Chapter Summaries

The Hive Will encountered Orsaga and Shi Tiankong, then tried to capture Shi Tiankong to study Warp Space. Orsaga abandoned Shi Tiankong to grow through battle, and Shi Tiankong slaughtered Zerg and absorbed nearby planets while the Hive Will observed.

• The Hive Will sensed Warp Space through Orsaga and Shi Tiankong and became interested in capturing Shi Tiankong for research.
• Orsaga closed the portal and left Shi Tiankong to face the Hive Will’s Zerg forces alone.
• Shi Tiankong roared and used Life Complement - Evolutionary Ladder to dissolve nearby Zerg into life energy.
• Shi Tiankong summoned blood-red inverted crosses that killed large numbers of Zerg, while the Hive Will sent more forward to study its abilities.
• The planets’ inhabitants worshipped Shi Tiankong as a savior, but it absorbed everything valuable from their worlds and killed them.

Shi Tiankong fought the Zerg, whose Hive Will adapted its forces with deadly toxins and corrosive attacks until he was nearly overwhelmed. He destroyed most of the fleet with a devastating blast, then fled as the surviving Zerg pursued him.

• The Hive Will sent more Zerg armies and modified special troops with powerful toxins, acid, and energy-contaminating abilities to target Shi Tiankong.
• The Zerg's attacks gradually contaminated Shi Tiankong's armor and slowed him, while a gravitational field threatened to block his escape.
• In Crimson Heaven, Elsa watched the battle with Philala as Orsaga explained that it was a live broadcast and granted them access to the realm.
• Orsaga predicted Shi Tiankong would lose but survive, and Shi Tiankong released a vast Blood Light that erased half the star system and nearly all the Zerg fleet.
• Shi Tiankong self-destructed most of his contaminated body, kept his core components, and raced through the debris as the remaining Zerg pursued him.

Orsaga reunited with Philala and Elsa, agreed to try Philala’s cooking, and revealed that one side in the battle on the screen was his avatar. After showing them his true form, he admitted that his body’s armor could not be removed and that he was effectively always naked.

• Orsaga agreed to eat Philala’s French beef stew with cheese, and he changed Crimson Heaven’s time flow so that two days passed there for every day on Earth.
• Elsa warned Orsaga that watching Shi Tiankong and the Zerg battle could cause trouble if either side noticed them, and Orsaga revealed that one side was his avatar.
• Elsa mistakenly assumed the Zerg were Orsaga’s avatar and called them ugly, prompting Orsaga to reveal his true form and inspect his appearance in a mirror.
• Philala and Elsa admired Orsaga’s true form and touched his exoskeletal armor, while he explained that it was part of his body and could not be removed.
• Philala asked whether that meant Orsaga was always running around naked, and he admitted that it did.

Orsaga reassured Elsa that Shi Tiankong’s perilous battle would not harm him, then explained that he was a top leader of the villain faction. By 2075, humanity had advanced its space program, and Orsaga told Ra that Earth remained safe because nearby star systems had been cleared of threats.

• Orsaga told Elsa and Philala that Shi Tiankong’s apparent death would not affect him, but changed his mind when Zerg reinforcements trapped the avatar in a desperate battle.
• Elsa asked Orsaga about his standing in the plane, and he said he was one of the villain faction’s top leaders.
• More than a decade later, humanity had developed lunar and Martian colonies, while society focused on sublight travel after rejecting FTL and space-jump research as too risky.
• Orsaga met Ra over an unusual alien meal, and Ra asked to buy more technology and learn humanity’s safe range.
• Orsaga told Ra that humanity could not reach dangerous threats, since the Ozhaki had wiped out nearby star systems and the remaining life-bearing planets posed no immediate danger.

Orsaga met with the six women closest to him in Crimson Heaven while arranging a new Divine Kingdom for his believers. He postponed the Eldar’s tribute of a thousand maids, but the Art Sanctuary announced a ceremony to select them every hundred years.

• Orsaga summoned Gerlan, Allison, Keliya, Kaila, Philala, and Elsa, who questioned him about his relationships before resuming their conversation.
• Orsaga learned that the Eldar planned to offer him a thousand devoted artist-maids, so he postponed the tribute and made it a hundred-year tradition.
• Orsaga created pocket dimensions within Crimson Heaven to gather his dead believers’ souls and form a composite Divine Kingdom.
• The Eldar archbishop received Orsaga’s artistic knowledge and interpreted his message as approval of the tribute plan.
• The Art Sanctuary announced an Art Grand Ceremony every hundred years to choose a thousand female artists as maids to the God of Art, and its believers celebrated.

