I Am The Swarm-Chapter 777: Relocation

“Indeed, some of you seem to lack confidence in our direction. I won’t deny that the Swarm is extremely powerful, but that’s only because they were lucky enough to inherit someone else’s legacy. They have no true foundation. Compared to us—with hundreds of thousands of years of history—they’re clearly still inferior.”

“Yet past records show that the Swarm excels at absorbing mechanical theories and converting them into biological implementations. That’s something we must guard against.”

“That’s just hearsay. If the Swarm truly inherited an ancient and powerful civilization, then they should already have a complete advancement system. What appeared to be coincidence in the past—I say it was exactly that, coincidence.”

“Yeah, the Swarm has its own unique path. For all we know, once they’ve accumulated enough technological prerequisites, they might develop a biological version of the Star Gate themselves.”

“That’s impossible. There are many aspects of Star Gate technology I simply can’t imagine being realized through organic means.”

“Hmph. Before the Swarm showed up, could you imagine any creature surviving in open space?”

“Biological life and bioweapons are not the same—don’t confuse the two.”

“What difference does it make? Are those space octopuses not alive?”

“All right, enough digressing. I believe everyone has already formed an opinion. Let’s proceed with the vote.”

The Swarm’s chosen site for the Star Gate was Star System 116—about fifty light-years from the frontline, and roughly thirty light-years from the Swarm’s royal court in the Neighboring Star System. This was the location they had selected for the Star Gate’s construction.

In truth, it wasn’t the ideal choice. Although it had some distance from the frontline, it still lay within the direct danger zone of the stellar explosion. Ideally, the location should have been more than a hundred light-years from the front—some quiet, stable place.

But time didn’t allow for such luxury. Building a Star Gate already required several decades, and traveling to a better location would add several more. Combined, that could stretch to nearly a hundred years—a span during which too many variables could emerge.

To minimize these uncertainties, the construction site had to be moved closer. Even so, transporting the necessary equipment and personnel via Star Gate XM1209 to the build site would still take nearly twenty years.

During this time, the Swarm would need to prepare various base materials according to specifications and conduct basic processing—no small task. Some rare materials might not exist anywhere in the entire Star System, making procurement extremely difficult.

The construction timeline for the Star Gate was also estimated at twenty years—an optimistic projection, considering this would be the Inner-circle Alliance’s first attempt at building one. For a first-time effort, one couldn’t expect too much.

Altogether, this meant that it would take about forty years before the Swarm could provide large-scale support to the Inner-circle Alliance. But that didn’t mean they would offer no assistance in the meantime.

To express their gratitude for the Alliance’s help in constructing the Star Gate, the Swarm pledged to deploy forces stationed in Star Systems like Red Ant, White Grub, and Golden Horn. Units closer to the front would travel via warp travel, bypassing the stellar explosion zone, to reach Star Gate XM1209 and assist the Inner-circle Alliance.

These troops were either ones that had withdrawn from the frontline to avoid the explosion, or units originally scheduled to reinforce the front but were halted mid-deployment. The pledge also included forces from the Swarm’s original royal court defense zone—systems like Genesis, Neighboring, and Sandstorm. These were some of the earliest territories conquered by the Swarm, where troop quality was significantly higher and numbers were also abundant.

The reason these forces were included was because the Swarm’s royal court was far too close to the Star System where the explosion had occurred. Even if they could withstand the overwhelming shockwave, the cost would be immense.

Moreover, the Swarm had already been considering relocating their royal court. The Neighboring Star System was simply too close to the frontline. If the Swarm hadn’t pushed outward at the beginning, it would’ve practically bordered the Interstellar Technological Confederation.

Even though the Confederation no longer counted as an enemy in the broad sense, having the royal court so close to the border was still too precarious.

They hadn’t moved it earlier because one of their original strategies required deliberately exposing this weakness to bait the enemy into action. Now that plan had been scrapped, the royal court no longer needed to remain there. They might as well wrap it up now while the opportunity was ripe.

As for the so-called Swarm royal court—it wasn’t anything grand and was extremely easy to relocate. As for the original defense installations, anything immobile would be salvaged, and whatever could be moved would be deployed to support their allies.