The Empire begins with the Fourth Scourge.

2832, Dunn's Nightmare, Tarkin's Hesitation
The northern border of the Galactic Empire, the core planet—Palin-Minor.

Several strongly worded communications lay before Dunn Wessex, from Imperial Marshal Oswald Tessick, the Imperial Supreme Strategic Command, and the Imperial Palace Office.

He tapped his fingertips lightly on the table, his gaze sweeping over the scarlet "Urgent" stamp at the end of each communication—Tesick's wording betrayed anxiety, the Strategic Command's wording revealed suspicion, while the one from the Royal Palace Office used a simple, cold sentence: [Ensure the smooth execution of Operation Cleanup.]

Execute? Execute using what?
Dunn Wessex handed the communications to General Gerard Perrin, who was standing to the side.

After reading it, General Perein sighed and said, "Your Excellency, our battle report and technical analysis were sent to the Imperial Center a month ago. It seems they are simply ignoring the questions we raised."

“The strategic importance of the North is steadily declining,” Dunn-Wessex said. “When I last returned to the Imperial heartland, I could clearly sense that the political landscape there is undergoing a dramatic transformation. The only reason those people still greet me with smiles is because they fear I might amass too much power.”

“But even so, this behavior of completely ignoring our specific battle situation and forcing us to launch a strong attack on the enemy's defenses is quite inappropriate,” Gerard Perein said.

“This is the Empire, General Perrin. This is the Empire,” Dunn-Wessex said coldly.

He has already dispatched a fleet to attack the planet Ode-Mantel in accordance with the operational requirements, threatening the defenses of the Kingdom of Dawn from the flank and supporting Marshal Oswald Tesik's offensive against the planet Bilblin.

However, the mobile forces he can now send to attack the planet Ode-Mantel already constitute one-third of his total mobile forces!
Indeed, Dunn-Wessex, the mighty King of the North, with 3000 capital ships and over 60000 medium and small warships, could only spare 150 capital ships as mobile forces to attack the planet Od-Mantel.

In other words, his mobile forces total less than 500 capital ships!

why?
In fact, Marshal Oswald Tessick was aware of this reason, but he chose to ignore it. Ever since he led 30 Star Destroyers in a suicide attack on Bilbrin during the Goalkeeper Plan, ending up in a state that was neither human nor machine, Oswald Tessick no longer prioritizes military considerations.

What is troubling Dunn-Wessex?
Or rather, what is his nightmare?
The Throne-class battlecruiser! Or to be more precise, the Throne-class, codenamed T-34-1!

In recent months, these beggar-version, or even rudimentary versions, of the Throne-class battlecruisers have begun to appear in large numbers. These warships are crudely manufactured by the Geths on their production lines, and the most valuable parts of the entire warship are the eight ion rapid-fire cannons and the warp drive.

The warship's armor was filled with a large amount of miscellaneous metal scrap, crudely fused together. After analyzing the wreckage, Imperial scientists discovered that this haphazardly fused metal armor was, by the standards of the Imperial shipbuilding industry, a complete waste!
Because if these metal scraps were further refined, some useful rare metals could actually be extracted. But Geth, on the other hand, was extremely extravagant and wasteful, doing whatever was convenient, fusing large chunks of metal into armor and then simply installing it on.

Although the strength of these scrap armor materials cannot compare with the materials used in the armor of real warships, they are thick!
Those human-made versions of the Throne-class battlecruisers had armor thickness of up to 15 meters in their core areas! This was the result of completely abandoning all life support equipment, living space, and even fire control systems, radar, and close-in weaponry.

However, these stick-shaped warships have two characteristics—extremely high sub-light speed engine speed and extremely strong close-range firepower.

In every battle, these Throne-class battlecruisers charged straight at their target like mad dogs, unleashing a barrage of fire at close range of less than 50 kilometers. Their eight rapid-fire ion cannons could complete a salvo in 0.3 seconds, and with charging time included, they could destroy an unsuspecting Imperial-class Star Destroyer in 10 minutes if the crew wasn't careful.

