“Please excuse our tardiness Chancellors,” the violet-eyed lady spoke, “Young James here got carried away with his new friend,” as she spoke those last two words she gave a witty look at me.

“Well you didn’t make any attempt to tell me did you,” James retorted.

Before the lady could respond, Chancellor Dunam cut in, “Enough James, you shouldn’t have to be told when you need to be somewhere,” she then paused before turning to the lady, “Thank you, Rigel Evanii, for protecting my son.”

Giving Chancellor Dunam a nod, Evanii joined James in walking to the table.

So this is my sister. To think I was sitting right beside her just an hour ago. 

Evanii now had graceful silver hair that fell long past her shoulders. Her violet eyes seemed warm, but they looked as if they were calculating every move she made. 

She wasn’t as developed as the other ladies in the room, but her relative petiteness was still in a class way above most. 

She now wore a relatively tight black dress that was etched with amber lacings. Covering her abdomen and chest was a tighter black casing which I could only assume was some sort of armor. Protecting her feet were black and amber heels.

“Hey brother,” Evanii said, tracing her fingers over my shoulders as she walked by, “I’m glad that I finally got to see you.”

“Hello sister,” I said, trying to sound as professional as possible.

Although she didn’t give off the same intense pressure as Damon, I knew she could kill dozens if not hundreds of top-tier mages effortlessly. 

While Evanii went to her station in between Maeve and Olly, James took his position behind his mother. I followed suit and stood behind my father who then sat down alongside the other Chancellors and Rigels.

“Ah, now, back to where we were,” my father spoke, using his fingers, he zoomed to a grouping of 8 planets on the holographic image on the table, he then said, “The Oldorun Conglomerate has been losing planets at a troublesome rate, the strange part about it is that they don’t appear to be losing to a known government.”

Pointing to three specific planets on the outer realm of the major grouping he continued, “All three of these planets have reportedly been overrun by some unknown force and then any attempts to reclaim the fallen planets have failed, apparently due to their soldiers and settlers being overwhelmed by hundreds of Tier-4 monsters or higher.”

“Impossible,”  Chancellor Asghar said in disbelief, “It’s an anomaly to see more than a dozen Tier-4 monsters in a year, and you expect us to believe that not only are there enough Tier-4 monsters to overrun entire armies, but there are Tier-5 and Tier-6 threats there as well?”

“I don’t expect you to believe anything,” my father responded unbothered, “But it’s important that we at least prepare for the possibility some of the information is true, after all, the fact the Conglomerate has lost 3 planets in less than a year should be more than enough to make us wary.”

“The Conglomerate is a bunch of brown-nose merchants, their strongest fighters are comparable to our F-Rank mages at best,” Chancellor Asghar argued.

“That’s not correct,” it was Damon who spoke now, shutting Asghar up immediately, “The Conglomerate may be full of traders but their army is more than capable of dealing with most threats, for them to lose this many planets, it must mean something has happened to Kael, meaning we are dealing with a threat capable enough to subdue a man who could hold his own against me.”

“But ~” 

Asghar was interrupted once again.

“But nothing, I agree with Damon’s assessment, although we can’t confirm if the monster threat is true, it’s safe to say that someone or something is out there that is capable of conquering planets,” Rachel said sternly. 

“Agreed,” my father added, “We need to have all stations on high alert in the event that this ‘enemy’ comes into our territory.”

“Where were they last spotted,” Maeva asked as she zoomed closer to the three planets already lost.

Evanii was the one to talk next, “They’ve been missing for over two months now,” she said deadpan, “Chances are they are preparing their next attack somewhere around here.”

Evanii pointed towards our eastern border where one of The Conglomerate’s planets was located. 

“We need to contact Chancellor Valentine immediately at Space Station 0 then,” Chancellor Dunam said, “He needs to prepare all his forces and have scouts constantly surveying the border.”

“In the event, they do attack The Conglomerate, do we send reinforcements to fight this unknown force,” questioned Chancellor Amari.

“No, if our forces were spotted before they arrived we could risk starting a whole intergalactic war, it’s best if we just sit and observe what’s going on,” my father answered.

