Several days later, the Starship arrived at the Rohl 2 star system.
This place was not called by that name, of course, but Ou Zhanpeng had named it himself for ease of distinction.
But what did it matter? It was more intuitive than naming it with letters and numbers.
According to prior safety protocols, the Starship did not fly directly to the Rohl 2 star system but appeared in a barren star system near the target. Here, it rendezvoused with the starships of the three prehistoric civilizations, and then they flew to the target as a group.
Although humanity had never allied with the Glorious Empire, they had long ago reached an agreement: to advance and retreat together when facing other civilizations!
There was no other way; humanity was an inconspicuous little civilization. Even if the four generations of civilizations united, they were still a small force confined to a corner.
They could not compare not only with the Rohls but even with the Rohls' vassal civilizations.
Reality was that cruel.
Shortly after, the human delegation arrived at the periphery of the Rohl 2 star system.
In the center of the Starship's bridge, a panoramic projection of the star system immediately appeared. The third planet was highly developed. Although there were no orbital rings or anything similar, there were as many flying vehicles around the planet as there were cows in a herd.
Large numbers of flying vehicles were also present around other planets. Even though the environment was extremely harsh, it could not stop the Rohls.
What surprised Ou Zhanpeng and the others even more was that they saw Rohl ships deep within the gas giant, appearing and disappearing amidst the lightning-filled clouds.
That was a gas giant no smaller than Jupiter, with gravity, magnetism, and pressure far beyond imagination.
"What are they doing?" Ling Xiao couldn't help but ask.
"Mining, probably," Ou Zhanpeng guessed casually. "Perhaps salvaging metallic hydrogen."
"Why not sightseeing?" Xu Qing asked.
"That's possible too," Ou Zhanpeng agreed without any firm stance.
Ling Xiao immediately felt a longing: "I want to go and see too."
"When there's an opportunity," Ou Zhanpeng said.
The group chatted amongst themselves, commenting on the Rohl star system, thoroughly enjoying themselves.
However, the four warships could only remain on the outskirts of the star system and could not go any further.
It had to be said that the Rohls were indeed the masters of the Black Horn people. The entire space of the Rohl 2 star system was sealed off. External warships could only appear on the outskirts of the star system and could not penetrate deep into it.
The Rohls also did not allow external ships to enter the star system, even though all invited civilizations were guests.
Perhaps because of the considerable distance, humanity was one of the earliest civilizations to arrive. In the following days, various spacecraft from different civilizations kept arriving, and these unfamiliar civilizations became topics of conversation for everyone.
Roughly counting, there were over thirty civilizations invited!
Considering that the straight-line distance between the solar system and the Rohl 2 star system was only a little over six hundred light-years, it could be seen that there were far more interstellar civilizations in the universe than imagined.
This was still for civilizations that had already developed interstellar travel capabilities. Civilizations that were not advanced enough, received invitations but could not reach the destination in time, or even those that did not have interstellar travel capabilities at all were not included.
Adding them all up, over a hundred civilizations would be a conservative estimate!
Ou Zhanpeng couldn't help but sigh, the universe was truly prosperous!
In his previous imagination, there would be a civilization every few hundred or thousand light-years, which was already an overestimation. Who knew that the real Milky Way would be like this?
It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that warships were everywhere, and civilizations were as common as dogs.
Regardless, the civilizations summoned by the Rohls mostly arrived before the deadline, and the conference commenced as scheduled.
The Rohls were much more practical than expected. As soon as the deadline arrived, they immediately announced that the meeting was officially convened.
If it were just that, it would be fine. But the Rohls even provided simultaneous translation for all participating civilizations.
Not a universal language, but a direct translation between the Rohl language and the languages of various civilizations. This greatly surprised Ou Zhanpeng.
When did the Rohls master human languages?
Had the solar system been under Rohl surveillance all along?
It was truly chilling to think about!
As the meeting officially began, the Rohls wasted no time. The first item on the agenda was to introduce the origin of the Star Beasts.
According to the Rohls, Star Beasts first appeared in a star field four thousand light-years away. An exploration team from a certain civilization discovered primitive Star Beasts near a neutron star and brought them back to the laboratory for a series of in-depth studies.
If it were just that, it would be fine. However, that civilization went to the extent of wildly modifying the Star Beasts, giving them the ability to traverse interstellar space. Later, the Star Beasts accidentally went out of control, first destroying the planet where the laboratory was located, and then gradually expanding outwards, slowly forming a scale, and finally evolving into an uncontrollable interstellar disaster.