And what's the cost? This skeletal version of the warship is visibly cheap. Imperial engineers estimate that the cost of this warship is probably only one percent or even less than that of an Imperial-class Star Destroyer!

What's even more terrifying is that these warships are all controlled by Geth.

As always, Geth dismantled the hyperspace engines on his warships and replaced them all with warp engines. Then, with warp jump capabilities of only a few thousand times the speed of light, he traversed between star systems like a ghost. Even if it took him several months to travel, he would sneak up behind the Imperial defenses and cause massive destruction.

In fact, these warp-speed attacks had been going on in the North for over a decade. Dunn Wessex had to thank the Geths, because without these attacks, he wouldn't have been entrusted with the crucial task of building the Northern defenses, nor would he have become the Empire's most powerful warlord—the King in the North—possessing over 3000 capital ships.

However, the Geth used to use their own dreadnoughts and cruisers, which were generally small in size and were rarely updated.

Those warships might have posed some threat to the Jedi-class battlecruisers during the Clone Wars, but as the Empire's warships have been continuously upgraded, the Geth warships have been completely suppressed and their threat has diminished considerably.

Now, Geth has suddenly unleashed this batch of dummy Throne-class battlecruisers—not one or two, but hundreds! These warships attack and destroy everywhere like ghosts.

Gilard-Perein's previous defensive strategy relied on a network of hundreds of planets forming three chain defenses, with thousands of small patrol fleets tasked with suppressing Gethian harassing warships. However, this approach has now completely failed, as these cumbersome versions of the Throne of Kings would instantly annihilate any small patrol fleets that attacked.

Now Gerard-Perez has to increase the size of his patrol fleet, which has resulted in a greater and greater demand for manpower.

This is why Dunn-Wessex is so terrified now, and why the Northern Legion, despite having over 3000 capital ships, can only muster a paltry 150 to attack Odd-Mantel.

Gerald Perein had already reported the matter to the Imperial military about these human-shaped Throne-class battlecruisers codenamed "T-34-1," and six months ago, these warships first appeared in Oswald-Tesik's territory while harassing the planet Scipio.

Oswald-Tesick should be very familiar with this type of warship.

However, both he and the Imperial High Command ignored the immense threat posed by these warships—because in their view, no matter how troublesome or harassing they were, they were primarily active in the Geths. Until the Geths were confirmed to be appearing on a large scale in other star sectors, these Throne-class battlecruisers, however powerful, were merely a problem for the North.

So, as Dunn-Wessex put it—this is empire.

What he really wanted to say was—this is the fucking empire.

……

As Field Marshal Oswald Tesick prepared to launch Operation Sweeper, Fourth Army Governor Wilhelm Tarkin was also facing a great dilemma.

Although the Supreme Military Conference at the heart of the Empire did not yield any results, Wilhoff Tarkin believed that the judgment of the Imperial Marshal Miltin Tarker, who was high on drugs, was very likely correct—the Kingdom of Dawn might indeed be planning to fight its way from Umbala, break through the Fourth Army's defenses, and then threaten the Delon system from the east.

Once the Delon system falls, this final line of defense, which spans the two core shipping lanes of Hydia and Corellia and guards the gateway from the inner ring to the core circle, will be completely exposed.

Then the Dawn Kingdom's fleet can threaten at least two-thirds of the planets in the core area along these two routes!

Once this situation arises, the war between the Dawn Kingdom and the Galactic Empire will no longer have any battle lines! Every planet will be a front line! And this will be one-sided.

If it comes to that, it can be said that the Galactic Empire has already been defeated.

Therefore, Wilhoff Tarkin absolutely cannot allow such a thing to happen, but given the current situation, he is also helpless.

Although he immediately began constructing the defenses of Planet Umbala after the defeat of the Twelfth Army, the planet still harbored hidden dangers. While Umbala was industrially advanced, its inhabitants had aligned themselves with separatism during the Clone Wars!

