"The best way is still to lure Vulcan out."
Deathstroke ignored the motley fleet. His single eye was fixed on the distant planet, as though he could see through the atmosphere and clouds to the former royal palace—and the people within it.
"I can do that." Gladiator flicked his cape and accepted without hesitation. "If I begin destroying those fleets, Vulcan will definitely come out to fight me. Master, have you chosen the battlefield?"
Su Ming stood on the gray moon with his arms folded. "Not yet, but I doubt the Elder Princess wants Featherfall to be caught up in the destruction, right? So we need a battlefield far enough away."
Gladiator looked at Deathstroke, whose black-and-yellow armor gleamed dimly beneath the starlight. "But the problem remains. We have no way to seal off space, so we can't stop him from escaping."
"Much as I hate to admit it, humans have far more exploitable weaknesses than Shi'ar." Su Ming spoke in a low, eerie voice as his arm seemed to curl around Gladiator's neck of its own accord. "But I have a plan. It may require you to make a sacrifice."
A few minutes later, in Featherfall's magnificent imperial palace.
A young man who looked to be only in his twenties sat sprawled arrogantly on the throne. His eye sockets were deeply sunken, and his messy hair hung over his forehead. With his eyes closed, he appeared to be dozing off, while muscles that looked ready to explode stretched his red uniform taut.
Deathbird sat on one of his thighs, smiling as she fed him a grape-like fruit. Her slender fingers peeled away the skin before delivering the white flesh into her boyfriend's mouth.
Deathbird was younger and more beautiful than her sister. She wore a black bodysuit, and her