Every alien civilization has its own unique traits. The Talius Empire's military might did not rely solely on firearms; like ordinary Earthlings, they possessed no natural-born talents to speak of.
However, the Talius Empire had waged war against the outsiders for over a century, fighting from the rise of their steam age all the way into the nuclear information age. Along the way, they had compiled an incredibly rich database of the outsider genome.
Thirty years ago, the Highest Academy of Sciences of the Talius Empire initiated a classified project. They resolved to engineer a superior race of Talians by utilizing outsider genes.
The experiment was a roaring success, yielding the birth of Militmony. Born with monstrous physical power, his strength scaled exponentially with age until he now wielded several thousand tons of raw kinetic force.
He could single-handedly haul a fully-loaded freight train at a full sprint.
Devoid of any flashy or supernatural abilities, Militmony's strength resided entirely in his peak physical conditioning. As a solo combat asset, he was considered peerless.
On the other hand,
The project was also deemed a failure. Militmony's birth was a genetic fluke, a singular miracle that they were never able to replicate. No other individual of his caliber was ever produced again.
Faced with Hyuk, this terrifyingly powerful outsider, the high command resolved to deploy their ultimate weapon: Militmony.
Supersonic travel is named such because it outpaces the speed of sound. No matter how hyper-sensitive Hyuk's hearing was, she could never hear the missile's approach before seeing it with her own eyes.
BOOM!
The missile struck the coordinates of the 38th Regiment's base. Because it functioned as a one-way transport vehicle, the warhead had not been armed, resulting in a kinetic crash that merely carved a massive crater into the earth.
"Looks like I made it in time."
Militmony leaped out of the crater, his gaze locking onto Hyuk, who was currently enveloped in her evolutionary process. He closely analyzed her muscle definition, noting that her physical density seemed roughly on par with his own.
A look of genuine excitement crossed his face.
"This is the first time I've met someone with physical specs similar to mine. As an enemy, you couldn't be more perfect. Otherwise, I wouldn't have been able to enjoy a proper bout."
Hyuk did not reply.
She, too, sensed the staggering raw power of the man before her. She grew highly vigilant; she couldn't be sure if there were even more powerful entities waiting on this planet.
Without another word,
Militmony grinned. In the next fraction of a second, he lunged forward without warning. Pure kinetic fury ripped through the air, whipping up a howling gale as his fist hammered downward.
BOOM!
Hyuk answered with her own fist.
The collision of their fists detonated a localized shockwave of extreme air pressure, shattering the atmosphere around them. Layers of soil were peeled back one after another, leaving the surrounding area looking as if a category-five hurricane had swept through.
Seeing that Hyuk could genuinely hold her own against him, Militmony's excitement spiked.
"Yes! Just like that!"
With that,
He unleashed his full speed and power. Hyuk retaliated, swinging both fists in a counter-offensive. Her left arm, completely mended during the Ultimate Leap evolutionary process, was now fully operational.
Yet her evolution was far from over.
The inhuman skirmish raged with violent intensity. Their figures blurred beyond recognition, obliterating anything in their path. Solid boulders crumbled before them like soft tofu.
Following a deafening clash, Hyuk was forced backward. The brief exchange confirmed her suspicions: Militmony possessed both superior physical strength and greater combat experience.
In fights between titans of similar physical specs, experience was paramount. Complex martial arts techniques were entirely useless at their level; the fastest speed and the heaviest fists were the only efficient ways to deal damage.
Militmony was far more adept at utilizing this scale of power in active combat. Combined with his slightly superior raw strength, Hyuk was steadily being pushed into a disadvantage.
"My raw lifting force is roughly four thousand tons," Militmony noted during a brief lull. "It seems you're a step below me, and your combat style is rather unrefined. You lack experience."
Even as he spoke,
Militmony blurred, reappearing directly in front of Hyuk. A crushing punch hammered down. Hyuk could only cross her forearms to block. When the devastating impact connected, she felt her bones creak, as if they were on the verge of snapping.
"Hahaha! Is this all you've got?!"
BAM!
Hyuk retaliated with a sharp roundhouse kick, but Militmony raised an arm to block it. He immediately tried to seize her leg on the rebound, but Hyuk's body defied natural inertia, sliding laterally out of his reach.
"What?"
Militmony blinked in surprise. Seizing the opening, Hyuk buried a heavy fist into his torso, launching him backward. The sheer force plowed a trench dozens of meters long into the ground.
