The elevator doors slid open with a low hum.
Outside, a line of black-clad figures stood at attention. Leading them was Uchiha Fugaku, straight as a pine, the crimson Mangekyo Sharingan gleaming cold and watchful through the gaps of his visor. Behind him, dozens of elite Uchiha Clan warriors stood in silent formation, identically dressed, eyes sharp as blades. Though they reined in their reiatsu, the pressure still clung to them like an invisible shroud. They were the most loyal of shadows, sealing the exit airtight, scanning the chaotic platform beyond the connecting bridge where artillery fire lit the darkness.
Hiroki stepped out without hesitation. "Back to the platform—move."
"Yes, sir." Fugaku's answer was low, devoid of doubt. Understanding their commander's deeper plan was unnecessary; absolute obedience was enough. That silent trust was the bond the reborn clan had forged with Hiroki. At Fugaku's signal the elite squad shifted into a new formation, a precise black gear turning around its center, and escorted Hiroki at a run toward the fiercer fighting ahead.
The closer they came, the louder the roar of explosions, tearing steel, and energy weapons grew. When they burst back onto the platform the scene snapped into focus:
The four "train group" he'd brushed past minutes earlier—Stelle, the pink-haired March 7th, the steady Dan Heng, and red-haired Himeko—were locked in combat with a titanic Doomsday Beast. Armored claws raked the air as it spat beams of annihilation; every blow shook the platform's steel skeleton. Though the four fought in perfect concert, the monster's raw power and armor made the battle desperate.
Hasn't the train arrived yet? The thought flickered through Hiroki's mind.
At that instant the starfield itself seemed to tear open. A singular cosmic train—the Stellaron Express—plunged toward the platform, unstoppable. On its roof stood a composed, bespectacled man gripping an odd staff: Welt Yang. He swung the weapon and gravitational singularities—miniature black holes—bloomed and vanished at its tip, carving a safe corridor through the chaos and smashing Antimatter Legion troopers out of the way.
Yet escape was far from easy. Two ferocious Doomsday Beast pursued, hammering the train's shield with barrage after barrage, rippling its barrier; the defenders were clearly hard-pressed.
The already vast platform was now partitioned by three separate battlefields:
On one side the four train fighters pinned down a single beast.
On the other Welt Yang's train held off two more.
Between them, the remaining Hollow soldiers churned in disarray.
"Damn, Old Yang, you just pulled the whole add wave?!" Hiroki recognized Welt and couldn't help the gamer quip—Welt's entrance had brought rescue and the next boss pack straight onto the platform.
Surveying the area carved up by three Doomsday Beasts and a Stellaron Express, Hiroki judged at once: to swing his devastating Taixu Divine Sword he first had to remove the nearest threats, or he'd never get the space to cast.
"Fugaku, Shisui!" His voice cut through the din, absolute. "Stop the two chasing the train—buy me time!"
"Yes, Lord Hiroki!" Uchiha Fugaku and Uchiha Shisui answered as one, flashing forward like twin dark bolts.
"Bankai—Mangekyo Sharingan!" they roared in near-perfect sync. Scarlet light blazed in their eyes; the reborn Uchiha had merged the Mangekyo's reality-warping might with a Bankai's release, shifting most of the burden from Chakra to reiatsu.
"Susanoo!!!" x2 Two titanic half-formed giants erupted: one jet-black, one jade-green, towering over the smoke-wreathed platform.
Both men had vaulted straight to the second-stage Susanoo, the fused power of Mangekyo and Bankai. The sixty-meter avatars crashed toward the pursuing Doomsday Beasts.
Boom—crack! Fists like meteors met armored hide. The beasts howled, slashing back with claws and annihilation beams. Shockwaves tore across the deck, hurling nearby Hollows aside; the four titans fought to a momentary standstill, turning that quarter of the platform into a maelstrom of raw force.
"Whoa! So—cool—! Giant robots! I want one!" Stelle, still dueling the first beast, shouted in gleeful awe.
"Idiot! This isn't a show—focus!" March 7th snapped, reinforcing shields and loosing ice arrows.
