Was the world alive?
Perhaps that wasn't the right question to ask.
Was the world aware of what went on within it? That was a better question.
Did planet Earth know of the danger it was constantly in? Did it see the constant battles that shaped history? If so, what did it think of it all? When the Lords first came, when the Shadow arrived, when the Beast rotted the land, and Lucifer marched an army of the dead, while the Emperor freely destroyed all that was in his way, what thoughts went through the world's mind? What side was the planet on? Did she want the heroes to win, or was she ready for it all to be over with?
Battle after battle after battle, the planet has truly suffered. Only through a cosmic will, a power beyond humanity's understanding, the closest thing to a real hand of God, was this world even able to stay pieced together. If the world were living, if it could think as humans do, Mermaid figured that it would wish for death.
That the planet would beg the villains to put it out of its misery. To end its suffering.
These thoughts came to her mind because, in that moment, she could imagine that planet Earth was screaming. As the Emperor stood before her and the other heroes, rain began to fall rapidly and beat against them all. It was like the planet was weeping, and each crackle of thunder was a giant boom that shook the heavens. Bolts of lightning would occasionally drop from the sky, ramming into the ground hot enough to turn sand into glass. Tornadoes began to be generated, picking up scorched debris, and ice started to creep across the ground, while the air was set aflame.
At first, Mermaid thought that the weapons her father had set off were behind this, but the more intense everything got, the more she realized just how outmatched they all truly were.
The planet was shaking. The world was breaking. And it was all because of the Emperor.
His energy was slowly growing, like a never-ending river, pouring out more and more power that began to seep out. So great was he that he was warping space just from his raw strength. Of course, he wasn't the only one affecting the world on such a large scale. Someone else was doing that as well. Someone deep within the bunker. It was for this person that Mermaid and the other heroes decided to fight.
Even though they all knew they didn't stand a chance and that there was no way they could stop this monster, they were all going to fight with everything they had. Besides herself and her father, there were forty other heroes. That meant they were a small gathering of forty-two of the strongest fighters on the planet. Only one villain stood before them, yet it was the strongest villain that existed. A force of greater power. A being akin to the Devil himself.
And in only an instant, it was already over.
Mermaid got ready to give the orders, all the other heroes got ready, and then suddenly bodies hit the ground. The Emperor went from standing before them to standing behind the crowd that was in his way. Over half the heroes were sent blasting into the air as he simply plowed through them, and they all hit the ground hard. Mermaid let out a yell, and everyone turned around, launching as many attacks as they could at the monster they were fighting.
Beams of energy, orbs of fire, spikes of earth, bullets, and explosions ripped across the battlefield. The Emperor didn't even bother to dodge or defend himself. The attacks rammed into him, and his armor deflected them all. In the fight on the moon, Ruby had managed to dent and dirty his suit, but when he used Storymaker to appear back on Earth, he had also swapped his armor out. His current suit was undamaged and pure, and all of these weak attacks weren't able to even leave the faintest mark upon him.
The metal of this suit was created by a material that would appear after the Beast attacked a planet. A substance forged from its many suits, very few Supers were able to figure out how to use this material, but those that did could create objects of great power. Blades that could cut through even molecules, or in this case, armor that shunted forces of power weaker than the metal to a different dimension. In other words, the only way to actually harm the suit was to hit it hard enough to break it.
Normal armor, even that built to be as durable as possible, could in theory be destroyed or cracked if enough weak attacks were to hit it, but that was not the case with the armor the Emperor used. Anything less than the strength required to harm it would be fully negated in its entirety, leaving the suit completely spotless.
Unfortunately for all the heroes, none of them had what it took to harm him. The heroes didn't stop, though. They kept attacking, again and again, sending bolts of lightning or bombs the villain's way.
"Keep attacking!" Mermaid demanded. "We've just got to keep going! Sooner or later, we'll be able to break through his armor!" Of course, she and everyone else knew that that was a lie, one they were all willing to believe in because what else could they do? They had to have hope. Mermaid lifted her hands, and she slashed them out, the rain forming into the head of a massive dragon. As it launched toward the Emperor, ice flowed over it, freezing it solid.
The Emperor walked through the attack, the ice breaking and shattering on his suit. Young Dog growled out, drew several knives from his belt, and threw them. They were made out of the same metal as the villain's armor and were one of the few things that could actually manage to hit past the suit, but no matter how sharp they were, they were still just daggers being thrown by a human, and the Emperor caught them out of the air.
