Planet Master

169- Confrontation (1)

“What is it that you want us to do?” Tatsumi asked when he entered the Library of Consciousness where Dian’s consciousness was.Although from his point of view, Dian split off his consciousness but he was still aware of things here even when he was in that place.

“Well, there is this budding Star Child of the enemy civilization.” Dian began his plan. Tatsumi and Ame listened and realized what Dian was planning.

“You want to subtly influence the entire civilization? Will that be possible, though?” Ame asked since this was a bit challenging.

“It is possible. But we need an important variable like this to be able to pull it off.” Tatsumi realized that the Star Child of the enemy civilization had just been developing and wanted to meet him.

“That is why I asked you two. The Rodents have been pushed to the corner but the cornered civilization will definitely take drastic measures. To nip it in the bud, we need the cooperation of the Star Child. Although I need to remind you that this is a bit dangerous.” Dian explained.

“Well, I think I understand why this can be dangerous. But if we need to do this to end the battle quickly, I think we should try just in case. Failure is nothing but what if it is successful?” Tatsumi put his hand on his chin and knew that this plan had no negative drawback other than the potential threat from the Star Child, which could cause a variable.

Ame rolled her eyes, clearly knowing what Tatsumi had in mind.

“Fine. But to make this encounter meaningful, we need to isolate the entire place where we can slowly persuade him.” Ame said.

Dian closed his eyes while Tatsumi was lost in thought.

“So…”

-

The child was deployed into more missions by the captain of the spaceship due to his stellar performance in dealing with the Gling’s biological spaceship.

Biological spaceship after another was destroyed by him but he felt like the number of the enemy did not decrease in the slightest.

But the child could not care less about it. As long as he and his Marine Corps could survive each mission given, he could call himself very fortunate. Furthermore, he was surprised that the enemy kept sending the Gling’s fleet to Rodentia.

This caused his transcendent power to break through Rank 0 and become a Rank 1 transcendent.

Sadly, he could not develop faster due to the energy requirement increasing for Rank 1 transcendent. Of course, he became stronger and stronger with each biological spaceship destroyed.

Then…that mission came.

“Chief, are you prepared to land on the different spaceship?” an officer asked.

Now the battle between the Rodents and the Federation had reached a fever pitch. Dozens of spaceships were battling, letting their plasma cannons fire, and the near spaceship engaged in boarding and counter-boarding.

The child was now called Chief by the Rodents due to his achievement. But the Chief’s thought was that he had almost forgotten his own name. If not for the fact that he often thought about it when he was alone, he would surely have forgotten even that.

‘The name that my parents gave me…will I be able to see them?’ he thought as he wore a special helmet, a whole body armor to protect him and the Marine Corps who followed him.

“I am ready.” The Chief said resolutely. There was a small connection that bridged the two spaceships. Then the Chief and his Marine Corps entered the spaceship.

But when entering the spaceship, the Chief found something strange. That was…

“Do you detect the life signal here? There’s none except us.” One marine said with a frown. He actually had a bad feeling about this but the orders from above were important.

“Head to the bridge. This spaceship is said to belong to the Federation, so there should be something.” The Chief said while hiding his unease. Now that he had become a transcendent, his senses were sharper and his mind was more developed.

He felt a chill on his body when entering the spaceship but he had a mission to accomplish. So he, along with the Marine Corps, headed deeper into the spaceship.

The more they headed deeper, the more eerie it seemed to them. But one thing was for sure: the life support system inside the spaceship was turned on along with the lighting, making things slightly easier for them.

“Best be careful. I don’t think this is going to be easy.” The Chief said to the Marine Corps through the communicator.

Then when they almost reached the bridge where the command center of the spaceship was located.

The Chief suddenly felt his fur bristle and saw the sensor only to find that the life signal of the enemy was bigger and encompassed a third of the Marine Corps. He quickly twisted his body a bit to the left, and suddenly he saw an attack that caused two marines to be knocked back greatly.

“Enemy attack, get into formation!” The Chief could only order this while his eyes glowed with jade-colored light, trying to see the enemy but to no avail.

But there were traces so he used that to his advantage. Then the attack came to him and he could only passively react. He tilted his head to the right while thrusting his assault rifle, which already had a bayonet below the muzzle.

But it hit nothing and then he felt a blunt force hitting his stomach. Worse, it seemed that the attack penetrated his body armor, causing internal injury.

He coughed up some blood as his body hit the wall behind him.

“Chief!” the others quickly fired in the last direction the attack came from but it seemed that the attacker was elusive and even relying on invisibility to take them down one by one.

