Dignity and Price

Vados stood atop the wreckage of a shattered planetary ring, the divine staff in her hand glowing with a faint purple light.

Her long silver-white hair drifted slightly in the windless vacuum of space.

The dying afterglow of a distant collapsing star was reflected deep within her eyes.

She drew a soft breath—in truth, there was no air in space at all. It was merely a habit ingrained over hundreds of millions of years of life.

She spoke, her voice clear yet carrying an impossible weight, as though it entered one's consciousness directly. "Lord Chen Feng, I have a proposal."

Chen Feng floated several thousand meters away, surrounded by a faint golden aura.

The hem of his battle suit fluttered gently in that aura.

The asteroid belt he had shattered with a single strike moments ago still revolved slowly behind him, like a silent river of stardust.

Hearing Vados speak, he tilted his head slightly and looked over through the void with deep, unfathomable eyes.

"Please, go on."

Vados gripped her divine staff more tightly, her knuckles paling slightly.

She drifted forward a little. Behind her, the remnants of the God of Destruction's realm flickered in and out of sight—the shattered divine domain left behind after Champa's defeat, now slowly breaking apart into specks of light.

"If you are willing," she said carefully, each word deliberate, "I can recommend to the Grand Priest that you succeed Champa as the new God of Destruction of the Sixth Universe."

She paused, watching Chen Feng's reaction before continuing. "With your strength, you are more than qualified. And—" She raised her divine staff, its tip tracing a gentle arc of light through the air. "This way, we won't have to keep fighting."

Chen Feng watched her silently. Even the stardust around him seemed to slow because of his silence.

After a while, he shook his head. A faint, somewhat mocking smile appeared on his lips.

"A God of Destruction?" His voice was quiet, yet it seemed capable of shaking the surrounding space. "Lady Vados, do you truly think I came only for that position?"

Vados's brows furrowed slightly, and the crystal ornament on her forehead flashed with a glimmer of confusion.

"Then what exactly are you here for?" she asked. Her voice retained an angel's characteristic calm, but this time, there was a trace of unmasked bewilderment in it.

"Dignity," Chen Feng said.

The moment he spoke that word, the surrounding space seemed to freeze.

He raised his right hand, palm facing upward, as though he were holding something invisible.

"My dignity. The dignity of every warrior under my command. The dignity of all the people across the countless starfields behind me."

His gaze passed beyond Vados, toward the distant depths of the universe—the place he had come from.

"Champa injured my people."

Chen Feng's voice remained calm, but every word seemed honed from stellar iron. "That debt cannot be written off with the title of God of Destruction."

He paused, drawing back his gaze. His eyes were as deep as black holes, yet some flame burned in their depths.

"Besides," he said with a soft laugh, his smile carrying the serenity of one who looked down upon eternity, "the position of God of Destruction... honestly, I have no use for it."

Vados froze.

Her grip on the divine staff loosened unconsciously.

Over hundreds of millions of years, she had witnessed the rise and fall of countless civilizations, the succession of gods, and powerful beings turning entire galaxies upside down for a sliver of divine status.

But someone who calmly refused the position of God of Destruction, even seeming somewhat disdainful of it—this was the first time she had ever seen such a person.

"Then what do you want?" Vados finally asked, a faint tremor in her voice that even she did not notice.

Chen Feng did not answer immediately.

He slowly raised his right hand and spread his fingers.

At first, nothing happened.

The next second, a wisp of deep blue energy silently ignited in his palm. The flame was not hot; instead, it was cold as an eternal abyss.

The aura spun, gathered, and compressed into a ball of light the size of a walnut. Countless galaxies seemed to be born and die within it, its fluctuations of law making one's heart tremble.

He closed his hand gently.

There was no roar, no explosion.

The sphere shattered silently like a punctured bubble.

Yet it did not vanish. Instead, it transformed into countless tiny blue motes, flying from Chen Feng toward every corner of the universe like a rain of stars flowing in reverse.

The paths of those motes were elegant and mysterious, as though they followed the universe's most ancient melody.

At first, Vados was merely puzzled.

But when her angelic senses touched the essence of those motes, her expression changed instantly.

Her pale purple pupils contracted slightly, and her grip on the divine staff tightened.

Those motes were not ordinary energy.

The instant each one fell into the cosmic void, it was like the finest needle and thread, silently stitching itself into the structure of space.

They were not destroying anything, nor were they overwriting anything. They were merging, reinforcing, and elevating.

Vados could clearly "see" that, centered on this battlefield, the vast expanse of cosmic space was undergoing a fundamental transformation—the dimensions of space were becoming more stable, material barriers more resilient, and the tiny fractures left behind by the earlier battle were being gently and completely healed.

It was as if an invisible yet indestructible barrier were slowly rising from the deepest reaches of the universe, gently sheltering all things within it.

"Y-you're..." Vados's voice finally failed to hide her shock, even trembling slightly. "You're directly reinforcing the Sixth Universe's foundational spatial structure?!"

Chen Feng lowered his hand, and the faint golden aura around him receded slightly.

He looked at Vados and nodded, a simple motion that carried immense weight.

"That's right." His voice was calm as still water. "This way, when we truly fight, the aftermath won't easily tear apart the galaxies. Countless innocent stars won't be destroyed because of a battle between gods. This universe will be able to withstand more."

He gazed at the rotating sea of stars in the distance, his eyes remote.

"What I've always wanted was never to take anyone's place."

"What I want is for those who should pay the price to pay it, and for those who should be protected to remain safe."

Vados was silent for a long time.

She floated amid shattered stardust, her pale purple hair drifting soundlessly. The crystal ball atop her staff reflected the cold light of distant stars.

She stared at Chen Feng—the man who called himself the King of the Saiyans. He stood there in the void without any barrier around him, not even the hem of his clothes disturbed by the low temperatures or radiation.

Just moments ago, she had watched him raise his right hand and curl his five fingers inward. In that instant, countless fine blue rays spread from him like a web, reaching deep into the universe.

The spatial structure that had been on the verge of collapse was rewoven and reinforced in the span of a breath. Even the floating planetary fragments seemed to have been gently pressed back into place by an invisible hand.

The entire process had appeared effortless, yet it filled Vados with a chill she had never known before.

This was no longer a matter of merely being strong or weak.

Even she, an angel who served a God of Destruction, who had lived for countless ages and possessed unfathomable power, would find it almost impossible to stabilize such a vast region of universal space so easily.

It required an almost instinctive insight into the universe's underlying laws—perhaps even a kind of... control that transcended those laws.

A flicker of nearly imperceptible unease passed through the depths of her pale green eyes before finally turning into deep scrutiny.

The staff slowly turned in her hand as starlight flowed within its crystal ball.

"Who exactly are you?" Vados spoke softly, yet her voice clearly pierced the void, carrying a tension even she herself had not noticed.

Chen Feng smiled.