When the Galactic Republic attacked the planet Umbala, a terrible incident occurred: Jedi Master Pom-Krell betrayed them on the battlefield and joined the Separatists, and he is still serving the Kingdom of Dawn to this day.

Therefore, the loyalty of the Umbala people has always been questionable. In addition, the unique topography of Umbala, which is far from its star but receives heat from a radiation nebula, makes the planet perpetually dark. The radiation nebula and the perpetual darkness make it extremely difficult for the Imperial army to maintain a long-term presence there. The maintenance of warships and the psychological pressure on soldiers are both enormous burdens.

Even more critically, the radioactive dust in the Umbala orbit will continuously interfere with shipborne radar and communication arrays, causing the fleet's coordination efficiency to drop by more than 40%; while the bioelectric storms induced by the perpetual night environment on the surface will cause conventional sensors to malfunction frequently.

But Wilhoff-Tarkin had no choice but to establish a defensive line here—not for military reasons, but for political ones. Because once the Dawn Kingdom's fleet crossed Chalos IV and Kasik and entered the territory of Umbala, this area would fall within the inner galactic ring!
Once Umbala is lost and the Dawn Kingdom's fleet enters the Inner Ring, it will be an undeniable catastrophic defeat for the Galactic Empire's propaganda machine. The Inner Ring planets will be plunged into panic-driven migration and capital flight, and the noble families will become even more disillusioned with the Empire's future.

The Galactic Empire has consistently failed in the Outer Rings, which they can attribute to the unruly nature of the Outer Ring's inhabitants, a stronghold of separatism.

The Galactic Empire could argue that its defeat in the Central Ring was a strategic retreat, a trade-off of space for time to rebuild its military. But once the Inner Ring fell, there would be no excuse left. It was a vital part of the empire, home to numerous large corporations and aristocratic families. While not as large or powerful as the companies and families in the core circle, it was still the cornerstone of the empire.

More importantly, many prominent families in the inner ring are branches of the top wealthy families in the core circle, so the loss of the inner ring would have far-reaching consequences.

Previously, the fall of the planet Fangduo, located in the inner ring, could be attributed to the Dawn Kingdom's despicable and shameless use of biological weapons, and the Dawn Kingdom also paid the price with the fortress planet Yago-Dur.

The fall of Palancy, also located in the inner ring, prompted the Empire to launch Operation Goalkeeper, risking heavy losses to retake it. This demonstrates the importance of the inner ring.

Therefore, Wilhoff-Tarkin had no choice but to build the Umbala planet defense line. However, he always believed that the Dawn Kingdom's eastern border forces were weak and basically lacked the strength to threaten the Fourth Army. Even if they made a move, it was more likely that they would take down the Twelfth Army's capital, Lantilis.

However, the situation changed dramatically when the Titan warship Divine Messenger suddenly arrived in the Eastern Territory.

At the meeting, when Marshal Miltin-Takker, under the influence of drugs, told him that the Kingdom of Dawn wanted to conquer Umbala and threaten Delon, Wilhoff Tarkin realized that the threat facing Umbala was now very concrete.

Once the planet Ombala is breached, the flanks and rear of the Deron planet's defenses could be threatened, which is a serious offense.

The problem is that Wilhuff Tarkin is still in charge of the Death Star's construction, and a significant portion of his Fourth Army needs to be diverted to maintain secure air traffic to Scarif, the planet where the Death Star is located. Given that the Death Star is an open secret, both the Rebel Alliance and the Kingdom of Dawn are frantically searching for its location, trying to sabotage its construction, or at the very least disrupting the project's supply lines.

The pressure was immense. Under such circumstances, how could they possibly divide their forces on Umbala to prevent the Dawn Kingdom's Divine Messenger Titan warship from entering the inner ring and even threatening the defenses of Delon? It was almost impossible—the main force of the Fourth Army was firmly pinned down in the Scarif Channel by the Death Star Project, and he had already managed to muster 500 capital ships in the Umbala direction.

Not to mention that they had previously been tricked out of 150 capital ships by Serben of the Twelfth Army. (End of Chapter)