Soul of Searing Steel

Panda Novel

In the heart of the Dark Galaxy, the jubilant Chaos spawns suddenly paused and promptly turned towards a particular direction.

That particular course was simply darkness devoid of any illumination. Even brilliant radiance shining from dozens of thousands of light-years away would only reach them dozens of thousands of years later, whereas the sub-lightspeed particles and gravitational waves carried forth by the continuous distorted space would destroy everything in its wake. Naturally, it would only happen dozens of thousands of years later—as long as the cone of light had yet to reach them, it would not have happened or indeed even existed for them, who were at a faraway spot.

That was, unless they possessed senses beyond lightspeed or were lightspeed recon troops, or perhaps illogical Void alarms from beyond the world.

Whoosh—

In space, warp halos of all size shone as waves of Chaos spawns assumed formations. They were so many that they could cover entire systems and block out a massive zones spanning light-years as if they were a nebula. It was a tide of aberrations that the thousands of stars in a galaxy had nurtured, a horde that could drown everything if they spilled out.

Now, those aberrations were moving rapidly, forming a great horde fort—a structure of flesh, the Great Wall of the Universe. Stellar-cast Void Mothers had set themselves as cornerstones for that Great Wall by adjusting their coordinates, their astonishing scale releasing all forms of Chaos spawns that filled in as bricks…if it had to be put into words, it was like a school of sardines encircling the corals undersea, with the Chaos spawns hence connected into a sturdy living stronghold.

If so-called Order was a society of ants and bees, the Chaotic Evil Gods were considered Order as well: even the strictest human commanders would have been left embarrassed and felt out of place at that well-organized formation. If their command was equal to controlling the human body for ballet, the Evil God’s command over its spawn was probably thorough Extraordinary individuals controlling their blood and cells to build a new organ.

Meanwhile, thousands of Chaos spawns were unleashing powerful energy boundaries on a corner of the massive formation, creating a rendering magnetic light. That portion of the Great Wall was also under the illumination of a giant silver star which was seventy-five times the mass of typical yellow main sequence stars, and seven million times brighter than most other stellar bodies.

The magnetic boundary of the Chaos spawns hence collided with the solar winds of the giant star, forming a circular aurora with a diameter of over eight million kilometers. Even stars were rolling marbles in the midst of that bright and dazzling aurora, and planets were as small as dust. As the raging magnetic boundary tore atmospheres and lithospheres apart while igniting them, all of them were reduced to frivolous red cinders in the beautiful background.

In that moment, the Evil Gods and their brethren were fully prepared…

And was thus pulverized.

The distorted space needed only a split second—or perhaps even shorter—to cover its ground, for its speed was more than hundreds of times beyond lightspeed that even the interior of that space was moving at 95% sub-lightspeed.

However, any individual without reflexes beyond lightspeed was fated to not comprehend what they had seen: two ‘bowling balls’ that shone in silver and silver-blue respectively had simply crashed into the billions of Chaos spawns as if they were bowling pins, pulverizing everything along their way into basic particles.

A collision of such speed would trigger nuclear reaction even with celestial dust, so what was the Chaos spawns gathered so closely? Infinite substance was at once disintegrated or fusing, causing consecutive nuclear reactions that shattered protons, neutrons, and electrons. Indeed, where the two bowling balls had struck the Chaos horde, turbid quark fluid splashed like a geyser over all directions, creating a vast shockwave that extend over two hundred light-seconds.

There was only light in that split second.

At a corner of the grand Great Wall of Chaos, a halo was spreading at lightspeed as if a fiery star had ignited over a black curtain and would not stop expanding. Exaggerated energy surges had instantly approached the extreme temperatures of the Big Bang, with the infinite spawns and Behemoths being bombarded into clouds of particles in the universe even without their knowledge.

***

[Reminder: According to calculations, we have arrived at the center of the galaxy, the location of the Evil Gods.]

The voice of the Triple Curtain echoed in the spirit realm.

“I felt that I crashed into something just now too.”

Upon realizing that, Joshua began to cease his spatial distortion and return to the normal space to sense his surroundings and the location of the Evil Gods—he realized that he had crashed a hole into the horde of Spawns along with the endless aberrations that had lunged at him from all directions.

“Basically, we can be sure…” he said, lifting his brow, “that we are indeed here.”

As he spoke, Joshua’s first right hand tightened his grip over his weapon: it was a formless sword that was essentially a gravity well. Forged purely from pure distorted space, the Giant God lifted it high above, his back facing the silver-blue sphere that was a clone of the Triple Curtain.

The last time he was here in Stellaris, he had been in a tough spot when he was outnumbered by the millions of Chaos spawns.

But now, it was futile for an entire galaxy of Spawns, or indeed every minion in Stellaris, to attack him.

Clenching his fingers and combining as one with gravity, Joshua calmly stood off against the Chaos spawns that filled his vision by 360 degrees, giving them no chance to attack as he swung his gravity sword heavily upon thin air.

The dimensions hence twisted once again, with light that moved in straight lines now contorting into a sight that resembled a vortex. Hence, swirling light, rays, and electromagnetic waves spread over every direction, forming an impregnable iron wall.

Whether larger than stars or smaller than dust, every Chaos spawn reached by the twisted space was absorbed into the deep well of gravity and churned by layers of gravitational vortices Boundless darkness was drawn in, but was unable to block out that single silver spot—they were indeed lemmings jumping into the ocean, throwing themselves into a bottomless abyss or indeed a grinder that wore everything down.

But that was merely the prelude, just like when the warrior had brandished his fist. After a certain period and having charged considerably, Joshua simply swung his sword at the heart of the dimensional vortex before flinging the blade away.

Thus, the sword erupted.

