BANG!
An energy beam tore through the battlefield and exploded against the ground beside Ryan's Kairos. The shockwave lifted his entire unit off its feet and hurled it sideways like a broken toy.
Inside the cockpit, warning alarms screamed.
Ryan twisted his control sticks mid-air, forcing the bulky machine to rotate. His vision spun violently before stabilizing just enough for him to slam into the ground shoulder-first. Metal shrieked. Systems flickered.
Before the Khaerix could follow up, he snapped his mecha's arm forward and pulled the trigger.
The mounted rifle roared to life.
Bullets poured out in a relentless stream, streaking toward the towering creature ahead of him. Each round struck with enough force to tear through reinforced steel.
They did nothing.
The projectiles sparked uselessly against the alien's layered bio-armor, ricocheting off or flattening without penetrating. Ryan kept firing anyway, his finger locked to the trigger as if sheer stubbornness could make the rounds more effective.
"Get out! Just die already!" he shouted, his voice cracking through the cockpit.
His Kairos was an older model—one of the early-generation frames still deployed in outer defensive zones. It relied on conventional ammunition rather than the more advanced kinetic disruptors or compressed energy weaponry used by elite units.
Unfortunately, the monster standing before him did not care about technological nostalgia.
The Khaerix shifted.
One of its numerous scythe-like arms lashed outward.
Ryan barely registered the movement.
The impact came a fraction of a second later.
A thunderous crash split the air as the alien limb collided with his Kairos. Half of the mech's armor caved inward like crushed foil. The entire cockpit shook violently as the shockwave tore through the internal frame.
Ryan's teeth snapped together.
Pain exploded behind his eyes.
He tasted metal.
Warm, sticky blood slid down from his hairline, dripping past his eyebrow and into his vision.
Above him, the Khaerix raised two curved, bladed arms high into the air, preparing to cleave his crippled machine in half.
Through the cracked canopy display, Ryan saw the sky framed between those descending blades.
'Ah… I'm going to die.'
The thought arrived calmly.
His body went cold.
'No. I don't want to die. I don't want to die. I don't want to—'
The blades fell.
And for a moment—
Ryan thought everything had ended.
But he was still thinking.
Still breathing.
The expected crushing force never came.
Instead—
"Are you okay?"
A young voice echoed through the comms channel.
Ryan blinked, disoriented.
He looked up.
And his breath caught.
Standing above him was a Kairos unlike any he had ever seen.
It was sleek, almost elegant, its silhouette sharp and refined rather than bulky. Pale blue energy lines traced along its frame like veins of light beneath polished armor. It stood between him and the Khaerix with effortless stillness.
Deadly.
Beautiful.
For an irrational second, Ryan remembered the battered condition of his own outdated unit and felt a sting of shame.
Then that feeling was replaced by something else.
Pride.
Overwhelming pride that such a presence stood on humanity's side.
He opened his mouth to respond, but the armored figure tilted its head slightly.
"I see… he has a concussion. You can head back now. I'll handle the rest."
A holographic projection flickered into view on Ryan's damaged display.
A face appeared.
Young.
Too young.
Ryan's eyes widened.
It was him.
Still…
"Sir!" Ryan forced his voice steady despite the dizziness. "There are too many of them! That's over ten thousand Khaerix! You can't handle them on your own!"
It was precisely because he knew who this was that he couldn't accept it.
No matter how powerful.
No matter how famous.
No one should face that many alone.
"I see… thank you for the information."
The reply was calm.
Almost polite.
And then—
The Kairos vanished.
Not retreated.
Not dodged.
Vanished.
It disappeared in a flash of blue light so sudden that Ryan's sensors failed to register the displacement.
Panic surged through him.
He switched channels frantically.
"Sir! We can't let him fight all of them! We need to provide backup!"
Beside him, another Kairos stood firm amidst the smoke and scattered wreckage.
Talen.
The older soldier's gaze remained fixed on the distant battlefield.
"Idiot," Talen muttered. "He's the one providing backup for us."
Ryan fell silent.
Talen continued, voice low.
"It's rare for us to witness this. So make sure you don't look away."
There was no excitement in his tone.
No celebration.
Only quiet acknowledgment.
In his heart, Talen knew it was shameful—forcing someone barely past childhood to stand where seasoned veterans could not.
But the reality was merciless.
Strength determined survival.
