After spending a bit too long indulging in that absurd exchange with Petra, Orsaga finally figured out why Elsa had said his avatar looked "ugly."
He could only point solemnly at the screen, where Aeon was currently being chased down by a swarm of Tyranid reinforcements, and correct her:
"The one getting beaten up… that's me."
"…"
The moment those words left his mouth, Elsa suddenly felt second-hand embarrassment for him.
His avatar was literally being hunted down like a stray dog.
She sighed and asked, exasperated:
"Then why are you so calm? Your avatar's about to get killed!"
Even Petra, who'd been focused on cooking, looked over with a trace of concern:
"Isn't that kind of a big deal?"
Orsaga, ever composed, waved his hands dismissively:
"Nah, it's nothing serious. Even if it dies, it doesn't matter. Besides, Aeon is pretty strong—he won't go down that easily."
But the moment he finished speaking—before the words even stopped echoing—Aeon was abruptly cornered by an incoming wave of Tyranid reinforcements.
In seconds, the battle on screen turned grim—visibly dangerous, even for a powerhouse like Aeon.
Seeing that, Orsaga casually changed his tone:
"Okay… slight shift in the situation. He might actually die now."
Not a hint of shame crossed his face, even after being proven wrong in real-time.
"…"
Watching this unfold, Elsa was the one who felt embarrassed for him.
After a brief silence, she rubbed her temples and asked,
"You keep saying you're strong. And since you've now officially joined this dimension's system… Can I ask—politely—what's your actual status in our universe?"
She figured if he wasn't as powerful as he claimed, maybe someone should rein him in a little.
Especially given Orsaga's personality.
In her view, he was the kind of guy who'd eventually get himself killed just from being… deeply annoying.
The kind of guy who naturally drew aggro from every major faction.
"Status, huh…"
Orsaga thought for a moment, then rubbed his chin and replied:
"I guess you could say… I'm one of the top leaders of the villainous factions?"
Elsa was taken aback at first—but then quickly realized that it… made perfect sense.
For someone with his attitude, becoming a villain boss was about as likely as getting beaten to death in an alley.
Honestly, the odds were fifty-fifty.
But due to her limited perspective, Elsa couldn't fully comprehend what that actually meant.
"Notorious" would be a massive understatement.
These were Chaos God-tier villains.
The kind that made both the living and the dead tremble.
Even aliens would fall to their knees and beg for mercy.
Orsaga wasn't just "wanted"—he was practically the final boss of the entire universe.
While Elsa digested that with surprising calm, Petra had already resumed cooking, completely unbothered by the idea that Aeon was being chased to death on-screen.
All she wanted now was to show off her hard-earned culinary skills.
---
Time Passed…
Thirteen years later.
Earth year: 2075.
Over the past decade, human spaceflight had advanced at a staggering pace, driven by a mix of internal breakthroughs and—unknown to the public—external assistance.
Colonial bases on the Moon and Mars, once rudimentary greenhouse domes, had evolved into relatively self-sustaining settlements.
Closed-loop ecosystems were gradually being constructed.
At this rate, in just another decade or so, humanity would formally enter the era of interplanetary migration.
As for faster-than-light (FTL) travel and space-folding technologies, those topics had largely been sidelined by mainstream scientific consensus after the disaster involving the Horizon-class Starship.
Too risky. Too expensive. Too early.
So instead, the global focus shifted back to a more grounded goal:
How to conduct reliable, sub-light interstellar travel within the physical universe.
Of course, this problem was no small feat.
Humanity's current top-speed spacecraft barely reached 13 km/s—light speed was still far out of reach.
Limitations in propulsion, materials science, and energy systems continued to bottleneck progress.
---
At that moment…
Orsaga sat across from Ra while negotiating business as if it were the most ordinary thing in existence. Between them floated a dark mass of writhing flesh suspended in midair — no bowl, no tableware, no heat source. The creature had long since stopped screaming, yet its form still convulsed instinctively as strips of its own body peeled away and drifted toward Orsaga.
They dissolved before even reaching his mouth.
The flesh unraveled into strands of red mist, collapsing into his palm and vanishing into a miniature void that pulsed like a second heartbeat. Each "bite" erased a portion of the organism from reality itself.
Ra watched in silence.
There was no smell. No steam. No sign of digestion. Only absence.
"What's wrong?" Orsaga asked casually as another limb unraveled into nothingness. "I invited you to eat. Not interested?"
Faced with the friendly threat, Ra reluctantly reached forward and allowed a fragment to touch his hand.
The piece disintegrated instantly, reforming directly inside his mouth.
He paused.
…Surprisingly edible.
Seeing the change in expression, Orsaga proudly declared:
"Told you it's good! No clue what it is, though. I just scooped it off some life-bearing planet on a whim—looks edible, right?"
Ra ignored the madness of that statement,
and got straight to the point:
"I want to purchase more scientific technology."
Orsaga, who had known this was coming, gave an offhand nod:
"Sure. But you know the price."
Over the years, since his true body was stuck in the Warp, Orsaga had operated entirely through avatars.
And as a true abyssal demon, he never forgot his roots.
His daily activities mostly consisted of scamming, hustling, and flipping overpriced tech.
It was no surprise that Earth's rapid technological leap over the past decade had a certain… demonic contributor.
After all, he was the supplier.
Sure, the tech he sold was always overpriced and heavily redacted, but hey—he did deliver results.
"Fine."
After a simple agreement, Ra followed up with a more serious question:
"I want to know—how large of an area can you actually keep safe for humanity?"
He needed to know Orsaga's limit.
Only then could he decide how fast humanity could safely develop.
After all, progress isn't always good when it's too fast.
Run too fast, and you break your ankle.
Or worse—attract something you're not ready for.
Orsaga paused to think, then replied:
"Hard to quantify exactly. But let's just say, with humanity's current level of development… there's nothing dangerous they could stumble into right now."
Back when he first signed the contract to protect Earth's civilization, he had personally ordered the Eldrazi to sweep several nearby star systems clean.
Right now, aside from a few designated habitable planets, the surrounding systems were essentially sterilized.
If anything was still alive out there, it was already booked—scheduled to be dragged into the Warp later.
Which meant…
In the short term, humanity would have zero contact with any threatening extraterrestrial civilization.
Because—threatening or not—they were already dead.
.....
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