August paced around the command center established in the German theater. They were pushing steadily inland, Berlin being their next target, but August wasn’t satisfied with the pace. “The Order is scattering its people and conducting urban guerilla warfare against us, using civilians as shields. Their morale is still high, as our push has slowed, and we’ve been kept out of Australia entirely.” He was spewing out all his thoughts to Kayden as he was at a dead end on how to defeat the order more quickly, and hoped that Kayden could provide insight or spot something he couldn’t. “To defeat it, we must lower their morale and cut off the head of the snake, for that is where the trouble truly lies. There are still those who believe in the gospel of the Order, and to gain complete control, we must crush them completely in body and mind. From what we’ve been able to gather, the true leader of the Order, the so-called ‘Avatar’ has a power which allows the suppression of information. I know for a fact I’ve already found him once through some loophole in his power, now I just need to find him again. Unfortunately, the best clairvoyants and precognitives we have are helpless.” August said frustratedly. It really was extremely trying times for the man. They were on the verge of victory, yet like a cockroach, the Order clings to its power. Kayden suddenly had a thought. “Wait a minute, if you can’t find him in any known location on Earth, then maybe it’s not just himself he’s hiding.” “You mean…” August trailed off, his eyes widening. “Yes, he might be hiding the entire area he is in, which is why you can’t find his location. The location he’s staying at doesn’t register as a known location in any human mind.” Kayden finished. “Kayden, you’re a genius!” August exclaimed as he rushed to contact his intelligence sector. “Everyone, stop looking for the leader of the Twelve, instead, look for geographical locations where your powers seem to mark down as completely unremarkable!” August yelled over the comms, excited. After nearly 3 days of fruitless searching, maybe there was going to be a result!

After waiting with bated breath for a few minutes, a message came from the Intelligence sector. “Your eminence, we have a match. There is a bubble in Egypt where nearly all of our farseers and clairvoyants either have a blind spot, or report as completely unremarkable. Our post-cognitives report the same.” The man in charge of comms at intelligence reported, confused at why August was asking about such an unremarkable location. August collapsed back into his chair with a satisfied sigh. “Mark down the location and send it to my personal phone. We’ve got him.” He said triumphantly. “Should we just order a missile barrage?” Kayden asked, pulling up the nuclear warhead interface, which had been streamlined to be only accessible through August and Kayden’s handheld electronics. “No. I will confront him in person, and the confrontation will be livestreamed to the world, to silence all opposition and slanderous claims. Although, they aren't wrong in that we’re power-hungry and violent.” August said with a smirk. “Still, dissenters cannot be tolerated. Rebellions are difficult to deal with, especially if they have civilian support.” August took a deep breath. “Kayden, please get our assault fleet ready. I’ll gather a camera crew. We depart immediately.” Kayden nodded in excitement, looking forward to fighting what was essentially the final boss of their planet. Soon, a camera crew was prepared, along with a few heroic looking individuals who would accompany the two to the confrontation to improve the Underworld’s image of having capable people. After a short hypersonic flight, they touched down near the center of the imperceptible bubble. Although every instinct in their bodies and and every bit of knowledge in their minds screamed that this place wasn’t worth going to, they forged on, and soon, the previously empty dessert disappeared, replaced by a massive palace, bearing the sigil of the Order of Twelve. August sighed in pleasure, glad hat his hypothesis was proven correct. They entered the palace, which had zero security, and soon came face to face with an old man in a dark green suit. As everyone looked cautiously at the man, while the man looked back calmly, August spoke, his face lit up as if experiencing a revelation. And indeed he did. Once upon a time, as he looked into his long term plans to defeat the Order, he had run across this man.

