"Command, this is the exploration team—we're encountering a massive Zerg swarm! Requesting immediate support!" the urgent transmission crackled through base communications.
The exploration team, from whom they hadn't received any concerning news for quite some time, had suddenly sent an emergency distress call. This development caught Captain Locke completely off-guard.
They'd literally just been discussing potential issues with the exploration team moments ago. How had the situation suddenly escalated to them desperately requesting reinforcements?
"Quick! Notify all combat troops to enter full combat readiness!" Locke barked. "Except for essential defense teams, everyone prepares for deployment and support operations!"
As he issued rapid-fire commands, Captain Locke stood from his command chair and strode purposefully toward the exit.
They couldn't possibly compete against a full Zerg swarm with just their current forces. The optimal solution was immediately notifying Marcus and the Kryptonians for assistance.
Within minutes, both Marcus and General Zod received urgent notification from Captain Locke. Upon hearing the situation, both were obviously quite surprised.
The exploration team had located the alien Zerg concentration so quickly? And from what Captain Locke was describing, they seemed to have stumbled directly upon a primary Zerg hive nest.
"They found an actual Zerg base? And they thought rushing in like that was a good idea?" Marcus shook his head with obvious exasperation at the exploration team's actions.
Although he understood these people had taken reasonable precautions, he couldn't help feeling frustrated when considering their impulsive tactical choices.
"Are your forces ready for deployment?" Marcus asked Locke directly.
"Main combat forces are assembling now. Except for personnel designated for base defense, all combat units are gathering at the staging area," Captain Locke reported.
Locke felt somewhat puzzled. He didn't quite understand why Marcus was asking this specific question, but he answered truthfully anyway. After all, it wasn't classified information.
"All combat forces except defensive personnel?" Marcus stroked his chin thoughtfully for a moment. "Alright then. Inform me the moment your people have fully assembled, and I'll transport everyone there directly."
Marcus planned to teleport the entire relief force. The distance was simply too great—even flying at maximum speed, conventional transport would require far too long to arrive.
During that extended transit time, the exploration team facing the Zerg tide would endure tremendous pressure and potentially suffer catastrophic casualties.
But Marcus could use his spatial manipulation abilities to instantly bring this entire force to wherever the exploration team was currently pinned down, enabling them to provide support immediately.
After dismissing Captain Locke to handle preparations, Marcus considered the broader situation thoughtfully.
The major issues on this planet were almost resolved. After dealing with these alien insects, Captain Locke and his people could safely settle here for extended periods.
As for General Zod and his Kryptonians—well, they'd still need to accompany Marcus since their transaction hadn't been completed yet.
But Marcus believed those Kryptonians wouldn't particularly mind. After all, Marcus still possessed the Kryptonian Codex. For General Zod and his people, who regarded that Codex as more precious than their own lives, nothing else really mattered.
They genuinely didn't care about these delays at all. In fact, they'd seemed eager to depart for quite some time, but because Marcus hadn't indicated readiness to leave, they'd been obligated to remain on this planet.
"Help them eliminate the insect threat, and then we can finally move on," Marcus said to himself. "There are still many resources I need from this universe. At minimum, I need to craft those final five Warframes first."
With that decided, Marcus walked out through the doorway.
Throughout the base, assembly klaxons continued blaring. All armed forces except garrison personnel were gathering at designated rally points.
Beyond the largest concentration of marines, there were also numerous massive pieces of mechanical equipment. Siege Tanks represented the largest mechanized contingent, and substantial numbers of Viking fighters hovered in aerial formations.
But what captured Marcus's attention most was an enormous robot that stood distinctly apart from the other armed forces.
"Is that supposed to be a Thor?" Marcus asked, examining the oddly proportioned machine with a slight frown. "Why do I get the feeling this is just an enlarged Viking fighter?"
"You guessed correctly—this genuinely isn't an authentic Thor walker," Captain Locke confirmed, approaching Marcus's position.
"Thor units are extremely difficult to manufacture even within the entire Terran Dominion. What you're looking at is exactly what we built by scaling up Viking fighter components. We're calling it the Valkyrie walker."
This machine had been constructed by their entire base's combined efforts over months, consuming vast amounts of time and resources. The armed forces assembled before them represented literally all their available military assets.
"Is this everything?" Marcus asked.
"Yes, this represents our complete strength," Locke confirmed.
Hearing the captain's confirmation, Marcus nodded slowly. He waved toward General Zod to signal him forward, then began walking directly toward the assembled force.
As Marcus moved slowly through their ranks, thick fog began spreading outward around him. Within just a few breaths, every single member of the armed forces had been completely enveloped by swirling mist.
The next instant, the fog dissipated entirely—and everyone who'd been wrapped within it vanished from the base instantaneously.
