Sovereign of the Karmic System

The innate power emanated from their bodies was unique, and similar to human’s ki, beast’s essence, and Gai’ha and Lucious’s Aura. Yet, it was extremely weak, almost as if it had never been developed since the moment of the person’s birth.

The faces of the two were also extremely different from that of a human, with the only similarity being the presence of a set of two eyes. Their faces lacked a normal mouth and nose, and instead, had three consecutive vertical slits that went from right underneath the space in between their eyes, down to their chin, which ended with a pointy bone that pierced through the layer of brown skin like an overgrown petit goatee.

After capturing these two aliens, Daniel’s first idea was to get as much information as he could from them, but he quickly realized that something was wrong. The chests of the two did not inflate with the rhythmic motion of a human’s lungs, and their skin was quickly turning to a darker shade of brown.

It was clear that the natural environment of these two aliens did not match that of humans, and that sooner or later, they would die.

For Daniel to understand what form of atmosphere was liveable by simply looking at them was impossible, so instead of trying, he approached them, and placed his hand over their heads. If he could not ask them, he would learn by seeing.

Daniel’s mental power quickly engulfed the weak consciences of the two, and in a matter of moments, he was able to explore their memories. What appeared in front of him, was a portion of their lives. Born in a world that seemed to be unliveable for mortal humans, these two individuals appeared to have joined a form of military force native to their planet, and through talent and dedication, they had proceeded through their career until finally, they had obtained the assignment to explore the territory of the newfound civilization.

What Daniel was hoping to obtain was not the story of their lives, but to at least learn the language commonly used by their civilization. For minutes Daniel pried into their minds without success, as the method of communication used by these aliens was of a chemical nature, instead of a sound one. The only reason why they were forced to talk when in outer space, was because their equipment would isolate their bodies from free space, making their natural method of communication impossible.

Left with no other choice, Daniel searched for the translated version of their language, but unfortunately, the translation between their personal chemical trail and the odd sounding language was technological, and did not reside within their memories.

After numerous instances of trial and error, Daniel realized that the two did not have much time left. Giving up was not something which Daniel was used to, but once he felt their consciences dissipate, he was left with no choice but to let them go, leaving their now hardened corpses as a memento of what they once were.

Slightly irritated by his failures, Daniel closed his eyes. A moment later, his enormous planet appeared in front of him, along with the few figures that had observed the attack from within the planet’s atmosphere.

"What the hell is going on?" Asked Xargy with an audible degree of anxiousness.

A dragon’s smelling sense was extremely powerful, to a point where its use’s importance would be beyond that of a human’s five senses. For example, a man could experience blindness by closing their eyes, but dragons would live in the smell that surrounded them, remembering each of them like familiar faces. The complete lack of familiar smells was not only a nuisance for a dragon, but a stressful situation to say the least. If not for the familiar smells of Daniel’s planet and its millions of inhabitants, Xargy would have been the first dragon in history to experience what a panic attack was.

"They brought us here while we were shielded from their sound attacks." Said Daniel before turning to look at the technological components of one of the alien’s suits.

"How the hell did they teleport an entire planet without you or Nova noticing?!" Asked Xargy with doubt. He more than anybody else knew that no one had a deeper understanding of space than Daniel, and Nova, the perfect spatial elemental.

For how absurd as it sounded, however, there was an explanation for what was confusing the dragon. "They opened a wormhole big enough for the planet to move into, while our vision was shielded by their barrier, and our senses were stopped by the spatial barrier that I created to protect us from their sound attacks." Responded Daniel with a matter-of-fact tone.

In reality, he was as clueless as his draconic companion. It was only because he had explored the memories of the two aliens, that he had been able to understand what had happened.

"What do we do now?" asked Aeron, which had quietly appeared at some point in the past few minutes.

"There is a reason why those two escaped from us by coming here." Said Daniel before pointing his arm at a small white light that could be seen in the distance. He then added, "That star should be the core of the territory of these guys’ group. You guys stay here, while I’ll try to find out how to get back."

As he finished speaking, Daniel hid his planet as best as he could, and headed towards the star.

For the following few days, Daniel used the power of his mind to teleport towards the big white star without causing any form of spatial ripple that could give him away, and just as it seemed that he would reach the system without a problem, he was forced to stop abruptly.

Camouflaged with the darkness of space thanks to his comprehension of dark essence, Daniel waited in silence, until finally, only moments later, right in front of him, thousands of oddly shaped ships appeared from out of nowhere, and stood in two opposing formations.

