The Emperor of Mankind clenched and unclenched his fists slowly, deliberately, as if testing the weight and sensation of physical form after an eternity without it.
Each finger curled with precision, joints moving smoothly within the golden gauntlets. He flexed his shoulders, rolled his neck, feeling the armor respond to his will.
He spoke gently, his voice carrying warmth despite its overwhelming power. "I almost forgot how it feels to move. To exist in flesh rather than spirit. Thank you, Edward."
Deep within the soulscape, the infinite realm where all the heroic spirits resided within Edward's being, Edward stood with arms crossed, a tired but genuine smile on his face.
Around him, the other spirits watched with varying degrees of interest.
Gilgamesh lounged on a throne of light, Karna stood at attention, Alucard grinned from the shadows. Arjuna, Ishkander, and Kratos were playing 3 cards without any care.
Edward gave a thumbs up, his form flickering slightly with exhaustion. "It's nothing, Big E. Now let's deal with this guy before he wrecks the multiverse. I'm running on fumes here, so make it count."
The Emperor chuckled, the sound resonating through both the physical and spiritual planes. He turned his golden gaze toward the Anti-Monitor, who still thrashed within the gravitational prison , antimatter energy crackling desperately as he fought to break free.
"Very well," the Emperor said, his voice taking on the weight of absolute conviction.
"Whether Terra or Earth, whether humanity of the fortieth millennium or the twenty-first, I shall be the salvation mankind needs." He raised the Primarch Blade, its flames burning brighter. "Only in death does duty end."
He held the sword firmly and pointed it directly toward the Anti-Monitor, the blade's tip aimed at the cosmic being's cracked chest armor.
Anti-Monitor felt it then, something fundamentally different about his opponent. The presence had changed, the control and power levels was increasing. This wasn't the same being he'd been fighting moments ago.
He snarled, antimatter energy surging as he pushed harder against the black holes. "Who the hell are you?! You're not him! The anomaly's consciousness has changed!"
The Emperor of Mankind's lips curved into a smile that held ten thousand years of war, sacrifice, and unwavering purpose.
When he spoke, his voice was deep, resonant, carrying the authority of one who had guided humanity through its darkest hours.
"You can Contemplate it in hell, daemon."
The word 'daemon' was spoken with such contempt, such absolute disgust, that reality itself seemed to flinch. To the Emperor, the Anti-Monitor was no different from the Chaos entities he'd fought for millennia, a corruption that sought to unmake humanity's future.
He offered a silent prayer. The action was unnecessary for one such as him, but it was the acknowledgment that what came next was not mere violence but execution.
He whispered, but the words rang through the galaxy like a bell tolling the end of days.
"By my hand, let divinity kneel.
By my will, let humanity rise.
I am the Sword of our Ascension."
The Primarch Blade responded.
It shone with brilliance that made the sun look dim by comparison. Golden flames erupted along its length, but these weren't normal flames—they were Psyker force, the manifestation of humanity's collective will to survive, to thrive, to ascend beyond the limitations imposed by uncaring gods and malevolent entities.
The blazing fury emanating from the weapon was so intense that space itself began to burn.
Reality warped around the blade, unable to fully contain the power being channeled through it. Nearby debris, fragments of destroyed planets, scattered asteroids—simply ceased to exist, erased by proximity to such overwhelming force.
Anti-Monitor finally tore through the black holes, his hand ripping apart the gravitational field with desperate strength. The prison shattered, event horizons collapsing as he broke free.
But before he could move, before he could teleport or attack or defend, the Emperor glanced at him.
Just a glance. Nothing more.
Those golden eyes met the Anti-Monitor's burning sockets, and in that instant, the cosmic being found himself frozen.
Not by force, not by power, but by will so absolute that his body simply refused to disobey. It was as if the Emperor's gaze carried a command that reality itself enforced.
The paralysis lasted only a moment. A single heartbeat.
But that was all the Emperor needed.
He swung the Primarch Blade with absolute finality, with the certainty of judgment pronounced and carried out. The movement was perfect—not flashy, not dramatic, just efficient and utterly final.
"Perish, heretic."
"Aeternitas Imperator!"
The Noble Phantasm activated.
A wave of golden flame erupted from the blade, but calling it flame was like calling the sun a candle.
This was conceptual annihilation given form—the erasure of everything that stood against humanity's right to exist, to grow, to rule their own destiny.
