Chapter 52 52: The Final Tithe
Prince Valen fell to his knees, his "Stilled-Mind" now screaming with the psychic feedback of a power he couldn't comprehend. He looked at Carson, seeing not a man, but a "Sovereign Entity"—a being that had bypassed the Level 15 limit and reached the Ascendant Tier (Level 16).
"You... you sacrificed it all," Valen wheezed, blood leaking from his ears. "You've burned away your humanity. You can't even feel the air on your skin anymore, can you? You're just a machine made of Qi!"
Carson looked down at his hands. They were beautiful and terrifying, flickering in and out of existence. He looked at Hobs, who was staring at him with a mixture of awe and heartbreaking sorrow. Hobs knew. He knew that the boy who loved bitter tea and "Low-Key" infiltration was gone, replaced by a god who could crack a planet with a thought.
"The price was paid, Valen," Carson said, his voice echoing with a thousand ancestors. "And the debt is now due in full."
Carson reached out toward the Event Horizon. Through the walls of the Library, he grabbed the three Imperial Heavy Cruisers with his mind. He didn't crush them. He 'Synchronized' them with the collapsing star.
In a flash of violet light, the ships were pulled into the sun's core, their atoms becoming part of the star's final fusion. Prince Valen's connection to the Hegemony network was not just severed; it was incinerated.
"Go back to your father," Carson commanded, waving a hand. A small, stable spatial rift opened behind Valen, leading directly to the Solaris Capital. "Tell him that the Second Library is closed. Tell him that New Seattle is no longer a 'Free Port'—it is the center of a new galaxy. And tell him... that I am no longer his property. I am his 'Entropy'."
Valen was sucked into the rift, his screams vanishing into the void.
Carson turned to Hobs. He tried to speak, to say that he was still there, but his voice was now the sound of the stars. He couldn't touch Hobs without the old man's armor melting.
"Aura," Carson whispered, the ship's AI responding instantly to his new frequency. "Take them home. Take the data-rods. Rebuild the McCain Legacy. I have to stay here... for a while. The star needs a 'Governor' to keep it from exploding."
As the Sol-Invictus pulled away from the Library, Hobs stood at the aft viewscreen, watching the lone, glowing figure of Carson McCain standing at the edge of the collapsing sun. The boy from the gutters had finally reached the "Peak," but he was the only one there.