Several heroes attempted to engage the Emperor in melee combat, but he used the knives he caught and sliced up, cutting through both heroes' weapons. Then he dropped the blades and rammed his hands through their stomachs. Blood flowed out of them, but a blue light wrapped around their bodies, stopping them from bleeding out. In fact, that blue light covered all the downed heroes who couldn't fight, putting them into a stasis where they would not die.
As the Emperor knocked the two heroes down and slapped at the air, a moment later, he sent out a shock wave that blasted the other half of the army away, sending them flying. Young Dog managed to avoid this attack and drew the black blade he had, charging forward. He sliced out with the sword and hit only the air as the Emperor appeared behind him. The villain grabbed the hero by the back of his head, picked him up, and rammed him into the ground hard enough to shake the land. A blue light covered Young Dog, just like the other heroes, and he did not die, despite how mighty this blow was.
"Dad!" Mermaid let out a roar of rage, and she blasted out mountains of ice, all of them crashing down onto the villain. Other heroes piled on their own attacks, everyone giving it their all, and yet it still did nothing as the armored monster walked through the ice, shattering it all and coming out the other side.
Silence filled the air as everyone stopped and stared at this being, which they had still not been able to even scratch. As if to mock them, he didn't look their way and was more focused on his cape, which had become slightly dirty.
That was how little they truly mattered to him.
Lazily, the Emperor dusted off his cape and began to slowly walk toward the group of heroes. "A thousand ants. A million ants. A billion ants. A trillion ants." His voice rang out across the battlefield, loud and booming. Just the force of it caused the heroes on the front line to have their knees shake, and they began to collapse. "Ten trillion. One hundred trillion. Do you think it matters what the number is? Ants are just ants. Even if you were to gather a near-unlimited amount of them, what can a mere ant do to a black hole? Absolute destruction." Blue and black energy began to surge. It started to bubble and gush from the tip of the Emperor's finger, which he raised. Space started to swirl and bend, and reality began to scream. "Witness, annihilation!"
"Anyone who can use barriers, do it now!" Mermaid screamed. Her own power reached its peak as she forced out every ounce of energy she had. The rain in the air benefited her as it flowed and twisted, and she created a wall, compressing and shrinking it down, using an ocean's worth to make a small yet powerful dome around her and the others, which she then rapidly froze into a solid ball of ice. The ice kept spreading, going across the field, and the weather became snowy.
If someone in space were to see planet Earth now, they'd surely be shocked, for over one-tenth of it had become pure white. A dazzling field of snow and a wall made to withstand the sun.
While she did this, Mummy lifted his hands, and his bandages began to unravel. All the unconscious heroes were teleported behind the barrier, and the others who weren't knocked out used various powers to reinforce Mermaid's mighty wall. It glowed with every color of the rainbow and became thousands of times more durable.
And it was torn down in a single attack.
All the energy the Emperor gathered formed into a tiny orb of energy. No bigger than a golf ball. He took aim, and he flicked it. "Be gone."
Once more, if someone were to be in space and look down upon this planet, which was surely screaming and sobbing, they would bear witness to the horrifying sight, as over one-tenth of the planet faded and crumbled, black flames devouring all.
Mermaid's barrier shattered and exploded, and the force of the attack slammed her to the ground and caved the surrounding land in, forming a gigantic crater. If not for the fact that the bunker was miles underground, it would have surely been destroyed. The flames roared and kept stretching, getting higher and higher, burning the air, and kicking up waves of deadly fumes that polluted the air.
The barrier had somehow managed to take most of the attack, but it hadn't been enough to hold back the sheer wave of attack power. Mermaid groaned and spat up blood. She was still conscious and managed to force herself back up to her feet. As she did, she noticed the surrounding area glowed with a brighter blue gleam; every hero was down and wrapped up in energy.
Only she was left.
The energy tried to form around her, but she forced herself out of the energy shell, shattering it and freezing it with all her power. When she was fully out of it, she glared at the Emperor.
"Oh?" The Emperor cocked his head to the side. "You're still standing."
"Fuck you—" Mermaid gasped as he suddenly was in front of her, and he grabbed her by the throat.
The Emperor's fingers grew tight around her neck, and he began to squeeze. Her life was in his hands, and he was not gentle. "Why are you even still fighting?" The Emperor pulled her closely, and she was able to stare into those fiery eyes that blazed out of his helm. The blue glow burned with rage, disgust, and also... confusion? "I don't get it." He looked her over as if trying to understand. "You all have no hope. Full Monarch is gone. We sent him away. The only being who could truly stand before me is no longer on this planet. So why? Why do you all keep trying? Why do you keep fighting? You know, I could have stormed into this place at any time and taken it over? I only allowed you all to play this silly game because it was amusing seeing how hard you all tried despite being doomed. Like a bunch of sailors whose ship has sunk in the middle of the ocean. No shore in sight, yet you swim? Why? Why do you keep fighting? Why are you suffering?"
