Chapter 3718

In the end, the three great empires made up their minds and announced their withdrawal. Just as they were preparing to pull out of the Mengyu star system in an orderly fashion, the energy monitoring stations they had deployed within the system suddenly emitted sharp, piercing wails.

"Warning! Warning! The rate of increase in cosmic energy levels is exceeding the projected standard by 28.3 times! Warning!"

"Quick! Go report to Your Majesty! The energy levels near Earth are rising rapidly; it is suspected that a mutant has made a move! Hurry!"

"Your Majesty the Queen! The Phoenix! It's the Phoenix!"

If the Phoenix had only revealed a fraction of its aura before, it had already scared the Shi'ar Empire out of its wits; this time, the Phoenix was truly erupting.

An invisible wave of energy rippled out from around Earth, turning the area into a sea of fire in almost an instant. There was nothing in the vacuum that could burn, yet the flames existed all the same, gradually devouring everything—matter, dark matter, space, time...

The supreme rulers of the three great empires no longer maintained their calm demeanor. The Skrull Emperor said in a panic, "Withdraw!! Withdraw quickly!! Get out of here fast!!!"

Even the Supreme Intelligence could not help but override the automated evacuation protocols, beginning to withdraw its forces with maximum efficiency.

Lilandra was even more frantic. The noble elders were already wailing, yet he still had to pretend to suppress his panic while continuously issuing evacuation orders: "Pull the capital, Mengyu, out first, then have the main warships withdraw in sequence. If the frigates can't get away, leave them; we can just resurrect them later!"

But how could things be so simple? The three great empires had deployed quite a few blockade devices here, and shutting them down took time. Even for the Kree Empire's devices, which had the highest efficiency, it took at least 2–3 seconds to load the deactivation sequence. The Phoenix's power only needed two seconds to destroy a star system.

The jump drives were unusable, and relying solely on engines to fly out meant navigating through gravity traps surrounding the system. Although they knew which paths led out, only two had been left open. With so many warships and planets, how could they evacuate so quickly?

At this moment, the downside of the Skrull Empire desperately reinforcing this sector became apparent. The temporary troop deployments were not part of the three empires' tactical coordination; those extra warships had no assigned parking zones and were all crammed into the original Skrull Empire sector, resulting in an excessively high density of ships. As luck would have it, that was one of the escape routes.

Now that the Phoenix was erupting, the Skrull Empire was certainly letting its own warships go first. But they had 70 billion troops stationed here, with millions of warships, devices, equipment, and temporary factories of all sizes combined. Even at the fastest possible evacuation speed, it would take at least a few minutes. This was already assuming a scenario where the Skrull Empire had undergone high-level mechanized modification, calculated the optimal evacuation plan via supercomputers, and could execute it decisively. If even the slightest mishap occurred, the time required would multiply.

However, since they had already blocked that path, the other two empires had no way to force their way through and could only take the other route. But as it happened, that other route required the Shi'ar Empire to withdraw its own capital and those important resource planets. These planets had no propulsion and had to be towed by warships; they couldn't move very fast, and their massive volume ended up blocking all the Kree Empire's warships.

Although this Phoenix eruption was much slower than the previous one, within less than 10 seconds, the Phoenix fire had already burned everything within a radius of about twenty astronomical units from Earth. Dozens of capital ships from the three empires had been incinerated.

"Well done, Jean, just take it slow like this. Try your best to control the Phoenix; don't let it burn too quickly, so you can create conflict and infighting among them."

"Don't worry." Jean Grey's voice was slightly breathless, as controlling the Phoenix was clearly not easy. She said, "After practicing in the Andromeda galaxy, I feel I'm becoming more and more adept at it."

The difficulty in controlling the Phoenix was not in how to make it destroy and annihilate, but in how to control the direction and speed of its destruction. It was similar to driving a runaway truck; the hard part wasn't how to accelerate, but how to control the deceleration and keep it from crashing into other things.

However, Jean Grey had been practicing in the Andromeda galaxy, which was different from Earth—it was particularly empty, allowing her to release the Phoenix's power appropriately. These things only get easier with practice.

Now, she was controlling the Phoenix fire, spreading it outward at a relatively slow speed. Wherever it passed, the three great empires were terrified. Whether it was a capital ship with shields up or an extremely massive gas giant, this thing was less like fire and more like a curse; once it touched something, it couldn't be extinguished, and it would instantly be reduced to ash, leaving no need for rescue.

The situation for the other two empires was better; after all, they were mostly robots, controlled by a central brain and lacking excessive fear. But the Shi'ar Empire was different; they were carbon-based organisms more similar to humans, and they possessed all the emotions humans had. Moreover, they were a fused nation with various different races, their hearts were not united, and they were particularly afraid of the Phoenix. Under this extreme pressure, many warship captains simply went insane.

They stopped caring about retreat orders or how friendly forces were maneuvering; they just didn't want to die. Whoever runs the slowest is in the front row!

