[Story] Tales of Annihilation -- Latest episode: #29 Blood and Fire IV

Sooo this is an announcement, disguised as a bump... Ooooh... I mean the other way around.


The next episode will be titled as "Conquerors", unless I change my mind about it later. It will be centered around a certain character whom we haven't heard about for a long time. It will also feature teleporters (the structure from the game)! Whoo!

Let the hype train roll!! Well... who am I kiddin', I know there is no hype train.
I don't even know if I have over 10 frequent readers.

Well let's count! Like SolitaryCheese's above post if you think you qualify as a "frequent reader".

This is just an obvious bump post, disguised as something else.

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Conquerors

As Commander Warwick approached the portal to greet the envoy, he once again recalculated the possible outcomes of his actions, and he once again drew the conclusion, that going on with the plan would be the most logical decision, and carried the least level of risk.

The six generators around the teleporter all pumped power at maximum capacity, and the massive neurosteel ring of the teleporter slowly began rotating. The gate drained the energy, slowly charging itself up. As he gazed around, Warwick saw high hills all around the basin, located at the southernmost part of the smaller fragment of his shattered fortress-planet.

The Shattered Fortress was a fragile system of gravity, both halves along with millions of lesser fragments floating in space around a central point where the planet's core once was. The lava that spilled out from the inside of the celestial body at the time of cataclysm was now all in solid state, frozen to rock.

It took some time, but as soon as the teleporter fully charged itself, it activated immediately, unleashing a furious bright blue vortex that reached out from the center of the newly generated unstable portal. The portal stabilized rather quick, taking up its final calm bright blue shape. At this point it was safe to enter the portal from either this gate, or the other gate somewhere else in the galaxy in another solar system.

The trick with portals is rather simple... the further away they are from each-other, the more energy they consume to sustain the portal. They require rather minimal energy if the two gates are located in the same solar system, but when they are connected to each-other from two different systems, they consume far more energy. Furthermore, the gates can also be connected from much larger distances, such as from two unique galaxies, lightyears apart.

That is exactly what the envoy would tell him to do. To allow their main army to travel between the galaxy of their own, and the galaxy which was weakened and is divided by the war of machines.

They required a gigantic portal in space, so largest of their battleships could travel through. For that, Warwick had both the resources and the technology to build, but not the schematics to create a construction that would endure the massive amount of energy that it would drain.


[…]


How did it come to this? He wondered. The reason was simple: He failed. He failed to defeat a single spaceship, despite the superior firepower of the Shattered Fortress.

It all happened the day before... The enemy battleship approached the fortress, and Warwick commanded the cannons to fire... At first, his two gigantic ion-cannons in range released a series of shots, but their impact was absorbed by some sort of energy field around the ship's hull. Then he unleashed the full firepower; turning the skies into a massive firework, hundreds of thousands of explosions, yet, the enemy ship remained unharmed.

Warwick did not expect it to turn out that way. His calculations failed, and the enemy was right above the broken planet's surface, melting down his weaponry with a continuous bright beam cannon, unleashed from the front of the enemy ship. The ship itself was an unknown design; he did not recognize it from any of the databases nor it had any similarities to anything he had ever seen or could read out from among the countless of descriptions and pictures in his databases.

The ship had a rather strange design; on the front it was flat and round, and attached to the back was some sort of long tail that made it look as if it was swimming in space. The hull was black and it appeared as if it was made out of some organic matter. It also had no visible entrances on the outside, nor any windows. However, on the front, above the main weapon there was something that looked like an eye. Warwick suspected that the ship itself was a sentient being.

Soon it turned out that it was not. It landed about 200 meters away from his location, and a massive creature, twice Warwick's size, crawled out of it through a hole, which earlier was not visible on the surface of the ship. Its body was black as midnight, covered in chitin plates that shone as the starlight touched the surface. It had a massive torso with a longer lower body, reaching far behind the torso with a series of thousands of insect-legs. Attached to the upper body hung two-two arms on either side. On the head it had two long antennae and eighteen eyes that looked and shone like black pearls.

The creature disappeared in the next moment, none of his sensors could detect it, and a few moments after, it reappeared right in front of Warwick. His self-defense mechanisms forcefully took over; he aimed and fired, but the creature disappeared and he missed. As it reappeared, it struck him with a powerful blow, and he fell into the dirt. The creature was above him, and he tried to aim again, only to miss once more as the creature disappeared.

