Rumil's mother closed the book in front of him with considerably more force than necessary.
"You aren't even trying to read."
"I read more than three pages."
Rumil leaned back against the bench and let out the sort of sigh only a ten-year-old could manage.
His mother was unimpressed.
"If you continue like this, you will never become a great scholar like your father."
He made an annoyed noise.
"Or your grandfather."
"Or your great-grandfather."
"Yes, yes... I know."
She narrowed her eyes. "You say that as though it does not concern you."
"It doesn't."
His mother stared at him.
Rumil immediately wished he had chosen different words. They were sitting in one of the smaller parks built between the residential towers of Haven's northwestern sector, where carefully grown silver trees shaded broad paths overlooking the city below. Their home stood only a short distance away, high enough that the Oan system filled much of the evening sky whenever atmospheric conditions were clear.
Today, they were almost perfect.
Oa could be seen in the distance as a bright green-blue world, accompanied by the lights of stations, moons, and traffic moving between the planets. There was something new today as well. It had begun only a few minutes ago, with flashes of emerald appearing all across the sky.
Rumil looked toward them, his eyes narrowing, before he heard his mother's voice again and reluctantly responded.
"I don't want to spend my whole life on Chronicle."
His mother folded her arms. "Your father does not spend his whole life on Chronicle."
"He spends almost all of it there."
"He is a historian."
"And Grandfather is a historian."
"Yes."
"And Great-Grandfather was a historian."
"Yes."
"That is exactly my point."
Rumil pushed the book farther away.
"I don't want to spend every day reading about things that happened millions of years ago. I want to do something else."
His mother's expression softened slightly. "And what exactly do you want to do?"
Rumil pointed toward Oa.
"I want to be a Green Lantern."
There it was.
The declaration he had made at least once every few days for the last two years.
His mother followed his gaze toward the distant world and shook her head, though there was no cruelty in the gesture.
"Rumil."
"I'll be chosen."
Mother smiled faintly. "The rings search the universe for exceptional people, and in three hundred million years, only two million Oans have been selected. If you truly want that future, then you must prove you deserve it."
Rumil sat straighter.
"I will."
"Then perhaps you could begin by proving you can finish a chapter without looking up at the sky every thirty seconds."
Rumil opened his mouth to argue.
Then he stopped.
Something had changed in the sky.
"What is that?"
His mother looked up.
A wall of green light was spreading across the heavens.
At first, Rumil thought it was the same atmospheric display coming from Oa, but the light continued growing until an enormous shield began forming over Haven. Multiple layers of emerald energy connected above the planet, extending toward the horizon until they disappeared beyond the curvature of the world.
Two Green Lanterns streaked through the sky above the park.
Neither slowed.
Mother stood immediately.
"That is a planetary defence shield."
Rumil's excitement vanished. Planetary shields did not activate during ordinary emergencies.
"What happened?"
"I don't know."
Something struck the barrier.
A black shape splattered across the green surface high above them.
Then another.
Then hundreds.
Rumil stared upward as dark objects fell from space like rain, most striking the shield and spreading briefly across it before burning away beneath concentrated green energy.
A few passed through where the shield had not yet fully formed.
The first impacts reached the city several miles away.
Black masses struck rooftops, transit lanes, and towers. Some appeared almost liquid when they hit, spreading rapidly across whatever surface they touched before gathering themselves into moving shapes.
People began screaming.
His mother grabbed his wrist.
"Rumil, come."
"What are they?"
"Now."
She pulled him from the bench and ran.
The peaceful park transformed within seconds. Families abandoned tables, children were lifted into their parents' arms, and emergency announcements began echoing through the surrounding buildings as evacuation routes appeared along the paths.
Rumil stumbled after his mother.
More black shapes fell around them.
One struck a tree and wrapped around its trunk before springing toward an Oan man nearby. Another landed on the back of a woman fleeing toward the transit station.
Her scream ended abruptly.
Rumil's mother pulled him harder. The black substance spread across the woman's body until nothing remained visible beneath it. Her shape changed, growing taller and more muscular while tendrils erupted from her shoulders.
Then something hit Rumil's mother.
She screamed.
"Mama!"
Her hand tore away from his. The black mass had landed across her back and shoulder. She struck at it desperately, but every attempt to pull it free only caused it to spread farther across her arm.
