Rudra lifted his glowing sword. His voice was low, commanding, and final:
"This is your end, Android 17."
The blade pulsed as Rudra poured every ounce of his chakra, ki, and divine fury into it. The steel glowed white-hot, then beyond white, until it looked as if the weapon itself was forged from the heart of a star. Sparks danced around the hilt, thunder echoing even in the soundless void of space.
Android 17 immediately raised his hand, his barrier erupting around him in a translucent dome of indigo energy. The Martian soil beneath his boots disintegrated as the shield expanded.
"Humph!" 17 sneered, though there was unease behind his bravado. "Then try it! Try if you can cut through me!"
Rudra's eyes narrowed. And then he moved.
Lightning speed—faster than the mind could register, faster than the human eye could follow. One moment he stood yards away, the next his blade whispered through the air. The world itself seemed to pause, silence falling over Mars as though reality itself held its breath.
Android 17 blinked, confused. He hadn't even seen Rudra swing. He turned—
And Rudra was already behind him.
"…What?" 17 muttered, smirking, as he tapped the surface of his barrier. "See? Nothing happened. I told you—"
A cracking sound interrupted him.
Crack.
Crack.
His eyes widened. Fine spiderweb fractures spread across the barrier's surface, each glowing brighter, hotter, until the entire dome trembled under an invisible weight.
"What… what is this?" 17's voice faltered, panic bleeding through the arrogance. "My barrier…?!"
Rudra's voice was steady, cold as the void of space.
"I already slashed you, 17. You just haven't realized it yet."
The words struck harder than the blade. Android 17 staggered back, clutching his chest as a burning sensation erupted within him. His body began to glow faintly, wisps of smoke rising from his armor as though fire had been planted inside his very core.
"No… impossible!" he shouted, slamming his fists against his chest, against his barrier, against anything that could prove he still had control. "I am infinite! I cannot be—"
His scream was cut off as the fractures across his shield finally gave way. The dome shattered like glass, shards of blue energy dissolving into nothingness.
Then the fire inside him ignited.
Android 17's body convulsed, the glow intensifying until his entire frame radiated like a collapsing star. He screamed—not in anger this time, but in agony, in terror—as Rudra's divine slash spread through his artificial body, breaking apart circuits, tearing through indestructible alloys, searing into his very essence.
Rudra's smirk was gone. His expression was grim, almost solemn, as he raised his hand in a gesture of farewell.
"This graveyard suits you, Seventeen."
And in the next instant, Rudra vanished, teleporting beyond the orbit of Mars, into the silent safety of space.
Behind him, the planet trembled.
Seventeen's body reached critical mass, and the energy Rudra had forced inside him erupted outward.
The explosion was cataclysmic.
A blinding white sphere burst across the Martian surface, swallowing valleys and mountains in an instant. The light expanded, brighter than the sun itself, visible even from Earth's night sky. The ground liquefied into molten rivers, entire craters flattening under the sheer pressure.
The detonation rivaled a nuclear onslaught—no, it was greater, far greater. It was as though a miniature star had been born and died in the same instant. A shockwave tore through Mars's thin atmosphere, throwing dust and debris into orbit, scattering fragments of the planet into the void.
From his vantage point in orbit, Rudra watched. His cloak rippled in the silent blast, his eyes reflecting the fiery inferno consuming the Red Planet.
The explosion raged for minutes, a storm of fire and light devouring everything in sight. Slowly, painfully, it began to subside, leaving behind nothing but a blackened scar across Mars's surface—an eternal mark of Seventeen's end.
And in the heart of that crater, there was no trace of Android 17.
Rudra exhaled softly, lowering his sword.
"It's over," he whispered, though the words carried across the void as if declaring victory to the universe itself.
Yet deep within, Rudra knew this was not the end of the android threat. Eighteen was still out there. And the shadow of something far darker loomed in the distance.
But for now, Mars itself had become Seventeen's grave.
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