“Mephistopheles Arcania, The Divine Mirage. The true leader of the Order of Twelve, and the creator of the Hero System. His power is the manipulation of information relevant to himself. He was once a spy for some no longer existing country and when he was left for dead by his superiors, he awakened. He is the true first super. He destroyed all information pertaining to himself, leading a debauched life on stolen wealth. When Supers became more prevalent, he created the Order of Twelve to control all Supers, and eradicate any threats to his  lifestyle.” August glared at the man in hatred, now addressing him directly. “You erased all information about yourself from the world, except for this room. Even then, only the apostles knew of your existence. You use the idea of heroes to lure in the naive freshly awakened Supers and bolster your forces with their powers, yet you fail to mention to all but those who will become Apostles that the criteria of succession into the Twelve Apostle slots is to kill their predecessor. But you’ve indoctrinated the need to climb the ranks so deeply into hero culture that none can resist the temptation of being an Apostle. Those who embraced your backwards, ignorant ideals were forced to climb the ranks of heroics until they are meeting their mentors in mortal combat. That way, the Apostles, the only ones who knew of your existence and your power, would forever have to look behind their backs for the knife that would inevitably come from their juniors, blinding them to your true nature and your schemes.” By now, August’s voice had raised to a crescendo, his rage manifested by the wisps of dissolving matter around him. “Through the Hero System, you ruled those who aligned with order with an iron fist. The true villains and madmen were given free reign in the world, so that these heroes would forever have an enemy to fight against, too busy preserving the world to rebel against you. Those who did not fit within your ‘perfect system’, whose powers were too great, whose ideals too noble, were branded as villains and hunted down and locked away, all so that you could maintain your lofty position above all supers! For your own selfish pride, you condemned this world to over 90 years of stagnation, smothering all who sought to bring change in the depth of Tartarus! By the power vested in me by the precursors, the humans of earth, and the faceless, unborn children of the future we shall usher, for the sake of the past, the present, and the future, I sentence you to death for your crimes, Mephistopheles!”

Mephistopheles chuckled. “Ah, the younger generation sure is full of fire. But I’m curious, young August, what can you do to me now that you could not before? You see, information is the most valuable thing in the whole wide world, and I have a monopoly on it’s manipulation. With a single thought, I can make you believe I am your greatest ally. You are helpless against me, you see. And those so called crimes you’ve mentioned, I can erase that information from the minds of every being on earth too. In fact, I can do none of that and simply make you ignorant of my very existence, as I did 4 years ago, when you first discovered me.” The old man grinned down at August cockily. August regarded the twisted man coldly. Unbeknownst to him, August, and the world at large, had changed as he bathed in the luxuries his depraved crimes had brought him.“That was then. This is now. Goodbye, Mephistopheles.” August announced icily, before exercising his power. Before Mephistopheles could react, he was dead, a hole the size of a basketball in his chest. “Aw, come on! What the fuck was that August!” Kayden complained as August gestured for the men to cut the livestream. “There wasn’t even a fight! He just went down like that!” Kayden whined, snapping her fingers to emphasize her point. “Most all out fights between high level supers are like that you know. It’s part of the reason we get bored so easily.” August chuckled ruefully. “At least this chore is done. Let’s head back. It’s time to finish the Order of Twelve once and for all.”