On December 31, 2099, humanity celebrated the announcement that it could begin developing the Moon and Mars, while Elsa, Golanel, Orsaga, and Kaila watched the fireworks in London. Kaila and Golanel reflected on the dangers waiting beyond Earth and hoped humanity would use its twenty thousand years of safety to advance.

• Humanity announced that it had perfected key technologies for interplanetary migration, prompting worldwide celebrations at the end of 2099.
• Elsa asked Golanel whether living for thousands of years ever became tiring, and Golanel told her she would adjust to life as a Longevity Race member.
• Orsaga joined Elsa and Golanel, comforted Elsa, and explained that her mother and Keliya had sent him downstairs while preparing roast suckling pig.
• Kaila warned Golanel that the Warp and the Chaos Evil Gods, including Tzeentch and Khorne, made the plane dangerous even for ordinary pursuits like reading.
• Kaila and Golanel hoped humanity would use its twenty thousand years of safety to develop rapidly.

During dinner, Ra traded Orsaga a fragment of the Star God Void Dragon for advanced technology. Orsaga explained the Star Gods’ history and the fragment’s origins, then swallowed it to help him find a way to travel between the Physical Universe and Warp Space.

• Allison introduced a dish from her hometown while Orsaga claimed the roasted pig’s head for himself.
• Ra arrived and exchanged a Star God Fragment for a USB drive containing technology far beyond Humanity’s current capabilities.
• Orsaga identified the fragment as belonging to the Void Dragon and explained how the Star Gods once ruled the Milky Way before civil war and betrayal brought their fall.
• Orsaga told the others that Ra had defeated and sealed the wounded Void Dragon on Earth, then taken the fragment from its prison.
• Orsaga crushed the fragment’s isolation shield, swallowed it, and said it could help him discover how to travel between the Physical Universe and Warp Space.

Orsaga studied the Star God Fragment in Crimson Heaven while Golanel practiced controlling two bodies at once. On Earth, Ra examined the knowledge on Orsaga’s USB drive and began considering how humanity should prepare for him, a suspicion Orsaga sensed.

• Orsaga repeatedly dismantled and restored the Star God Fragment to decipher the Void Dragon’s information and seek a way around the restrictions on Chaos Gods.
• Golanel joined Orsaga in Crimson Heaven with her true body while her avatar attended a gathering on Earth, and Orsaga urged her to focus on the gathering.
• Orsaga kept Golanel, Allison, and the other five safe by having them travel outside only as avatars accompanied by his own avatar.
• Ra opened Orsaga’s USB drive in a London laboratory and found detailed scientific knowledge that could help build an interstellar civilization.
• Ra grew wary of Orsaga and considered how humanity should deal with him in twenty thousand years, unaware that Orsaga sensed his thoughts.
• Orsaga smiled as he sensed Ra’s suspicion and wondered how Ra would respond.

After studying the Star God Fragment for tens of thousands of years, Orsaga granted the Ozhaki the ability to move freely between Warp Space and the Physical Universe. He gathered his trillion-strong legion in the Crimson Heaven and sent them through a gigantic Space Door to fight and devour a group of beings in the Physical Universe.

• Orsaga used his findings from the Star God Fragment to weaken the Physical Universe's rejection of him and give the Ozhaki greater freedom to travel between realms.
• Imokku mastered the new Talent Ability, received Orsaga's order, and gathered his elite Ozhaki Derivatives into his Pocket Space.
• The Ozhaki converged on the Crimson Heaven after years of hunting throughout Warp Space, where their fearsome reputation made other creatures flee.
• Orsaga ordered the Ozhaki to defeat, kill, and devour their opponents in the Physical Universe.
• Imokku, Kojire, Ulamo, and the rest of the Ozhaki charged through Orsaga's Space Door.

Shi Tiankong and the Zerg’s decades-long conflict was interrupted when Orsaga opened a vast spatial passage and sent the Ozhaki to test their strength against the Zerg. Shi Tiankong transferred command of the Ozhaki back to Imokku, Wulamo, and Kojire as the battle began.

• Shi Tiankong and the Zerg continued evolving countermeasures through decades of fighting, and the Hive Will slowed its encirclements to observe him.
• A spatial passage tore through the Zerg blockade, killing or crippling most of the three-trillion-strong force nearby.
• Orsaga appeared through the passage and sent several trillion Ozhaki into the star system.
• The Hive Will ordered 2,755 trillion Zerg forces within five hundred light-years to converge and destroy the Ozhaki.
• Shi Tiankong emerged from the shattered star, and the Ozhaki transferred command authority to him.
• Shi Tiankong returned command to Imokku, Wulamo, and Kojire and told the Ozhaki to fight as they saw fit.