Water surged out and rammed into the back of the Emperor's head, but the attack didn't even make him pause, and he just kept talking as if she hadn't hit him with everything she had.
"Wouldn't it be easier to give up? Wouldn't that make the pain stop?" The question was genuine. The Emperor was actually asking her something. He was completely baffled by her way of thinking. Not just hers but every hero's. Every human's will to survive. "If you all had stopped, none of this would have happened. I gave you so many chances to give up. You just needed to not struggle and allow me to take fate into my own hands. I would have brought the world I was meant to create."
Mermaid spat out another glob of blood, staining the man's helmet. More tendrils of water whipped at his back, but he kept ignoring them. "Do you really care?" She glared at him with utter hate. "Aren't we just ants to you? Why does a black hole care what ants do?"
"It's curious." The Emperor admitted. "Faced with destruction, you all somehow manage to try. Even now, while your team is down, you struggle in vain? You know you can't beat me? You can't even harm me. There is no point to this fight, yet you do it anyway. Over and over again."
"When the Shadow came, do you think we would all be here still if the humans back then had given up and died out?" Mermaid challenged. "Those people who had their lives altered, who were forced to be reborn in a world vastly different from the one they called home, fought tooth and nail for survival. They paved the way to our future. I'm sure they thought about it as well. That they could just give up and let it all end, but they didn't, and because of them, you and I are in this moment now. The past shaped the future and led to this event. And it'll happen again and again. Even now." She reached up with everything she had and gripped the wrist that was tightly around her throat. "Haven't you ever had a moment like that? Surely all humans do. One where we can end it all, but we don't."
The Emperor was silent. He had stopped squeezing, and he quietly stood there. A memory came to him. One that he had tried to forget. One before he became who he was. Before a weapon had been properly smelted into existence. He remembered a basement, dark and cold, and a tired and dirty woman who always glared at him and hated him, for it was his fault that they lived down there. He also remembered the cruel God that kept them in that domain. He even remembered the hands of that God and what they would do to him.
Perhaps he did understand. Wasn't there a time when he should have died? When should his pathetic and miserable life have come to an end? Yet, like a cockroach, he survived. Spite. He did it because he envied the butterfly that flew above. The butterfly had a life; he didn't. The butterfly that left him behind did so because he was still a caterpillar, unable to form a proper cocoon.
"I can see some sense in it, I suppose." The Emperor gave the faintest hint of a nod. "There is some fascination with the greater will of survival. Still, there is an error you all made. The humans of old suffered; that is true, but to compare their blight with yours is like comparing a thunderstorm to a detonating star. I am far, far greater than the Shadow. I alone stand at the top as the true pinnacle of all. I am this universe's selected ruler, and fate is mine to command. The humans of old had a chance for survival, and so they fought with all that they had. You do not. You fought for nothing."
The crushing force was back, and Mermaid could feel her flesh bruising as the Emperor's hand began to squeeze down once more. He was doing it with enough force to nearly pop her head. Even so, she managed to smile, and that caused him to pause.
"Who said I was fighting for nothing?"
Shards of ice rammed into the Emperor's back, but he didn't budge. Then all at once, he felt pain. His eyes actually widen, and something went through his cape and his armor, digging into his back and breaking the skin. Before it could go any further, a flash of blue erupted out of him, and dozens of hands began to form, grasping at the object that rammed through his defense.
"Master!" Hell Hound had been on the sidelines watching the entire fight in silence, but now that her Ruler had been injured and harmed, she let out a growl of anger and almost stepped toward him to clobber Mermaid to death, but the Emperor raised his hand, and she halted in place.
The energy hands that formed from his suit ripped the object poking out of him and brought it before him, allowing him to see what Mermaid had used to harm him. He felt impressed as he studied it.
It was a black sword. The very same one that Young Dog had dropped earlier. Mermaid had used her control over water to grab it and hid it in ice. Her earlier attacks had been done to lure him into a false sense of security so that she could finally strike. If he had acted even a moment too late, that blade would have pierced his heart.
Mermaid laughed, her voice echoing out across the battlefield. "How does it feel to get bitten by an ant?"
