For all their brashness of stepping into the territory of the Lower Realms Alliance, the Holy Stars didn't seem to take much interest in securing things beyond their own borders. Just in case, though, the relay station had been set up several systems out. It would take a bit longer to send and receive messages, but it should be harder to find.

Xaliima was glad to have it, because that meant she and her crew would be able to provide more reliable updates. Transmitting to the instant relay would still be risky, but she was confident in her ability to hide anything as long as they weren't deep in an enemy system. Ever since her advancement, she had felt confident of that. Her crew were growing rapidly to catch up with her, though obviously they weren't going to turn into several dozen Enrichment cultivators anytime soon. Though if they did, they might be the strongest crew the Lower Realms had. Unless one counted Magnitude V battleships and stuff. But even the combined power of millions might be insufficient, with how much space they took up.

Then again, Xaliima wasn't that good at fighting. She was the leader of a scout ship. Even if they were all Enrichment, they'd have to take that into consideration. Doing what they were good at was the only place where they'd live up to that potential.

That was why they weren't home defending territory. They were in the Holy Stars, hunting down divinities. Not to fight. Absolutely not. Just to report on their locations. If they figured out how many there were, and how many were present, they could fairly safely help the rest of the Alliance balance their responses. If they couldn't even find Daria… it would be safe to assume they were all on an offensive route and would be trouble for the Alliance in the near future.

Their task wasn't to infiltrate specific planets. There would be some void ants they carried along as well as others that would do that, but they just needed to get a broad overview. And a quick one. It seemed to be the case that the strongest cultivators wouldn't hide themselves within their own territory, but that could have been a misreading. Daria didn't do so, but she had just returned. Perhaps normally they were more subtle.

Xaliima had already made an initial assessment during their first trip, but they had been far from surveying every system in the Holy Stars. Just a small number on the border to get a good picture of the territory they controlled and how they functioned.

The plan was to seek out the nexus of each major sect. Whichever ones were most likely to have a divinity among them. That included the Purified Wardens- assuming they had only Daria might be too much. Optimally, the crew would find some way to prove they didn't actually have any others- though that seemed unlikely. Unless they had sewn very convincing lines among their own people. One informant from the Burning Hearts swore they had one, so that would be one of the first stops.

Just passing the systems near the edge was good enough. It was a shame they wouldn't get to take in many of the unique features of the systems, except what could be seen from a distance. Some odd energy readings from planets, though whether those were natural or due to the influence of sects was a bit difficult to determine. A variety of stars, of course, and some had special properties. One had particularly fast rotation of celestial bodies around it.

Xaliima would have preferred to look into that stuff more, but they moved on. No divinities so far. She almost hoped to never find any proof of more than one, but she did.

The Burning Hearts did have one. That seemed to be the limit after checking the dozen largest systems they controlled, and Xaliima was pretty sure the ship would have actually picked them out from a system out at least. That had been true for both so far.

She sent an update, though it wasn't urgent. One more confirmed divinity- their quality and quantity of power were vastly different from anything else. The ship had approached close enough to confirm the source was a person and not some sort of strange phenomenon, but there really hadn't been much doubt.

Confirming others would be important. Hopefully they didn't have too many. The Lower Realms Alliance only had three Unity cultivators after all. Plus a couple methods to take down people at that level of power at varying levels of reliability.

-----

Velvet was assigned to the western conflict for various reasons. Obviously she was most comfortable working out of the Little Alliance, but if she was spending most of her time in enemy territory that wasn't important. The targets were also easier to pick out, with known conspirators that could actually be reached. The Hardened Crown Sect wasn't exactly an exciting target, but she would move out from there towards others responsible for putting together Project Apocalypse. Which might just be everyone who had begun to launch attacks against the Scarlet Alliance at the same time.

It didn't matter if it had become moot because of Everheart's much better virus. It was the principle of the thing. Plus, there was no way Velvet was going to try to take down Everheart without some sort of very well put together plan that involved far more than just her. So someone else would suffer the consequences of Everheart's actions, as usual.

There was a nagging thought in the back of Velvet's mind that she should have just killed every Augmentation cultivator that the great powers had. It was possible. At most if she had been detected she would have just run, and they wouldn't have been able to reliably pick her out.

Velvet didn't want to live that life, though. The constant death wouldn't be so bad as never being home. Besides, it would have fairly quickly provoked a mass attack that could easily have involved all of the Exalted Quadrant or Trigold Clusters or both- instead of just a handful of powerful sects banding together.

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The Scarlet Alliance had grown powerful, but not that powerful. They tried not to be arrogant, and thinking they could just wipe out most of their relevant enemies would have been true arrogance. She had only taken down a select few targets in ways that hinted at other possibilities, but over the course of hundreds or thousands of kills it would have been obvious sooner or later.