The Ozhaki released their vast Derivative Legions as the Hive Will gathered the Zerg forces across the star system to confront them. After the Zerg arrived in overwhelming numbers, the two armies clashed, with the Void Legion’s coordinated Ozhaki Derivatives unleashing an array of attacks.

• Imokku ordered the Ozhaki to release their Derivative Legions and prepare for battle, swelling their numbers to hundreds of trillions.
• The Hive Will sensed the Ozhaki threat and summoned Zerg forces from across the star system, prompting Zerg armies to abandon other targets and converge.
• Kojire ordered the remaining nearby Zerg force destroyed, and the Hive Will withdrew rather than launch an ineffective counterattack.
• The Zerg forces assembled across dozens of light-years and advanced toward the Void Legion, consuming matter and energy along the way.
• The Zerg and Ozhaki forces clashed, as the Void Legion coordinated spatial, temporal, pollution, mechanical, ghost, melee, and spell-type Derivatives in a barrage of attacks.

The Zerg and Ozhaki forces fought a massive battle across the star system, with their clashing numbers and unusual abilities creating a stalemate despite the Zerg's numerical advantage. As the Hive Will deployed new biological weapons, the Ozhaki countered by transforming wounded Zerg into Derivatives.

• The Zerg unleashed biological attacks and special abilities while Ozhaki space units resisted their attempts to distort space, and both sides' elite fighters clashed.
• The battle continued into the second day, leaving the star system's inhabitants terrified and unable to do anything but watch.
• By the third day, the Zerg held roughly ten times the numbers of the Ozhaki, but the Ozhaki's varied abilities kept the conflict in a stalemate.
• The Hive Will released clouds of microscopic insects that consumed battlefield remains, but Ozhaki Sovereign-Father-level curse Derivatives used a Bloodline Curse to kill the swarms and their parent Zerg.
• The Hive Will sent planet-sized armored beetles to bombard the Ozhaki with acid carrying horsehair-worm Zerg that could infect targets or relay information.
• Ozhaki Derivatives infiltrated wounded Zerg, warped their bodies, and turned them into members of the Derivative Legion.

As the Zerg and Ozhaki war devastated their star system, humanity expanded across the Solar System, endured a devastating civil war, and united as the Human Federation. When the Ozhaki moved into a new system, the Zerg ambushed and encircled them, leaving the Void Legion badly damaged and Ulamo dead.

• As the war continued to consume planets and resources, nearby civilizations fled the star system, unaware that Zerg infestations threatened neighboring systems too.
• Humanity transformed the Moon and Mars into ecological colonies, expanded to more planets, and reached a population of 170 billion by the year 4685.
• A human civil war destroyed more than half of Human Civilization before the unnamed Mr. Ra secretly helped one side win; after recovering, the nations united as the Human Federation.
• The Zerg and Ozhaki exhausted and ruined their star system, then migrated while fighting into other systems.
• The local Zerg anticipated the Ozhaki's arrival, trapped the Ozhaki Legion in a resource-starved, heavily mined system, and inflicted devastating losses in an ambush.
• After decades of fighting, the Void Legion escaped with one-third of its forces lost, Ulamo dead, and the Ozhaki leadership aware that their racial foundation and ability to obtain support were weaker than the Zerg's.

On Mars, Philala worried that history had left her behind, so Orsaga showed her how beings above time could create and destroy timelines. He left her with the claim that they and their companions could eliminate history, but history could never eliminate them.

• Philala remembered that the crater-turned-lake had once been a park and reflected on how her era and country had disappeared.
• Orsaga told Philala that history eliminated only the weak and that they, Golanel, and the others stood above it.
• Orsaga showed Philala a timeline in which a meteor wiped out the dinosaurs and mammals eventually developed human civilization.
• Orsaga split off a timeline where intelligent dinosaurs ruled Earth, then destroyed that civilization by sending Earth into the sun.
• Orsaga told Philala that beings like them created and manipulated time, space, and history, and could eliminate them at will.

Orsaga created a newborn universe and gave Philala access to it within her room in Crimson Heaven. He explained why the Physical Universe was different from the Sub-Universes and admitted he had no confidence in his plans, though he was willing to wait for another opportunity.

• Orsaga formed a newborn universe in his palm and offered it to Philala, who accepted it.
• Orsaga merged the universe into Philala's room in Crimson Heaven, where she could enter it and control its development.
• Philala asked why Orsaga pursued the Physical Universe when he could create worlds, and he explained its special role and the restrictions imposed by the other Chaos Gods.
• Philala asked how confident Orsaga was in his plans, and he answered that he had no confidence but could wait for future opportunities.

