Soul of Searing Steel

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Panda Novel

Great Voids separated the Galaxy of Beginnings from neighboring galaxies, with billions of years of drag preserving the balance between the celestial forms. Their gravity slowly drew the worlds that once lay between them, finally leaving the bordering Void that had sparse stars with nothing.

There was now a relatively young middling-sized realm near those borders with four planetary systems, seven stars, and one hundred and twelve planets along with uncountable satellites. Vast but lifeless, each sun was an incandescent blue and yet nurtured no life. Many Void civilizations have been reluctant to develop it due to their excessively complicated and extreme environments. Those stars have thus never been named to date, remaining anonymous amongst the Multiverse.

And yet, it had become the focus of the entire Multiverse, for a war had erupted in that place.

Bang—swoooosh!

With a terrible crash, the ‘sound’ of a World Barrier shattering reverberated throughout the Void. A blinding psionic speck was pierced away along with the World Barrier by a vast white ray and gravity beam invisible to the naked eye, crashing at sub-lightspeed towards the furthest star from that realm.

Boom!

Collision of the psionic speck against the outermost blue surface of the star caused an astronomically observable gap, almost fourteen times more massive than a main sequence sun, to appear on the stellar form. Having turned oval due to high-speed rotation, the star’s surface caved in at once like a bitten apple, the hundred and twelve-thousand-kilometer-long gap being considerable even for a star.

The struck star shifted violently to restored its balance, but that collision had destroyed its cycles and constitution. The luminous dot directly pierced through its photosphere and chromosphere to shoot deep within, and radiation unimaginably powerful to ordinary civilizations and celestial gases resembling yolk ejected outward into a massive jet extending billions of miles long. From afar, it was as if the blue sun had pursed its lips to spew a stream thirty million degrees hot—perhaps even hotter, a raging wind that would not die down but instantly destroyed stellar bodies.

At the speed of light, the unlucky star’s planets were destroyed in the first, fourth, eighth, thirteenth and fifty-fourth minute respectively. One of the planets and a gaseous giant were fortunately beyond the trail of explosion, but were still pulverized in the ensuing detonation of the star. Only planets that were very far—over two hundred light hours away—could survive, but their form would have still broken under the bursting solar storms.

But everything that should have happened did not take place.

Such a sight greeted Joshua and Imperator Amos when the both of them had directly warped into that realm: the blue star which should have exploded at once from the pair’s combined might was dimming unusually, the bursting sun’s gases only spraying for a bit before diminishing. The seventy-million-kilometer pillar of flame was cut short halfway through, pulled back by the star’s gravity unto its surface. Affected by a mysterious power, the blue star slowly reverted to its natural cycles.

The energy that should have destroyed all things vanished—or more precisely, was intercepted by someone halfway through.

Meanwhile, a luminous psionic speck returned to the planet’s surface from its core. All of the Grand Patriarch’s war robes, weapons and elite jewelry were parched. His body, however, remained unharmed—though not totally unscathed after having absorbed the power of an exploding sun. It was nothing too serious—Joshua and Imperator Amos’s joint attack had indeed forced it out of the Rabricated Realm, but they were both probing each other, giving him time to stay on guard and recover.

Thus, psionic light, a small silver star, and the super nebula containing more mass than the blue giant could be seen standing off against each other solemnly. Nonetheless, the latter two’s unthinkable mass had once again disrupted the inner balance of the mid-sized realm, distorting the planetary systems’ orbit so that they slowly approached and whirled around the three individuals. Some of the stars had actually been torn apart by those complex and profound gravities, and their remains circled along an oblong orbit in desolation.

There were no exchanges or words precisely because all three were wise, innately talented, and had cultivated themselves as weak physical creatures that walked on planets to superior lifeforms that fed on stars. Mind games, interactions, and mutual understanding hence did not require ineffectual language—they merely needed to observe and determine body structures and strengths of the others to reconstruct a likely growth progress in their heads. That had also been the reason that all three were aware of the others not being ordinary lives that would compromise: they would not bargain, retreat, or allow any form of concession to their enemies on any level.

From a certain perspective, they were all individuals with existences far more abnormal than that of humans. Therefore, only battle was needed—the victor would gain all authority, with the defeated scampering away or accepting death.