August steered the ship to head back to China, where the Underworld was gathering a massive amount of soldiers. The Order of Twelve had been ousted from America, and with Mephistopheles’ death, the remnants in Europe were falling like dominoes. The final remainder of the old order had amassed in Australia, and the Underworld was massing it’s armies in preparation for the final battle. When the Nemesis, along with it’s escorts arrived at Tasmania, the staging point of the invasion on Australia, Aristotle, Sonya, Niya, and Sebastion were all already there, each bring with them their own fleets. The former two were here because the Fighting in Africa was basically done, and only Ryker was necessary to put down any insurrections from the local populace. The islands around mainland Australia had all been conquered already, and ground troops were gathered at Devonport, with many naval troop carriers ready and waiting to deliver them to Melbourne. As the Nemesis slowly descended to resting altitudes, the rest of the fleet and the troops gathered in China slowly rocked into the bay after wrapping around New Zealand. The 4 gathered Overseers quickly assembled on the Nemesis’ bridge, where August was briefing them on the strategy. “The gathered naval fleet will cross the Bass Strait, and assault 3 strategic locations. Of the gathered 5 air fleets and 4 naval fleets, the Australian fleet, being the largest, will assault Melbourn proper from Port Phillip, making beachhead at Williamstown, Sandridge, and Middle Park Beach, while another portion of the fleet heads inland through the Yarra river to provide heavy fire support. The North Pacific fleet will also enter the port, but assault Geelong, to prevent reinforcements from arriving to Melbourne. These two fleets must however first destroy any defensive positions at Queenscliff and Portsea, less they be surrounded and destroyed. Aristotle, your airfleet will scout ahead of the naval fleet to ensure the defender have not set traps in the narrows of the bay.”
The Overseer echoed his agreements, while the respective fleet Admirals noted down their roles in order to make preparations. “The South Pacific fleet will take on Western Port Bay, make landfall at Tooradin, and head for Berwick. The land troops will encircle Melbourn from the east. Niya, your air fleet shall accompany them. Lastly, the Indo-China fleet will also head into the Bay, and the land troops will make landfall at Corinella, heading towards Warragul, where they will lay in ambush. In case we cannot annihilate their forces in Melbourne, we will herd their retreat towards Sydney by the seaside highways, which will run them straight into Warragul.” With that, the other 2 fleet admirals nodded their understanding, while August now focused on the remaining air forces. “The Nemesis and its escort fleet will, alongside Sonya and Sebastian’s air fleets, fly over and around Melbourne, cutting off their major routes of retreat towards Canberra. We will then also push into the city itself, while maintaining air superiority. However, we will only make ourselves known after they devote the majority of their forces to the Australian and South Pacific fleets, leaving their backs open and vulnerable. The Australian fleet will hold position in the bay and ground troops are not to advance beyond the ship’s firing range. They outnumber us numerically, so rely on the ship’s support and make sure you don’t push too inland. The 3 air fleets will strike once the defenders have busied themselves with the entranced Australian fleet. Everyone understand?” A resounding “Yes, your eminence!” Echoed around the bridge. “Good, the assault begins in 4 hours, dismissed.” The admirals and Overseers departed, each making their own arrangements to carry out August’s commands. 

Soon enough, 4 hours had passed by, and the battle began. As August had predicted, the Order had indeed placed ambushes at both Queenscliff and Portsea, but Aristotle’s air fleet alerted the Navy and together, they took out the ambush forces before they even managed to lay a single bullet on the Navy. Aristotle himself had to take to the field as the Order had actually placed one of the 3 remaining Apostles at Queenscliff. The battle between the Apostle’s dragon transformation and Aristotle’s own broken ability to ignore 1 physical law at a time made for an absolutely spectacular battle, with projectiles going at over lightspeed, time being inverted and rewinded, space being twisted beyond recognition, and in the middle of it all, a man and a giant, flying, fire-breathing, ultra-durable lizard. Thankfully, with the airfleet’s massive arsenal of weapons, Aristotle manganged to kill the Apostle after nearly 20 minutes, and the plan was still on track. In the meantime, The South Pacific fleet had to wait a bit in Western Port bay before making landfall so as to not attract the defender’s attention away from the beaches in Melbourne. As beachhead was established, August commanded the raining 3 airfleets to approach Melbourne from the south-east, flying just past the detection range of the Defenders fighting near the waterfront. Soon, they arrived at the west corner of Melbourne, and ground troops began to descend into the city. It was almost entirely clear of defenders, and any that August could feel were identified by his power. However, neither Kayden nor August acted on the information brought by their powers. Both of their powers could reach mostly across the city, but August had wanted his armies to get a taste of real combat, to be blooded, in a sense, before they ran out of opponents. Thus, the ground troops and ariel forces coordinated to identify and eradicate their opponents. They were actually quite effective, but there was a clear disparity between August’s own troops, who had been across the world on multiple battlefronts, and the other armies, who had only acted as shock troops and eradicated most of their enemies with overwhelming ease. 