The blazing force moved forward with absolute certainty. It didn't follow the normal laws of physics. It didn't spread like fire or expand like an explosion. It simply advanced, a wall of judgment that declared: everything before it would cease.
The path it traveled tore through the universe's fabric of reality like tissue paper. Space cracked. Time fractured. Dimensions bled together as the attack moved through multiple layers of existence simultaneously.
Anti-Monitor felt fear.
True, primal fear—an emotion he hadn't experienced in eons. He'd destroyed universes, consumed realities, stood against cosmic entities. Nothing had made him afraid.
Until now.
He understood instantly that while this attack might not kill him permanently, his nature as a fundamental force made true death nearly impossible, it would shatter his life shell completely.
The armor that contained his unstable antimatter core would be destroyed, leaving him exposed, vulnerable, weakened to the point where even ordinary cosmic beings could end him.
And worse, he'd fail. Fail to free Mother. Fail in his purpose.
That thought drove him to desperation.
He gathered every ounce of power at his disposal. Energy drawn from the thousand universes he'd consumed over his existence. Antimatter from the core of his being. The fundamental force of entropy and annihilation that he embodied.
All of it condensed into a single defensive wall.
"I am eternal!" he roared, his voice shaking reality. "Nothing will stand in my way! Die, Anomaly, or whatever creature you are! Who the hell are you even!"
The wall formed before him—a barrier of pure antimatter, so dense and powerful that it warped space around it. It was dark, not black but somehow darker than black, as if it absorbed the very concept of light. Energy crackled across its surface, drawn from countless dead realities.
The Emperor replied with a neutral tone, as if stating a simple fact. " I have been called many names in my long life, so much so that I even forgot my own.
Daemons like you called me 'The Anathema', some beings called me 'Neoth', I myself sometimes went by the title 'Revelation'. I was the Emperor who guided mankind. But my subjects and enemies ofter refer to me as 'God Emperor of Mankind' "
He swung down the blade.
The two forces met.
BOOM!
The explosion wasn't just physical. It was metaphysical, conceptual, an eruption that occurred across multiple dimensions simultaneously.
The shockwave consumed everything in range. Nearby stars, distant suns with their own potential solar systems, simply winked out of existence.
Planets were atomized before they could even register the impact. The very fabric of space-time rippled outward, the distortion visible from Earth despite the tremendous distance.
The Andromeda Galaxy, thankfully far from Earth's location, bore the brunt of the devastation. Vast swathes of it were simply erased, leaving voids where matter had once been.
Back on Earth, people felt the aftermath.
Not the explosion itself, they were too far away, too small to perceive it directly. But they felt something. A tremor in reality, like the moment before an earthquake. Birds fell silent. Animals huddled. Babies cried without knowing why.
Humans across the planet looked up at the sky, not understanding what was happening but knowing instinctively that something cosmic was taking place.
They didn't know what to do except pray, pray that the golden hero who'd saved them would return victorious. Due to his regal bearing and armor, they started referring the hero as 'The Emperor'. How true they were.
At the epicenter of the explosion, the Anti-Monitor's antimatter wall held firm. The golden flames of Aeternitas Imperator crashed against it, burning, cutting, trying to pierce through. Reality screamed between them, unable to fully contain either force.
It was a collision on multiversal levels. Two fundamental concepts opposing each other—humanity's will to ascend versus entropy's desire to return all to nothing.
The Anti-Monitor's wall cracked slightly but didn't break. He poured more power into it, reinforcing it, his regenarated hands pressing against the barrier from behind as if physically holding it together.
He allowed himself a brief moment of relief, then a smirk crossed his nightmarish features.
"You can't cut through universes!" he shouted over the roar of conflicting energies. "You might be an unstoppable force, but I am an immovable object! And when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object—"
"They shatter through them."
The Emperor's voice cut through his words like a knife. There was no doubt in it, no hesitation. Just statement of fact.
The Emperor pushed harder. Not physically, his stance hadn't changed. He poured more of humanity's will into the blade, drew upon the collective unconscious of billions of souls who'd fought and died for the future.
The flames intensified. The pressure increased.
Crack!
It was a small sound, almost insignificant against the cosmic roar of their battle. But to the Anti-Monitor, it was the sound of doom itself.
His eyes widened in shock and genuine fear as he saw a fracture appear in his defensive wall. A thin line of golden light piercing through the antimatter barrier, burning its way deeper.
"No," he whispered, then louder: "No!"
