He walked past the core and toward the eastern wing of the sanctum—a structure far more personal.
His private mansion.
An elegant spire fused with organic architecture and reinforced with tech drawn from dozens of worlds. Every corridor was warded. Every room had passive defenses so discreet, even a god would feel welcome—until they tried something stupid.
As he entered the main atrium, his fingers sparked lightly, tracing a glowing symbol in the air.
A portal shimmered open—a stabilized rift connecting the hidden sanctum to his old residence on Earth.
Through the glowing frame, Max's room was clearly visible. He stepped through and stretched, finally back on Earth. Walking down the stairs, he found his girls lounging in the living hall—some scrolling on tablets, others chatting casually.
"Yo," Max said simply.
"You're back. Faster than I thought," Gwen said, standing up and walking over to hug him. The others followed, each taking a moment to greet him warmly.
After the brief reunion, Max dropped a casual bombshell:
"By the way, I moved that Armangda planet. I've renamed it Horizon, and… I made it the ninth planet of our solar system."
The room went silent.
"You… moved an entire planet and relocated it here?" Gwen asked slowly, staring at him in disbelief. The others looked equally stunned.
Max nodded like it was no big deal.
"Well, I ended up reforming the planet, so I didn't think about leaving it out there. So… I brought it."
The five women—Ruze, Malia, Lan Xue, Mu Qing, and Gwen—just stared at him for a long moment. Finally, Gwen shrugged and said,
"Yep. You can do that."
The others exchanged a glance, then nodded in agreement, as if this was just another Tuesday with Max.
Max chuckled at their reactions—or rather, their lack of reaction after the initial shock.
"Well, since you all seem fine with it," he said, smirking, "how about a tour? It's not every day I move a planet next door."
Gwen arched an eyebrow. "You're serious?"
"Of course I'm serious." Max tapped the air lazily, and a shimmering holo-portal expanded in the center of the hall. Beyond it was a breathtaking view—the skyline of Aether Spire, Horizon's capital city. Floating towers of glass and black steel twisted elegantly into the skies, glowing neon veins pulsing through the structures. Below, green forests stretched endlessly, broken only by rivers that shone faintly like streams of light.
Lan Xue gasped softly, her eyes reflecting the luminescent view.
"It's… beautiful."
Mu Qing tilted her head, quiet but impressed.
"You really built this?"
Max gave her a sideways glance. "Technically, Gaia did most of the work."
At the mention of her name, a soft voice chimed through the room, smooth and melodic.
"Acknowledged. Greetings, designated companions of my creator."
The girls blinked as a tall, elegant woman formed from glowing pixels and solid light—Gaia's avatar. She had hair like silver threads flowing endlessly, eyes like crystal circuits, and a gown that shimmered with constellations.
Ruze crossed her arms, studying the AI with a calculating gaze.
"So this is the one who runs the place?"
"Yes," Max said, smirking. "Gaia handles the planet. I handle… well, the fun stuff."
Gaia bowed gracefully.
"Security and environmental optimization have reached 94% completion. Horizon is fully stable, Master."
"Good," Max replied casually, then turned to the girls.
"Right now, we're standing in my old Earth house and the core base is at Horizon's heart. Two homes, one link. But eventually…" He snapped his fingers, and the holo shifted to a view of the Hollow Mausoleum—the massive underground sanctum with its black spires and glowing ley lines. The Gaia Core pulsed at its center, locked behind shimmering fields of energy.
"This is where I keep Gaia's true core," Max explained. "Hidden so deep, even gods would get lost trying to find it. I also have my private mansion there. Fully secured, fully stocked."
Malia smiled faintly.
"So… when do we move in?"
Max grinned. "As soon as you want. Horizon is ours now."
He walked closer to the portal, gazing through it at the glittering city and wild, green valleys beyond. His voice softened, almost amused:
"You know… it's not bad, having a whole planet for a backyard."
He glanced over his shoulder.
"You coming or what?"
The five exchanged looks—then one by one, they followed him through.
The portal rippled like liquid glass as Max stepped through, his boots clicking on the obsidian floor of the arrival platform in Aether Spire, Horizon's capital. The girls followed, one by one, their eyes widening as they took in the surreal world around them.
Above them stretched a sky laced with neon auroras, crisscrossed by silver skybridges and soaring airships that shimmered with glyph-tech energy. Towers twisted upward like living sculptures, their surfaces flowing with streams of data and soft pulses of mana-light. Yet between these futuristic monoliths bloomed vast parks, rivers of liquid crystal, and gardens filled with bioluminescent flowers that danced to unseen rhythms.
It was a harmony of steel and nature, magic and machine.
"Holy… hell," Gwen whispered, her usual confidence cracking as she gazed upward. "You weren't kidding."
Mu Qing's eyes softened slightly. She reached out and touched a glowing vine coiling up a railing—it pulsed warmly beneath her fingers. "This… feels alive."
Max smirked.
"Gaia designed it that way. Tech that breathes. Cities that grow instead of decay."
As if summoned by his words, Gaia's avatar appeared again, gliding along the platform like a phantom of light.
"Welcome to Horizon, secondary-designates. Your access privileges have been synchronized. Please enjoy full sovereignty across protected zones."
Ruze raised an eyebrow. "Sovereignty?"
"It means you're basically untouchable here," Max said with a shrug. "No laws apply to you. You are the law."
Gwen grinned. "I like this planet already."
Max waved his hand, and the skyline shifted—platforms rearranging like puzzle pieces as a skybridge extended, carrying them toward a distant spire. From this vantage point, the full scale of Horizon unfolded.
Far beyond the glittering city lay war-forges, massive black rings suspended over magma chasms, where abyssal titans and techno-undead legions were being constructed by necro-tech engineers. Further still stretched endless green restoration zones—forests regenerating under atmospheric towers, wild beasts roaming under watchful drones. And beyond them, shimmering seas where biomechanical leviathans stirred beneath the waves.
***
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