Chapter 28: World-Targeting Weapon
Just as Joshua and Nostradamus once again engaged the Void Mother Beast in a chase battle within the Far Light Star System.
At the Sixth Orbit, Neptune Star Fortress, due to the loss of most of the psychic energy particle sensors along the way, the tense atmosphere was spreading within the current Midgardian fleet command center, though they could not know the details.
"Hurry up, is it debugged yet?!" The First Fleet Commander paced anxiously in the meeting room, occasionally glaring furiously at the empty light screen, sometimes looking up to gaze at the distant cosmic space, letting out heavy sighs. But what this middle-aged Midgardian did most often was urge the technical department for news in an impatient tone.
"And because of our own, approaching us!"
"Why?!"
Instantly, almost everyone in the entire command center was stunned, but they were all elites selected from thousands, and immediately snapped out of their shock. A Midgardian with a chest full of medals on his military uniform guessed with a grim expression: "Could it be that the two void beings who came from the home planet have already been dealt with by the Mother Beast?"
This overly pessimistic idea was immediately unanimously ignored by everyone present. Manipulating the light screen, the Third Fleet Commander, Xina, displayed the detected gravitational trajectory before everyone. His facial muscles were tense, but he analyzed calmly: "No, the Mother Beast's trajectory change is very abrupt—rather than having dealt with the enemy and naturally coming over to annihilate us, it's more like it suffered some kind of attack and urgently turned back!"
In other words, it was driven away. Everyone understood the implication behind these words, but no one dared to agree with this guess, because it was even more unbelievable than the previous pessimistic idea—they had seen the Void Mother Beast's psychic gravity shield before. That was a defense that could barely be penetrated only with the blessing of the Void Saint, even with countless light spears firing in unison! Unless those two void beings could push a dozen-kilometer-class large meteorite to crash into it at extreme speed, even Xina couldn't think of any way to break the Mother Beast's psychic shield.
And in fact, this commander was not wrong. The Void Mother Beast had indeed been forced to turn around awkwardly by a giant meteorite accelerated to an unbelievable degree.
But the damage it suffered was far less severe than it appeared on the surface.
In the vacuum of space, the giant Mother Beast was still moving at extreme speed. The spacetime distortion caused by its massive mass mixed with psychic energy even crushed the small meteorites and void monsters along its path into powder. At the same time, countless scattered injuries on its body were visibly recovering.
Green blood flowed backward as if alive, returning to the body. Charred, severed muscles rolled and reconnected into complete parts. Thick, sturdy chitinous shells and various tumor-like organs spread and regenerated rapidly on the outer layer and inside the Mother Beast's body, like mushrooms swelling after rain. In the eyes of Joshua and Nostradamus, who followed closely with furrowed brows, the Mother Beast's power, constantly absorbing void monsters as nutrients, was quickly recovering to its peak.
The old mage even suspected that the opponent might suddenly stop and counterattack—if that happened, despite how enthusiastically he and Joshua were chasing now, they would have to turn and evade again.
"It won't turn back."
Suddenly, Joshua spoke. He seemed to have seen through Nostradamus's inner worry and said in the spiritual link: "It already knows our power is enough to harm it, so until it replenishes enough inorganic matter from the asteroid belt and restores its psychic shield generator, it won't risk attacking us again." Saying this, the warrior's tone was certain, which reassured the old mage somewhat. But then he immediately changed his tone: "However, regardless, it is after all a chaotic lifeform, so I can't be sure whether this Mother Beast will act according to common sense—"
"Then why are you chasing so urgently?!" Hearing this, Nostradamus almost stopped the teleportation in his hands. He immediately asked: "Chasing so closely, if the Mother Beast suddenly turns to attack us, we won't be able to evade and will have to take it head-on!"
At this moment, the distance between the two legendary experts and the Void Mother Beast was only about two hundred kilometers. Given their speeds, they would collide in less than a second.
Hearing this doubt, Joshua shook his head with a deep gaze. He said solemnly: "We have no other chance—at least in the short term, this is the only opportunity."