The ships of which the first fleet was made out of were metallic and smooth, their exterior was painted with a rusty white color, with two red stripes which moved diagonally across the ships. The ships of the second fleet were more rough looking, with an appearance that reminded a crustacean’s bumpy chitin shell, and protuberances which resembled a lobster’s antennae.

Both fleets were composed of different kinds of ships, which Daniel could only classify as massive, relatively big, and smaller ones. Nevertheless, the numbers were similar, and it did not seem that a battle between the two would end one-sidedly.

What shocked Daniel the most, however, was not the number or size of these ships, but the fact that they had not teleported in pace, but decelerated from a speed which he could not possibly hope to comprehend. A speed which went against the understanding of space he possessed, and that put the speed of light to shame.

This hadn’t been the first time Daniel had been surprised by the speed of this civilization, as he had witnessed a simple technological suit allow a person to reach a movement speed that could surpass the speed of a cultivator.

Almost hopeful that speed was the only thing that this civilization had to show, Daniel opened his mouth in horror as, from out of the blue, millions of flashes of light started to be exchanged between the two fleets. Soon after, swarms of suited up warriors emerged from the many ships, and started to engage midway as the bullets of light flashed past them, and crashed against the powerful shields of the enemy fleet’s ships.

The first to fall were the smaller ships, as their smaller size could only allow for a weaker shield which could not hope to compare with the power of the cannons of the enemy fleet, leaving behind a cemetery of metal and corpses, as the bullets went through the spatial vessels as if they were made out of paper.

Following the first barrage of attacks were the strategies, which reminded Daniel of his father’s teachings about how position was sometimes more important than numbers, or how crucial was taking out the strategists of an enemy army.

This spatial war went on for more than an hour, after which the fleet of crustacean-like ships managed to attain victory by focusing their fire against the main vessels of the enemy fleet. As the battle ended, the rough-looking fleet turned towards the direction where they had come from, and with a burst of their massive propellers, disappeared as quickly as they had arrived.

Daniel had never seen anything similar. While he had traveled through space with a cruise ship, the only weapons in possession of that kind of ship were dependent on mana, and their main use was to free the path from random obstacles. However, these objects were so rare to encounter, that most ships would be able to travel for years, without encountering one.

The difference between the ship in which Daniel had traveled, and one of these ships, was the same difference between an ice breaker, and a warship. Armed with weapons which could destroy worlds, and travel between galaxies in minutes, these ships were superior in every aspect.

For the following few minutes Daniel tried to understand what this would mean in case a war between the universal government and this civilization actually broke out. From what he had just seen, there was no doubt that this new technological civilization was not something that could be taken lightly.

Just as Daniel was about to leave, numerous small ships began to appear near the wreckage of the red striped fleet. From these ships floated out numerous individuals, which slowly took the salvageable pieces of the destroyed fleet, and quietly brought them back into their small vessels.

This process seemed extremely slow, especially when compared to the speed which he had witnessed only a few minutes ago, but due to how experienced these scavengers were, the entire process took a little more than a few hours, after which, not a single working piece of technology was left.

Once they finished salvaging, the numerous ships turned towards one of the few planets which orbited around the large white star, and departed with a speed that was still within the scope of Daniel’s abilities.

Since the scavengers were going in the same direction as him, Daniel decided to follow them quietly, until they led him to a relatively small planet with an atmosphere composed of gases which could never sustain human life. The planet itself was composed differently from any of the government’s inhabitable planets, starting from the lower gravity, the extremely sharp winds at high altitude, and the different proportions of minerals which, had this planet been in the territory of the universal government, would have either being mined, or left alone.

And yet, in this part of space, this planet was flourishing. Thousands of ships entered and left its surface in mere minutes, its cities glowed from the dark side like clusters of lights connected to one another, and in each city, dozens of different kinds of strange looking aliens behaved similarly to how humans behaved in the territory of the universal government.

Once again shocked, Daniel came to a sudden realization. In the territory of the universal government, the human race had been the first to expand, taking as much as they could to feed their needs. This, had taken away the chance for other life forms to evolve.

From that fact, Daniel had managed to gain enlightenment of a concept of life which he was unaware of, the concept of interruption. A concept of life which, ironically enough, existed to remind people that not all life was destined to make its course, and that life could lose its chance to exist as a consequence of anything, including a person’s decision.

After absorbing this piece of knowledge, Daniel covered himself with a mixture of the most human-like suit he was able to scavenge from the ship cemetery and random pieces of cloth, and quietly landed on the planet’s surface.