Rumil grabbed it.
"Get off her!"
His fingers sank into something cold and wet.
The substance moved onto his hand.
Rumil screamed and stumbled backward, shaking desperately until the fragment detached and crawled back toward his mother.
"Run!" she shouted.
"Mama!"
"Rumil, run!"
Black covered her face.
Her scream changed into something deeper.
Rumil froze.
A creature now stood before him, claws forming where her hands had been while a huge white mouth opened across its featureless black face.
It looked down at him.
Then it laughed.
Rumil's legs stopped working.
"Mama?"
The creature stepped forward.
Someone ran between them.
A stranger raised a compact plasma weapon and fired repeatedly into the monster's chest. Burning holes appeared through the black material, but each wound closed almost instantly.
"Get away from the boy!"
The creature moved faster than Rumil could follow. It crossed the distance in a single leap, seized the stranger by the shoulders, and bit down.
Rumil saw the man's head disappear between its jaws.
Blood struck the ground.
Rumil screamed, and then he ran.
He had no idea where he was going. The emergency routes meant nothing anymore because the city around him had become chaos. Vehicles crashed into buildings while people fled in every direction, and black creatures climbed across walls or leapt between towers.
Rumil could hear the monster behind him.
His mother.
No.
Not his mother anymore.
He dared to look back and immediately wished he had not. Its arms had lengthened into clawed limbs, its body had swollen with black and red substance, and a mouth filled with white teeth stretched across what should have been her face. It crashed through a fountain stall without slowing, scattering debris across the avenue as it pursued him.
Rumil's legs were beginning to fail. He could hardly breathe.
A shadow passed over him.
Rumil turned just as the monster sprang.
Emerald light struck it in midair.
The blast threw the creature across the plaza with enough force to smash it through a decorative wall and send stone fragments rolling across the ground. Rumil stumbled backward and fell, both hands shaking as he tried to understand what had happened.
A Green Lantern descended between them.
At first, Rumil saw only the glow. Then the figure landed, and the details became clear: red skin, a dark uniform crossed by brilliant emerald lines, and eyes that shone with permanent green light.
For one stunned moment, Rumil forgot his fear.
There was no Oan child who did not know that face. His stories were taught in schools, carved into monuments, and told by families across the entire system. He had been the first Oan chosen by a ring, the first Alpha Lantern, and had served the Corps longer than almost any living being could comprehend.
Durin the Deathless had landed in front of him.
Durin turned immediately, his voice calm.
"Are you injured?"
Rumil tried to answer, but his throat closed. He could only shake his head before lifting one trembling hand toward the ruined wall.
"M-my mother."
Durin followed the gesture.
"That thing is my mother."
The creature dragged itself from the rubble and roared. Black material shifted across its body as torn sections repaired themselves, then it charged again with its claws raised.
Durin did not move from Rumil's path. He extended one hand and struck the creature with another concentrated burst of green energy, driving it backward before constructing a spherical barrier around it. The monster slammed into the inside of the prison and began attacking with enough force to make the emerald surface ripple, but Durin barely watched it.
"Ring, have you completed the cross-reference with all Oan databases? What is this thing?"
A moment later, the AI responded.
"Updated identification received directly from Moth…Jade. Host organism classified as a symbiote. Information has also been relayed regarding methods of neutralization."
"Can it be separated without killing the host?"
"Affirmative. High-frequency sonic resonance combined with controlled electromagnetic disruption. Estimated host survival probability: ninety-eight point seven percent."
For the first time since arriving, Durin smiled.
"That will do."
Green light expanded around his arm.
Rumil watched an enormous weapon take shape. Durin built it piece by piece, creating a long-barrelled cannon wrapped in concentric rings and shifting components.
The monster kept attacking the barrier.
Durin raised the cannon.
Rumil's terror returned.
"No!"
Durin glanced back at him.
"You'll kill her!"
"I am not going to kill your mother."
The barrier opened.
The creature lunged immediately.
Durin fired.
Rumil screamed.
Instead of an ordinary blast, a deep, vibrating pulse erupted from the construct. The air itself seemed to shake as layered waves of sound and electromagnetic force struck the creature at once. It convulsed in midair and crashed to the ground, clawing desperately at its own body while the black substance began moving violently across his mother's skin.
