While the Milky Way was certainly the most action-packed galaxy of the ninety-third universe, it was still only one of countless galaxies undergoing the Prima Guardian event. Wars were happening everywhere as innumerable planets fell to the event every day, with even more overcoming what many believed to be the final system-made test for the newly integrated planets.

To many, this event was a challenge one was simply meant to overcome and a disaster for the planet due to the large number of dead innocents dealing with the armies of regular primas. However, to others, this was nothing more than an opportunity.

Massive factions made use of this time to truly stabilize themselves, using the excuse of a common threat to unite everyone under their banner if they had failed to do so earlier. It was also a great opportunity to make contact with native factions yet to fully integrate themselves with multiversal factions and bring them into the fold.

Valhal, the Holy Church, Altmar Empire, the Primordial Church, beastfolk tribes, Risen, and a vast array of divine factions gladly exploited any and all opportunities to get a foothold in the new universe, preparing for what was to come when the universe opened up to the rest of the multiverse.

To make things even better, this type of recruitment using the event even had a built-in test of sorts. The planets facing their Prima Guardian alone would only join the alliance after achieving victory, proving that they had at least some level of competency, making them worth recruiting. As for those who failed to deal with their Prima Guardians… well, that didn’t mean these were a lost cause. They just wouldn’t be claimed by factions of the enlightened races.

Because while a planet falling to the event was a disaster in the eyes of the enlightened races… it was an opportunity for the monster races. The Prima Guardian was not a creature made to rule a planet. It was not created to be the beast king that suppressed every other monster, but just a tool from the system to turn the Planetary Pylon into a Planetary Core should the enlightened fail to beat it.

Shortly after accomplishing this task, the Prima Guardian would once more go to the surface of the planet, having fulfilled its role. From there, it would wait until the system event expired, and when that happened, the Prima Vessel would disappear, reclaimed by the Seat of the Exalted Prima, and the Prima Guardian would naturally die.

However, with its role fulfilled, the Prima Guardian wasn’t sure to survive. With the event effective over, it was no longer immune to attacks from native beasts, and even its bond with the regular Primas would be severed. A system notification would be sent to all monsters, letting them know that another “event” had begun, this one aimed at them, with their goal the same as the enlightened: kill the Prima Guardian and claim the key.

The Prima Vessel would still disappear after the event was done, and these monsters wouldn’t join the Prima Guardian Alliance or anything like that… but they could qualify to also be contenders for claiming the Seat of the Exaled Prima, the same as many World Leaders of the universe.

While it wasn’t always equal, the system did tend to act fairly and not discriminate based on whether one was a monster or an enlightened. Each had its own advantages and disadvantages, and while the enlightened certainly had more system events, it was because the monsters already had the inborn natural advantages to do well during the integration, and unlike the enlightened, they had been helped along by unique items provided by the system.

Overall, the monster population of planets did tend to surpass the enlightened, with the enlightened usually only doing well due to their cohesion. Monsters were simply far worse at working together, and the mere fact the majority of major factions in the multiverse primarily consisted of enlightened races was proof of that. Even the powerful monster factions, such as the Dragonflights, were only cohesive due to all being dragons and generally all very humanoid in how they acted… and even they had plenty of internal conflicts as different variants of dragons didn’t always get along.

Factions with beasts or monsters of multiple races all working together were remarkably rare, and it was nearly only seen with the United Tribes, and even there, the name itself communicated that it was just a large alliance of many different tribes coming together to rival the truly massive factions of the multiverse.

It also had to be pointed out that most factions were totally fine with monsters joining them, though it tended to only happen in higher grades after they achieved humanoid forms. Even the Holy Church had its fair share of monsters, as even they could undergo a baptism. So, many monsters chose to just join an established faction rather than make one with other monsters.

Anyway, the result of Prima Guardians winning on planets tended to end up with it being a victory for the monsters, with the planet then turning into somewhere nearly devoid of enlightened, with the few enlightened that did happen to survive now far from being able to claim themselves the rulers, and as the generations passed, there was a good chance they would even lose contact with the rest of the multiverse unless other factions came by their planets.

Some monsters even made very sure that the enlightened were either entirely wiped out or taken control of, though.

Hives of the Endless Empire were a good example, as most actually decided to help the Prima Guardian in slaughtering the enlightened of the planet, only to afterward kill the Prima Guardian and proceed to round up all the enlightened. Deciding if the enlightened were then killed off and used for food or enslaved was then dependent on how useful the Hive Queens judged them.

