**Chapter 47: Diplomatic Mission**
**Day 1,228.**
**Location: The Tungsten Spire – Main Conference Hall.**
**Current Status: Undercover.**
**Mood: Delicate.**
There is a specific art to mopping a floor when your arm strength is capable of tossing a tectonic plate like a Frisbee.
It requires a level of restraint that borders on spiritual enlightenment. If I press too hard—even by a fraction of a millimeter—the tungsten-reinforced mop handle will snap. If I apply too much friction, the water in the bucket will flash-boil into steam. If I scrub with genuine effort, I won't just clean the floor; I will scour the molecular bonds of the tiling and leave a hole that drops straight into the sub-basement.
"Left to right," I whispered to myself, guiding the mop with the gentleness of a surgeon handling a raw nerve. "Smooth strokes. Don't break the physics engine."
I was wearing a grey jumpsuit with a nametag that read *'Stan'*. A hat was pulled low over my eyes, hiding the faint, golden luminescence that constantly swirled in my irises—a side effect of having mana density higher than a neutron star.
"Boss," a voice hissed through my earpiece. "You missed a spot near the potted fern."
"Shut up, Ren," I muttered, wringing out the mop. "I'm practicing my fine motor control. Do you know how hard it is to hold a Styrofoam cup without crushing it into diamonds? This is training."
"It's ridiculous, is what it is," Ren replied. He was standing at the head of the massive conference table, looking regal in his new **[Void-Weave Formal Robes]**. "The High Commissioner is landing in five minutes. You're the leader of Earth. You should be sitting in the big chair, not cleaning under it."
"I want to see how they treat you," I said, moving the bucket. "The Sylurians were traders; they just wanted money. But this guy? He's from the **Galactic Council**. Bureaucrats are a different breed of monster. I want to see if they respect humanity, or if they just fear the 'Anomaly'."
"And if they don't respect us?"
"Then I accidentally knock over the bucket," I said dryly. "And we see what happens."
***
**The Arrival**
The doors to the Spire's main hall didn't open; they dissolved.
A beam of hard-light deconstructed the heavy steel blast doors, turning them into shimmering particles that reassembled perfectly against the walls. Through the opening marched a squad of **[Praetorian Guards]**.
They were eight feet tall, encased in white-and-gold power armor that hummed with a frequency that made my teeth itch. They didn't walk; they glided on anti-grav boots, holding halberds tipped with singing plasma.
**[Scan Complete.]**
**[Target: Council Guard.]**
**[Level: 250.]**
**[Threat Level: Moderate (for a human). Negligible (for me).]**
Behind them came the diplomat.
**High Commissioner Vexx** was a member of the Aethelgard race. Tall, impossibly slender, with skin like polished marble and three eyes arranged in a triangle on a face that lacked a nose. He wore robes made of shifting liquid metal and floated six inches off the ground, presumably to avoid touching the same matter as us primitives.
He didn't look at the guards. He didn't look at Ren or the gathered human delegates. He certainly didn't look at the janitor in the corner.
He floated to the center of the room and stopped.
The air temperature dropped ten degrees. The sheer pressure of his mana—refined, controlled, arrogant—washed over the room. The human politicians shivered. Damon, standing guard by the window in his tank armor, tightened his grip on his sword.
Ren didn't flinch. My disciple sat in the center chair, his hands folded. His **[Domain]** wasn't active, but the shadow beneath his chair was darker than it should have been.
"Greetings," Ren said, his voice steady. "I am Ren, acting proxy for the Order of Truth. Welcome to Earth."
Vexx stared at him. His third eye, the one on his forehead, blinked slowly.
"Earth," Vexx said. His voice sounded like glass breaking under water. "Sector 7G-99. Designation: Dirtball."
He tapped a holographic bracelet.
"I am here to process your integration paperwork. You have been flagged as a Class-4 Hazard Zone due to the localized reality distortion event caused by the entity 'Shigu'. The Council has graciously decided not to quarantine your solar system."
"Graciously?" Ren raised an eyebrow. "We repelled a Zorgon invasion fleet. We thought that might earn us a seat at the table, not a quarantine order."