However, Militmony's defensive durability was immense. The blow did little actual damage. Before Hyuk could capitalize on her success and follow up, he effortlessly stabilized himself.
Hyuk asked, "How many others like you exist on this planet?"
Hearing this,
Militmony bared his teeth in a wide grin. "Why don't you guess?"
"..."
By this point in the battle, the scabs covering Hyuk's body had completely fallen away. Her skin was entirely renewed and her injuries fully healed, returning her to her original state.
Even her hair had grown back.
As the power flowing within her surged to its absolute limit and finally stabilized, her strength reached an entirely new echelon. This was a complete, profound metamorphosis.
[ Ultimate Leap · Completed ]
[ Strength: 4,500 tons ⬆ ]
[ Evolution Rate: 1% ⬆ ]
With the completion of Ultimate Leap, her injuries vanished and her raw strength skyrocketed to forty-five hundred tons, a significant jump from her previous thirty-two hundred. But that wasn't all.
Hyuk's body slowly floated upward. Hovering in mid-air, she realized she had naturally unlocked true flight, as if it were a dormant instinct she had possessed since birth.
Militmony's pupils contracted.
He was utterly shell-shocked.
"You can fly?!"
BOOM!
Within a fraction of a second, a deafening sonic boom shattered the air. Hyuk went supersonic instantly, appearing right in front of Militmony. Grabbing his head, she slammed him face-first into the dirt.
The earth quaked violently under the impact.
Immediately after,
Hyuk hurled Militmony straight up into the sky. Her body blurred as she rocketed upward, breaking the sound barrier to overtake him. Clasping her hands together, she delivered a devastating double-fist hammer strike, slamming him back down.
Now, Hyuk's strength and speed completely eclipsed Militmony's.
"Pfft!"
This was the first time Militmony had ever sustained injuries in combat. The staggering kinetic force reverberated through his body, causing him to cough up a mouthful of blood as he plunged toward the earth.
She wasn't done yet.
Seizing the opening, Hyuk pursued him relentlessly. Preventing Militmony from ever hitting the ground, she bounced him around in the air like a soccer ball. Militmony tried to exploit an opening and grab her during her assault.
But Hyuk answered with a violent headbutt that left his brain rattling and his vision swimming.
Finally,
Hyuk dove after the falling Militmony, unleashing a rapid, three-strike combo. Each strike carried the immense kinetic energy of her flight acceleration, her fists growing heavier and more devastating with every impact.
BOOM!
With a thunderous crash, Militmony hit the ground, carving out a colossal crater. Slumped at the center of the pit, he lay on the brink of death, completely stripped of any capacity to fight back.
He looked up at Hyuk as she slowly drifted down from the sky, offering her a bloody, defiant grin. Dark blood bubbled from his mouth as he mustered his final remaining strength to raise his right hand, giving Hyuk a vulgar Talian offensive gesture.
"Cough... you hit like a truck, but I still have to say... this was the most satisfying fight of my life. In the end... gurgle... screw you—"
SQUASH!
Hyuk didn't wait for the bastard to finish his insult. She brought her heel down with absolute force, crushing his head. If she hadn't already fractured his skull during their brutal exchange, even her current strength might have struggled to pulverize it so easily.
[ Infinite Overload · Potential Unleashed ]
[ Strength: 6,000 tons ⬆ ]
——
[ Infinite Overload · Ultimate Leap ]
[ Evolution Rate: 5% ]
——
[ Leap Scan Completed ]
[ Process Displayed ]
[ Mission Module Added ]
[ Reload Completed ]
The system interface flashed to life with updated notifications. With the completion of the Ultimate Leap scan following the end of the battle, a new process had been triggered, unlocking the Mission Module.
——
[ Main Mission: You must return to Earth through the door within 9 Earth days. Failure to do so may result in being stranded indefinitely in Quadrant 211. ]
[ Mission Reward: Evolution Rate · 5% ]
——
Hyuk had expected the mission rewards to be raw tonnage increases or items, but she was pleasantly surprised to find it was evolution rate. Honestly, this suited her preferences perfectly.
Gaining raw strength was easy enough, but raising her evolution rate was a grind. This time, she had to take repeated, near-fatal damage just to trigger a single Ultimate Leap.
As her physical conditioning grew stronger, accumulating evolution points would only become more difficult. Being able to secure evolution progress via missions was an excellent reward.
Besides, she had no desire to linger on this planet. Who knew if even stronger enemies were already on their way? Or worse, if these lunatics would decide to simply glass the area with nukes.
Hyuk decided to retreat immediately.
BOOM!