"If the Void Mother Beast restores its psychic shield, it will be almost impossible for us to inflict the same kind of damage as before on an opponent that is now on guard. Killing it would be extremely difficult; we must inflict irreversible major damage in one go."
"If we don't want to fight a prolonged chase battle lasting months within this solar system against this monster, we absolutely cannot let go of every opportunity!"
Joshua's reasoning was not wrong; even Nostradamus understood this principle—for this giant chaos minion, the previous setback was just a moment of carelessness. If the two sides had seriously engaged each other from the start, the two of them would definitely be at a disadvantage. Neither side could do much to the other, and the battle would turn from a brief blocking action into a prolonged mobile war with the star system as the battlefield. Who knew how long that would take.
If it were just Joshua alone, without the old mage, it would be a pure war of attrition. The Mother Beast had not yet shown any attack that could overcome Joshua's defense, and the warrior would have no way to quickly eliminate the endless void monsters and break through its psychic barrier so rapidly. The difficulty would increase at least tenfold.
"Can we go any faster?"
Being carried by the old mage through multiple short-distance teleportations, Joshua did not continue on this topic. He asked: "This distance is still a bit far; I can't attack the Mother Beast."
"Not that I can't, but you're too heavy. Your mass affects the opening of the teleportation channel. If I go faster, I can't guarantee the accuracy of the teleportation."
"..."
While the two were discussing the upcoming battle, both Joshua and Nostradamus noticed that the Mother Beast, after healing most of its injuries, was beginning to rapidly transform its life form.
On the dark green flesh body, a layer of cold black-light shell shield covered it. On the front part of its body, fragile compound eyes were covered with a thin layer of transparent crystal. Dozens of reproductive cavities, each as large as a mountain range, were all sealed shut, covered by thick shields. The Mother Beast's previously spherical body was also elongating into an oval, spindle-like form.
In addition, countless tentacles of the Mother Beast, accompanied by intense life force conversion, began to rapidly degenerate, finally turning into short, sharp bone spurs covering the surface of the oval body—unlike the 'Fortress Mothership' form it had shown against the Midgardians and the Volpi people, the Void Mother Beast had now completely transformed into a combat form specialized against super lifeforms!
After all, it was a legendary-rank chaos minion. Even without much intelligence, its combat instinct allowed it to know how to self-evolve and adapt against its enemies. The moment its form transformation was complete, countless sharp bone spurs, originally degenerated from tentacles, flew off its body surface. Then these dense, star-like black bone spurs, like cannonballs, flashed with deep green psychic light and shot toward Joshua and Nostradamus!
But this kind of purely physical attack was fine against Midgardian warship clusters but meaningless against the warrior. Joshua simply condensed a Steel Sword in the void and used massive gravity changes to distort the trajectories of these bone spur projectiles. The residual effects even hit the Mother Beast, shattering large areas of its shell. The Mother Beast was not annoyed by this failed attack; it grew another batch of bone spurs on its surface and fired them again. This time, the bone spurs had the ability to change trajectory through psychic energy, similar to missiles or torpedoes.
This internal chase and counterattack within the star system spanned several astronomical units. Neither side could do much to the other, and in the end, they both arrived at the asteroid belt.
The Anboya Asteroid Belt. Presumably the remnants of a small planet shattered by a super meteorite wandering from outside the star system. Long stretches of dust zones and countless huge metal rocks orbited along this former planetary orbit. It had remained peacefully in this star region for millions of years, but now it welcomed several uninvited guests.
The Void Mother Beast twisted spacetime, propelling itself with psychic energy. It rapidly flew toward a dense meteorite area. In front of its body, the giant mouthpart, like that of a lamprey, slowly opened, revealing countless dense, immeasurable sharp 'teeth.' This crushing device, capable of grinding a ten-kilometer-class meteorite directly into debris, was eager to complete its mission, bringing large amounts of urgently needed various minerals to its body.