Vesperia’s approach to the entire matter was very unusual by Endless Empire standards and was done primarily because of Jake and her sensibilities toward the enlightened races and because she knew the Milky Way galaxy would never be claimed by the Endless Empire. Thus, she judged it better to set the standard for working together in synergy from the beginning.

The Endless Empire was naturally far from the only monster-focused faction claiming their planets, most of them not big factions but smaller ones with the local monster leaders guided by singular gods and their own small forces. Many didn’t really engage, though, as the enlightened winning didn’t necessarily mean the monsters would be wiped out, and many monster factions – like on Earth – even worked with the enlightened.

Thus, naturally, the vast majority of planets were claimed by the enlightened races, and as the months quickly passed, more and more Prima Guardians fell one way or another. Maps of the galaxy all across the universe were all being filled with flags of different colors, the Milky Way holding two interesting records.

The first one was for being the galaxy with the most planets marked with black flags, courtesy of the Desolate Child of Loss, and because planets being ruined in C-grade conflicts was really fucking rare.

Second was a more positive record… due to the development of teleporters, allowing the two major alliances that had formed to help even the planets that hadn’t joined the alliance, the Milky Way was in the lead for the highest amount of Prima Guardians dealt with, and as things were going, on track to be the first galaxy to finish the event, well before the time limit of the event expired.

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This also meant the World Leaders of the Milky Way Galaxy had to be the first ones to consider… what would happen once the event was over and the vast cross-galaxy teleportation network facilitated by the Prima Vessels stopped working? 𝙍�

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“A False God,” Carmen said with a serious look on her face as she sat inside Jake’s lodge. She had just recently arrived back on Earth from having gone around killing Prima Guardians with Valhal. Knowledge of what had happened to the Fallen King naturally hadn’t spread beyond a few select people, but Jake had chosen to tell the Runemaiden anyway… which proved to be a very good idea as she knew some obscure as fuck knowledge no one else seemed to.

“You’re saying this Desolate Child of Loss was an actual god?” Jake questioned, finding the notion ridiculous.

“Not at all, hence why it’s called a False God and not an actual god,” Carmen scoffed. “They’re more like spirits than gods. Their name just comes from how they are born and is honestly more of an insult than merely a way to describe them.”

“Can you tell me about them?” Jake asked with interest.

“Eh… what was it again…” Carmen said, searching her memory. “Right… so you know how shamans work, right?”

“Very loosely, but they form pacts with elementals and channel their power or something, right?” Jake said.

“Right,” Carmen nodded. “Shamans are generally known to come in two forms. The ones who create a bond with a singular elemental or other spirit-like entity they then grow alongside, and the more religious sort who form a bond with a being far more powerful than themselves, sometimes even gods.”

“I did read about that,” Jake nodded as a motion for her to keep going.

“Well, there is a third type who is a bit more heretical in nature, which is probably also why they aren’t spoken much about. These shamans don’t form a bond with a creature at all, and yet they receive power anyway… because rather than bond with an actual living entity, they bond with the idea of one. Think about before the system how a bunch of people worshipped random made-up gods without any real evidence of their existence besides just pure faith,… this is pretty much that,” Carmen explained.

“That doesn’t sound like it should work,” Jake frowned. “How in the hell do they receive power from something that doesn’t exist?”

“Ideas are powerful and can birth concepts. Think about it, with Willpower alone, you can do shit just by thinking about it. Now imagine an entire civilization believing in some divine being. Actually, you don’t even have to imagine it; just look at all the damn religious factions around who farm faith from their followers like they’re cattle. Alright, now actually imagine if this faith had nowhere to go, and yet a lot of people genuinely believe with all their hearts something does exist… that energy sometimes ends up forming what we call a False God. The belief something exists makes it actually exist,” Carmen continued explaining what Jake believed was pretty obscure knowledge based on how neither Jake nor anyone else had come across it. Then again, it wasn’t as if they were the most knowledgeable group.

“So some faction formed a False God because they believed hard enough it actually existed?” Jake questioned, highly skeptical of the notion. “That seems oddly… non-extraordinary. In that, I would expect it to happen all the time…”

“Well, it doesn’t, it’s actually pretty fucking rare, even if some do exist out there, mainly serving as totems of tribes who aren’t in contact with the rest of the multiverse or something like that,” Carmen answered. “From how the shaman I did Nevermore with explained things, it didn’t sound like anyone truly knew all the conditions for one to appear. All I know for sure is that a lot of genuine faith is required, which means most people who know actual gods exist don’t even qualify as their faith isn’t genuine. Some major event also has to happen, which leads to the formation of the False God, and finally… extremely strong emotions tend to be required. Unnaturally strong emotions.”