The Grand Patriarch stared at Imperator Amos, his ancient nemesis that was as dazzling as a nebula. He was one of the rare few lunatics in the Multiverse, with legends telling of how he had consumed the Amos species’ homeworld, and then the entire system, on the very same day he had decided on his path to refinement. It sought greatness radically and was demanding even to its own subjects, which was why all alien races were naturally unforgivable, thieves plundering his future powers.

Indeed, Imperator Amos believed the Multiverse to be his future wealth, and that everything was a part of his power, food yet to be consumed. It was a natural order that the strong consumed the weak, and it was a great sin for food to resist—why resist when it was a great honor to become one with the Imperator?

To reclaim his treasure, he would destroy every life in the Multiverse, and the Amos species’ survival was merely a reward for their service ever since the Imperator was born. Furthermore, he needed life to maintain a soul cycle in his body in the future, and if that was the case, would certainly pick from his own kind.

On the other corner was a faraway visitor form the mysterious Lost Galaxy, the place where the ancient Forerunners were said to have lived. The leader of the small silver planet appeared tiny, but gathered the power to destroy all things, and origins and intentions of this galaxy remained unclear and shrouded in mystery. With the Combined Fleet of many champions breaking through the long distance of the Ruin Pit, were they agents of ruin or another powerful race that wish to advance into the Multiverse?

Even so, it was a pity that the Multiverse was full and had no remaining spots. The wars between civilizations, the roaming Void Behemoths and World Eaters, destruction, and the vengeances leveled again them were in play at any given moment, in accordance to the foretold end where all things were claimed by ruin. The vast spheres of substance had no safe harbor, much less ability to accommodate another powerful race. With that thought, the battle thus started.

In the same split second, all three combatants attacked at once. All twelve runes over Galgur’s head shone, a vague whirling purple-green vortex appearing behind him to swallow him into a majestic psionic luminescence. By the next instant, a massive psionic boundary of twelve colors more dazzling than rainbows unfurled at ninety-nine percent light speed, inflating and directly devouring attacks from Joshua and Imperator Amos.

A bright detonation that had to be computed in units of ten thousand kilometers and a gravity blade that cut stars apart were all devoured by the ring boundary formed by the twelve psionic stars. It swiftly enlarged, spreading and tightly enveloping the dimming blue star, absorbing near endless energies.

It was a celestial body of psionic cycles—a Spectral Wraith.

Having surpassed boundaries of limits and exceeded the ‘Psymaster’ class of typical psionic Legends, boundless psionic energies would hastily convert everything with form to become their own. While the twelve-hued psionic boundary spreading, both the star pulled into its fold and the emptied vacuum dust were completely consumed, with the Spectral Wraith’s body enlarging in that process of eating and assimilation.

Through it all, innumerable luminous psionic orbs—pure luminous spheres and flickering stellar bodies that floated in vacuum without whirling—darted away from the Spectral Wraith’s body. Those spheres were soon, however, accelerated by a power beyond the master, molded into planet-devastating light particles that streaked towards his opponents like a rain of hail.

Despite that, would such a blow have had any effect? While that profound power would have been apocalyptic to an entire ordinary armada, it had been nothing more than a soft snowball to the other two combatants.

Imperator Amos trembled in silence, his massive form accelerating and rotating. It was a spiral that stirred space itself and drew light particles within its folds, tearing them apart into halation with complex gravity shift and then consuming it. The nebula that resembled a luminous jellyfish raised a single tentacle, its tip conjuring a crystal the size of several planets. Then, as the crystal burst out with infinite ring ripples within, each formed sharp blades that slashed directly at the psionic circle throwing planets. Absolute empty domains were created with every spreading ripple, emptying momentum from everything while turning limbo space and time into weapons, cutting down with the might of destroying a star.

Nemesis for countless years, the Amos race and the Takurians had risen from the same stars when Imperator Amos and the first Grand Patriarch each finished refining their lifeform. Endless years of battle gave them such great understanding of each other that one would have always attacked the other even in a free-for-all.

Of course, that had not meant that Joshua was able to stay out of the matter.

