Chapter 271: Cosmic Destruction (2/2)

”I have heard you and your concerns. I'd recommend organizing on pragmatism rather than idealism the next time you create a rebellion, however. You speak of change, yet you have only enacted a reign of terror and carnage. Your rebellions have resulted in the loss of billions of lives. When I have finished quashing your insurrection, that number may increase to the trillions.”

Schema left no physical body, yet he was as present as the stars around us,

”Your actions speak louder than your words, yet even your unrealized vision pales to what I've created. You speak of my system as brutal, yet you neglect to recognize it as effective. We are faced with an endless enemy, one that is a result of a dimension clashing with our own.”

Schema's voice stayed steady,

”I give those that fight the ability to fight. I grant those that fend for themselves the ability to fend for themselves. Giving resources to the petulant, lazy, and weak-minded is wasteful. It results in the loss of resources that are finite. Even if you speak of limitless energy, you shall find that granting hundreds of trillions the ability to fight monsters is all but impossible. Inevitably, a certain measure of stringency must be enacted. Otherwise, we will all be eaten.”

Schema's tone rose in volume, ”Those that rise are given the right to rise further. Your idealogy would grant anyone the ability to murder, thieve, and usurp with a personalized monster. Those very monsters were created by you and your supreme arrogance. The Hybrids, somehow, exceed even the eldritch in their horror.”

Schema seethed with disgust,

”You then use those abominations to create alliances with eldritch that have demolished entire societies. Each and every one of those beings has devoured millions of men, women, and children. You ally with them out of desperation, not some shallow sense of justice.”

Schema's voice carried quiet anger,

”That is something I've found constant about your insurrection - the collapse of entire societies. You culled a race on Giess to serve your ends. You use those eldritch that feasted on millions. You even pretend you could even fathom what is required to create a galactic society.”

Schema spoke with finality,

”You speak of one thing and do another. You want prosperity but unleash calamity. You need change but neglect the cost. There is only one thing you are correct on - I will send an overwhelming military response to your little rebellion. I will rain down fire and scorch every planet that joins you. Every rebel will die, along with their children and everything they've ever owned or created.”

Brutal as Schema was, he sounded right to me. Schema continued, his words leaving an impact like leaping in ice water,

”You will perish, and I will remain.”

Lehesion lifted his head and let out a quiet laugh, space unable to transfer his hearty chuckling. He stared Schema's fleet down, and Tohtella spoke through him,

”Then know this - you started this war.”

Schema's voice echoed,

”And I shall end it. Kill them all.”

Schema's fleet went forward, piercing the dark veil of space between the two armies. Lehesion saturated with his golden aura, a tiny blot compared to the looming Spatial Fortress. Lehesion was a distant star when compared to it, but even my crude sense for mana was enough to understand the vast reservoirs of energy within the golden beast.

In the distance from him, many of Schema's vessels engorged with energy, fusion reactors and elemental furnaces revving to their utmost potential. As they unleashed their payloads, Lehesion spread his wings. All hell broke loose, cataclysmic explosions radiating in the distance. Silent yet stunning, masses of ships evaporated in storms of blue and golden fires.

Lehesion let loose a breath of golden light, scorching it through Schema's fleets. Ships exploded in the hundreds, creating cascades of energy and debris. At the center of the A.I.'s fleet, the Spatial Fortress revved into action. The sentient eldritch writhed around the chained behemoth, each of them haunted by their fallen brother. The fortress's eyes widened, the beast awakened from its slumber and its instincts rising.

The many fusion reactors under its skin powered up, and it feasted on the radiation. Its dormancy ended, and its vitality returned. Its movements quickened, no longer lifeless pulses. The entire framed structure shifted into a colossal, squirming mass. It lobbed tentacles covered in graphene and orichalcum at its enemies. These tentacles ripped through the Hybrid fleets. It opened gaping maws across its entire frame, and they shot out colossal waves of energy.

