A shrill, whistling wind screamed across the upper sky as the golden war fleet broke apart like a scattered flock of geese.
Aboard the flagship Radiant Solar Sovereign, alarms blared through sky bronze comms tubes. high-sky signal arrays flickered wildly atop the towering two-hundred-foot main mast, flashing desperate red distress glyphs toward the Upper Realm. Yet through the open space-folding fissure, no reinforcements emerged. Only the ear-splitting, hollow rumble of the Primordial Spirit Siphon echoed through the void.
Sky Envoy Bai Ming stood near the steering dais. His hands shook so wildly that his ivory judge scepter clicked repeatedly against the golden deck grating.
“Form the royal square!” Bai Ming shouted, his high-born voice cracking with desperation. “Honor guard, raise your sun-shields! Comms officer, transmit the emergency sovereign recall glyph to the Central Court! We must purge this sky with heavenly decree!”
“My Lord!” the comms officer cried, wildly pumping spiritual essence into the mast’s base runes. “The lower relays are unresponsive! Twenty-four vessels have been dragged into the mortal dirt. The leftover captains are throwing their comms mirrors overboard to prevent tracking!”
“Unfit cowards!” Bai Ming hissed, his chest heaving under his starry white-gold silk robes. “We’re judges of the high heavens! We represent the cosmic will of the Tribulation Court! How can an immortal legion be humbled by bears with ropes and a blue ball of pond slime? Raise the mast wards to maximum! If they try to board, burn up the entire deck!”