Going from static to full throttle in an instant, her body shattered the sound barrier, rocketing toward the door at Mach 2, which was currently her absolute top speed.
Since this planet's gravity was stronger and its atmospheric density higher than Earth's, she estimated she would be even faster once she returned home due to the reduced drag.
Sonic booms rumbled across the sky as she flew. The rapid compression of moisture in the air condensed into liquid, forming a distinct white vapor cone around Hyuk and leaving a brilliant vapor trail in her wake.
...
Talius Empire Military Headquarters.
The atmosphere inside was suffocatingly tense.
"Militmony... is confirmed KIA."
"The outsider target has displayed flight capabilities, clocking a maximum velocity of Mach 2. It is estimated she will reach our nearest frontline city in two minutes and thirty seconds."
"Commander, the target has shown a terrifying rate of adaptability and growth. If this continues, we will be completely powerless to stop her."
"I request authorization to deploy strategic nuclear weapons."
"But that is an imperial city! There are millions of civilians..."
"They will sacrifice themselves to eradicate the outsider. It is the ultimate honor of the Talius Empire. We have no time to argue! Submit the request to high command immediately!"
"Sir!"
Hyuk's rate of evolution was simply too terrifying. Talius Military Headquarters was forced to make a grim, agonizing choice. On the scales of survival, the lives of a few million citizens could not outweigh the preservation of their entire civilization.
Either the outsider died,
Or the Talius Empire fell.
This was the unwavering resolve forged through a century of brutal warfare against outsiders. They would not hesitate to shed their very last drop of blood, fighting down to the final survivor.
The Talius Empire and Hyuk shared an irreconcilable enmity, they were locked in a mortal struggle. Yet, this did not make the sheer courage and iron-blooded resolve of the Talians any less tragic or grand.
This was the raw, magnificent beauty of cosmic civilizations.
It could not be defined by simple concepts of friend or foe.
"Authorized."
The moment the Talius Emperor signed the executive order, a hidden missile silo slowly opened its hatch. A massive thermonuclear warhead was primed for launch.
Codenamed: Destiny.
Yield: eighty megatons of TNT.
To guarantee the absolute annihilation of the outsider, denying her any remaining window to adapt and evolve, they decided to detonate this hydrogen bomb over their own sovereign city.
Countdown complete.
Ignition.
Plumes of thick smoke erupted as a brilliant tail of fire shot skyward. The thermonuclear missile Destiny entered its final approach countdown, and Hyuk remained completely oblivious.
The millions of civilians in the city below remained completely oblivious.
Only a certain other individual from Earth suddenly froze in absolute horror. He possessed a future-foresight talent, and a terrifying vision had just flashed before his eyes: the entire city turned to ash and dust in a blinding nuclear firestorm.
"A nuclear explosion?!"
The bespectacled middle-aged man's eyes went wide, gripped by pure panic. Wrapping his heavy clothing tightly around himself, he sprinted forward, desperately searching for the other Earthlings scattered nearby.
Only by pooling their efforts could they hope to survive and return to Earth. Otherwise, they wouldn't even be able to get close to the portal, and worst of all, that door was about to be obliterated by a nuclear blast!
This realization made the bespectacled man feel deeply anxious.
If the door was vaporized, would it ever reappear? His foresight couldn't answer that question yet. He could only pray that it would, or they would all be stranded here forever.
But in his vision, he had also glimpsed a flying figure. It was a fellow Earthling, someone who must have been pulled through the door just like him.
If it were possible, he would have loved to hitch a ride with her, but that obviously wasn't an option.
"Dammit!"
He muttered curses under his breath. If he had to guess, that flying figure had undoubtedly triggered this imminent nuclear strike. The sheer hostility these planetary locals harbored toward outsiders was incredibly intense.
Fortunately, passing through the door had naturally granted him the ability to understand the alien language, allowing for seamless communication. Otherwise, things would have been far more complicated.
More than two minutes later,
A white vapor trail cut across the horizon, heading straight for the nearby city. Before the civilians could even register the sight, Hyuk plunged headfirst into the metropolitan area.
Her sonic boom shattered the glass windows of skyscrapers along her path, sending the surrounding crowd into a panicked frenzy. Hyuk completely ignored them; she had zero time to worry about alien civilians.
The door's resonance was like a sonar beacon constantly emitting pulses, allowing anyone with the sensory connection to pinpoint its exact coordinates. The closer she got, the more violent the pulses became.
