Starting from the Planetary Governor

Chapter 890: Chapter 483, Silver Tribunal_2 Chapter 890: Chapter 483, Silver Tribunal_2 He felt extremely frustrated, but what was even more suffocating was that he sensed the local forces in the western Dragonhawk Star Domain reacting due to the extraction of resources from the Cold War and the oppressive and dominant rule that the Fury Flame Battle Group had been forced to adopt.

Resource allocation and personnel replenishment were becoming increasingly unsmooth, and the conveyance and execution of orders were also growing more obscure.

He felt as though he was sinking into a quagmire. He could clearly sense that if things continued this way, he and his Battle Group would drown in the Dragonhawk Star Domain.

He had to break the game.

But the method to break the game couldn’t be war, at least not an unjustified war.

Blatantly accusing the Alliance of treason wasn’t enough; while his words were fierce, Erso knew better than anyone what the image of ‘Iron Fury Stone’ was in the Empire’s political arena. If you yourself can’t wash off the mud you’re stuck in, pointing fingers at others and calling them traitors won’t be believed by anyone.

Once he initiated a war without sufficient ‘claims’, it might provoke a very severe reaction. In the worst case, it could even lead the Empire to declare the Fury Flame Battle Group as traitors and mobilize forces to suppress him.

At that point, it would be another ‘Cercis Flower Rebellion’. That was the most critical opportunity for ‘Iron Fury Stone’ to grow and strengthen, but also their greatest crisis. Back then, if they hadn’t won, the fate of the three Battle Groups: Cercis Flower, Starbreaker Blade, and Phoenix, would be the fate of Iron Armor, Fury Flame, and Bedrock Shield.

But on the other hand, what if the ‘claims’ were sufficient?

Over the past two years, Erso had been finding various troubles for the Alliance, all to accumulate ‘claims’.

Defying orders, ignoring assignments, not accepting officials from the Star Domain Government… And this time, the issue with the Imperial Tax was a finishing blow.

Erso had already considered that Gu Hang wouldn’t pay him the tax. Otherwise, with over seventy billion in his hands, many issues could be resolved smoothly without having to exploit the locals so harshly, and he could even share some benefits…

But not paying the tax was also fine, even if Gu Hang would pay it to the higher-level government, just like the previous incident of reporting achievements, it was within his expectations.

He even considered whether he should plunder the transport fleets dispatched by Gu Hang, since they weren’t officially the Imperial Tax Fleet, and plundering them wasn’t the same as robbing the Imperial Tax.

But after consideration, the risk was still too high; it was too offensive to the Space Domain Government. After all, that money was meant for the Space Domain Government. If they claimed that this was their official tax fleet, he would be in big trouble.

Under the current circumstances, it was enough.

Skipping the Star Domain Government and paying taxes directly to the higher-level government?

Even if he got approval from the senior government, there were too many angles to exploit in this issue.

In this universe, things that are truly black and white are few, most affairs exist in shades of gray, merely varying in depth. The same issue, under different judgments or different stances, could entirely change in nature.

The accumulated material from the past, along with the current issue of Imperial Tax, were all ammunition for Erso’s next move.

But this ammunition couldn’t be fired by the Fury Flame Battle Group, for the same reason he couldn’t start a war on his own.

However, ‘Iron Fury Stone’ had been messing around in the Empire’s political scene for so many years, doing many rule-breaking and illicit things, and could still be so brazen now, there was naturally a reason for that. Apart from their inherently strong capabilities, they had developed some collaborators and shared-interest groups, which also formed a certain level of ‘protection’.

Without connections, he would have capsized long ago!

And now, it’s time to utilize those “connections.”

Imperial Inquisition.

Over the years, ‘Iron Fury Stone’ had maintained fairly good relations with numerous Imperial Inquisition institutions and Orders.

Speaking of the Imperial Inquisition, this is an organization within the Empire quite exceptional in nature.

They are a super-spy organization that combines the functions of secret police, espionage, intelligence, domestic surveillance, dealing with heretics, eliminating demons and aliens from outside, and more.

Their power is immense, almost towering above any other political entity in the Empire, constantly monitoring every living being within the Empire.

In theory, a Judge possesses almost boundless power. As long as there is a justifiable reason, they could virtually do as they please—signing an Extinction Order, killing billions or even hundreds of billions of people on a planet; executing an Empire Marshal; overseeing lords of the Supreme Council; declaring a Starfighter Battle Group traitorous…

At the same time, the Imperial Inquisition is a vast, loose, and complex organization. Every Judge has their own idea of how to defend the empire more effectively. Depending on their philosophy of handling situations and methodology, the Inquisition internally actually divides into countless factions.

There are specialized tribunals like the Demon Tribunal for dealing with Abyss Demons, the Extraplanar Tribunal focused on various kinds of aliens, and the Heretic Tribunal for rooting out traitors within the Empire… These three are among the largest, yet there are many smaller, radically different other factions.

The Imperial Inquisition does not have a formal structural framework; some Judges, when facing significant problems they cannot solve alone, form cooperative groups. Often, such cooperative groups are the precursors and embryonic forms of a tribunal faction.

While Judges’ powers are boundless in theory, in specific affairs, the situation is much more complicated. The nominally excessive power of the Inquisition often evolves into having no power at all. Or rather, what a specific Judge wishes to do depends on his “strength.”

This strength depends on how much power a Judge can mobilize within the Inquisition itself, how willing his own faction is to support him, how much power he can mobilize from other factions, how much support he can fish from outside organizations, and whether he can mobilize help from the State Religion, Sect of Mechanics, or even the Star Realm Army or Imperial Navy. All these constitute parts of a Judge’s strength.

On the other hand, it depends on how much recognition a Judge’s words and judgments can gain within the Empire.

Thus, although Judges possess almost boundless secular power in theory, if they abuse their authority in reality, they will soon face a variety of worldly repercussions—even the Inquisition itself has a specialized institution responsible for overseeing Judges who abuse their power. Therefore, although theoretically feasible, Judges cannot really do as they please.

And yet, the connections of ‘Iron Fury Stone’ within the Inquisition are surprisingly good.

Especially a major faction that is often active in the Eastern parts of the Empire—the Silver Tribunal.

This tribunal had a glorious history, commanding tens of thousands of formal Judges and maintaining good cooperation with several powerful Star Realm Army Corps and Admirals. The biggest case involved them successfully inciting a trial against the Cosmic Domain Chair of the McClay Domain—a figure absolutely among the top officials of the Empire, which ended with the judgment by the Silver Tribunal.

Whether he was actually as the Silver Tribunal claimed, a “traitor,” “incompetent and corrupt,” causing “immense losses to the Empire,” in the end, that Domain Chair tried to incite a rebellion for self-protection but was still dismantled and executed by the Silver Tribunal.

And their second major act was during the massive Cercis Flower rebellion over a century ago, they proved the loyalty of the Iron Armor Battle Group, sentenced the Cercis Flower Battle Group to extinction, and ordered the Starbreaker Blade and Phoenix on a redemption expedition.

With these two major incidents happening one after the other, the Silver Tribunal became famously influential in multiple Star Domains within the eastern part of the Empire. ‘Iron Fury Stone’ also often coordinated with some of their actions, causing quite a stir.

Moreover, the decisions made by the Silver Tribunal, backed by their original strong force and support from ‘Iron Fury Stone,’ always materialized. They also managed to get the headquarters of the Imperial Inquisition to sign off and approve their judgments.

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