Many Shi'ar Empire ships began to dash wildly through space, desperately trying to escape, diving into any gap they saw and hiding behind any planet they could find. The orderly evacuation of the other two empires was disrupted by them, and in the end, everyone was in a chaotic mess.

"Lilandra!!!" the Skrull Emperor roared in the communication channel, "Can you control your people!! They have completely disrupted our evacuation plan and even crashed into two of our ships!!!"

"I have no way to control them!" Lilandra was also screaming out of control, "They are afraid of the Phoenix, do you understand?! Those killed by the Phoenix cannot be resurrected!! They are afraid of death!!!"

"Calm down." The Supreme Intelligence was still trying to appease her, "At least get your people to stop; our warships can take responsibility for towing them out..."

"Impossible!" Lilandra said, "You robots don't understand at all; we are capable of fear. When people are afraid, they have no reason and can't hear a word anyone says. They have completely lost their minds now!"

"Then you must at least take some measures!!!"

"What measures can I take? I..."

"Oh no." The Supreme Intelligence's tone sank, "The Phoenix..."

His words came to an abrupt halt. Because in that very second, the Phoenix had fully erupted. In just a fraction of a second, the entire star system was leveled, and everything that hadn't been evacuated was turned into flying ash.

The entire star system fell into a deathly silence.

This was also the first time humanity had seen the Phoenix erupt at full power. Black Bolt couldn't help but say to Professor X, "Just how much does the Queen of the Shi'ar Empire love you to let you protect Jean Grey in the midst of such a tragedy?"

Professor X just smiled and didn't speak. Black Bolt looked at those bright, clear blue eyes and sighed, "Beauty is a blade that hangs over one's head."

"Sorry, I can only control it for this long at most." When Jean was carried back by Logan, she said with some frustration, "This power is too violent; it inevitably goes out of control whenever it's used, no exceptions."

But cheers erupted in the war room. Steve was the first to rush over and hug her, then said, "Do you know what you've done, Ms. Grey? If the intelligence from Jarvis is correct, you annihilated the Supreme Intelligence, one of the leaders of the three great empires!"

"What?!" Jean's eyes lit up instantly, "The Supreme Intelligence didn't get away?!"

"Yes, the Kree Empire withdrew the slowest, and the Supreme Intelligence was the furthest from the edge of the system. He was probably too busy coordinating troops and didn't notice your situation. The warship housing his main brain was destroyed directly by you!"

"But, he is an electronic lifeform; he should have backups, right?"

Jarvis nodded and said, "Of course, there are other main brains in the Kree Empire's capital, but as far as I know, main brains capable of accommodating his level of command are not easy to build. He has suffered a major blow this time."

"More importantly, the Kree Empire suffered the greatest losses this time, and they won't let it go." Nick Fury walked in and said, "They had absolutely nothing to do with this; they were purely here to provide support, and they played the biggest role in the war, yet they ended up being the side with the greatest losses. The Supreme Intelligence won't swallow this."

"Are we going to see them turn on each other?" Wanda raised an eyebrow and said.

"I suspect the three of them are probably already arguing to high heaven right now."

"Lilandra!!!" This time, the Skrull Emperor and the Supreme Intelligence roared together. Both of them were about to lose patience with this stupid woman.

"Why are you yelling at me!" Lilandra said, "You ran too slowly yourselves; what does that have to do with me? Do you want to pin your failures on my head?! You're dreaming!"

"If it weren't for you..." The Skrull Emperor had a belly full of words, but couldn't get a single one out. Facing Lilandra felt like a scholar meeting a soldier—there was no reasoning with her.

You try to reason with her, and she vents her emotions at you; you vent your emotions at her, and she turns around to lecture you on gains and losses. When the Skrull Emperor and the Supreme Intelligence spoke to her, it was like playing the lute to a cow.

"Forget it." The Skrull Emperor decided not to live as the person he hated, saying, "What do we do next? Are we still attacking the Nine Realms?"

"We must attack." The Supreme Intelligence said, "These damned humans have already started celebrating their victory. If we don't have a follow-up counterattack, how will the interstellar society view us?"

The combined population of the three great empires was indeed not small, totaling several hundred billion in all. But in reality, if you compare it to the situation on Earth, you can see that this isn't actually that many. A single Earth can hold 7 billion; 100 Earths would be 700 billion. The population of the three great empires was only the size of 100 Earths, which was already relatively small compared to the scope of their colonization.

The total interstellar population was much larger, conservatively estimated at tens of quadrillions. The combined population of advanced civilizations with interstellar colonization capabilities was far greater than that of the three great empires; it was just that each of them was smaller in scale, but there was no shortage of civilizations that were highly advanced, technologically powerful, and sufficiently ancient, which also gave the three great empires a headache.

Resources in the interstellar space are limited; if you have more, I have less. Many advanced civilizations are not pushovers, and they look for opportunities to bite a piece of meat off the three great empires. Therefore, the three great empires still have to care about their interstellar reputation.

"Then let's attack." The Skrull Empire Emperor said, "The three of us will temporarily cease fire and mobilize our armies to head toward the Nine Realms."