386: This is really explosive.

The “heavenly pillar,” a kinetic weapon that embodied the pinnacle of Interstellar Peace Corporation's mining capabilities, did not accelerate like a conventional missile with continuous propellant after leaving the launch tube of the flagship “Azure Dragon.”

At its tail, several miniature spacetime bubble generators, arranged in a ring, simultaneously lit up with a ghostly blue light, emitting a hum that couldn't be heard but caused the surrounding space to subtly warp.

Immediately after, the Zero-element crystal thrusters embedded in the pillar's base activated, erupting in a blinding white light!

Buzz—!

A strange tremor, as if space itself had been compressed and then violently sprung open, swept through the entire fleet.

The next second, to everyone's disbelief, the colossal five-kilometer-long object seemed to undergo a bizarre visual “contraction” of its massive volume.

It wasn't actually shrinking, but its presence gradually became ethereal, like observing it through a rippling curtain of water.

Then, it vanished.

No, it didn't completely disappear, but rather transformed into a blurry afterimage, trailing spatial ripples, “tearing” through the void at a speed that defied conventional physical limits, heading straight for the fissure on Tai Yi's Divine Body.

That massive, mirror-shattered fissure that Morning Light had blasted open with his life!

Pseudo-warp.

This was a crazy technology proposed by a few madmen in the Technology Research and Development Department, theoretically and experimentally feasible.

It utilized spacetime bubbles to briefly envelop an object, then used the immense energy provided by Zero-element crystals for a short but incomplete dimensional jump, achieving almost instantaneous acceleration.

Its speed was boosted to an astounding level in an extremely short time: 1 Astronomical Unit (AU) per second. This meant it could cross the average distance from Blue Star to the sun every second.

However, this state could not be sustained; it was an extreme load for both the carrier and the generators. But from the initial design, the consequences of this extreme load were also factored in.

Just as the metallic, cold-glowing tip of the “heavenly pillar” was about to touch the fissure on Tai Yi's Divine Body, its surrounding miniature spacetime bubble generators let out a mournful cry of unbearable strain, then actively overloaded and self-destructed!

The consequence of forcibly interrupting the pseudo-warp state was catastrophic spatial backlash.

The previously warped and compressed space snapped back like a rubber band stretched to its limit, and the surrounding spatial folds were forcibly “smoothed out” by the fundamental rules of the universe.

Under this terrifying spatial tension, the “heavenly pillar's” speed, which was almost zero in its independent spacetime, was abruptly and violently rewritten in the real universe in that one-billionth of a second.

30 kilometers per second!

This speed might seem slow on a cosmic scale, but when its carrier was a solid three-titanium-iron alloy giant pillar weighing 1.7 trillion tons (approximately equal to the mass of 6 Mount Everests), it became synonymous with destruction.

Asteroid catastrophes capable of causing mass extinctions were no worse than this.

This giant pillar, like a world-ending spear thrown by an ancient deity, slammed squarely and without any flourish into Tai Yi's wound!

At the moment of impact, no sound could travel in a vacuum, but everyone who witnessed this scene “heard” a terrifying roar deep in their souls, as if two worlds had collided and galaxies had collapsed!

The matter near the contact point, whether the alloy tip of the “heavenly pillar” or the crystalline structure inside Tai Yi's Divine Body, was instantly and completely plasma-ionized under unimaginable pressure and speed!

A light sphere billions of times brighter than a star erupted, devouring everything!

Tai Yi's immense Divine Body, like a glass art piece struck by a heavy hammer, shattered completely into three pieces starting from that huge fissure.

That “human face,” which had maintained a certain expression, clearly twisted into an expression mixed with extreme unwillingness and bone-deep fear in the instant before its final fragmentation.

He, Tai Yi, the Order Star God, did not die at the hands of Harmony, another Star God, but was crushed by a mere mortal, a single straw!

Even if it was just the last straw, facts were facts. He, failed at the hands of mortals.

Devastating energy wildly dispersed from the fracture point in the form of shockwaves! Like an invisible tsunami, it instantly swept across the entire battlefield.

“Shields overloaded! All shields overloaded!!!”

“Structural damage, watch out for impact!!!”

“Damage control team, repair immediately!!!”

The fleet channel was in chaos, with every warship's shield generator sparking after being overloaded and completely failing.

The massive hulls, like sampans in a storm, were tossed and displaced by the shockwaves. Fortunately, the main structures of the hulls largely held up after the initial shock, and aside from some external equipment and unlucky ones close to the explosion center, the main fleet did not suffer much fatal damage.

A deathly silence, born of escape, enveloped the battlefield, broken only by the crackling of short-circuiting equipment and the coughing of personnel.

Just then, a roar filled with extreme malice and madness, just like before, exploded directly in everyone's minds, coming from the already disintegrated Divine Body:

“All of you go—!”

He seemed to want to shout “die,” to drag everyone down with him. But the word “die” got stuck forever.

Just seconds earlier, Pexito, upon seeing the “Tai Yi” before her shatter into three pieces, instinctively reached out and grasped the largest piece, watching it slowly merge into her palm.

And in the real universe, the three shattered pieces of the Divine Body did not scatter like ordinary matter, but rapidly liquefied, transforming from their original purplish-gold into a deep, deathly blue-black.

Immediately after, these three massive liquid masses seemed to be drawn by some invisible gravity, rapidly converging towards the center, collapsing.

Finally, a heart-stopping celestial body appeared at Tai Yi's original location. A slowly rotating, blue-black “liquid black hole” that seemed to be devouring all surrounding light.

However, it clearly didn't possess the extreme gravity of a black hole, otherwise it wouldn't be visible.

Although it looked very large and dangerous, strangely, not many of those present felt afraid; instead, they felt a certain tranquility.

And the remaining half of Three-Body Star, as if pulled by invisible chains, rotated its surface towards this nascent “liquid celestial body.” In slow motion, it eventually achieved tidal locking, beginning its slow orbit.

All dust settled.

After a long silence, a trembling and incredulous voice on the public communication channel softly asked a question, in a questioning tone.

“Did we… win?”

No one could answer immediately.

What was that “liquid black hole” that replaced Tai Yi? Was it the remnants of the Order path? Was it a new threat? No one knew.

Until a voice that everyone thought had been sacrificed and would never be heard again rang out in the communication system.

Although clearly weak, and with a grimace like he'd taken a beating, it was full of joy.

“Yes, hiss—everyone! We won!”

It was Morning Light's voice!