Chapter 866: Selene: No One Understands Publicity Better Than Me

"She is a good girl. Though not my biological daughter, I raised her, nurtured her, and loved her as if she were my own."

"Then where is she? Where is Gamora?!"

In the depths of space, the infamous Mad Titan Thanos sat upon his Void Throne clad in golden armor. He sat there in silence, ignoring the burning deep space and thunderous bombardment beyond the shield field, looking down at the half-blooded Earth human who had boarded the Sanctuary II flagship amid the chaos and sought him out.

His son-in-law.

Half of one.

"Gamora... my Gamora..."

Leaning back against the throne, his massive chin ridged with vertical grooves tilted upward as he murmured softly, as if recalling something. A trace of sorrow lingered in his heavy voice—an emotion the legendary Mad Titan was not supposed to possess, yet it undeniably existed for a fleeting moment.

But only for a moment.

"She is dead."

Thanos lowered his head and regarded the half-human boy standing at the foot of the throne steps with the authority unique to those who wield power. His tone was casual, almost indifferent.

The chill in the air seemed to deepen instantly.

"I killed her. It was a necessary step. I made the hardest choice..."

His deep, resonant voice echoed through the throne hall, stating the fact without joy or sorrow.

...

Star-Lord Peter Quill’s eyes reddened at once. His face turned pale as fury ignited within his chest. His fists clenched so tightly his bones cracked, and he roared through gritted teeth, the sound torn from his throat.

"Thanos!"

"Wasn’t Gamora your daughter?!"

With a furious shout, the rocket thrusters beneath his boots flared to maximum output. Like a bullet leaving the chamber, he drew his energy blade and element guns and charged straight toward Thanos on the throne.

Thud!

Crack.

With a casual snap of his fingers, Thanos shattered the element gun’s beam, then broke the energy blade in half. In less than half a second, the golden-armored Titan dislocated Star-Lord’s arm and seized his head in one hand. A slight twist of his wrist crushed the man’s open-faced nano-helmet, exposing a face flushed red from suffocation.

Thanos examined the brown-haired, lightly curled-haired human.

"I understand this feeling, boy. Better than anyone. That day, I lost more than you could ever imagine."

He lifted Star-Lord by the head as though holding up a chick. He did not crush the interstellar thief’s skull. Instead, he spoke with an almost tender tone.

"Peter Quill, forget all of this."

Unlike certain individuals who delighted in eradicating problems at the root, presenting one face publicly and another privately while treating morality as flexible, what the world did not know was that Thanos was a Titan of ideals, ambition, and principles.

He was simply too mad.

Thanos had long since discovered the Guardians of the Galaxy’s movements. It was he who had pretended not to notice, restraining his elite guards from shooting them down or arresting them, leaving the path nearly wide open so they could reach the flagship’s throne hall.

Because he wanted to see for himself what kind of man his daughter loved.

As for his taste in men, that was another matter.

But now he had seen.

"Cherish it. This is Gamora’s final gift of love to you."

He tossed Star-Lord to the ground, rose from his seat, and with controlled force kicked him down the throne steps, sending him crashing into his ragtag teammates.

Guardians of the Galaxy?

He did not recognize them.

Aside from Gamora and Star-Lord, the rest were no more than weeds in his eyes. He did not even spare them a glance. When he had sacrificed Gamora to obtain the Soul Stone, her final request had been that he not kill Star-Lord, nor target her companions...

Thanos chose to honor that promise.

As for whether, after snapping his fingers and erasing half of all life at complete random, this bargain-bin son-in-law of his might also be wiped away—that was not within his consideration.

That was another matter entirely.

"I’ll kill you! I’ll kill you, Thanos! I—mmph!"

Rage and despair churned violently within Star-Lord.

Unfortunately, Ebony Maw, who had long been waiting at the side, twisted a steel bar through telekinesis and sealed his mouth shut. A golden-armored guard of the Black Order stepped forward and cast a powerful sleep spell.

"Interesting toys. Their equipment... it was gifted by those people, wasn’t it?"

Picking up the heavy pistol Rocket had dropped—a weapon engraved with crimson patterns and glowing with scarlet energy—Thanos used the Space Stone’s power to relocate the detonation point of a miniature black hole grenade outside the ship.

He glanced toward the corpses of several Chitauri and Sakaaran guards lying curled on the floor.

They had been struck by high-temperature energy weapons.