“With the exception of protecting refugees of course,” Chancellor Dunam added.

My father, Damon, and Maeve all nodded in approval. Although almost everyone here was technically even in rank, it was clear who truly led the Empire.

If Apis wasn’t too busy with his nap he may have been included but the light snore coming from him made clear of his disinterest.

Olly was too busy daydreaming himself to care while the leaders of Ptah remained silent.

“It might be smart if we~” my father's voice trailed off as the sound of the large door rang through the building once more.

Two guards came rushing into the room in a panicked fashion.

“Cha- Chancellors,” the smaller guard started, “An- An emergency transmission- from- from Space Station 0.”

The bigger guard who had finally caught his breath took over, “They are requesting immediate consul from you all, do you allow it?”

“Send them through,” my father replied calmly while everyone else but a few seemed panicked.

Those few being Damon, Evanii, and of course, the sleeping Rigel Apis.

A sharp static screeched through the air as an image started forming above the table. By the time I could tell what was happening, Damon had already asked, “WHAT IN THE HELL IS GOING ON?”

The poor man who was shown on the table was badly beaten with blood pouring all over him. His background wasn’t much better. Bloodstained walls and corpses filled the room he was in. 

“Attack.” 

~ ~   A static cut through as the screen rippled. 

“I repeat we are under attack.”

“By who,” Chancellor Dunam replied urgently, “Who is attacking you?”

“Two”

~ ~

“Two what.” Chancellor Dunam asked, trying to clarify. 

~ ~

“Two monsters.”

A dreary silence filled the air before Chancellor Asghar proclaimed, “You expect us to believe that two people are single-handedly bringing down a Vestarian Space Station, no rather, SPACE STATION 0, the most fortified FOB in the galaxy, home to over one million soldiers, no, I refuse to believe this nonsense, where is your Chancellor, where is Valentine.”

A loud thud could be heard from the hologram before the door protecting our man blew open. Then, rolling towards us, came a dismembered head. If it wasn’t for my years of seeing death firsthand, I probably would have puked like James and Chancellor Asghar did.

“CHANCELLOR VALENTINE,” Rachel Dunam screamed out. Everyone around me had now stood up. Even Apis was beginning to stir.

“Oh, that was his name was it, hmph, he was a nice warmup,” said a man, no, a devil as he came into view.

When I say devil I do mean devil. Red skin littered with hundreds, if not thousands of white marks all over his body. These weren’t battle scars like the demon of my past life had. No. These seemed… intentional.

His massive body was protected only by an ancient roman-like kelt that was made of black fur. Then covering a small portion of his chest and abdomen was a black harness-like armor. Though it was probably more for decoration than protection. 

“What are you hoping to achieve here,” Damon said sternly, looking the devil in its eyes. 

“Ah, straight to business,” the devil said disappointedly, “Well, to be honest, we just came to have a little bit of fun.” 

“You’ll die for this,” Chancellor Ashgar said weakly. 

A loud laugh could be heard from the hologram.

“Oh, I highly doubt that butttt,” he held the ‘but’ as he looked behind him, “Since you’re so confident, let’s see you try shall we?”

“Ugh.”

A silhouette of a man loomed in the background. He had a horrible posture and was casually resting on the wall.

“Two minutes,” the silhouette said, “Then I’m leaving your ass.”

With that, a large wisp filled the air and what appeared to be a black hole appeared over our heads. 

I felt him long before I saw him. An oppressive force like no other. Fear ran through my spine like it had moments before I died in my previous life. 

Cold. The air around me felt as though it was trying to choke me alive. Every pore on my body itched as though I had drunk fire. Hot. Cold. A mixture of sensations wreaked havoc throughout my body. My body begged for me to close my eyes and sleep.

I stumbled to the ground. All around me I saw people begin to pass out. I kept fighting. I couldn’t pass out. 

Struggling to breathe I fought on the floor as my father stood protectively over me. 

This was bad. Only my father, the Rigels, and Chancellor's Dunam and Maeve were able to stand. Maeve herself looked as she was about to vomit while Dunam was busy protecting her own child.

How. How could such a being exist?