"This... mass spatial displacement?" someone breathed in shock.
Marcus's casual display had thoroughly stunned Captain Locke and the remaining base personnel. They'd only ever witnessed this kind of capability among the Protoss.
"Does Mr. Marcus possess Protoss technology as well?"
This ability to conduct mass spatial jumps existed only among the Protoss throughout known space.
Although the Terran Dominion also possessed spatial jump technology, it was exclusively used for spacecraft—not individual soldiers. It was completely impossible to perform instantaneous jumps like the Protoss could.
However, there was something Captain Locke found particularly confusing about what he'd just witnessed.
Even the Protoss required establishing pylon energy fields to complete spatial warps. But Marcus had simply emitted that strange fog and transported the entire military force away.
What kind of power was this? Not just Captain Locke—even the most brilliant scientists in the Terran Dominion probably couldn't figure it out.
Swish~
After being teleported, the personnel wrapped in fog suddenly heard roaring sounds and sustained gunfire all around them.
This development left them feeling extremely confused. They'd just been enveloped by cloud moments ago—how could the external environment have changed so dramatically?
Just as they were processing this disorientation, the fog gradually dissipated. Finally, they could see the situation surrounding them clearly.
There were no familiar base structures or machinery here. Instead, they found themselves amid an endless swarm of Zerg continuously advancing, with the exploration team desperately maintaining defensive fire.
"We're... already here?" someone exclaimed in disbelief.
Then without hesitation, he charged toward the Zerg with weapon raised. The alien insects had to be eliminated.
He wasn't alone in taking immediate action. Numerous soldiers raised their weapons and began firing continuously at the Zerg rushing toward their position.
Even General Zod and his Kryptonians employed their superhuman abilities to launch devastating attacks against the swarm.
Beams of concentrated heat vision swept through the Zerg tide like scythes through wheat. Massive numbers of aliens were killed instantly. Even the rolling Banelings that approached detonated prematurely under thermal assault—exploding violently before reaching their targets.
"The Zerg were originally just wild beasts inhabiting a single planet," Marcus observed quietly. "But they were exploited and manipulated, evolving into what they've become now.
They've devoured many Protoss over the years, yet the golden armada could only barely suppress them. These creatures should return to their original existence as simple animals."
As he spoke, Marcus walked steadily toward the Zerg swarm. His body transformed within brilliant crimson light, shifting into a Warframe bristling with razor-sharp talons.
Garud
Sizzle...
The deadly claws collided against each other, producing melodious metallic sounds as if preparing to slice through reality itself.
Marcus crossed his arms across his chest. Eight wickedly sharp talons separated from his wrists and began moving rapidly in orbital patterns around his body.
"Let's begin with blood," Marcus declared.
As his voice resonated, the flying claws exploded outward and shot toward the alien insect swarm at tremendous velocity.
As the airborne blades scattered, they continuously separated crimson afterimages. In mere moments, they'd painted the entire area before Marcus blood red. The claws—containing devastating kinetic force—penetrated every alien insect instantly. Massive numbers of Zerg were killed in seconds, then trampled into paste by the swarm rushing forward from behind.
After that devastating initial strike, Marcus became enveloped in brilliant light once more. Large quantities of ice crystals manifested on the ground surrounding him, and intense cold began spreading outward in waves.
Frost
After completing his transformation into this new Warframe, Marcus stomped down hard against the frozen earth.
An enormous ice wave composed of countless razor-sharp crystalline structures rushed toward the enemy. As it continued advancing relentlessly, the area covered by the expanding ice wave grew progressively larger.
Facing these lacerating ice formations, enormous numbers of alien insects were torn into fragments instantly and frozen solid within the crystalline matrix.
Observing the massive ice field released by Marcus, the human forces ceased firing entirely.
Their weapons' effective range couldn't possibly match Marcus's area-effect devastation. All the Zerg that had rushed to the front positions had been systematically eliminated, so they naturally didn't need to continue expending ammunition.
However, the destructive capability demonstrated by these ice crystals genuinely opened their eyes with awe.
This location represented the closest approach to the actual Zerg hive base. The insect tide contained numerous Ultralisks—the swarm's most powerful ground units.
But those massive creatures had been blocked by the seemingly fragile ice crystals without exception. Some Ultralisks had even been completely pierced through their armored bodies by enormous crystalline spears and died instantly.
The ice wave finally halted its advance. The ground lay completely covered by countless huge sharp ice formations, effectively blocking both forces' advancement.
The next moment, these extremely hard ice crystals exploded simultaneously. The alien insects frozen within the crystalline structures shattered during the detonations, transforming the entire battlefield into a desert composed of broken ice fragments.
"If we resolve this quickly, we can also proceed with our own plans more rapidly," Marcus observed.
