Marvel Magic Case Files

Chapter 1611, Chapter 1607: The Lunar War (123)

"I've noticed that the game Milia's been playing lately is a bit dangerous. It's the kind of game kids used to play back in our day. Maybe kids these days still play it, but I'm not sure modern kids are interested in that kind of game; they have video games."

Joan of Arc's voice broke the silence.

Perhaps because she couldn't bear the ambiguous atmosphere that didn't encompass her, especially since she was certain that this atmosphere only appeared on Bayonetta's face, and she couldn't stand her best friend acting silly, she finally chose to break the silence. When Bayonetta cast an inquiring glance, she could only shrug and begin to make up a story that was half true and half false.

"Don't look at me like that. After all, you've entrusted me with the education, haven't you? Of everyone here, I'm the only one with experience dealing with children... You want to ask what game it is? Well, it's throwing a stone into the air and counting to five. Back in our day, we threw knives, but for Milia, a stone is dangerous enough. I'm pretty sure that without someone to supervise her, she'll play that dangerous game again. Laura Crawford only knows how to stroll on the beach or read in the library; if we don't remind her, she'll starve to death under the bookshelves. If we don't want to come home to a brain-damaged, stupid child, we'd better get this over with quickly."

"Give her some magic," Bayonetta said, squinting at the man sitting across from her. She offered a very intriguing suggestion: "Finger tricks instead of psionic powers. Someone can do it; after all, we all know how dexterous his fingers are."

"Now that Milia's taken to daggers, swords, and guns, are you going to get her to like playing cards and coins?" Joan rolled her eyes. "Next, is she supposed to learn how to appreciate cigars and whiskey?"

"My suggestion is to start with cocktails, like my favorite cherry martini. She should learn how to identify alcoholic beverages, even though we advocate abstinence and aren't keen on drinking." Bayonetta calmly extended a finger and tapped Jeanne's shoulder. "Also, Milia probably hasn't started learning about ammunition yet, has she? If you don't mind, you can get a standard training manual and a guide to laser weapon disassembly and maintenance from the Ministry of Military Affairs. As far as I know, the batteries in individual laser weapons are also very dangerous."

"Ceresa!"

The two witches' joke did not break the emperor's silence; he remained frowning, his eyes fixed on the void.

The abyss, the void, the dream—the ancient Greek poet Hesiod called this Chaos (Χο), referring to the primordial form of the world, meaning a vast, empty space. The ancient Roman poet Ovid further expanded the concept of Chaos to mean a space devoid of internal order, somewhat similar to the modern term "chaos." The names people give to that dimension all reflect its infinitely broad and profound core. Later scholars, when studying Hesiod's *Theogony*, often believe that the book was heavily influenced by Hittite mythology from West Asia.

More than one scholar who had been visited by the emperor as a student—including the renowned philologist, British linguist and classicist, Professor of Greek at the University of London, Honorary Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, and former Fellow and Vice-President of the College of Classics at Oxford University—stated that the Hittites, who lived on the Anatolian Plateau, had long proposed the idea of ​​a chaotic world at the beginning of the world, which is exactly the same as the Eastern myth of Pangu. This can be seen as a typical case of the convergence of myths in primitive civilizations, just as myths all over the world tell the story of the Great Flood.

Catherine, clutching one of Priestess Feliel's eyeballs, walked through the scattered remains, severed limbs, and filthy blood, past the surgical precision of the Royal Guard's blades and the knights' lightning-fast strikes, towards the portal. Suddenly, Regent Victor von Doom rushed to her side. He raised his staff, and a completely transparent, arc-shaped, blazing white flame burst forth, revealing a blurry yet enormous figure in the air—the Royal Guard and knights had no idea what kind of enemy they were fighting; neither infrared detection nor thermal imaging could discern any details of this figure. Only their frantically beeping psionic detectors sounded alarms with even greater fervor. This figure was almost completely invisible.

It was far taller than the Royal Guard, taller than the knights, even comparable to the portal itself; the radiance emanating from Catherine and her staff could only scorch its skin. Regent Victor von Doom had been wary of this being, and even he secretly breathed a sigh of relief when it appeared, for he couldn't be certain that this being would show itself and prevent the portal from closing. Their understanding of the dimensions beyond the veil was still far too limited.

If humanity wants to set foot in that realm and embark on the path to eternity, it must abandon its human nature.

Once again, Regent Victor von Doom felt sorrow for the Emperor. The price of knowledge was too heavy, but someone had to pay the bill for the survival of the human race. All they could do was ensure that the human race stood at the top of the galaxy before the bill was paid, and that the cost of paying the bill would no longer be the dagger that slits humanity's throat.

The knights were the first to turn their guns and engage the enemy. They fired explosives, plasma, and molten metal at the beast that was vaguely visible in the air. Every explosive shell that could penetrate armor, every plasma and molten metal shot seemed to disappear into the air. If it weren't for the beast's high-frequency screams that were beyond human hearing, and if it weren't for the huge, blurry figure in the air retreating step by step, the knights would have thought that conventional weapons had failed.

As the blazing white flames spread, the ethereal alien finally began to reveal its physical form in the material universe. Every time the giant sword, longer than a super-heavy tank, swung down, it would smash into the shield released by the Regent. Each spark that splashed from the shield would leave charred, bloody craters on its body, sizzling and emitting thick smoke as it reacted with the filthy blood, creating wounds comparable to those caused by bombs, plasma, and thermal burns.

