JVMenjivar

Astashica: Eternal Starborn Dominion

"Listen well, child of the twin suns. The land speaks, the winds whisper, and the rivers carry old songs. But there is one voice that does not sing, one truth that sleeps beneath your feet. The world you stand upon is not what you believe it to be."

The Xothek Galaxy is gone, consumed by its own hunger for power. The Asemeri once shaped the stars, bending light and void to their will. Their greatest creation, the Formicrons, built empires that stood for millennia.  

But Xothek fell—not to time, nor to gods, but to its own arrogance.  

The Azurevat fire erased them. Cities vanished. Kingdoms dissolved into the abyss. And the last Asemeri fled aboard the Defiance Vanguard, a warship of lost power, its runes still pulsing with ancient knowledge. They sought refuge. They found Astashica.  

A world of twin suns. A world veiled in Light. A world that does not belong to them.  

For three hundred cycles, the Asemeri ruled. They carved their names into the mountains, built their towers over rivers, but Astashica is awake. It watches. It remembers.  

Now, the shadow returns.  

Cosmus has returned. The exile. The usurper. The last remnant of a dead empire. His fleet blackens the sky. His armies rise from the abyss. And in his grasp? The final Azurevat missile—the fire that once shattered the heavens.  

And in the path of destruction, one man stands.  

Tlandar. Son of two worlds. A man of soil and harvest. A man who should have lived his days in peace.  

But war does not ask who you wish to be. It demands who you must become.  

Flee, and the twin suns will set forever.  
Stand, and awaken the Light once more.  

He takes the blade. He spills the blood. He walks the path of no return.  

The Defiance Vanguard looms overhead.  
The Azurevat fire waits in silence.  
The Formicrons stir beneath the sands.  
The ancient Asemeri cores pulse in the dark.  

But beneath it all—beneath the ruins, beneath the rivers, beneath the very bones of this world—there is something older than the Asemeri.  

Something forgotten.  
Something that was never meant to wake.  

This is not a war for land. This is not a war for power.  

This is a war for the right to exist.  

And so I ask, child of the twin suns—will you fight for the Light, or will you let the darkness take it?"

ASTASHICA: Eternal Starborn Dominion

The Battlefield in Chaos

The first impact sent a shockwave through the trenches, hurling warriors into the air, ripping through fortifications, and igniting the sky in an unnatural green glow. The Defiance Vanguard had fully decloaked, its monstrous form dominating the heavens, the symbol of Cosmus' power now visible to all.

Inside his Formicron cockpit, Tlandar's breathing was steady, but his heart pounded. He had studied Salgaran battle doctrine, Formicron synchronization, and planetary warfare for five years—but nothing could have prepared him for this.

The bombardment was random, unpredictable, indiscriminate in its destruction.

Val'katl's voice came through the comms, sharp as steel.

"Stay together! Do not scatter! The battlefield is ours! Move as one!"

The order was clear. They could not break formation.

Tlandar, gripping his controls, turned his Formicron swiftly, leading his Salgaran warriors through the chaos, dodging falling debris and plasma fire.

Akashma's voice crackled over the comms. "They're moving through their own bombardment! They don't care what they hit!"

Tlandar's visor flickered, tracking Ixtiel's forces advancing even under the Vanguard's artillery fire. They weren't retreating. They were pushing harder.

And at the front of it all—Ixtiel himself.

Ixtiel's Confidence Unshaken

Inside his command Formicron, Ixtiel grinned, watching Val'katl's forces weave between the bombardment like rats in a firestorm.

He spoke into his comms, his tone amused. "See how they scramble? They cannot fight in this chaos. They are already breaking."

One of his generals hesitated. "We've lost two units from the bombardment—"

"Then move faster! We break them now!" Ixtiel growled, his hands tightening on the controls.

The Defiance Vanguard was not there to protect him. He knew that. Cosmus had no interest in land warfare.

But Ixtiel thrived in disorder.

He would crush Val'katl here, prove that the warlord had always been too weak, too cautious.

"All forces—forward! No hesitation! Strike deep into their ranks!"

The ground shook as his warriors surged ahead, pushing into the heart of Val'katl's defensive line.

Val'katl's Response

Inside his Formicron, Val'katl clenched his jaw. Ixtiel was fearless, but that did not make him invincible.

"Tlandar, Akashma, take your squads and break their left flank! Do not let them form up!"

Tlandar's pilots responded instantly, adjusting course, their Formicrons darting through the burning wreckage.

Akashma's blade-like Formicron twisted through the air, cutting down an enemy unit with a precise, explosive blast of green laser fire.

The leading warrior of the Eight of Boulderkeep slammed his Formicron into Ixtiel's charging frontline, creating an opening for Val'katl's ground forces to counterattack.

But even as Val'katl's counterstrike began, a new voice entered the comms.

"Continue pressing forward. The battle has not yet reached its true course."

And the moment those words left his mouth, the Defiance Vanguard adjusted its position—preparing for something far worse.

Tlandar's Realization

Tlandar's instincts screamed at him.

This wasn't just random bombardment anymore.

The Defiance Vanguard was calculating something.

He opened a private comm to Val'katl.

"Chieftain, I don't think this is just an attack."

Tlandar's hands moved over his interface. "The Vanguard isn't shifting randomly. It's adjusting in intervals. It's testing where the strongest resistance is—and it's not hitting Ixtiel as much as it should."

This wasn't just a battle.

It was a calculated maneuver.

Cosmus was playing a longer game.

His voice was firm as he spoke into his comms.

"Regroup. We change formation. Now."

The battlefield shifted once more—but the true fight had yet to begin.

Fire from the Sky