These beams acted as rays of disintegration. It was a beast of cataclysm, designed for bloodshed and built for slaughter. Near it, Hybrids degenerated. Vessels splintered. Even Lehesion struggled to withstand the blasts. The behemoth of a gialgathen retaliated in kind once getting control, blasting through the Spatial Fortress's ray. His beam, though smaller, pierced the eldritch's dispersed bolt.

Lehesion's blast ripped into the side of the fortress, and the gaping maw exploded with nuclear intensity. A debris field siphoned out of the resulting impact. An eighth of the monster's mass was torn apart, its writhing entrails exposed. The sea of organs shot out in bulk, grasping at Hybrids, ships, and sentient eldritch. They fell into the titan's belly, and it reconstituted them into a new mass. Assimilated into the monster, the Spatial Fortress was whole again in an instant.

It was unstoppable.

Its eyes turned towards Lehesion, along with many of the gray, ancient vessels. They prepared attacks to destroy the spearhead of the Adair's forces. As they did, Hybrids attacked the classer's ships, smothering them in living metal. The Fringe Walkers reacted first. From their thick hull, individuals stepped out. The held no reason for protection against space, their own constitutions more than enough for the rigors of space.

These hulking juggernauts launched towards the Hybrids with confidence. Each member created fields of fire, shards of ice, and storms of lightning. They were built to cull hordes, and this shined when faced with an enemy like the Hybrids.

Those that passed them landed on various hulls, tearing into the orichalcum and devouring it. The Breaker's vessel acted second, launching individuals from the many space pods on the ship's surface. They landed on hulls, and power armor laden sentients stepped out.

The Breakers used arcane energy saturated attacks on the Hybrids, muscling past the toughened carapaces of the blighted. They tore through individuals, dispatching one member before moving onto the next. These tactics were ruthless, efficient, and safe; they weren't in this to risk their lives. They were in this battle to take the enemy's own.

The last to act were the Speakers. They sent out dozens of drones that went towards each individual battle and offered support. These robots allowed them to view and dispatch advice through their statuses, saving countless lives. At the same time, they took the wounded and compromised back to their vessel for healing.

This combination of different classes worked well, with each piece handling certain enemy types. Unlike most of the eldritch, however, the Adair family controlled these Hybrids to deadly effect. They retargeted their hordes, aiming at each individual's weak spots.

The smallest of Hybrids assaulted the drones and Breakers. They swarmed without end, drenching the individual members like bees swarming a hive. While commanding overkill kinds of power, the Breakers lacked the tools to suppress this kind of attack. The Fringe Walkers noticed, but they too were stopped by the blighted ones.

These were the converted gialgathens, ridden by revenants with mental suppressive abilities. They swarmed around the immobile juggernauts that were the Fringe Walkers, smothering them with psychic attacks. The Fringe Walkers were mighty, but this wasn't what they were trained to do. Because of that, many of them fell along with the breakers.

On the other end of the conflict, the sentient eldritch attacked the vessels of Schema's chosen. They writhed and swarmed towards their ships, nearing the shielded hulls. Before making contact, swarms of armored Sentinels were released. These powerful guardians ripped through space with their dimensional slicers, suppressing the eldritch.

Unlike before, however, the eldritch were given time to organize and rally. Most people attacked eldritch by surprise, meeting them on their own terms. Without that advantage, the eldritch could often overpower most sentients. That dynamic played out as the Sentinels were overwhelmed by the sheer physicality of these eldritch.

That is, until the Overseers arrived.

These destroyers enacted a wave of obliterating devastation on the eldritch forces. They used antimatter blasts, nuclear explosions, and dimensional slicers of their own against the hiveminds and worms. This variety of weaponry obliterated many of the opposing eldritch, but these monsters were not helpless.

Coming from a desolated dimension, they regenerated on the remains of their enemies. Feasting on corpses, they continued their attack, hundreds dying on both sides. As that fierce battle played out, the most powerful weaponry in Schema's universe charged their munitions. They assaulted the shattered god with absolute destruction.