And the child they were watching possessed strength that bordered on the inhuman.
On the open channel, a familiar voice spoke.
"1,534 Destroyer-class and below. Fifty-three Devastators. Three Annihilators. How should I proceed, sister?"
Ethan's voice carried no strain.
No urgency.
Only a matter-of-fact calm.
On the other end of the line, a female voice answered.
"Just that much? Then proceed with full extermination. We'll be landing soon."
The transmission cut.
But the final words lingered.
'Be careful.'
Ethan smiled faintly inside his cockpit.
"Don't worry," he murmured. "I don't plan on dying before you."
The Khaerix swarm had already closed in during the brief exchange. Tens of thousands of alien forms filled the battlefield—towering frames, bladed limbs, writhing appendages, and grotesque silhouettes blotting out the horizon.
They lunged at him simultaneously.
"Die."
The word left his lips softly.
And the world changed.
In a single instant—faster than human sight or mechanical tracking systems could comprehend—his Kairos moved.
It did not dash.
It did not leap.
It simply ceased to be where it had stood.
A ghostly blue afterimage streaked across the battlefield, weaving between monstrous forms in a pattern too precise to follow.
"Moonlit Style, Moonflower."
Silence descended.
At the center of the carnage, a single luminous flower began to bloom.
Its petals unfolded slowly, formed from condensed blue light. Even the artificial clouds above seemed to part, allowing pale radiance to bathe the technique in an almost sacred glow.
For one suspended heartbeat, the battlefield felt peaceful.
Ethan hovered at its core, observing.
Satisfied.
"Good."
The flower dissolved.
The light vanished.
And the truth was revealed.
Every Khaerix within the radius—Destroyers, Devastators, even the towering Annihilators—had been cut apart.
Not shattered.
Not torn.
Sliced.
Cleanly.
Precisely.
Their remains fell in neat segments, collapsing in delayed unison like statues finally acknowledging gravity.
The human soldiers who had stood within the swarm remained untouched.
Not a single scratch marked their armor.
Not a single stray shockwave had reached them.
"What…"
Ryan stared, unable to process what he had witnessed.
A raindrop fell from the clearing sky and landed in his open mouth.
He didn't notice.
"I guess we're just too weak to even comprehend his movements," he whispered.
Talen rose slowly within his own cockpit.
"What a monster."
There was no insult in the word.
Only awe.
He turned toward Ryan.
"This isn't the time. The area may be cleared, but we still need to purify it."
War did not end with slaughter.
There were toxins to neutralize.
Terrain to reclaim.
Humanity had learned that lesson painfully.
On the open channel once more:
"This area's clean. Moving to the next checkpoint."
Ethan's voice returned.
He issued a mental command.
The plates along his Kairos's back separated with mechanical precision. Pale blue light flooded outward as thrusters ignited.
The machine ascended into the sky like a falling star reversing its path.
Gone in seconds.
Approximately one hundred and fifty years ago, humanity received its first visitors from another world.
At first, the discovery sparked equal parts wonder and terror. The confirmation of extraterrestrial life was the greatest revelation in human history.
Then reality settled in.
The beings who called themselves the Khaerix could not survive on Earth as it was.
Their biology rejected the planet.
And due to the severity of their situation, they made a decision.
They would reform the world.
Terraforming began.
In less than twenty years, humanity lost over half the planet.
Eighty percent of the world's landmass was seized and reshaped into an environment suited to the Khaerix homeworld.
Cities fell.
Nations collapsed.
Hope thinned.
When extinction loomed near, humanity did what it had always done.
It united.
The United Government was formed.
Resources pooled. Research accelerated. The Kairos program was born.
One hundred and forty years ago, humanity lost its final overseas territory.
They retreated to their last stronghold—a fragment of land later known as the Central Continent.
A war spanning more than a century followed.
Generations were born into conflict.
Raised in sirens and ash.
In that world, peace was myth.
Childhood was brief.
And survival was everything.
No one could have imagined that the turning point of that endless war would begin with two children.
Perhaps, in another era, their story would be dismissed as exaggeration.
A myth constructed to inspire morale.
But those who lived through it knew the truth.
They existed.
And without them—without their strength—humanity would have fallen.
This is the story of two children.
A pair of twins.
A devil and a reaper.
A savior and a commander.
This is the story of a slightly talented girl—
And her younger brother.