Vexx laughed. It was a cold, chittering sound.
"You repelled a scavenging party," Vexx corrected, floating closer to the table. "Do not mistake luck for competence, primitive. The Galactic Council governs ten thousand worlds. We have weapons that can rewrite the DNA of a species from orbit. You are barely out of the tutorial."
Vexx waved a hand, dismissing Ren's existence.
"Where is the Asset?"
"The Asset?" Ren asked.
"The Anomaly. The entity Shigu. My orders are to fit him with a **[Limiter Collar]**. We cannot allow an unregulated biological weapon to roam free. He will be conscripted into the Council Vanguard and deployed to the Outer Rim where he can be useful."
Damon stepped forward, the floorboards groaning under his armor. "He's not a dog you can leash, shiny-face."
The Praetorian Guards leveled their halberds instantly. The hum of plasma rose to a whine.
Vexx turned his marble face toward Damon.
"Level 75," Vexx sneered. "Tank Class. Crude equipment. Low intelligence."
Vexx flicked a finger.
A pulse of telekinetic force slammed into Damon. It wasn't an attack intended to kill; it was a casual backhand.
Damon, who had tanked a starship laser, was lifted off his feet and slammed into the wall. The impact cracked the reinforced concrete.
"Damon!" Ren shouted, standing up. Shadows erupted from his feet, the **[Theater of Silence]** threatening to expand.
"Sit down," Vexx commanded.
**[Skill: Voice of Authority.]**
A crushing weight descended on the room. It was a high-tier mental suppression spell, designed to force lower-level beings into submission. The politicians in the room collapsed, gasping for air. Ren's knees buckled, his shadows flickering as he fought the mental pressure.
"You are savages," Vexx declared, floating higher, looking down at them like a god inspecting insects. "You have played with toys and think yourselves warriors. The Council is Order. Order requires submission."
He looked around the room with disgust.
"This entire structure smells of sweat and carbon. Disgusting. Even your cleaning staff is incompetent."
Vexx looked toward the corner.
I was leaning on my mop, watching the scene with a neutral expression.
"You," Vexx pointed a long, marble finger at me. "Servant. Wipe the floor beneath me. My shadow touched it."
Ren's eyes widened. He looked at me, panic flashing in his gaze—not for himself, but for the diplomat.
*Don't do it, Boss,* Ren mouthed. *We need the trade routes.*
I sighed.
I really hated bureaucratic bullies.
I picked up the bucket. I walked slowly toward the floating alien. My footsteps were heavy, the *thud-thud-thud* of rubber boots echoing in the silent room.
The Praetorian Guards tracked me, but their threat assessment scanners were reading me as a Level 1 Civilian. My stealth skills, boosted by the **[Limit Breaker Serum]**, were absolute. To them, I was less than a distinct object; I was background noise.
I stopped five feet from Vexx.
"You want me to clean the floor?" I asked. My voice was raspy, modified by a vocal cord shift.
"I want you to kneel and perform your function," Vexx spat. "Or I will have my guards vaporize you to improve the room's aesthetic."
"Kneel," I repeated.
I looked at the bucket. The water inside was swirling.
"You know," I said, my voice dropping back to its natural, resonant timbre. "I've been working on my control. Trying to be gentle. Trying not to break the world just by walking on it."
I looked up. Under the brim of my hat, my eyes flared. The gold light wasn't faint anymore. It was a supernova contained in an iris.
"But some stains," I whispered, "are really stubborn."
I dropped the Killing Intent.
I didn't use 10% of my power. I didn't use 1%. That would have liquefied everyone in the building.
I used a decimal point. I unleashed the accumulated malice of **Day 1,228**. I let the concept of "Infinite Growth" leak out of my soul for a microsecond.
**[Passive Skill: Aura of the Apex Predator.]**
**[Activation: Partial.]**
The air in the room didn't move, but the light died.
It was as if a heavy, suffocating blanket had been thrown over reality. The concept of "up" and "down" ceased to matter. The only direction was *away* from me.
