The job change is a bizarre and calamity; the nation begs me to tone it down.

"I watched your daughter grow up. When she was seven, she came to the council tower for the first time and couldn't even reach the door. I had to carry her to the doorknob. So... I worry about her no less than you do, but I believe that with her strength, she won't give up so easily!"

"Unfortunately, there's very little we can do before the parliamentary vote!"

"What you can do now is to stabilize the family internally. As for the collateral branches, the news won't stay hidden for long. Once they hear that Anya is missing or even possibly dead, those who were already itching to make a move will definitely jump out."

Terence was silent for a few seconds, then nodded emphatically: "I understand."

Rigley looked at him without saying anything more, but simply tapped the black crystal on the table twice: "Go ahead. I will formally submit the motion within five standard minutes. See you at the top of the council tower in half a standard hour."

Terence nodded again, turned and walked toward the door, but paused when he reached it.

"Lord Rigre."

"Um?"

"If...the parliamentary vote is not ideal."

"I'll go by myself."

There was a moment of silence in the office. Rigley stared at the retreating figure without answering.

……

Half a standard hour later, at the top of the council tower.

Looking out, the dome of the entire council tower is a single piece of transparent star rock, exposing the entire starry sky above the Ashmerkr headquarters to the attendees without reservation.

The stars slowly shifted, and occasionally the exhaust flames of patrol ships streaked across the sky, like a silver needle leaving a white mark on black velvet.

The round table, twelve meters in diameter, floats in the center of the room. Its surface is engraved with six grooves radiating outward from the center, each with a family crest embedded at its end.

The six seats are evenly spaced and there are no superfluous decorations.

Riglie was the first to sit down.

He placed the black crystal in the center of the table, then crossed his hands on his knees, his gaze falling on the intersection of the six emblems on the table.

Behind him, Terence sat quietly, like a child who had come with his elders to broaden his horizons.

Two minutes later, the second chair was pulled out, and Hector Seger, the ruling elder of the Seger family, strode in.

He was thin and bony, with high cheekbones, and his gray-green eyes showed obvious signs of weariness.

After taking his seat, he nodded slightly to Regli and then said nothing more.

Next up is the Ozheimer family, with the ruling elder, Turan Ozheimer.

However, the elder in charge had a rather unpleasant expression on his face at that moment.

After all, this is a family that built its reputation on military prowess.

Whether in terms of fleet size or the strength of professionals, they are unparalleled among the six major families.

However, even with such formidable power, the family's fleet was driven back before even reaching the edge of the Rift Abyss, a truly humiliating defeat.

The fourth person to arrive was Elena Karsa, the ruling elder of the Karsa family.

As the only female ruling elder among the six major families, although she is over two hundred years old, anyone who looks at her would think she is only in her early twenties.

The fifth is Cassius Wienhall, the head of the Wienhall family.

This person is not old, looking to be only in his early forties, and is the youngest leader among the six major families.

The last to enter was Oleg Taranis, the ruling elder of the Taranis family.

He is the oldest of them all, and is over four hundred years old.

He needed a short cane to walk, but refused the help of two guards and moved step by step to the chair, where he slowly sat down.

Six chairs, six people, all present.

Seeing this, Rigley skipped the pleasantries and went straight to the point: "Now that everyone is here, I won't go into the details!"

At this point, he paused, his gaze sweeping over the six emblems one by one: "This is the third time since the establishment of Ashmerkton that a motion for the survival of the star field has been triggered. The previous two were the battle for the divine realm in the early days of the establishment of the divine court and the stellar tide a thousand years ago. We survived both times."

"But this time, it's different from the previous two times, even more terrifying than the previous two crises combined, because our opponent... is an Old God."

With that, Rigley raised his hands from his knees and placed them flat on the table: "I don't intend to beat around the bush. Faced with this situation, everyone, please share your thoughts."

After he finished speaking, there was a silence around the round table for about five seconds.

Hector Segel cleared his throat and spoke first: "Any other opinions? I'm sure you all know what our family's fleet went through not long ago, so I don't need to say anything."

"To put it bluntly, the legions of the Old Gods are beyond our ability to contend with. Even if we combine the forces of all six families, it would only be like adding more meat to a meat grinder."

"I know that the best course of action right now is to report this to the Star Council and have other divine realms share the risk."

"But if I may be frank, even if we report this to the Star Council, which of the dozen or so star regions in the council would send troops to fight for us?"

At this point, Hector sneered, "They'd love for us to all die so they can divide up the Starfall Divine Realm's shipping lanes and resources. Rather than waiting to die here, we should take advantage of the fact that the blockade hasn't completely closed yet, withdraw from the star field, and preserve our strength."

"As long as people are alive, there is a chance to turn things around."

Upon hearing this, everyone in the room tensed up slightly and subconsciously frowned.

Clearly, most of the ruling elders did not agree with his words.

But in the end, he didn't say anything.

Elena Calsa slowly shook her head: "Mr. Hector, I'm sorry to say I disagree with your opinion. Withdrawing from the star system sounds easy, but have you considered how much work it would require? Leaving aside how long the evacuation would take, how long do you plan to move all six of our families, hundreds of affiliated forces, plus professionals and infrastructure?"

"One month? Or three months? Will those Old God legions wait until you've finished moving everything before they make their move?"

"Furthermore, what happens after we withdraw? Our foundation is entirely in the Starfall Divine Realm—resource deposits, warp nodes, and the professional training system. Can we take any of these with us? Without our foundation, we'll be nothing more than wandering refugees. Aren't you afraid of being purged by other divine realms?"

"You know yourself that the Star Council is unreliable. They're all smiles and friendly until we turn into sitting ducks. Once we're reduced to a helpless foe, those forces with grudges against us will pounce on us without hesitation!"

Hector opened his mouth as if to refute, but in the end he swallowed back the words that were on the tip of his tongue.

How could he not understand this principle?

But the key issue is that the Old Gods Legion is right in front of us. If we don't retreat now, are we really going to have to confront the Old Gods Legion head-on?

That's just plain stupid; she doesn't want to die fast enough.