Star Beast Race territory, Red Rampart Starfield.
This starfield had none of the starlight familiar to human civilization. Three dark-red dwarf stars hung deep within the Firmament like the half-closed eyes of some colossal creature, spreading scarlet halos across the void.
François's lair had been built at the heart of this starfield, inside a planet whose core had been hollowed out. The planetary shell retained its primordial rock structure, its grayish-brown strata covered in claw marks left by Star Beasts over countless years and scorched black by energy burns.
The lair's interior had been transformed into a vast hall. Its vaulted ceiling rose several thousand meters high, while the walls were embedded with fragments of energy crystals plundered from human outposts. They gave off a cold pale-blue radiance, a stark contrast to the scarlet sky outside.
François coiled atop the raised platform at the center of the hall. He was larger than any Beast King, exceeding six hundred meters from head to tail. Dark-gray scales covered his entire body, every scale edged with a dim red gleam, like the color of red-hot iron solidifying as it cooled.
His head was triangular, and embedded in the center of his brow bone was a dark-red core the size of a fist. It was the Core of Laws he had condensed over tens of thousands of years, as well as the hardest and most formidable part of his body.
At that moment, his slit pupils were half-closed, his foreclaws folded atop the edge of the platform. His posture seemed casual and relaxed. Yet none of the other nine Beast Kings in the hall dared lower their guard—François only adopted such a posture when pondering matters of great importance.
The nine Beast Kings stood in ranks along either side of the platform. They were