The gray-bronze metal armor of their masks and breastplates had warped into rippling craters, like melted wax that had suddenly solidified mid-flow.

"Eternity... grants eternity only to the few, dividing all things into ranks. Only Death loves all life equally, without distinction."

He spoke suddenly, immersed in his own revelation.

He studied the finely crafted weapon in his hand. Compared to the crude organic soldiers under his command, every aspect of the Divine Empress Order carried an air of refinement over quantity.

With his hands clasped behind his back, he gazed toward the starfield roiling with war.

Though the Divine Empress Order fleet was small in number, each vessel was a core-class star destroyer—colossal steel constructs of unimaginable scale standing amid the Black Order’s assault like towering bulwarks against a black tidal wave.

Those immense warships swept across the celestial expanse filled by the Black Order fleet as though harvesting crops, moving as if through empty space.

Meanwhile, Thanos’ offensive—composed of countless small, numerous, diverse formations and vessels—resembled a massive net woven from innumerable ants, layer upon layer of such nets forming a surging tsunami.

Boom—

Another thunderous explosion shook the void. The curtain of space rippled violently as a Chitauri X-shaped mothership was blasted into fragments. Continuous shockwaves flared, and interwoven crimson lance beams sliced through a Caldari fleet formation brought by Thanos as effortlessly as a hot knife through butter, cutting it cleanly in half.

Yet in the next instant, more Caldari, Chitauri, Sakaarans... the slaughtering and plundering races who chose to follow Thanos—or more bluntly, mass-produced giant bio-weapon ships—surged forward to fill the gap.

This was the battle he had long anticipated and yearned for.

If Thanos regarded the races whose populations he had halved with a twisted sense of mercy and salvation...

Then now, with the apostle of Eternity so close at hand, and with both sides employing entirely different styles of warfare, believing he had witnessed a battle aligned with his ideals, Thanos felt only a profound sense of mission.

Eternity—immortality, foreverness, permanence—is the ultimate aspiration of all rational beings toward life and the universe. Yet in reality, such a nebulous concept is absurd to most.

It remains lofty and untouchable, bestowing favor upon only a rare few geniuses.

Only Death—

She loves all beings equally.

"I will claim victory!"

Thanos’ gaze burned as if a blazing fire raged within his eyes.

"I will let Death reign over the universe, bring an end to the collapse born of unjust favoritism, and prevent new tragedies from arising. I will allow the newborn universe to flourish once more. The children yet to be born will rightfully grow beneath the same clear sky."

His emotions surged higher and higher, his movements growing more intense. He raised his left arm clad in the gleaming Infinity Gauntlet. Purple (Power), blue (Space), red (Reality), and orange (Soul) halos revolved around it, and the entire throne hall trembled with his declaration.

"I can feel you. You are there." With the brief episode involving his bargain-bin son-in-law concluded, Thanos turned his gaze toward the central position of the Divine Empress Order fleet formation.

It was precisely the moment of their formation rotation. Thanos keenly seized upon the fleeting weakness within that complex, layered defensive field array.

Bzzzz—

Unbreakable conviction condensed into an unparalleled violet radiance. Wielding the authority of the Power Stone through the Infinity Gauntlet, a vast stellar-annihilating sphere of energy gathered in an instant.

Boom!

From the open-air throne atop the Black Order flagship Sanctuary II, a colossal beam more than a thousand meters wide tore through the veil of the universe, grazing the darkness as it surged toward the Divine Empress Order fleet.

Dazzling beyond compare.

Though only a kilometer across, the beam seemed in that instant to suppress all other movements across the astronomical scale of the interstellar battlefield. Beneath this lethal brilliance capable of incinerating all things, everything along its path was reduced to ash.

At the moment of impact, violet gaseous flames engulfed the 117th Fleet’s formation shields like a red-hot glass sphere thrust into a furnace. Under the searing assault, the layered ripples of overlapping energy shields fractured into mottled, irregular web-like cracks.

As if struck by an invisible titanic fist, the pouring force compressed relentlessly. The void shields began to overload and warp.

Thanos bared his teeth in a grin as he watched. His left hand clenched—Bzz!—and the blue glow symbolizing Space began to flicker upon the Infinity Gauntlet.

Crack!