"Those people… the odd group we saw by the elevator," Dan Heng observed, eyes narrowing as he tracked the black-clad newcomers—and the commander who seemed to hold their leash. Himeko's gaze was darker, thoughtful.
As the Stellaron Express finally smashed through the obstacles and edged alongside the platform, Welt Yang leapt down from the roof and landed squarely in the middle of the four-person train crew's battlefield. Without hesitation he swung the „Eden Star" and joined the assault on the first Doomsday Beast. Backed by this seasoned, overwhelmingly powerful Trailblazer, the previously deadlocked fight snapped; victory's scales tipped violently toward the Express.
Against the grand backdrop of three simultaneous clashes—explosions and roars interwoven—Hiroki, shielded by a living wall of elite Uchiha, ghosted along the platform's edge. They weaved past stray rounds and energy blasts until they reached an open vantage point well beyond the core shock-zones of the three battlegrounds, giving themselves precious clearance for the coming cataclysmic strike.
"Perfect spot." Hiroki planted his feet, swept his gaze across the chaotic cosmic battlefield, and inhaled as though drawing the universe's breath into his bones.
"Well then," a cocky, expectant smirk tugged at his lips, "time for me to shine."
"System, activate Taixu Divine Sword!" he ordered silently.
Only icy silence answered. A few heartbeats later a flat, faintly disdainful voice pinged in his mind: "Kindly cast the skill yourself."
"…" His grin froze; a flicker of embarrassment flitted through him.
So much for a helpful system.
He calmed his thoughts, pressed his palms together at his chest, and the vast reiryoku stored within surged, condensed, and accelerated like never before. An ancient formula that distilled the laws of heaven and earth rumbled from his lips, each syllable a pebble rippling the cosmic pond: "The Divine, utmost of transformations, named for its wondrous birth of all things, beyond shape or question…"
With every line his aura transformed. An indescribable, primordial force gathered and erupted around him, a tempest of power howling outward with him at its eye.
It was too vast, too pure, too terrifying. In an instant every combatant—two Susanoo grappling two Doomsday Beasts, the Express crew and Welt subduing another, even the Express itself ringed by the Antimatter Legion—every sentient, sensing being, beast or human, froze. Instinctual dread seized them like an invisible hand throttling mind and breath. The seething platform and nearby space sank into an eerie, absolute stillness. Every gaze—horrified, stunned, blank—snapped toward the lone figure haloed in a radiance growing blinding.
Energy peaked. "Great Void Sword Qi—Divine Essence!" he thundered; the final word rang like heavenly decree. In that heartbeat the battlefield felt sealed in amber.
No—defined by a sword. A titanic blade impossible to describe in grandeur, splendor, majesty—an ethereal weapon spanning starfields, forged of pure law, pristine energy, ineffable Divine Essence. It dwarfed the station, made distant dreadnoughts look like toys, its very existence the negation of annihilation.
The sword moved. No arc—just a simple downward cut. Silent. Traceless. Yet to every soul it felt like the loudest thunder since creation.
Light from the primordial cleaving of Yin and Yang swept across the Destruction Legion's fleet. Like an eraser across a charcoal sketch, cruisers and guns, prow to stern, dissolved into motes of nothingness.
Momentum unspent, the resplendent blade casually brushed the three Doomsday Beasts on the platform.
Their roars, struggles, mountain-sized might meant nothing. They froze, unraveled from molecules upward, and vanished with the universe's sigh.
The light faded. Only empty, unnervingly clean space and drifting motes remained, wordless testament to power beyond imagination.
Silence. Absolute silence. The platform that had thundered with war now hushed enough to hear cosmic background radiation.
At the corridor entrance stood Hiroki's group; on the platform, the Express crew and a still-catch-breath Welt were statues. Even the forewarned Uchiha stared in awe; the Express quartet gaped, minds blank.
A curious voice finally broke the hush. The silver-haired Trailblazer—Stelle—tilted her head, dreamy wonder in her wide eyes. "So… we win?"
Beside her, March 7th swallowed, equally dazed. "I… I think so?" She looked around, needing proof the beasts and warships had truly vanished.