Defending the Divine Artifact x2

In the hazy dusk, the fires on the ground gradually died out. Stars glittered across Aiur's sky, while clusters of meteor showers encircled the firmament spinning overhead.

Aiur's wind was no longer warm and humid as it had once been. It felt like the final breath exhaled by a dying lady.

The sky was completely unobstructed, and even from the ground, one could see the traces of battle in orbit.

Some warships flew very low, their fusion trails stretching for miles in a magnificent display, like long brooms with their tails set ablaze. More warships remained above the ionosphere, no more than flickering points of light.

In the upper atmosphere, human plasma weapons and Protoss beam weapons attacked each other relentlessly. Orange and blue rays crisscrossed in a tangled web. The swarm's attacks were less conspicuous, but most of the exploding warships were their handiwork.

Every few minutes or so, a new star would flare in the sky. Then a warship torn apart by gravitational forces would break into countless white-hot fragments, slowly turning red, then blue, falling like rain.

With tremendous crashes, pieces of wreckage occasionally fell near the Protoss temple. Some gleamed like precious metals, like gems abandoned by gods among the sandbars.

Countless human and Protoss soldiers died miserably within the molten hulls of overheated ships. If they had still been alive at the time, the agony they endured before death was no less than the most inhumane torture in the world.

On the ground, the various units entered new positions after a brief rest. Though everyone was exhausted and had barely managed to retreat to the assembly point alive, they could still fight.

The new position had been built around a Protoss temple. Its internal energy source was vast enough to charge the Xel'Naga artifact.

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