Soul of Searing Steel

Panda Novel

What is darkness?

It is all that exist without light.

The path ahead is unseen, no hope could be felt.

It is desolation incomprehensible and unfathomable, a terrifying unknown, silence and deathliness.

That was why the Multiverse was currently dark. The cosmos were divided, civilizations could not come to mutual understanding, and the path ahead was cut off by the grand cycles and Evil Gods, leaving a hopeless tomorrow—if even that was not considered darkness, then nothing was dark at all.

So, how could the darkness be repelled?

Quite simply, there was one thing that had to be done, whether in reality, in imagination, in the mind, or for others.

That was to ignite a fire—the fire of discontent against everything, the fire of resistance.

***

Sporadic lights flickered over the dark Multiverse. Those were the light of worlds and civilizations over the main background of profound shadows. It was bright one moment and dark the next, shining and vanishing as they fluctuated, but one could see that amongst the boundless galaxies spread over the multiverse, there was a shadow that resembled a root—consuming, spreading, and infecting over all directions, passing on darkness.

Joshua van Radcliffe stood at the midpoint of the Dark Galaxy, staring at the center of the galaxy which exuded endless Chaotic presence. The Giant God could hear the sounds of a world breaking, and that Star the Steel Python was gradually awakening in the stabbing pain as the World Barrier slowly collapsed. Even so, being drugged by exceedingly profound darkness, the superior being crawling in the Void had reached out with its tentacle into the world, using it to open paths and a vanguard.

Countless massive monsters were gathering at the center of the Dark Galaxy as well—there were spheroid, grotesque, and fearsome breeding Mothers, just as there were elaborate and lethal insectoids that appeared to have been crafted out of crystals. Each specimen of both species measured over thirty kilometers long, with the largest having a body comparable to that of a gas giant.

Nonetheless, their titanic forms did not mean that they could not perform delicate processes: powdery energy particles hovered above the skin of those monsters, swirling like twin spirals to mold chunks of plates. Those particles would erupt in thunderous rumbles should they have fallen into a world with an atmosphere, absorbing substances and other energy to rapidly grow into various curious combat spawns.

The monsters surrounded the largest star forge cluster, silently waiting. It did not take too long that, with the song of something breaking emanating into their minds and the stares of multitudinous spawns, the white nebula began to distort like flowing mercury, reflecting near pure-white radiance. Then, even that light slowly turned into a massive vortex that was 2.5 lightyears wide, expanding at an astonishing rate as if something was crashing down from worlds beyond, and manifesting a near-solid projection.

It was a Permanent Void Portal—one that was several times larger than the last.

Pure white light reached out, engulfing the many waiting monstrous behemoths with no lack of planetary-sized specimens. Even so, they were all entirely reduced to nothingness when touched by the light, although the waiting Chaos spawns neither retreated nor showed fear, simply prostrating themselves in reverent anticipation instead.

Then, in a split second, darkness exploded from the center of the vortex.

A dark shadow—or, to be precise, a fragile doorway in the shape of a circular dimensional rift directed to the Void beyond, had opened. It expanded like ripples over still waters, immediately taking up one-thirds of the vortex surface, its indescribable Void-like darkness that even appeared colorful consuming the existing pure-whiteness.

The paradoxical spirals of black and white swirled in opposition to each other, while four shadows resembling nebulae shot out from within, sinking into the vast nebula cluster of the silver star.

The first presence revealed was barrenness. Where the darkness passed, cosmic energy was stolen while nebulae lose their light. All rays and radiation also disappeared as if being eaten, and the complete deaths of dozens of outer shells of stars while their cores collapsed into white dwarves or neutron stars occurred, creating a chain of supernova eruptions before a transparent form of twenty-four sides seemingly forged from crystals appeared out of nowhere.

Within the form was a rotating dark nebula, emanating Chaotic malice of despair in all directions, leaving all things in the state of post-death barrenness.

Famine has appeared.

The second presence was a ‘pause’. Wherever the shadow passed, stars and planets would stop where they were as if in a photograph—motionless and non-responsive as if time did not exist to them. Then, those stagnated stars soon collided with other planetary systems moving normally in the dense cosmos of the star forge cluster, and amidst the dazzling explosions that rapidly cooled after and motion clashing, a black cloud that resembled a clock appeared.

Observing from different angles, the hands of the clock appeared to point at different directions and scales. One could even see the images of finality for countless worlds, and it stayed still if the observer did not move. The Chaos malice of death would hence spread, disrupting the boundaries of motion and stillness.

Limbo has appeared.

The third presence was ‘splitting’. Objects were breaking apart and energy mutually consuming where the shadow passed, with everything from light of different spectrums, waves of different frequencies, or energy and objects of different intensities becoming minute. Celestial bodies that were once whole thanks to gravity utterly crumbled as the shadow flashed and disintegrated into clusters of varying clouds, with space itself being distorted into a layered structure. Then, in the instant all things were categorized so intrinsically that they were no longer connected, a dark halation that resembled mosaic appeared.

Each colored mosaic piece was composed from countless different hues, incessantly divided and categorized until the limits of observation, that even the observer was assimilated—eventually, the brain and the eye were no longer connected, and the hand and heart no longer in synchrony. The Chaos malice of perplexity spread, driving all things towards separated destruction.

Divide has appeared.

With the fourth and the last, nothing could be felt, observed as there was nothing, as if not a single thing had ever happened. There was neither presence nor threat, for neither darkness nor shadows were present as if it was all merely an illusion.