Rumil stared in horror as the creature appeared to tear itself apart.
Durin adjusted the cannon.
"Frequency is working. Increasing by three percent."
A second pulse struck.
The symbiote shrieked.
Black tendrils peeled away from Rumil's mother, stretching outward as though something invisible were dragging them from her body. The creature fought to maintain its bond, wrapping itself around her arms and shoulders again, but Durin continued the attack with carefully controlled bursts rather than one overwhelming blast.
"Separation at sixty-three percent."
Durin shifted his stance.
"Keep monitoring her nervous system."
"Host remains stable."
Another burst followed, and the symbiote finally tore free.
His ring chimed.
"Host fully separated. Symbiote neutralized."
Durin lowered the cannon.
"It works."
Rumil was already running.
"Mother!"
He dropped beside her and reached for her face, terrified that she would not respond. Her eyes opened slowly, unfocused at first, before finally settling on him.
"Rumil?"
He threw his arms around her.
She held him tightly despite how weak she looked, and Rumil buried his face against her while tears ran freely down his cheeks.
"Ring, status."
The AI answered immediately.
"Confirmed symbiote incursions across Haven, Academy, Sanctuary, Chronicle, and Bastion. Ionith and Castanor on Oa are both reporting significant outbreaks. Eight Alpha Lanterns remain deployed outside the Oan system. More Lanterns are arriving from neighboring sectors."
Durin looked up toward Oa and the battle raging there.
His expression hardened.
"Baris. Melgar."
Two responses from Alpha Lanterns came through the ring almost at once.
"Here."
"Receiving."
"Return to Oa immediately. Baris, reinforce Ionith. Melgar, take Castanor. Do not allow either city to become overrun."
"Understood."
"On my way."
Durin raised his ring, transmitting the weapon schematic and Jade's newly acquired data across the Corps network.
"All Lanterns in the Oan system, new combat information is being transmitted now. Sonic resonance combined with controlled electromagnetic disruption can force separation from an infected host."
His gaze shifted toward the unconscious black mass lying several metres away.
"Use the attached construct schematic as a baseline. Adjust the frequency to the individual host and monitor vital signs continuously. Do not assume an infected civilian is lost."
The ring chimed.
"Combat data and construct schematic transmitted to all active Lanterns within the Oan system."
Durin looked toward Oa again.
"Prioritize civilians and containment. Arriving Lanterns are to reinforce Haven and Chronicle."
"Orders transmitted."
He looked down at Rumil and his mother.
"Medical teams are coming."
Rumil barely seemed to hear him. He still had both arms wrapped around his mother, refusing to let go.
Durin allowed himself a small smile before turning back toward Oa, where the Guardian battled the invader responsible for all of this. He watched for only a few seconds before his glowing eyes narrowed. Emerald light surrounded him as he launched from the plaza, crossing the sky in an instant, and disappeared toward Oa.
.
.
.
The space around Oa had become a war zone.
Emerald light and Black Light tore across the system in endless waves, illuminating Oa and its two moons beneath flashes bright enough to resemble miniature stars. The largest constructs were visible even from the planetary surface. Green giants shaped in the image of a caped man fought enormous black dragons whose bodies crawled with symbiotes, each clash sending ripples of distorted energy through the surrounding void.
The emerald figures resembled Max. Broad shoulders, a flowing cape, and fists wrapped in concentrated willpower struck against the black dragons while the creatures answered with attacks of their own. Neither side gained ground for long. Whenever a green construct was torn apart, another was remade in its place almost immediately, sometimes larger than before. Whenever one of the black dragons shattered beneath an emerald fist, the darkness simply gathered again.
Meanwhile, thousands upon thousands of symbiotes continued raining toward Oa and its moons.
The Citadel had suffered the worst of it. Its outer defence grid had been torn apart during the opening minutes of the assault, leaving much of the moon exposed. Green Lanterns formed overlapping barriers above its cities while Oan defence forces desperately tried to hold off the symbiotes already on the surface, but there were simply too many.
Ships were attempting to flee in every direction.
Some carried thousands of Oans packed into emergency transports, families pressed together while a single Lantern escort guided them away from the moons. Others barely cleared the atmosphere before black tendrils wrapped around their hulls. Symbiotes forced their way through maintenance ports and damaged sections, infecting the Oans inside.