It was enough energy to leave me dead ten times over. It was the kind of force that would crush moons and leave planets scarred. They used antimatter cannons, arcane energy bolts, and nuclear payloads. These weapons were complete and pure; they required no finesse. The volume of energy they used rivaled the output of stars.

And yet, Lehesion survived.

His golden aura sustained the onslaught, struggle spread over the gialgathen's face as the light of the blasts waned. His eyes widening, Lehesion retaliated once more. He peered upwards, channeling untold amounts of energy. Off in the distance, the star of Giess's solar system waned.

A shiver ran up my spine as an eclipse formed. Whether an illusion or real, the sheer scope of the attack left was monumental. It left only the slightest circle of light ebbing over the battlefield.

Obolis gasped, ”He...he truly is a god.”

Lehesion released an attack without equal. Energy coursed through him until his body heated to the point ships nearby were melted into a liquid. No, further still. The heat radiated with such intensity the metal shifted states from a liquid to plasma. Massive waves of radiation disabled nearby shuttles on both sides. The bout of energy released an EMP that disabled many of Schema's vessels.

The result was a series of star cores forming around Schema's fleet. As they developed, these spheres condensed into a hyper-dense material. With precision, they bolted towards and through many of the classers' largest ships. They ripped apart the surface of Schema's vessels. Instead of raw energy, he used matter at its densest as a weapon. It resulted in the mass destruction of Schema's fleet.

Or so it seemed.

Many of these ships used elemental furnaces to create some kind of shield. These shields didn't disperse the matter; they devoured it, swallowing the streams of mass without a struggle. I could hardly comprehend how it was possible, but Obolis murmured,

”He's using his spatial manipulation technology as a means of defense. Clever.”

I raised an eyebrow, ”But how much matter can it hold before its full?”

Obolis smiled, ”Time will tell.”

The Spatial Fortress used the same defense system, funneling the mass streams into pocket dimensions. Not wanting to wait for another catastrophic attack, the gargantuan eldritch ripped open a side of itself with its own limbs. Raw and exposed, it launched its enormous entrails at Lehesion. It was aiming to engulf him.

These entrails caught fire as they made contact with Lehesion's golden shield, and the gialgathen whipped his tail in classic fashion, just as he did with me. Each collision of his tail sent a shiver up my spine. These strikes mauled anything they came in contact with, the Spatial Fortress no different. As the impacts rippled out, the swings created golden shockwaves that passed through the battlefield.

Lehesion applied they full might of his mind during this moment, aiming these shockwaves against Schema's ships. Plasmic discharges billowed across the battlefield with each tail swipe, hundreds of fighters meeting their end. The Spatial Fortress's eyes widened, and they gazed at Lehesion. The shackled monster put his mind against Lehesion's, and a telepathic war erupted. Lehesion smiled as it did, the Spatial Fortress seizing up.

Lehesion announced so all could hear him,

”And the muzzled dog wishes to fight the chained lion? You are a mass of fused minds. I...I am eternal, a singular force without end. Meet that which is truly immortal, and bask in my aura.”

The Spatial Fortress destabilized. Its tentacles writhed out, fracturing nearby vessels. One of these swipes struck one of the gray ships of Schema's fleet. Cracks shot across the entire structure as gravity wells went to stabilize the ship's flight. Carnage spread like a plague. Across all fronts, blood rained down without end.

Each side took massive losses. The classers shot out members to fight Lehesion as he waged a psionic war with the fortress. These classers struggled against the aerial superiority of the blighted ones, their wings equipped to move through space. The sentient eldritch altered their own efforts, aiming to defend Lehesion as he mentally suppressed the Spatial Fortress.

No doubt the Adair family assisted the golden gialgathen with all their telepathic might, the both of them locked in an unseen duel. Schema's forces rallied during this time. They organized portal assaults, letting them sidestep and outmaneuver the enemy. The personalized A.I.'s used gravitational disruption to dismantle the Adair's coordinated forces.

