PLANET ZETHAR: ROYAL PALACE
On a massive bed forged from dark, star-tempered iron, King Orlox's eyes snapped wide open.
A cold shock of adrenaline surged through his nervous system, his pupils contracting into sharp, trembling slits.
His massive chest heaved, his heavy breaths echoing off the high stone walls of the royal bedchamber. The remnants of a horrific, suffocating nightmare clung to his consciousness like tar.
In the dream, the sky had been torn apart, bleeding a blinding golden fire, and a singular human figure had stood before him—a man whose fists carried the unmaking of reality itself.
Before the king could fully steady his erratic breathing, the heavy, sigil-carved doors of the royal room slid open.
General Xylo hurried into the room, his long, flowing robes rustling against the polished floorboards.
His distinct, curled horns glinted beneath the dim violet crystal lights, and his hair fell loosely around his worried face.
He rushed toward the edge of the dais, bowing his head deeply.
"My lord! You're awake!" Xylo gasped, his voice trembling with an overwhelming wave of relief. "... I am so deeply relieved, Your Majesty."
A second later, a sharp, rhythmic clicking of heels echoed from the threshold.
Valkhyre stepped inside, his lean, intimidating silhouette cutting through the rising incense smoke. He was dressed in an immaculately tailored black tailcoat suit over a crisp white vest.
A bone-white, mask-like visor concealed the upper half of his face, flanked by two spiraling, crimson-tipped horns that curved aggressively backward.
He leaned casually against a the large windows, his gloved hand resting lightly on the pommel of a thin, elegant rapier.
"Looks like our sleeping beauty is awake," Valkhyre said, a sharp, mocking grin cutting across the visible lower half of his face.
He tilted his head slightly, his tone completely dripping with casual arrogance. "Ain't that just beautiful?"
Xylo's head snapped toward him, his brow furrowing as his hands clenched tightly into the fabric of his robes. "Tch! Don't speak to His Majesty like that, Valkhyre! Show some damn respect!"
King Orlox didn't acknowledge the bickering.
He slowly raised a massive, pale hand, pressing his palm hard against his temple as a blinding, throbbing ache flared deep within his skull.
The weight of his own memories felt fragmented, scattered across a vast void of lost time.
"What happened...?" Orlox asked, his voice a , He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to force the static out of his mind. "I can't seem to remember... anything."
Xylo quickly stepped closer, his expression softening into deep anxiety. "Well, my lord... you see... the revival process was highly complex,and—"
"You got your ass kicked by the humans," Valkhyre cut in smoothly, crossing his arms over his chest as he let out a short, amused chuckle.
"Stop it, Sir Valkhyre!" Xylo yelled, turning his entire body to glare at valkhyre. "His Majesty has just woken up! Your insolence is entirely uncalled for!"
"What? I'm telling the truth, ain't I?" Valkhyre replied, nonchalantly.
Orlox's hand froze against his head. The words struck a chord deep within his chest, causing his heart to beat with an unfamiliar, suffocating sensation.
For the first time in his long, immortal life, the king felt a cold spike of genuine fear pierce through his soul.
The very concept of defeat was completely foreign to his lineage, yet the phantom pain in his chest told him otherwise.
"How... impossible," Orlox muttered, his voice dropping into a dangerous whisper as he looked down at his own trembling hands. "How long... what exactly happened down on that planet?"
Valkhyre took a step forward, his playful demeanor shifting into something much sharper, though his voice remained casually conversational. "Well, when we came back to earth, the humans had done something that we never expected —they unlocked their evoliths. They completely rebelled against our forces, We fought them, of course, But there were a few select humans who were exceptionally talented... specifically, the one they called Paul Walker."
Hearing that name out loud caused Orlox's heart to hammer violently against his ribs.
"Pau...l..." Orlox groaned, gripping his head with both hands as violent, flickering images began to detonate in his mind. He saw a man with a fierce, unbreakable gaze, a man who went tie to two with him.
"Please... Valkhyre, go on... I'm slowly regaining my memories..."
