Chapter 2763: Main Objective

Just as Ye Liuyun was about to act, he suddenly thought that if the Foreign Tribe were wiped out completely, the Empire would probably concentrate its efforts on dealing with him.

So Ye Liuyun considered and altered his approach, setting the primary objective as destroying the Foreign Tribe's Altar and capturing alive the Eightfold Sovereign foreign strongman. As for the other Foreign Tribe members, he tried to leave them untouched, letting them keep resisting the Empire and tying down the Imperial army.

In this way, the Elder group led by Mo Ran could continue to gnaw away at the Empire's planetary territories in the Southern Region.

Therefore Ye Liuyun abruptly changed tactics, releasing only that Eightfold Sovereign foreign being to strike the Altar directly.

When it moved, the remaining Eightfold Sovereign foreign strongman could only intervene. This time a clone acted, borrowing the power of the Space World; with one palm it slammed the foreign being down, then planted a Slave Seal to capture it. The Altar was also blasted apart by them.

The other foreign strongmen were terrified, thinking they were about to be annihilated. But unexpectedly, after Ye Liuyun eliminated those two primary targets, he vanished and made no further move against them. He also did not tell Liu Haotian the news, letting the two forces continue to stalemate.

On the foreign side, they immediately selected a Sevenfold Sovereign foreign strongman and began funneling resources to it, urging it to ascend to the Eightfold Sovereign level as quickly as possible.

Ye Liuyun then left the Alien Battlefield, greeted Liu Haotian and said he was pulling his troops back. Now the Empire was no longer at a disadvantage, so he need not act again, lest the Empire trap him once more and completely wipe out his army.

In this battle he lost just over twenty thousand Wolf Hunting Legion soldiers and fewer than ten thousand Demon Race soldiers, a relatively small loss, yet he gained a huge amount of resources.

He collected all the foreign corpses and gave them to the Sealing Demon Tablet. Since the Magic Vine can still absorb other resources, but the Sealing Demon Tablet can now only absorb this, after feeding it millions of foreign bodies, Ye Liuyun estimated the Tablet's power should be comparable to the Magic Vine's.

The Magic Vine, in turn, agreed to grant it several planets as compensation, allowing it to expand its power in the Space World, so the Magic Vine consented.

For the other soldiers, he exchanged them for other resources they could use as rewards, never letting those soldiers die in vain. Moreover, he now had no shortage of resources and would not mistreat his own troops.

Tong Xin and Qiong Qi also began leading a group of artificers to forge a new type of warship, the Spirit Cat.

This Spirit Cat is a slightly larger warship, several times bigger than the original Hunting Falcon, but with enhanced propulsion and invisibility, and stronger firepower; each ship is crewed by sixteen pilots, split into two shifts for continuous combat.

Its defense is also stronger, able to withstand a full‑force strike from a Sevenfold Sovereign Martial Cultivator. Each attack now covers an area rather than a single target, allowing it to bombard a field of enemies, killing roughly seven or eight at least, and it can even slay a Sixfold Sovereign Martial Cultivator.

However, the number of these advanced warships won't be as many as the previous Hunting Falcons. The damaged Hunting Falcon ships this time were all completely scrapped and re‑refined into raw material for new ships. The Hunting Falcons that were only slightly damaged and still usable were gathered and sold, not wasting resources.

On his return this time, Ye Liuyun did not use the teleporting Black Tower, but slipped away with the Thief Cat all the way.

The two Eightfold Sovereign foreign strongmen also became Ye Liuyun's two top enforcers. When a strong opponent attacked them, Ye Liuyun had them don Invisibility Cloaks and strike, frightening the foes into not daring to pursue them.

When he came across a planet he disliked on the road, Ye Liuyun truly seized it for the Magic Vine into the Space World, showing no courtesy to the Star Disk Empire.

The Star Disk Empire also dispatched Martial Cultivator strongmen to investigate them, but those sent were captured by Ye Liuyun and handed to Ye Tiandao as troop sources.

Mo Ran at this time was expanding again and had been marked by the Star Disk Empire. When Ye Liuyun rushed back, he cleared the obstacles for him and captured the Imperial strongmen who were about to move against Mo Ran.

While Soul Searching these strongmen, Ye Liuyun discovered they all came from an Imperial Guard unit. These people carried out secret Imperial missions and engaged in unsavory dealings.

After learning about this Imperial Guard, Ye Liuyun struck several of its bases, helping Ye Tiandao capture over two hundred Martial Cultivator strongmen of Sixfold and Seventh Sovereign levels.

However, this time he suffered retaliation from the Imperial Guard, and they soon sent forces to wipe out the two Mercenary groups that Mo Ran had established.

As revenge, Ye Liuyun was ruthless, striking directly to steal the Primordial Power of those two planets, causing the planets to collapse outright.

Yet dealing with the Imperial Guard was not easy for Ye Liuyun. They operated from the shadows, appearing and disappearing like ghosts. Ye Liuyun couldn't simply Soul Search every strongman he saw, so locating the Guard was not a simple task.

But once he spotted the Guard's trail, those people had nowhere to run. Because the two Eightfold Sovereign foreigners in Ye Liuyun's possession were virtually invincible; in Martial Cultivator battles, no one could match them.

Later Ye Liuyun also found that the Mercenary groups' development was becoming increasingly difficult; the Empire sent many Imperial Guard members disguised as mercenaries to infiltrate them, and even several Elders had already been eliminated by the Guard. Some mercenary groups consequently disbanded, and their resources were lost.

So Ye Liuyun simply reclaimed those Elders, turned the act into an open raid, and directly seized the Primordial Power of more than ten planets, calming the situation for the time being.

The Star Disk Empire again found itself without a way to deal with him and lost its target; even the Imperial Guard could not locate him.

After a period of calm, Ye Liuyun acted again and was ambushed by the Imperial Guard, but their ambush failed, and instead several Martial Cultivators were taken down.

Liu Haotian at this time was also exchanging blows with the Foreign Tribe, with losses on both sides. Yet there was no commander like Ye Liuyun who could infiltrate the foreign stronghold for intel; otherwise, a full‑scale assault could have driven the Foreign Tribe away completely.

Meanwhile the Foreign Tribe accelerated training strongmen and dispatched many of them to infiltrate human settlements, raising a massive Corpse Demon Army to replenish their depleted troops.

On Liu Haotian's side, recruitment was also difficult; the Empire's appeal was waning, and some commanders were no longer wholeheartedly serving the Empire, looking out for their own futures.

Meng Wenxiang and Han Qiao, moreover, tried to preserve their strength, rarely joining battles voluntarily. Liu Haotian protected them so they wouldn't be trampled by the Empire again.

(End of Chapter)