The space around them rippled with silence.
No sound, no scent, no sky.
Only the light—soft, radiant, and stretching from their bodies in five different hues. Li Wei stood in the center, his Diendriver held at his side but forgotten. Zhu Zhuqing, Ning Rongrong, Xiao Wu, and Meng Yiran formed the points of a circle around him. The energy flowing from them wasn't like spirit power or soul pressure. It was a threads of light—woven, alive, and resonating among them quietly.
Each thread reached toward the center, entangling with the others, forming a luminous loom of colors: crimson, violet, deep green, silver, and golden-blue.
The ground beneath their feet seemed to vanish, replaced by a transparent mesh of light and echoing memory. They stood not in the Unknown Cavern anymore, but in a pocket of something greater—an echo of the Axis itself.
And as each of the threads fully connected, the loom reacted.
A shape began to form above them, massive and glowing, pieced together from the flow of their harmonized light.
It seems like that was humanoid—but only barely. Towering like a statue, its limbs were sharp and angular, wings of overlapping plates extended from its back, and its chest held a blazing knot of pure resonance. The five colors of their aura ran through its frame like exposed circuits.
To Li Wei, it was unmistakable.
"That is unmistakable a Gundam…?" he whispered. "No… not exactly. But it seems to looks like one. I wonder which Gundam this one exactly." He cannot see clearly as it show a silhouette of the robot. But he recognized that face shape. Not many have that kind of shape for the head.
The others did not seem to recognize it the same way. Zhu Zhuqing narrowed her eyes seeing as she do not recognize the shape with any figure from history that she learn. Xiao Wu ears seem to twitched uneasily looking at th unfamiliar shape. Meng Yiran blinked her eyes in awe. To them, it was not a machine, not a robot—but a strange and divine warrior clad in shapes alien to any realm they knew.
Ning Rongrong whispered, "It looks… like a god wearing armor forged from the sky."
Zhu Zhuqing added quietly, "It also feels like it's made from us. Maybe..."
But then—
A tremor.
A surge of dissonance.
The thread that connect to them seem to be snapped in one motion.
The luminous structure cracked—then shattered like fragile glass.
The weave of the Axis collapsed.
The light vanished.
And in its place came silence.
"What.... What happen?" Ning Rongrong said what was on everyone mind.
The thread that seem to be trying to merge into their body was cut off suddenly, looking like it came from the sources.
But it wasn't the sacred quiet of the Axis. It was the choking stillness that make them felt incredulous like it trying to shown a calm before the storm.
The cavern walls then seemingly twisted, bent, and fell away like peeling parchment. The transparent world crumbled, replaced by a grey battlefield that stretched endlessly in every direction—metallic earth, crimson skies. And from the farthest edges of the horizon, they came.
A single footstep rang out.
Then another.
Then hundreds.
Then thousands.
Armored warriors emerged in rows, black-helmed and faceless. Each one wielded a jagged halberd or greatsword, and their armor bore the motif of shattered crowns and broken wings. Their movements were mechanical, yet filled with violence restrained only by command.
They were like knights—but twisted. Their bodies were too tall, too thin, the armor too dense to be worn by anything organic. Each one radiated killing intent in perfect harmony.
Each one having the strength of a soul elder. Varying between rank 31 to rank 39.
The five of them already reach soul king, even though they are strong but to fight a thousand enemies will be quite a chore.
Xiao Wu stepped closer to Li Wei, expression tense. "What are they?"
Li Wei eyes narrowed. "They're not spirit beasts. Not even constructs. They're… must be the echoes. Manifestations of something that hates harmony."
"Like an immune response," Zhu Zhuqing murmured. "To what we just did."
Ning Rongrong took a breath, lifting her pagoda. "We awakened something, and this—this is the punishment?"
"No," Meng Yiran corrected, her cane clicking against the metal floor. "This is the rejection or something equivalent. The Axis existence just now can be said to disappear suddenly. And now, something else wants to erase what we made."
From above, the sky cracked with purple lightning.
The ground beneath their feet pulsed. The knight-like monsters began to march—fast, synchronized, unstoppable.
Li Wei raised the Diendriver and inserted a card with a single motion.
[KamenRide: Diend!]
Blue light exploded around him. Zhu Zhuqing shadow cloak wrapped tighter. Xiao Wu vanished for an instant before reappearing with a shimmer of light at her back. Ning Rongrong floated slightly as her Nine Treasure Pagoda emitted a low chime. Meng Yiran Eight Spider Lances erupted outward from her back, poison dripping from the tips while her martial spirit serpent cane appear in her hand.
They stood as one.
Thousands advanced.
Li Wei looked at the others. "Get ready. We don't run. We resist."
Zhu Zhuqing claws shimmered.
Xiao Wu cracked her knuckles.
Meng Yiran smiled, fangs glinting.
Rongrong aura flared.
Threads didn't need harmony to connect.
They only needed a choice.
The five stood shoulder to shoulder.
And above them, unseen, something whispered in the voice different from the Axis.
[Fall. Die. Despair. Amuse me whether you're my successor.]