Broken Borders: A Humans Remade Novel

By Aarush Kukadiya

After the fall of the Necroms, the world is finally at peace. Ardex Kronx is 17 and ready to take the Guardian exams after his father who was the main cause of the fall of the Necroms, but no Kronx has a simple story. An Inter-Universal Conquerer has shown up in his universe and now Ardex and his teammates are forced to stop him. With the most random team of his rival his ex and the maybe son of his father's worst enemy, he will not know who to trust maybe even not himself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tablo Publishing
• Release date: Mar 23, 2022
• ISBN: 9781685833022

Book preview

Prologue

Universe 750, year 26500

Open it up, doctor, growled the Warlord. Sire, I warn you, if you travel to 616, their heroes will obliterate you. You should know better than anyone in this army, the Scientist cowered.

Do you doubt my power, doctor?

N-no.

You dare lie? and with one clean swoosh of his sword, the Scientist's head tumbled off his body.

Find his replacement, the Warlord growled to his servant. A soldier dressed head to toe in blue and gold brought another cowering scientist was brought inside.

Open it.

Yessir.

A vast swirling mass opened up on the ground.

Finally, I am seeing it, The Warlord whispered. The portal to the land of heroes.

And with that, the portal grew more prominent, and he sicced his thousands of planes and millions of men into the last multiverse he planned to conquer.

The universe of war at last. Here I come, said the Warlord, and he jumped in the portal.

It’s me (not Caillou)

Ardex

Bam! The sounds of my father shooting lasers at me made my ears ring like crazy. Ducking and rolling, I sent two pistol shots at his open legs. Then, he jumped over them in one fluid motion and had his ion spear pointing at my heart in one fluid motion. 

With a deep sigh, he said, Fail. If you want to graduate to the ranks of Guardian, you have to be less predictable, or if you are, then your strategies should be unbeatable I shoved the point of the spear aside with my sword and spun around about to send him flying with a hook kick. Still, in the space of a millisecond, I was on the ground groaning from the pain of having my feet swept out from under me and falling on a stainless steel floor headfirst.

Just like I said, you're predictable, he told me.

Lay off him, Alvin; he's only 15, my Mom told him, walking towards us.

When I was 13, I was forced to save the world, he replied.

And you watched your father, friend, and godfather killed during that same year, she shot back, do you want that for him.

Why must you make so much sense? he sighed wearily. 

Come on, Ardex, your sister is waiting for dinner, and let's get some ice for your head, she told me soothingly as we exited the training room.

After getting some ice, we walked into the kitchen, where my twin sister was already seated and waiting for us.

Took you long enough I'm starving, she grumbled. Judging by her mood, I assumed she had run through another boyfriend today and was mad about it. 

That's a shame, Arra. I liked Titus. He was much nicer, Volt, I teased though I did like Titus. 

If you dated him, you wouldn't, she shot back.

Isis, did you know about this? My dad asked my Mom.

Everyone did, Dad. The entire school knew, including the staff, I said, rolling my eyes. 

You kids gossip too much, he told us.

Oh yeah, what about the time you were on the front page of every magazine when you accidentally ran into the Empress of the Hachiman Nation and accidentally kissed her, Mom told him.

Really? both Arra and I said. Mom nodded, and both of us burst out laughing, and soon all of us, including Dad, were all doubled over laughing. 

---

After finishing dinner, Arra and I faced off in the training room that our family friend Archimedes Flannel had built to turn into different biomes by a push of a button. We were in a deep forest. While Arra scaled trees and leaped from treetop to treetop using an arsenal of anti-matter pistols, a semi-automatic particle accelerated ammo machine gun, and an ion burst assault rifles, along with two arm anti-gravity RPGs and a heavy dark matter sniper rifle. Meanwhile, on the ground, I would track her down on the ground using old hunting techniques that my ancestors used to track down monkeys and other Magilane species. Finally, I caught sight of her, drew my particle accelerated sword, and started up my ion shield. She was perched on the tallest tree with her Burst AR pointed at my head. Fluidly, I shot up my sword hand, revealing an arm grappling hook which I used to shoot myself towards her branch and knock her off with my shield. Stray shots went everywhere, and I almost died when one grazed my temple, but at the last second, I turned on the legendary Spartan Armor which had been a gift from my father on my 13th birthday. Arra was wearing her Kevlar bodysuit and thermal and infrared imaging face mask, thermal and the old Omega Centurion gear mixed with Mom's Eclipse outfit when I landed. She held an eclipse flare katana. Still, my visor blocked the blinding qualities that made it so powerful.

That's new.

