Soul of Searing Steel

At first, Joshua had intended to leave immediately without further contact with the radiant cocoon, but changed his mind at once upon noticing that it was using the Great Mana Tide to spread the supernatural epidemic.

"Can't do nothing."

It was neither his heroism nor his sense of justice at work, but the sheer realistic harm it posed. Joshua knew about the terrors of the Ultimate Virus and the terrific repercussions of allowing it to engulf all worlds along the Great Mana Tide: 99.999% of all life would have been directly reduced to withered bones and souls, with what few survivors mutating into Ultimate Entities, horrors superior over Chaos aberrations.

It would be unstoppable, a great harm beyond Evil Gods. Just like how the Black Fog was no Evil God either, the sheer destruction it would have wreaked was more horrific than Evil Gods.

Whether for Mycroft or other innocent civilizations and races of the Multiverse in passing, Joshua could never have merely stood by and watched—hence, in the instant before he left, the warrior took a deep breath and mustered all strength the clone possessed to let out a silent roar.

Boom!!!

Around Joshua, solid ring-shaped tremors began to spread. In the presence of that abrupt burst carrying profound force that was able to destroy multiple worlds, even the vast light of the Mana Tide bent for an instant, allowing hidden flows to increase as the surging stream was split into countless branches and undercurrents, divided by vortices. Steel Particles within the surges and world fragments hovered in the expanded ripples before finally being reduced to fine powder.

In the blink of an eye, the shockwaves caused by Joshua struck the ripples made by the radiant cocoon, which was also the trigger that helped the Ultimate Virus manifest. The warrior looked up, his eyes that were turning crimson reflecting the toxic seed and seeing the massive threads from the radiant cocoon once again making substantial ripples that followed the flow of the Mana Tide to reach for worlds beyond.

But would Joshua have given them the chance?

Lifting the Dragonslayer Swordspear forged from Emotional power, the warrior ignited the ripples that he had created himself with blazing flames of rage!

As if a firing star had fallen into a deep oilfield or a flickering spark reaching black gunpowder, the reaches of the Mana Tide that Joshua affected, including the radiance which was turned into undercurrents or vortices, were all ignited by the crimson spark within one split second. Every ripple seed that the radiant cocoon made was therefore consumed by the blaze and reduced to ashes, the wrathful burst of flame even climbing upstream against the Mana Tide, fueling itself with pure energy to spread within the surrounding Mana Tides.

The Mana Tide stirred while the inferno raged!

Not even the radiant cocoon could ignore the sea of blazing flames in the surges of Mana Tides. It reached out with its tentacles to brush off the flames of rage around its own fungal network, but it was futile—the sea of flames did not merely reach upstream, but had also extended downstream as well. Regardless of the power it possessed, the cocoon could only douse the fires of Emotion around it, while the flames that kept spreading downstream would have eventually become snares that devoured its ripple seeds. Before Joshua's energy was completely exhausted, the epidemic the radiant cocoon had been causing would never have spread with the Mana Tide as its medium.

Naturally, the cost of that fire was a period of interruption in the Mana Tide. Some worlds would have briefly lost the nourishment of the Mana Tide energies, but with the alternative being poisonous sweet dew, it was certainly the better choice to keep drinking the bland natural water back home.

However, the radiant cocoon did not react too much despite noticing what had happened. It simply scanned its surroundings and attempted to identify Joshua's location, trying to find its lost quarry which had not only parried its blow, but also interfered with its plans.

Naturally, Joshua had already disappeared without a trace, vanishing into the inferno created by the flames of Emotion.

"…"

As if thinking for a moment, the radiant cocoon retracted the tentacles it had wanted to elongate, silently pausing for an instant before shrinking back into gushes of energy, hiding its whereabouts.

***

"This isn't good."

At the same time, in the Galactic Trench, Joshua's true form which had been prepared for a long-distance warp opened his eyes and said with a somber face, "It is certainly an unexpected presence, and its power is definitely beyond what was imagined."

[Question: What have you found in the worlds beyond?]

[Puzzled: Was it the Evil God that is the origins of the Ultimate Virus?]

[Query: What are the actual present circumstances?]

The Triple Curtain was equally serious, since it was the one that worried most about the problems in Stellaris. Even if Joshua was summoned to offer aid and not as some tourist, the warrior had less responsibility as compared to the Artificial Intelligence Collective, which was also the Protectors of Life in this world—even if it had to use its very last vestiges of power, the Triple Curtain would have fought against the foes who were bent on vanquishing the many lives of the diverse civilizations.

