The banquet hall was silent, but it was no longer the silence of a library.

It was the silence of a graveyard.

Noah's voice, calm and melodic, broke the spell.

"The food is getting cold," he repeated, his eyes scanning the trembling faces of the remaining delegates.

"It would be a tragedy to let such a spread go to waste. Please, join me."

There was no rush to the tables.

Instead, there was a slow, mechanical movement.

Envoys from the Lesser Systems, beings who had spent their lives bowing to the Dragons and Spirits, now moved toward the wine decanters like puppets on strings.

They didn't move because they were hungry.

They moved because a man whose general could snap an Immortal King into glitter had told them to.

Hands shook as they lifted crystal glasses.

The clinking of silverware against fine porcelain sounded like hammer blows in the quiet hall.

Liara, the Phoenix Queen, was the only one who moved with genuine ease.

She reached out, her slender fingers wrapping around a flute of amber nectar.

She caught Noah's eye, her expression unreadable, but her lips curved in a sharp, beautiful line.

"To the 'filthy mud creatures,'" she whispered, loud enough for the closest Spirit Race attendants to flinch.

She raised her glass toward Noah.

"And to the King who reminds the universe that even stars can be snuffed out. Cheers."

Noah clinked his glass against hers.

The sound echoed.

He took a sip, the vintage high-gravity wine burning pleasantly down his throat.

He then turned his gaze toward the corner where the Dragon and Spirit envoys huddled.

Their glowing forms were dimmed in a display of instinctive submission.

"Tell me," Noah said, leaning back against the head table.

"The tournament was supposed to start today."

"A display of might to settle the border disputes of the Aetherion sector."

"Would you like to start now? Or would you prefer to wait for your superiors to arrive?"

He smiled, but the smile didn't reach his eyes.

It was the smile of a predator watching a trapped rabbit decide which way to run.

An envoy from the Dragon Race, a man with crimson scales along his jawline, swallowed hard.

His pride was screaming, but the pile of glowing dust that used to be a High Elder was still visible on the floor.

"We... we would like to wait," the Dragon envoy stammered.

"The High Overlords are en route," the Spirit Race representative added in synchronization.

Their voices trembled in a haunting harmony.

"It is only fair that the Great Races are represented by their true pillars."

Noah nodded slowly.

"Very well."

"Five hours."

"I'll give them five hours to travel across the void."

"If they aren't here by then, we start without them."

"And if they aren't here to represent you..."

"Well, I suppose your systems will just become provinces of the Earth Empire by default."

The next five hours were the longest in the history of the sector.

Noah sat at the head of the hall.

Occasionally, he conversed with Liara about mundane things.

The quality of the silk.

The flavor of the fruit.

The architecture of the palace.

To the onlookers, it was maddening.

How could he be so casual while the literal gods of the galaxy were burning through hyperspace to kill him?

Outside the palace, the sky began to change.

The atmosphere of the planet began to groan under the weight of arriving mass.

It started as a low hum.

Then it grew into a roar that shook the foundations of the city.

Noah looked up, his gaze piercing through the vaulted ceiling.

"They're here," he muttered.

The sensors in his mind, linked to the Earth Empire's surveillance network, began to scream.

High-level auras were flooding the planet's orbit.

These weren't just soldiers.

These were the "Old Ones."

Noah sensed them clearly.

Some of these beings had reached the pinnacle of the Immortal King realm.

A few, the ones leading the charge, had auras that felt dense and suffocating.

They were closer to the "Half-Step Transcended" realm.

Their cultivation was so high that their mere presence began to warp the local gravity.

Judging by the hidden energy signatures they were suppressing, their actual combat power was likely even higher.

"Looks like they sent the real power houses this time," Noah said.

A genuine spark of excitement finally appeared in his eyes.

He stood up, smoothing out his regal black tunic.

Beside him, Rudi straightened his posture.

His bored expression was replaced by a sharp, focused stillness.

Fiona and William moved to Noah's flanks.

Their hands rested on their weapons.

The palace gardens became a landing pad for legends.

Massive, organic ships grown from star-crystals descended from the Spirit Race.

