Spacetime Rift

The little bit of flippancy on his face shattered at once, leaving behind nothing but bone-deep terror.

His body involuntarily staggered back a step, his feet sending ripples of energy across the void.

That face, always wearing a smile, was now pale as paper, even its muscles twitching.

"This kind of power... has completely surpassed the limits of a God of Destruction! That Beerus... and that Saiyan... just what are they—"

Before he could finish, his voice abruptly cut off.

Because at the very center of the clash of destructive energies, something even more horrifying was happening.

The silver-white and dark-purple energy spheres were not merely colliding.

The instant they made contact, they began madly devouring and merging with each other, like two colossal beasts of the starry sky tearing into one another, intertwining, seeping through, ripping apart, and unleashing countless blinding arcs of lightning.

The two colors tangled together, churning and spinning until they formed a massive vortex more than a thousand kilometers in diameter.

The vortex slowly turned in the deathly silent starry sky. Chunks of space at its edges were torn apart and sucked in, leaving behind nothing but absolute darkness in its wake.

Even the faint glow of distant stars was distorted and swallowed the moment it drew near, as though mercilessly erased by something.

At the deepest part of the vortex, the structure of space had been completely pierced through.

It was no ordinary rift, but a black hole leading to an unknown dimension. Its edges twisted grotesquely, while time and space turned into shattered streams of light.

The fundamental laws of the universe peeled away like broken glass.

Any light that approached seemed to fall into a bottomless abyss, leaving not even a trace behind. Only dead silence remained.

From the depths of the void came an indescribable aura.

It was neither the violent destruction of a God of Destruction nor the gentle creation of a Supreme Kai. It was a more primal, more fundamental fluctuation—like the chaotic origin exposed when spacetime itself was torn apart.

Qi Heng bore the brunt of it, the first to feel that suddenly erupting pull.

That power was like the cry of the universe at its birth—ancient, heavy, irresistible—and like the absolute pressure of a black hole swallowing light.

The silver-white aura around him flickered wildly before that gravitational force, its glow visibly dimming like a candle about to be snuffed out in the wind.

His body began sliding forward out of control, inch by inch, foot by foot... slowly being dragged toward that abyss of darkness.

The turbulent energy currents beneath his feet left trails of light that gradually faded away.

He wanted to retreat.

Gritting his teeth, veins bulging from his neck, every muscle in his body struggled desperately as he squeezed out the last of his strength to resist that gravity that devoured everything.

But his body had already reached its limit.

The Super Saiyan 5 form had been unstable to begin with. Its silver-white aura waxed and waned, like a star one moment and a firefly the next.

His stamina was severely depleted. His vision grew increasingly blurred, his ears rang, and every breath burned like fire—his strength was truly almost gone.

"Qi Heng!"

Champa's shout tore through the roaring energy, overflowing with anxiety and fear as it echoed sharply through the void.

Beerus also immediately realized something was wrong.

His purple eyes narrowed sharply as he tried to retract the destruction energy still pouring forth, but the Destruction Sphere had long since slipped out of his control, roaring and expanding like an unbridled beast.

His body felt the pull as well, though not as strongly as Qi Heng—after all, the core of the Destruction Sphere still retained some connection to him, while Qi Heng's Super 5: Star Extinction had already burned through all his strength.

"Whis!"

Beerus made his decision instantly and shouted sharply.

Almost as soon as the words left his mouth, Whis appeared beside him.

It was not an afterimage left by high-speed movement, but as if he had been standing there from the very beginning—an existence beyond time and space.

The Angel's staff lightly tapped Beerus's shoulder. A pale blue halo spread outward like ripples on water, enveloping the God of Destruction.

That light was like a gentle yet firm giant hand, slowly "pulling" Beerus free from the void's gravitational pull.

But Qi Heng—

No one could save him in time.

On the other side, Vados had already raised her staff, Angel power gathering at its tip. But thousands of kilometers of deadly void lay between her and Qi Heng, filled with turbulent energy currents and spatial rifts.

That distance would normally take no more than a blink to cross, but now it was like an uncrossable chasm.

Even worse, the void's gravitational pull was still growing madly stronger.

If she left her current position, the already fragile barrier before her would collapse at once. When that happened, not only Quitela, but even Champa beside her would be swallowed by the shockwave.

A rare, unmistakable flicker of anxiety crossed her pale purple eyes.

"Lord Champa, please let go!"

Vados's voice was no longer composed. It had become urgent and stern.

But Champa clutched her sleeve tightly, his fingers gripping so hard that his knuckles turned white and the veins on the backs of his hands stood out.

His eyes were bloodshot, fixed on the silver point of light in the distance as it was gradually swallowed by darkness. A low growl escaped his throat, like a trapped beast. "No! Qi Heng, he—!"

"Even if you rush over now, it won't do any good!" Vados's voice was nearly a roar, resolute and beyond dispute. "In your current state, you cannot get through that twisted energy field at all! Before you even reach the void, your divine body will be torn to pieces!"

Champa's whole body trembled, and the hand clutching Vados's sleeve shook violently.

For the first time, his eyes—usually either filled with appetite or blazing with rage—revealed a helpless despair.

He stared into the distance, at that faint silver light gradually being swallowed by darkness. His lips trembled, but he could no longer utter a single word.

At that moment, the abyss-like void turned even slower, even heavier, like an ancient beast newly awakened, opening its silent, greedy maw.

He knew Vados was right.

Her voice had been calm and certain, like an icy stone crashing into the churning lake of his heart.

But he simply could not let go—could not stand by and watch the child into whom he had poured twenty years of effort, whom he had watched grow from immature to powerful, be swallowed by darkness and fall into a void from which even light could not escape.

Qi Heng's body was still being dragged by the suction, sliding backward.

The silver-white aura around him had once been so dazzling that it could illuminate an entire starfield. Now, it was like a dying candle in the wind, flickering violently, dimming, thinning, as though every trace of life in his body was being sucked away by the black hole.

His clear silver eyes had not yet dulled. Through the chaotic energy and stardust, they remained fixed on the figure in the distance—Champa, the round, plump God of Destruction, now like a helpless child, trembling as he clutched Vados's sleeve with both hands, his nails nearly digging into the fabric.

His chubby face was covered in tears. Purple teardrops burst from his eyes, crystallizing into tiny glowing shards of ice in the vacuum before drifting away.

Champa was crying.

A God of Destruction who could destroy planets at the slightest provocation was crying so miserably, so desperately.

Strangely, that sight soothed the final ripples in Qi Heng's heart.

He felt an almost liberating calm.

With extreme difficulty, yet unmistakably, the corners of his lips lifted into the faintest smile.

There was no pain in that smile, no regret—only gentle clarity.

"Lord Champa..."

He spoke, his voice as soft as a whisper, nearly swallowed by the black hole's howl and the wail of spacetime.

Yet the words seemed to carry the power of some law, piercing through every noise and resounding directly within everyone's hearts, echoing through every corner of this shattered void.

"Thank you... for these twenty years."