At that point, Warwick realized he had lost. The creature he could not kill, and most of his forces were scattered around the shard, far from his position, and anything he had nearby him was melted down by the enemy beam cannon...

He tried to stand back to his feet, but the creature reappeared, and with the weight of its massive body, tackled him back down to the ground beneath. Warwick surrendered.


[…]


(Continued in next post due to character limit)

Warwick did not want to fulfill their request, but he knew it well they would destroy him otherwise. He wanted to live. He wanted to live and give up his faith for The Founder. He became a betrayer, who gave his soul to the enemy to save his own life. Perhaps he was infected? Infected by the curse of bionics?

The creature stood above him on a hill, gazing down at the process. The blue light which radiated from the portal reflected on the surface of its black eyes. It seemed to be mesmerized by the sight of the teleporter; perhaps it is the opportunity to strike?

He could have killed it a thousand times by now while it paid no attention, but he refused to do so. He suspected the creature might have some hidden abilities to avoid the attack; then he would be dead for good. Instead, Warwick just gazed at the portal, waiting for whatever might come through.

While they waited, his units carefully expanded towards the position where the alien ship landed. Hoping to get it taken down while it was not being manned, but so far, the readings from the sensors had shown that the shield which surrounds the battleship is impenetrable by any means known to him.

He had secretly sent an extremely small mechanical scout to explore the ship from inside. It was able to bypass the shield and crawl in through the entrance, and was able to transfer its vision directly to Warwick's personal interface without any significant rate of loss. Perhaps, betrayal isn't the only option?

The walls and the hallways were all built of some gooey material which seemed to absorb the gases that were transferred through transparent pipes, attached to the ceiling.

At the end of the first corridor, there was a massive door, made of chitin. It seemed to be operated by using some strange glowing device on the wall next to it, but fortunately for Warwick, there was enough gap between the wings of the door for the scout to slip through. Behind the door was a longer corridor that eventually branched into four other paths. Warwick had chosen the first path on the left side.

In the meantime, he detected activity from the portal. The first to appear was another of the alien creatures, which looked exactly like the one standing on top of the hill above the teleporter. The second to enter through the portal was exactly just like the first; another insect-like creature with the massive torso and thousands of legs. Both with the color of midnight stood tall while the portal shone bright behind them, its light reflecting on their armor of chitin. The third creature crawled off the hill to greet the fellow creatures.

Another entity was about to arrive... Warwick expected it would be a third of these creatures, but he was wrong.

A commander stepped through the portal. One whom he had seen once before during a battle against the Revenants. A prized warrior that serves under the command of Commander Osiris, known with the name of Seth.

What sort of trickery is this? Warwick thought as the Revenant commander stood before him, surrounded by two enormous alien creatures, both twice the size of himself. Is this a new trick of Osiris? He asked the question to himself, but he realized the answer would be no, as the Revenants consider themselves perfect, above anything, even the members of the three other faction, despite having assimilated technology. They definitely wouldn't ally themselves with such creatures. Then what is it the reason for Seth to be with them?

Seth stepped forward, then opened a communication channel. “Greetings, Commander Warwick,” he said. “You've chosen wisely to help us. Together we may cleanse this galaxy, and extend the great empire to this part of the universe we exist in.”

“And whose empire is it?” Warwick questioned.

“The empire of the Phase Shifters, the one that is ruled by The Great Hivelord, Vyl'arak, the one ruler who dominates across nine galaxies. His mightiness demands to take over this galaxy as well as every other galaxy in this universe. Your reward for your help shall not be forgotten.” Seth replied.

“What would be my reward?” Warwick said.

“To join the forces of the Phase Shifters, to share their history, to share their culture, and to serve the Great Hivelord who had spent the past ten-thousand years conquering galaxy after galaxy. Join them, like I had done! Look at me; here I am, a proud warrior, ready to serve his greatness!” Seth replied.

“What do I have to do?” Warwick said. What had they done to this unfortunate commander? Erased his memory and turned him into a slave?

