The dawn had given way to the morning light, which streamed through the ventilators, casting a partial glow across the room. The space remained still, as if it had lost its voice, while everyone listened intently to Hung's words.

"Let me bring everyone up to speed on our current situation," Hung said, his voice steady yet weighted with an unspoken urgency. He continued, his words weaving through the tension in the room like a blade carving through dense fog.

"Based on the data Centric and his Astro team retrieved from the South, the Primordial Beasts are gradually migrating toward us. Their numbers are fewer than a hundred, but their coordination is unsettling, almost unnatural. The probability of them possessing intelligence is no longer just speculation. We all witnessed firsthand how two of them alone turned the battlefield into a nightmare just days ago. Though we've fought individual Primordial Beasts before, never have we encountered a tide of them. This changes everything, making the battle ahead an overwhelming challenge."

The weight of his statement settled like an oppressive cloud over the room. Silence lingered, thick and suffocating, but Hung pressed on, his words unrelenting.

"What makes matters worse," he continued, his gaze scanning the assembled warriors, "is that we have no choice but to split our forces into two. Only half of us will be deployed to the South, drastically reducing our strength. Fighting these creatures in numbers this great while being divided… it's a risk that borders on recklessness."

Nyxander remained motionless, his mind dissecting each word, searching for reason amidst what sounded like a doomed strategy. His eyes narrowed slightly before he finally spoke, his voice edged with curiosity and skepticism.

"Why must we engage them at all?" His words, though calm, carried the weight of a challenge. "If retreat is an option, why not take it? Leaving this place behind ensures survival. There's no guarantee of victory against a horde of Primordial Beasts. Even in our last battle, when two Astro teams joined forces, we barely scraped by against just one. Shouldn't this be a battle we avoid rather than charge headfirst into?"

A pause. The air shifted, subtle, but enough to make Nyxander feel that his question had touched something hidden beneath the surface.

Centric's voice cut through the silence like the crack of a whip. "It seems Lumina didn't tell you. It seems she doesn't have the time..."

His right hand came to rest on the table, fingers drumming lightly against the surface, a rhythm that felt almost mocking. His eyes flickered between Lumina's cold, unreadable expression and Nyxander's piercing gaze. A smirk played on his lips, as though savoring the moment before revealing a bitter truth.

"Centric," Hung's voice held warning, his expression stern. "This is a serious matter. Don't twist it into something beyond what it should be."

Hung turned to Nyxander, leaning forward ever so slightly. "This is about the Primordial Children."

Nyxander's breath hitched. His eyes widened, not in fear, but in the quiet realization that a puzzle he hadn't even known he was solving had just begun to take shape. The missing pieces were falling into place. The connection he hadn't yet grasped now stood before him, waiting to be unraveled.

The reason behind the North Celestial Station had to split its forces into two groups stemmed from a dark and long-buried history, the stolen offspring of the Primordials. Seven centuries ago, in the celestial calendar before the Year of Riftless Reckoning, an uneasy truce was struck between the celestial gods and the demon monarchies, a fragile peace woven from mutual selfish interests. Among the many terms laid upon the negotiation table, one of the most sinister agreements was the silent abduction of the Primordial race's young, an unspoken crime both sides were complicit in, bound by their mutual greed.

For centuries, this treacherous arrangement remained undisturbed, both sides feasting on the spoils of their deception. But two months ago, the demons, whose greed knew no bounds, crumbled under their own insatiable hunger. Without warning or restraint, they shattered the agreement, hoarding every last stolen child for themselves.

The North Celestial Station had initially prepared for retaliation, planning to launch a full-scale assault against the North Dark Station, the demon stronghold. However, fate, ever the cruel orchestrator, placed them in an impossible bind. A beast tide, a relentless wave of monstrous creatures surging from the south, threatened closing their distance towards them, their people, and their very survival. To march against the demons would be to leave their rear exposed, vulnerable to an ambush. A single misstep could lead to ruin.

Thus, they had no choice but to divide their forces. One battalion turned toward the North Dark Station, standing as sentinels to keep the demons in check, while the other faced the storm of beasts, fighting tooth and claw to push back the tide. In the midst of this chaos, they also have to carved an escape path for the merchants and civilians, ensuring safe passage for those who wished to flee before the battle consumed everything.

And at the heart of these divided forces stood Hung and Hildred, the unyielding pillars of the Celestial North Station, bearing the weight of a fractured battlefield.

The room settled into an unsettling stillness, a silence laced with unspoken truths. Nyxander's gaze, sharp as a blade honed through battle, flickered between Hung and Hildred, reading the unsaid words in their expressions. "It seems there's still a great deal you're keeping from us," he said, his voice steady but edged with knowing.

Hung's and Hildred's eyes met for the briefest moment, a silent exchange, a wall built of secrets, before they returned their focus to Nyxander.

"What do you mean?" Lumina's voice sliced through the heavy air, laced with curiosity and restrained tension.

Nyxander smiled, but there was no warmth in it, only the chill of a man pulling at the frayed edges of a concealed truth. His eyes remained locked onto Hung and Hildred. "Nothing much," he said, though the weight behind his words suggested otherwise. "I just find it odd, The beast tide approached too neatly, as if it were orchestrated. And then there's the matter of the headquarters… I heard they've never allocated high-quality pills down here before, yet the last gathering was an exception. And on top of that, you two were uncharacteristically eager to set things in motion. All of these pieces form a pattern, one that points to something bigger happening behind the curtain."

A muscle twitched in Centric's jaw, his patience thinning like the final strands of a fraying rope. "If you already figured that much out, why waste time with unnecessary questions?" he snapped, irritation simmering in his tone.

Hung exchanged a glance with Hildred, who gave him a solemn nod. A sigh, heavy, resigned, escaped Hung's lips. "Hah… It seems nothing escapes your sight," he admitted.

A ripple of shock passed through the room, faces stiffening, thoughts unraveling. A realization settled over them like a slow-moving storm, had they been blind to the truth all along? Centric, who had spoken so brashly just moments ago, now felt the sting of his own ignorance sharper than any blade. His fingers curled slightly, a bead of sweat tracing a slow path down his cheek, his gaze dropping to the shadow pooling between his hands resting in his lap.

"We didn't bring this up before because we feared it would crush the morale of our Astro teams,and I hope you could keep it away from them." Hung finally revealed, his voice weighted with the burden of unspoken worries. "A war has already erupted in the South, and both sides' headquarters are now entangled in the conflict. The cause? Strikingly similar to what the Dark Station did to us."

Hildred nodded, his gaze shifting toward Centric with meaning. "That's why we need you all to set aside whatever grudges or differences you have and function as a team," he added, his tone edged with finality.

Centric's hands curled into tight fists, his knuckles white under the pressure. A bead of sweat traced a slow path down his cheek, vanishing into the shadows cast by the dim light above. His eyes fell to his lap, where the darkness between his fingers seemed to swallow the last remnants of his defiance.

"So that is that about the cause and the connection that brought up this war," Hung said, his voice steady, yet carrying the weight of a thousand unspoken burdens. "Let's move to the next agenda, which is the plan to tackle this stalemated war." His words, though measured, felt like the edge of a blade slicing through the tense air. Sweat, glistening like morning dew, traced a slow path down the side of his hair, betraying the composed mask he wore. It was a fleeting crack in his armor, a silent whisper of the gravity hidden beneath those deceptively simple words.

The room, once thick with tension, now carried a different weight, a realization pressing down on their shoulders. The war had already begun, and whether they were ready or not, they would soon be thrust into its raging depths.

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