Soul of Searing Steel

The incident which saw Mycroft being attacked in their own domain did not remain secret, although it would have been impossible to hide it. When the elf who once went by the name Neuper suddenly revealed himself and went on a rampage, none had expected the star of the cosmos that was rising meteorically to suffer a blow from the epidemic.

One-third of the central installation on Zeta Ram was destroyed from the inside in that disaster, including the diplomacy zone arranged for envoys of the otherworld civilizations. Fifty-one emissaries died on the spot, although Mycroft suffered the worse casualties: 370,000 elite installation personnel were killed as the entire base was left in limbo, with the ships of the Third Fleet Detachment that had been on guard duty by the harbor sinking one after the another, the surviving vessels heavily damaged. 

If the two Legendary champions stationed nearby—Brandon Kaos and Nostradamus—had not reached Zeta Ram on time and scared the Ultimate Entity into fleeing, the losses would have several times what it had been.

While the casualties appeared insignificant and only one Void installation had been ruined, the dead were all Void personnel each handpicked amongst thousands, not to mention that the Zeta Ram base was directly connected to Mycroft's homeworld and formed a part of their core domain. It was unquestionably a great caution for the Mycroftians, shaking off the mistaken notion that disaster was too far from them.

In the end, distance was nothing for a supernatural plague.

Still, the other civilizations now had to truly face the disaster unraveling across the Multiverse. Indeed, it was not as if most of them were still unaware that the state of the Multiverse was become ever grave and unsettling, certainly noticing the signs such as the increase in World Eaters, some squirming existence in the dark Void, and the increasing surges of the Great Mana Tide…all of them understood that the old era of stable peace where they could calmly develop and enjoy themselves was gone, that the epidemic that engulfed the Multiverse was the prelude as conflict descended from the distant Stellaris.

As the Mana Tide came, so did war—the final moments of an era's cycle were now slowly unraveling upon the stage that was the Multiverse.

***

"…We must admit the truth that we are facing a profound crisis."

On the Zeta Ram Void installation, in another major assembly of many civilizations hastily organized by the Mycroftian alliance, a beautiful blue-haired youth with a calm face stood before the stage and spoke with a solemn tone—he was Merlin, the God of Order and Destruction and whose profound might left the entire scene stunned. He did not hesitate to reveal the truth to the civilizations that were willing to know: facts about the Evil Gods that the Mycroft civilization was aware of, as well as their theories about the future of the Multiverse.

"This major epidemic is just the start. It may not even be created by an Evil God, but by another superior being who faces the same threat—the Evil Gods are not what it could face alone. Trust us in this: that assault of over a hundred Evil Gods would include powerful primitive specimens that surpass human intelligence, and no civilization can fight them all alone."

"Indeed, we are researching and resisting the epidemic, and should nothing unexpected happen, our specialized researcher Aydril Galanoud will develop a vaccine in days to come. Though we cannot guarantee its effectiveness, we are confronting the epidemic head-on and not merely guarding passively. We will freely provide the information to every civilization who would in turn create them independently, and in that respect, it is our hope that all civilizations will join hands against future threats and do as we did: to share and collaborate, an attribute of civilizations, not beasts."

"Even beasts share and collaborate though…" one of the envoys below the stage muttered very quietly. However, the stage had been very silent and the newly-appointed envoys considerably powerful, which was why those words instantly caused waves of muffled debate.

From a grander perspective, the Mycroft civilization had used the epidemic to rapidly congregate all nearby Void civilizations into a sparse organization, just as a great purge and military emergency was implemented in their civilization.

Apart from necessary personnel or workers who sacrificed themselves to continue their work in foreign colony bases, most others had returned to the demiplane of the Multiverse Sacrificial Grounds through emergency teleportation, where they were checked most thoroughly and cleansed even in spirit. Though it appeared cruel, it was a necessity—after investigating Ultimate Entity Neuper's anomalies as a human, many Extraordinary individuals pointed out that his souls had signs of changing before turning completely into an Ultimate Entity. That alerted all champions to the fact that the supernatural plague might not begin physically, but could also infect from the spiritual and soul aspects.

William the Mind Lord hence promptly designed a spiritual verification program through the Mana Net to determine spirit deviation rates on a maximum scale. Anyone logging in to the Spirit Terminals were to be scanned once: anyone showing 5% deviation would have been officially monitored with importance, 10% and inspectors would have visited them, and at 20%, anyone—old, young, man or woman—would have had to face an alert elite suppression team who descended upon them from overhead.

Meanwhile, every Void exploration project was halted, with Void echoes analysts being identified as a high-risk task—only the most loyal individuals with on-par abilities were allowed to work under supervision.

It was a series of swift and decisive actions that unquestionably and significantly suppressed the spreading epidemic. After singling out suspected infected individuals, the Mycroft civilization was ever prudent with the case, even truly considering Project Relocate.

***

In the Moldavian territories, the Northern Empire in the world of Mycroft, the modernized city chain which was now an heavy arcane industry base of the Empire's north and drew energy from the Great Ajax Volcano welcomed the arrival of an old guest from the past.

Under gloomy rainclouds, Roland the Holy Knight stared at the city that was at once familiar and strange in the distance. He remembered that the main city of Moldavia was a middling town in his last visit, exuding a cool yet prideful atmosphere. But now, it had turned into a pearl of the northern provinces, with towering factories, massive arcane towers, energy transporting arrays, and many tall buildings—all of which gave him a feeling of otherworldliness.

However, he was not left emotional from the loss of something familiar, but rather with delight and pleasure over something being as it was.

Still, now was not the moment to remember the past and be in awe at change. The Holy Knight's gaze focus, and he strode towards the Liege Avenue.

He had an important task. With the blessing of the many Mycroftian Legends, including Joshua's own from Stellaris, he was granted a secret key through those authorities that would open that door.

"Shelter, Relocation…" he said quietly, before breathing a sigh and striding forward again.

As the homeworld of Mycroft activated an experimental project due to the great threat of the Ultimate Virus, a formless crisis spread again and again across civilizations who thought themselves to be safe in their remote domain, keeping within their worlds ignorance of the threat.