The Rohls' introduction was very general, omitting the most crucial details, leaving everyone confused.
Ling Xiao was the first to raise a question: "Neutron star? Can there be planets near a neutron star?"
The supernova explosion that could form a neutron star would definitely not be small. Even if there were habitable planets originally, they would have long since been swallowed by the expanding star during the red giant phase, and the remaining planets would have been pushed away by the immense energy during the supernova explosion.
In short, even if there were planets near a neutron star, they could never have a habitable environment.
Xu Qing thought for a moment and said, "Could it be a binary star system?"
"Impossible!" Ling Xiao shook his head vigorously. "Can a binary star system avoid a supernova explosion? Besides, gamma-ray bursts last for months. How many living beings would have died?"
"Could it be that the Rohl's information is problematic?"
"Do the Rohls have any reason to deceive us with false information?"
At this point, everyone was confused. Recalling carefully, the Rohls' story was full of flaws and could not be logically self-consistent.
Ou Zhanpeng suddenly said, "Is there a possibility that the planet where the Star Beasts were bred was a rogue planet? This is the most reasonable possibility I can think of."
"If the planet originally had a very advanced civilization that protected the planet during the supernova explosion, could that also be possible?"
Ou Zhanpeng nodded: "That's also a line of thought!"
Xu Qing was not to be outdone: "What if it was a planet with a lot of water, and the supernova explosion couldn't completely evaporate the oceans?"
"It's not impossible," Ou Zhanpeng continued to nod, but immediately added, "Let's stop researching these useless things and continue listening."
Regardless of how the Star Beasts appeared, they had occupied a vast expanse of star systems. How to deal with the Star Beasts was the priority. Dwelling on the reason for their appearance was meaningless.
After explaining the origin of the Star Beasts, the Rohls also gave a general introduction to their distribution.
Simply put, these things scurried around randomly, going wherever they pleased.
The earliest location of the Star Beasts was in the direction of the galactic core of the Orion Arm, about 1,000 light-years from the near end of the spiral arm.
The near end referred to the end of the spiral arm closer to the galactic core.
Currently, the entire near end of the spiral arm up to the middle of the spiral arm, half of the spiral arm had fallen under the control of the Star Beasts.
To put it more plainly, about a quarter of the Orion Arm.
The Rohls were also unclear about how long it took the Star Beasts to achieve this, but it was certainly not a short period.
Ou Zhanpeng's mood soured completely. Although the Orion Arm was just a small and inconspicuous spiral arm of the Milky Way, its length was over ten thousand light-years.
The Star Beasts currently occupied a vast star system with a length of nearly five thousand light-years and a width of over one thousand light-years.
Ou Zhanpeng recalled the slow speed of the Star Beasts and felt a surge of fear.
Good heavens, that must have taken at least tens of thousands of years! Even a hundred to two hundred thousand years, or even longer, would not be strange.
So, what was the total number of Star Beasts?
If the Star Beasts crossed the near end of the Orion Arm and continued to spread to other spiral arms, what would their total number be?
Just thinking about it was despair-inducing!
What was that civilization thinking, to create such unscientific creatures as Star Beasts?
Also, in the span of over a hundred thousand years, had no interstellar civilization discovered the threat of Star Beasts to the entire universe? Had they been unable to devise effective methods to deal with them?
That was impossible, right?
And why did the Star Beasts only occupy half of the spiral arm? Could it be that the other half had something strange about it?
As expected, after explaining the territory of the Star Beasts, the Rohls began to talk about the various civilizations that had been fighting the Star Beasts with all their might over the years.
Among them, three most important civilizations jointly established a defense line spanning thousands of light-years, effectively curbing the expansion of the Star Beasts.
However, these three major civilizations were located on the outer side of the spiral arm, so this defense line effectively cut off the first half of the spiral arm.
As for the New Bay starfield, it was unfortunate. The strength of the three major civilizations was also limited, and they would naturally prioritize protecting the star systems where their own civilizations were located, so they could not pay attention to other directions.
Therefore, in recent years, the outer end of the spiral arm had been the primary direction of expansion for the Star Beasts.
The Rohls had contacted Star Beasts long ago and conducted extensive research on them, but they had never found effective means to combat them, only watching them continuously approach until today.
After listening, Ou Zhanpeng fell into deep thought.
Several crucial issues were revealed in this statement. First, the Rohls had contacted Star Beasts long ago.