Blue fire burned across the Emperor's back, sealing his wound close, and he reduced the sword to ash. He held onto Mermaid as tightly as he could and brought her close. Then he whispered. It was short and to the point, and it caused her eyes to widen.
"You've earned my favor. See to it that it is done." And before she could process anything else, the Emperor rammed her down into the ground face-first, knocking her out. Like the other heroes, a blue barrier covered her.
"Master, are you okay?" Hell Hound rushed over to his side, but he ignored her and kept staring down at all the heroes who were knocked out.
"What do you think of them?"
Hell Hound paused and glanced at her leader in confusion. "What do you mean?"
"Are they not interesting to you?" The Emperor questioned. "Do you not almost want to respect them? The way they try again and again? The way they are trying to tell their own story? It has me wondering why we're even doing all of this sometimes, yet I know the answer to that. We do what we must. The path that was built on lies and suffering. I alone am the one who will make a perfect world, and so I cannot let such simple-minded creatures halt me. So why do their words make me so curious?"
Hell Hound's eyes narrowed slightly. "Don't forget, Alpha, we do this because it is the only way. A happy ending isn't possible. Not in a world like this. It's been marked and destined for doom. Remember what Avalon and Nier discovered. As long as this world remains, suffering will pile on. That's why it all must end. The very planet itself needs to be stripped away and remade in the correct image. Your image."
"You are right." The Emperor nodded. "This story is just starting. I cannot, and I will not falter. For we still have so much left to do. A better world. A perfect world. I will do what planet Earth is begging me to do, and I will bring about its end. This world will crumble and be reduced to ash. I am the being of Creation and Destruction. I am—"
Purple.
For a split second, everything was bathed in a pure purple glow. The skies themselves split apart, and every bolt of lightning that was high above came ramming down. Over trillions of bolts, hotter than the surface of the sun, all rammed directly into the head of the Emperor.
The battlefield shook, and molten lava began to spill out as every drop of lightning rammed into the Emperor, over and over again. They kept coming and infused the very rain, turning it into a circuit network of heat and death. Like a field of lasers that weaved out and wrapped around the armored figure before it finally all imploded, sending a wave across the surface of the planet.
So powerful was the electricity that rained down that the poles themselves twisted, and everything that could go wrong did go wrong. The Emperor himself was forced to his knees, and steam rapidly lifted off him. His armor had become white hot, and his cloak burned to ash. Hell Hound was down, wrapped in a blue barrier, but he remained strong, and he stood up as the attacks finally died down and the lightning no longer flowed.
"I'll admit," the Emperor spoke up. "I didn't expect you to come right for me. How monstrous of you. You could have caught all these people in your attack."
"How heroic of you that you kept them all safe." Up in the sky, Max floated. The prey had come to the predator.
All the heroes had fought so that Max and the Hero Branch could set their plan into motion. Deep within the bunker, there was a single gate to another world, which had been built by the late Sini. Not even Avalon knew about it. While all the heroes fought, every Hero Branch member entered the gate and used it to escape from the bunker. Max did not follow, though. He would never follow. They all knew that. So, a new plan had been put in place.
While the battle up top happened, Max used a tunnel to leave and escape to the surface and used his power over the weather to grab every bolt of lightning in the world and compress it all into a single point. When the time came, he would unleash it all on the Emperor. It was so much power that it had to do something, especially if the man was caught off guard. Max had put his all into that attack, and he knew that it wouldn't be what killed the villain, but he hoped it would at least weaken the bastard so that he could then finish him off himself.
In the event that he wasn't able to do this, one more person stayed behind. Someone who was using tiny drones created by Omega, which mimicked the drones Avalon had.
Ward rested in his chair, the last Branch officer in the bunker. The signal to the bombs would only go off if it was from the real world. He would stay as well and watch the fight. In the event that Max wasn't able to beat the Emperor, then he would do what must be done and go down with the ship. In his hands, he held the detonator. At the press of a button, he would end everything in a massive flash of light that would ensure the Emperor didn't get his hands on Max.
Lois was in the gate and would be safe. The power should transfer to her, but in the event it didn't, it would still mean the Emperor wouldn't instantly get his hands on it, buying them all a little more time. That was all they could do nowadays. Buy time.
The gate would be closed now, making it impossible to get in, and it had been loaded with food and other resources. From the very beginning, this was a trap and never an actual sanctuary. The pocket realm would eventually collapse and reopen somewhere random on the planet, so no one would even know where it would be.
This plan had been made because Max wanted to at least try. So much had happened, and so much would keep happening. He needed to at least attempt to fight the man who ruined his life, even if he knew he likely wouldn't win. More than that, though, he really, really wanted to punch the metal man in his face.
