Interstellar: Return of the Villain
Chapter 350: The Alliance’s Future

Chapter 350: The Alliance’s Future

As the Legion of the Long Night fleet vanished into the distance, Cohen wiped his face, took a deep breath, and turned to face the four Admirals of the military.

"Since she handed you the star map," Leandro said with a smile, "it’s only natural that you’re now our leader."

Raphel snorted and turned his head away. "Well, I’m out. Don’t expect me to clean up this mess."

Fighting was one thing, but leading a massive group to rebuild the Alliance? Not a chance.

Among the Supremes, only Lynn and another middle-aged man had survived. They, like Raphel and the other Admirals, shared the same indifferent attitude.

As for the other senior military officials, they were now corpses, no longer capable of offering objections.

Valeria took a deep breath, looked around at everyone, and declared firmly, "From today onward, we nominate Cohen Whyte as the new Fleet Admiral, entrusting him to lead us to a new home and rebuild the Alliance."

The government faction, represented by Leona, quickly voiced their agreement. "I support this."

The nobles, however, had lost all authority. With the key members of the royal family dead, they had no say in the matter.

Lyra had purged the Alliance’s corruption and pinpointed a safe haven. All that remained was for them to help this giant rise again—stronger, healthier, and ready for renewal.

...

Cohen soon regained his composure and got to work. His first order was to have everyone collect and properly handle the corpses.

During this grim task, Kogar’s attention was drawn to Aurelius’ lifeless face, still frozen in bitter defiance.

"I checked his opticomputer," Kogar said. "Turns out, he was conspiring with the Admirals. Since the formation of the Legion of Everglow, he had been spying on Lyra. The blueprints and samples of the new weapons? He provided them. In exchange, after this crisis, he planned to establish a new royal family."

Aurelius’ obsession seemed almost pathological. Despite enduring abuse at the hands of the royal family, he had tried to become what he despised most.

Little did he know, in the new world the Alliance sought to build, there would be no room for privileged nobility.

Cohen glanced at Aurelius’s body. "Bury him with my father and the others in the mausoleum."

...

That day, the surviving humans embarked on their journey—not in fear of endless flight, but with hope for a new home.

With over five billion Alliance citizens remaining, evacuation had to be done in phases.

The first groups to leave consisted of technical personnel and construction workers.

Once everyone was aboard, Cohen sat in the cockpit of the flagship, and a collective sense of relief settled over them.

In the command room, Caspian followed Leona, using her as an excuse to escape the crowded common areas.

"I’ve been wondering," Caspian began. "Lyra was right under the military’s nose all this time. How did she manage to pull off something this big?"

His question earned him a series of piercing stares from Cohen and the others.

Leona, clearly fed up, smacked him on the head. "Have you forgotten what her ships looked like? None of them seemed familiar to you?"

When Liliana posed as the Alliance’s leader, she hadn’t used her flagship. But when Lyra arrived to meet them, she made sure to show off.

Leona recognized the flagship immediately—it was from a company she knew well.

Caspian finally connected the dots. "Oh, back then, she ordered ships from me... It was for the Legion of the Long Night!"

He coughed awkwardly. "I, uh... I didn’t know!"

Lyra had ordered many ships from his factory. If the old Alliance administration hadn’t collapsed, he would’ve been branded a Class-A fugitive for sure.

Kogar shook his head. "She probably had her ways. Besides, it seems Miss Shedd had dealings with Admiral Iskandor."

"Iskandor?" Leona asked.

"Yeah. He had a brilliant mechanic under him—Koros. If anyone could build teleportation arrays allowing her to move between factions, it’d be him."

Cohen paused, recalling the figure he had seen within the Legion of the Long Night. "As for Admiral Iskandor, it’s likely Ian, the man from the Empire, acted as the intermediary."

It was clear now that everyone had underestimated Lyra’s ambitions. Many assumed her relentless climb through the military ranks was driven by a desire to become an admiral.

In reality, all she wanted was power—the leverage to use the Alliance’s resources to establish the Legion of the Long Night.

As the group reflected on this revelation, they realized that, in one way or another, they had all unknowingly played a role in her grand plan.