Other ships were simply destroyed.
Max saw all of it.
His senses covered too much of the Oan system to escape any part of what was happening. He could feel Lantern rings transmitting emergency signals, hear Jade issuing evacuation orders across a thousand channels, and see sections of the civilization he had spent hundreds of millions of years building being torn apart around him.
At the centre of that chaos, he and Knull fought.
Their swords collided hard enough to distort the space between them.
Knull wielded the Necrosword with both hands, the black blade shifting its shape with every attack as living darkness moved along its edge. Max answered with the strongest sword construct he had ever created, a weapon made to mimic an alloy that did not exist, one he had imagined from a combination of the strongest substances in the universe.
Knull slashed toward his neck.
Max caught the Necrosword and twisted, forcing it aside before driving his shoulder into Knull's chest. The King in Black flew backward, recovered instantly, and swung again. This time, the Necrosword lengthened in the middle of the strike, forcing Max to turn his entire body rather than simply lean away.
The tip passed close enough to cut several strands of his hair.
Knull laughed.
"How long have I waited for this?"
Max answered with another strike.
Their swords collided once, twice, then six more times in quick succession as they crossed thousands of miles of space. Each impact created a burst of green and black energy that sent nearby debris spinning away from them.
Knull blocked a downward strike and smiled into Max's face.
"Do you know how long I have waited for revenge, Ion?"
Max's eyes turned red.
Omega Beams erupted from them at point-blank range.
Knull moved his head aside.
The beams missed.
For less than a second.
Then both crimson streams curved sharply behind him.
Knull's smile disappeared.
He flew upward, expecting the beams to continue past him, but they changed direction with him. He twisted between them, accelerated toward Oa, then cut sideways through the wreckage of a destroyed defence platform.
The Omega Beams followed.
"What?"
One struck him across the back.
The second hit his shoulder.
Knull spun through space as Max arrived above him and brought the emerald sword down with both hands. Knull barely raised the Necrosword in time. Their blades met, and the force drove him hundreds of miles toward Vigil.
Knull snarled and attacked again.
The next exchange became almost impossible to follow. They vanished and reappeared across the battlefield, leaving trails of emerald and black behind them as sword struck sword. Knull tried using tendrils from his armour to bind Max's arms, only for Max to sever them and answer with another pair of Omega Beams.
Knull dodged left.
The beams turned.
He dropped beneath them.
They looped around and came from below.
Knull raised the Necrosword to block, but the beams split apart, curved around the weapon, and struck him from opposite sides.
For the first time, genuine frustration appeared on his face.
He blasted Max away with a wave of darkness and wiped black blood from the corner of his mouth.
"You have learned new tricks, Ion."
Max hovered several miles away, sword held low at his side.
Knull smiled again.
"So have I."
Black Light erupted from his body. It carried the same wrongness Max had seen in his memories after Moridun opened the path to Anti-Life.
A construct formed behind Knull.
It grew until it dwarfed both combatants, a monstrous cannon made from Black Light. Hundreds of tendrils anchored it across space while darkness gathered within its opening.
Max saw where it was aimed.
"Don't."
Knull fired.
The beam crossed the battlefield like a black spear.
Max accelerated and moved in front of it, but the attack curved at the last instant. He changed direction again, trying to intercept it, only for the Black Light to split around him and reform farther away.
It struck the Citadel.
The moon's shields, held together by Green Lanterns on the surface, collapsed.
Thousands of life signs vanished at once.
"No."
The darkness faded from the impact zone, revealing shattered buildings, broken towers, and bodies scattered across miles of the ruined city.
The horror did not stop there.
The bodies began to move.
Dead Oans rose from the rubble.
They had been technicians, soldiers, medicos, and attendants working in the moon's defence facilities. Their wounds remained visible, but black energy now burned through them as their bodies lifted from the surface and flew into space.
Hundreds turned toward Max.
Then thousands.
He reached for them instinctively.
For their souls.
Every Oan carried a fragment of the Green Light, a part of him. When they died, their souls passed onward to the Far Shore. Max and Death had built that afterlife together so his creations would always have somewhere waiting for them beyond their mortal lives.
He felt nothing.
The souls were gone.
Not passing into him.
Not reaching the Far Shore.
Nothing.