Still, it was not aware that the man before itself would have fought those same foes even if unnecessary, and had proven to be an unpleasant undesired guest of the Chaos. One way or another, Joshua considered his words carefully before saying quietly, "Powerful Evil Gods have arrived outside Stellaris—or as I would put it, a superior lifeform filled with malice…whatever the vessel may be, Evil Gods are simply tools at its disposal to achieve its own purposes, and I even suspect that Evil Gods are merely navigational systems that this particular lifeform is utilizing in seeking the 'eternal'."

"As for what it actually is…well, I can only call it a beast."

Even as Joshua spoke, he narrowed his eyes as he remembered the Stellar-class Void Behemoth he had once captured, and then the radiant cocoon along with the movements after spreading the Ultimate Virus all over. 

"The most powerful one there is," he continued. "One that is like no other, even in the Multiverse."

***

Meanwhile, Joshua clone was still fleeing in haste along the surge of the Great Mana Tide afar, heading away from Stellaris.

With his present speed, the radiant cocoon would have had a hard time catching up and had probably wasted great effort in return. Even so, the warrior had no inclination to pause at all, but simply kept advancing.

There was no doubt that the radiant cocoon had maintained a blockade around Stellaris, and it was impossible to return, whether he approached the realm or took a detour. Joshua would certainly not have risked the chance of having the Triple Curtain infected by the radiant cocoon just for a clone by having it open the backdoor that the Creators left for his return.

So, even if it was like recycling a waste product, Joshua would have moved the clone, which could never return, in an attempt to go downstream and survey the Void around Stellaris.

One could tell that the vicinity of Stellaris was once a bright and flourishing galaxy. But now, after the passing of endless time, the brush of the Great Mana Tide, the erosions of Chaos, along with the time dilation due to temporal pitfalls, the once brilliant starlight had all darkened, reduced to hovering Steel Particles and world fragments that wafted around in the Mana Tide.

Though their former radiance might have still been shining upon the infinite worlds on the other side of the Multiverse, here, in the land where they belonged, there was simply nothing left.

For a very long time, all that Joshua could see was a blank whiteness—such was the radiance of the Mana Tide. The Void was no better, as it was simply empty across every direction, a vacancy that had nothing but energy. If not for the Mana Tide itself flowing 'downstream', Joshua would probably not have known the direction he should have been flying.

Time passed.

In that exceedingly extended silence, only a single silver light advanced alone in the Void filled with the white gushing.

Joshua imagined that the journey of his clone would have lasted a very long time until he could reach the first galaxy next to Stellaris—at the same time, he was very aware that the galaxy he used to live was certainly not the one closest to Stellaris. Even so, the warrior still saw a rather bizarre shadow in the white background of the Mana Tide.

"What is that?"

It was a very simple idea that came to Joshua's head. He could see that the shadow was not along the direction he was heading towards and was actually indistinct—if not for Steel Vision, which was a special perception of his, he might never have caught that shadow. Either way, he had seen it and tried to get closer to see what actually lay behind the shadow.

As he shifted his course and approached the location of the shadow, it became more distinct and darker. Eventually, in the instant when the light of the Mana Tide suddenly turned dull, the existence behind the shadow revealed its true face.

"Damn!"

Save for his lifted brow, Joshua's expression remained unchanged, although he could not help but to praise it.

"That… is really big."

***

A corpse so colossal like no other lay before Joshua.

On first glance, it was so outstandingly massive that it actually dwarfed the Giant God of Steel. A serpentine monster that resembled a mountain, it had three horns on its head that responded to the three Extraordinary forces of ether, lifeforce, and Psi. Its layers of scales were a pale green and possessed a special microscopic structure that acted as thick armor. The spell formation that assumed form within each scale were imbued with thousands of chain runic constructs, a sturdiness that protected whatever lay beneath, even in the case of a supernova explosion.

The corpse was curled into a ball as if in slumber, but had assuredly lost all signs of life. In fact, the great serpent's scales still flickered with faint golden glimmers that floated along the radiance of the Great Mana Tide.

Even Joshua himself had to move an entire lap around the corpse to make out its true form—and one should not forget that Joshua's clones were titanic bodies that could create stars or pinch small worlds as if they were mere toy. And yet, the lifeless serpentine corpse still managed to actually exude a menacing might of its own, its sheer size dwarfing most smaller mid-sized worlds.

As the warrior would have put it, it was a corpse, even if its energy had yet to completely diminish, and part of its motor functions could attack any being approaching it with hostile intent, although it would have been no different than scratching an itch for Joshua. After he had moved around it, the warrior had also determined that it was not actually a serpentine Void Behemoth, but a Void Snake which started life as an ordinary creature but eventually evolving through every level, venturing far into the limits of Legend, and obtaining great power. It certainly possessed the ability to survive in the Void, having the capacity to feed on worlds.

