Chapter 376: Thunderous Behemoth! Entropic Energy! Escape at the Brink!
"We still have our teleporters. If it really comes down to it, we can get out of here."
Paul patted the Master Chief's shoulder as he spoke.
Every member of the Universal Megacorp expedition team carried a personal teleporter. If it came to the worst, they could all escape safely at the last second.
But the same couldn't be said for the survivors.
"Alright, just keep an eye on the time." Seeing that Paul had made up his mind, the Master Chief said no more. He walked over to the utterly exhausted Payne.
Before Payne could react, the Chief hoisted him up and, under cover from Din Djarin, picked up the pace toward the extraction point.
Seeing someone leave first, the remaining survivors grew anxious and uneasy. There weren't many people protecting them to begin with—and now two were gone.
Driven by the fear of unequal treatment rather than scarcity, the survivors all turned to Paul with worried, pleading eyes, afraid they would be the ones left behind.
They were just ordinary, frail people. If abandoned on this planet, their fate would be certain death.
Paul could clearly see their fear. He quickly stepped in to reassure them:
"Don't worry—those two have another task and need to go ahead of us. The rest of us will stay and escort everyone to safety."
"You have three more minutes to rest. After that, whether you can still run or not, you'll have to push through."
"Anyone with strength left, help those who are older, injured, or weak. Do your best not to leave Anyone behind."
Hearing Paul's words, the survivors relaxed slightly. They took deep breaths and pulled out energy-packed candies and snacks to quickly recover their strength.
This was their only hope of survival. Everyone was doing whatever it took to hold out until the end.
Watching the glimmer of hope return to their eyes, Paul couldn't help but feel a pang of guilt. The expedition team had Universal Megacorp's teleporters. They could instantly return to the Hyperion and leave.
But these civilians had no such luxury. They'd already been abandoned once by the Terran Federation. If they were cast aside again, how cruel would that be?
"Paul, you've already done everything you could. Even if this ends in failure, at least we tried."
Chani could tell what Paul was thinking. She could feel the deep compassion in his heart. She squeezed his hand in support.
If it were her, this was as far as she could go, too. Whether they could save the survivors now was in fate's hands.
"I'll do a sweep and check if any bugs are catching up."
With that, Panam shouldered his hardlight sniper and moved to the rear of the group.
Although the Protoss cleansing beams had unleashed devastating destruction earlier, the resulting molten glass and widespread energy had wiped out many Zerg in the process.
For now, Paul's team faced far less pressure from Zerg ground attacks than before. Their only remaining threat was the Protoss fleet looming in low orbit.
Perhaps the Zerg had prioritized the Golden Armada as their main target. After failing to eliminate Paul's group, they gave up and stopped wasting forces to chase them.
After all, if the Protoss decided to rain down more purifying beams, no one was going to make it out.
Following a few minutes of rest, the survivors finally regained some stamina. But by now, the Golden Armada had descended dangerously close to the planet.
It wouldn't be long before the Protoss' purification cannon entered its final charging phase—just waiting for Selendis to give the order.
At that moment, Panam returned from his patrol and reported, "Another batch of Zerg is incoming. Looks like those bastards still aren't giving up."
Apparently unable to stop the Golden Armada, the Zerg had redirected their hatred at Paul's team—hoping to drag someone down with them.
"Move out!"
At Paul's command, the group began running once more. The Zerg pursued relentlessly from behind. To cover the retreat, Paul and Luke threw themselves into battle with everything they had.
Terran Federation soldiers and local militia also coordinated with the expedition's defense, opening fire with their C-14 Impaler Gauss Rifles.
These weapons, firing depleted uranium rounds, packed enough punch to pierce even the thick shells of Roaches—making them standard anti-Zerg equipment.
But as they advanced toward the extraction point, a low rumble suddenly shook the ground.
A massive beast burst from beneath the earth, rising like a mountain before Paul's group.
It was a Ultralisk—towering 30 meters high, weighing nearly 60 tons. Its back was armored with thick, chitinous plating, and it wielded two monomolecular scythe-like appendages.
Among Zerg ground units, Ultralisks were undoubtedly elite—its hulking frame making it one of the most distinct and feared creatures on the battlefield.
Beyond its formidable armor, its twin bone-like scythes functioned as living battering rams, perfectly designed to breach human fortifications and shred defensive lines.
Emerging from the earth, the Ultralisk immediately locked onto its prey. With a roar, it charged at the survivors, limbs pounding the ground like falling meteorites.
As it drew near, the earth trembled under its steps. The survivors went pale with terror—no one dared run anymore.
The Federation troops opened fire en masse, but the depleted uranium rounds, usually unstoppable, failed to penetrate the beast's armor.
The impacts sparked and clanged, but didn't break through. Their firepower wasn't enough.
Someone brought out a rocket launcher. The missile struck the beast's massive head, erupting into a ball of flame.
When the smoke cleared, all they saw was a shallow dent in the Ultralisk's armor. It wasn't even staggered—just mildly annoyed before resuming its charge.
"This thing should go a round with our Buttcrack Beast—I bet Axehead would love a brawl with it."
