The Twenty-Second Year - Orbiting Thelha Ra'tha - Astral Express:
A violent wrenching sensation slammed through the Express, followed by red alerts screaming from every console. Lights flickered. Energy surged and buckled.
Pom-Pom's voice cracked. "Wh — What?! Something's pulling us—!"
Outside, the swirling astral light split open — and the Express was ejected from its original path like a skipped stone, flung into unknown space.
The stars realigned. A planet appeared.
A monstrous world, hanging broken in the dark: cracked purple crust drifting like tectonic plates, with molten yellow light spilling through its open wounds. It looked half-alive, half-dead, like something ancient had torn it apart and left it to rot in silence.
"Wh... what is that?" March breathed, gripping her seat.
Dan Heng stood up, already tapping data into his terminal. "No charted records. It's not in any database either..." He mumbled as a blue light shone through one of the windows.
Welt leaned closer, voice soft and thoughtful. "A blue sun… That's not something you see every day."
Soon, the entire crew of the Astral Express gathered around a large observation window, their faces illuminated by the eerie glow of the fractured planet. Silence settled over them, each person lost in thought as they took in the haunting sight.
The purple cracks stretched endlessly, veins of molten yellow light pulsing beneath the surface like a dying heartbeat. The blue sun's faint radiance added an otherworldly tint to the scene, casting long shadows across the ship's deck.
March broke the silence first, her voice barely steady. "We've never seen anything like this. It's... beautiful, but it feels wrong."
Himeko folded her arms, eyes narrowing as she studied the fractured sphere outside. "This kind of planetary devastation…"
Pom-Pom waddled in, his usual chipper tone only slightly dulled by the situation. "From what Pom-Pom can see, the Express itself isn't too banged up — just a few dents I'll need to patch up later. But the Star Rail is being blocked by some sort of anomaly. Star Rail stability has dropped to six percent. Our stopover time is now… indefinitely extended."
"Nuh-uh… again?" March muttered, giving a deadpan look. "It's gotta be—"
"A Stellaron. As always," Welt finished, adjusting his glasses as his gaze returned to the shattered planet outside.
Dan Heng pulled away from his terminal as he spoke up. "It would also appear that this planet is outside the Interastral Peace Telecommunication's range as well..."
"Which would mean the safest bet would be to use one of the Astral Express's car," Himeko said as she crossed her arms and looked down at Pom-Pom.
Pom-Pom gave a reluctant nod, his little ears twitching. "Mhm… safest bet, yes. But also riskiest. If anything happens out there, Pom-Pom can't just reel you back in."
Himeko's gaze stayed steady. "We won't have much of a choice. If we're isolated and the Star Rail's blocked, we need to investigate directly."
"Could there be a chance that the Relic is what's causing this?" Dan Heng asked, glancing over at Welt.
Welt shook his head without hesitation. "No. Relics can be dangerous, but not on this scale. As March suspected — and as I've already said — the anomaly is a Stellaron. Preliminary analysis confirms it. Same pattern, same signature. As always… it's a Stellaron."
Welt shook his head without a second's pause. "No. Relics can be dangerous, but not on this scale. As March suspected — and as I've already said — the anomaly is a Stellaron. Preliminary scans confirm it. Same pattern, same signature… as always, it's a Stellaron."
Himeko turned toward him, her tone firm. "Welt, go with March and Dan Heng. As Navigator, I'll need to assist the conductor."
Welt adjusted his glasses, giving a small nod. "Understood."
March crossed her arms, puffing her cheeks slightly. "You make it sound like we're going to need a babysitter."
Dan Heng, already keying in commands on his terminal, didn't look up. "Given the state of that planet, we might."
Himeko's voice softened just a little. "Gear up. Oxygen reserves, hazard shielding, and combat loadouts. That surface isn't going to be forgiving."
Pom-Pom waddled in, shaking his head as if the whole ordeal was a personal inconvenience. "And try not to break anything else. Pom-Pom already has dents to fix."
Outside the viewing window, the fractured planet's molten scars pulsed faintly under the cold light of the blue sun, like a heartbeat waiting for them to arrive.
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Thelha Ra'tha – The Twenty-Second Year:
It had been five years since the Stellaron first appeared. Five long years of watching the land twist under its influence, of hearing once-familiar places echo with unfamiliar sounds.
Ever since killing the first horde of Pyre Dogs that had fallen to the fragmentum's corruption, Anthony had been encountering them more often
What concerned him more was the trend. Each month brought fewer natural Pyre Dogs and more of their warped, corrupted counterparts
And to Anthony, it could only mean one thing.
The Pyre Dogs — the natural breed, both the common and the superior — were dying out. Month by month, their numbers dwindled, until every sighting of one felt like stumbling across the last of its kind. And in their place, the corrupted variants multiplied.
And that terrified Anthony. If the Pyre Dogs vanished completely, so would his only food source. They were his hunt, his water, his meat — his life in this hellhole. Without them, he wouldn't last long.
I can't even check out this Stellaron because the system put barriers around where it landed. The thought burned in his mind like a splinter.
The Stellaron had been here for five years now, and yet he'd never laid eyes on it after it landed, only saw it when he saw it descend into Thelha Ra''Tha.
The system's barriers weren't just walls of light; they were absolute, cutting off entire regions as if they'd been erased from the map.
Every time Anthony tried to approach, the air would grow thick, heavy, and his vision would warp until the world around him folded back on itself, spitting him out miles away. It wasn't even worth attempting anymore.
He kicked a loose rock across the cracked ground, watching it clatter into a patch of dried, blackened soil where nothing had grown in years. The world felt smaller with every passing month, the places he could hunt shrinking, the corrupted Pyre Dogs multiplying like a plague.
What made Anthony even more ticked out was that for some reason, the system didn't log the corrupted kills. Didn't give him EXP. The system treated it like these variants didn't exist.
However a large boom from the sky caught his attention. And what he saw was a... train car?
The train car descended through the heavy crimson clouds. From what Anthony could see, it wasn't an ordinary one. It shimmered with an otherworldly glow, and rocket thrusters roared to life, propelling it downward with a controlled but relentless force.
Anthony's eyes widened. His breath caught in his throat.
"What the fuck?" he muttered, disbelief thick in his voice.