While the two brothers were busy plotting against their tyrannical sister, the sister in question was watching them on a barely functioning video feed.
It's not surprising they didn't realize they were being watched the whole time. Their parents were the ones who came from the original Fourchan civilization. Not them—not that it would change anything.
Tiza's mother was only a child when they left their home world.
An orphan and a peasant girl with no real worth. Just like everyone else that was taken and forced to make a barely functioning colony.
If it weren't for the fact Tiza was the second wife of Lord Grinder, she never would've known about this ship in the first place.
The man had it stripped for parts and only kept it because he wanted a getaway plan. Sadly, in his negligence—and the fact that he failed to teach anyone how anything worked—the whole ship was left in disarray for years.
It was already stripped for parts in random locations to help build city walls and keep out the wildlife.
This thing hasn't been fit for interstellar travel for years.
Not enough fuel, reactor missing, hull stripped bare, wires yanked out because they were a tripping hazard.
Honestly, it was a miracle they could get the thing to move from A to B. Fortunately, there were just enough systems that worked to make the place barely livable, and miraculously, some of the cameras still worked since the wires connecting them were too high up to cause a problem.
Ironically enough, if the brothers had walked into their own cabins or never talked about any of this, they might have even achieved their goal of killing their sister.
They deserved their privacy. They weren't savages after all.
Sadly for them, their sister was all too aware of almost everything going on within their own halls.
Tiza watched the video feed sizzle on and off while she listened to their conversation.
She had a blank expression as she overheard their remarks about her and her subordinates—over half were women, and over half were forced to serve in Lord Grinder's harem.
All of them faithfully loyal to her and the oracle.
Needless to say, it made her think.
…
…
…
"Do we really need men?" she said to herself.
Well technically, physically, they were all the same. Frail and lacking muscle. And since nobody knew the history of their own people or the laws put in place, she started wondering… thinking.
Sadly, as an impulsive race, she didn't think for long. She was awfully quick to make up her mind, and so that's exactly what she did.
So she sent out a silent order stating that once all the Dragon-rank cultivators were dead, they would begin collecting the bodies. Tiza herself would perform the mass slaughter of all the men who had sided with her for years.
Of course, she needed all of their qi, so she made sure they landed on the moon after she destroyed her real enemies.
She had already spoken to John about how some of the moons had gained sentience and how they were connected to Holstein. She didn't understand how any of this was possible, but she was certainly glad that it was.
Sadly, all the files and history books were wiped out years ago, so there was no real point in looking into it now.
Either way, she had made her plans to convert her society into a matriarchy whether they wanted it or not, and after she became an Earth-Immortal, there was nothing anyone could do about it.
Thankfully they were getting closer to the moon known as Jace. An odd name for a moon, but there was no reason to think too hard about the naming sense of a stranger. An alien at that.
'Strange name from a strange person. I never did ask about his name.'
Before she could start thinking about pointless things, she heard a mangled alarm with the sound of static and a monotone alert echoing down the halls:
"WARNING… KRSKSS… HOSTILES… KRSSS…"
Before shutting off abruptly.
All of a sudden everyone felt the ship start to shake and vibrate. Tiza didn't sense any Dragon-ranks near the ship, so that must've been the ship guns firing.
"KRSSS… ONE HOSTILE ELIMINATED… KRSSS…"
Tiza heard that notification and so did everyone else. Suddenly more sounds of weapons fire went off in the ship. This time even she was worried the ship would collapse in on itself. She would be fine, but losing over a hundred loyal Grandmasters and a hundred more Masters would definitely be a real loss. For now anyway.
She had already sent a notification to her officers to apprehend her brothers and, fortunately, despite being Grandmasters, they weren't true combatants. They only cultivated to increase their lifespans.
Her loyal confidants weren't nearly as soft.
This gave her the chance to kill a few of her fellow "colleagues" herself. The moon would gather most of the qi, and she would receive the rest. Sure, it wasn't a lot, but who else could say they could do the same?
