B7 Star Sector.

No one had expected it.

A surge of abyssal creatures had crawled from a fissure torn into space itself, and by sheer misfortune, collided head-on with a Celestial unit that had been out on a routine mission.

By the time nearby planets picked up on the terrifying spike in energy readings and scrambled to send reinforcements, the situation had already spiralled beyond control.

Countless starships hovered at the edges of the battle zone, but even brushing against the shockwaves unleashed by the two forces sent their systems screaming with high-level threat warnings—so shrill, it was as if even the AI onboard had learned how to fear.

Flashes of light flared across the void. Severed limbs and shredded torsos of alien creatures drifted amid the wreckage, their rancid blood splattering into the stars. The scene painted a canvas of carnage—hell, smeared across the galaxy.

—They realized, with grim finality, that this was a battle they could never be part of.

Every cockpit fell into a silence so heavy it echoed. Cold sweat trickled down brows. Throats tightened.

“…Are they even monsters anymore?”

And then—a flash of white streaked past the glass.

A breathtaking figure tore through their field of vision.
Its every strand of hair glowed with immaculate purity. Wings of pale light unfurled behind its back, gleaming like a dream.

It made you want to fall to your knees.
To beg for mercy.
To believe that maybe, just maybe, your suffering could end if only this being willed it.

But then you met its eyes—those cold, inorganic eyes.

And everything shattered.

This was a Celestial.

A race known as much for their beauty as for their brutality.
They were machines, designed not for empathy, but for war.
They did not hesitate. They did not question. They executed orders with perfect precision—
As one did now.

The Celestial passed overhead—damaged, blood-slicked—and without a flicker of expression, dove back into the heart of the battlefield.
In one ruthless sweep, it carved a vacuum through the alien horde.

Then it left, flying toward its next assignment.
Tireless. Joyless. Pitiless.

Those watching from their ships were frozen, breathless.

“They say the Celestials lost the ability to feel emotions ten thousand years ago. That’s why most don’t even consider them alive.”

“They’re more like linked processors—flawless, compartmentalized. To them, the universe is code. And we? Our enemies? Even themselves? Just lines in a data stream. Delete, if needed.”

Someone went pale.

“Then… living in a starfield governed by them—is that a blessing or a curse?”

“Ha.” A dry, crooked smile. “If you’d seen what it was like before they unified this region—
when every planet lived in fear of becoming the next warzone—
you’d know just how lucky we really are.”

The battle dragged on, blood and flame grinding together—
until something changed.

Suddenly, the Celestials on the field shifted formation.
All of them began converging on a single point.

A grizzled veteran in one of the command decks paled.
Something in his memory stirred—
a scene he’d tried for decades to forget.
And he screamed.

“No—! They’re using Open Heaven!
Full retreat! Evacuate all forces—broadcast evacuation orders to the entire star sector!”

Open Heaven.

A catastrophic joint attack only possible when multiple Celestials combined forces.
A single beam of light, capable of erasing anything in its path.
A divine strike. A planet-breaker.

The Celestials’ wings glowed bright with charging energy. The air—or what passed for it in space—quivered with something ancient, and terrifying.

The loading bar reached its end.

And the universe remembered what it feared.

---

Back on Baihe Star, the festival had reached its climax.

The god stand-in released his arrow, the string snapping with a sharp, satisfying hum. The arrow soared upward—
And all at once, fireworks bloomed across the sky, painting the heavens in bursts of color.

Boom, boom—
Each explosion echoed with the cheers of thousands, sweeping the city into wave after wave of roaring celebration.

Even the sky seemed to glow with the people’s joy.

No.
It didn’t just seem like it.

The only person who knew the truth—stood on a cliff high above it all.
And he was watching another arrow.

A real one.
Not made of wood and prop, but of light.

Forged by the sun god himself.

Xia Ze stared. He had heard it—a crackling, shattering sound, like glass under pressure.
Hairline fractures had splintered the air.
Thin rifts had opened in the fabric of space, revealing glimpses of stars and galaxies beyond.

The planet had cried out beneath the weight of it.

—Until the god showed mercy.

The golden figure only needed to lower his gaze.

And the arrow, thrumming with celestial power, paused—
then stilled.
Its blinding light collapsed inward, power reined in by divine will.

It soared into the sky like a comet—
A myth, passing briefly through the world of mortals.
Ancient, brilliant, and gone.

Even with fireworks flooding the heavens, some still saw it.
Or almost did.

Their expressions never caught up to their awe.
By the time they tried to react, the miracle had vanished from view—
a godly act never meant for mortal eyes.

They stood frozen, mouths half-open, heads tilted skyward—

And looked, without realizing it, slightly ridiculous.

