Evenheiler’s esper power characteristics seemed peculiar... In the past, Lei Ting hadn’t given it much thought, but it was a question worth pondering.
However, while the visual effects of Evenheiler’s abilities were known throughout the galaxy, their specific mechanics remained classified, much like most of his combat records.
*I’ll look into it later...* After all, as the former strongest esper of the Human Federation, Lei Ting felt he should understand the man, if only out of respect for a powerhouse and a war hero.
As for that deep canyon cutting through the planet’s poles today...
Without having witnessed the moment of its formation, Lei Ting didn’t dare draw a definitive conclusion about its cause. But he was certain of one thing: if it was the work of some passing esper who had casually wiped out Prince Hataan, that individual’s power might not necessarily be greater than his own, but their control was undoubtedly more refined.
He had observed that the bottom of the rift possessed a certain curvature, which was why it hadn't split the planetary power core directly. The damage to the core had been pinned at a delicate threshold—one where it wouldn't explode as long as it was cooled. Achieving such precision with a "direct damage" type of attack was incredibly difficult.
While Lei Ting could manipulate metal to achieve a similar effect, if he were to launch a direct attack of that scale, there was still a thirty percent chance the power core would have detonated under his release of energy.
Musing over this, Lei Ting rubbed his chin and lay back down. He decided that when he returned, he would personally ask certain legendary esper warriors about their ability effects—and while he was at it, ask if those extraction fluids were any good.
But before that... he needed to rest.
He had barely slept these past few days, and after taking a stroll through the enemy’s nest, he was indeed feeling a bit weary.
Before long, he fell into a deep sleep.
……
Lei Ting was jolted awake by an alarm.
Even before he had fully emerged from his dreams, he lunged upward, snapping his seatback into position in a second. His eyes, instinctively glowing with a faint golden light, stared fixedly at the ship’s main control interface, which he hadn't shut down.
Sure enough, a menacing, crimson warning window was flashing.
A second later, a communication request from headquarters came through. Lei Ting accepted it without a word.
"Sun Star!" The commander, who remained in full armor according to Federation regulations, appeared on the screen. "The Hataan have launched a general offensive. They are currently pushing through the fire coverage zone. Soldiers over the age limit are evacuating in an orderly fashion. The Fulo don't seem to have received their notice—their coordination is failing! The 1st through 22nd Legions are intercepting them, but here..."
"We need you!"
"Sun Star is ready for orders," Lei Ting nodded calmly.
"Then—I know you can do it. Proceed to the fire coverage zone immediately and tear the enemy apart!" the commander said in a low voice. "May the Federation’s glory endure!"
Hearing this, Lei Ting’s expression turned solemn. "May the Federation’s glory endure!" he responded in kind.
The communication interface closed. Lei Ting opened the ship’s external viewports and looked up at the distant combat zone. He could see a massive shadow spreading from the Hataan side. The cross-bolt-shaped Hataan ships integrated into a vast armada, interspersed with spindle-shaped escorts and ring-shaped flagships. When they pressed forward together, it was like a waterfall crashing into a narrow street.
Building-sized explosive shells were detonated prematurely; kinetic weapons could only comb a fleeting path through the dense clusters of ships. Countless radioactive weapons were hurled, crashing toward the Human Federation’s positions in waves like star clusters.
The Hataan had gone mad. Or rather, the decision-maker behind the Hataan had gone mad.
It intended to pile up the lives of its soldiers to buy a victory, or at least ensure the Human Federation’s win was far from graceful.
Because it had lost something very important.
Lei Ting... suddenly revealed a smile.
*Lost something important? That’s right. Invaders should lose everything they hold dear.*
And the one thing a decision-maker should never lose is their sanity.
He shut down the ship’s main systems and rose, floating gently upward. Like gold or stone surfacing from water, he drifted through the hull of his small vessel.
From this vantage point, he watched the distant torrent—
To his flight capabilities, they were...
...Right before his eyes.
……
"Madness! This is complete madness!!!" someone screamed in a Hataan sub-channel. "His Majesty has gone completely insane! He wants us to go to our deaths... he wants us to—argh!!"
[Member 1402-07 of Assault Team 1402 showed disrespect to the Emperor. Executed.]
When such information pop-ups appeared, they naturally carried a heavy sense of deterrence. The wavering morale of the Hataan soldiers sank momentarily. Only momentarily.
Soon, more roars and screams echoed through the starry void.
—"We don't want to fight!!"
—"Killing your own kin at will... the ancestors will punish you!"
—"'Emperor'? Does it even deserve that title?! It doesn't even deserve to have twin horns!"
—"If we keep fighting, we’ll just be torn apart like Paradise Three—"
More execution notices popped up in rapid succession. Swept along by the torrent unleashed by a madman, the Hataan screamed in despair. Initially, they couldn't control their starships because their central AI had briefly consumed immense computing power to push this flood forward. Now, they had no choice but to keep moving; in the process of a mass charge, whoever stopped or turned would be collided with and crushed into space debris by their own comrades.
Why? Why exactly?!