The Emperor folded his arms and stared up at Max. The boy had become a man. He wore a white skin-tight suit and had on a red flowing cape. He looked like a real hero now, and his hair was the color of clouds, with his eyes burning a fiery red, showing that he was already in his Lord mode. Max dropped from the ground and landed before the Emperor.
Without exchanging words, the battle began. The Emperor still lacked weapons, and so the fight was an exchange of fists. Lightning danced off of Max, and he disappeared in a flash of light. As he reappeared, wind swirled around his arm, and the punch he unleashed sent out a shock wave, but the Emperor caught it and twisted Max's wrist. The hero winced in pain and growled and slammed his palm into the Emperor's head, sending out a wave of lightning that heated the air. Unlike the other heroes, the Emperor's helm burned and cracked from Max's attack, the armor unable to keep up with the heat and force. The Emperor was forced to let go of Max, and the man took that as his chance and began to lay into the Emperor with dozens of attacks, each charged with more lightning.
The Emperor recoiled back, and his own energy flared to life. His eyes blazed bright, and it rippled across him, allowing the damage to be negated as he threw out a powerful right hook. Max blocked it, but the force of the attack nearly shattered his arms and made him wince. He was lifted off his feet and sent flying back, but as soon as he recovered, he felt a hand ram into the back of his head as the Emperor appeared behind him. The villain gripped the hero by his long hair and began to swing him around. Max superheated his body with his lightning and barely got out of the armored warrior's grasp, but not even a second later, the Emperor was ramming another strike directly into his stomach.
Max rolled across the ground, spitting up blood, but slammed both his hands out and unleashed a wave of wind, ice, and thunder, creating a sonic boom that flew toward the Emperor. However, he lazily backhanded it and marched forward.
Max met him head-on, charging forward and flying fist-first into the Emperor, hitting him hard enough to crack the ground. He blasted the Emperor back with as much wind as he could muster, then flew forward even faster and did it again. Punch after punch, he pushed the villain further and further away, and in actuality, he was getting closer to the center of where the bomb would go off.
"I hate you!" Max declared, and from his eyes a laser beam fired out, ramming into the chest of the Emperor. "You've done so much wrong! Hurt so many people! And for what? Nothing! You're a monster! No better than the Beast—"
"That is enough!" The Emperor was done playing. "What a blubbering fool you are." He reached out through the beam of lasers, and he gripped Max by the face and raised the man up. The energy kept coming, melting his gauntlet and burning his flesh, but he didn't let go this time. "All these people. They did so much. Fought so hard, and yet you come to me, offering yourself up on a silver platter. I'm almost disgusted. How many had to die so that this moment would happen? If you wanted to die so badly, you could have come to me from the start and negated this game of cat and mouse that we did, but instead, you allowed it to fester to this point. At least if you kept running and hiding, all of these people would have died knowing that they did their best but stood no chance because they were up against me. For it to end like this almost seems like a waste of everyone's time. Has all this effort seriously been what you can muster up—"
Max smashed his fist into the helmet, and it dented, but the man inside did not flinch.
"I guess that really is all you have to offer." The Emperor said in disgust. "One last stand."
Max winced and then chuckled. "You villains just don't learn, do you? Did you forget? I can see the future. I had this all planned from the start."
"Don't attempt to lie." The Emperor sounded as if he was sneering now. "I know how your power works. It's worthless. You can't see the Paths of those equal to or greater than your level, and I am far, far above you."
"That's true," Max admitted. "There are pieces I can't see. That said, I know some stuff. For example. 'She' is coming."
"She?"
Right on cue, there was an enormous force that slammed into the planet, shaking the entire world and kicking up a sea of dust. The Emperor turned, and his eyes actually widened at what he saw.
Ruby Admiral stood up, getting out of the crater she had formed. "Wow! That was close! I almost missed the planet!"
The Emperor blinked in confusion, then looked back to the moon where she had come from. She had jumped all the way back to Earth and followed him here.
Someone was dumb enough to try it after all...
In his moment of stunned shock, Max smashed his knee into the Emperor's gut and escaped from his grasp. He flew forward quickly and landed next to Ruby, and the two heroes got ready to face the final villain.
"I'm not done with you yet." Ruby declared. "We're finishing our fight. One way or the other. Emperor—No. Whoever you are. Let's settle this once and for all. May the stronger one win."
The Emperor let out a sigh as he stared at the couple. "Fine." His energy seeped across the ground, and dozens of hands began to form. "Let's play a little bit longer."