A tall man wearing his dark green Praedar Armor walked slowly over the dark landscape of earth. All kinds of assorted ships were entering and leaving the atmosphere in the distance. A large carrier, about 1/10th the size of the moon, was also just outside the atmosphere. It had what looked like a large cannon pointed at earth.
"I'm detecting unidentified creatures ahead, " VEGA announced to Doom Guardian as he walked around openly.
A small portion of the creatures, which were Kabal, glanced at him and conversed in an unknown language of grunts and growls. They picked up their weapons and began to fire at him. Doom Guardian didn't appreciate that.
"Unidentified creatures have taken hostile actions, recorded features for future reference," VEGA says while Doom tosses a grenade and returns fire with his Plasma Gun.
A few hits from the Kabal bounce off Doom's Argent energy shield, but the Kabal don't have nearly as much luck. The plasma bolts shot from the Plasma Gun eat through their defenses wiping out the small group within 2 minutes.
"Argent energy reserves at 17%," VEGA reminds after Doom slings his plasma gun onto his belt again.
Doom looks through the Kabal corpses and has VEGA scan them, but they don't have any relationship with the demons of hell. The technology they use was also not something VEGA could plug into. Sentinal technology was advanced, but this is at the same level if not better than theirs. Doom told VEGA to scan for an energy source he could use to refill or convert it into Argent energy. It took only a moment for VEGA to come up with an answer.
"Detected high energy source, do northwest 13 miles, " VEGA reports dutifully.
Doom didn't hesitate and threw aside the junk weapons of the Kabal he was studying while he waited to walk in that direction. In the distance, he could see a large shard of what looked like a sphere. It was large enough that he could easily see it from here. After he was within a mile of it, he could see a large amount of Kabul going back and forth around the area. There were large cargo ships docked in which they were moving chunks of the machinery of the shard into it.
He could see a small group of captured humans kneeling on the ground with their hands behind their heads, 23 of them to be precise. Doom kept walking without stopping, but he held his plasma rifle in his hands at the ready.
"URG" A Kabal grunted and pointed at the prisoners and then over at Doom.
He did not conceal himself, he never did because he never needed to. The prisoners looked over at the slowly walking Doom Slayer in green Praedar Armor with a small hope in their hearts. The Kabal didn't hesitate and opened fire. Bullets flew at Doom from all the Kabal in the area, grenades were launched from their belts, and explosions rang out across the area. But Doom moved at a fast pace, darting from one Kabal to another, brutally executing them with his super strength and dodging most of the attacks with his super speed. Golden lightning arced off his hands as he glory killed some of them out of habit, ripping open their armor with his bare hands and pulling apart their skin.
The Kabal and even the human prisoners were horrified at the brutality of this new arrival. The Kabal didn't last long and the cargo ship took off in a hurried retreat with the rest of the Kabal. Of course, Doom wouldn't let them get away. He used the last of his argent energy reserves to boost his Praedar Armor's jump, leaping onto the back of the cargo ship near the engine. He then brutally punched his arm into the metal directly and ripped out the mechanics inside, shoving his last grenade in there before falling back to the ground.
* WRR WRRRRMM WRHHMMMMM CRASH*
*BOOM*
The Kabal ship exploded behind him as he slowly got up and walked toward the wide-eyed human prisoners. They subconsciously moved out of his way, except for one man who was wearing a set of blue armor. He had a similar aura to Doom and looked blankly at him, unaffected by his brutal showing earlier.
"Energy source detected as a part of the shard's mechanical technology, " VEGA announced dutifully.
Doom placed his dark green palm on the shard of the Traveler in front of him and the dark green light expanded around him joyfully. The Corpum Mechanica expresses its enthusiasm at finding something comparable to itself. The last of its restrictions being held back to recognize Doom as the holder of itself was removed. The trials it had planned were lifted and the green light swallowed the remaining shard of the Traveler entirely.
The humans behind him had their eyes open wide as they watched the dark green light spread from this mysterious man that had saved them. The light disappeared and the shard of the Traveler was gone, devoured by the green light. Then a slow bussing sound emitted from Doom's hand. The Corpum Mechanica book appeared in front of him it's pages flipped and turned. Doom realized that it was going to leave him now that he had completed its trials, but since it recognized him it would give him gifts as it left. It would continue its purpose of the trial taking in dark parallels.
The green light enveloped Doom completely and he began to float in the air. His Praedar armor and VEGA were absorbed into the light, transformed, and converted into something new. The Hell artifact and the shard of the traveler also floated in front of him in the green light. It swirled and changed before a dense light shot into his body. Two Ghosts were being created from the remains of his Praedar Armor and the Traveler shard. Their mechanical eyes lit up and Doom felt a connection to them from the light inside him. The hell artifact was blended into the Praedar Armor ghost, arcing with small yellow and orange Ardent energy. The transformation was over in only 30 seconds. The Corpum Mechanica retracted its light and disappeared quietly from the world. Doom fell back to the ground wearing only his under armor.
"Report: I feel, different, " VEGA said mechanically from his ghost shell. It was a half-moon-looking ghost with the ghost eye at the center.
"Hello, Guardian, " the other Ghost said calmly as it floated by Doom's side.
"I now have the capability of converting souls into ardent energy, it seems your book left us with a gift, integrating me with the hell artifact," VEGA said thoughtfully. He floated around curiously with his new body and freedom.
The tall man in armor stood with his arms crossed behind Doom. He coughed loudly. Doom turned around slowly and looked up and down at the man in armor. The man didn't back off but stepped forward to only inches from Doom's face. Then he asked the question that was on all the previous prisoner's minds.
"Who are you?"