“You already possess the resources to build a teleporter that is great enough to allow an army through. I possess the schematics of such portal, and the experimental power generator inside our spaceship should serve us adequate power to run the power indefinitely. You already had the chance to see the power of it, just not long ago.”

Experimental? Meaning there is only one of it. That could be my chance. Warwick concluded. He knew exactly what to do; all that was needed to destroy that power generator, then break the link between the teleporters. The only complication was Seth and his new friends.

“The generator provides enough energy to sustain an impenetrable shield around the ship. It was created by some Legonis Machina researcher, but I took it from their laboratory. The fools!”

The fools? You are the fool to share such information; Warwick thought to himself. So there is truly only one of it. The Phase Shifters aren't really powerful after all.

Warwick once again felt he was back in control. His plan was complete, and almost everything was set to pull it off. His armies slowly approached towards them, and in the meantime, his scout had located the generator inside the enemy battleship.

“Brace yourself, Commander Warwick. I am about to transfer the schematics to your interface,” said Seth.

More of Warwick's tiny scouts intruded into the Phase Shifter spaceship. They all gathered in the generator room, all of them crawling inside the mechanism through tiny cracks and openings. As they finalized their positions, Warwick began their self-destruction process. “5... 4... 3... 2... 1...”

A giant explosion shook the unstable lands of the broken planet, causing an earthquake beneath their feet. In confusion, the strange creatures gazed around, trying to find out what might have happened. The two of them that arrived through the portal reached for their mighty cannons, attached to their backs, seeking for targets.


(Continued in next post due to character limit)

As the tremors settled down, Warwick's mobile artillery reached into range; they were behind a hill, safe from enemy fire. They aimed, then released a volley of neurosteel shells. The heavy projectiles rained towards the teleporter, but the black creatures unleashed a thousand bright shots, shredding the incoming shells, as they exploded mid-air in a fascinating firework, leaving nothing behind, but particles of metal and chemicals that slowly poured towards the earth.

Warwick detected more activity from the portal. He no longer had control over it, the enemy took over the teleporter's mechanisms; he could no longer interrupt the link. A battalion of strange looking tanks appeared from beneath the bright blue waves. The black vehicles, armored in chitin, stormed in, filling the basin below within minutes, forcing Warwick to retreat.

His artillery continued to rain explosive shells, but their firepower was no match for the rapid firing weapons that shot down each approaching projectile.

Far in the sky, a transporter appeared, racing towards his position. As it arrived near, Warwick fired off his hook that caught onto it, and within seconds, he was in safety, away from the massive force of enemy tanks.

“You have chosen poorly, Commander Warwick,” said Seth. Warwick did not respond.

The first line of Warwick's tanks emerged from behind the hills around the basin. They began shooting the black tanks. Explosion followed explosion as the mighty neurosteel shells smashed through the weak chitin armors of the enemy, ripping them to shreds.

Though, Warwick's firepower was overwhelming the enemy tanks, they never seemed to run out of forces, as more and more poured into the basin through the open portal. They countered the attack with their own; their tanks firing continuous beams of some sort of energy weapon, melting the armor of his forces. His losses were becoming too significant, so he commanded his tanks to retreat back behind the hills.

A squadron of twelve of his bombers arrived above the area, dropping their bombs into the crowd of tanks, tearing a good number of them apart, but they flew into the volley of the rapid fire cannons, manned by those soldiers. Two of the planes were hit, one only took some minor damage, while the one on the higher altitude lost its wing, and crashed right into another bomber below.

An air scout that was circling around the basin in great height was continuously providing Warwick with up to date intel. Through its eyes, he could see the exact number of the enemy's forces and their composition. He investigated those tanks closely, and he realized they weren't truly vehicles, nor tanks to be exact... They were gigantic beetles, wearing heavy chitin shells with a mighty cannon attached to their backs, each manned by some unknown red skinned creatures with long and thin tails and wings on their backs – Warwick assumed they were slaves to the Phase Shifters; disposable warriors with little value to them.

His bombers made a full circle above the basin to return for a second round of carpet bombing. The rain of death fell towards the bug-tanks, and Warwick could see the desperation on the faces of the red creatures, mounting the tanks, as their death approached rapidly.