And yet, it had died here for some unknown reason.

"…It actually died from hunger? That cannot be."

Joshua's brow furrowed upon realizing its cause of death. "It would be reasonable that an Evil God has slain a Legendary-tier superior lifeform of such existence," he said quietly, "but dying from energy depletion? You must be joking."

Leaving aside the fact that the surge of the Great Man Tide had boundless, inexhaustible energy to draw from, there were simply too many measures at one's disposal to have kept oneself supplied with unending sources of energy—that is, when they had reached beyond the threshold of advanced Legendary, thereby completely transcending one's own state of being. Aside from methods that Joshua was familiar with such as pulsar engines, ruin hedging endings, or black hole gravitational wave engines, even ordinary nuclear fusions would have kept one burning for a few billion years, as long as there was sufficient volume and that it was stable enough. In addition, adding elements of Extraordinary powers could have actually improved upon it as well.

"Before the Great Mana Tide began to flow, this place may have been complete emptiness for a very long time. There was no substance or energy, and it certainly could have caused insufficiencies in energy and supplies during that period. Even so, dying from hunger is simply unthinkable."

When he considered that the Mana Tide was not a continuous phenomenon, but something like a fountain that would have jet intermittently between epochs instead, Joshua could understand that the lack of material replenishment was an actual issue under such circumstances. Even so, to die due to a simple lack of energy was truly a unique death.

As an example, if Joshua himself had really lack energy, he could have simply turned himself into a real world and slumbered. By turning off most of his mental faculties and have his combat systems go into slumber, he would have become a harmless world that wafted along in the Void. No one would have ever notice him because he would have really been a world that simply floated away, and it was a state that Joshua estimated would have lasted for incalculable aeons, long enough for the Heroic Spirits of civilizations that lived within him to develop into a powerful Void civilization, and it would have taken a lot less to wait for another wave of Mana Tide.

And for what Joshua could achieve, the other champions naturally would have had other means to do as well. Even when he had previously confirmed that the Snake was truly lifeless, the warrior was still cautious about a possible feigned death, that his approach would have triggered its warning systems and revive it. Nonetheless, after verification through various means, Joshua had to admit that the huge serpent was indeed dead, and its massive form was nothing other than dead meat.

"Why are you here, and dead?"

Why would you leave your homeworld to die here in the middle of nowhere? And what could have actually killed you and left your corpse here in the stillness as unfathomable time moved on?

There was so many questions that Joshua could not understand. That being said, as one who never considered questions without answers, he stayed silent for a while before sighing and continuing to move downstream along the Mana Tide.

The silver radiance continued streaking through, and that was when the journey started to change.

The number of corpses floating in the Void was increasing.

At first, Joshua had done as he did in the case of the Void Snake's corpse and stopped to study, but as he moved along, he would have at most slowed down a little to glance at the tremendous forms hidden behind the shadows of the Great Mana Tide. Even so, the warrior could hardly suppress his surprise: all those corpses that were floating along the Void were powerful Extraordinary lifeforms with no exception!

Amongst them were a humanoid giant with three eyes, crystalline composites made entirely out of crystals and steel, even some unusual plant lifeform with a body that was still alive, its leaves and branches reaching for the light of the Mana Tides and absorbing the rich energy from the surrounding environments…yet it was still dead. Joshua had tried multiple times to talk to it, but received no response in return.

The surge of energy kept raging onwards. In the white mist of overly concentrated energies were many dead bodies with their sheer sizes comparable to actually worlds. While there were certainly smaller individuals, the energy levels they emanated was in a class of Extraordinary powers of its own. In that respect, size was meaningless since the small could enlarge while the large could shrink.

"…It reminds me of the Creators."

By now, the Void where Joshua was travelling through was filled with innumerable piles of corpses. All of them belong to champions who were at least advanced Legends, and could easily destroy a small world—most of their bodies were still alive and could exchange energies with the Mana Tide on their own accord, but their spirit, soul, or the self that marked their individual consciousness had all diminished.

"It's like the Creators who had lost their Thought Component individuals, a complete lifeform thereby crumbling, their bodies disintegrating down into the form of the Psybugs."

Joshua stood in the Void, fully armed with each of his four arms holding a weapon. He looked up and around him with a somber gaze, and murmured, "This isn't mutual slaughter—there aren't any wounds left from battle by another, and the few beings that have lost their physical bodies as well had simply done that to themselves, because their living state requires individual will to stay alive."

Around the warrior was a cluster of radiance that resembled a collapsed nebula. It had been the core of some elemental lifeform, and because it had lost its primary consciousness, the extremely dense energy crystal at its core was being incessantly washed over by the Great Mana Tide, becoming a part of the Tide itself and spreading towards the many worlds where the Great Mana Tide reached.

