Corvus's POV
"No, no, no, no, no!"
I stumbled back as I felt the tether connecting me to Lauren and the God she channeled get burned out of me with an intermingling of demonic and angelic energy. I muscled down a scream, but my Ascendants—or rather what was left of them-weren't as resolute.
They let out varying degrees of grunts and screams as their concentration snapped, and my war array sputtered; the healing, adaptations, and debuffs they provided by my endless army stopped for a moment, giving the defenders of Earth the opening they needed.
Thousands died to a fist strike from a psychokinetic brute who called himself Sentry. Hundreds more to a backhand. Most of Glutton's attention was concentrated on keeping him weak, and it was barely working.
Useless. If Psylocke, Vulcan, Storm, or Silver Samurai were here, I'd at least have multiple frontliners to occupy the orangutan. Instead, I had to make do with only casters. It was less than ideal for a battle as frenetic as this one.
I gnashed my teeth. I knew that the Nephilim was behind the sudden loss of my divine Patron. The same Nephilim Lauren had promised me she could handle. If the pain in my soul was any indication, she'd failed.
"What's going on?" Endless, the youngest of my new Ascendants, asked. He was based on the DNA of one Armando Munoz, a child with the remarkable ability to adapt to all known phenomena.
"What the fuck was that!" Glutton demanded, holding her head. She had heterochromia and hair that was equal parts white and red. "Where's the system shop! I was this close to buying Life Drain!" she whined.
Glutton was a failure in many respects. Her mutation wasn't quite as potent as her predecessor—Marie D'Acanto's. She couldn't retain the power she drained for long, but she could take and hold a lot of it for a very short time. Her "build" concentrated on building upon that singular advantage.
But she paled in comparison to the other two.
"Are you okay, my Liege?" Helix asked. His soft voice was a balm in these unsteady times. He was my pride and joy. I'd managed to cram Omega-level mutations into him and grant him an Ascendant bloodline—my very own. He was still no match for what I could do naturally, but he was the closest thing I had to an apprentice, an equal.
"Perfectly fine, Helix," I said sharply, letting none of the pain and growing panic I felt show. "Get the array back up! We've come too far to turn back now. Blessing or no blessing, we are Ascendants; we can absorb souls to strengthen ourselves, and I've gifted you a suite of techniques designed to fit your unique biologies. Use them." I commanded.
Glutton fixed me with a glare out of the corner of her eyes, but did as commanded. Helix and Endless fell in line without much of a fuss, and like nothing ever happened, we continued the assault and even started making progress. The human intelligence agency was dedicating more and more people to containing the outbreak of the Red Death, weakening their defenses and their chaos-wielding sorcerer.
She concerned me more than even the lightning-wielding Asgardian.
"Helix," I commanded. "Concentrate our draconic forces around—"
The word turned to ash in my throat as reality twisted and she appeared. She was draped in a silver armor that covered her face entirely, not even leaving eye slits, but the faint wisps of cosmic fire that surrounded her set her apart well enough.
Jean Grey. Avatar of the Phoenix. Her presence here confirmed Lauren's defeat or, at the very least, her death. The Nephilim couldn't be far behind.
No. I balled my fist. Why did I let her take my other Ascendants…
Let her? I scoffed at my own misplaced rage. My own weakness. Jean vanished in a flash of flame, and my stomach dropped.
"You were saying something, my lord?"
Helix's words centered me.
"Max out the bio-creation chambers, and initiate the Kaiju protocols," I said. "Endless, link yourself to the false Ascendants. Glutton, stop spending your stolen energy. I need you to bank it."
She was practically vibrating on her fleshy seat. "We going to fight?"
"Yes," I said. "We are about to lose this ship." And we had no way back. It was now or never.
My fears came to pass in moments. Jean Grey lit up like the sun, and after burning my plague out of the flesh bags of New York, she burned her way up to my ship and lashed at it, destroying it in a single strike.
I went white. No skill. No finesse. Just absolute carnage. She was just like Lauren, born at the top of the mountain. My siblings and I had our advantages, but at least we had to climb.
A well-raised crystal blood shield protected us from the damage.
My Adam's apple bobbed involuntarily. She was gone. Kanehua. My warship. I spent months making her. She was alive in ways many of my creations weren't. And the False Ascendants. They were a failed version of my current stock. Endless hadn't even gotten the chance to wake them.
It was all wrong…
This wasn't how it was supposed to go.
I took in a steadying breath. I will just have to rise above it.
I was born to rule. To be king. I refused to be anything less.
As my ship fell apart around me, I summoned my domain. It had changed substantially since I became Ascendant and gathered a few otherworldly skills.
Majesty of Flesh. Demonic energy billowed out, usurping reality. The ocean below us turned to blood for miles; thick, twisting flesh spires burst from the water, reaching high. An armor woven from the densest bones in the galaxy wrapped around me, and a staff materialized in my free hand. A crown twisted out of the helmet I wore. And I looked her straight in the eyes.
She seemed just as determined as I was.
My three Ascendants floated behind me, a fraction of the true numbers I would've preferred to go to war with. I had hundreds of strategies ready, thousands of spells, and tricks.
The heroes of Earth soon joined Jean. First Sentry, then the team Dante had gathered, a few Norse gods, and dozens of other heroes I didn't immediately recognize.
I raised my staff. "What are you waiting for, an invitation? Give me your best shot."
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