High Martial Arts: Slay enemies to become stronger, forge invincibility from billions of corpses.

Song Chen stared at the city outside the porthole, his Eye of Truth piercing through the clouds and distance, locking onto a wide open square in the city.

In the center of the square stands a tall obelisk, in front of which a group of winged people dressed in formal attire of various colors have gathered.

They stood before the obelisk, looking up at the sky, their wings pressed tightly against their backs.

The spaceship descended to low altitude, and the clouds rushed past the portholes, torn to shreds by the high-speed shockwave.

The spaceship then began a vertical descent, breaking through the troposphere and hovering above the main city of the Seven Wings Council.

The spacecraft's outer shell hadn't cooled down yet, and the pale red thermal radiation emitted distorted halos of light in the emerald-colored atmosphere.

Then the spaceship slowly descended to a height where it could clearly see the faces of every winged person in the square.

Song Chen stood in front of the holographic projector in the center of the bridge, watching the high-definition images transmitted back in real time by the sensors.

There were about five hundred winged people in the square. At the front row were seven winged people dressed in the most gorgeous robes, each wearing a different colored feather headdress. These were the seven chieftains of the Seven Wings Council.

Behind them were council officials, tribal elders, and a small number of guards.

The guard held a spear, but his hand was trembling.

When the black spaceship of the Department of Punishment completely broke through the clouds and hovered above the city, the winged people in the square collectively raised their heads.

They saw the spaceship, entirely black with a silver sword emblem painted on its bow, the nightmarish shape that was known throughout all Type I civilizations.

The seven chiefs in front of the obelisk knelt down at the same time, and behind them, hundreds of council officials and tribal elders also knelt down in unison.

"The messenger of divine punishment has arrived."

An old chieftain knelt on the ground, looking up at the black spaceship in the sky. His thin wings trembled violently behind him, and he let out a hoarse cry.

"We're fucked."

Another chief roared, his voice echoing across the square.

She was a female winged being; her light green membranous wings had shrunk into a ball, tightly wrapping around her body, like a dying woman's embrace.

Then came more cries and screams mixed in.

Hundreds of winged people knelt on the ground in the square.

A young winged person ran over from the edge of the square. He looked only the size of a seven or eight-year-old human child, with only a pair of small wings on his back that were not yet fully unfolded.

He ran to a winged woman kneeling on the ground, tugged at her clothes, and asked her something in confusion.

More winged beings peeked out from the buildings on the city streets surrounding the square.

They had been evacuated to underground shelters, but after hearing the loud noise of the spaceship breaking through the atmosphere, they couldn't help but run out again.

They stood at the edge of the street, looking up at the black spaceship in the sky, their expressions identical: fear, despair, and numbness.

A young winged woman crouched down on the side of the street, burying her head in her knees.

An old winged man leaned against the wall, looking up at the spaceship, muttering to himself. His wings slowly opened and closed behind him, as if performing a final wing dance, a dance without an audience or music for his impending death.

The skies above the Seven Wings Council's capital city were once the stage for the Winged People's proud winged dances and wind songs.

It has now become a display stand for the Department of Punishment's black spaceship.

The spaceship's loudspeaker system was turned on.

Kane's voice echoed throughout the city, cold and devoid of any emotion.

"The Emerald Star Winged Civilization, we are the Seventh Action Team of the Galaxy General Bureau of the Punishment Department of the Azure Star Alliance."

"You have defaulted on three installments of your payment. The Ministry of Justice has issued three collection orders, and you have failed to comply with any of the three extensions."

"Today is the final deadline. Chief of the Seven Wings Council, please report to the plaza in front of the spaceship immediately. You have one last chance to fulfill your repayment obligations."

The seven chiefs in front of the obelisk helped each other to their feet.

The old chieftain, wearing a white feather headdress, walked at the front. He staggered, his wings dragging on the ground behind him, and his feathers were covered with dust from the square's stone slabs.

He walked to the very center of the square, directly beneath the spaceship, and then knelt down again.

The other six chieftains knelt behind him in turn, and all seven chieftains spread their wings at the same time. This was the highest form of etiquette among the winged people, equivalent to prostrating oneself in human form.

After spreading their wings, they simultaneously buried their heads between them.

"Your Excellency the Punisher, we...we really can't repay it." The old chieftain's voice came from under his wings, hoarse and trembling.

"How much inventory do you have left?" Kane's voice came through the loudspeaker.

"What inventory?"

"What you can sell includes crystal cores, minerals, technology, artwork, and even your own people."

The old chieftain's body trembled violently. He raised his head, his white feather headdress askew, and opened his mouth as if to say something, but his lips trembled so much that he could not utter a sound.

The winged people around the square also heard the words "your own people" from the loudspeaker, and the crying stopped instantly.

The entire city fell into a deathly silence, which was then broken by an even louder cry.

The winged woman holding the child screamed as she stood up and ran desperately towards the back of the square, still clutching the child.

She ran a dozen steps before being stopped by a young winged man who pushed her back down, crying as he did so.

"there is none left……"

The old chief knelt on the ground, tears streaming down his wrinkled face and into the feathers of his wings.

"We've sold everything we could. Our city, our spaceship, our children—everything's gone. There's nothing left."

Kane stood on the bridge, looking down at the winged people in the plaza through the porthole, and shook his head coldly.

"Listen up, everyone! The Winged Civilization insists on refusing to repay the debt."

"Spaceship descending, all personnel prepare for ground combat."

The spaceship began its descent, its black hull casting a massive shadow over the plaza, completely enveloping the seven winged chieftains kneeling on the ground.

The obelisk's shadow was swallowed by the spaceship's shadow, the light in the square dimmed, and the red anti-collision lights flashing at the bottom of the spaceship cast a flickering red light on the winged people's desperate faces.

As the spaceship descended from hover to a height of a dozen meters above the ground, the anti-gravity shockwave from its descent stirred up a ring of dust on the plaza's stone slabs, causing the robes of the winged people to flutter in the wind.

Several white feathers on the old chieftain's head were blown off by the shockwave and scattered in the air.

He didn't reach out to take it, nor did he look up. He just stared at the ground in front of him, his lips moving silently, as if singing a final elegy for his impending death.