The undead Oans attacked.
Black energy gathered around their hands as they rushed toward him, some still wearing expressions frozen from the moment they had died.
Knull laughed somewhere behind them.
Max raised his ring.
Hundreds of weapons appeared around him at once. For half a moment, Max hesitated.
Then he fired.
Green light consumed them.
The undead bodies disappeared so completely that not even ash remained.
Max lowered his hand.
Knull's laughter grew louder.
The Necrosword came toward Max's back.
He turned in time and caught it. Their weapons locked together once more, but something in Max had changed. He pushed harder, forcing Knull backward while the emerald sword in his hand grew brighter.
"You think that is funny?"
Knull grinned.
"Your suffering, Ion? Yes. I find it quite entertaining."
Max's eyes burned red again.
The Omega Beams struck Knull in the chest and drove him away.
Before the King in Black could recover, Max opened both hands.
Constructs appeared around him.
A hundred enormous gyroscopic structures formed in every direction around Knull, each one composed of interlocking emerald rings rotating along different axes.
Knull glanced around.
"What is this?"
The glow in Max's eyes intensified.
The Omega Beams erupted once more, but this time emerald energy surrounded the crimson light. Pure willpower wrapped itself around the beams as Max fired into the nearest gyroscopic construct.
The machine caught the energy.
It began to spin faster.
Then it redirected the beam into another construct.
That one accelerated as well.
The Omega energy passed through a third, then a fourth, multiplying and splitting each time until red-green light moved through all one hundred structures in a network around Knull. Beams erupted from every direction, all of them converging on him.
The King in Black screamed.
Concentrated Omega energy, what Max called the combined power of the Power Cosmic, primordial energy, and willpower, struck him from every direction simultaneously. He attempted to shield himself with the Necrosword, but whenever he blocked one stream, ten more curved around the defence and struck elsewhere. The gyroscopes continued rotating, constantly changing the angles of attack so there was nowhere for him to move.
His armour began burning away.
Black flesh followed.
Max clenched both fists and forced more power into the construct network.
"How do you like that?"
Knull roared as another hundred converging beams struck him.
Max advanced slowly through space while maintaining the attack.
"You came to my home."
Another layer of Knull's armour burned away.
"You murder my friend... You massacre my people."
The Omega Beams intensified.
Max's expression twisted with rage.
"I AM GOING TO RIP YOU APART ATOM BY FUCKING ATOM!"
For several seconds, Knull disappeared completely within a sphere of red and green energy.
Then one black tendril emerged.
Max saw it too late.
Knull forced one hand out through the bombardment and created an enormous Black Light construct above the Citadel. It resembled a jagged mountain turned upside down, its lower edge covered in spikes as it began falling toward the moon.
Max's eyes widened.
"Fuck!"
He broke concentration.
The gyroscopic prison flickered as Max turned and created a massive emerald barrier over the moon. The black construct crashed into it hard enough to crack the shield from one end to the other, forcing Max to focus on keeping it away from the civilians below as they evacuated.
That instant was enough.
Knull tore himself free and flew away from Max.
Max destroyed the falling construct with one final surge and immediately turned.
Knull was not heading toward Oa.
He was heading toward Veridion.
The Celestial's corpse still drifted near Oa, his severed head separated from the rest of his body while cosmic energy flickered through the wounds.
Max pursued him.
Another emerald light reached Knull first.
Durin.
The Alpha Lantern appeared between Knull and Veridion's remains. He raised both hands and formed a shield.
"Move!" Max shouted.
Knull swung the Necrosword.
Durin attempted to reinforce the barrier, but Max knew before the blade touched it that it would not hold.
He accelerated.
Space bent around him.
Max appeared in front of Durin at the exact instant the Necrosword arrived, his emerald blade catching Knull's weapon with an impact that sent both swords screaming against one another.
Durin stared at Max's back.
"Ion."
"Get to the Citadel."
Durin hesitated.
Max forced Knull away and glanced back.
"Evacuate everyone on the moon and lead the Lanterns when they arrive in securing the planets. Leave Knull to me."
Durin looked toward the burning Citadel.
Then he nodded.
"Yes, Ion."
He flew away.
Knull watched him leave with an amused smile.
"What a loyal dog."
