Chapter 152: Nuclear Interception

Can gravity truly be shielded? If gravitational waves could be blocked the same way an electromagnetic cage blocks radio waves, wouldn’t that effectively create anti-gravity?

This was one of the holy grails of theoretical physics for any developing interstellar civilization.

According to established quantum theories, gravity is not a magical “action at a distance”; it relies on a specific medium propagating through space at the speed of light. Theoretical physicists called this hypothetical carrier particle a graviton.

If a localized area could be scrubbed of these gravitons, would gravity cease to exist there? Just as a thick wooden board blocks photons to create physical darkness, what material or force could block a graviton to create gravitational “darkness”?

The manipulation of gravitons had always been the ultimate, desperate research goal of the Viridian Empire. They knew that mastering true anti-gravity technology was the primary threshold for becoming a cosmic power.

If gravity was essentially the flow of gravitons, it might be possible to construct a “graviton superfluid,” mimicking the superfluidity phenomena observed in condensed matter physics. By surrounding a specific space with this superfluid, it could theoretically short-circuit the flow of ambient gravitons passing through that area, effectively creating a localized gravitational void.

This would be a true gravitational shield, capable of confining or outright canceling universal gravitation within a designated zone!

Viridian scientists theorized that the ancient Gaia artifact containing the neutron star fragment operated on exactly this principle. The ability to simply press a switch and eliminate the crushing gravity of degenerate matter… it was god-like.

However, replicating this true anti-gravity technology had proven impossible for the Viridians. Thousands of years had passed, and their top scientists had achieved absolutely nothing. They were constantly slamming into unbreakable theoretical walls.

Many scientists even suspected that possessing the ancient artifact had actively harmed the Viridian Empire’s technological progression. By obsessing over the Gaia artifact, their R&D had been led down an impossible dead-end; such god-like technology was simply centuries beyond their foundational science!

Perhaps other advanced empires achieved anti-gravity through much simpler, brute-force methods, such as utilizing ultra-high voltage electric fields combined with spin polarization?

Following their second emergency council, the radical, militant faction had completely dominated the Viridian leadership.

The Viridians hardened their hearts. They resolved to completely abandon the ancient Gaia artifact, the neutron star fragment, and their prized spaceship… all to deliver a swift, apocalyptic death blow to the Annihilators!

As per Mal’s plan, the Viridians prepped a small, ten-kilometer-long auxiliary space shuttle for their escape back to their home world. Because the shuttle’s life-support capacity was severely limited, the vast majority of the crew would be placed in deep-cryo hibernation, with only a skeleton crew of engineers remaining awake to pilot the craft.

It was an incredibly desperate and dangerous maneuver, akin to abandoning a nuclear aircraft carrier in the middle of a typhoon to cross the ocean in a wooden boat. But this was how the Viridian mind operated; such a perfect, devastating revenge aligned flawlessly with their cultural principles of “propriety,” making any logical objection futile. Even if they all died in transit, the vengeance was worth it.

Their colossal spaceship would remain behind in the Solar System as bait! An onboard AI would be responsible for the final timed operations, delivering the apocalyptic blow just as the Annihilator super-fleet crossed the system’s threshold…

The Annihilators were terrifying, but they weren’t literal gods. Their fleet absolutely could not withstand the point-blank detonation of an artificial supernova.

Furthermore, the Viridian leadership was supremely confident that the “precious tribute” they were leaving behind would satisfy the terrifying Federation, ensuring the “gods” would look the other way and allow the plan to succeed… After all, it was a king’s ransom!

A dozen hours later, the Federation’s Gravitational Wave Telescope suddenly detected a massive anomaly. The massive gravitational signature representing the Viridian spaceship weakened significantly, and a much smaller signature broke off, beginning to move slowly into deep space. Simultaneously, the Noah’s Communication array received an urgent, maximum-priority transmission from the Viridians.

“The localized gravity dropped? Are they breaking orbit?”

Jason’s heart fluttered with hope. He immediately opened the decrypted message, praying that these walking disasters were finally leaving the system.

The first few paragraphs of the transmission were sickeningly polite. The Viridians lavishly praised the “infinite generosity” of the Federation, expressing their deepest, eternal gratitude for the sanctuary provided. They formally announced that the entire crew had evacuated aboard a backup shuttle and were officially departing the sector…

Reading this, Jason frowned in confusion. If the crew had evacuated, why was the massive gravitational signature of the spaceship still anchored to Sedna? Had they just abandoned their flagship? Was humanity going to be able to scavenge a fully intact interstellar spaceship?

A sudden surge of excitement gripped him.