But how could Joshua and Nostradamus sit by and let the opponent restore its strength like this? At this moment, the old mage was ready. He activated the special magic array constructed during the previous chase, and layers upon layers, over a dozen giant thunder rings appeared in the vacuum. Joshua's giant body was at the very end of these lightning rings, feeling the powerful electromagnetic acceleration force around him. The next moment, as Nostradamus fully activated the array, the warrior's body, like a cannonball accelerated to the extreme, passed through over a dozen electromagnetic acceleration tracks in an instant, crashing straight toward the Void Mother Beast!
Behind the Mother Beast were hundreds of huge psychic propulsion streams. If inside an atmosphere, each propulsion stream would be enough to blow away a city. This was precisely why the two had been unable to catch up before—these powerful propulsion streams caused them great interference. But now, with Joshua's current physical strength and speed, mere propulsion streams could not do much to him. So, a few seconds later, due to the relative speed difference, the warrior almost collided with the Mother Beast.
The reason it was 'almost' was because the Void Mother Beast, to avoid Joshua and prevent this troublesome enemy from reaching its body, changed its trajectory, allowing Joshua, who had overtaken it, to get ahead. But this was exactly what Nostradamus and the warrior wanted. Having temporarily surpassed the Void Mother Beast in speed and arrived at the previous dense meteorite area, Joshua swept his eyes and quickly activated the Fusion Core Heart furnace on his chest—immediately, under the effect of Steel Force, all matter related to repairing the psychic shield crystals in this large area was absorbed by him. What he couldn't absorb temporarily, he destroyed completely, ensuring that even if the Mother Beast absorbed it, it would take days before it could use it.
You want it? I won't give it!
This was the least technically sophisticated countermeasure. If the Void Mother Beast didn't evade, Joshua would reach its body, making zero-distance or even negative-distance contact. At that time, this Plague Evil God's minion would probably experience what the Famine Evil God's minion, the Calamity Evil God's minion, and part of the Atmosphere Evil God's remains had felt before—and if it evaded, the Void Mother Beast, having changed its trajectory, would definitely slow down, allowing Joshua to overtake it. Then the warrior would use his Steel Force to rapidly collect the trace precious resources it needed, sending the opponent away empty-handed.
To this, the Mother Beast showed neither anger nor hesitation. Seeing that the resources it needed were collected and destroyed, it immediately turned and flew toward another meteorite-rich area. It was a chaotic creature; while not entirely without reaction, it certainly wouldn't have overly intense emotions. Since this area was useless, it would go to the next. In terms of attrition and stalemate, it didn't think it would lose.
But even the Mother Beast itself could reach this conclusion, let alone the two legendary experts? So all this was merely a trap set by the two for the Mother Beast—just as the Mother Beast changed direction and flew toward another matter-rich area, Nostradamus, who had not moved since electromagnetically accelerating Joshua forward, stood still, raising both hands above his head. Between his hands, familiar and massive spacetime fluctuations were gathering.
—Target locked.
—Trajectory predicted.
—Beginning acceleration, attack deployment preparation, 10, 9...
Apart from its thick shield, the Void Mother Beast's most troublesome aspect was its speed, completely inconsistent with its size. As Joshua had suggested in his four proposals during the conversation with the Mother Tree back at the Midgard home planet, the Mother Beast's speed made it impossible for it to be hit by an asteroid. The previous hit was only possible because the Mother Beast was temporarily halted by Joshua's full-force strike. Now, the Mother Beast evaded as soon as it saw the two approaching, making the previous method useless.
But how could such a disappearance stump Nostradamus? Since the enemy wouldn't stand still and let itself be attacked, he would make it actively move toward the direction he wanted to attack!
The first asteroid belt the Void Mother Beast chose was hard to determine, but the second was much simpler. So the old mage prepared his means, letting Joshua arrive first to seize the resources in that area. If the Mother Beast fought Joshua on the spot, Nostradamus would have the opportunity to guide a meteorite attack. If the Mother Beast moved toward another asteroid belt, the old mage, having already calculated where the Mother Beast would go, could predict the lead and continue bombarding it with meteorites!