Max attacked, their blades meeting in a clash that sent both of them spinning away from each other. Max recovered first, twisting through the debris field surrounding them and filling the space around him with constructs unlike anything an ordinary Lantern would have thought to create.
Some resembled weapons only in the loosest sense. Others were arrangements of rotating geometric shapes, interlocking tetrahedrons, spiralling rings, impossible polyhedrons, and angular frames that folded through one another without ever touching. Max had accumulated billions of years of experience with war, technology, magic, alien physics, and civilizations whose sciences had vanished before most species that existed now had even evolved. He had long ago stopped limiting himself to imagining guns, swords, or fists whenever he truly needed to hurt something.
A cluster of emerald cubes unfolded around Knull and divided the space surrounding him into intersecting fields. The King in Black tried to move, only to find each direction redirecting him toward another plane of force. Before he could cut his way free, a series of triangular constructs rotated together and fired concentrated beams along every calculated escape route.
Knull raised the Necrosword and absorbed the first volley.
Max was already creating something else.
A helix of emerald rings spiralled around Knull and contracted, each ring producing a different gravitational pull while a second construct projected pulses of compressed kinetic force into the spaces between them. Knull was dragged left, right, upward, and downward simultaneously before he finally roared and released enough Black Light to tear through the entire formation.
Max flew directly into him and attacked with the emerald sword. Knull parried, turned his wrist, and tried to drive the Necrosword through Max's side, but Max dissolved his blade before contact and reformed it in his other hand behind Knull's guard.
The edge cut across Knull's armour.
Black blood scattered into space.
Knull laughed and drove his forehead into Max's face.
Max answered with an Omega Beam from less than a metre away.
Knull twisted, but the crimson energy followed his movement and struck him across the jaw, sending him tumbling through the wreckage of another orbital defence station.
"Jade."
Max accelerated after Knull while three geometric constructs formed around his shoulders and began firing independently.
"Status."
Jade responded while Max blocked another swing of the Necrosword and drove a construct spear through Knull's thigh.
"Oa is stabilizing. Ionith and Castanor remain under attack, but Alpha Lantern reinforcements have established containment zones. Haven is currently experiencing the largest concentration of symbiote incursions. Academy and Chronicle are both under heavy assault, though their planetary shields remain partially operational. Sanctuary has not been attacked."
Knull ripped the spear from his leg and threw it aside.
Max created another six.
"And the Corps?"
"Green Lanterns and Vigilants throughout all active sectors have received the emergency recall. The majority are already travelling toward the Oan system."
"How long?"
"Three thousand will be arriving shortly."
Max slammed his sword against Knull's Necrosword, forced the black blade downward, and struck him across the chest with a construct hammer.
"Good. Focus on coordinating evacuation and defence."
"Max..."
"I've got him."
Jade did not argue.
Max hit Knull again.
This time, the King in Black was thrown toward the Citadel.
He entered the moon's damaged atmosphere like a meteor and crashed through one of the upper towers. The entire structure folded beneath the impact before collapsing into the surrounding district, throwing dust and fragments of white stone miles into the air.
Max descended after him.
Dozens of constructs appeared around the crater.
Weapons, and many more things that had not possessed names in any living language for hundreds of millions of years. Some projected matter-disrupting fields. Others emitted pulses designed to destabilize the molecules of a target, while countless more operated on principles long forgotten by the civilizations that had created them.
Max fired all of them.
The moon shook beneath the assault. It continued again and again, only stopping when his ring warned that the local crust was beginning to destabilize.
Nothing moved inside the enormous crater that had formed across the surface.
Max hovered above it.
Knull erupted from beneath the rubble.
The Necrosword tore through Max's shield and struck him across the chest before he could completely evade it. Pain exploded through him as he was thrown backward, and Knull was already moving past him before Max stabilized.
Toward Veridion.
Max's stomach tightened.
"No."
He followed.
Something had changed around the Celestial's corpse.
Black tendrils covered Veridion's severed body. They had begun around the wound at his neck and spread outward across the emerald and golden armour, crawling over the Celestial like veins. More strands extended from his body toward the severed head and wrapped around it.
Max watched in horror as they pulled.
Slowly, Veridion's head began moving back toward his shoulders.
"Don't you fucking dare."
Max increased his speed.
Knull stopped him, and they clashed once more.