Why do this? Why not find a better time? Why spread death across the stars? Why destroy a peaceful life to provoke a dangerous opponent?!
Almost every Hataan was asking this question for different reasons.
—Why?
Until the sea of engine plumes from the shell clusters ahead, which had rushed toward the distance before them, suddenly halted in the darkness.
Then, a golden radiance—utterly foreign to the vast majority of Hataan soldiers—spread out from within that sea of plumes.
A sun rose.
As it passed through the plumes, the sources of those lights turned of their own accord, facing the Hataan torrent alongside it.
Then came more light—light like sharp swords, like a supreme and cruel sun, silently piercing through all metallic barriers and falling into the Hataan armada.
In the next second, from calcium to iron to whatever else, every metal ion within the Hataan bodies began to roam and scatter freely. For that light was their true master; in years past, they had listened to the body, but now, they listened to that sun.
Before long, that golden glow brightened to a massive and blinding degree.
An esper sun appeared, one whose volume rivaled a real star in everything but heat. Under the terrifying energy interference, all radiation was excluded and diverted. No photographic equipment could face it directly, making it even more impossible to capture the core within—a figure clad in esper armor.
Behind the Federation’s lines, in the command center, the commander who had just given Lei Ting his orders stared blankly at the distant sun, dumbfounded.
Beside him, every screen facing that sun broke into dense patterns of white noise. Particles bombarded the imaging equipment like a heavy snowfall piling up in deep space.
"This high-energy reaction..." the young operator in charge of detection muttered, "it’s just... like a damn solar storm..."
"..."
The commander shouldn't have engaged in the chatter; he should have scolded the youngster—who was practically a child to him—to focus on her work.
But... as if possessed, he opened his mouth.
"...Yeah," he heard himself say, "it’s just like...
"...a solar storm."
...
At this moment, almost everyone within the theater of war maintained a tacit silence.
Shock, awe, bewilderment—everyone felt it.
Until another information operator in the main command room suddenly jumped up: "Go for it! Brother Lei!!" Sandro’s face was flushed with excitement as he pumped his fist and shouted, "That’s it! Tear them apart!!!"
Everyone in the main command room looked at him in unison. They were almost all young people who had just rotated in, as most veterans had been forced to retreat, except for those who had written their wills in advance.
Currently, in this massive chamber, one-third were students from the First Military Academy, and two-thirds were from other military academies.
Even Sandro stiffened under such "intense observation": "..."
But a second later, Susanna beside him also jumped up: "That’s right! Just like that!! Cheer for our 'Sun Star'!!!"
"Ohhhhhh—!!! 'Sun Star'! 'Sun Star'! 'Sun Star'...'Sun Star'!!!" The youths cheered loudly. The wave of sound nearly knocked Sandro over. He gave Susanna a plaintive look, only to receive a mocking expression in return.
Yet, even that usually taciturn and cold girl now had a flush of excitement on her cheeks.
Sandro chose silence because of it.
And on the command platform before everyone...
"...Go on. 'Sun Star'," the commander murmured in a low, raspy voice. His hands, seemingly unmoved, nearly crushed the edge of the console.
"—Let me see if you are... stronger than the 'Starflow' of back then."
Under the gaze of ten thousand eyes, the light of the distant "Sun Star" ceased to be soft like flowing mist for the first time.
The sharp radiance piercing the enemy formation was no coincidence. With ten thousand beams shooting straight out, the metal chaos triggered by the "Sun Star" crushed almost every Hataan soldier.
*They are the enemy,* Lei Ting thought.
He would not show mercy to the enemy.
Thus, he raised his left hand and slammed it into a fist.
The Hataan fleet torrent was also violently crushed into a ball. Any subsequent charge that couldn't stop, as long as it neared the Sun Star’s range of influence, was silently grasped by that titanic force into a massive conglomerate the size of a small planet.
Then, he raised his right hand.
This time, the shells emitting a sea of blue engine plumes did not twist into the shape of divine arrows or heavenly spears. Instead, the metal constituting the "Black Box" behind him rapidly converged and transformed into a sharp piercing lance. Then, the sun-like radiance of the "Sun Star" rapidly shrank, finally compressed by its master into a terrifying point, gathered at the tip of the lance.
Yet even though that "sun" had shrunk, the ten thousand beams of light did not fade.
No... it should be said that precisely because it was concentrated into such a single point...
...Its light truly became a "Sun"!
***
| Chinese | English | Notes/Explanation |
| :--- | :--- | :--- |
| 阳星 | Sun Star | Lei Ting's title/codename. |
| 星流 | Starflow | Evenheiler's title/codename. |
| 哈塔恩 | Hataan | An alien race currently at war with the Human Federation. |
| 弗洛人 | Fulo | An alien race allied with the Hataan. |
| 黑箱 | Black Box | Lei Ting's metallic esper construct/ability. |
| 人联 | Human Federation | Short for the Human Union/Federation (地球人类联合). |
| 桑德罗 | Sandro | A young soldier/operator, friend of Lei Ting. |
| 苏珊娜 | Susanna | A young female operator/soldier. |