Amidst the screech of shattering glass and roaring sonic booms, Hyuk crashed into a high-rise office building, moving in a straight, uncompromising line as she pulverized every wall blocking her path.
BOOM!
"Ah!!"
Amidst terrified screams, office workers poked their heads out of their cubicles to look at the massive, gaping holes in the walls, completely dumbfounded.
"What the hell is going on?"
"Is a demolition crew tearing down the building?!"
At the far end of the series of shattered walls stood a young figure clad in a blood-stained Talius military uniform. When the aliens inside the office caught sight of her face, their pupils shrank in horror.
"The outsider!"
Hyuk had no time to waste on them. She stood before a plain white wooden office door, the overwhelming, pulsing resonance confirming that this was indeed the door.
She reached out, grabbed the doorknob, and gave it a firm twist.
CLICK.
The door swung open.
Stepping through the threshold, her figure instantly vanished, as if crossing a threshold of space-time itself. In a single heartbeat, she was back on Earth.
Exactly ten minutes after Hyuk stepped through the door, Destiny descended at hypersonic velocity, striking the absolute center of the city. A blinding flash of light erupted, vaporizing everything in its radius in an instant. The building housing the door was utterly obliterated.
...
Earth.
Jpscan City.
Hyuk stepped out from the sliding glass door of the abandoned storefront. From the outside, nothing seemed out of the ordinary; she had simply slid the door open and stepped out onto the street.
[Main Mission · Completed]
[Received Reward: Evolution Rate · 5%]
[Evolution Rate: 10%]
Hyuk cast a quick glance around her surroundings and hurried away. Her Talian military uniform was far too conspicuous, and the phone she had brought with her had been destroyed during the battle.
After two long weeks, she was finally able to return home. Now that she possessed the ability to fly, she constantly willed her body to levitate slightly above the floor at all times, no longer having to worry about her immense weight collapsing the building.
The television in her living room, which was on standby, suddenly flickered to life.
The pixel-art girl in the sailor uniform materialized on the screen.
"Welcome home."
...
Hyuk went to pick up a new phone. The moment she powered it on, Type Zero appeared on the screen and asked, "I picked out the model myself. What do you think?"
"It's decent."
Hyuk wasn't picky.
But the situation made her realize something: "Can you actually modify bank database figures at will? Wouldn't that mean you have access to unlimited wealth?"
"Theoretically, yes," Type Zero replied. "Altering network data is incredibly simple for me. If I wanted to, I could easily become the person with the most virtual assets on Earth."
Wealth?
Speaking of which, Hyuk remembered something.
Type Zero asked, puzzled, "What's wrong?"
"After my parents passed away, I inherited their estate. Aside from this apartment, there was 3.5 million in savings. I didn't think much of it before, but looking back, it doesn't make any sense."
"What doesn't make sense?"
Hyuk explained, "My parents were just ordinary working-class employees. Their combined monthly income was less than twenty thousand, and buying this apartment had already wiped out over half of their life savings. Where did they suddenly get three point five million in savings?"
They didn't trade stocks, they had no habit of buying lottery tickets, and they certainly didn't have any wealthy relatives. This inheritance was completely beyond their financial reality.
Type Zero understood.
"I'll investigate it for you. Give me some time."
"Alright."
From entering the door to returning from Quadrant 211, less than twenty-four hours had passed. Today marked the tenth day since that door had first materialized.
She had kept Type Zero monitoring the site with security feeds the entire time.
Ten full days.
During this period, not a single government official or investigator had visited the site; they remained entirely oblivious. Only two vagrants had attempted to sneak into the abandoned storefront to find a place to sleep.
They were never seen coming out.
Soon,
The countdown entered its final hour.
Unexpectedly, in the literal final moments before the door deactivated, two battered, disheveled figures scrambled out of the doorway. It was the old man and the bespectacled middle-aged man.
The old man's talent was the manipulation of networks and electronic machinery, while the bespectacled man's talent was likely future foresight. The first thing the latter had done after awakening was purchase a lottery ticket, which had actually hit the jackpot.
"Oh? They actually made it back," Type Zero remarked.
She was genuinely surprised.
Hyuk wasn't surprised. "Both of their talents are highly practical. As long as they kept a low profile and worked together, making it back wouldn't be too difficult."
She still had no idea about the thermonuclear explosion.
"You are highly likely the strongest person on Earth right now. Why not take advantage of this head start to establish your own faction? You could try to recruit them."
"Pass. Just keep an eye on them for me."
Hyuk had absolutely no interest in playing kingmaker.
The countdown reached zero.