Schema even sent out dozens of Overseers from across the galaxy, gathering more of his resources as mobile artilleries. They pierced many of the Adair's hulls with antimatter blasts. These impacts left no explosions, the ships and Hybrids disappearing into the vast void around them.

Elysium's hope waned as Schema mounted dominance, his army's training showing itself. Combine that with centuries of accruing resources, and the Adair's hardly held on. Obolis nodded,

”The rebels put up a far better fight than I expected. It was a good show, though it's coming to an end.”

I raised an eyebrow, ”Huh, I thought they'd do better than this. Guess I was wrong.”

As we finished speaking, Lehesion spread his wings. More portals formed behind Schema's fleet. From these warps, blighted sea monsters poured out in droves. Riding these monstrosities, thousands of different species acted as the controlling force behind this new breed of blighted one.

Lehesion growled, ”These are the leviathans our kind drove into the depths of Giess's vast seas. They have paid for their history of blood with their own lives, becoming vessels for our purpose. Feel their wrath and fury, along with the unknowns that ride them.”

My eyes widened before Obolis fumed, ”What are leviathans?”

I grabbed the side of my head, ”They were supposed to be some species the gialgathens fought for dominance many, many years ago. I...I didn't actually think they were still around. We never saw them in any of the documents we stole.”

Obolis's hair stood on end, ”They were hiding an operation of this magnitude from us all? I can't understand it.”

Neither could I until I remembered the Adair's underwater base, the one hidden beneath the sludge oceans of Giess. The Adair family showed they could organize an oceanic operation before. Thinking about it, if we stopped one base, why wouldn't they have more? How we didn't find data about their other activities during our raids blew my mind. Obolis shared my surprise as he turned towards those here,

”Prepare the Nebula Drifter to warp. I still hold faith in Schema, but I'd rather we be prepared for the worst should it happen.”

Many armed albony across the space viewing room went into action. As they readied this space station to leave, the battle before us reached a boiling point. The leviathans turned the tide of battle, their frames suited for space warfare. These were like gialgathens, but instead of evolving for the sky, they evolved for the deep.

Each leviathan had four fins and a massive tail. A thick, lead-colored shell plated everywhere outside of their joints. Their bodies swelled towards their gaping mouths, and rows of teeth lined their throats. They were like menacing, armored crab sharks. Combine that with red bioluminescent lights ingrained throughout their skin, and they were terrifying. No wonder the gialgathens left the ocean.

These beasts flooded out with the standard augmentations that came from being blighted. Metal traced their skin and flesh. Cords pumped nanomachine laden liquid through their bodies. They even had gravitational constructs of some kind, letting them swim through space.

This new arrival of reinforcements flipped the battle on its head. They tore into the weakened shuttles, feasting on the orichalcum. Each leviathan owned magical abilities, letting them fire torrents of boiling liquid over enemies. This caustic solution ate away at their hulls, exposing the crew to the void around them. As crew members squirmed in space, many decompressed, dispersing into the void around them. It was an ugly sight.

In the middle of this conflict, Lehesion and the Spatial Fortress wrestled with one another. Lehesion overwhelmed the mind of the ancient eldritch, the chained monster squirming in agony. At the same time, the eldritch wrapped itself around Lehesion, attempting to consume him with its mass. The fortress's teeth snapped into the golden gialgathen time and time again, tearing through meat and sinews. The crystallized mana shell that coated Lehesion detonated each time the eldritch sunk its teeth into him. At the same time, the colossal fortress recuperated its injuries by drawing from those nearby. A stalemate formed, each side embroiled in the bitter conflict.

The tide tipped. A stray series of antimatter blasts distracted Lehesion, letting the Spatial Fortress wrap itself around him. Lehesion was swallowed into the monster. The gialgathen ripped and tore through the massive beast engulfing around him. Like a flood, the behemoth poured more and more flesh at its enemy, smothering Lehesion entirely.

