Chapter 269: King
'Only 2 days…'
Alex thought to himself, quite shocked.
It had only been 2 days since he departed from Mars, but now he was already about to arrive at the Shen Wu system.
It was a completely unthinkable distance to cover in such a short time if it were not for the fact that he was in a top grade military ship.
Mira and all the other students wouldn't arrive at their destinations for another 6 days, meaning he took a quarter of the time to arrive than they would.
It was only a few hours later that he came out of the warp tunnel, still slightly astonished at the speed of his ship.
Not far ahead of the ship, he could already see the battle raging on in real time.
This star system was a relatively small one, with only 1 dwarf star, and 2 planets with no moons, occupying the entire region.
One of these planets, the only one suitable for life, was the scene of this intense battle.
Alex didn't know how long this battle had been raging on for, but considering the Red Demon fleet had only arrived and started attacking a few days ago, it must have been very recent.
'Huh, I expected to see more fights in space than this…'
Alex was most surprised about the fact that there were only a dozen or so ships currently locked in dog fights, across the entire star system.
It was strange, considering the fact that he thought most wars in this day and age would be fought in the depths of space, rather than on land.
But he forgot to take into account the fact that the Red Demon race's ships were mostly people carriers without any actual fighting capacity.
***
On the human station, not far ahead of Alex, the officers in charge of watching over the detection mechanisms of the system were a little confused.
"Hey, didn't the higher ups say that the students from Capital Prime would be arriving for another 6 days?"
One officer asked another.
"Yeah they did, so what?"
The other officer wasn't too thrilled to be disturbed while on his personal break.
Due to the current situation with the war, things were quite stressful in the military, and the soldiers and officers were given less and less break time as the days went on.
So every minute counted for these men and women.
"Well, the radar just picked up a ship exiting warp in the star system, with its designator saying that it's from Capital Prime?"
'Not to mention its designator is a little weird, 'King' seems a little bit unusual to name a ship…'
The first officer was still a little confused and sceptical about this unusual scenario.
What if this was an attempt by the Red Demons to trick them, and end up attacking from their flank?
"Hail the ship if you're so unsure."
The second officer didn't want to be bothered anymore, so he left the room until his break would finish.
But following his suggestion, the first officer opened up a communications channel and contacted the suspected ship.
"Designated ship, 'King', this system has been declared a war zone, any unauthorised ships will be shot down if you do not comply with our requests. Please state the intentions for your visit."
He spouted out the usual response he had to give to every ship that even passed by the star system.
***
'Huh? Didn't the university tell them I was coming? Why am I getting questioned?'
Alex was perplexed.
Not only because the name of his ship was supposedly 'King', which he had no idea about.
But also because the military stationed in this place should have already known about him coming.
He accepted the hail from the station, and replied.
"I know this is a war zone, I'm a student from Capital Prime. This is the battle that I've been stationed at."
***
'Wait, so it was a student, but how did he get here so quickly then?'
The officer was a little confused.
But then he saw the face of the student who replied.
'King class prodigy Alex!'
He threw away all previous suspicion he had when he recognised Alex.
In fact, he was actually happy and excited that Alex had been stationed to this system.
Just his presence alone would increase morale on the battlefield, and his sheer power meant that they would have a much higher chance of winning, with lower casualties.
That was the kind of effect real prodigies had in wars like this one.
***
After his chat with the officer, Alex was quickly let through the blockade prepared at the border of the star system.
He entered within, and immediately he was hit with multiple notifications from his communicator.
The most important of which, were the ones that told him who to report to.
'Colonel Margit.'
He had received orders to report to a Colonel Margit, who was in charge of the military stationed in the Shen Wu system.
Colonel Margit's strength alone was nearing that of a higher class being, with him only 1 step away from ranking up.
The only reason he withheld that process was because this war had started out of nowhere.
If it weren't for the fact that these war zones strictly regulated the rank of the people who could fight, he would have done so already.
He could break through any time he wanted, but that would just cause the battle in this place to escalate even further.
The Red Demon race would send their own B tier awakened in response, along with many more reinforcements from their main fleet, which would put much more pressure on the soldiers stationed in this star system than they could handle.
But there was a way that either side could technically skirt these unwritten rules of combat.
And it was by sending in prodigies, like Alex.
He was relatively low ranked, compared to the rest of the soldiers and awakened on the battlefield, who were mostly C tier.
But his strength was above most of the awakened at his level, across the entire federation, let alone this small war zone.
If he reached C tier , he could possibly have strength breaching into the higher class side of things, which could completely change the outlook of this place's future.