The Martial Unity

RUMBLE!!!!!

Argenton gritted his teeth as he unleashed an onslaught of superluminal laser beams at the Divine Mothers. Each laser beam was made out of an impossible light that was produced by Legislated matter. The laws governing the electromagnetism of his machines were already highly divergent; the speed of light was much greater, allowing him to successfully snip them with attacks that they couldn’t react to.

But that was it.

VMMM!!!

BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM BOOOM!!!

The Divine Mothers easily withstood his attacks without much effort. Their bodies were much tougher than he had expected, but more than anything, with even a little bit of effort, their Webverses could make them practically completely immune to his offense.

”How. Weak,” the Shredder clicked with contempt. ”Just. Give. Up. And. Come. Here. Obediently.”

She swung her arm, causing a net woven from extremely sharp and piercing webs to swing at him. The attack, as a whole, had enough power to reduce an entire planet to little cube-shaped pieces, but the power was distributed along the scale.

Argenton activated his HSOBL System, converting his entire body into pure light to smoothly pass through the grinding net of sharp strings.

WHOOSH

”He. Turned. A. Light. Beam.”

”How. Irritating.”

The system was inspired by Bodhisattva Maitreyi’s signature technique that she had acquired after becoming a Transcendent Candidate. Even the name of the system, the HSOBL System, was an abbreviation of Heavenly Step of Boundless Light, the name of her technique. The fact that she was able to achieve it at all meant that this was possible within the laws of Physics. He had managed to create a technological system that allowed him to harness it in battle, although he hadn’t achieved the mastery of it that the Bodhisattva did.

More than anything, the light that his body converted to was much faster than the ordinary light. This was one of the reasons that the Divine Mothers had yet to capture him despite the fact that he was so weak.

But that alone wasn’t enough.

”Your. Mind. Remains. Regardless. Of. Form,” the Mindstitch spoke with a cold expression. ”I. Will. Subjugate. Your. Mind. In. A. Web. It. Shall. Never. Escape.”

She raised her hand in his direction, but before she could infiltrate and control his mind, a powerful sense of threat behind forced her to abort the effort, defending herself.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM!!!

The Mindstitch’s expression grew ugly as she was forced to use her Webverse to defend against a truly destructive hammer attack from God’s Hammer. The powerful autonomous mech didn’t have a Verse, but it’s raw power born from the harmony of dwarven creation, the Transcendent esoteric technology its frame was infested with, and of course the Legislated laws of its body.

It was also much larger than them, giving it the size advantage as well.

In terms of raw output, it vastly exceeded the Divine Mothers, which was why they needed their Verses to close the gap. An opponent that didn’t have a Verse should have been very vulnerable to having their information manipulated.

And yet, the glowing halo of fractal geometries around the mech made it clear that this was not the case for this creation. The Flowing Wisdom armor technology that Dwight had created had already proven itself able to slow down Verses and grind them down with a highly dense and swift river of information that made crossing it very difficult.

”What. A. Quaint. Vessel. But...” The Mindstitch’s six eyes flared with intensity. ”It. Is. Only. A. Matter. Of. Time. Before. I. Infiltrate. Your. Mindweb!”

She could sense the integrated information of the artifact, a rather remarkable novelty, even if it wasn’t unprecedented. But in this case, it meant that the artifact was susceptible to her attacks. If it had been a lifeless artifact, she wouldn’t have been able to do much to it, since she specialized in minds.

But thanks to its creator endowing it with consciousness, she could successfully subjugate the mech and use it against Argenton.

The mech could clearly sense this. It fought with everything, even at the cost of its own health, to kill the Divine Mother at all costs.

RUMBLE!!!!!

CRACK CRACK CRACK

Cracks began spreading across its frame as it pushed itself to the very limit, wielding its the hammer in its hand with all the power that its dark energy reactor could muster, allowing it to bombard the Mindstitch with an onslaught of physical attacks.

Yet, the Mindstitch remained calm.

Even though she wasn’t specialized for physical brawls, at her level, she was still strong at it. The mech’s attempts were in vain. It failed to inflict so much as a scratch on her body. At the same time, the Flowing Armor technology didn’t have the ability to resist such powerful Verses. Rui’s armor was constantly bolstered by his Martialverse, which could resonate with it thanks to its water-like nature. But God’s Hammer lacked this advantage.

It could only struggle to slow down what was an inevitable outcome.

Far away, Argenton let out a soundless scream as three Divine Mothers surrounded him. The Shredder, the Webslinger, and the Netweaver found it annoying to try and capture a beam of light that moved at FTL speeds, but they managed to leverage their Verses to alter reality within the battlefield.

The young Transcendent had put up a good resistance considering his youth, but had ultimately been caught.

”Rgh...! Damn you!” Argenton cursed as the three of them bound him tightly with a web that could capture even light.

”O-ooo—o... We. Caught. Him,” the Shredder called out to the Mindstitch fighting God’s Hammer. ”Switch. Places. And. Extract. The. Knowledge. I’ll. Handle. The. Mech... Let’s. Finish. This. Before. The. Emperor. Of. Water. Does. Something.”

All of them could sense how intense the battle between the Emperor of Water and the leader of their faction was. It was shocking to see that the Emperor could take on one of their very strongest arakai head-on and not lose. They didn’t want to tempt fate. They wanted to finish this as soon as possible and go home.

The Mindstitch nodded calmly even as God’s Hammer grew more desperate. But not even the desperation and the self-sacrificial bid for power were enough to stop the inevitable. The two switched places as the Mindstitch went over to the restrained Argenton.

Yet, before she could infiltrate his mind... the world shifted.

The entire solar system shifted.

Half a million kilometers away, revolving around Gaia, a giant serpent finally opened its eyes.

Just that very action alone sent gravitational waves across the solar system.

Its pupils slowly shifted towards the eight Transcendent presences in the battlefield some distance away from Gaia as a single thought from the serpent rang in their minds.

’What... what is this?’

Its reptilian eyes fell on the unfamiliar alien creatures that were tormenting pathwalkers it was familiar with.

The Mindstitch’s six eyes sharpened.

”Go. Back. To. Sleep... Long-bodied. Creature.”

She pointed in its direction, exerting her Webverse upon its mind.

That was a mistake.

Jormungandr’s eyes flickered.

’You are an enemy.’

RUMBLE!!!!!

The world shook as the World Serpent mobilized its truly unfathomable, astronomical might as a creature of the Transcendent grade.