But then, the tone of the Viridian message abruptly shifted. They launched into a fanatical, venomous tirade against the “Annihilator Empire” that had slaughtered their kin, detailing their undying, blood-soaked hatred…

Alright, alright, we already figured out you were running from a war, Jason thought impatiently, skimming the text. Just run away and stop grandstanding. Retreating isn’t a crime.

But as his eyes tracked further down the translation, his expression froze. The blood drained from his face, and his temples began to throb violently. He literally couldn’t believe the words on the screen. The contents were so shockingly insane that his mind rejected them. He bit down hard on his lower lip, the metallic taste of blood grounding him in reality. Only the sharp pain allowed him to process the horror of what he was reading.

Despite the intense psychological conditioning of the last few days, Jason lost his composure completely. “…Are you fucking kidding me?!”

Humanity had planned to use the Viridians as bait to lead the unknown armada away. But these psychotic, lunatics were planning to detonate the Sun! They were going to turn the star into a supernova!

Jason’s throat was bone dry. He swallowed hard, a cold sweat breaking out across his body.

He wasn’t the only one on the Astronomical Observatory deck. Dozens of senior scientists and tactical officers were reading the main projection. They all stood frozen, utterly bewildered and horrified, as if a localized EMP had shut down their brains.

The Viridians… they’re completely insane!

But the transmission wasn’t over… Jason forced his trembling hands to scroll down, continuing to read the nightmare.

In their final plea, the Viridians formally “implied” that the Federation should permit their grand revenge and refrain from shooting the spaceship down as it flew into the Sun… To compensate the Federation for the inconvenience of having their local star blown up, the Viridians offered a tribute of exactly 0.3 units of something called “Anti-Entropy Field Aggregation Particles.”

What in the absolute hell was that?!

The message promised that if the Viridians successfully observed the supernova from deep space, they would happily gift the Federation the remaining 0.7 units of the “Aggregation Particles.” The Federation simply had to swing by one of the Viridian colony worlds to pick it up; the Viridians promised they absolutely wouldn’t go back on their word…

The message ended with another nauseating string of flattery and a detailed star map pinpointing their colony worlds.

Jason was entirely speechless, while a deafening chorus of screams and curses erupted from the officers behind him.

No one on the deck gave a single damn about what an “Anti-Entropy Field Aggregation Particle” was; their entire existence was focused on the fact that the Sun was about to be blown up!

Those psychotic, suicidal aliens had fled the system, leaving behind a bomb that would vaporize the entire solar system!

Everyone on the deck was trembling with pure, unadulterated rage. They had to stop this! They had to stop the spaceship at all costs!

Within minutes, Jason convened a full emergency tactical council.

“We nuke it! We nuke it out of the goddamn sky!”

Austin was screaming, his face flushed purple with rage. He was practically shaking in anger. No one had ever seen the stoic Security Minister lose his temper like this, but the rest of the council was in a similar state of homicidal frenzy.

What did a supernova actually mean? It was the single most violent natural disaster in the known universe. A shockwave of pure, unadulterated plasma and radiation that would instantly engulf and vaporize everything within a light-year radius!

Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Pluto, and even the distant Oort Cloud, everything would be reduced to subatomic ash.

And what would happen to humanity aboard the Noah? They wouldn’t even have time to scream before their atoms were scattered across the void. Mars was far, far too close to the blast zone!

No one in the room gave a damn about the incoming Annihilator super-fleet anymore. The only thing that mattered was intercepting that Viridian spaceship before it reached the Sun!

How could they fight a 150-kilometer alien spaceship? Naturally, with humanity’s absolute trump card, apocalyptic nuclear force.

“Shoot it down! Bring the bastard down!”

The Federation’s ultimate weapon was the Trillion-Ton Tetrahydrogen Nuclear Warhead. Standing as tall as a ten-story building, it was the absolute pinnacle of human destructive capability, a thousand times more powerful than the Helium-3 bombs they used to blow up the crashed Martian spacecraft.

Right now, no one cared about the cost of the exotic materials used to build it; they just wanted to turn that alien ship into slag!

While the warhead’s yield could theoretically be scaled even higher, the Federation simply lacked the chemical rocket boosters required to physically move anything heavier. The trillion-ton yield represented the absolute physical limit of their propulsion capabilities.

After the tactical team ran frantic intercept calculations, Jason stood up, his voice grim and hollow. “We only get one shot at this. The Viridian spaceship is preparing to accelerate to near-light speed. It will cover the 85-astronomical-unit distance to the Sun in roughly three to four months. Our crude rockets simply cannot match that velocity.”

“If we miss our intercept window, we will permanently lose our only chance to strike. We won’t be able to catch up to it!”

It was basic physics: using a low-speed interceptor to hit a high-speed target was incredibly difficult. The intercept window was a fleeting microsecond; once missed, it was gone forever.

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