During the time the Chief was struggling to go up, another ten members of the Marine Corps were incapacitated, unconscious but not dying.

Then one of them used a smoke grenade, causing the corridor to be filled with smoke. They decided to retreat, and the Chief also moved to the smoke as a cover.

There was one thing they wanted: to be able to detect the attacker by the smoke. Sadly, their plan was likely to be seen through since there was no change in the smoke.

Even the Chief with his transcendent sense could not find the detail of the attacker. The others carried their unconscious members back to where they came from.

But then the door to the previous room suddenly dropped, trapping them in the corridor along with the attacker.

“What should we do?”

“We fight.” The chief answered the scared and hesitant marine.

Then the Chief moved forward alone and taunted, “Fight me head-on if you dare!”

On the communicator, he said, “Hold your fire. Just follow along.”

Then a voice could be heard throughout the corridor.

“Now do you understand the difference between you all and me?” A familiar language could be heard by all the Marines. Their eyes narrowed at the voice since they knew that this voice was feminine.

At the front of the smoke, they could slowly see a figure appearing.

The Chief finally could see the enemy that had attacked them but the fluctuation of the transcendent energy from the figure was not appearing.

‘Damn it, looks like she is actually a high realm transcendent. Most likely…a Rank 2.’ The Chief was in battle stance and then shouted out loud.

“Throw it!”

Then immediately, the marine threw off something like a barrier. The figure let them throw it since she knew what that thing was.

“Do you want to weaken me by throwing the Equalizer?” the figure said. Although only a figure could be seen but her voice was cold, devoid of any warmth.

The Chief knew that only by this way did he have a chance at winning. Then he moved forward, step by step until he was finally thirty steps from the figure.

The moment the Chief finally faced off against the figure, the smoke cleared out and he finally could see the figure clearly.

‘A…human?’ The Chief was surprised to see the primary enemy race facing him.

She had long brown hair that reached her waist, her brown eyes focused on him, at his every move. She held an umbrella, which was quite abnormal but the Chief knew better than to underestimate anyone from the human race that could appear at the frontline.

She wore body armor but it could not completely hide her curvaceous body and her deadly focus, ready to react at any action the Chief wanted to do.

As for the Equalizer, that was the invention of the Rodents. Basically, it made a barrier that forced anyone to fight at equal power. Transcendent power became only available to Rank 1 transcendent or lower. Above that would be restricted and sealed.

Not only that but external influence would not be able to penetrate it, at least until another Rank 2 transcendent intervenes from outside. Furthermore, the one inside had to be defeated. The designer knew that defeat meant death, but he did not change the setting, letting even a chance to live open even for the defeated.

“Who are you? You are definitely not a nameless individual.” The Chief said.

“Who I am doesn’t matter here. What matters is that you bravely challenged me. For a budding Star Child, you are clearly reckless.” The woman said.

‘Star Child…what is it?’ The Chief did not understand what Star Child was but he knew that to be important.

“If the enemy is weaker than you, you will grow to be more formidable. Even if there is a life-threatening influence, you can even benefit by overcoming it. But in a battle between Star Child, it is the most direct manifestation of a battle between civilizations. Are you ready to stake everything?” the woman said.

“For my parents, for my civilization, I will fight!” the Chief said resolutely, gripping his assault rifle and aiming the muzzle at the woman.

He shot at her as the barrage came out of the muzzle but the woman just sidestepped and slowly got closer. Her way of movement was forming a zig-zag which made aiming more difficult.

The Chief realized that he could not outpace the human in front of him, so he decided to try a close-quarter combat.

He used the assault rifle like a spear and thrusted the sharp blade of the bayonet at her. The woman then used her umbrella and thrusted using it.

But what surprised the Chief was that the umbrella slowly transformed into something he recognized. It turned into a spear, which made things at the surface equal.

But he did not forget to imbue the blade with his transcendent energy after he strengthened himself with the transcendent energy. With his eyes, he could see that the woman also did the same thing but much faster!

A metallic sound clashing could be heard reverberating. Inside the barrier, the two was not even on equal fight.

The Chief felt slowly being pushed back while the woman suddenly twisted her body, and slashed the spear at him.

The movement was so fast that the only thing he could do was to instinctively hold the assault rifle horizontally. He was truly pushed back to the barrier, hitting it, and his internal injury slightly worsen.

But his eyes kept focusing on the woman. He kept learning something new but sadly, he was outclassed in both speed and power.

