CHAPTER 401: CHAPTER 401: WARP SIGNALS

"There’s nothing here," Ma’abu said with a look of confusion on his lion face.

He sat atop his high pillow throne, overseeing the numerous lions and lionesses operating his arkship.

A large screen hovered right above their heads, showing a live projection of a planet.

They had tracked the disturbance to this star sector and followed the traces of unstable auras they felt.

From the readings they were getting, this planet used to be covered in ice and was suitable for fierce blizzard storms.

But the planet wasn’t frozen, it was now filled with cold water and barren land.

Not just that but the planet wasn’t even supposed to have any water because it wasn’t close enough to any star for its surface to heat up.

The planet just remained at the same spot in the void, not attached to any star or similar celestial bodies.

Technically, this planet should still be freezing as there was barely any greenhouse gas to heat it up.

But here it was, warm and covered in water perfect for life to evolve.

This was a rogue planet, a world that wasn’t bound by the gravity of those burning gas giants.

It was free.

But at what cost?

The planet looked like it had been hit with the most devastating attack.

Four large cracks stretched over the circumference of the planet, visible from outer space, looking like the maws of abyssal beasts.

The faint ember glow of the planet’s molten layer could be seen as vast amounts of water poured down from the edges of the cracks.

Apart from the four large cracks that wrapped the planet, countless other cracks could be seen upon getting closer.

A full scan of the planet was done with Ma’abu’s arkship and they discovered something.

Places that looked like they should have had mountains were empty. Numerous pieces of rocks, large and small, were strewn across the world.

It looked like the planet had been hit by a powerful force that stopped it from moving in its own orbit.

"What happened here?" A water lioness asked with shock written all over her face. She was Wadolius’s mother and was here to avenge her son’s death.

She was one of those lionesses that had been born in heaven and had spent her whole life there.

Being the consort of a Lion King usually meant that she could ignore the call for a proof of Lionhood.

She was Ma’abu’s most pampered consort, hence her lack of experience.

She had never seen the destruction of a planet or witnessed a large-scale orbital invasion before.

Seeing something so big with so much damage was visually shocking for her.

Compared to her, Ma’abu and most of the other lions were not too shocked. Although, they were also surprised.

"Has the Primordial Lion gotten to such a power level where he can cause so much damage to a planet?" Ma’abu asked, frowning.

He didn’t believe the words that came out of his mouth.

For any lion to be able to do this, they would have to be at least tier 7 and that was the minimum requirement.

Unless they had an arkship, no Lion below tier 7 could perform such a feat of causing such planetary destruction.

It was too soon. How old was the Primordial Lion? How long had they even known of his existence? Ma’abu refused to believe that the Primordial Lion was that strong.

He himself was just a tier 6 lion and he would have to rely on his arkship before he could do this kind of thing.

’Does the Primordial Lion have an arkship?’ Ma’abu asked, sinking into deep thought.

"There’s dragon aura, Your Majesty. Did the Primordial Lion clash with the dragons?" One of the male lions in humanoid form asked.

Ma’abu narrowed his eyes. The presence of dragons complicated everything. Their very existence justified the existence of the Primordial Lion.

Whether it was the dragons or the Primordial Lion, Ma’abu didn’t care. He wished to provide stability to the lion race and he would wipe out the dragons and all Primordials if he had to.

Nothing was too big to be his enemy, nothing.

"Start sending out warp signals, and activate our receivers," Ma’abu ordered. There was no use dwelling on this place or trying to investigate what happened.

Whatever went down here, the culprits couldn’t be too far away.

Immediately, the lions and lionesses went to work.

Wadolius’s mother urned around to look at her King, her Pride leader, "Don’t worry My King, we’ll find him," She said, trying to ease his nerves.

Ma’abu merely nodded, not saying more. He was simply using this water lioness at this point.

She didn’t know that Ma’abu no longer cared about the death of his son. If he were to kill the Primordial Lion today, it wasn’t because he desired revenge.

"Your Majesty, we’ve started receiving warp signals from the other arkships," Another lioness replied.

Ma’abu nodded, "Good, send out our own warp signals too. Start creating a layout of all the star sectors so that we can find where our signals get lost," He said.

Outside, the massive saucer-shaped arkship gradually moved away from the broken planet.

Invisible and barely detectable warp signals were being transmitted from one arkship to another.

These warp signals couldn’t be detected with normal means. They were War signals in the sense that they could be transmitted through space and time without the restriction of distance or the speed of light.

Thousands of arkships began to position themselves in different areas of the Void Spill Galaxy, mapping out the small corner of the universe and looking for any ’odd’ occurrences.

The Void Spill Galaxy was big, more than one hundred and thirty thousand light-years across, and it would take some time before they could find anything.

Perhaps, a few hours, or worse, a week.

While the Anti-Primordial Coalition was busy with their work, the Primordial Supporters were also working hard so that they could find Kael before anyone else.

///////

Three days had passed and Eridoria was no longer safe.

Warp Signals were starting to close in on the distortion field around the planet.

A few arkships and their Lion Kings have already noticed this place but haven’t made any moves yet.

Soon, they would close in to check it out. And the more arkships discovered this weird spot in the void, the more they would gather.

On Planet Eridoria, the first phase of Operation Exodus was almost complete.

By now, anyone still on the planet was either extremely stupid or didn’t have the qualifications to go.

Unfortunately, quite a lot of creatures were not allowed to enter the arkship.

N’bayé had made calculations and she had suggested that they make preparations in case of population growth.

If they ended up packing so many creatures and there was no space for growth, it could be a disaster.

No one knew how long the Exodus Operation would last. No one could say for sure if they would even survive what was coming.

Billions of creatures were left on the planet while the stronger elites were granted entrance into the arkship.

The mastermind of it all, King Kael, didn’t care, nor could he afford to. It was like preparing for a long journey, he would pack what was needed and abandon the rest.

Many creatures lamented as they watched their fellow kinsmen carried away in shuttles or whisked away by spatial portals.

By the fourth day of the week, the first phase was completed. All the creatures that needed to be in the shuttles were in the shuttles.

No vultures were left behind apparently, same with elephants, rhinos, and other creatures that had low birth rates.

Everything was done.

The arkship hovered beyond the clouds, close to the silver moon, and reflected the light from the sun.

It was beautiful.

And then, they waited.

They waited and waited until darkness was cast upon the other side of the planet.

...

Exalon: They’ve detected something, they seem to be moving in that direction.