"I know your true name. Every crime you have committed against humanity testifies to your existence," Regent Victor von Doom proclaimed. He removed his helmet, revealing a face streaked with tiny scars, his dark green cloak hood billowing in a supernatural wind, his long, greyish-white hair flying wildly. "I will banish you, I will curse you. You will forever wander in another sea of ​​souls, never to set foot in this universe. Fate has only revealed the ending, but not the process."

"Humble mortals!"

The giant beast roared, and an aura of violence filled the air.

Victor von Doom pinched an eyeball. The behemoth clearly recognized the incantation engraved on the eyeball, for it was its true name, written in characters transcribed from the sounds that constituted this universe. It hadn't expected the mortal before it to possess such knowledge. "I curse you in your name."

"You actually know the truth! You'll die too!"

"Maybe so. Who knows if we don't try?"

Seeing that the greatsword could not immediately break through Victor von Doom's shield, the behemoth flapped its bat wings and changed direction. Before the knights could even react, the semi-invisible greatsword, scorched by white flames and belching thick smoke, slashed down from mid-air. One knight barely raised his shield to block, but the immense force not only shattered the shield and charred the ion shield with its electric shock, but also smashed the knight into a mixture of metal and flesh like a warhammer.

Aparisha could smell the coppery odor of his genetically modified blood through his breathing grille. As the blood-stained greatsword swung horizontally, the enraged Aparisha immediately charged forward, slamming his execution axe against the tip of the greatsword with all his might, forcibly changing its direction and lifting it upwards. After doing this, he felt a tearing pain in his arm muscles, and his electronic muscle fibers and spinal exoskeleton were constantly issuing alarms.

Two other knights rushed forward, using their shields and chainswords to parry the edge of the black greatsword. Aparisha saw warnings from the medical systems of the two knights in the squad command link; their spines had been violently broken, and their spinal nervous systems had been completely destroyed.

Constantine charged forward, followed by the rest of the Royal Guard, who rushed toward the invisible behemoth. In contrast to the knights' astonishment, the Royal Guard remained completely unmoved; they had already witnessed the power of this formidable ethereal alien.

The sacrificial rituals within the Chimerian clan's wizard tower allowed it to project a portion of its consciousness into the physical universe. The carnage of the Attilan campaign and the cult's final sacrifice opened a portal, enabling it to descend into this world with the help of Maximus and Black Bolt. Finally, at the cost of the souls of the last two heirs to the Attilan royal family, it managed to insert its own overly powerful soul into the physical universe.

The Imperial Guard immediately began attacking the beast's knees.

Constantine used the lance bestowed upon him by the Emperor to sever the behemoth's knee, forcing it to lose its balance. Unlike the knights, the Imperial Guards did not form a tight formation; they dispersed as soon as they engaged the enemy, some coordinating with the knights' firepower to force the behemoth off its balance, exposing more vulnerable parts. Needless to say, every warrior knew they had to protect the now unprotected Regent Victor von Doom; the incantation they couldn't comprehend, the one that had caused the Regent to cough up blood, was undoubtedly the key to tactical victory.

Catherine did not swing her sword at the demon; she had more important things to do.

Dita and the other battle sisters clung to her, desperately hacking away at the aetheric aliens surging towards Catherine while holding the priestess hostage. They thronged around the radiant Catherine, rushing towards the portal, where she drew the longsword given to her by the emperor and fought valiantly. Sometimes, when the enemy was within arm's reach, her sword would even pierce the portal, killing aetheric alien entities that had not yet arrived in the material universe.

"We will meet again, sisters," Catherine said to her battle sisters as she stepped into the portal. "The loyal will meet again in His kingdom."

As if guided by some force, the two witches simultaneously turned their gazes in the same direction.

The assault transport ship flew high in the sky, sandwiched between the pitch-black void and the atmosphere reflecting a blue glow. It was a sudden intuition, a powerful sixth sense unique to psionicists. The witches' gaze seemed to penetrate the machine and armor, looking at the moon floating in the void. Although they didn't possess the prophetic foresight of the Emperor or the Kamar-Taj planetary defense system, they were extremely sensitive to changes in the lunar phases, and at this moment they sensed a burst of psionic energy on the moon. Their focus was below the horizon; that was the moon's precise location.

"This psionic burst will provide us with cover. Even the planetary defense system will be unable to detect us."

If a psionicist with a second vision were to look down at Earth, they would see that at the moment of the psionic burst from the moon, a giant circular shield composed of complex three-dimensional geometric shapes and burning orange-red sparks flashed by, completely enveloping Earth. The energy of the psionic burst was blown into the void and then disappeared, just like Earth's magnetic field resisting the violent solar wind particles.

"This is just one factor, not the whole story."

Bayonetta paused for a few seconds before realizing he was answering a previous question, one to which he had previously responded with silence, and whose limited explanation hadn't fully elucidated the necessity and urgency of the Attila campaign. Bayonetta deliberately raised an eyebrow.

“I didn’t realize the doctor on this plane was so skilled.” She looked at Diana. “Get him a bottle of whiskey. He’s most intelligent when he’s slightly tipsy. I’m not talking about his intellect.”

"The portal has closed, but I don't know if it was a wise decision. I could have used that portal to gain more benefits, but I would also have had to take greater risks. Considering the sunk costs and the possibilities, I made the most conservative choice."

"You mean that portal and its connection to the Sorcerer Supreme?"

"Yes, Ceresia, you have always been astute," the Emperor said. "I have finally decided that each war will have only one enemy."

(End of this chapter)