxy, I’m just a Bounty Hunter moving where the money is, going from system to system and taking whatever’s been posted, that’s all I do," the man said, his voice flat and calm as he spoke under the hypnosis.
"Bounty hunting’s blown up across the intergalactic stage, it’s the new big thing, people treat it like a career and a spectacle, and every week you see new hunters popping up with bolder gear and bolder claims.
"Because of that, the number of easy bounties has been shrinking while pay-outs get crazier, so rcenary groups that used to live off the leftovers have had to band together and move on to larger targets. So people and organisations started posting massive sums on not only pirates but major players, high-profile criminals, and even rivals in power who they want removed without having to fight open wars. Those big bounties turned the whole thing into a hunt on a scale nobody expected, so hunters and rcs started acting en masse to take down the lucrative targets before soone else did.
"It’s gotten worse than simple piracy catching; entire empires have entered into conflict because bounties went up on mbers of leadership and ambitious crews took the work, sotis succeeding and sotis touching off full-blown reprisals. A lot of innocents get caught in the crossfire when a high-value target hides in a populated region, and so systems have been destabilised because people treat bounty placent like a political nudge or an assassination by proxy.
"So now you’ve got freelance hunters, coalitions of rcenaries, shadow guilds, and corporate or state-backed teams all moving across galaxies looking for claims, and the ones who used to make a living off random pirates are being squeezed out because the Federation and other powers are stepping in to clear big targets themselves, either to keep control of pay-outs or to avoid political fallout. That’s the situation out here, sir, and that’s why you’re seeing so many groups suddenly active in this galaxy."
"..."
Jamie stayed silent for a while after hearing the man’s explanation, trying to process how such a situation had co to be in the ti he’d been gone.
Anyone could see the kind of instability that would spread across the intergalactic stage because of it, and the man’s words had already ntioned several of those consequences.
Political fallout would be the bare minimum, and soon enough, a string of intergalactic wars could erupt, dragging the entire Zanerth Universe into civil war as major powers began taking sides and gathering under shared banners.
Such a thing happening now, right when he intended to raise the banner of war against the Neo-Extinction Legion?
’It’s fishy. Incredibly fishy.’
"When did all this nonsense start?"
"About six months ago," the man replied without hesitation.
’If what this man said is true, and this so-called Bounty Hunting Era has spread to the scale he described, not just limited to this region or corner of the universe, then the matte—huh?’
Jamie’s thoughts stopped midway as a sudden realisation dawned on him.
’Wasn’t it around six months ago that Richard said he was going to et up with John and Olivia...?’
He rembered clearly because Richard had ntioned finding the last place Angela had been before she disappeared.
In other words, for the past six months, none of the Hybrids had been active within Zanerth.
Jamie, Miranda, and Sarina were outside the universe, while Richard, John, and Olivia were in a sealed dinsion that was half-disconnected from the rest of the universe.
The thought made Jamie frown, and without a word, he turned and vanished, his departure automatically ending the immobilisation and hypnosis on the bounty hunters.
He warped to a distant region of space, entering another random galaxy to see what was happening there, and found the entire galaxy engulfed in war.
After conducting so quick investigations, he discovered that the war had begun in this galaxy following the assassination of its Galactic Ruler by bounty hunters.
Jamie imdiately abandoned his plan to head to Pinecone and started warping back toward the Vela Galaxy, moving straight for Estea.
He stopped in several galaxies along the way, finding similar circumstances everywhere, which confird what the hypnotised man had said about the Bounty Hunting Era spreading far and wide.
’Zanerth’s a friggin massive universe. There’s no way sothing like this could’ve spread so far and so fast on its own. Soone’s pulling the strings behind it.’
Probably not just one person, but a group. No single person’s influence could shake the entire universe like this, since other beings of similar standing from different races and factions would likely join forces to stop them.
The ones who held that kind of influence within Zanerth were naturally the Supre Realm Existences, many of whom were currently present within it, either in person or through their clones.
They were the true powers within Zanerth, and even the selection of the Universe’s Main Entities could be affected by their influence, as seen when a Dragon Supre had been the one to push for Heilong’s appointnt as the ’Keeper of Death’.
The question now was what their goal was in creating such chaos. Miranda had definitely inford them about the very real threat of the Neo-Extinction Legion, so why create such disorder at this point in ti?
’Is it the traitors? Could they be leading the others without them realising they’re indirectly helping the Neo-Extinction Legion?
Mira said there’s a gag order on matters involving those pseudo-nonexistence wielders, so in that case, there are likely many who don’t realise the threat level has increased from what she originally told them.’
Thoughts like these ran through Jamie’s mind as he passed through the folds of space, entering the Vela Galaxy and heading straight for the Aeternum Star System.
As soon as he arrived, he sensed two familiar presences on Estea’s Main Moon, where the Race Sanctums were located, so he changed his course from the Cassarean Region of the Werewolf Continent to the moon instead.
The mont his foot touched the moon’s surface, a ’woman’ appeared before him with a ’poof’.
[Westley, where the hell have you been all this ti!?]
The voice of ’Estea’, the incarnation of his ho world’s consciousness, was filled with agitation, a stark contrast to ’her’ usual calmness and a sure sign that sothing was terribly wrong.
"I’ve been busy. What’s going on?"
Jamie replied while walking toward the Sanctum, but before ’Estea’ could respond, the grand doors of the Sanctum burst open, revealing the two familiar faces he had sensed earlier.
Rowena, the Elder Vampire disciple he had instructed to assist Miranda before leaving, and Caera, his Archdevil disciple, who possessed one of the finest scout-type abilities in the universe.
Seeing them, ’Estea’ turned her starry eyes toward the two and spoke.
[Have them explain it to you. Things are in a much bigger ss than you’d ever expect.]
After those ominous words that made Jamie frown, ’Estea’ vanished, leaving him alone with his two disciples.
"What’s the situation? And I already know about the whole Bounty Hunting nonsense, so skip that."
Rowena was briefly surprised by his words but quickly regained her composure before responding.
"Then, are you aware of how it all started? The Intergalactic Criminals who broke out?"
"What?"
Seeing his reaction, Rowena realised he wasn’t aware of that much, and as they entered the sanctum, she began to explain.
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