Each cruiser we got had twenty fighters installed inside a special deck in them. That means we have now over two thousand fighters, but unfortunately we have no pilots to run them."

James' smile was even bigger than that of Rigo, as his grin was literally from ear to ear. "Don't worry about this now, these gains would only double or triple in the next few traps, and we could seek to make our own army later on," he said, declaring his inner thoughts and plans regarding the future.

James didn't know about the treasure trove in this area, as if he knew, he and Rigo wouldn't have such a conversation at all.

"So, we have won these fights so far," Islinda muttered when she heard the news. She didn't stop gathering up news after each mission ended, and the more she knew about this place, the more one thing seemed incomprehensible.

This place was literally a gold mine, whether its location, its amount of traffic, its trade specialty, all were rare and unique, but no power owned this place. that seemed weird!

As she was already deep into the mechanics of ruling a huge empire, she knew how important this place was, and she was more sure this place might actually belong to some kind of power, a power that wanted to be hidden.

And that was dangerous!

The more she investigated, the more clues she found about this hidden power. The ruling government of any planet was just made of a simple group of officials, who weren't able to run this place by themselves.

She even went ahead and asked to meet one of them to ask about opening another trade line here, the line of stolen food. She met the official responsible for this, and all he said was to wait for a few months before getting an answer.

That meeting made her realize something, whatever this power was, it wasn't so near from here. that was reassuring, to some extent, as it meant they would have a time of months before any interference.

But, she wasn't feeling good as long as she didn't find out what the true power behind this place was. Alex, on the side, was watching all of this, silently, without any saying. He wasn't even able to understand what she was doing, as he thought she was only having some fun.

Even when she requested and met that official, he thought she was trying to establish a trade, really establishing a trade!

She never bothered to explain anything to him, and he never asked her anything, wrongly understanding the reasons for her actions. She knew he was misunderstanding things, but she didn't correct him, never bothered to do that.

When the notice of the end of all the current attacks had come to her, she was about to move out, heading towards another planet, when she noticed some odd thing.

The official she met, who was supposed to be one of the main three officials on this planet, was running into some kind of normal building, with his guards waiting outside, not entering the place.

This was weird!

"Rigo, is there a droid here with a spying ability? Like listening to a talk inside a heavily guarded building?"

She sent this to Rigo, as he replied:

"All of the droids at your cruiser can do this, but why?" he asked back, as he felt something was off.

"Later," she didn't have time to waste, as she sent Alex immediately to fetch one of the droids. Alex chose one humanoid, and once arrived, Islinda didn't even say anything, as she grabbed him, pointed towards that building through the big glass of the commanding deck, as she said:

"Spy on this place, and transmit and record anything you might find."

Just as he was about to interrupt her, she added, "I spoke with your leader and Rigo, and they have no objection to that."

The humanoid didn't buy her words, as he sent for permission to Rigo, who complied. Rigo also ordered him to transmit all what he sees and records to him as well.

Rigo, with James, were feeling some awkwardness from Islinda's sudden request. So, when she asked for a droid, Rigo activated the spying function of his, so they could hear and see everything that the droid could see and hear.

Once reached to Islinda's place, and she took him, by force, to monitor that building, Rigo didn't have any objection for that. he then transmitted what this humanoid was seeing and hearing, to his leader.

The first few words Islinda said were strange, as she mumbled for a bit about how dangerous it was, and if the time was late or not. For them, what the droid saw was just a normal building, without any special marks of it.

"That stupid official, I'm sure he is going to speak to his master now. hey, why aren't you broadcasting what's happening inside? Do it now!"

Her voice echoed in the silent commanding deck of James' cruiser. He was feeling her anxiety, and when she mentioned the official, James felt some odd feeling, as he had some vague guess about what was going on.

The droid then started to activate his investigation abilities, and in less than ten seconds, a detailed design of the whole building appeared in front of everyone.

"Wow, this isn't a building, it's a huge spaceship!"

The words of Islinda came from the spying droid were really on the mark, this wasn't a building, but a huge spaceship that didn't lose to the huge cruiser of Dora.

The design of this cruiser wasn't modern, and its presence deeply buried here seemed to be for a long time.

"what is this cruiser?" James said, as he noticed the cruiser wasn't functioning, as it was turned off, except for primitive defensive functions, to protect it from the decaying effect of the time and ground.

"I- I don't know the supreme leader, I think this cruiser is buried like this for a long time already."

Rigo's words came to add no new to the guess James had in mind. He was wondering how Islinda knew of this cruiser, when one red dot appeared, moving into the depth of this cruiser.

"Can you recognize the pattern of this cruiser?" James asked, "Is this person going to the commanding deck?" he added, as he believed that was the case.

"I think this model is even older than what we once had at the Rojedia empire, and he isn't heading to the commanding deck, he is going to the communication deck," Rigo said, and when he noticed the weird look over James, he added, "back in the old days, communication deck was separate from the commanding deck."

James nodded, as he watched the person moving in some sort of elevator.

"Can we hack on the communication he will do, and listen to him?" James asked, as he wanted to know what was going on.

"Sure," Rigo said, before adding, "give me a minute."

He then went silent, without speaking a word, or even opening his eyes. He was trying to analyze the waves around this buried cruiser, using the droids at Islinda's cruiser. The process took a few minutes actually to end, but he was finally able to hack the system of that cruiser.

"It's an old cruiser, older than I initially thought," he muttered, while opening his eyes and saying, "I have complete control now over that system."

"Really?!" James doubtly asked.

"This cruiser is very old, and its system is obsolete. I simply hacked it and gained control over everything there," he explained.

James went silent for a moment, as he thought about how to get use of this advantage. "Can you download all the data stored inside this cruiser?" he asked, "also try to find which empire it came from," he added.

Rigo nodded, as he started to explore the whole system, looking for any records, and luckily he found a bunch of old records that were left in the communication deck.

He also managed to identify the name of this cruiser, and some of the weird, weak connections between this cruiser and others nearby.

Rigo then started to explain to James what he found, but midway he stopped abruptly and didn't continue to speak. His face told James everything, as things seemed to be off!

"What happened?" James asked.

"The communication is linked," Rigo said, "I will transmit the recording now," he added.

James thought for a moment before saying, "make the droid down there broadcast the call as well."

"Affirmative," Rigo wasn't that trusty towards Islinda, but he had to admit, without her help they would never have found this cruiser, or even known its presence there.

The cruiser was, so old, that it couldn't make a huge threat to the current growing fleet of James, but the power it represented was the problem, as it was, somehow, related to an enemy they didn't want to stir trouble with right now.

The Terases race!