CHAPTER 230: THE GAROGS HAS ARRIVED (4)

The air in the command bunker was thick with a terror so profound it was almost a physical force.

On the main display, the figure of Kharn, the Garog High Priest, had become a living star of malevolent energy.

A massive, swirling vortex of sickly black power, siphoned directly from the colossal stone warship behind him, was coalescing into a sphere of pure, annihilating force above his four raised hands.

The sheer power being gathered was enough to make the Oracle satellite’s sensors scream with warnings.

"By the goddess..." Damien breathed. "He’s not just attacking the shield. He’s trying to crack the planet."

"Adrian!" Jeffery urged, his usual serene composure gone, replaced by a desperate urgency. "We must reinforce the shield! We have to divert more power!"

The other leaders echoed his panic, their voices a rising chorus of fear. But Adrian remained perfectly calm. He watched the display, his Transcendent eyes analyzing the data streams, a small, cold, and utterly confident smile on his face.

His calm was so absolute, so out of place in the face of their impending doom, that it momentarily silenced them.

"Look closer," Adrian said, his voice cutting through their fear. He gestured to the ship. "Look at what he’s doing. In his rage, he has exposed the power reactor of his ship."

Most of the council members didn’t understand what Adrian meant, but they could very well see the change on the display.

A massive section of the Garog ship’s stony hull had retracted, revealing a colossal, glowing green core surrounded by what Adrian recognized as a network of power converters.

"He’s pulling power directly from its main reactor, bypassing every safety protocol," Adrian explained. "He’s treating a battleship’s power core like a personal battery."

After more of his strongest attacks had failed to shatter the shield, Kharn had been forced into using this desperate method.

He was running low on his personal energy reserves, and he could feel that the barrier was on the verge of being destroyed already. There was no way, he believed, that it wouldn’t go down after this final, ship-powered assault.

Adrian looked at his stunned council members. "It’s incredibly powerful, yes. But it is also incredibly inefficient and unbelievably reckless. In his arrogance, in his haste to show off his strength, he has exposed his single greatest weakness."

A new, daring strategy bloomed in Adrian’s mind, a gambit of epic proportions.

"Nyra, Serena, Loryn," Adrian commanded, his voice now echoing in their minds via a telepathic link. "You are the three most powerful casters on this planet. I want you to focus all of your magical energy into a single, concentrated point on the shield, directly opposite his attack. Do not spread the defense. Create a singular, unbreakable point. Make him believe we are preparing to meet his attack head-on."

’Lad, that’s suicide!’ Eli, who was also included in the vassal link, complained immediately. ’The rest of the shield will be as thin as paper!’

’Trust me, papa,’ Adrian sent back, his mental voice calm and reassuring.

The three instructed Transcendents looked at each other across the command bunker, and seeing the absolute certainty in Adrian’s eyes, they gave a grim, unified nod and began to issue the orders to their respective magical corps.

On the sky, a brilliant point of golden light began to form on the Planetary Shield, a tiny, defiant star against the overwhelming darkness of Kharn’s attack.

High above, Kharn saw their response and let out a telepathic sneer of pure contempt. {Insects, combining your pathetic sparks to try and block out the sun. Futile.}

"Charles," Adrian continued. "Give me direct, manual command of the Oracle’s weapon systems. All platforms."

"Boss, you can’t mean..." Charles began, his eyes widening in understanding.

"I do," Adrian confirmed.

The stage was set. The bait was laid. High in orbit, Kharn finally finished gathering his power. The sphere of chaotic energy above him was now a terrifying, unstable sun. He thrust his four hands forward, unleashing the colossal blast.

At the exact same moment, Adrian began to act. He had, of course, installed armaments on the Oracle satellite. They were a series of magic crystal-powered blasters, not nearly powerful enough to do any significant damage to the Garog’s leader, but the priest wasn’t his target.

Adrian’s will extended into space, giving him absolute control over the satellite’s systems. He focused all his willpower, making sure to secure a perfectly precise aim. This might be the only chance he had before the weapon’s limited crystal reserves were exhausted.

~VMMMMMP-VMMMMMP-VMMMMMP!~

Hundreds of thin, brilliant beams of blue energy, silent and deadly, traveled through the vacuum of space.

Kharn, his being focused on the singular joy of unleashing his ultimate attack, felt the sudden, massive shift in energy signatures from the planet’s orbit.

He saw, in his peripheral vision, the hundreds of brilliant lances of energy streaking past him, all aimed not at him, but at his ship. At his home. At his army’s only lifeline.

His four eyes widened in pure, absolute horror as he realized he had been completely, utterly outplayed.

He was still trying to comprehend what his next action should be when the result of his own attack finally arrived.

The massive, world-breaking blast of chaotic energy slammed into the tiny, super-concentrated point on the Planetary Shield.

The barrier yielded. But it wasn’t in the way Kharn had expected. It didn’t just break. The failsafe of the barrier, overloaded by his own attack, activated.

~KRA-KAAAAAA-BOOOOOOOOOM!~

A wave of pure, kinetic and magical force, the backlash of his own amplified power, slammed into him. He took the brunt of the explosion head-on, his body thrown back thousands of meters into the void, his own power used against him.

And through the blinding light of the shield’s detonation, he could do nothing but watch as the combined volley from the Oracle’s weapons struck the Garog warship’s exposed power system.

Silent, blinding explosions erupted across its stony hull. The green, glowing reactor core fractured, venting raw, unstable energy into space. The ship, which had been a symbol of absolute power moments before, was now a crippled wreck.

Kharn, caught in the shockwave of his own ship’s explosions, was thrown back even further, his body battered, his arrogant fury now replaced by the shocked, wounded expression of a king whose castle had just been turned to rubble.

In the command bunker, the council stared in stunned scene in silence.

Adrian had not only defended their world, but he had crippled the enemy’s flagship without them landing a single meaningful blow. He had won the opening round of the war not by overpowering his enemy, but by brilliantly out-thinking him.

Adrian stood before the display with a calm face.

"Their ship is crippled. Their priest is drained of his energy. They have lost their two biggest advantages." He turned to face his council, his eyes burning with a cold, hard fire.

"Now, the real battle begins."