The Martial Unity

”Huff…” President Jarkathar heaved a shaky breath as he leaned forward on his table, his dark eyes wandering about in deep thought. His terse expression betrayed his mood. The man hadn’t been having a good week.

He had pleaded with the Blood Empress the other day to stay in the Arima III System and on Planet Sarantel, but unfortunately, the powerful top-ten powerhouse had refused to grant his request. Even though he had completely sacrificed his dignity in his humiliating prostration, she didn’t so much as even budge and was dismissed out of hand.

”Goddamn hemosapien,” he muttered with an angry expression. ”She has no idea what frontier states like mine go through in these times!”

It wasn’t just her; he had pleaded with the other strong pathwalkers, most of whom were senior Martial Sages, but all of them had refused him as well. The simple reality was that he simply couldn’t compete with the force of conscription or the extremely lucrative War Contracts offered by the Gaian Alliance.

He was on his own.

The only saving grace was that the Arima III System was one of many, many frontier states; there was a statistically small chance that it would face an acute threat from the impending war.

That was when he felt it.

RUMBLE

It was a faint ripple.

He frowned.

It was not a tremor through the ground beneath his feet, nor a vibration through the air. No, this was… vibration through space itself.

BEEP BEEP BEEP!!!

The man was jolted into shock as the alarms in his official commpad began ringing. Several notifications flooded his neural inlay, along with countless messages.

[Extremely abnormal gravitational anomalies detected!]

[Space-time ripples detected across the entire star system!]

[An unauthorized wormhole opening has been detected at the edge of the star system!]

”What?!” The man shot to his feet as an expression of horror emerged on his face. ”What the hell is this?!”

BANG

The door opened as his secretary walked through with a grim expression on her face. ”Sir, I have just received word that there is an unidentified entity trying to open a world bridge to our system! According to analysts aboard the 41st Entar Patrol Fleet, it appeared spontaneously out of nowhere with great force and speed!”

President Jarkarthar felt like he wanted to vomit. The sheer amount of terror that this anomaly plagued in his heart was deeply intense; it made him fear for the worst. Yet, he gritted his teeth, pulling himself together.

”Instruct the defense force to immediately suppress the wormhole with an interdiction field! Have all of our space suppressors and anchors crush that thing right away!”

The native forces of the Arima III System had already detected and had begun applying emergency space-time suppression methods in accordance with emergency protocols. Even the nominal presence of the Gaian Alliance patrol fleet began applying cutting-edge gravitational fields to snuff the growing world bridge.

Yet, it was futile.

RUMBLE!

The tremors passing through space and time intensified as they spread across the Arima III System. The vibrations didn’t just vibrate the fabric of reality; they vibrated everything that rested within it.

”Rgh…!” The president stumbled as the vibrations intensified; his Martial Master bodyguards rushed forth, catching him.

”Careful, sir!”

”Please follow us; we must evacuate you to the emergency shelter connected to your office!”

RUMBLE!

They practically lifted him and rushed away with him into a secret passage in the corner of his room while the man urgently kept up with the notifications while trying to contact the relevant authorities in his government.

RUMBLE!!

The tremors only grew more intense, much to his grave horror.

BZZZT

His commpad lit up with the live feed from his director of intelligence, whose expression was equally severe. ”Lavyn, what the hell is going on?! What are we dealing with here?!”

Director Lavyn’s eyes darkened. ”…An invasion. We are being invaded by the Arakai Web Civilization. This star system and this planet are doomed.”

He transmitted a live feed of the anomaly that had unfolded in the Arima III System, allowing the president to take a good look at what was unfolding in his own backyard. President Jarkathar’s expression crumpled with soul-wrecking terror as he beheld the anomaly.

It was a wormhole.

One that stretched nearly one thousand kilometers in diameter.

When his mind parsed this information, the President’s energy immediately collapsed. His eyes lost their energy, slumping with pure despair. He may have been a fear-filled coward, but he was not a fool. The man understood all the implications of what he was seeing.

Any civilization that could create such a massive wormhole in the first place couldn’t be stopped by the forces within the Arima III System from doing so. And any civilization that felt the need to open such a massive wormhole was likely not doing so in vain. Wormholes were profoundly resource- and energy-intensive.

There was only one reason to create a wormhole that massive.

It was to facilitate an even larger army.

RUMBLE!!!!!

From the depths of the wormhole, the Web of War emerged.

*****

The operation had commenced.

The Gate of Conquest had opened a bridge between human civilization and Arakai Web Civilization, allowing the Web of War to cross through and commence the operation to annihilate human civilization.

”Initiating. Coordinated. Propulsion. Systems.”

”Field. Status. Is. Nominal.”

”Breachhead. Systems. Are. Active.”

”Interdiction. Array. Is. Active. And. On. Standby.”

”Commencing. Coordinated. Incursion.”

RUMBLE

The breachhead at the very forefront of the Web of War commenced its invasion through the wormhole and began accelerating. It was composed of a layer of ablative breachers—massive hexagonal battering shields that were a dozen kilometers in length, composed of a strange, blindingly bright abnormal form of matter. They were tasked with serving as a shield to protect the Web of War from powerful sieges from enemy defense forces.

The titanic, bright ablative breachers numbered in the hundreds, locking together to form a hexagonal shield array that was so massive that it barely fit through the already vast Gate of Conquest. The domineering array moved slowly, thrusted with powerful antimatter explosions, before entering the wormhole.

RUMBLE

Ripples passed through the fabric of space and time as the breachhead entered the Arima III System, moving into human space. Behind it, the edges of the Web of War followed suit, passing through the massive Gate of Conquest before finally entering human civilization.

The first step had been taken.

”The. First. Step. Towards. The. Destruction. Of. The. Human. Species.” —o-o—o’s six black eyes glinted with inhuman bloodlust as the rest of the Web of War pushed through.

RUMBLE!!!!!