To the humans, it felt like a sudden drop in pressure, a moment of primal fear that made their lizard brains scream *RUN*.
But to Vexx? To the psychic, high-level diplomat attuned to mana?
He didn't see a janitor anymore.
He saw the End.
He saw a mountain made of teeth. He saw a black hole that was looking back at him and licking its lips. He saw a graph line going vertical forever, piercing the ceiling of his understanding and shattering the logic of the universe.
**[System Alert: Target 'High Commissioner Vexx' is experiencing a Sanity Cascade.]**
The Praetorian Guards didn't even have time to react. Their sophisticated armor sensors tried to calculate my power level, encountered a divide-by-zero error, and simply shut down. The elite soldiers collapsed like puppets with cut strings, their armor locking up in emergency stasis mode.
Vexx didn't collapse. He froze.
His liquid metal robes turned rigid. His third eye rolled back into his head. His mouth opened in a silent scream, but no sound came out because he had forgotten how to breathe. He had forgotten how to exist.
"I don't like collars," I said, taking a step forward. The *step* echoed like a gunshot in his mind. "And I don't like people who hit my friends."
I reached out and tapped him on the chest with one finger.
*Boop.*
The touch was light. Gentle.
But to Vexx, it was the judgment of a god.
His eyes rolled back completely. Foam bubbled at the corner of his mouth. The high-level diplomat, the representative of the Galactic Council, simply... powered down.
He dropped out of the air and hit the floor with a wet smack.
The pressure vanished instantly.
Sunlight returned to the room. The birds outside started singing again.
I picked up my mop.
"Clean up on Aisle 4," I said.
Ren let out a breath he had been holding for twenty seconds. He slumped back into his chair, wiping sweat from his forehead. Damon groaned, pulling himself out of the wall debris, shaking plaster off his armor.
"Boss," Damon wheezed, rubbing his chest. "You really have to work on your customer service."
"He started it," I shrugged, taking off the janitor hat and tossing it onto the unconscious body of the Commissioner.
Ren looked at the fallen alien, then at the frozen guards.
"You realized you just assaulted a Council High Commissioner," Ren said, though he was grinning. "This is an act of war. They'll sanction us. They might send a fleet."
"Let them," I said.
I walked over to the table and picked up the datapad Vexx had dropped. I scrolled through it. It was a list of demands. Resource quotas. Conscription orders.
I crushed the pad in my hand.
"The galaxy thinks we're a tutorial level," I said, brushing the dust off my hands. "They think they can come here, flash a badge, and own us."
I turned to the window. High above, the Bifrost Elevator was piercing the sky. Beyond that, the stars were waiting.
And somewhere out there, **Warlord Drakon** was coming.
"Change of plans," I announced. "We aren't waiting for the Rim Coalition to come to us. And we aren't waiting for the Council to send a fleet."
"We're not?" Damon asked, kicking one of the unconscious guards to see if he would move. (He didn't).
"No," I said.
I looked at the timer in my peripheral vision.
**[Time until Day 1,229: 30 Minutes.]**
Another 10% was coming. Another layer of godhood.
"Ren, get the *star-maps* ready. Damon, wake up the Guild Leaders. Tell them the raid is starting early."
"Where are we going?" Ren asked, standing up, his strength returning.
I pointed at the ceiling, past the atmosphere, past the moon, toward the dense cluster of stars near the galactic rim.
"We're going to the Galactic Council HQ," I said calm as a frozen lake. "I want to return their diplomat. And while I'm there..."
I smiled.
"I'm going to file a noise complaint about Warlord Drakon."
Ren stared at me. "You want to invade the capital of the galaxy?"
"Not invade," I corrected, picking up the bucket again. "I'm just going to do some cleaning."
***
**The Aftermath**
**Location: Med-Bay, Tungsten Spire.**
**Time: 1 Hour Later.**
Commissioner Vexx woke up screaming.
He scrambled off the bio-bed, his limbs flailing, his marble skin pale and cracked.
" The Mountain!" he shrieked. "The Eyes! The infinite math!"