Max struck once, twice, then shifted his sword into a spear and thrust toward Knull's throat. Knull knocked it aside before the Necrosword changed shape in his hands and released a burst of Black Light directly into Max.
Max answered with Omega Beams.
Black and crimson collided.
The explosion sent both of them flying in opposite directions.
Max recovered first, but the distraction had lasted long enough.
Veridion's head had reconnected.
The dark tendrils sealed the wound and disappeared beneath his armour.
Then the Celestial moved.
Max froze.
Veridion's enormous body slowly turned toward Oa.
His chest began to glow.
At first emerald.
Then gold.
Then black.
Celestial energy and Black Light gathered together within Veridion's core, concentrating until the space around his chest distorted beneath the pressure.
Max's eyes widened.
Knull began laughing.
The beam fired.
A column of Celestial power wrapped in Black Light crossed the distance toward Oa almost instantly, aimed directly at the planet.
Max moved.
He had travelled faster before.
Space vanished around him.
He appeared between the beam and Oa.
He formed a shield. Every fragment of Max's will poured into it, layers upon layers of emerald energy building in front of him until the construct stretched across thousands of miles.
The beam struck.
For an instant, the shield held.
Then cracks appeared.
Max screamed through clenched teeth and reinforced it.
The first layer shattered.
The second followed.
Then the third.
"No, no, no!"
He forced more power into the construct.
The beam tore through everything.
The final shield broke.
Max had no time to create another.
The blast struck his body.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHH!"
The scream ripped out of him so violently that it hardly sounded human.
Max felt as though his body were being torn apart in a thousand directions at once. Celestial energy burned through him while Black Light attacked something deeper, cutting through flesh and soul with equal cruelty. His armour disappeared almost immediately, burned away beneath the force, and his skin split open across his arms and chest as white-green light escaped through the wounds.
A lesser body would have ceased to exist.
Max survived only because there was almost nothing ordinary left about him. The Power Cosmic reinforced every cell. The Power Primordial sustained him beneath forces that should have reduced matter to nothing. Will itself poured through his body from the Source, holding him together through sheer refusal to die.
Still, the beam pushed him backward.
Oa filled his vision behind him.
He could not move.
If he moved, the planet would take the rest of the blast, and millions would die.
So Max remained there and screamed, taking all of it upon himself.
The attack finally ended.
Silence returned with shocking suddenness.
Max floated in space, smoke and green energy rising from his body. Most of his suit was gone, leaving only torn fragments around his waist and shoulders.
His vision doubled.
Jade was saying something.
He could not understand her.
Then Knull appeared before him, and his fist struck Max in the stomach.
The impact folded him around Knull's arm and drove the air from his lungs.
Knull raised the Necrosword.
Max saw the blade coming toward his head and forced himself aside at the final instant.
It missed.
Knull's hand closed around Max's throat instead.
"Got you."
Max tried to fire the Omega Beams.
Knull slammed him downward.
The Citadel rushed toward them.
They struck the moon hard enough to flatten what remained of an entire district.
Before Max could rise, an enormous shadow covered him.
Veridion.
The dead Celestial descended above the moon.
One mountain-sized fist came down.
Max raised his arms.
The punch drove him deeper into the Citadel.
Another followed.
Then another.
Each impact broke miles of the moon around him. Craters merged together while fractures spread beneath the surface.
Max tried to form a construct.
The next punch shattered it.
He tried to move.
Another blow buried him deeper.
Veridion's fist rose and descended again, guided by Knull with the same casual cruelty someone might use to crush an insect.
The moon began breaking apart.
Max no longer knew how many times he had been hit.
His healing could not keep pace. Bones broke and repaired only to break again, his skin burned beneath the Black Light leaking from Veridion's hands, and every impact drove more fragments of the Citadel into the space surrounding him.
Eventually, the blows stopped.
Max lay at the bottom of an enormous crater.
He could barely move as Knull landed nearby.
The King in Black looked almost completely recovered from Max's earlier assault. Some burns remained across his armour, and one side of his face had not fully healed, but his smile had returned.
He walked toward Max.
"This is disappointing."
Max tried to lift his head.
Knull crouched beside him.
"This is not the being I fought at the dawn of this multiverse."
Max forced one arm beneath himself.
Knull kicked it away.
"What happened to you, Ion?"
