Two months later at Beyond HQ...
The Novas zoomed around the training room, in first gear. Helio sat out in the audience seats with Sarah. Standing in the center of the room was Tobi, transformed as well.
Amaara and Carina caught up in the past two months, by rigorously training against their comrades. Now Tobi wanted to prepare them all personally for the next battle. No weapons, just hand-to-hand combat. Sarah broadcasted the training session to her website, as many people around the world, had gained interest in the Novas.
Tobi picked up a rock. "I'm only going to use three elements and this rock."
They laughed, thinking he wasn't taking them seriously. "Ohh sure sure, good luck." Some of them replied.
Simon and Koji leaped at him first, while Amaara trailed behind them. Then Carina and Kayed raised metal and stone golems, for support.
Kayed, Tobi, and Carina weren't allowed to use lava or magma, so as to not injure the others. For earthwielders, once they had ascended, it was much easier to separate the minerals that they needed and use them however they wished. Tobi and the others dug up, mass amounts of gems and gold on different planets for Sarah, by doing this.
He clad himself completely, in a flame and electric armour, maintaining it as the two eager Novas struck him. He blocked the both of them with both his arms up, then simultaneously blasted them flying back, with greater fire and electricity out of his arms.
Amaara came in after, flanking from the side, and striking for his head, with flames thrusting her arm forward, as fast as she could. He ducked with ease, then sent a sphere of electricity into her stomach, sending her hurdling backwards, while bowling down the golems behind her.
He then fireballed all the heads and feet of the rest of the golems in less than a few seconds, as Norah came in with a blur of electricity behind him.
Noticing at the last second, he turned around quickly and blocked all of her strikes, then tripped her and used a palm thrust with hundreds of thousands of volts to send her flying back horizontally. He then turned his attention to Kayed and Carina still launching rock volleys at him, which he sensed without difficulty and stopped them with thick walls of ice forming in the air.
Suddenly, he rushed them, stepping hard as he got closer, and created a wall of ice separating them with his feet, as mist kicked up, blocking their vision. They braced themselves and jumped away from the wall, looking for him. A little too late, as he jumped off it and backflipped behind them, placing his hands on the ground, as trails of ice crept up to their feet and caught them before they could notice. Then enveloped them in a tomb of ice, while shocking them with thousands of volts.
Simon and Koji appeared behind him once again, with spheres of fire and lightning hovering above their palms, as they aimed for his back. However, they stopped in their tracks, as a trail of ice leading from his heels, froze them in place, and gave them a familiar moment they hated.
Then he leaped up in the air looking down at all of them, completely immobilized. Norah appeared in a blur beside him, a sphere of electricity trailed her palm as well. He smirked, realizing he was caught off guard but took it head-on, by diffusing it with the rock he was holding onto, covered in ice and electricity, as she tried to strike him with it. There was a small mist explosion, but moments later, he grabbed her hand through it, then whirled and threw her down with the rest, as they defrosted out of their binds.
"Are you guys purposely making this easy for me?" He asked, as he iced his hands together giving them a bit of space, and started making a ball of fire, added electricity, and gathered the remnants of the rock and some more from down below him, breaking his rule.
For the last few months, he had practiced more experiments with his abilities. One of them was making a makeshift oven, to cook the sphere of fire inside hotter and denser than ever before. Producing blue flames.
"Forget the rules, go all out!" He yelled at them.
He didn't have to tell them and they didn't hesitate. Among the many feelings they had, the drive to grow stronger was the most prevalent. Accompanied by the desire to beat or even damage him just a little, to balance the humiliation they were facing up to now, led them to put everything they could into their hands.
Spheres of fire, electricity, and superheated lava within magma, formed hovering between all of their hands. Then they let it go, as he did the same.
Each bracing themselves for the head-on collision. The shockwave was incredible. Sarah had gone to great lengths to fortify the training centers with the strongest materials on earth and recently started adding versillium plating. Yet the walls began to crack and break, threatening to fall apart.
She watched in horror, knowing she was unable to stop the madness. She thought it would be a light training session, not the end of the Moon.
Tobi was being slightly pushed back. He knew he would have to stop it soon or he would be killed. However, the desire to grow stronger, had him starved, there were no other opportunities to challenge himself but this.
