Adam stood in stunned silence for a while, but his mind could still not piece together the depth of knowledge that it was somehow glimpsing at. He could barely see a sliver of it and it was enough to create an unhealthy obsession within him.
He snapped himself out of it immediately the moment he realised this. The more he tried to pry open that needle-sized hole he was peeking through, the more he would realise that he could not pass through. And all that will lead to was driving him insane... literally.
This was not on the same level as someone trying to say a word that was just at the tip of their tongue but could not remember. This was an entirely new depth of knowledge and truth that relates to the nature of the Universe. How could be so easily and simply understood?
Adam would have to give up for now and be content with what little tidbit he received from that sudden enlightenment. He could feel his light pulsing within him, yearning for the truth within that knowledge, but it would have to wait.
Adam shifted his attention back to the matter at hand. They still did not know how time is measured by the Starnet Company. Their only option was to ask the Universal System and hope it had an answer for them.
"System, how long in Earth days is a week for the Starnet Company?"
Silence was all that followed. It was a deafening silence as everyone waited to hear an answer from the Universal System, hoping that one of them would receive the answer. But no one did. Perhaps the Universal System was not meant to answer such questions making that one time it did answer Adam an unique occurrence owing to his dangerous predicament at the time.
He was the Envoy of the Universe, delving deep into the site of a forgotten battlefield where a dangerous breach was discovered. The uniqueness of that circumstance might have granted him some privileges that he could not currently enjoy.
With a sigh, Adam turned his gaze back to the hologram of the planet. There were points highlighted on the surface indicating some form of activity, likely mining and other related work. Meanwhile, the Orbital Station itself was abuzz with activity.
The Orbital Station was roughly about the size of the Moon back when it was still a satellite. Compared to the size of the planet itself, the Orbital Station might as well be a grain of sand. But such a size was enough for the Company to set up a temporary base of operations while constructing a main base on the surface. They were likely scheduled to complete it before the reinforcements arrived in a week, whenever that was.
All this to say that it was small even for Adam and Evelyn. They could probably destroy it in less than an hour and it would just be like a small detour. But that was why Adam turned to Evelyn and consulted her before making a decision.
"What do you think we should do? Do we destroy it before we devour the planet? Or do we just ignore them?"
Adam did not really have much of an opinion on this matter. He could not care any less whether the people in the Orbital Station or the planet died as a result of his actions. All of them were committing some kind of sin anyway, including himself.
While these mortal little lifeforms fought each other to the most depraved ends and even destroyed planets spanning an entire galaxy, he would be doing the same in just a swifter and more exaggerated manner. He would not be hypocritical and judge them for such things.
He was a planet. His very being thrived on the law of nature. And in nature, it was not only the strong who survives. It was also a fact that those who survive become stronger. There was a delicate balance to be upheld, especially for someone like him.
A Mundi grows by devouring other celestial bodies, but if they only devour everything, what would be left of the Universe. That was why he would carefully pick and choose his prey.
But returning to the reason he asked Evelyn, he really did not see the point of going out of his way to kill a bunch of people for no reason. They would not be able to stop the two Mundi from devouring the planet no matter what they did after all. However, leaving them alive would instead invite trouble for them, both while devouring the planet and in the long run.
And this point was something that Evelyn herself had thought about which informed her answer.
"I think the safest choice is to eliminate everyone around the planet. This Orbital Station may not pose much of a problem, but they would likely slow our pace. More importantly, we are currently unknown in the Universe. If we let these people survive after encountering us, then they might report to their superiors before we are ready to face them. And we don't know how powerful the leaders of this Starnet Company is yet. We cannot afford to carelessly attract their attention."
Indeed, this was the justification Adam needed to destroy the Orbital Station. He may not care about the death or survival of these people, but he definitely cared about Evelyn's safety. He would not put her inn unnecessary and unknown risk just because he could not be bothered to commit massacre.
Compared to the life of a planet, what were the lives of a few miscreants whose only desire was to milk another planet until it was dead dry? It may seem callous, but Adam was a victim of such things. The blatant disregard that humans had for the condition of their planet had left him thoroughly aggrieved.
This resentment had stretched far beyond just Earth as it seemed that all these races knew how to do was to take and take without giving anything back in return for the debts they owed the worlds they ravaged so wantonly.
First it was Helmin, destroyed to such a degree that it was seemingly rotting even while alive. It had been left more dead than it would have otherwise been had the Corpus not created Corpuscladis. One might argue that it was the Corpuscladis' fault for Helmin's destruction, but the truth of the matter was that the Corpus failed to protect their home. Instead, they lived in a giant mothership that they created for the sake of galactic conquest. What is that if not gross negligence.
And the now, Adam was seeing a world so full of life being split open and dissected by foreign invaders. Its resources being harvested by people who did not even belong here. The Company very likely had several hundred more such planets, and all of them are being stripped of everything. How can greed be so insatiable and untamable that it manages to transcend racial boundaries?
This was not the law of nature.
This was just pure cancer.
As Adam's simmering resentment reached a new precipice, he suddenly calmed down as he began to wonder. How different was he from them? He devoured Helmin's core and let it finally crumble completely. He was here to devour this planet entirely. Was he really so different?
He could say yes and justify it with the threat of apocalypses, but how much of that was true? How much of it was really justifiable? Was V1-G9937 not also a planet facing an apocalypse right now?
Whether it was him or the Starnet Company, both had come to destroy this world. Both were apocalypses. The only difference was that while the Company will take it slow and milk every last drop out of the planet, he would be devouring it whole.
Would he not continue doing the same in the foreseeable future? He was like a ravenous beast whose desire for survival had twisted his hunger into just a mindless and insatiable appetite that always thirsted of blood and craved flesh.
He was a monster.
A human on Earth once said, "Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster... for when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."
Humanity was foolish, but sometimes, they can be wise. And this man had hit the nail on the head. In the eternity that Adam spent seeing countless apocalypses and dying countless times, he had already given up hope of survival without some kind of sacrifice. And now, this mindset was baring its ugly fangs at him.
He had been desperately trying to run away from apocalypses from the moment he awoke. What he had failed to realise was that he himself had become the very thing he was most afraid of.
He was a monster.
He was the apocalypse.
It pricked his conscience knowing what he had become yet still unable to find a different way to survive. Without devouring other worlds, he would be to weak to face the apocalypses that would come for him. So he could only continue in his misguided ways, but he had a feeble hope. A hope that at some point, he would no longer need to be the apocalypse.
He hoped to be the Quietus.