As he spoke, Marcus stepped confidently onto the ice crystal wasteland. Intense cold continued bursting from beneath his feet, and the scattered crystal fragments gradually froze together, reforming solid paths as he walked.
"My God, can this really be accomplished by human beings?" someone asked incredulously, staring at the apocalyptic scene before them.
"Others might not know, but don't you?" another marine replied. "This guy isn't operating on the same level as us at all."
They'd all witnessed Marcus's power firsthand multiple times. The meteor rain of flames that had fallen from the sky previously, and the newly manifested stone mountain outside the new base—these served as undeniable proof.
The power Marcus demonstrated had never been something they could properly comprehend. In their perception, he seemed more like a living god than a man.
This sentiment existed not only among the human forces, but also among the Kryptonians led by General Zod. They shared identical thoughts.
As Kryptonians, they did possess formidable superhuman abilities. They could even relatively easily kill Ultralisks that were considered overwhelmingly powerful threats by human standards.
Especially here on this planet, without any Kryptonite present in their environment, their greatest weakness simply didn't exist. Without Kryptonite to exploit, the only viable method for defeating them was extended attrition warfare.
But despite being so individually powerful, they still felt genuine threat when facing Marcus's casual displays of force.
Even that ice wave Marcus had just released represented a legitimate danger to them personally. They could sense with absolute clarity that if they were touched by those ice crystals, even their current steel-like bodies couldn't easily withstand the damage.
If they didn't react and defend immediately, any body part that contacted the frozen, piercing ice formations would be completely severed.
Powerful and dangerous.
That was precisely the impression those sharp ice crystals released by Marcus conveyed to the Kryptonians. If Marcus hadn't deliberately made those formations explode and clear, the Kryptonians would never have descended from aerial positions.
Even now, they remained hovering in the air with absolutely no intention of landing.
Marcus understood their cautious reasoning perfectly well. After all, Frost had been enhanced through power augmentation modifications.
With a casual wave of his hand, the frozen ice barrier behind him instantly dissipated. Enormous numbers of massive ice spears materialized before Marcus, continuously bombarding the alien insect tide in devastating volleys.
Under Marcus's relentless assault, the Zerg tide retreated step by step. Most alien insects transformed into frozen ice sculptures where they stood.
Only a handful managed to slip through the net and escape immediate death—but they still couldn't avoid the concentrated fire from various melta weapons wielded by human forces.
As the combined force continued advancing, they finally crested a mountain ridge. Spread before them was terrain completely covered by black organic creep.
"So this is the Zerg hive base?" Marcus observed, looking at the countless fleshy biological structures standing upon the creep carpet.
The Zerg truly represented the ultimate expression of biological adaptation. Although they hadn't developed any conventional technology, in terms of pure genetic modification and evolutionary optimization, these creatures that superficially resembled simple animals had demonstrated unprecedented vital resilience.
These flesh-and-blood structures all served to train and produce Zerg forces. Different alien insect species had corresponding specialized spawning buildings.
Across the creep beside them crawled countless larval forms. These represented the fundamental roots of Zerg reproduction. They could mature rapidly through accelerated growth cycles and eventually metamorphose into virtually any Zerg species.
This was the most terrifying aspect of the swarm. They didn't even require corresponding adult organisms to breed new forces. A single tiny larva could rapidly hatch an entire massive army.
"My God, have the Zerg multiplied to this extent already?" a marine exclaimed, emerging from cover to stare at the scene before them.
It wasn't that he hadn't imagined what a Zerg base might look like—but this reality obviously exceeded his worst expectations.
This entire plain had become a breeding facility for the swarm. If the Zerg were given just slightly more time, it wouldn't be long before an unstoppable insect tide would devour them all completely.
Their arrival also alerted every Zerg hidden within the base complex. Dense swarms of insects erupted from underground positions. Even massive numbers of aerial Zerg appeared in the distance, their wings creating ominous shadows.
"Looks like this will still be quite a challenging battle!" Marcus noted.
As he spoke, Marcus walked steadily toward the approaching Zerg. General Zod and the other Kryptonians flew to high altitudes, preparing to engage the aerial swarm.
As for the human forces, they'd already assumed combat formations. All Siege Tanks transformed on the spot, entering siege mode. Hellion flame vehicles and Hurricane missile platforms deployed alongside the marines, awaiting the approaching tide.
"Everyone prepare..." the exploration captain began issuing commands, feeling the ground shaking continuously from the Zerg's massed assault.
Although they had Marcus's assistance, they still needed to fulfill their own combat responsibilities.
"FIRE!"
Boom boom boom...
Various weapons systems began spewing flames of destruction. Melta rifles in the soldiers' hands shot concentrated streams of superheated fire, igniting the Zerg tide surging before them in walls of deadly flame.
The battle for the hive had begun in earnest.
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