He grimaced, gathering all of his strength and energy around him, then pushed back harder against the massive beam targeting him. Wanting to win, no matter the cost.
His eyes flickered blue, completely. Streaks of silver hair sprouted up, evenly all over his hair. The purple and reddish marks all over his body, glowed and flowed like lava, rapidly, as sparks of electricity crackled around him.
Mist escaped, with every breath he took. Then his beam boomed bigger, eating up and racing back down to the middle half, shocking the Novas with the sudden pushback.
Norah, Koji, and Carina were knocked out. The constant drain of energy was too much to bear along with the force. Leaving, Simon, Amaara, and Kayed, each holding their own against Tobi's attack.
The beam descended, quickly. Their lives flashed before their eyes. This couldn't be it. 'No. If it meant dying, give everything first!' They thought in sync.
Their lifespans began to shave away, giving them an option, to gain more strength, as they refused to lose. Amaara and Simon's eyes flickered blue, as their orange-reddish veins, glowed even harder and flowed faster around their body, while the heat around them intensified.
The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Kayed experienced the same phenomenon as well, as his beam glowed bright, like a star. His eyes switched to a dim, glowing hazel, as he and the others, sprouted even streaks of silver hairs.
Tobi noticed their transformations and the phenomenon happening around them, then decided to redirect the blast through the roof. It incinerated a hole and blasted through the moon sky. Sarah was going to be angry.
The terraforma quickly closed the hole by moving small nanites around. They all collapsed, as he descended to them clapping. He started treating Carina, Koji, Norah, and Kayed right away, while Helio treated Simon and Amaara
"Hey guys, that was pretty intense, wasn't it? How did your hair and eye colour change?
Amaara looked at him, confused. "I'm not sure how, but yours did too."
He looked at her funny. "That's crazy, did I?"
Then he looked at his hands, as the purple veins marking them moved rapidly in a lava-like flow. He had also just noticed the amount of electricity still crackling around him. He powered down looking back at them. "Hmm, I might have to check the footage, but I think we may have just unlocked a new gear."
The Next Day, At the Gym Center...
Osei was furious. He had ascended about two decades ago and some newbies had overtaken him in less than a year. Sarah had explained to him that it was Tobi's cells that had accelerated their growth. Yet he was still unsatisfied with himself, taking his frustration out on the gym.
By lifting and working out with the maximum, the gym had available. It was in the middle of his 5 km run, when Amaara barged into the gym, in an all-black fancy dress, with her makeup done on point. He looked at her, with his face slowly turning to regret.
"You forgot didn't you?" She asked.
"I can be ready in 15 minutes." He replied.
"Nahh forget it, I've tried and I really like you, but you've got to think about more in life, than just training sometimes." She turned around to leave. "Ughh and I was looking forward to that restaurant in Paris..." She trailed off, fuming as she left the room.
Osei, put his head down, actually feeling some guilt. Koji walked in, moments later and greeted him. While ignoring the prince's depressed state and going straight into his workout.
Osei got up and approached him, as Koji looked up taking his earpods out. "Hey man, I need some help."
Koji sat up, Osei never asked for favours. "What kind of help?"
Osei was a bit embarrassed since he was asking someone younger than him. Nevertheless, he wanted to try harder. "You have a girlfriend don't you?"
Koji nodded. "Yeah, why?"
Osei paced around a bit, as he tried to find the right words. "So let's say you forgot some plans with her, what would you do to make it up to her?"
Koji chuckled. "Oh damn, you're in the deep end, aren't you?"
Osei looked away. "If you're not gonna tell me."
Koji slowed him down. "Relax, relax I'm just messing with ya. Listen surprise her. Just do something spontaneous, have a whole day planned for her, of just stuff she likes to do or wants to see."
Osei walked around pondering about his advice. He never had any romantic encounters, living under the Cerian empire. However, Amaara had been kind to him. She had often brought him treats, always checked up on him, and had taught him more about the world, to help him fit in.
He made up his mind. However, just then Sarah spoke, over the speaker. "Can every member of the Nova Division, please report to the Command Center at 1800 hours. Thank you."
They both looked at each other, then immediately tried to get their last reps in.
Later at 6 pm...
Sarah had been busy in the last few months, rebuilding cities on Sonara and helping to rehabilitate the 750 million prisoners that formerly had to work there. Men, women, and children from multiple different races, she wanted to study and help them all.
