Chapter 117: Planetery Emergency Alert

Louis lowered his arm, only to find himself standing directly in front of Ruby again.

The little girl was staring up at him with an expression that suggested her mental list of questions had just tripled in length.

”So you can teleport objects across long distances, too?”

Louis closed his eyes briefly.

‘Here we go again.’

”Yes, Ruby.”

”Can you teleport people?”

”Yes.”

”Can you teleport an entire building?”

”Under certain specific circumstances, yes.”

”Can you teleport a planet?”

Louis opened his eyes and looked down at her. “That depends on what you mean by teleporting a planet.”

Ruby nodded thoughtfully, her head tilting as she processed the answer. Then she opened her mouth to speak again.

Louis held up a single finger. “One question at a time.”

The girl obediently snapped her mouth shut, for approximately three seconds.

”Can you—”

”Ruby.”

She stopped, looking up innocently.

Louis let out a quiet sigh. He had faced terrifying galactic entities capable of reducing star systems to ash, yet somehow, this seven-year-old girl was proving to be a uniquely exhausting challenge.

”Come along. We need to leave the premises.”

He turned toward the corridor exit, and Ruby fell into step beside him, clutching her book tightly against her chest.

When they stepped out into the quiet alley behind the building, Louis scanned the surroundings to ensure no civilians were nearby. Satisfied, he placed a gentle hand on Ruby’s small shoulder.

Space rippled around them like disturbed water.

In the next instant, the two vanished without a sound.

Barely a minute after their departure, the main entrance doors of Stellar Academy burst open as planetary law enforcement finally arrived.

A squad of heavily armed enforcers rushed into the lobby, blasters raised and tactical shields deployed. They had responded to a priority-one alert reporting an armed assault on the academy, fully expecting to engage in a prolonged firefight against a heavily equipped mercenary squad.

Instead, they were met with dead silence.

The primary corridor was littered with bodies.

Thick blood stained the floorboards, concrete debris lay scattered across the hallway, and abandoned high-grade weapons were strewn beside the fallen attackers.

The enforcers stopped in their tracks, their tactical boots frozen against the floor.

For several seconds, no one spoke.

”What the hell happened here?” the captain muttered, stepping forward with a grim expression as he surveyed the devastation.

He had prepared himself for horrific civilian casualties; an armed force breaching a primary school usually meant a tragedy. Yet every single attacker in the hallway was dead.

Crouching beside one of the fallen men, the captain inspected the unnaturally clean, precise severing of the neck before standing back up.

”Secure the perimeter!” he barked into his comms. “Check every classroom for survivors, sweep the building, and make sure there are no remaining hostiles!”

His team dispersed instantly.

Within minutes, an officer jogged back to the captain. “Report, sir! We’ve swept the entire facility. Every single attacker positioned throughout the building has been eliminated. Zero hostile survivors.”

The captain’s brow furrowed tightly. “Any sign of who took them down? Was it local security?”

”Negative, sir. Local security was neutralized early on. The bodies show evidence of absolute, overwhelming force, unbelievably precise decapitations. Whoever engaged them possessed terrifying superiority.”

The captain remained silent, looking down the ruined hallway.

‘Someone powerful intervened.’

There was no other logical explanation. The attackers had entered with military-grade equipment and full tactical coordination, yet they had been wiped out to the last man before official forces could even arrive.

”Notify planetary intelligence,” the captain ordered, rubbing his neck. “Get the medical teams in to evacuate the children, catalog every piece of unregistered gear, and secure the perimeter for forensics.”

As the enforcers worked, classroom doors slowly unlocked. Teachers cautiously peeked out before ushering frightened children into the hallway. The kids clung to their teachers and each other, crying softly as they were guided toward the exit.

The captain watched the evacuation, exhaling slowly. Whoever had intervened today had prevented a massive slaughter.

Now he just had to figure out who, or what, had done it.

Meanwhile, Louis stood on the wind-swept rooftop of a high-rise building several blocks away, Ruby standing safely by his side.

The cool breeze blew across the roof, carrying the faint, distant wail of emergency sirens from the streets below. From this height, the academy was clearly visible, surrounded by flashing red and blue lights.

Ruby walked near the edge, keeping a safe distance as she looked down at the city grid. “That was fast.”

Louis glanced down at her. “What was fast?”

”The teleportation,” she said, looking up from her book. “We were in the alley, and now we’re up here.”

He nodded smoothly. “Spatial displacement is vastly more efficient than conventional transit.”

Ruby’s eyes sparkled with renewed curiosity. “Can you teach me how to do that?”

”Not at your current stage of growth.”

”Why not?”

”Because manipulating space requires precise mana control, advanced spatial perception, and a physical body strong enough to endure the structural strain of shifting through dimensions. Attempting it without the proper foundation would dismantle you at a molecular level.”

Ruby considered his explanation carefully. “Oh.”

She turned back toward the city view.

Louis nearly smiled. Perhaps that sobering explanation had finally satisfied her endless curiosity.

Then, his communicator vibrated again.

He raised his wrist, expecting a preliminary report from the weapons research division. Instead, a harsh crimson light flashed across the interface as a system-wide emergency broadcast took over the display.

Louis’s expression darkened as he opened the file.

[PLANETARY EMERGENCY ALERT]

Louis read the red text twice, his weathered face growing increasingly solemn.

This was no isolated security incident.

The coordinated attack on Stellar Academy had taken place at the exact same moment a planet-wide emergency alert was triggered. Armed Evolvers wielding unregistered military technology, an attack on an elementary school, and now a planetary defense breach…

Coincidence was mathematically impossible.

Something far larger was moving in the shadows of the Astral Dominion.