Orsaga watched the Zerg and Ozhaki wage an ever-expanding war, while humanity’s stagnating, divided society drifted toward another conflict. In 7985 CE, the Fourth Full-Scale Civil War broke out across human civilization, with weapons that made it more brutal than the previous three.

• The Zerg used the Warp Shadow to block Warp Space and psionic power, and the Ozhaki evolved countermeasures that weakened the Hive Will’s control.
• The Zerg and Ozhaki escalated their war across multiple star systems, destroying countless lives and civilizations, while Orsaga welcomed the mutual killing and evolution.
• By 7985 CE, humanity had spread across forty-seven Colony Stars, and political fragmentation, entrenched social classes, and widespread idleness weakened the Human Federation.
• Golanel and Orsaga discussed the likelihood of war as they watched traffic around the Sun, with Orsaga describing conflict as a recurring cycle.
• Three months later, humanity’s fourth large-scale civil war erupted, and advanced weapons made it more brutal than the previous three.

Orsaga and Ra watched humanity’s factions destroy their warships, while Ra accepted the fighting as a necessary sacrifice to break civilization’s stagnation. Days later, Golanel, Allison, Kaila, and Orsaga visited an Eldar festival, where Orsaga said the race had no especially good future.

• Orsaga asked Ra whether he would stop the human factions’ battle, and Ra refused, calling the destruction a necessary sacrifice.
• Ra believed war could release humanity’s internal tensions and spur technological progress, and he planned to intervene only if civilization’s foundations were threatened.
• Days later, the Art Grand Ceremony drew crowds of Eldar and neighboring alien races to the Eldar planet hosting the Art Sanctuary.
• Golanel, Allison, Kaila, and Orsaga explored the crowded streets and observed the Eldar’s culture and architecture.
• Kaila asked Orsaga about the Eldar’s future, and he said its many possible outcomes were all poor.

At the Art Grand Ceremony, Keliya asked Orsaga what his believers prayed for, and he explained that even beings who did not know the gods could become their believers through their desires. He showed her a distant planet where a beast’s prayers linked it to three Chaos Gods, then opened a door to an unknown region.

• The Art Sanctuary’s Archbishop began the Art Grand Ceremony, while Allison and Orsaga watched the performances and discussed the Eldar.
• Keliya asked Orsaga what his believers usually begged him for, and he listed requests ranging from power and love to fruit and beatings.
• Orsaga explained that he was a conceptual entity whose believers did not need to know his name or divine authority.
• Orsaga transported Keliya’s consciousness to a primitive planet and showed her a beast praying to an unknown existence for strength and hunting skill.
• Orsaga revealed that the beast’s desires had connected it to Khorne, Tzeentch, and himself, then opened an illusory door to an unknown region.

Orsaga showed Keliya a creature’s memories and explained how his concepts of growth and tempering let him benefit from the other Chaos Gods’ powers, making him stronger than any one of them. He reassured Keliya that he would protect her, and she settled down to enjoy the Art Grand Ceremony.

• Orsaga led Keliya into a creature’s mind, where they watched its memories unfold.
• Orsaga explained that growth, evolution, aberration, and hardship connected countless believers to his power.
• Orsaga told Keliya that his concepts gave him an advantage over the other Chaos Gods, though two working together could overpower him and none could permanently kill another.
• Orsaga returned with Keliya to the Art Grand Ceremony and reassured her that he would protect her from the other Chaos Gods.
• Keliya kissed Orsaga and began enjoying the carefully selected performances.

Humanity developed sub-light travel and began exploring beyond the Solar System, while the Eldar reached the height of their galactic power and fell into hedonism. Orsaga foresaw their corruption as the countdown to Slaanesh’s awakening continued, and by 15887 CE humanity’s Age of Discovery was underway despite the dangers of exploration.

• In 15278 CE, humanity completed the Sub-light Engine after six internal wars and gained the ability to travel beyond the Solar System.
• The Eldar defeated their remaining rival, ruled the Milky Way, and began receiving tribute from countless civilizations.
• After the Eldar destroyed a star over a perceived insult, their arrogance and hedonism grew, while more traditional factions continued research, martial training, and art.
• Orsaga watched the Eldar and recognized that their corruption would feed Slaanesh’s impending awakening; the other Chaos Gods chose not to interfere.
• By 15887 CE, humanity mass-produced sub-light spacecraft and began developing nearby planetary systems, with explorers facing long voyages and a round-trip success rate of about one-quarter.