She made them a few countries around Sonara, and had millions of androids, showing them how to run a government and keep the peace. Helio and Tobi brought freshwater fish from Earth, to help create new lakes and water resources, for the population.
Afterward, she developed a dollar, called the Sonaran Dollar, backed by the funds she'd been acquiring, which grew to a net worth of 400 trillion dollars. Now she had to go over the next war plans with everyone, keeping her days constantly busy.
Kalista, Tobi, Osei, and the Novas took a seat, with the four new Novas already seated at the table. The first one was a 24-year-old Spanish man named Leon, who was chosen from a small overlooked town. He had a rough childhood and had to steal to survive, but had always been kind to the children in his alley.
Sitting beside him was Tai Min, the 21-year-old Chinese candidate Sarah picked from their recommendations. In exchange for political favours, they wanted to participate in space exploration and defensive efforts.
Runa Maja, a 20-year-old, woman from Norway, sat beside Nur Syeda, who was just a year younger. Sarah had flown over to Pakistan, and chose her, a victim of a great flood, that had hit the country. Both of them had gone through extremely difficult lives, growing up as orphans, before Sarah had found them.
After evaluating their minds and witnessing their virtue, from situations like when they had nothing, yet still sacrificed for others. That, along with the underlying feeling of their latent potential, made her feel more confident about choosing them for the Nova Division.
She clapped once, beginning her meeting. "Okay, everyone! So we'll be going over the plan for Operation: Hydra." She said while looking around the group. Content on how the family had grown so large, in such a short amount of time.
"I have recently developed an energy scouter called a joulzer. It takes joules and other factors into account to measure the strength of an opponent. This way we can organize our forces accordingly. The standards for these measurements were the first princes we encountered. Normal humans range up to 100, but Kairon and Zaryon had a power level of 45,000 and 95,000... However, after Zaryon ate Tobi's arm, it grew up to 130,000."
She paused as they took in all of the new info, then continued. "The ones that came to Earth after, were at 105k-110k. Bolgan seemed to have been the strongest we've encountered so far at 210k. You would need the second gear or at least 3 people to defeat an opponent like him."
Osei raised his hand. "How strong was Galzed?" He asked, curious.
Sarah gave him a smile. "He had a power level of 165,000."
He nodded back, impressed with himself.
She looked around the room and continued. "With the files and records, I was able to salvage from the enemy ships, we know that there are 5 children of Altas on Dargan. I've sent a drone to scout Dargan ahead and they confirmed, the five huge energy signatures on 3 different continents... I will be spreading our main forces out against military forts and outposts, but just like Sonara the children of Atlas like to live in solitude. They only come out to terrorize the cities on their planets, every other day."
She took a deep breath. "With that, the teams are as follows, Kayed and Leon will be taking out Hadron, at 115k. Koji and Simon you will take out Luxaico, who's at 125k."
They all nodded, understanding their mission. "They won't see it coming," Simon said, confidently.
Sarah nodded back, smiling. Then, looked over at Kalista and Runa. "Kalista & Runa, you will be taking on Tamorn, he should be at around 145000."
"I gotta take care of the newbie?" Kalista asked, disappointed.
Runa looked at her, calmly. "Not even, I can take care of myself."
Sarah smiled at the both of them, then proceeded on to Norah and Nur. "I think you guys can take out Gobaela, who might be able to go up to 120,000."
Norah was excited, her smile evident on her face. However, Nur was a bit nervous and immediately looked down, anxious. Norah noticed and reassured her, with a fist bump. "We got this!"
Nur smiled weakly and bumped back. "Yup!"
Sarah continued and looked over at Tobi. "I'm sure you can handle Haylon alone, right?"
He looked up from the map of Dargan on his console. "For sure."
She nodded, then looked back to the group. "Ok then, the rest of you, will stay on standby in case, the Earth is attacked again. Once we complete Operation: Hydra, we'll invade Saltos 12. The next step in creating an escape path for Earth." She clapped her hands once. "With that, I would like to conclude the war meeting."
They all agreed, some of them wishing they could go, but decided to leave it all to Sarah's judgment. Regardless within moments, they all started to leave the Command Center, going about the rest of their day.