An uneasy silence filled the room until Raphel broke it, ruffling his hair in frustration. "The real problem is we’re down half the Alliance’s military leadership. The Supremes are practically gone, and we’ve got no weapons, no extra Peculiars. If the Empire decides to attack again, what are we supposed to do?"

The other commanders mirrored his worried expression, but Cohen remained calm.

"As long as she’s in the center of all this, the Empire won’t dare make a move," he said confidently.

Whether it was her dominion over space pirates, her potential alliances with the Empire, or the near-destruction of humanity, Cohen still trusted her in this moment.

...

Meanwhile, aboard the Legion of the Long Night fleet, Helion and the others followed Mandy, barely concealing their shock.

Mandy seemed familiar to everything here, too familiar.

Vikie suddenly grabbed her by the neck. "Wait a second, Mandy—you knew all along, didn’t you? You’ve been hiding it from us!"

Mandy smiled faintly. "It was a matter of utmost importance. Even within the Legion, very few knew Lyra THE leader."

"So, when had she planned all those?" Vikie pressed, half-joking but clearly curious.

After a moment of thought, Mandy glanced at Liliana. "If we’re talking about the beginning, Liliana probably knows better than I do."

The red-haired woman, with her otherworldly and wicked look, smirked knowingly. "It started when SHE was abducted and taken to Voidstar No.2. That’s when Blackheart first set his sights on her. To divert his attention, she developed the ’core’ for elastic metal and secretly joined forces with me."

"Back then," Liliana continued, her tone laced with nostalgia, "SHE was the prime target for all three factions on Voidstar No.2—a prize everyone wanted. She pretended to ally with us, but her real goal was to gather everyone together to take revenge on the Shedd family."

"Too bad Blackheart didn’t cooperate. Once she gained traction in the Alliance and encountered the Shedd family earlier than expected, she handled them herself."

"As for the Legion of the Long Night," Liliana added with a self-satisfied flip of her hair, "that came after I dealt with Blackheart. I personally managed the operation, but the space pirates? That was all her. She brought them in singlehandedly."

Shane couldn’t help but chime in at this point. He had experienced her methods firsthand. After capturing him and throwing him into the Legion, ’the leader’ sent him to Wyrmtrace, where she trained him as Lyra.

Shane was so grateful for her, until he found out that ’the leader’ and Lyra were the same person.

He still remembered the overwhelming mix of gratitude and unease—first at her saving him, then at discovering she had been the Legion’s leader all along.

Freon patted Shane on the shoulder in sympathy. "I know how you feel. I was captivated by her beauty once too, but looking back, I’m just thankful to be alive."

Liliana finished with a wry smile, "Although her plans were long in the making, everything she did flowed with the circumstances."

It was just like Lyra had told Frederick. Her initial goal had been to unite the factions on Voidstar No.2 with the space pirates, using the Stellar Devourer’s eruption to destroy the Alliance. But after Thierry’s death, her perspective shifted.

The place she despised might still be someone else’s dream. So instead of wiping it out, she chose to eliminate the corrupt leaders in the military and government.

...

"But after dealing with the military, how did she find the time to manage the Legion of the Long Night?" someone asked, voicing the group’s collective curiosity.

This was the real mystery.

As Helion and the others explored the Legion of the Long Night, their path led them to the ship’s technical department.

From within came an unmistakably arrogant robotic voice:

"Work! Work! Your KPI for this month is still incomplete! All you do is demand more funding, but we’re about to build a brand-new world! There are countless expenses ahead, so you’d better step it up. Once we attract more talent, SHE might just sell you off!"

The voice belonged to Assisbot No. 1, whose emotional programming had significantly improved over the years.

With a dramatic sway of its waist, a tilt of its round chin, and its long arms akimbo, the robot radiated the image of a nagging landlord demanding rent.

Its over-the-top antics drove Koros, Sean, and the other engineers to their limits, making them wish they could simply shut it down.

When the bot noticed Helion and the others entering, it waddled over to greet them with mechanical enthusiasm.

"Finally! You’re here!"

Helion smirked. "You’re awfully enthusiastic."

"Welcome, workers!" the robot declared grandly.