No one else emerged from the door.
As the portal vanished, the low, pulsing resonance finally faded into complete silence.
The doorway returned to its ordinary state, showing absolutely no signs of anything unusual. Had someone not personally experienced it, it would be impossible to believe that this plain glass door had recently served as a spacetime corridor.
...
Late at night.
Inside a certain residential building.
A pungent, metallic stench of blood hung heavy in the darkness. Two bodies lay slumped in the living room, their deaths horrific and violent, while a middle-aged woman cowered in a corner, trembling uncontrollably.
She clamped her hands tightly over her mouth to stifle her sobs. Her entire body shook with absolute terror as tears streamed down her face, her eyes wide with primal fear.
"Too weak."
A man stood directly before her. His hands were drenched in fresh blood, yet his expression was chillingly detached. He was supposed to be this woman's husband, yet now, he seemed to be a completely different entity.
He had just murdered his own parents with his bare hands.
"Humans on Earth are just too fragile," he muttered, completely ignoring the woman's desperate weeping and pleas. He ruthlessly delivered the killing blow, letting the warm splatter stain his face as he complained, "Is there really no sturdier vessel available?"
Little did he know,
His every move had been captured by a home security camera tucked away in the corner of the living room. He seemed entirely ignorant of what the device was, which was why he had ignored it completely.
...
The following day.
Officers from the homicide division arrived at the crime scene. The site was stomach-churningly brutal, but with the recent spike in savage homicides across the city, the veteran investigators had already grown somewhat desensitized.
Shenan Carter, a female detective on the squad, was deeply unsettled. Not long after she had transferred to the homicide division, Jpscan City had been plagued by a series of exceptionally sadistic murders, leaving her increasingly anxious about the city's safety.
"Deputy Chief, is it just me, or has Jpscan City seen an absurd number of homicides over the last few months?"
The most troubling aspect was that these cases, to varying degrees, carried an eerie, abnormal undertone. Some of the execution methods simply did not seem humanly possible.
The Deputy Chief sighed helplessly.
"It's not up to us to decide when they happen. If there's a case, we have to solve it. All we can do is hunt down the killers and let the court hand down the judgment they deserve."
Shennan looked toward the security camera installed in the victim's living room.
"At least this particular case shouldn't be too hard to crack."
If their previous cases had only hinted at the supernatural, this time, they were about to witness the impossible with their own eyes.
Watching the surveillance footage of the man casually crushing a victim's skull with a single hand, Shennan was frozen in sheer shock. She could barely believe her eyes.
"This... a normal human being shouldn't be physically capable of doing this, right?"
The detectives in the room remained dead silent.
The Deputy Chief realized the terrifying gravity of the situation.
"I'm going to report this directly to the Chief."
...
PING.
Her phone screen lit up with a notification.
Type Zero delivered some good news to Hyuk: "I've detected a human who appears to be possessed by an alien host. Any interest in taking care of it?"
Hyuk slipped on a black hooded jacket.
She was concise.
"Where is he?"
Killing aliens scaled her raw strength; there was absolutely no reason to pass up the opportunity.
"XXX Complex, Building 5, sixth floor. This alien is exceptionally careless; vicious and bloodthirsty, but likely hailing from a non-technological civilization. He has absolutely no awareness of Earth's technological devices."
Type Zero's analytical capabilities were exceptionally sharp. As long as someone wasn't actively hiding from her, she could easily extract sufficient data and perform highly accurate analyses.
"Additional intel: his objective seems to be finding a sufficiently powerful host. Your physical specs are incredibly high, but I must still warn you not to take him lightly. Be careful not to let your guard down and slip up."
"I know."
Since it was still broad daylight, Hyuk couldn't risk flying openly. She played it safe, hailing a taxi and taking her time as she traveled to the target complex.
Slipping through a blind spot in the security cameras, she entered the residential area with ease. From a distance, she could already smell the thick, metallic stench of blood in the air. Over her Bluetooth earpiece, Type Zero's characteristically deadpan voice carried a trace of teasing amusement.
"Congratulations are in order. Jpscan City has birthed its very first superhero. Some kid successfully 'assisted' the police by neutralizing a fleeing drug dealer. He is now officially on the police wanted list."
Playing the vigilante.
Who didn't dream of being a hero once in their life?
Hyuk ignored Type Zero's attempt to strike up a casual conversation. Reaching out, she gripped the main door lock of the apartment building and casually ripped it apart. The solid steel felt like play-dough in her hands.
The hunt had officially begun.