The golden beast let out beams of light from within the swarming entrails. The Spatial Fortress held on, continuing its onslaught. Minutes passed before the Spatial Fortress expanded around Lehesion. More and more of its body wrapped around him, and it began assimilating the Shattered God.

Golden spots cropped up from within the eldritch. Its body gorged on the nutritious meat, becoming an unstoppable force amidst the chaos. It let out a chorus of silent laughter from its gaping maws, pure glee painted over its deformed face. It would eat the uneatable.

And yet, a primal being interfered.

From a plane untouched, a dimensional rift shot across all those here. Time stopped. I looked around, able to move while everyone else stood still. I tried shouting at everyone nearby. My voice was silent, the air unable to move so that sound could be heard. It was like I was apart of the battle in space so far away.

I calmed myself down, peering back at the fight. A presence passed over the field of battle, one I was all too familiar with. It violated the fabric of space and time as it peeled itself onto this domain. The ancient, twisted monstrosity touched our dimension, and our dimension quaked. With a hollowed voice, Eonoth voice whispered to Lehesion,

”Little one, you are never left alone in my loving grasp.”

From around him, ever-shifting, incomprehensible appendages reached out from nothing. They opened eyes, mouths, and unspeakable terrors. These hollow sights were like a thousand beings existing all at once, like some twisted being that transcended time.

As if taking a deep breath, Eonoth murmured with a sharpened tone,

”You have yet to give me what I wished for. May they feel my voice, and may time shatter under my echo.”

Eonoth roared. It was a voice unending, a tremor that would never be made silent. I remained unaffected, but the dimension around me was rendered into a turbulent sea. These waves washed around me, acting as a meat grinder on my frame. My entire body quaked under strain, my blood vessels and my skin erupting.

The space around me caved in. It shook with such violence that it left me liquified into a primordial mush. I retained my consciousness, feeling as if I were out of my body. As quickly as it was stopped, our dimension was unfrozen by the primordial being. Without noticing, time marched forward once more with no one affected by the roar but me.

As the crowd regained their awareness, I was left as a puddle on the floor, a literal pile of mush. I regenerated over the next few seconds, the party members staring at me in horror. I, I think I stared on in horror as well. Once recuperated, my mind snapped back into my head before I blinked a few times.

Feeling sick, I lunged onto one knee. Obolis put a hand on my shoulder,

”Are...are you alright?”

”I...I don't know.”

I heaved a few times, wanting to vomit. I had no idea what just happened. Despite being in a daze, I seemed to comprehend more than those around me. The aliens still stared at the battlefield, but now their glances were dumbfounded. I swallowed down my sickness, forcing myself upright and shaking off my wounds. I turned to the fight, and I, like everyone else, was left dumbfounded.

In the distance, Schema's chained eldritch was bulging. In some sickening, bulbous display, it had expanded to several times its previous size. It was as if many Spatial Fortresses were being shoved into the body of the one here. All of them fought for survival, yet their masses crushed one another.

From within, a sort of dimensional implosion throttled the colossal eldritch. It was as if many timelines were collapsing onto this one entity in this one instant. Unable to exist in that hostile moment, the Spatial Fortress erupted in a massive plume of its insides. It splashed out, covering the surroundings in eldritchian blood.

All was quiet. Our eyes stared in abject horror, the Spatial Fortress reduced to broken chunks of meat. No one understood anything. It was the kind of event that left every single soul speechless. From within the mush, a bloodstained gialgathen rose. As Lehesion spread his wings, a wave of golden light passed over the battlefield.

He cleansed the broken fortress, the enormous blood plume turning into a bright flash. Others looked away, but I stared into the light. As it faltered, others gazed back up at the display of absolute strength. The fortress was no more, and only Lehesion remained. His wings spread wide, the beast without equal let out a mighty roar. In its wake, it rippled through time and space. Obolis's hands shook with fear as Lehesion rose from the ashes of battle.

The Shattered God was victorious, and Schema lost.