And then the resistance fighters saw three giants strike strange poses, unleash beams of light—and after that, they knew nothing at all.
The Ultraman Zod had created were practically foolproof to operate. Even how to fire the beams was included, appearing directly in the mind like an instruction manual.
There was no transformation device needed—one could transform directly. In other words, the Ultraman was essentially the human host itself.
And these weren't mass-produced Ultraman either. They didn't all look exactly alike. Besides, a single Ultraman could basically keep an entire planet pacified on his own, so there was no need to manufacture too many of them.
After all, the Kryptonian Empire only ruled a few thousand planets at the moment—and those were all life-bearing planets, with the resource planets not even counted among them.
Place three Ultraman on each planet, and that came to just under ten thousand Ultraman total—nothing compared to the Land of Light's sixty million Ultra Warriors.
Those guys had all gone through proper training. Zod's creations could only be considered high-grade knockoffs.
But even as knockoffs, they were more than formidable enough.
[Shocking: The Kryptonian Empire has developed a new super-soldier—the Giants!]
[Shocking: The Giants developed by the Kryptonian Empire have destroyed dozens of warships belonging to the nearby Skrull civilization!]
[The Kryptonian Empire's new weapon—the Giants!]
Information traveled fast across the universe. They had already been playing with quantum entanglement communication technology, after all. It let everyone know that the Kryptonian Empire had unveiled yet another new weapon of war: hundred-meter-tall giants.
And some ancient civilizations almost mistook them for the Celestials—because the resemblance was too strong.
The Ultraman's form really did bear a certain similarity to Marvel's Celestials.
The cosmic Celestials were called "Star Giants" by many races precisely because of their exaggeratedly enormous size.
When they appeared, they were often clad in armor, and no one knew what they looked like beneath it.
The designs of Celestial armor were also wildly varied, following no discernible pattern. Perhaps, in their eyes, the Kryptonian Empire's Ultraman looked much like Celestial armor as well.
That was understandable. After all, the cosmic Celestials were an immensely vast and mysterious race—their abilities were strange beyond counting, and the differences between individuals were equally vast.
Moreover, the race's various detailed settings had never been clearly explained in any comic publication. By the look of it, even Marvel's editors hadn't figured it out yet.
Generally speaking, though, the Celestials' size wasn't limited to just a hundred meters.
They typically stood around 2,000 feet tall—roughly six hundred-some meters when converted—far taller than the Kryptonian Empire's Ultraman.
Of course, that was just the average height. Even among Celestials, there were differences between individuals. Some Celestials even had the ability to adjust their own size, so a hundred-meter-tall Celestial wasn't actually all that strange.
At first, they had thought they were overthinking it. The cosmic Celestials—what were they, really? The Kryptonian Empire might be formidable, but there was no way they could take on the Celestials, every member of which stood at the universal-entity level... right?
But after seeing the Ultraman unleash beam attacks of immense power, they began to waver.
Every cosmic Celestial possessed the ability to manipulate cosmic energy, and beam techniques happened to be a specialty of the Celestials as well.
And that was without even mentioning the uploaded videos of Ultraman battling cosmic warships.
Previously, the only ones capable of so brazenly soloing a fleet were Esdeath and Gladiator—at most, you could add Darius, the Hand of Noxus to the list.
But now things were different. An Ultraman could take on a fleet single-handedly, and it even looked easier.
Before the Ultraman, those warships were like so many targets, waiting to be struck down by beam attacks.
As for the warships' counterattacks—in a battlefield as vast as space, the Ultraman could evade their fire with ease.
Their attacks were simply far too slow against an Ultraman.
Originally, the interstellar civilizations had thought the Kryptonian Empire was strong, rising fast—but up until now, they hadn't had a single fleet, relying entirely on Bifrost boarding actions. Impressive, yes, but nothing to be truly feared.
But once the Ultraman appeared, everything changed. A single Ultraman was worth who knew how many fleets, and Ultraman could also descend directly onto planets via the Bifrost to wreak destruction.
Those capable of bringing down an Ultraman numbered only a scattered few. Even a blank-slate Thanos at the sub-Skyfather level would have a hard time of it.
After all, Thanos only had single-arm strength of fifteen hundred tons, whereas every Ultraman had a grip strength of a hundred thousand tons alone.
The Precursor civilization had managed to invade dozens of civilizations with nothing more than giant monsters and environmental pollution—so what about a far more powerful giant unit like an Ultraman?
"Bad news—it's the Kryptonian Empire's Ultraman! Run!"
On a certain planet, accompanied by brilliant rainbow light, two enormous giants appeared before the eyes of everyone on that world.
The hundred-meter-tall giants terrified the planet's civilization. Even though they already knew of the Ultraman's terror from the interstellar network, many fighter craft still fought back desperately to protect their home.
"Why, after witnessing our divine power, do foolish creatures still resist?"
A blue-type Ultraman waved his hand and released a shockwave that blasted the incoming fighters apart. A red-type Ultraman, meanwhile, condensed light in his right hand and fired a barrage of destructive light bullets.
Each destructive light bullet's impact released energy equivalent to three terawatts. Keep in mind, in EVA, the energy output of Unit-01's positron cannon was only one terawatt.
Just as this planet's civilization was about to be largely annihilated by the two Ultraman, a golden figure hurtled toward them.
It was Captain Marvel—Carol Danvers—the one who had once fought the Kryptonian Empire's Grey Knights and come up short against the strength of their two material types!
Not the flat-faced version from the movies, but a hot-bodied blonde bombshell.
After Captain Marvel had been humbled in that encirclement by the Grey Knight and the Black Knight, she had stopped involving herself in Kryptonian Empire affairs—because clearly, the Kryptonian Empire's technology was absurdly advanced. Even she couldn't do anything to their cannon fodder.
But more often than not, you can't dodge every problem forever just by hiding. The same went for Carol Danvers. She just happened to be on this planet carrying out justice when the Kryptonian Empire's Ultraman suddenly appeared, making it impossible for her to slip away.
And after watching the two Ultraman go on a rampage, laying waste to city after city, Danvers drew a deep breath. She decided she would no longer run from the Kryptonian Empire.
The golden figure slammed directly into one of the Ultraman.
Given that this Ultraman's mass exceeded a hundred thousand tons, very few forces could even budge them.
But Captain Marvel was clearly not among those few.
And so, an absurd-looking scene unfolded: an Ultraman of colossal size was sent crashing to the ground by a golden figure far smaller than himself!
/-\
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