The Chief breathed in and out before he stood up, his body trembled but his eyes showed his tenacity.

“Another round!” he exclaimed before he attacked the human woman.

Then the spear the woman held became a twin dagger as she finally moved forward…to the left and to the right.

‘What is it this time?’ The Chief was surprised to see this. He had not faced any transcendent before so he did not know that transcendent could use techniques to enhance their fighting prowess. Rather than not knowing, it would be more accurate to say that his technique was shallow.

He realized that the other two were likely distractions, but he could not be careless since he did not know where the real one was. But he quickly analyzed things and came up with a way to counter the move.

The woman and her two phantoms then closed in on the Chief, the twin daggers gleaming and slashing at him. The Chief then used the blade of the bayonet to block the one he felt to be the real one while tanking the other two.

Fortunately or unfortunately, his guess was right, and he felt a similar hit coming from the blocked one.

He was struggling to just empower his entire body since the built of the Rodent was overall weaker than the other races. That was why the race was compensated by its high reproduction rate.

The blade of the bayonet was locked with the twin dagger but the Chief’s stance was slowly broken down before he kneeled down, his entire body trembling due to the force he had to bear. As for the woman, she kept pressuring him with her twin dagger as if he were something insignificant.

Then the Chief failed to keep his stance and was pushed back once again.

‘This barrier should be in effect yet this human can still overpower me. What…went wrong?’ the Chief thought.

What he did not know was that there was something he had missed. He did not know that the human transcendent had theorized that their prowess was equal to one realm/rank higher than their current realm/rank.

This was the normal situation. Add to the circulation technique and the ability to utilize the transcendent energy, as well as their weapon and they might as well challenge the higher realm/rank.

Due to that information gap, he did not realize that he should just surrender and instead forced himself to fight.

But the consumption of his transcendent energy was quite a drain since he needed to keep strengthening his body to fight against the woman.

With a ragged breath, he saw that the woman was so relaxed, as if this was just a routine for her. On the other hand, he struggled so much that he injured himself often just to be her equal.

“What…makes you so strong despite being in the Equalizer?” he finally could not help but ask.

“This is just an innate advantage for us.” The woman replied coldly.

‘Innate advantage? What the…heck?’ the Chief almost could not believe what he had heard. All that strength was just something the human transcendent possessed? Even though the Equalizer had been deployed?

Then, without the Equalizer, wouldn’t he and the entire Marine Corps be annihilated here?

‘What should I do? I cannot let her out of here, but I am so powerless and helpless.’

While this was happening inside the Equalizer barrier, the outside was not as calm as the Chief thought.

From the edge of the corridor, someone else suddenly appeared. The Marine Corps saw him and pointed their guns at him, but the human did not care and indifferently walked to the edge of the Equalizer barrier.

“Hmm, this is the castrated version of the Individual Duel arena. Looks like the Rodents also experienced something similar to the human race to create this. Of course, the effect of equalizing is something that we can learn from. What a good harvest we have today.” The man said.

When the marines saw the appearance of the man, they became afraid. Suddenly appearing on the spaceship that was deserted was strange but the fact that the transcendent human appeared right after the Chief and the transcendent woman entered showed that this was arranged.

The man appeared to have short black hair with black eyes. On his waist was actually a sheathed blade, and he also similarly wore body armor, like the transcendent woman.

“You'd better not shoot those weapons if you want to keep your life.” The transcendent man spoke their language. His eyes now narrowed and focused on them, unleashing something that caused the marines to feel deep fear rising from the bottom of their heart.

The Marine Corps that the Chief led was actually composed of many races, including the Rodents, Elves, and the Lizardfolk.

There were what looked like Crustaceans as well so that counted too, even though they were more suitable for a water environment. But with the development of technology, there was a way to make them able to breathe on land or in the absence of water.

Both sides of Planet Master now watched this since they realized that the budding Star Child was the Chief.

“You did not tell me that this Rodent is the Star Child.” Goliath was protesting.

“Well, you did not ask. I have known about this child since my fleet’s spaceships were destroyed one by one by him.” Chikara crossed her arms in front of her chest, clearly displeased by the plan that were executed based on the sacrifice of her biological spaceship.

But now, looking at the struggling Star Child of the enemy Planet Master gave her the satisfaction of beating him up indirectly.

Dian tapped the armchair of his throne with his index finger, waiting for the time when the Star Child would use their exclusive right to be granted some power from the destiny seed and the fortune of the planet.

Dian thought as he saw that his two Star Children were present at the place where the battle was imminent.