The Martial Unity

Chapter 4116: Undone Casualties

The pathwalkers in Sirius were exhausted. Most of them hovered weightlessly in the vacuum of space, too tired to move around. Many of them had damaged exosuits. Around them was an ocean of debris of rock and esoteric matter, from the bodies, created from the destruction of the golem army left behind by Garg after he ’shed’ his outer skin.

Defeating them hadn’t been easy, even though they had a majority of the warships of the Unified Gaian Space Forces and a large majority of all pathwalkers in the world, including two thousand Martial Sages. It spoke to the sheer amount of power that just one specimen of the Gargantian Hive possessed.

There was a hive of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of them out there.

This realization made all of them feel small. They were truly insignificant to the forces that existed in the Milky Way Galaxy. They felt this even with the Laminar Civilization and the Nebulars, but it was terrifying to realize just how massively outgunned they were.

And it made them understand why the Emperor of Water wanted to expand their civilization aggressively. Ten thousand stars in ten years was impossible, as far as they were concerned, but even that was impossible.

Then there were the corpses of their dead comrades hanging in outer space. The sheer toll that this battle had taken on pathwalkers was immense. And it weighed down on a lot of other pathwalkers more than it did on the Martial Sages.

The Martial Sages were psychologically prepared to lose their lives in any battle. This was the reality that came with being a Martial Artist, and it was something that most Martial Artists made peace with when they chose to walk the Martial Path.

The other pathwalkers, however, didn’t have the same indifference. They mourned their compatriots more. They expressed more grief and anger than Martial Sages, for Paths had different meanings and cultural significance in other civilizations beyond simply being warriors. The violent purpose of Paths was something that was unique to homo martialus living in the Panama Continent.

RUMBLE

They froze as ripples through reality swept through them.

The bodies of corpses shimmered for several seconds as countless microscopic quantum tweezers ran roughshod upon their corpses, altering the biochemistry of their bodies.

Crushed corpses, ravaged corpses, torn corpses, it didn’t matter what the state of the corpses were; the countless quantum tweezers swept across them, weaving their bodies back together.

Weaving their lives back together.

RUMBLE!!!

The pathwalkers strewn across space widened their eyes with shock as their fellow comrades, many of them at the Sage Realm or the equivalent in other Paths, opened their eyes despite having undoubtedly died at the hands of a golem onslaught.

Not a single one of them could even fathom what had happened.

Except Kane.

”Rui, you damn bastard,” Kane grinned as he saw several Martial Sages wake up. The Martial Masters among them remained in a coma despite also having been returned to life.

Pure bewilderment and astonishment washed over everybody in Sirius.

On the other side of the wormhole, Rui smiled. ”Just this one time, since I put you lot up to this.”

He didn’t intend to become a resurrection machine for everybody for the next ten years as they conquered ten thousand stars. Though it was worth offering it as a service exclusive to him if they were willing to pay an exorbitant price.

’You have achieved your goal.’ The voice of Jormungandr drew his attention as the serpent pushed against the very fabric of space to draw closer to Rui. ’Now what do you intend to do?’

Rui shifted his attention back to the lava globule before him that had hardened into rock. It became clear to him that the lava was merely a protective layer of sorts. The true mechanism for terraforming Gaia into a gargantian was the primordial seed and the existential equation, a metaphysical equivalent of human DNA.

”...Now, we accelerate towards the stars,” Rui remarked with a serious expression. ”We have obtained everything we need. Now, we just need to dedicate everything our civilization has towards interstellar conquest.”

He turned towards the serpent knowingly. ”What do you intend to? Now that you have achieved freedom?”

’I do not know,’ Jormungandr remarked, flicking its tongue in a very snake-like manner. ’I have never thought of it. But for now...’

He turned towards Gaia. ’I think I will stick to doing what I have always done; protecting my home world.’

RUMBLE

Gaia tremored with ecstasy at the suggestion.

”You intend to go back?” Rui raised an eyebrow.

’I will protect her within this solar system,’ the Jormungandr reaffirmed. ’I will ensure that no force, whether they are nebulars, laminars, or gargantians or whatever, will be able to harm her.’

Rui’s ethereal eyes lit up at those words. ”That’s reassuring.”

It meant that he didn’t constantly need to be in Gaia to protect. The serpent had proven to be an extremely formidable combatant. Of course, its prominent presence would not be unseen by distant civilizations, but since light took a long time to travel across the Milky Way, he wasn’t too concerned about that.

”Sir,” the voice of the Supreme General rang in his ears. ”The space force has returned to Sol through the wormhole. We no longer need to keep it open, for now at least.”

Rui turned towards the wormhole as he spotted the last of the countless fleets finally returning through the wormhole back to their solar system, heaving a breath of relief as he finally let go of the wormhole, allowing it to collapse.

The moment he switched off his Martialverse, the consequences had already begun manifesting.

WHOOSH

He began fading out of existence.

”Man, this would suck so much if I hadn’t figured out a way to overcome this,” he muttered, watching his body fade out of existence, turning towards the serpent. ”See you soon.”

WHOOSH

Just like that, Rui Quarrier faded out of existence.

Operation Gargle had come to an end with an unexpected conclusion, but a success nonetheless. Gain Civilization had gotten its hands on rapid, large-scale planetary reproduction.