Within 3 hours, the battle was over, the two other apostles being handled by Sebastian and Niya. One of them was killed straight up with a fist threw the chest, and the other was drowned, as she was invulnerable. Casualties were not low, but certainly well within expected ranges. Overall, it was not a bad outcome, as the armies were now blooded and experienced, at least a little. These men were worth 10 greenhorns each, and thus August considered it a worthy outcome. After wrapping up the battle and leaving some instructions for Aristotle, August did some statistical paperwork and organized the logistics for crushing the rest of the Order in Australia. They were expected to take complete control over the world within the next 2 weeks. As he finished up the last of the necessary work, he returned to his chambers, where Kayden was laying on the couch like a big cat. “Let’s head back. I finished that secret thing while you were sleeping, so we should get to it, now that the final hurdle has been overcome.” Hearing his words, Kayden’s eyes brightened. She was really excited about what this secret thing was, as August had been hyping it up for quite a while. Soon, they returned to the San Francisco base, the starting point of the Underworld and August’s ambitions. 

Stepping into their lab, August quietly tapped away at his PC for a moment, before straightening up. “With Mephistopheles’ death, the entire Order is in disarray as the remaining Apostles either fled or surrendered. Soon, the world will be ours. Humanity is rejoicing at the fall of a hidden tyrant, and the dawn of a new age. But even now, countless issues plague the world. It’s about time to carry out what we’ve discussed.” Around the world, thousands of rockets carrying satellites were shot into orbit, as a weave of satellites was formed over the earth. “But first, while the satellites calibrate, let me tell you about what I’ve discovered about the Precursors and their enemy” Taking a deep breath, August disclosed the most well hidden mystery of humanity. “The Precursors gave humanity both a gift and two curse. They gave us the potential for superpowers after years of evolution, but also put a hard limit on our ability to develop our intelligence. We have reached that cap, one of the reasons why many Supers struggle to use their powers effectively. It’s also why we must ascend. But I digress. The precursors did this because their enemy, the Titans, were masters of the mind. They are a race which had digitized themselves, then proceeded to, for a lack of better words, hack into the fabric of reality, allowing them miraculous abilities. The Precursors could not counter such ability with their technology, and thus, they placed their hope in biology, hoping that one of the sparks the sent out would bear fruit and one day defeat the Titans, but they limited our intelligence to minimize the risk of us taking of into space and being discovered before our powers matured.” Taking a deep breath, August pulled up a 3D map of the earth, gesturing to the net-like weave around it.