"As you wish, orlox," Valkhyre said, his tone leveling out into a cold, historical narrative. "The war was reaching a critical point. Most of our men were being slaughtered by the man called Paul Walker. He was an absolute anomaly, Eventually, he saw you and challenged you directly. To prevent the complete destruction on the planet, you transported the fight into an isolated, pocket dimension. You two fought inside that void for three days straight, completely unbothered by the passage of time."
Valkhyre paused, adjusting the cuffs of his black suit before continuing.
"While you were locked away in that pocket dimension, the second day of the war , Another human with an exceptionally evolith cleared our entire secondary line. He killed our high-ranking officers, and he even managed to execute our 1st Commander—Darius's father. This particular human possessed unique trait... his eyes were much like the stars themselves. He lead the human rebellion straight to victory on the surface."
Orlox sat perfectly still, the images in his head becoming clearer, louder, and infinitely more violent.
"Then came the end of the third day," Valkhyre stated, his mask tilting downward slightly. "The pocket dimension you fought inside could no longer sustain the fight.
It completely shattered from the inside out. When the smoke cleared on the battlefield, standing victorious amidst the debris was Paul Walker. But you... you were dead."
Orlox's eyes widened to their absolute limits, the word echoing in his ears like a death knell. "Dead...?"
"Yes, you died," Valkhyre confirmed, his voice devoid of pity. " We spent months on our Planet Zethar just trying to pull your consciousness back reconstruct your frame. But since the time on Earth run significantly faster compared to our home world, what felt like mere months to us on Zethar was actually a span of many years on Earth. It took years of earthly time before we could fully revive you in this palace."
"Damn it... damn it, damn it!" Orlox roared, his massive fists slamming into the iron frame of his bed, leaving deep, warped indentations in the star-tempered metal.
The psychological weight of knowing he had been put down by a creature of flesh and bone infuriated him, yet the terrifying image of Paul Walker's final strike remained burned into his memories.
Xylo quickly stepped onto the dais, his hands extended in a gesture of panic. "My lord! ! Are you okay?"
"Yes... I'm fine," Orlox growled, forcing his breathing to slow down, though his eyes remained wild and bloodshot. He looked up at Valkhyre, his expression twisting into a cold demand for tactical intelligence. "Tell me... what happened after I was confirmed dead? What happened to Earth, and what became of that monster, Paul Walker?"
Valkhyre let out a slow sigh, his metallic tail resting still against the stone floor. "Well, the irony of the universe is quite amusing. Paul Walker died only a few days after he defeated you. The excessive, over-exerted use of his evolith during those three days straight without rest completely destroyed him from the inside out. His internal organs and neural pathways simply burned away under the strain of his own power."
Orlox's eyes flickered with a grim sense of satisfaction, but Valkhyre quickly crushed it.
"So, when we received word of his demise, we immediately mobilized our secondary armada which was on Earth for another full-scale war," Valkhyre explained, his fingers tapping rhythmically against the hilt of his rapier. "We wanted to take the opportunity. But His best friend and eternal rival—that damn star-eyes user who slaughtered Darius's father—was still standing on the frontlines.
We fought and we lost the second war entirely. We reorganized and went back a third time, but the legacy didn't stop there. Paul Walker had a successor. He's own son.
In that clash, we lost five more of our elite Commanders."
Orlox's jaw clenched so tightly that his teeth clicked audibly. "Five Commanders... completely wiped out by a legacy?"
"Precisely," Valkhyre said, his grin returning beneath his white visor. "The situation was entirely out of hand, so I took absolute control of the military operations on the surface. We immediately replaced the five fallen Commanders with their chosen successors, the zethrians who have reached the level of god ranks, we altered our strategy. We stopped rushing into brutal frontal engagements and began taking control of the sectors little by little, slowly suffocating their resistance from the shadows."
King Orlox slowly leaned back against the dark iron headboard, his mind fully re-aligned with the terrifying reality of the current universe. The threat of the human race was no longer a minor pestilence; it was an existential plague that had cost him his life, his commanders, and his absolute pride.
"I see... damn it all," Orlox muttered, his deep golden eyes narrowing as he stared intently at Valkhyre. "Then tell me... what a
bout the current generation? What about the Walkers?"