As a matter of fact, he had been jointly struck by both the Imperator and the Grand Patriarch, since they were each attacking and being attacked by the other two. A series of anti-matter particles were blasted rapidly at the warrior’s silver star amidst the dark multiverse, but ever so distinct in Steel Strength vision, they resembled black dots on a white sheet of paper. On the other side, a colossal power emanating from a non-physical realm was ‘helping’ the warrior collapse into himself, ‘kindly’ shrinking the warrior’s neutron star battle form further into finality.

But it was meaningless—the anti-matter cannon or psionic pressure meant nothing to Joshua at present. Away from his fleet, allies, world, and galaxy, the warrior did not have anyone, anything, or even a future to be cautious over.

Thus, with sonorous laughter, he released the first ‘seal’ layer over his body.

First, a shackle of light and heat.

A faint sheet of silver light around the silver stellar body dispersed—Steel Strength no longer emanated powerful radiance in tandem with its owner, but began to unleash near billion degrees heat. The God of Steel, with his first seal released, decimated all color and concept in the surrounding dimensions, with only pure whiteness and light darting away in arcs.

With part of its fundamental form now unraveled, the neutron star resembled a white hole due to gravitational lensing. All the Imperator and the Grand Patriarch’s Spectral Wraith form could see from astronomical units away were a series of rapid sky-blue waves warped by gravity, shrouded in a circle of blue light and cloud-shaped rays, lethal and beautiful.

Light ignited every floating particle in the vacuum just as great power caused electrons to detach. Neutron beams broke shattered proton cores, causing series of fission even while raging light consumed oncoming dark matter cannons, and planet-sized fireworks began to burst around the incandescent stellar form.

The second seal of electromagnetism was then released.

The seal shielding the planet from contact with beyond so the neutron star remained harmless, able to even move alongside the Combined Fleet, was let loose. Three astronomical units of protons were pulled into a needle shape as all that had form were broken, the very essence of existence shifting. No energy or substance could ignore a gravity field of such scale. Like ink dripped into hot water, the formless psionic pressure changed drastically, rolling and crushing, and with a dull grunt in spirit, the Grand Patriarch’s attack was severed at its root.

In that very moment, the combative form of the rotating neutron star transformed. Dark-red divine circuits had spread over the white-hot planet surface, branding it with mystical runes belonging to Joshua, while rays shot out from his two poles just like solid blades, whirling and cutting through the universe.

Finally came the third sealing layer: gravity.

The star that should have emptied all matter around warped the dimensions like a heavy ball of lead that dug deep unto a soft couch. Imperator Amos’ absolute zero strike cut directly through the distorted dimensions, while the Grand Patriarch’s beam breath, capable of incinerating a giant star, was diced into pieces. The four-handed Giant God’s form was no longer optically visible—it would have been otherwise incomparably distorted, akin to a demon god climbing out of a deep gravity well. Within that abyss of unobservable gravitational force, he closed his palms, withdrew his arms and punched out.

A trail of dimensional collapse over ninety million miles long extended vertically at lightspeed, striking towards the Giant God’s enemy with the profound force of destroying a star.

***

Beyond the realm, a living world where a civilization was yet to enter the Void grew.

An alien scientist resembling a seal was turning on its Void scope by habit, prepared to study the fringe galaxy’s empty and silent Void.

However, in that very moment, the entire dark Void shone.

Before it was able to even react in shock, surprise, or fear, the scientist’s eyes were scorched by powerful light that transcended the Void. It fell down and rolled around in agony, and before its assistant and a research intern could help it up, another unparalleled brightness illuminated the world yet again.

Three more supernova lights appeared partially from the stars that hung permanently over the skies. A twelve-hued gleam had combined with pure whiteness and a blue luminous bundle to portray a piece of art that stretched across the sky. Beyond dreams, volatile and vivid, the World Barrier was a canvas that the champions colored, obediently marked with their powerful essence.

Countless falling stars could be seen darting in reverse, gathering from the edge of the skies towards the three stars. Those were the remains of uncountable worlds that wafted in the Void, their sturdy construct untouched by the grinding of dimensional turbulences—they simply streaked past, leaving brief afterimages.

The skies were now a three-part portrait, and it turned out that it was during a slaughter between the greatest champions of the entire Multiverse when the seal-like race first observed otherworldy beings.