Ou Zhanpeng didn't find anything wrong with this. Since the Rohls were the most powerful civilization in this star region, it was not strange for them to contact Star Beasts earlier than other civilizations.
However, the Rohls had not established an interstellar defense line. This was a bit problematic. Was it that they didn't want to, or that they were unable to?
Speaking of which, the defense line established by the three major civilizations protected half of the spiral arm, which could be seen how powerful those three civilizations were.
Therefore, the Rohls were far inferior to the three major civilizations in terms of technology, courage, and decision-making.
Furthermore, the Rohls should have contacted the three major civilizations. Were they planning to establish a new defense line in the same way as the three major civilizations, completely blocking the expansion route of the Star Beasts?
It wasn't that Ou Zhanpeng looked down on the Rohls; he had a feeling that the Rohls simply lacked the capability!
However, he also felt extreme curiosity. Since the Rohls had summoned so many civilizations, they must have some way to stop the Star Beasts.
It couldn't be that the Rohls intended to abandon their own planets, grab some resources, and flee to the outer end of the spiral arm, or even to other spiral arms, could they?
After all, the width of the inter-arm space was only 6,000 light-years. As long as they brought enough supplies, traversing the spiral arm was not a dream.
Of course, it was only theoretically simple; in practice, it was not that easy.
Taking the current Flame-class warships of humanity as an example, with one resupply, the maximum flight distance was only two hundred light-years, and the combat radius was less than one hundred light-years.
The three prehistoric civilizations were similar.
Wormholes were not omnipotent. Each activation consumed a large amount of energy, and one could not go wherever they pleased.
The Starship was in a slightly better situation. Ou Zhanpeng had tried it before; the farthest voyage exceeded one thousand light-years, but one thousand light-years was also the limit for the Starship. It needed to be resupplied to continue sailing.
When navigating within a spiral arm, there was a star every three to five light-years, so resupply was not very difficult; it just took some time.
However, leaving the spiral arm was not so simple. Finding a place to stop between spiral arms was extremely difficult.
It was not impossible that some advanced alien civilizations had the ability to fly 6,000 light-years in one go, but since the Starship could only fly 1,000 light-years, the possibility of other civilizations crossing 6,000 light-years in one go was very low.
At this point, the Rohls finally got to the main topic. In essence, they intended to contact the three major civilizations, provide sufficient resources, and ask the three major civilizations to help establish a defense line capable of resisting the Star Beasts.
Ou Zhanpeng was very disappointed. He had thought the Rohls had some extraordinary means, but they were just asking for outside help?
Moreover, establishing such a defense line would require a considerable amount of resources. Even if the Rohls contributed the lion's share, other civilizations would bear a significant burden.
The Rohls also admitted that the defense line could not be established in a day or two; it might take several hundred years to show initial results. But for the survival of all civilizations, were several hundred years or the expenditure of large amounts of resources not worth it?
The participating civilizations were all lost in thought.
To ensure the survival of their own civilizations, such a sacrifice was indeed within an acceptable range. However, thinking that their entire civilization would have to obey the Rohls' orders for the next few hundred years, any civilization with a bit of ambition would surely be displeased.
Good heavens, weren't the Rohls trying to unify the entire star region by taking this opportunity?
Who could guarantee that the Rohls would use all their resources on the defense line? Who could guarantee that the Rohls would not take this opportunity to collect resources they needed? It was even uncertain whether the three major civilizations were willing to help the Rohls build the defense line.
At this time, Ou Zhanpeng received communications from several prehistoric civilizations to discuss humanity's overall stance.
No one wanted to be ruled by the Rohls, but the Rohls were more powerful than expected, and a direct refusal might bring unnecessary trouble.
Ou Zhanpeng felt that the time was right and proposed the idea of using stars to resist Star Beasts to the three prehistoric civilizations.
This plan would also consume a large amount of resources, but compared to the Rohls' plan, the consumption was much less.
However, the three major civilizations lacked the technology for this. In the end, the four parties joined forces and submitted this plan to the Rohls.
Upon receiving the plan, the Rohls were a little stunned. These humans were truly ambitious. Their technological level was not high, but their imagination was indeed considerable.
The Rohls also lacked the technology for this, but they found the plan very creative and immediately decided to conduct corresponding experiments.
If it could achieve the effects described in the plan, it would not be about resisting the expansion of Star Beasts, but about the possibility of completely eliminating them!