A nearby companion, still blissfully unaware, blinked and asked, “What are you staring at?”

“I… I don’t even know what that was…” The other replied in a daze, glancing toward the stage—where the sun god stand-in still held the same bow. That long, trembling weapon caught his gaze like a jolt of lightning. It surged through his mind and tumbled out of his mouth before he could stop it:

“Ah. Maybe that… was the sun god’s ‘star-shattering shot.’”

The miracle had been too brief, too unreal. Later—when the scattered few who’d caught a glimpse of it began to share their stories—only then might they truly realize:
It wasn’t a dream.
It wasn’t illusion.
It was a myth brushing against reality—and then vanishing before they could reach it.

Elsewhere, Hexin still stood atop the cliff. He could sense that the arrow had already pierced beyond Baihe Star’s atmosphere, and he blinked, just a little sheepish.

Because… he might’ve overdone it.

It was his first time shooting a true solar arrow—one born of divine power—and judging the force… wasn’t easy.
Worse, he’d instinctively kicked in his full acting mode while striking the pose—passion, drive, emotion and all. The moment was just too good.

The result?

The arrow, fueled by all the sun god’s anticipation, turned out to be a sentient, overachieving divine weapon that absolutely understood the assignment.

“I’m going to destroy everything.”

Hexin: …?

There was no stopping it now.
The arrow wasn’t interested in some mere abyssal creature.
It wanted more.

And as it streaked toward the B7 star sector—faster than even Sun City itself—it didn’t find its original target first.

Instead, it met something else.

A beam of light.
Cold, bright, apocalyptic.

—Open Heaven.
The most devastating combined technique of the Celestials.

Oddly, the two forces felt… similar.
Perhaps made from the same cosmic thread.

But where the arrow burned like a blazing sun, the beam felt like it came from the void between stars—icy, surgical, pure annihilation.

And it was headed straight toward Baihe Star.

The arrow, loyal and prideful, decided its beloved master deserved better than some leftover god-race fireworks show.

So it opened its mouth—and ate the beam.

In other words, it absorbed it.
And in doing so, the blinding light that once masked it vanished.

Now the arrow stood alone, undisguised, unshrouded—
The brightest thing in the universe.

“…What is that?”

The question came a heartbeat too late.

For a second, silence ruled. Then the feed snapped to life again—
The crews on board scrambled to review their starship recordings, slowing down the footage frame by frame.

And there, clear as day:
The arrow, sheathed in golden light, had erased the Celestials’ most powerful combined strike.

With a single clash.

“That… can’t be real.”
“Maybe the beam misfired. Maybe it wasn’t even at full power—”

That excuse died on their lips the moment they glanced at the performance readout.
The data confirmed it—the beam had been full-strength. Lethal.
Exactly what you’d expect from a race of god-crafted war machines.

Which made the truth even harder to swallow.

What was that thing? An arrow? In the interstellar age? That should’ve been laughable—primitive. Obsolete.

But no one was laughing.

“Maybe it’s not really an arrow—maybe it’s a creature in disguise? A shapeshifter?”

“But we couldn’t detect any life signs. Nothing. Not even a heartbeat.”

“So you’re saying it really was just a weapon? But what kind of being could possibly wield something like that? Just one shot—one arrow—and it rivaled a godmade race in power?!”

The conversation stalled.

They looked at one another—
And saw the same truth dawning across each face.

None of them wanted to say it.
None of them dared to say it.
But their bodies betrayed them—
Trembling.
Breath caught.
Hearts racing.

Panic, awe, disbelief, reverence, exhilaration…
A thousand tangled emotions, too loud to separate, too vast to contain.

—There was only one being in the universe capable of such a thing.

—The one who had created and once ruled over the Celestials themselves.

The eternal wielder of the sun’s power—

…the god.

With this shared realization, all eyes turned once more to the battlefield.
Forgive them, please—for being soldiers who’d dared to space out mid-crisis.

But what they saw made their breath catch all over again.

The battle… was nearly over.

No, it wasn’t even a battle anymore.
It was a cleansing.

The arrow, like a broom sweeping through stardust, glided through the alien horde—effortless, majestic.
The creatures weren’t just destroyed; they were erased from existence.
Not even ash remained.

And then they noticed something else—
At the centre of the battlefield, the Celestials hovered, motionless.

Frozen in place. Watching.

And at last, they understood.

All their guesses, all their theories—useless.

If they’d wanted to know the truth, they only had to look at the ones who knew that god best.

His creations.

So what were they doing now?

Ah—
They were crying.

Emotionless machines, unmoved for ten thousand years…

had tears in their eyes.