He immediately shifted tactics. If defense wouldn't work, he'd force the Emperor to defend instead.
Multiple antimatter spears materialized around him, dozens of them, each one formed from condensed annihilation energy. They pointed at the Emperor's unprotected back, aimed at vital points in the armor where the joints were weakest.
"Let's see you dodge this! Either you attack , or you defend." Anti-Monitor grinned savagely, baring teeth that looked like broken reality. He waved his remaining hand.
The spears hurled forward with incredible speed. They moved faster than light, crossing the distance in a fraction of a second. Each one was powerful enough to pierce through planets.
They were about to strike when they stopped.
All of them, frozen in midair just inches from the Emperor's back. They trembled, straining against invisible bonds, but couldn't advance further.
"Why not both?" Came the reply.
The Emperor was using his Psyker abilities, his mind holding them back through sheer telekinetic force.
But his focus was divided now—most of his power was still channeled into the Primarch Blade, maintaining the assault on the wall. He couldn't maintain this split concentration for long.
Sweat beaded on his brow. His jaw clenched with effort.
Anti-Monitor saw the strain and felt a surge of desperate hope. "Yes! Keep struggling! Divide your power! You can't—"
The wall crumbled.
The antimatter barrier, weakened by the constant assault and now unsupported as the Anti-Monitor's attention shifted to his spear attack, finally gave way.
Aeternitas Imperator surged through.
The golden flames engulfed the Anti-Monitor completely. They burned not just his body but his essence, his concept, his very existence. The power of humanity's ascension crashed into him like an avalanche, overwhelming his defenses.
"AAAARRRGGGHHHH!"
The pained howl rang through the entire universe. Creatures on distant worlds felt it, a psychic scream that bypassed physical hearing and resonated directly in their souls.
Even the Endless, far beyond normal space, paused and looked toward the disturbance. Olethros grinned from his small house in Greece, " Cool fight."
Morpheus looked nonchalantly. "I hope he suffers a little Atleast. " He didn't forget the old grudge.
Delight smiled and clapped. " Big brother is so cool! I should go show him my new form."
Destiny stopped her with a hand. " Don't, sister. This is not our battle...yet."
He closed his book and muttered. " And thus the end begins."
Death looked at the direction and muttered. "Why is my husband fighting the Anti-Monitor? Didn't he just dropped down to get the children home for dinner? I should go get him."
The Anti-Monitor, destroyer of universes, conqueror of realities, was hurled backward by the force of the attack. He crashed through space, through dimensions, finally slamming into a desolate planet at the edge of a dying galaxy.
The impact was catastrophic. The planet's crust shattered on contact, magma erupting. The shockwave of his landing split the world nearly in half, tectonic plates grinding and breaking.
He lay in the crater of his own making, armor shattered. The life shell that had protected him for eons was broken, fragments of it scattered around him.
Antimatter leaked from the cracks in his body, no longer contained.
He groaned, his voice weak and distorted. Disbelief colored every word.
"No... this can't be. I... I'm supposed to be invincible. I am supposed to free MOTHER from her imprisonment." His remaining hand clawed at the ground, trying to pull himself up.
"I can't stop here! I'm supposed to be a god who crushes these weaklings! They are nothing!"
Golden light descended.
The Emperor of Mankind landed softly in front of him, his massive form casting a shadow over the fallen cosmic entity. The Primarch Blade still burned in his hand, though its flames had diminished to a gentle glow.
Blood ran from a wound in his side—one of the antimatter spears had managed to bypass his guard in that moment of divided attention.
The golden armor was slightly cracked in several places.
But he stood tall, unbowed.
He looked down at the Anti-Monitor with an expression that held no triumph, no satisfaction. Just weariness and a kind of sad understanding.
He smiled softly, the expression almost paternal despite the circumstances.
"A god, you say?" The Emperor's voice was gentle now, almost conversational. "People worshipped me as a god once, despite myself never claiming such a title. I fought against it, tried to teach them reason over faith. But they needed something to believe in. Someone to pray to."
He knelt slowly, bringing himself closer to the Anti-Monitor's level. "It is an empty word, 'god.' Given form by those foolish enough to believe it, given power by those desperate enough to need it.
In the end, the only thing that truly matters is the legacy you leave behind."
His golden eyes grew distant, looking at something beyond the physical realm. "What will your legacy be, creature of the void? A trail of dead universes? Worlds that will never birth life because you erased them?
That is not power. That is waste. That... is a heresy against what I stand for."