Panam winced. He figured this monster might even make a good transport hauler—if it could be tamed.
"Quit joking, Panam! This isn't the time for beast-wrangling!" Chani aimed her hardlight sniper at the Ultralisk, but even that energy weapon barely left a mark.
Their guns were good for taking down Roaches—but they were woefully inadequate against an Ultralisk.
In truth, the creature's chitin armor was reinforced with minerals unique to the Koprulu sector. Mixed with psionically bound carbon, its molecular structure formed diamond-like carbon bonds.
This made the armor especially dense—nearly impervious to human artillery. As a living Zerg tank, the Ultralisk was a nightmare.
In desperation, Luke Skywalker dashed beneath the beast, attempting to sever its legs with his lightsaber.
While the blade could slice into the chitin, it barely left scratches on such a massive creature. His attacks were like acupuncture—far from fatal.
Even though Luke slashed and stabbed with everything he had, the monster's limbs were as thick as ancient trees. His lightsaber felt like a toothpick.
"What is this thing?!"
Luke's lightsaber carved grooves in the outer shell, nicking internal organs—but he couldn't sever any limbs.
Then, with a roar of pain, the Ultralisk raised its foreleg and brought it crashing down toward Luke. Its shadow alone engulfed him completely.
BOOM!
A thunderous crash shook the land. The Ultralisk's foot left a deep crater.
If Luke hadn't moved in time, he would've been reduced to paste.
"This isn't like the other Zerg. Blades and guns won't cut it!"
Luke retreated quickly, reporting through the comms.
The Ultralisk, charging at full speed, was an unstoppable force. Not even Protoss energy barriers could halt its rampage.
Paul's only option now was to scatter the survivors—if they stayed clustered, the Ultralisk could mow them down in one blow with those dual scythes.
But spreading out also meant exposing them to other Zerg units, like Zerglings.
Even so, the Ultralisk barreled forward, gaining speed. Panam fired another hardlight round—this time only managing to chip off a horn from its head.
Still not enough to stop it.
Paul launched a Hunter's Spear, aiming for the creature's brain—hoping to liquefy its neural core.
But he soon realized: the Ultralisk was packed with redundant organs.
Every vital part had backups. If one was destroyed, another would immediately take over.
Its whole body was a network of fail-safes.
Paul, Luke, and the others were left speechless.
"What the hell is this monster…"
Panam was on the verge of despair. He'd thought that once the Ultralisk's external armor was broken, he could destroy its internal organs through the weak points.
But he hadn't expected the Zerg to have such a trick up their sleeve—redundant organs lying in wait. This level of resilience was unlike anything Universal Megacorp had encountered before.
Back at the Myriad Realm Base, the terrifying durability of the Ultralisk triggered an uproar among the upper ranks.
The number and strength of Zerg units had far surpassed expectations. Conventional firepower simply wasn't effective!
For a beast of this scale, a clean kill was almost impossible. Only absolute firepower could wipe it out completely.
At this moment, it was already too late for Paul to rely on throwing more Hunter's Spears and destroying those extra organs one by one.
The Ultralisk's massive frame loomed directly in front of them. It raised its terrifying dual monomolecular scythes and brought them crashing down on the helpless, terrified survivors.
But just as the scythes were about to land—poised to turn the exhausted and terrified civilians into pulp—a pitch-black figure flashed in between, taking the full brunt of the attack!
> "This is seriously getting annoying. Watching you people struggle like this will only end up dragging me down."
Megatronus, standing tall beneath the scythes, stopped the Ultralisk's full-force strike with a single hand. He turned and shot a cold, contemptuous glance at the survivors behind him.
As black energy surged around his hand, the towering Ultralisk's body suddenly began to lift off the ground, completely out of its own control.
Even though it thrashed violently, trying to resist the invisible force, it was useless.
With a sudden flex, Megatronus crushed one of its scythe limbs in his grasp.
The Ultralisk spun several times in midair before crashing to the ground, smashing through a horde of lesser Zerg and kicking up a cloud of dust on impact.
Paul was just about to move in and finish it off—when the Ultralisk's body suddenly erupted in black flame.
That was entropic energy, conjured by Megatronus. The beast's biological structure began to corrode, melt, and fade away into nothingness—consumed by entropy.
> "That's it?"
Luke stared, dumbfounded, at the sinister-looking Transformer. If this guy had acted earlier, they wouldn't have had to exhaust themselves fighting the Zerg in the first place.
With the Ultralisk completely, irreversibly dead, the survivors finally allowed themselves to breathe. Their taut nerves and trembling muscles relaxed at last, though they had no energy left to even cheer.
Paul looked up at Megatronus, speaking from the heart.
> "Thank you, Megatronus."
> "Save it. If we keep dragging our feet, everyone here is going to die."
Megatronus looked up toward the sky. The Protoss Golden Armada had entered low orbit. The Sanctum-class purifier ship, The Purifier, had begun its final charging sequence.
The countdown to planetary annihilation had entered its final 10 minutes.
Just as Paul was wracking his brain to figure out how to evacuate the now-exhausted survivors, a series of explosions rang out from behind the Zerg swarm.