Jake’s face fell at the last part. “Fucking Ell’Hakan.”

“Yep, I have a hard time seeing he isn’t somehow involved based on what you said,” Carmen just agreed.

Over the last few months, they had discovered some more things about the planet the Desolate Child of Loss had originally come from, and they quickly learned that it had been part of the Prima Guardian Alliance. Originally, it was a faction of orcs who all seemed very keen on Ell’Hakan, but nothing much was known beyond that.

“Do you think it’s possible that-“

“You know, my exact thoughts based on everything I heard is that Ell’Hakan tried to make people super loyal to him, ended up mind-fucking an entire planet of orcs to view him as an actual living god, and then somehow, shit hit the fan, and they ended up forming what we know as the Desolate Child of Loss,” Carmen said, pretty much reading Jake’s mind.

“We can’t know for sure, but that does sound pretty probable,” Jake said with a sneer. “It all leads back to him and that Bloodline of his.”

“Yeah… not gonna lie, it’s scary as fuck,” Carmen said, making a show of shivering at the thought of it, even if she was genuine in her concern. “It’s bad enough that it was made expressly clear I was not to ever be even on the same planet as him, and if we were, I had to stay on the opposite side of it. Orders straight from the big guys and gals above.”

“Sounds like a policy every faction should adopt,” Jake sighed. “No, scratch that, every person should adopt it.”

“Hear, hear,” Carmen agreed with a smile as she looked at him closely, and her look turned serious. “I need to tell you… False Gods… they’re not easy to get rid of. Their lives linger in an annoying fashion, and to truly kill them, you sometimes need to destroy whatever totem binds them to existence.”

Jake mimicked her serious look and frowned. “Knowing the methods of the King… would a False God be able to survive if their soul was blown to smithereens?”

“I have no idea,” Carmen shook her head. “I’m not an expert; I just know what I was told. You know, when spending decades with someone in Nevermore, you’re bound to have plenty of conversations about random shit and get to know one another, intentionally or not.”

Jake didn’t say anything but just faintly felt for the mask he’d made invisible. He knew very well how it was unavoidable to get close to someone after spending fifty years together.

Carmen noticed Jake’s expression and turned apologetic. “Sorry… look, I’m sure you can find some way, right? It kind of seems like the thing you do, isn’t it? Stuff that shouldn’t be possible? Why is this time any different?”

“Thanks,” Jake just said, the mood getting a bit down before Carmen tried to bring it up.

“Now, for a brighter subject… you know, for being a cripple, you don’t look all that bad,” Carmen teased him, and Jake was more than happy with the change of topic.

“Barely a cripple anymore,” Jake smiled. “I actually recovered quicker than Eron expected me to.”

The healer wasn’t sure why Jake healed faster, but the prevailing theory was that his arcane affinity was involved, or maybe his Bloodline was helping somehow. Ultimately, it didn’t matter much… what mattered was that Jake could now see the end of the tunnel and was already considering what would come next.

His time for a full recovery also seemed to coincide with another major happening: the clearing of the final planet, ending the Prima Guardian event for the Milky Way Galaxy. This forced them all to consider many things… and later that day, they would have a meeting in Jake’s lodge to go over everything with most of the influential people back on Earth. They had chosen today because not only Carmen would come back, but Jake’s little brother would also finally return, along with Maria and everyone else from Earth worth having in the meeting.

Miranda had also made a schedule and list of topics for the meeting, with lots of subjects to go over before she would later have a meeting with diplomats and whatnot to actually get stuff done. However, Jake considered adding one more thing to discuss.

He’d been thinking a lot over the last many months since the King fell, and honestly… he was tired. It was not just because of his heavily injured soul but all the bullshit that had been going on over the last many years. This talk with Carmen only cemented his thoughts further, and he decided to finally bring it up.

Having collected his thoughts, he turned to Carmen and wondered about her opinion on the subject.

“Hey, Carmen… rather than waiting around for Ell’Hakan to do his shit, why don’t we take proactive measures?”

“How so?” Carmen asked, unsure what Jake was getting at.

Jake opened and closed his fists and once more felt the mask on his face. “Ell’Hakan wanted a fucking war for so damn long… why don’t we consider giving him one if he wants it so badly, but this time, it’s on our terms?”