From them stepped beings of pure elemental fury.

Creatures of living ice, roaring fire, and jagged lightning.

Their auras alone were so heavy that the grass beneath their feet turned to glass.

From the Dragon side, the sky was literally torn asunder.

Colossal Fire Dragons, Ice Dragons, and Earth Dragons, beings who had been in deep meditation for ten thousand years, dived through the clouds.

They shifted into their humanoid forms as they landed.

Their eyes glowed with ancient, reptilian rage.

The air grew thick with the smell of ozone and sulfur.

The "Superior Races" had arrived in force.

It was a coalition of power that could flatten an entire galaxy in a weekend.

But then, a different kind of ship appeared.

It was silent.

It was sleek.

It was white.

It carried an aura of absolute neutrality.

It bore the insignia of the Chaos Temple.

Noah narrowed his eyes.

"They also came to join the fun?" he whispered.

He didn't fear them, but the Chaos Temple was a wild card.

They were the self-appointed arbiters of the universe.

He wasn't quite ready to dismantle their entire organization yet.

The crowd of newcomers pushed into the hall.

They were led by a Spirit Overlord whose body was a blinding pillar of white light.

He looked at the pile of dust on the floor, his fallen kin.

His energy flared, cracking the marble pillars.

"How dare you?" the Spirit roared.

The sound vibrated in the bones of everyone present.

"How dare a biological accident, a speck of dust like you, kill one of our kind?"

The psychic pressure was immense.

Lesser delegates fainted where they stood.

Noah didn't blink.

He reached up and casually put his little finger inside his ear.

He wiggled it as if trying to clear out a pesky itch.

"Are you done yelling?" Noah asked.

"You're very loud."

"My question remains."

"Do you want to start the tournament now, or do you need more time to puff out your chests?"

The Spirit Overlord's light turned a violent shade of red.

Before he could strike, a calm, aged voice drifted through the hall.

"Emperor Noah, you are disrupting the balance."

The Grand Sage of the Chaos Temple stepped forward.

He was flanked by his paladins.

He looked at Noah with a thin, polite smile.

It didn't hide the warning in his eyes.

"Do you truly wish to take on the entire universe?"

"There is a limit to how much chaos we can allow."

Noah looked at the Grand Sage.

Then he looked at the dragons.

Then at the spirits.

He looked like a man who had just been asked if he wanted dessert.

"The 'entire universe' is a very big place, Sage," Noah said calmly.

"But if the universe wants to stand in my way, then the universe has a problem."

"As for the tournament..."

"Do you guys also want to enter?"

"I don't care."

"The more, the merrier."

A deafening silence followed.

The delegates who had stayed behind felt their hearts stop.

Challenging the Dragons was suicide.

Challenging the Spirits was madness.

But challenging the Chaos Temple?

"What did he say?" someone whispered from the back.

"He's challenging the Temple too?"

"He doesn't want to win," another gasped.

"He just wants to be destroyed."

"He's a madman."

Noah ignored the whispers.

He walked toward the center of the hall.

He stepped right into the middle of the circle of "gods."

He looked at the Grand Sage.

His expression was cold and unwavering.

He wouldn't pick a fight with the Temple today if he could help it.

But he would never, under any sky, let them behave like his superiors.

"The stage is set," Noah said.

His voice echoed out to the fleets waiting in orbit.

"Let the tournament begin."

"Let's see who is actually fit to rule, and who is just a very bright light bulb."

The hall trembled as the declaration settled into reality.

Ancient beings who had ruled eras felt something unfamiliar tighten in their cores.

Uncertainty.

The Dragon Elders exchanged slow, deliberate glances, their pupils narrowing into vertical slits as suppressed power stirred beneath their skin.

A Spirit Lord raised a hand, sigils flaring around his arm before he forcibly restrained himself.

The Grand Sage's smile thinned by a fraction.

High above the planet, fleets adjusted formation, weapons priming without orders.

Noah stood alone at the center, relaxed, unguarded, and utterly fearless.

Somewhere in the void, fate shifted.

The tournament was no longer a contest.

It was a judgment.

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