The next instant, as a deep blue crack tore through space, swallowing light, a giant asteroid, larger than the previous one and equally fast, was guided by Nostradamus to crash toward the Mother Beast, which was heading toward another dense meteorite area! Given the distance between them, with the movement lead already calculated, the Mother Beast had no chance to evade!
Boom!
As the asteroid rapidly crashed into the Mother Beast, which tried in vain to evade, a terrifying explosion that shook the heart once again appeared in the Far Light Star System.
Endless shockwaves immediately shattered the flesh on the Mother Beast's side that was hit, dispersing into organic blood mist spreading over hundreds of kilometers. Temperatures exceeding ten million degrees burned these still-living tissues to ash. Even the sturdy shells and bone spurs were melted by the erupting flames.
The energy aftermath formed spectacular giant waves. Violent electromagnetic radiation spread at light speed toward other regions of the Far Light Star System. Months later, Midgardian fortresses built elsewhere in the star system might lose communication and observation capabilities due to this delayed impact. But for now, the only one affected was the directly hit Mother Beast—the compound eyes of this giant chaotic creature were crushed and exploded by the immense force capable of shattering continental shelves. Its entire oval body was bent into a long concave shape.
"Success!"
The old mage showed a confident smile. Facing such a huge enemy, even with Nostradamus's extensive war magic knowledge, he didn't know what to do. Without Joshua constantly holding the front, he couldn't have released so many powerful spells. The Void Mother Beast was a terrifying and troublesome strong enemy for each of them individually, but now, under their coordinated combination attacks, it was repeatedly wounded. This was the power of wisdom and cooperation!
But not far away, Joshua, who was rapidly flying toward the Mother Beast's area, suddenly paused and forcibly stopped his movement. He first frowned, seriously looking at the meteorite impact area covered by flames, shockwaves, energy radiation, and smoke. Then his expression changed, and he shouted loudly to the old mage in the spiritual link: "Dodge!"
"What?!"
Although he didn't understand why, the old mage's keen reaction speed immediately carried out the warrior's urgent warning. Nostradamus immediately split spacetime, revealing a deep blue spacetime door, and stepped into it. The next instant, just as the spacetime door had not yet closed, the area where the Void Mother Beast was, originally completely covered by smoke, suddenly lit up with a blinding light like a supernova explosion!
—Zzzz————!!!
A thick, blazing white laser, like a white line dividing the entire dark cosmic space and splitting the star river in two, swept across the area where the old mage had been at nearly 300,000 kilometers per second. The powerful energy even brought up patches of plasma clouds in the cosmic vacuum. Countless electric plasma and jumping blue arcs leaped and vanished in the vacuum, decomposing and breaking down all matter along the way into the most basic particles!
Inside the blazing white light, temperatures exceeding 300 million degrees were enough to destroy all matter. Although the light only flashed briefly, lasting less than a second, it was enough to annihilate everything in the mortal world. As the light disappeared, the distorted and deformed massive body of the Void Mother Beast behind it appeared in Joshua's eyes.
The chaotic minion's oval body had been smashed into a concave shape by the meteorite summoned by Nostradamus. But although it was severely wounded, it was not killed. It hadn't even lost its ability to counterattack—the warrior could see countless fleshy tentacles and tubular appendages covering the nearly shattered meteorite, even penetrating into it. This Void Mother Beast did not use its powerful psychic energy to tear apart the meteorite that had severely wounded it; instead, it used its devouring assimilation ability to absorb it as urgently needed supplementary resources!
It could be seen that the area where the Mother Beast's compound eyes had been had turned into large patches of raw crystal ore—temporarily generated biological tissue for laser resonance. Powerful psychic energy mixed with black chaotic force was spreading over it. It was a weapon, and also one of the Void Mother Beast's trump cards—a world-targeting destruction weapon capable of destroying planetary surfaces with sustained irradiation.
The light stream dissipated, and the area where Nostradamus had been.
Was empty.