Soon Tiza walked over to the airlock and pressed the button to let her out of the ship.
…
…
…
After a grueling minute, the doors finally began to open.
Slowly.
Very slowly.
Tiza would've tried some breathing techniques to calm herself down and prevent her from bursting through the doors and going straight into battle if she could.
Sadly, the door was already open to the vastness of space, so she couldn't breathe even if she wanted to.
So she broke the door open.
...
Johns pov
John and his companions stood on Jace's surface, waiting for the big fight.
Tiza had just left the ship and landed on the moon. Six Dragon-rank individuals had already been killed, but surprisingly, more were on their way.
A few of the girls were watching the fight unfold but not all of them were interested in it.
Sixteen of them had more of a mature or peace-oriented personality. They refused to watch the fight because it went against their sensibilities. He understood where they were coming from, but he thought it was necessary.
They needed to understand how fights between high-ranking cultivators worked and how strong they really were.
Most importantly, they needed to understand how much influence technology had in a society where cultivators were the main fighters.
Who was more dangerous?
'And should I make my own world dominated by technology? Or is it too dangerous?' he asked himself.
These were all serious questions he would find out soon enough.
This fight mattered more to his future and would decide the fate of many.
Just as he was having those thoughts, he saw Tiza close in on another of her kind.
The man(?) seemed to panic a little as he avoided cannon fire while avoiding the claws of a crazed rival.
He didn't completely understand what was going on, and for a good while he assumed this whole mysterious treasure thing was just a trap made by mysterious and hostile aliens.
It made matters worse when he saw a ship firing weapons he had never even seen or heard of before, killing off both his allies and enemies alike.
At this point, he and many others were convinced that this was a trap made by alien scum. Sadly, they couldn't be more wrong.
As in the next second, Tiza flew out of the ship and struck down her first enemy with her claws. It was a quick display of force.
Her prowess was clearly superior to her foe.
Years of training and abuse from her late husband had made her immune to pain. Her skills were average, but her enemies were even less aware of the challenges of war and battle.
Since the founding of their new "civilization," no Fourchan had ever picked up a blade except a select few.
The wives of Lord Grinder had to withstand the pressure and tyranny of their late husband on a daily basis. None were allowed to be weak, and none were spared from the pain of a fully trained war veteran scarred by a lifetime of bloodshed.
So yes, her opponents died in droves.
One scaled beast fell after another. Men and women alike either fell by her claws or by cannon fire.
Of course, Tiza was not invincible. She was bleeding from several wounds and her scales had been ripped off in several locations. Yet she still wasn't done. She needed to finish this fight, and thankfully she had plenty of qi to spare.
With every kill she made she could feel her qi replenish, and her victims releasing an explosion of qi into their surroundings. It wasn't violent, but it invigorated her greatly.
She could feel her bones slowly mend back together, her wounds close up, and her mind slipping into the zone—a state where all thoughts were washed away and all she could think about was taking her enemies down in the quickest way possible.
After hours of fighting, almost a hundred Dragon-rank enemies had been slain, and she knew for a fact there were a dozen more on their homeworld. Only a dozen…
'It's done. My ascension to power is at hand. Over a hundred Dragon ranks were born only days after that bastard killed himself—and almost a hundred dead at my feet. I'm too close. I can't stop now!' she shouted in her mind with a ferocious smile plastered on her face as she stared into the heavens.
She quickly made plans to unite her people and former enemies, and the ones who defied her would quickly submit or die. Either way, death was inevitable for all cultivators that refused to stand with her.
Man, woman, or child.
Only she could be the one true god and high queen of her people. This she had decided.
'First, my brothers, then the crew.' A bold and cruel statement she just made.
Only if they denied her claim, of course.
She wasn't that senseless.
John meanwhile stood close by as he stared at Tiza. He and the others watched her, making sure to conceal their presence.
Thankfully it wasn't very hard.
Just as he was about to speak to Tiza and congratulate her, he received several new notifications.