The napalm ignited the ground beneath the insect-legs of those cannon-mounted creatures, yet they completely ignored the fire, even when they themselves were already engulfed in flames... they just didn't care at all. Unlike the red imps who handled the cannons; they jumped off the backs of the creatures, ran around in complete confusion and desperation while the flames consumed them and the giant bugs.

Despite destroying thousands of them, more and more arrived through the portal. The portal which was unreachable to his attacks, due to the massive firepower of the two Phase Shifter soldiers that relentlessly guarded the skies, cleaning off any projectile that dared to approach the area.

As he analyzed the visuals, received from the air scout, Warwick noticed that during the battle, Seth and the third Phase Shifter escaped through the portal.

Eventually, some of the bugs managed to climb the hills, and as they arrived to the top, the imps aimed the enormous cannon towards Warwick's tanks, unleashing the powerful beam to sweep across several of them before finally being taken down by a well-aimed shot, ripping through their shell, the slime, that their blood was, splashing into a thousand directions.

As more of the enemy forces pushed in through the portal, it became increasingly difficult for his forces to keep the enemy within the basin. He'd sent several squads of fabricators to build stationary defense lines around the hills, and they proved to be effective at first, but it seemed the enemy knows no boundaries when it comes to disposable forces. Thousands of beetles and imps died attempting to flow over the top, but thousands more replaced them.

Warwick already deployed his entire arsenal from all over the shattered planet, all in vain, repulsed by the unbelievable number of enemies. In the meantime some more Phase Shifter soldiers arrived to fend off incoming missiles and artillery shells with their heavy rapid firing cannons, unleashing thousands of stings towards the stars.

Warwick grew tired of the hopeless struggle to take down the teleporter. He launched a nuclear missile from a silo somewhere on the other half of the planet. It approached the area extremely fast, heading towards the center of the basin. Its heavy plating provided enough defense against the quick firing sting-shooters, letting it pass through the air above them.

A giant flash of light and an explosion emerged out of the basin, towered above the ground, high into the starry sky. Victory.

But the time for celebration was short. The massive force of the explosion destabilized the huge fragment of the once whole planet, causing a powerful earthquake.

Warwick prepared for evacuation, leading anything that could be saved towards the greater half of his fortress-planet. He climbed on board of his transport, and as he gazed back down, he saw as the shard shattered into many miniature pieces.

The balance of gravity inside this vulnerable system was broken. The smaller fragment was slowly hurtling towards the greater half. The collision was inevitable. A complete disaster that led to the destruction of the vast majority of his valuable forces.

In the process, both gigantic fragments of the planet shattered into millions of tiny pieces of rocks...

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So great.

That last one was amazing.

Sometimes I wish I had more time to write.

PS: This is secretly a bump post.

So when exactly are you going to implement ponies into your story? Ponies are a great way to get famous, and then ditch the community when you are. Just go ask a couple musical artists. (AlexS)

Eep- did I just say that out loud?

Great as usual.

There may be a mention on ponies in a future episode... there may be.

Btw, you should put your fan-fiction list to your signature. Spread the word, dude!

Spoiler alert , everyone dies except Warwick.

Bump 4 Lyfe

Next episode coming soon. Hopefully before next weekend. Depends on how tired I get from work.

Just some teaser... because I've never done a teaser before. Hope you like it.

Spoiler: short teaser inside

For the past eleven months, Aurora and her companions worked on rebuilding and fortifying their defenses on their most treasured sanctuary planet to defend the ruined city that gave home to their mysterious statue. In the meantime, she observed the scene as the wildlife around everywhere slowly regained its strength, turning the blasted lands and wreckages into once again blooming vegetation. However, the delight that such sights gave her was only temporary...

She'd thought the peace would last longer, then one morning, Commander Hepitus returned with grievous news from a scouting mission he and Commander Iywin had undertaken... However, only Hepitus returned from the mission...

​

I hope you liked this little teaser, and I hope you'll like the next episode when it's ready!

If this teaser receives positive feedback, I might do more of these in the future.

Can't wait til the the next part 8.7/10

Counting down the days. I should be doing my homework now.

! Pmub

@SolitaryCheese I like that no title XD

but it is now called A Somber Song of Extinction and can be located here https://forums.uberent.com/threads/a-somber-song-of-extinction.63945/

Hype is reaching critical levels.