“This satellite network, the Shirah System, is the tool of our ascension.” August announced. “The Shirah System, whose name stems from the ancient sanskrit word for ‘head’, is a network of satellites carrying the power amplifier. Once this network is complete, I will be able to view and manipulate every single gluon, quark, and hadron on the planet, while you will be able to manipulate all waveborn phenomena in the world. Non shall be able to hide from our sight. Through it, we will facilitate the evolution of humanity as a race as it’s heads, so that we may reach beyond the stars and into the unknown, and protect ourselves against the Titans. Once this system is deployed we will truly become gods of humanity. And once I develop this technology to be more wide-range, we will be able to protect Earth from even the most devastating of cosmic disasters, as we will have plentiful room, and time, to protect ourselves. For some odd reason, the signals of powers transmit to and from our brains faster than then speed of light, perhaps some form of quantum phenomenon which I do not grasp, but either way, Earth shall be safe in our hands, and we will enter an entirely different plane of existence. Our minds will expand beyond human limits, capable of comprehending things which ordinary humans cannot even conceive. We will, in essence, cease to be human, as our lifespans become tied to the survival of the human race.” August holds the activation button to Kayden, laying a hand on it gently. He then brought out 2 bracelets, holding one to Kayden as well. “These bracelets will activate a special sequence within our genome, connecting us to the fabric of the universe beyond physical matter. We will be much, much harder to kill.” August looked into Kayden’s eyes, and whispered lightly. “But that is if, and only if, that is what you want. The Titans are a threat that may not appear for centuries. We may very well live out our natural life spans without ever encountering them. What say you, Kayden? Should we begin our ascension?” August asked dramatically. This singular moment, as time seemed to stand still, would become the turning point of human evolution. As the moment passed, Kayden grinned toothily. “Lets do it. Finally, I can move past being a boring human. I can’t wait to fight some aliens.” August chuckled at his fiancee’s simple yet elegant approach to life. After all, if one does not understand and pursue that which they desire, then what meaning would their lives have? “And so it shall be.” August announced melodramatically. The satellite web began it’s activation, each node boosting the scale of their powers by magnitudes the human mind was not made to understand. Kayden’s mind tracked every motion, every heatwave, every beam of light, every wave and pulse in the planet’s superheated core, their complexity both stunning and beautiful. Meanwhile, August’s mind expanded to accommodate the spatial coordinates and interactions of every atomic and subatomic particle on their homeworld, something which took his already impressive localized omniscience to a whole new level. Their physical bodies were incinerated, consumed by the ascension of their minds, burnt to ash. In their place remained pure energy, traveling through the matter in the shape of their former bodies, restraint by thought alone. “Wow.” August breathed out deeply in wonder as he felt the world take shape in his mind, knowing that a tiny nudge could send this tiny blue ball into disarray. “Wow indeed.” Kayden agreed as she felt the power of the sun, even from their distant world. To say that it was immense would be the understatement of the century. If she wished to, she could redirect all of that power and burn even the largest known planets into cosmic dust. Not to mention, their minds had been forcibly elevated beyond mortal flesh, now existing in an entirely different plane of existence, unrestrained by physical rules. As they looked out onto their nascent world with a perception that went beyond 3 dimensional space, as they observed the synapsis firing away in the trillions of creatures, from ants to humans, they finally reached the answer of human existence. There is indeed humanity beyonds the confines of biology, this fact reaffirmed as they watched the remnants of dead souls, bits of remnant energy imperceptible to all but those who attain the forms they had attained, drift by them, slowly dissipating into the silent void. Though young, the Earth was filled with life, and as they looked down upon the beautiful yet oh so fragile blue orb, they could not help but allow a few tears to slip by.

“We are now, well and truly, beyond humanity. But they’ll catch up one day.” August commented as he looked down on the world which birthed him, and which he would herald the rebirth of in return. A gentle yet determined smile graced his metaphysical face, which, to those few who could see it, glowed with a joy that surpassed a thousand stars. “Yes, we will ensure that one day, they may match our prowess and grow to both aid and challenge us in the most glorious of battles.” Kayden added, a less pure, though no less emotional grin twisting her features. Although their motives differed, they understood each other’s goals well, and even agreed on a deep level. The boredom brough by such lofty existence could only be endured by a pair, for a single being would sooner lose himself to madness than achieve anything in such a state. To alleviate their minds from the crushing pressure of emptiness, the two took action immediately. Kayden immediately localized waveborn energy to slowly but surely enhance humans resistance to cosmic radiation, while August set about editing their genome, making them stronger, faster, smarter, and live longer. Food and water descended on the desperate, and light and warmth was provided for the hopeless. The people looked up in wonder, seeing the almighty power of their new rulers, and even the most faithless and despondent began to see hope once more. Humanity’s own ascension had begun, but it would take many, many years for it to complete. Even then, there would always be even higher reaches to climb towards. Thus, as the people united in celebration, Kayden turned to August metaphorically, reaching out with her mind. “There’s somewhere I want to go.”