***

In the Void, the supermassive nebula lifeform had revealed its combative form of endless bone frames and leaves, along with a swirling dimensional vortex. He was like a small artificial Void Vortex that incessantly absorbed the Mana Tide energies and matter fragments around himself, with some miniature continental worlds chewed and consumed with his layers of gravitational power that acted as teeth. Meanwhile, Imperator Amos’s gradually enraged spirit embodied borderless rage as it swept through the stars.

“Futile resistance.”

“You two are really destruction incarnate, agents of ruin… you are enemies of the Multiverse!”

Having assumed the Spectral Wraith form, the Grand Patriarch’s existence was permanently between a state of illusion and reality. He would keep avoiding Joshua and Imperator Amos’s blows, his great saucer psionic cycle form raising a shrine at its own center, summoning mysterious divine power from afar. Boundless, anonymous, and unknown, it gathered upon the shrine, jumbled with the psionic energy of various radical emotions, to mold myriad-colored shield, weapons and machines to counter the blows of his two opponents.

“Interesting.”

Unfatigued from the pleasure after fighting for who-knows-how-long, Joshua was utterly enjoying the process, unlike the raging Imperator and the reproachful Grand Patriarch. Even if the three-sided battle was unwittingly pressed towards the range of engagement between the Combined Fleet and the Knowers under the combined might of the other two, Joshua was not worried.

Our mass is causing time to distort. The brief battle is actually one or two months for the outside. Even if there were to be errors, Barnil has probably completed the Dimensional Hub.

Indeed, the warrior even found himself taken with the Grand Patriarch’s accusations. An agent of ruin? What a joke—he was ruin incarnate, although he was only that for the Evil Gods: destroying to destroy ‘destruction’, a ruining which ruins ‘ruin’.

But finding Joshua to be seemingly relaxed and nonchalant, both Galgur and Imperator Amos released a massive cluster of information to affect the warrior’s mind.

“You believe that you would succeed in raising a dimensional rift at the edge of this galaxy?”

The Grand Patriarch’s psionic blasts were as sharp as his spirit. “The other champions of my race have warped there with the beacon I’ve left. Do not imagine that your delaying brings you advantage!”

“My subjects are heading for your lair—delusions of occupying the Imperator’s wealth? Only your fall awaits you!”

However, right after the message was dispatched, Imperator Amos once again began to clash head on with the Grand Patriarch. Compared to a foe from a foreign world, both were much more bent on their nemesis’ destruction.

Joshua was not surprised by the message, unlike the other two who had different expectations.

Not even the warrior himself would be capable of forcing a teleportation to the Zeta Ram system with the Dimensional Hub on standby. The two were, at most, hurling verbal threats and were nothing to fear. Barnil himself was no slouch, and as long as the pair did not head for the Hub with their true forms, the Rune Master who controlled every resource in the system would be able to teach any who dare ambush them a lesson.

More words were therefore unnecessary. Joshua drew divine weapons cast of light from his two poles and joined the fray.

The Void beyond the world was at once filled with flames, every corner and every system flickering with explosions and light.

The brightness of the stars was easily shrouded while the remains of a world slowly collapsed behind them. Seven stellar forms had already been killed or consumed into mass of energies for the conflict, with teleportation and warping as way of transportation. Every inch within seven thousand light-hours were their standard battle area, just as vast worlds in three point two light-years were an inescapable range.

Lightspeed blows were merely fundamentals, devouring and converting all objects to the most mundane of energy restoration moves. Celestial mass reassembling and creating objects were essentially comparable to mortal platelets closing wounds, their breaths draining quantities used over thousands of years in non-Void civilizations.

Warping dimensions, splitting protons, absolute guard, unconditional deflection, destroying elements, and turning enemies’ attack on themselves… powers that sounded like a child’s boasts were turned into reality, loyally obeying their masters’ control.

Light shone upon the Void, dragging an extended luminous trail. All world barriers along the way without civilization and life docilely marked the sight of that battle—in millions of years, when species growing within step out into the Void, they would clearly see former sights of that ancient, glorious battle upon the barrier of their homeworld.

It was a battle that eclipsed worlds, fought between Extraordinary champions in units of galaxies.