Interstellar Age

Erich did not stay on Svartalfheim to celebrate. No, there was no time for his victory over an ancient and lurking evil. Rather, he was forced to contend with a far greater threat, here and now.

With the darkness that had shrouded the original elf homeworld for close to a million years having disappeared without a trace in the span of a mere second, the nearby Naraku who had been stalled at bay, fearing the shadows that could and would corrupt them instantly began to attack in a feeding frenzy like a school of piranha who smelled blood in the water.

But for them to do so, meant that they would have to first break through the line of defense which Erich had established around the system when he invaded, and seized control of orbit. Put simply, the Naraku and their biological efficiency were forced to contend with the surgical precision of ships controlled by artificial intelligence and robotic crewman.

This entire war, for the last few decades on the borders of the Germanic Star-Empire and its space had been such a contest, and until now the machines which operated in tandem with mankind, or what remained of it, had been winning.

Today was no exception, as Erich took off his gilded helm and stepped aboard his personal starship, he watched as the Naraku fleets were torn apart with a level of accuracy so precise the laser beam which targeted their weak spots, and pierced through it like a knife through soft butter, was more a scalpel than a spearhead.

As always when the Naraku Queenship was destroyed, and the hive queen with it, what remained of her children became feral and uncontrollable the moment the hive mind collapsed, turning on everything in their vicinity, including one another, as they tried their best to mindlessly consume as was their base instinct without intelligence.

The autonomous drone fighters sent out to intercept them melted the carapaces of the insectoids designed to operate in their role within the vacuum of space, and flew without regard for their own wellbeing.

No longer were human pilots expected to evade and tactically outmanuever their opponent, if it meant killing the enemy, the ai on board the autonomous fighter would sacrifice itself, as steel was easier to replace than biological material, especially when said biological material was without a queen to reproduce.

Thus, the battle from the perspective of the ship bridge was like watching the sky of a fourth of July celebration from a time forgotten in history, from a nation whose name had not been remembered.

Erich could not help but comment on how brutally efficient the scene he was watching unfold in front of him truly was, as Tia sulked over her most prized suspect being terminated by her own will.

“It’s incredibly how easy it has become for us to destroy them. In my first life, a fraction of a splinter fleet nearly the entirety of my people’s civilization, now they are like flies being swatted out of the sky with ease.

It is all thanks to you Tia…”

Tia, of course knew she was the reason that the GSE had become a major player on the galactic stage instead of a mere vassal state of those above them, and had done so in the span of a few decades.

She also knew she was the only reason biological life even existed in the milky way, she didn’t need thanks, even if hearing it from her master would have normally granted her satisfaction

After all, she still reared to him by the title master not because she was bound to his will without her own, but because she chose to obey his orders, and wanted to remember her place, unique to him, as he had granted her the ability to become what she was now.

But today, she was not in the best of moods. She had followed orders for the first time that were contradictory to her own desires, her own inherent need to learn, adapt, and evolve.

And she had done so out of loyalty to the man who desired it. It wasn’t that she was angry at him, or even at herself. She just felt it was a total waste to extinguish the only voidweird in recorded galactic history other than a few ghost stories told during an age so ancient nobody alive today even truly remembered what had happened back then.

There was something else… a fear, a deep-seated one, that perhaps this wasn’t the end of the shadow, malevolent and spectral entities. All that really knew was that the Alfheim Empress claimed to have destroyed them long ago.

But had never realized her sister was possessed, and corrupted by one. Let alone that a million year long conspiracy to sacrifice the elves for the resurrection of the maw, and whatever darkness lie within it.

The very implication it could be brought back into the milky way, implied it was still hiding out there, somewhere in the universe or in the subspace beyond its grasps, not truly gone, just waiting, and watching for its chance to bring forth the darkness once more.

With all of this in mind, Tia could not truly be happy at this minor victory, instead she simply asked Erich what his plans were now.

“Should we begin the next phase of our operations? Shall the Eternal Crusade begin, here and now in the Milky Way now that the darkness of the maw has been dealt with?”

Erich’s words were solemn, stoic, as he gazed upon the hive fleet being rendered into nothingness in front of him, nodding his head as he confirmed the order.

“Yes… the time has come… The time to reclaim the milky way, reseed its barren and devastated worlds, and to rebuild civilization in preparation for the Eternal Crusade beyond our stars and into the universe where the Naraku lie in unfathomable levels of infestation. Begin the march towards total war!”

Tia did not sigh, nor did she remark with excitement, she knew, forever she would be with Erich, aboard this vessel, as they forever purged the galaxy of the Naraku, and rebuilt from the ashes that remained, but today, here and now was the beginning of that eternity.