It formed a 700 light-seconds-wide dimensional vortex and in that split second, formless ripples engulfed everything surrounding like a tidal wave, with all Chaos spawns which the ripples reached being drops in the ocean, helplessly flung towards a direction that they would never know.

The grand Great Wall of Chaos was now visibly crumbling from its center as unthinkable gravity projected blasted away every spawn, the shockwave even reducing a chunk of the wall into pebbles and thrown heaven-knows-where. The spawns fruitlessly struggled within the gravitational waves, but their own strength could only ensure that they did not die too horribly.

[Reminder: Chaos density decreased to 26.43563% of initial levels.]

However, Joshua’s offensive was not limited to scattering the physical spawns. As the gravity sword erupted, Joshua raised his second right arm and reached out, making a grasping gesture at the giant star that had been twisted into waveforms by gravity distortion.

“Sword, to me!”

The star with a mass almost equal to half of the Giant God’s true form began to quake intensely. The celestial form which was over thirty-seven million kilometers in diameter and should already have collapsed now truly broke apart, rapidly becoming a supernova. Even so, that eruption beginning from the star core that could burn everything and develop heavy metal reaction was perfectly controlled—endless light, blaze and a storm of high-energy sub lightspeed particles began to take shape in vacuum, before being forged into a Sword of Heaven and Abyss which touches both light and darkness!

Boom—

The manifested blade extended through space at lightspeed, igniting endless Chaos spawn in its way while a golden-red fiery light danced and spread, triggering a series of explosions.

Joshua waved the luminous edge in the vacuum to draw some sparks, with the supernova blade drawing complex explosion arcs like a whip. Even so, the sword appeared not to be stopping, and would have spread over dozens of light-years if not stopped by the Giant God, truly becoming a Sword of Heaven and Abyss that divided the stars just like its namesake.

However, before that moment could arrive, the supernova sword that Joshua was brandishing had shot into the scattered swarms, rampantly destroying.

None could know how many Chaos spawns were destroyed in that period.

At the same time, the neutron core of the giant star had been extracted by itself before it could react, and now resembled a satellite that orbited around Joshua like a satellite. Moreover, in the distorted space and in the time where great distance was traversed, every star core which bodies had been crushed by Joshua circled him—dozens of different-sized neutron stars and white dwarves rotating and drawing a gravitational rift in space.

Their function was unknown, but soon, as a Chaotic blast came out of nowhere, striking true on a rapidly-rotating white dwarf but was deflected at once, its purpose became clear.

It was Joshua’s external defense system.

“Evil God?”

Even Joshua himself only noticed his adversary after being attacked, although he was not actually surprised: if the enemy could not actually do that, it would have already been cleaved into particles by his random swings of the supernova blade.

Therefore, in the ocean of fires where the Chaos spawns were still exploding, a twenty-four-sided crystal form glimmered with turbid and dark nebula radiance, revealing unconcealed malice of despair.

It was the Evil God of Famine.

The white dwarf which had been struck by the Chaos blast was now motionless, its light a silent darkness just like the remnants which had cooled over hundreds of years later. It slipped off from Joshua’s external defense before breaking apart as a sporadic cloud of molecules…at that instant, the gravity and electron degenerate pressure that kept it together diminished, along with its heat and angular momentum.

With neither preamble nor hesitation, Joshua had already done what he was capable of against that Evil God that he may consider an acquaintance—cutting down directly at it with his supernova blade.

Having already spread for several thousand light-seconds, the blazing blade lashed at the faraway Evil God’s crystal core like a whip. Joshua had not considered why the remnant of the former Crystal Insect civilization Yurmadais would have taken such an appearance that was not at all insectoid, and he had to attack, measuring its various abilities before destroying it.

But soon enough, the Giant God realized why the Evil God of Famine had appeared in such a form.

However, the crystal core did not attempt to move, simply unleashing formless ripples that rapidly cooled the burning blast and the Chaos spawns that were sent flying, but also reducing them to space dust.

Famine needed no appearance. It just had to satiate its hunger and consume anything that could be devoured.

The twenty-four-sided rotating form that was the Evil God of Famine therefore deliberately met the Sword of Heaven and Abyss, and consumed all light and heat like a bottomless crater.

Joshua raised his brow, watching as the supernova blaze fell into the Evil Gods’ body, its boundless energiy being eaten and absorbed whereas the twenty-four-sided body whirled rapidly, ejecting turbid dark gold energy weapons. Between breaths, a colossal dark golden crystal insect with fiery markings and resembling a dragonfly assumed form, brushing over a small star which was the length of half an astronomical unit, cutting it smoothly into two and detonating it before consuming it as well.

Beautiful, dazzling, elaborate—it would have been better to call it an exquisitely-crafted piece of art than an Evil God.

Meanwhile, Famine flapped its crystal wings after absorbing inexhaustive energy, before launching itself in Joshua’s direction to attack.

However, that was also the moment when Joshua rushed towards it on his own, with the warrior who distorted space moving even quicker than the Evil God.

“Famine?”

There was no expression on the Giant God’s face. He had abandoned all his weapons, replacing them with several violently pulsating neutron stars. Joshua’s attack was simple and direct—as the Evil God charged at him, he closed his fore arms before his chest and crushed those stars as if they were cookies.

“That greedy?”

Breaking the Oppenheimer limit ever so simply, the singularity hence formed. A dazzling burst of light appeared for one brief moment before warped and twisting into darkness—the final darkness of decimation tore space apart, causing even light to crumble.

It was a dark gravity well surrounded in an unrivaled bright ring of light and resembled an eclipse, appearing at the center of the Giant God’s four palms before his chest.

“Let’s see which of you is greedier—you or a black hole.”