The decrypted message hung in Astra's mind, a cold, supernova fact that dwarfed all his previous concerns. Frieza was a tyrant. The Zarlac were pests. This... this was an existential tide, and the wall holding it back was crumbling.
Five hundred cycles. The message didn't specify the length of a cycle, but the desperation in the data-stream suggested it was a shockingly short timeframe. Years, perhaps decades. Not centuries.
He sat in the timeless silence of The Cradle, the 1:500 bubble now feeling not like a luxury, but a desperate necessity. He had to plan. He had to prepare. But for what? How did one prepare for a "Shard-of-Infinity"?
His first action was one of supreme will. He partitioned a significant portion of his Cognitive Partitions, creating a new, dedicated intelligence he dubbed the Sentinel Core. Its sole purpose was continuous, deep-level analysis of the decrypted data and constant monitoring of the "Silence Frequencies." It was his early-warning system for the end of everything.
His second action was to return to Vesper. He found Borg and Elara in the central command hub, reviewing agricultural reports. The normalcy of it was almost painful.
"We need to accelerate," Astra stated, his voice cutting through the mundane discussion. "All projects. Everything."
Elara looked up, her brow furrowed. "Architect? Is there a new threat? The Zarlac—"
"The Zarlac are irrelevant," he interrupted, his tone leaving no room for argument. "There is a storm coming. A storm that will make Frieza's genocide look like a summer shower. I cannot give you details. Knowing is a danger in itself. But you must trust me. We need more. More power, more industry, more people. We need to be stronger than I ever thought possible."
Borg's face was grim. "What do you need us to do?"
"Double the shifts on the geothermal taps. I want the energy output of the Nexus increased by three hundred percent within the month. Begin prospecting the asteroid belt for heavy metals. I will provide new schematics for advanced fabrication units. We are moving from a colony to a fortress. A forge."
He was asking them to transform their peaceful society into a war machine, and he was giving them no reason why. He saw the confusion and fear in their eyes, but he also saw their trust. They nodded, accepting the impossible task without question.
That trust was a weight heavier than any gravity field.
He returned to The Cradle and plunged back into the time bubble. He had to become stronger, faster. The 300x gravity field was reactivated, but it was no longer enough. He pushed it to 350x, then 400x. His [Dense-Body Constitution] screamed, his bones feeling like they were being ground into neutron star matter. His Power Level, already monstrous, began to climb again through sheer, agonizing force of will.
[Power Level: 485,000 -> 510,000... 550,000...]
But raw power, he now understood, was likely useless against a "Shard-of-Infinity." He needed something else. A different paradigm.
He turned his [Stellar Forge] inward, not on his body, but on his understanding. He began to model the "Shard" based on the terrifying fragments of data. An entity that could adapt. That could consume worlds. That could wipe out 87% of a fleet powerful enough to kill a 42,000-power-level soldier.
He ran simulations, trillions of them, in his mind. Every known form of attack—Ki, magic, technology—was applied against the theoretical model. They all failed. The entity adapted, learned, and turned his own weapons against him.
There was only one consistent variable in the simulations that led to a temporary stalemate: the complete absence of energy. A perfect void. The entity seemed to feed on power, on structure, on reality itself.
The Void Fist.
His fighting style, built on creating emptiness in an opponent's defenses, might hold the key. But he needed to scale it up. From a combat technique to a cosmic principle. He needed to learn to project a field of absolute nullification, a bubble of non-reality where the laws of physics ceased to exist.
It was a terrifying thought. To unmake a portion of the universe to save the rest. It was the ultimate expression of his philosophy, and it tasted like ash in his mouth.
The Architect, who had dedicated his life to building, was now contemplating the art of ultimate destruction. The weight of the crumbling wall was upon him, and he was being forced to become the very antithesis of his own dream in order to preserve it. The path to salvation was leading him into a darkness deeper than any he had ever known.