I walk a few steps forward, closing some of the distance that separates me from the floating sword. The thing spins in midair, its orbit unchanged even without the imperial scepter beside it.
As I take a few more steps I tentatively begin to will myself off of the ground, and lift off of the floor. My maidens and Thalace watch me curiously as I begin to slowly and imprecisely float towards the spinning weapon. As I will myself forward, propeling myself mostly through a subtle and somewhat inaccurate usage of nanokinesis, I close the distance between myself and the weapon.
I come to a stop in front of the blade. It continues to lazily float in circles and as I study it up close I get an appreciation of its finer details. The blade is wonderfully crafted and truly stunning to behold, and I know that it’s also part of my inheritance. I eventually reach out and grab it, taking a firm hold of the blade’s hilt and closing my eyes as I feel a surge of potent ether flow into me.
I am still for a few seconds as the blade’s excessive ether fills me, flowing into me through my arms and then subtly spreading through the rest of my body. When the blade is done attuning to me, in the same curious manner as the scepter, I turn towards my retinue and I point my royal instruments in the direction of the ship.
“Hey! Let’s go explore the dreadnought.” I say to them, and they all smile at me before nodding. I begin to slowly fly in the direction of the gigantic ship, occasionally turning and making sure they are still behind me. As I do I allow a part of my focus to drift and for me to focus on the escapades of my clone. To be fair, the clone is up to some important activities in the End of Time, and its activities are as important as my ones here happen to be.
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The strange sensation of etheric energy entering me through the actions of my other self sends phantom warmth up my arm as I place my outstretched hand on the chest of one of my servitors. The creature, a strangely genderless being with a nondescript face hums pleasantly as I work on it.
I shut my eyes and focus on my hand as I fill the creature in front of me with powers. I am using “Alter Power” to share hilariously scaled down versions of my own powers with the servitor, and it is the hundredth being I have done this with in the past hour.
For almost as long as the other me has been making his way to the vault and then exploring it I have been doing this, busily preparing my legion of servitors for what promises to be a period of furious activity as we work to take stock of the city’s resources. Beside me Delphi is doing the same thing, having also been a beneficiary of this activity of mine.
We are not in the complex anymore. Instead of doing this in the complex we are currently seated in the middle of a large street, and there are rows of servitors lined up to receive powers from us. The sky above us is pleasantly overcast but no rain falls on us, thanks to the specific weather configuration that Delphi turned on before we left the complex.
“So… Does anyone ever visit the End of Time anymore?” I ask, filling the mostly silent space with some noise. The servitors are quiet, and Delphi is not nearly as talkative as Star or the thronemaidens. The silence is pleasant, but I have been quietly curious about what I just asked her for some time. Delphi thinks about my question before eventually answering it, giving us enough time to finish bestowing powers on a few other servitors before she speaks.
“Well a few people do. The most frequent visitor I’ve seen time and time again is a ‘Chronaiad’ named Phlee. Chronaiads are nature spirits attuned to time itself, capable of freely traveling through timestreams as easily as someone else might walk on a sidewalk.” Delphi reveals, causing me to let out a surprised sound. Truthfully I was not expecting a real answer, or at least not that the real answer would be that there are, in fact, visitors to the ruins of the city.
“Huh… I wasn’t actually expecting this place to get visitors.” I confess, causing Delphi to let out a quiet laugh. The servitor in front of me walks out of the way when I finish giving him his superpowers.
“It’s not easy to get here. Doing so requires either extraordinary magic or even more extraordinary longevity, so the number of creatures other than chronaiads who can actually find this place is exceedingly small.” Delphi says, wisely. I nod as I hear her explain why some creatures can make it here when others can’t.
“Still, Phlee is quite nice. She has never seen me in any sort of physical way, but I’ve left her messages in the sky and done small things using my attunement to the city. In return she occasionally left little gifts for me in public parts of the city.” Delphi reveals, smiling as she says this.
We lapse into a relaxed silence in the wake of this reveal but only one that gets to last about half a minute, long enough for me to empower another few servitors before a distant sound gets my attention. I hear the sound of what I assume must be weapons firing off in the distance above me and I turn my attention skyward. Delphi watches my head snap in the direction of the sky and also glances up, trying to see what I can see.
At first all I see are thin clouds. It takes me focusing for a few moments before my vision penetrates the small layer of clouds that bathe the city in the perfect amount of shade. When I peer past the clouds my vision, enhanced by one of my abilities, allows me to see a curious sight a vast distance from even the highest layer of the city.
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A gaggle of spaceships seem to be pursuing a curious red machine, one that is shaped like a gigantic sphere the size of a small building. The spaceships are firing on the machine they are pursuing, and I can hear their weapons firing even though they are flying in the void of outer space.
“So… I see a gang of spaceships firing on a weird flying sphere. I think I should intervene, but I didn’t even know that there were other lifeforms around given that we’re both in and at the End of Time.” I remark. Delphi snaps her head in my direction.
“That ‘Flying sphere’ you mention… It might be a ‘Godsphere’! Tell me about the spaceships behind it.” Delphi tells me, and I immediately do as she asks.
“I can see eight scarlet colored ships attempting to either harass or destroy the sphere. They are firing what seem to be blasts of plasma at the sphere, and the thing is struggling to avoid their attacks.” I explain. Delphi falls silent for a moment before eventually deciding on a course of action.