He stood again, his form beginning to shimmer slightly as the transformation strained to maintain itself.
The Emperor spoke softly to Edward within their shared consciousness. "I have done what you asked of me, Edward Elric. The threat is neutralized, though not eliminated.
Now you must carry on my legacy. Protect humanity. Guide them. But never let them worship you. The moment they stop thinking for themselves is the moment they truly fall."
Edward's consciousness rose to the forefront, his voice thick with emotion and exhaustion. "Thank you, your majesty. For everything. For the power, for the wisdom, for the example."
"The honor was mine, my child."
For a moment before he returned, The Emperor thought silently 'I hope you don't end up like my son Horus, Edward.'
The golden armor began to fade. The towering form shrank. Within moments, Edward stood in his normal body once more, though the Primarch Blade remained in his hand, still glowing faintly.
He took a deep breath, feeling every ache, every strain from the battle. His body was pushed far beyond normal limits. But he couldn't rest yet.
He walked toward the fallen Anti-Monitor, who was attempting to teleport away despite his broken state. The cosmic being's hand glowed with unstable energy as he tried to tear open a dimensional rift.
Edward made a simple grasping motion with his free hand.
Reality solidified around the Anti-Monitor, space becoming rigid. The attempted teleportation fizzled and died. He was rooted to that spot as surely as if chains held him.
The Anti-Monitor's eyes blazed with fury and desperation. "You may have broken my armor, but you can't kill me so easily, Anomaly! I am fundamental! I am eternal! Even weakened, I will regenerate, and when I do—"
Edward's voice was cold, drained of warmth, carrying only grim determination. "Then I'll keep killing you again and again until you curse yourself for being alive.
I'll hunt you across dimensions. I'll find you in every timeline. You'll never know peace, never know safety. Every time you reform, I'll be there."
The Anti-Monitor actually recoiled slightly at the absolute conviction in those words.
Then, cutting through the tension, a sound echoed across the desolate planet.
Clap. Clap. Clap.
Slow, deliberate applause.
Both Edward and the Anti-Monitor froze. Their heads snapped up, searching for the source.
Edward, who'd been breathing heavily from fatigue, from the strain of channeling the Emperor's power, felt his blood run cold.
His enhanced senses, his ability to detect cosmic threats, screamed a warning.
He looked up at the sky of this dying world and uttered a single word, his voice barely above a whisper:
"Fuck."
A deep rumbling chuckle rolled across the planet like thunder. The sound carried weight, presence, the sense of something vast and terrible descending.
"Edward Elric," the voice boomed, each syllable resonating with power that made the broken planet tremble. "So good to finally meet you again. I figured you were the one behind that sneak attack on my planet, and my assumption was correct as expected. You have grown strong, even defeating a cosmic being."
A massive form descended from above, each movement deliberate, unhurried. There was no need for speed when victory was inevitable.
"Now then," the voice continued, carrying dark amusement and barely restrained fury, "let me repay you... with interest."
BANG!
Darkseid's true form, not an avatar, not a projection, but the actual godhead of Apokolips, landed on the desolate planet with earth-shattering force. The entire world buckled under his weight. Mountains crumbled. Oceans boiled away. The planet's core destabilized.
He stood easily over a hundred feet tall, his body composed of living stone that radiated power. His eyes burned red with Omega energy. The very fabric of reality distorted around him, space-time bending to acknowledge his presence.
This was no avatar. This was Darkseid himself, the New God who embodied tyranny and inevitable conquest. His incorporeal form given flesh.
And he had come for Edward.
Edward stood between two cosmic threats—a weakened but still dangerous Anti-Monitor behind him, and Darkseid's full power before him. His body was slightly exhausted. But he
He was in no condition to fight a being of Darkseid's caliber along with Anti-Monitor, who took the chance to escape. But he would be back once he forms a new outer shell. Time works differently for such beings after all.
But he raised the blade anyway, assuming a fighting stance despite the trembling in his arms.
"Well," Edward muttered, a weak smile crossing his face despite the dire situation. "Guess that's what I get for dumping antimatter blasts on Apokolips. Should've seen this coming."
Darkseid's lips curved into something that might have been a smile on a less terrifying face. "Indeed you should have, mortal. Did you truly think I would not notice? Did you truly believe there would be no consequence?"
His eyes began to glow brighter, Omega energy building.
"Now... let us see if you survive the reckoning."
*****
Fuck around and find out in it's simplest form ! 😂