With a brittle snap, one Imperial warship after another saw its void shield collapse. Violet gaseous flames lashed onto the nearest Gothic and Baroque-styled vessel, climbing across its upper citadels and battlements. The burning purple patterns crept steadily toward the hull armor.

Within moments—Boom!—the ship’s magazine detonated. Shattered armor plates, along with the screaming crew clinging to them, were hurled into space. Thanos could almost foresee the final disintegration of the warship stretching over a dozen kilometers in length.

The revelry of the Black Order began. Countless Outriders howled and chanted aboard their various interstellar vehicles and bio-ships, shouting Thanos’ name in their own crude tongues.

Yet just as the violet flames of destruction were about to swell further, a gentle, tranquil emerald radiance flared to life.

One vessel after another—whose void shields had collapsed due to spatial distortion, whose energy shields had shattered, whose hull armor had begun to dissolve under the creeping violet patterns—now shimmered with dazzling green light.

The disintegrating adamantium composite armor began to restore itself. Crew members flung into space, even soldiers half-consumed by the blazing energy sphere with one side of their bodies reduced to ash, began to regenerate—reforming along with fragments of metal and rejoining the vessel’s structure...

As though time itself were flowing backward.

"The Time Stone."

Thanos snorted coldly, his deep voice articulating the essence of that power.

"So you reveal yourself at last, Apostle of Eternity." His pupils constricted involuntarily as he fixed his gaze upon the towering figure rising from within the strange temporal reversal field.

Like a god ablaze in golden flames, as vast eagle wings unfurled to blot out the sky, the repulsive force they expelled effortlessly tore apart Black Order craft one after another.

Thousands upon thousands of branching, serpent-headed energy tendrils extended behind her in hues of violet and gold, emitting a soft glow. They arranged themselves in ordered formation, encircling her body and brewing an alluring, radiant splendor.

Sacred. Majestic.

Yet for those of the Black Order who had pressed their advantage and charged toward the colossal being’s very face, sacredness was a cruel joke. Those luminous wings of holiness were executioners, pouring forth an incomparable torrent of light that drowned them entirely.

Splash...

After dispersing and annihilating the irritating "ants" surrounding her, Selene turned her head. While signaling Master Chief John to prepare for withdrawal, she gazed across the astronomical distance of the battlefield at Thanos.

This was the first time she had seen him in reality.

Mm. His chin really did look like a wrinkled purple sweet potato.

Oh? Star-Lord and the others were still alive?

Sensing their faint life signatures near Thanos’ flagship, Selene smiled faintly.

What a merciful father-in-law.

"Thanos, Apostle of Death?"

In response to the title he had given her, Selene returned the courtesy by addressing him thus.

Her voice was like the stillness of night—soft, yet spreading through the vacuum, clearly audible as it carried across the entire battlefield, imposing an overwhelming pressure upon all who heard it.

"Ha..."

Within the throne hall, Selene’s call left Thanos refreshed and invigorated, even suppressing the lingering melancholy stirred by Star-Lord’s devotion to Gamora.

It was rare indeed for him to encounter an apostle of a primordial creator deity active within the real universe.

The Silver Surfer of Galactus did not count.

After all, his own title as Apostle of Death was more a case of unrequited devotion—a self-proclaimed boast. He had never truly been acknowledged by Death. At best, he was a believer. A devout believer. One capable of perceiving the Goddess of Death.

But now—being addressed so by Eternity’s apostle—did it not imply recognition?

Never one to concede to anyone in his life, Thanos immediately activated the Reality Stone upon the Infinity Gauntlet, projecting his form at a scale no less imposing than Selene’s.

At that moment, a tableau unfolded across the now-silent sector of space—light and darkness facing one another, one peerless in brilliance, the other hideous and terrifying.

The scene caused Selene to arch a brow unconsciously.

Wasn’t this like being handed a pillow just as sleep arrived?

Did it not resemble the armies of justice and evil locked in standoff?

After a brief moment of thought, Selene connected through the internal spiritual circuitry of her Servants to Master Chief John, signaling him to activate the live broadcast immediately.

This was an excellent opportunity.

An opportunity to win over—cough—potential allies.

All that time she had spent carefully wrapping herself in the golden "Power of the Sentry" visual effects instead of wielding Chaos Magic or the Phoenix Force outright—even packaging the demonic aspect of her Beast Goddess body—would not be wasted.

Selene cast a glance from the corner of her eye beyond the battlefield.

They had finally arrived...

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