She might take on a Domination cultivator, with a plan. A simpler one than Everheart, but a plan was still necessary.

First, the Hardened Crown had to lose a few people for choosing to work with some people that were troublesome. For all that they were notoriously hard to kill, if they weren't fighting back Velvet found it rather simple. Everyone died more or less the same when their brain was destroyed, though stabbing through the spine was harder for the Hardened Crown. Fortunately, her blade was long enough to go up from beneath the jaw where she wouldn't encounter any pesky bones.

Another one fell, and then-

Ugh. Maybe Velvet had held back too much? This man wasn't dead. Even though his brains shouldn't have been intact. He was ineffectively swinging around some sort of cannon- not one that should have been handheld. Velvet easily avoided it, leaving the building as he began to bring down the walls. He had to die eventually, right? She was just going to let that sort itself out. His energy was active now anyway, even if it wasn't sanely controlled as far as she could tell.

Besides, leaving him would result in destruction that Velvet couldn't cause herself. They would likely lose a lot of people subduing him. And without a brain, he had to die. Velvet consoled herself with that, but she was annoyed at the man's resilience. It made her perfect getaway more of a crashing retreat. Early discovery meant she couldn't cause any more trouble in this system, and the next closest systems should be on alert. She'd have to pick something further.

-----

The Numerological Compact was pretty awful. Most of their systems had been absorbed into the new hiveminds. Or rather, pretty much all of them. Instead, some of their members had fled and begun to build up again among various different Exalted Quadrant sects. They were at least partly responsible for the virus, and some facilities had been traced down that hadn't been dealt with yet.

It had felt rather heartless when Velvet heard about it, but she also realized that there were limits to what void ants and small groups of agents could do. Even a single Domination cultivator like her had to consider the possibilities.

The Numerological Compact had given up on ships. Perhaps they had lost too many people that way, or the survivors had always been interested in other routes and simply went with their interests. Either way, they shared a clear core with the others.

That core was unfortunately powered by human suffering. The suffering might be secondary, but it was a very real part of their setups. Using humans as power plants was still a thing to some extent, but they had also been using them for something else. Velvet was infiltrating that facility now. She wasn't sure if she could take it down. If she simply freed everyone inside, that would just leave a million weak cultivators in hostile territory. But the information that others had been able to gather wasn't complete enough to get a solution.

Perhaps she'd kill someone important to make her job easier next time. She would if opportunities appeared.

Normally, doors were the bane of any stealthy cultivator's existence. That was true for Velvet to some extent, but with a certain level of power she simply made people on both sides believe nothing had happened. Local illusions were something of a specialty, and she could absolutely pierce through any sensing barriers. Snatching necessary keys or grabbing a whole person to open a door weren't too difficult either. Convincing someone they hadn't been dragged away from their job was a much more complex illusion, but she could sometimes lead them to open a door for her instead. It depended on how much speed and certainty she needed.

Every step of the way, Velvet was alert to make certain it wasn't a trap. She'd dealt with enough formations she should be able to detect that, and she was very careful to inspect inside the walls for anything untoward. Catarina had helped with her training efforts over time, and Everheart had done so unintentionally a few times in the past. In the upper realms, specifically. In the lower realms… his tombs did seem to intentionally train the people of Ceretos.

Eventually, Velvet arrived at the beginning of the rooms she was looking for. Humans were strapped into devices, piled atop each other as compact as they could get it. So normal Numerological Compact stuff. But unlike normal, they weren't being used as a power source.

At least not for only their upper energy. Instead, they were being used more like… computers. Or at least parts of a greater one. Yes, the facility appeared to be one of the potential origin points for Project Apocalypse. The fact that it had worked on Scarlet Alliance technology was already amazing, given how far behind the Exalted Quadrant had been.

It seemed they had managed to brute force some of the understanding somehow. It shouldn't have been possible, but that was the current theory. Most likely, there was a cultivator or cultivators with some level of insight that were boosted by the whole system. The technology itself just didn't seem sufficient.

Velvet could tear apart the facility now, but everyone would die. There was no way to get them out. Unless… she tore out a chunk of the planet.

It would be easier to destroy the whole thing. The planet, not just the facility. Velvet's abilities didn't lean towards wide area destruction, but a single planet was within the power of a Domination cultivator. Carrying things… varied from individual to individual. Most importantly, Velvet might not be able to drag a million or more people with her and stay unnoticed. She didn't want to be chased down by a dozen sects all on her own. That wouldn't save the people. Death would be better… but it was too early to make that choice for them. She could come up with something, somehow.

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