“Those… sound like they might be ships used by ‘The Enemy’, a malignant and malicious stain on the multiverse, and one of the only active alien forces still around at this point in time. ‘The Enemy’ is a primordial evil, and its forces destroy, murder, and corrupt everything they can. Master, if you can, I advise you to save that sphere. If nothing else it’s the right thing to do. Do you think you can save it?” She asks, causing me to think up a few different strategies in a single instant. I smile and nod, and she tells me to do it, which I respond to by teleporting from my location to an area directly in front of the flying sphere some tens of thousands of miles away.
I immediately feel the chill of outer space as I find myself floating in the interstellar void of the end of multiversal time. The sounds of the distant battle are much, much louder now, and I can see the ships that I was just looking at from a new angle. The sphere is still far enough away that even at the speed it’s moving it’s got a few seconds before it’ll need to adjust its flight path to avoid hitting me.
I raise my hand in the direction of the “Enemy” vessels and take aim. The ships turn ever so slightly and a few of their plasma projectiles are spewed in my direction. I let out a quiet laugh and make use of one of my abilities: the power that made Delphi dub me a “Blaster”. Five different jets of omega energy explode out of my fingertips and begin streaking through the empty void of space.
The projectiles I have just fired collide with the plasma fired by my enemies. My beams punch through them and continue on, entirely doing away with the attacks of my foes while moving with an uninterrupted speed towards my enemies. I let out a hearty laugh when I watch the enemy ships scatter, clearly aware of the danger posed to them by my weapons. The remaining three vessels redirect their attention more fully to me and begin to try and barrage me with even more projectiles made of plasma.
I fire off more of my omega-powered beams in the direction of the vessels which were not targeted by my previous beams even as the speedy projectiles I just fired crash into some of the closer ships. The ships hit by the beams explode, and I smirk at my foes.
The remaining vehicles attempt to escape in the wake of seeing my beams one shot their allies, but as they turn to flee I get to see my attacks speed up and hit each ship dead-on. In seconds all eight ships have been thoroughly dismantled and the sphere begins to slow as it closes the distance between us.
The vessel comes to a stop a few thousand feet from me, which given that we are in outer space feels like it is incredibly close. The sphere is constructed from some stark white metal, and I can feel the object, possibly a whole being in and of itself, studying me. We are both silent as we appraise each other, as it were. I am a bit startled when I hear the vessel project a voice out into the void, using some sort of strange technology to project noise into the void.
“Identification required. Please state a name with which this one is to call you. This one is willing to use the appellation ‘Heartening Glimmer’.” The vessel “States” some strange technology allowing it to fill the void with noise. The voice coming out of it is emotionless and synthetic, almost like something out of an old science fiction movie. I pause for a second and contemplate coming up with a fancy title, as befits my unusual status as both an alien and an omega lord. I eventually smile and reply to the vehicle.
“This one is willing to use the appellation ‘Ignacio’. Please identify what sort of a vessel you are, or are flying.” I reply, and when I utter this I get a response immediately.
“‘Ignacio’, you have performed a great deed for ‘Heartening Glimmer’. This one wishes to repay you for your act of kindness, however this one is damaged beyond its ability to repair on its own in short order. Do you have facilities in which this one may be repaired and recover its lost strength?” The machine asks, evidently ignoring my previous question.
“I may… However, to know for sure I need to understand what kind of a vehicle you are or are flying.” I reply, and the vessel falls silent. There is a long, tense moment of silence before the vessel eventually replies to me.
“This one lacks proper context for this, as its internal archive has been damaged, but what information is available to it suggests the term for its type of machine is ‘Godsphere’.” The vessel informs me, causing me to smile.
“In that case… Well, I would not be the one to ask. However, let’s leave this place and go home, my home. From there we can surely figure out how to help you.” I reply, and the vessel begins to glow. It glows brighter and brighter for several seconds, eventually reaching a level of luminosity comparable to that of a flash bang. When the light vanishes, so too does the vessel. In its place is a woman with hair the color of a dragon’s breath and eyes akin to those of a snake, a lovely and strange golden color with slits in the middle.
“The multiverse is filled with hot redheads. Wild.” I mutter, not complaining, as I smile at the woman. She floats through the void, moving at an impressive pace, before she reaches me. I offer the machine my hand and she takes it, before I use true-warping to teleport us back to the surface of the End of Time. Delphi smiles at us as she studies Heartening.
“Delphi, this is Heartening Glimmer. She is a ‘Godsphere’, but she has been damaged and injured. Heartening Glimmer, this is Delphi. Delphi is an artificial spirit oracle, a creation of the ancient omega lords. I am the inheritor of all of their creations, the last omega lord.” I explain, brightly. Heartening Glimmer studies me for a moment, before nodding at my remarks and then nodding at Delphi. Delphi excitedly approaches the machine, and studies her.
“Greetings ‘Delphi’, this one is pleased to meet part of the inheritance of this one’s savior.” The machine mutters, its voice still synthetic-sounding but filled with more emotion than it was previously. Delphi continues to study the machine, amazed by it. Delphi eventually turns to face me, and grins.
“We should take her to the city’s spaceport. Repairing a godsphere is not easy, but we can begin to piece together HOW to do it if we can inspect Heartening’s internal composition.” Delphi suggests, and both the machine and I nod. At the same time as we’re nodding I look at the curious machine and ask a question I’ve been curious about for a bit now.
“What the hell is a godsphere?” I ask, which makes Delphi laugh even as she begins to lead us in the direction of the spaceport.
“I’ll explain along the way. Think of them as… unbelievably advanced machines. The kind that can modify galaxies. Or at least… they can, normally.” She replies, as she begins to think of how to explain the nature of the strange new ally we seem to have made.