The Martial Unity

Rui watched the admiral grow moved by his words, feeling a surge of gratitude, admiration, and even reverence towards him.

“Yes, Your Majesty!” she saluted him. “I shall choose to remain here by your grace and pursue the mission of extracting all the resources we are able to in Sirius, including this gargantian specimen.”

He smiled at her. “Very well then. So be it. I shall live up to my word and send you all the resources you need to continue your mission. For now, remain on standby.”

BZZZT

He ended the call, heaving a soft sigh. A part of him felt a little guilty for manipulating her, but the gargantian specimen was simply too interesting and too filled with resources for him to ignore.

He had reached a stage where controlling people was effortless. His insights into people with his predictive systems of thought had risen to extraordinary levels. He was able to plot out countless possible futures for ordinary people, based on the responses he gave them.

It allowed him to steer the conversation in exactly the direction he wanted. It would be too much of a waste for Pioneer V to return to Sol after discovering something so interesting and valuable as a member of the gargantian planetary species. WHOOSH

He floated in outer space, slowly moving towards Gaia. After he had opened up a portal to the three distant light-years, he had transferred his consciousness from his previous vessel to his new one, allowing him to return in the blink of an eye, overcoming the cost of the Transcendent Realm once more.

It was something that he could do limitlessly.

Perhaps that was the reason he made Admiral Soehok do what she did even though he knew that they were dealing with civilizations and species that were more powerful than anything that they had ever done before. He was a Martial Transcendent who had bypassed the limitations of Transcendence. That made his strategic power astronomically greater than what a normal Martial Transcendent would be capable of.

It gave him confidence that no ordinary threat could best him.

But he didn’t want to grow too arrogant, so he still earnestly prepared to increase the power of Gaian Civilization by itself so that it could survive even without him. He didn’t want the people under him to grow dependent on him materially or psychologically.

In fact, if not for the emergencies, he wouldn’t have opened a portal to the distant star systems with his Transcendent power either. But given that they were in a very sensitive moment in their civilization’s development, the pros of doing so overwhelmed the cons.

“We need to grow stronger,” he remarked. “For that, we need to expand our civilization and our people across the cosmos. For that…”

He turned towards Gaia with a knowing expression. “…we need new homes. Homes that could bear life. Homes that can sustain Gaian life.”

RUMBLE…

A small tremor washed over Gaia in a strange manner. Rui smiled at that. “You get what I mean, don’t you?”

In order to spread Gaian life across the cosmos, they needed more Gaias and Gaia-like planets. Ordinarily, that would require an extremely intensive terraforming apparatus that could spread across entire planets. It was a technology that the elves possessed the greatest mastery over, but even they would need tremendous resources and energy.

“I thought it would have been impossible to get it done more easily,” Rui remarked even as he gazed at the planet, floating in outer space. “But then… the Tendril of Light told me about the gargantians.”

His eyes lit up. “Planets with esoteric matter that gained sentience and consciousness and created what appears to be a less taxing method for reproduction. They can recreate planets like themselves by terraforming other planets to be more like them through some method that we don’t know of yet.”

His ethereal eyes lit up.

“That is what I want to get my hand on.”

More than even the esoteric matter of the planet, which was certainly attractive by itself, he wanted to get his hands on how a planet was able to populate the cosmos in what appeared to be a very reasonable amount of time, considering how absurdly difficult and distant other planets were.

Most likely, the conscious planetary species had developed a method that was quick, low-energy, and low-cost in terms of resources. “Since you are also an esoteric planet, you must also be capable of reproduction as well.” He grew more eager. “Then, we can create habitable worlds for other human populations across the entire cosmos.”

That was the ambition that he had come to harbor when the Tendril of Light had told him about the gargantian species. Indeed, their greatest bottleneck was their inability to find or prepare habitable worlds in other star systems and solar systems within a reasonable amount of time.

“The Tendril of Light has already warned that my shenanigans have drawn the attention of powers across the cosmos,” Rui spoke with a severe tone of voice. “We cannot withdraw at this juncture. We must expand and spread across the cosmos. The more we spread. The stronger we will be when the threats approaching us finally do reach us.”

That was the ultimate calculus. If there weren’t impending threats from other powers across the cosmos. If there weren’t threats from the alien virus that sought to capture the Universalis Mensis. If there weren’t so many threats, then perhaps he would have been inclined to explore the universe in a more relaxed manner.

But unfortunately, he had to play with the cards that he was dealt. And as things stood now, Gaian civilization was in great danger. And it needed to grow strong enough to protect itself from the threats that would undoubtedly come to harm it.

Rui quickly sent a command to the Directors of the Panamic Space Organization and the Panamic Space Force.

“Prepare for the capture of a gargantian.”

The organizations accepted his command without hesitation, rushing to make preparations for the operation.