However, just because it could not be seen did not mean that it was not there or non-existent—there was no Chaotic presence or anomalies, and save for the fact that the fourth indeed existed, nothing was certain or clear, just like the hairless primates that pointed at the tiny stars upon the night sky, grinning as they claimed that the universe was bright.

Avoidance has appeared.

The spawns cheered, surged, and squirm at their sight, those endless monsters fluctuating like tides with their tidal numbers that could obscure the light of a thousand stars. Their rulers, lairs, or even true forms had finally returned, having finally received new orders to learn about their other purpose beyond spreading and destruction.

***

Meanwhile, Joshua and the Triple Curtain looked on as everything unfolded—witnessing the advent of Evil Gods.

Starlight was simply too thin compared to the gods which consumed worlds, the source of darkness that guided the movements of countless Chaos spawns across the entire Dark Galaxy. Despite being markers for direction and guiding beacons that had been used over eras as tools for exploration and observation, in the instant that those ancient remains of civilizations and present-day Evil Gods appeared, the many armadas of the Stellar Guard shuddered, before sensing some profoundly terrible darkness striking towards them.

The desolation, death, terror, and unknown…the presence of those corpses left by ancient civilizations resembled the very essence of the Multiverse.

“Civilization…is just like fireworks.

Like fireworks on the curtains of darkness—dazzling and beautiful, yet so brief that they were reduced to wafting smoke and dust in the blink of an eye.

[Alert: Radcliffe, the Evil Gods have concealed the silver star. They are working together to expanding new Permanent Void Portal. Warping over certain zones would be affected, and if we don’t stop…]

“We’ll stop them,” Joshua replied determinedly, recovering from his musing. While his four hands summoned weapons, the Giant God growled, “Those Evil Gods are essentially Superior Void Entities, used as anchor points for exploring and invading Stellaris…the Chaos spawns must have gathered the power to summon their parent forms through their extended invasion, but the Stellar Guard’s Great Turnaround had ruined their plan.”

In the first place, those Chaos spawns and Evil Gods would not have had the strength or chance to maintain their offensive inside and outside the Stellaris World Barrier after the last Permanent Void Portal was destroyed, but now things appeared to have change.

“I understand now…the first to invade Stellaris must be Chaos spawns summoned by civilizations within, while their aligned Evil Gods must not be nearby Stellaris but spread throughout various corners of the Multiverse.”

As incredible gravity distorted the dimensions around Joshua that even space itself was malformed and no longer a Giant God, the warrior advanced, the warping of space pulling him forward.

At that very moment, Joshua understood something.

It was not the Sublimator Virus that controlled the Evil Gods and had them invade Stellaris, but that it had spent a very long time and tremendous effort in search of those Evil Gods summoned to Stellaris by their spawn. Then, by using them as beacon and guide, they would open the portal that was large enough to accommodate it.

If an analogy had to be made, the Evil Gods and their hordes of spawns were merely one doorknob.

“That’s why even if the thousands of Stellaris civilizations spent millennia resisting and repelling them, it’d be merely splashes made by fish in the ocean that is the Multiverse.”

Leading the Triple Curtain’s clone and advancing while distorting space, he moved swiftly while warping intermittently, and the duo rapidly approached the center of the Dark Galaxy.

They sensed the thickening Chaotic presence and the ever-growing manifestation of malice. The Triple Curtain’s intelligence was alert like never before, and while they wielded great power, today might be the very first time that they engaged in direct conflict.

Joshua, however, was different—he breathed in the Chaos presence that was far fainter than the Darkest Abyss, his heart unaffected.

Civilization is like rainwater.

Rain that falls upon the sea in the dark night.

Rain which falls quietly and unbeknownst to all over the vast sea. It would silently knock upon the sea’s surface and create many ripples, even stirring little tides—but neither the sea nor the fish within would feel it, nor be concerned.

Therefore…

I will not be the quiet and discreet rain.

The speed of distortion motion had virtually swapped the coordinates of the Giant God in the universe like teleportation. Because it was invincible, even the speed of sound that would affect distortion was ignored—in the distorted space, Joshua’s movement appeared to be hundreds of times beyond lightspeed to external perspectives, with rings of blue-white light appearing before his eyes. Where he passed, his speed would tear apart all stars and planets unlucky enough to run into him, reduced to dust or expanding nebulae in the dimensions forced into distortion. For that brief moment, it was hard to say which destroyed more planets: the Evil Gods or the warrior.

Once they had warped through the sealed area, the Triple Curtain did not hesitate to bring Joshua along in the leap, covering the distance of a planetary system in minutes.

I will be a cyclone.

A cyclone capable of destroying land and overturning the seas, blowing the fishes of the deep into the air and exposing the depths where none had reached over ten thousand years beneath the sun.

I will have heaven and earth change, burning and crushing all that is old—and hence be the burning, cascading cyclone like an inferno.

The hordes of Chaos spawns in the Void could now be seen. Blocking the skies and light, the millions of Chaos behemoths wandered through space, but the profound gravitational tides and surge of dimensional cyclones destroyed even stars—what more were the horde to dust towards it? Everything was decimated instantly, reduced to tiny particles of dust.

Almost.

[Warning: The Dark Galaxy is just ahead. Radcliffe, that is the heart of the lair which belongs to Chaos spawns and Evil Gods.]

In distorted space, the Triple Curtain spoke in a tone unlike ever before.

[Somber: The battle is about to begin.]

Joshua did not reply. His eyes flowed with red-hot radiance.

The warrior clenched upon his weapons and his future—for the battle was about to begin.