"Easy, Commissioner," a human nurse said soothingly, trying to restrain him. "You had a... fainting spell. Low blood sugar, perhaps?"
Vexx shoved her away, backing into the corner of the room. He was trembling violently. The arrogance was gone, replaced by the primal terror of a prey animal that had looked into the abyss and seen the abyss looking at its watch.
"Where is he?" Vexx whispered. "The janitor. The Monster in the Grey Suit."
"Stan?" The nurse looked confused. "I think he went on break. But the leader of Earth, Shigu, left a message for you."
She handed him a small, handwritten note.
Vexx took it with shaking hands. He opened it.
The note was written on a napkin. It read:
*To the Galactic Council:*
*Earth is closed for renovations. We will be conducting an external audit of your leadership soon.*
*P.S. Your guards are in the lobby. We drew mustaches on them.*
*- The Management.*
Vexx stared at the note. He looked at the nurse. He looked at the window, where a massive human fleet was beginning to assemble in orbit—ships that were ugly, blocky, and radiating an aggressive amount of mana.
Vexx did the only logical thing a High Commissioner could do.
He curled into a ball and decided to stay in bed.
***
**Orbit**
**Flagship: The Indomitable Spirit.**
**Player: Shigu.**
The bridge of the human flagship was a chaotic mix of NASA engineering, Zorgon crystal-tech, and duct tape. It was beautiful.
I stood at the helm. I had ditched the jumpsuit for my **[Architect's Robes]**—a shifting fabric of black and gold that didn't have stats because the System couldn't calculate them anymore.
"Fleet Status?" I asked.
**"Green across the board,"** Zero's voice echoed from the ship's core. **"The Order of Truth has mobilized 40 Cruisers. The Mercenary Guilds have contributed 150 Frigates. And we have the Space Elevator hauling up the heavy ordinance."**
"And Ren?"
"Here, Boss."
Ren walked onto the bridge. He looked different. The encounter with Vexx had changed something in him. He realized that titles and levels didn't matter. Only *will* mattered.
"We have a lock on Drakon's trajectory," Ren said, pulling up the star map. "He's three jumps out. He's stopping at a trade hub called **Station 9** to refuel and intimidate the locals."
"Station 9," I nodded. "A public venue. Good."
I looked out the viewport. The Earth hung below us, blue and fragile. I was leaving it behind. For the first time in three years, I was leaving the server.
A thrill went down my spine.
"Zero," I commanded. "Open a channel to the fleet."
**[Channel Open.]**
"This is Shigu," I said. My voice was amplified by the ship's comms, broadcasting to thousands of players who were strapped into prototype starships, clutching magic staves and plasma rifles.
"For three years, we have been digging in the dirt. We have been fighting slimes and goblins and defending our homes. We have played the defensive game."
I paused.
"Today, we switch to offense. Today, we go to the galaxy and we introduce ourselves."
I raised my hand.
"Set coordinates for Station 9. Warp Drive charge to maximum."
"But Boss," a nervous navigator spoke up. "We haven't tested the Warp Drives on a fleet this size! The synchronization could fail!"
I placed my hand on the console.
**[Skill: Mana Stabilization.]**
**[Cost: 0.]**
I flooded the ship's engines with my own power. The unstable Zorgon drives purred like kittens. The golden light of my aura spread from the flagship, linking every ship in the fleet into a single, cohesive unit.
"I am the synchronization," I said.
The stars outside stretched into lines. The reality of the solar system began to bend.
"Punch it."
**[Warp Engaged.]**
The universe snapped.
Earth vanished. The solar system vanished.
We were in the slipstream. The colors of hyperspace swirled around us—violets and neons and blacks.
I stood at the window, watching the tunnel of light.
My power ticked over.
**[Day 1,229 has begun.]**
**[Growth Applied.]**
I felt the surge. It was stronger than yesterday. It always was.
"Drakon wants a challenge," I whispered to the infinite tunnel. "He wants to see the strength of Earth."
I clenched my fist, and the warp tunnel vibrated, widening to accommodate my mass.
"I hope he brought a bigger axe."
**[Chapter 47 Ends.]**