In life, it must have been so powerful that Joshua believed it did not lose out to himself. But even if it had once been an ultimate champion that could dominate galaxies single-handedly, it was now ashes—in the distant future, not even its corpse would have remained.

It was simply too weird.

"What were they actually—wait." Joshua muttered in great perplexity as he looked around at the champions' corpses, but he soon paused and said, "I get it now."

He narrowed his eyes and turned to look towards the direction he had come from: the course where the radiant cocoon had been, Stellaris, and the fountainhead of the Great Mana Tide.

"Right, it was so simple… what else could have lured so many champions here?"

Indeed, there was nothing else.

"Only that—only the Initial Flame."

For the briefest of moments, Joshua seemed to have seen the corpses around him reviving. He could see illusions created from sheer determination when those powerful Extraordinary beings darted like meteors even before the Great Mana Tide had begun, streaking through the absolutely emptiness of the Void—some of them would have lost their bearings, some of them firmly advancing, leaving their own home galaxies and civilization which could have kept them supplied with endless resources and energy to journey on in this silent darkness.

They had failed and died here for unknown reasons, but all of them had assumed this path without an ounce of regret. Even their dead bodies faced the way ahead.

Silently, Joshua turned towards the direction where the Mana Tide flowed towards the worlds beyond. He could faintly see galaxies after galaxies at the edge of the Tides, every remaining world in the Multiverse and converging points of surviving civilizations. There, light and shadows existed, moving along the radiant path of the Great Mana Tide to migrate upstream.

***

There was a species of fish with a rather unique journey in life, living in different locations during each phase of their existence.

At birth, they were born upstream in freshwater rivers where they settled and grew. As they grew, they returned to the sea where they could bloom, but when the time came, they returned upstream where they lay their eggs, continuing a new cycle.

Each cycle meant a profound journey, and that unique existentialism was called migration.

And now, Joshua could sense that this was a migration too—one exclusive to champions, a way of living that only the strong embodied.

When the being and its civilization had reached their pinnacles, when the ultimate champions searched themselves inwardly for things in life they had yet to unravel and what mystery it was that clouds their hearts—that was the moment they moved.

None would have been able to stop their advance, just as none would have questioned their actions. Therefore, they would have gone on, journeying from distant reaches against the direction where the Mana Tide flowed and arrive to this Void that was all but empty.

"It's not only us who yearn for the Truth in the Multiverse. Neither the Sage, the Wise One of Arcane, or even the Creators—the Wise One of Psi was the first!"

Joshua could not help but mumble as he studied the cadavers, clenching the weapons in his hand.

"Evil Gods, the Masterminds, the repeated cycles of ruin and rebirth of civilizations amongst the stars, even the withering Multiverse," Joshua said with a deep voice. "There may be a repetitive cycle of misery, but every powerful being that desires the Truth would certainly understand that and develop a curiosity in their hearts!"

Therefore, they began chasing after that Truth and migrated in the direction of the Mana Tide's fountainhead and the Initial Flame. Like the fish that returned to complete their life cycle, the great ones headed to the origins of that Multiversal cycle of misery, and questioned the Truth and purpose it held!

It was never him alone who desired the Truth, just as he was not alone in having the power to pursue the Root.

All of them had failed, their lifeless bodies thus left here—but so what? Joshua himself was alive, and he would keep on searching, and go to the very edge in pursuit of the Truth.

Joshua lifted his eyes and turned towards the distant source of illumination—at the direction of the radiant cocoon, as well as the root of the Great Mana Tide beyond where the Initial Flame was.

"You—virus who lives for the sublime—are you pursuing the Initial Flame too!?"

***

Faraway, near Stellaris, the colossal radiant cocoon was wriggling, twirling its tentacles that was binding multiple Evil Gods to knock the Stellaris World Barrier from time to time.

One could see that the hammering actually without force and with no effort to speak off. It was a mechanical motion, for the cocoon's attention was not focused there.

All of its efforts were converging at the radiant side of the Great Mana Tide—the great cocoon was staring towards the distance at the source of the like.

Because of curiosity, duty, and its intention to break the cycle, or perhaps because wanting greater power, to rule over everything or save everyone…there were millions of different reasons and countless possibilities.

Even so, every outcome ultimately converged back unto a single point.

In the end, every individual that had obtained great power, no matter their allegiance, no matter their alignment to good or evil, no matter if they were ignorant, wise, gentle, or radical, every champion pursued the origins of everything: that Flame, the fire which warmly nurtured all worlds and living things.

And the Sublimator Virus was the same too.

In that long, silent, and lonely journey, hence recollecting and migrating…

In search of the first radiance.