It was the Universal Megacorp flagship's assault team—a detachment of mechs and Transformers had landed at the perfect moment to help extract the survivors.
With a wave of heavy bombardment, the assault ships carved open a path through the Zerg. At the front, Commander William Cage shouted without delay:
> "Get in—we don't have time!"
The arriving Autobots and Decepticons quickly shifted into vehicle form, picking up the survivors and speeding toward the dropships and assault vessels.
With this unexpected reinforcement, Paul no longer needed to stay behind to provide cover.
He boarded William Cage's gunship, letting out a long, heavy breath.
> "One more minute and we would've been dead!"
Cage grinned. It was thanks to the Protoss and Paul's team holding the line that they'd even made it here.
Without the Protoss' intervention, the assault team might never have landed. The skies had been crawling with Overseers, Banelings, and Mutalisks. Reaching the extraction point was almost impossible.
In a way, the Protoss inadvertently helped Universal Megacorp.
> "Paul, you really put on a show back at the Myriad Realm Base. You're definitely moving up after this!"
The more William Cage looked at him, the more Paul reminded him of V and David—men who always took on the hardest missions.
Exceptional talent and ridiculous luck—guys like that always rose to the top.
With support from the expeditionary forces, the survivors were quickly airlifted away from the doomed planet.
At that same moment, with the Golden Armada bearing down, the Zerg launched a final suicidal charge.
Swarms of Mutalisks soared through the sky, rising alongside Universal Megacorp's vessels, racing into orbit.
To Paul's surprise, none of the Mutalisks attacked the dropships—a clear sign that the Zerg were fully focused on the Protoss and had no energy to waste on anything else.
Moments later, the Purifier completed its charging sequence and began firing on the planet's surface.
A blinding blue-white beam burst from its main cannon like a pillar of divine radiance.
But this wasn't a gentle, merciful light.
This was absolute annihilation.
Where the beam struck, the land split open in concentric waves, the crust shattered, and entire swathes of terrain caved in.
Countless Zerg were obliterated on impact. Even the mighty Ultralisks were instantly vaporized by the energy surge.
The ground collapsed, swallowing creep and Zerg alike, while oceans boiled from the beam's heat.
Gale-force winds carried scalding air across the battlefield, peeling flesh and carapace from Zerg bodies, revealing raw, red muscle beneath.
Thankfully, the assault ships carrying Paul and the others had already reached low orbit—just outside the blast radius.
As soon as they broke through the atmosphere, the ships engaged stealth mode, and with Mutalisks acting as unintentional cover, Paul's group slipped away right under Protoss noses.
From the viewing window, Paul watched as everything below was burned into a hellish wasteland.
Rivers of molten glass flowed across the surface. Dense black smoke rose with shimmering blue ripples, like the tormented souls of a billion Zerg.
Through the haze, Paul could feel the life force of the planet draining away.
The Purifier's beam was killing not just the Zerg—but the entire ancient planet, whose ecosystems had evolved over billions of years.
But Paul didn't flinch. He'd seen it all before. Mass-scale planetary purges were nothing new.
Instead, he simply observed the timing—estimating how long it would take the Protoss to fully destroy a planet.
From his calculations, the entire "purification" process would take under 20 minutes. Possibly less than half an hour.
In terms of exterminating surface life? The initial blast took only seconds. The rest was just to glass the planet completely.
As the survivors aboard the dropships watched their homeworld die beneath them, cold sweat ran down their backs.
They had escaped by a hair's breadth.
Their homeland—where many had lived all their lives—was now covered in thick black smoke. Crimson rivers of molten glass traced across the planet like bloodshot veins in a dying eye.
From orbit, the planet resembled a crimson-streaked eyeball staring into the void.
In that moment, cries of sorrow filled the dropships.
Tears of both relief and grief streamed down the survivors' faces.
They had narrowly escaped death—but had lost everything in the process: family, friends, homes.
Luke Skywalker understood all too well.
He had seen his own home, Tatooine, destroyed by an Imperial superweapon.
If it hadn't been for Universal Megacorp's help, he and Uncle Owen might have died that day.
Soon after the planetary purge was complete, the Golden Armada left orbit without delay.
This was just one of countless planets they had "cleansed." It held no further value for them.
The once-bountiful colony was now scorched and lifeless, reduced to a dead world unfit for any form of life.
---
Back at Myriad Realm Base, swarms of Universal Megacorp analysts fed the entire battle into AI processors, breaking down every second of footage and combat data.
The AI, Loki, compiled its findings and presented them to Li Ang :
> Protoss Fleet Rating: Top-Tier S-Class
In terms of conventional spacefaring naval power, Universal Megacorp and the Protoss weren't too far apart.
But under the assumption that no law-level weapons were used, and only conventional firepower was involved, any full-scale war between the two would result in massive casualties.
And that was a price Li Ang couldn't afford.
After all, he had calculated every inch of the war budget to preserve resources and manpower, to maintain order across the unified universe.
Rebellions, suppression, and deterrence were already expensive enough.
A large-scale war with the Protoss in the StarCraft Universe would set Universal Megacorp back at least 10 years just to recover.
And that was not Li Ang's vision of efficient unification.
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