Ajak did not dare to hesitate for a moment; she immediately closed her eyes and took the initiative to contact Arishem the Judge.
She reported the incredible sight she had seen truthfully.
"Great Arishem the Judge! Inside Earth... there are two Celestials! This is beyond my understanding!"
Upon receiving this absurd report, the six eyes of Arishem the Judge, deep in space, glowed intensely.
Twins? He had only planted one seed on Earth.
Arishem the Judge finally realized the gravity of the situation.
He immediately activated the cosmic energy sensing fluctuations unique to the Celestials, sweeping across the sector where Earth was located.
Just as his perception touched the star system where Earth resided...
...he did not sense twin Celestials, but instead detected another special power.
The energy fluctuations of the Infinity Stones!
"Someone is interfering with the birth of a Celestial!"
Arishem the Judge instantly reached a conclusion, his voice pregnant with fury.
"This is unforgivable."
Arishem the Judge spoke to the trembling Ajak.
"I shall personally travel to this incubation Planet."
With that, the mental space collapsed.
Ajak opened her eyes, her back already drenched in cold sweat.
The Prime Celestial was descending; for Earth, this might be a cataclysmic disaster.
Inside the Earth.
Ajak's sudden probing just now, though only a brief glimpse, had still alerted Ego, who was fully concentrated on assimilating Tiamut.
Ego's consciousness immediately extended from deep within the core, rapidly climbing up along the ley line network.
...
New York, inside the Principal's office of the Vought Vanguard Hero Academy.
Homelander was leaning back in his custom-made, oversized principal's chair.
Alisa, the Inhuman girl with the ability to create clones, was showcasing her amazing talent.
Five Alisas, looking exactly the same, were distributed around Homelander.
Two Alisas stood behind Homelander, one on each side, kneading his shoulders and pounding his back with just the right amount of force.
One Alisa held a plate of peeled grapes, occasionally feeding one into Homelander's mouth.
The remaining two Alisas leaned over to report on the 'measurement of a straight cylinder' to Homelander.
"Great Master," Ego's voice suddenly rang in Homelander's ear, carrying a rare sense of urgency.
Homelander's brow twitched slightly.
The several Alisas clearly felt the momentary tensing of Homelander's muscles.
"What's wrong, Mr. Principal? Did we do something wrong?" one of the Alisas asked cautiously.
Homelander opened his eyes, patted the cheek of the Alisa beside him, and gave a reassuring smile.
"No, you're doing great, it's perfect."
"But right now, I have some urgent work to handle."
"Besides, it's time for you to go teach your class," Homelander patted her shapely rear. "Once I'm done, I'll come back to have an in-depth discussion about 'teaching' with all of you."
Alisa breathed a sigh of relief, a sweet smile appearing on her face.
"Okay, Mr. Principal."
With a thought, the clones distributed around Homelander turned into afterimages and were quickly retracted into her main body.
She then adjusted her uniform and left the Principal's office with light steps.
After the office door closed.
"You can speak now, Ego," Homelander responded.
"Just now, an unusual fluctuation probed the core. Unsurprisingly, I've been exposed." Ego paused for a second. "Arishem the Judge is likely on his way to Earth."
"Mhm, as expected."
Hearing Ego's deduction, Homelander stopped cleaning his long spear and responded indifferently.
Trying to pull a bait-and-switch right under the Celestials' noses, being discovered was only a matter of time.
He had been mentally prepared for this.
Moreover, he now had the confidence to confront them.
On his desk, a short rod with a V-shaped head lay quietly.
That was the first generation 'God-Glow Rod' that Skynet had just finished manufacturing.
With this powerful weapon, Homelander was confident that even if he faced a T1-level Celestial like Arishem the Judge, he had the strength to fight head-on.
However, confidence was one thing; Homelander was not a reckless man.
Arishem the Judge was, after all, one of the oldest beings in the Universe.
No one could say for sure where his true power ceiling was. Striking blindly was by no means a wise move.
"Ego," Homelander issued a tactical command.
"Let Super Ego go test the waters first. Let's see just how much this Prime Celestial is worth."
"By your command, Master," Ego immediately accepted the order.
At this moment, beside the yellow star.
Super Ego was floating quietly within the corona.
During this period, absorbing the radiation of the yellow star day and night at close range had put his cells in a state of extreme active saturation.
His entire body radiated a faint golden light.
Although maintaining the Reality Stone's operation over Earth's surface consumed a great deal of his power...
...under the replenishment of endless solar energy, his current strength was already several times greater than when he first arrived.
Ego and Super Ego were two bodies with one mind; the moment Homelander gave the command, Super Ego moved.
The Reality Stone on the Infinity Gauntlet erupted with brilliant light, and majestic red energy poured into space like a giant maw.
He had to set up the battlefield before Arishem the Judge arrived.
In the vacuum of space millions of kilometers away from Earth's orbit.
The red energy began to reshape matter and light.
A mirror Earth, identical in mass, volume, appearance, and gravitational field to the real Earth, rapidly took shape in space.
Then came the oceans, landmasses, clouds, and even the atmospheric refractive index, all perfectly replicated.
Following that, Super Ego snapped his fingers again.
A burst of red mist wrapped around the real Earth layer by layer.
From a macroscopic perspective of the Universe, Earth simply vanished into thin air.
Having done all this, Super Ego turned into a golden stream of light and flew toward that mirror Earth.
He hovered outside the atmosphere of the mirror Earth, arms crossed over his chest, gazing into the deep Universe.
Waiting for the God's descent.
...
South Dakota, a farm.
Ajak sat on the porch steps of the wooden house, watching the horses running in the distance, her heart filled with struggle and pain.
During these thousands of years on Earth, she had witnessed the prosperity of Babylon, the founding of Athens, experienced the wave of the Renaissance, personally touched the sculptures created by humans, and listened to their moving music.
Although humans had many flaws—selfishness, greed, and bellicosity...
...the resilience and mutual aid they showed when facing desperate situations had completely moved Ajak.
She had ultimately fallen in love with this Planet and with humanity, a species of infinite possibilities.
She had endured immense moral pressure throughout these long years.
And now that Arishem the Judge was about to descend, no matter what happened, she did not want the entire civilization to be turned to ashes because of Arishem the Judge's wrath.
She had to do something.