He laughed softly.
"Have you become so weak now?"
Knull suddenly stopped smiling.
His head tilted.
"What?"
Max watched his expression change.
Knull slowly looked upward.
"How strange."
"I can feel them."
A cold pressure entered Max's chest.
Knull closed his eyes.
"So many little lights."
Max's eyes widened.
The Corps.
"They are coming here."
Knull laughed.
"All of them."
Max tried to stand.
His body refused.
Knull continued looking through whatever connection he had discovered.
"Three Lanterns..."
His smile faded into concentration.
"And two..."
He stopped.
Something changed.
Knull turned toward Veridion.
The dead Celestial still hovered above the shattered Citadel, one massive palm resting against the moon near Max's crater.
Knull looked at him for several seconds.
Then his smile returned.
"Oh."
No, Max thought as he understood what was happening.
"Oh, oh, oh."
Knull began laughing.
"The machines."
Max closed his eyes.
No.
"The Vigilants."
Every fear Max had buried for hundreds of millions of years came rushing back at once.
His arguments with Veridion.
Voicing his displeasure with the Vigilants.
Jade telling him they were not independent machines.
They were extensions of Veridion.
Pieces of Veridion himself.
Knull placed one hand against Veridion's armour. His smile widened.
"I have them."
Knull almost trembled with delight.
"All of them."
"No." Max's voice barely carried.
"I can feel every one."
Knull closed his eyes again.
He spread his arms as the Black Light pulsed through Veridion's corpse and then outward through the universe. His smile widened with every passing moment, as though he were listening to a symphony only he could hear, and when he looked down at Max, there was almost childish delight in his eyes.
"My Hunters," he said softly, then louder, savouring every word.
"Kill them all."
Max's scream tore across the shattered moon.
Across the universe, Green Lanterns were already on their way to Oa when the Vigilants, their partners since the beginning of their service as Lanterns, turned on them.
In Sector 4801, three Lanterns flew together with their two Vigilants when both machines suddenly dropped out of formation. One Lantern turned in confusion, only for a Vigilant to punch straight through his chest while the other crushed his partner's skull before she could raise a shield. The third tried to accelerate away, but a Black Light beam tore through his back and sent his body spinning into space.
In Sector 772, the Lanterns were still discussing the emergency when their Vigilants attacked from either side. One machine severed a Lantern's ring hand and then drove an energy blade through his throat, while the second seized another by the legs and tore him apart. The last Lantern managed to form a weapon before both Vigilants opened fire together and vaporized him.
In Sector 2109, three Lanterns travelled toward Oa, trusting the two machines flying beside them as they had for decades. Without warning, one Vigilant rammed through the middle Lantern hard enough to burst through his body, while the other grabbed a second Lantern by the head and twisted until his neck snapped. The survivor screamed and attacked, only to be struck from behind and impaled through the spine.
Elsewhere, three Lanterns flew through hyperspace with their Vigilants positioned ahead of them. The machines suddenly slowed and let the Lanterns pass, then attacked from behind. One Lantern was split open by a blade through the back, the second had his head destroyed by a point-blank blast, and the third managed to turn just in time to see both Vigilants coming toward him before they tore him apart between them.
In another sector, one Lantern noticed the Vigilants' green eyes turning black and shouted a warning. He managed to raise a shield, but the machine beside him already knew how he fought. It struck the exact weak point he always left when defending from multiple directions, broke through, and crushed his chest. His two partners barely had time to react before the second Vigilant cut one in half and the first fired through the other's skull.
Again and again, the same thing happened across the universe. Lanterns flying toward Oa were attacked by the very machines they considered partners, often dying before they even understood they had been betrayed. Green lights vanished from the routes leading home as the Vigilants turned black and continued the slaughter.
And through the master connection, Max felt it all.
He felt each ring go silent like a nerve being burned out of his body. One, then five, then twenty, then hundreds in cascading waves, until numbers ceased to mean anything and only loss remained. Half-formed final thoughts. Lanterns calling for help. Lanterns calling the names of the machines killing them. Lanterns trying to save one another and dying before the attempt was complete.
Pinned beneath Veridion's undead hand, Max could do nothing but feel them die.
Knull looked down at him, savouring every second of it, and laughed.
"The symphony of death. How beautiful."