Courtesy of Mom, she replied cheekily.

My sword's edges split, revealing a railgun that was set to stun and sent her flying.

Courtesy of Dad! I yelled back.

The Other Guy

Ardex

A whistle echoed from behind me.

Wow, kid, you got good. I turned to look at the speaker and saw the grinning face of my Godfather, Maximus Max Finix. He had his standard ginger hair with a tall semi-muscular build and a blue sweatshirt.

Max! You came, I said giddily with joy.

Of course, I came to my Godson's test into the Guardians Ranks. I get a front-row seat for all the events too.

Where's Artemis? Arra grumbled, emerging from the trees. She still looked disgruntled, but that was probably renewed because of her flight into the tree-tops.

She's in the kitchen with Isis, Max replied. Arra sprinted away. She had liked Artemis since they first met. Artemis had taught her everything there is to know about sharpshooting. That's why her sharpshooting skills were better than mine and Dad's. Though my Godmother was not the brightest person Magilane, she was fun. During my parent's fight against the Necroms (a group of rebels trying to commit genocide), her brother was killed by Satan, their leader, when they were trying to stop a pandemic planned to wipe us all out. Both Arra and Artemis were nice but rough and tough, which gave them an annoying brooding quality, making them perfect for each other. Max and I were fun-loving but could annihilate anyone who disagreed with us, and both of us had a short temper. I got my personality from my mom but still had the fighting skills and physique of my dad. Anyway, can we get back to the conversation?

Want a match? Max asked. I grinned. I was training to be a Merinian guardian. Still, the  Guardians from the Hachiman Nation were unique fighters famed for their katana skills, and Max was the top-ranking Guardian for the Hachimanish. With a quick pull at his sweatshirt drawstrings, nanotech put on full assassin gear with the arm crossbow, throwing knives, and two ion katanas strapped to his back. Still, the most impressive was a blazing SuperNova sword that, rumors say, had been pulled out of the pure tungsten and vibranium floor of the most secure prison in the world. Even though I was used to weapons at this point in my life, I gawked as the blade seemed to draw all the light in the room towards it. Next, I pulled out my now unimpressive, particle accelerated metal sword, which was a blue blur of power. We engaged in a swordfight that could have winded even the most athletic of people, jumping from trees using the rivers that had now formed as tools of destruction. Finally, I lept from a tree that I was hiding in and knocking him off of his feet and holding my now charged railgun, ready to shoot at his head. Tapping my leg, he got up and moved my sword aside.

Good job. Perform like this during the test tomorrow, and they’ll be kicking off the old Guardians, he told me, now go get some rest. You have a big day tomorrow. I knew Max had been going easy on me but, I still went to bed proud of myself.

Ooh Shiny (with a side of danger)

Ardex

When I woke up the next day, it felt like a regular day, but it hit me. It was the day I took the exam to join the Guardians. So I hopped out of bed, changed into my best clothes, and backflipped off the top floor's balcony into the 3rd-floor breakfast nook.

Someone's jumpy today, Arra said from right beside. She still looked stern but now more like wood than her usual steel expression.

Someone's happy, I responded.

I'm always happy little brother.

You're only 13 minutes older, and I'm taller than you. 

Settle down the two of you, Dad said as he walked in. 

Ardex, you're coming with me for the Guardian test. Isis will take you to the Secret Army HQ. 

Yeah, that's right, my sister will join the Secret Army, the espionage division for the former Raid-Force, which was every nation's shield against the Necroms but is now basically a police force for each country.

Ardex come, I have a present for you, Dad called. So I followed him into the armory where Max was waiting for me with one of my best friends and his son Trixideon or Trix for short, Trix looked nothing like Max with his brown hair and animated features. He hair and small and skinny frame with pale skin. 

Man, wait till you see what I made for you, he said. Trix was two years younger than me, but that didn't matter because he was a fantastic friend, always loyal and listening also one of the most intelligent people on the planet. He had recently gotten us contact with Renzia, another intergalactic world that had humans on it due to the Covid-19 pandemic about 28500 years ago on Earth's origin planet. Anyway, back to the story. 

Trix took out a large sword off of a frame on the wall. It had a curved blade with a narrow beginning and a wide end.

It's based on the old scimitars back when Earth was a livable planet, Max said.

I designed it to be able to switch the physical or chemical makeup of its matter so that you can erase someone from existence and a second later sends someone molecules into a frenzy. Also, the blade  can turn into a bladed staff, and it has a hidden knife in the hilt.

Wow, I said because that was all I could muster. Trix chuckled, It is specially designed so that your thoughts are the only things that can make it a deadly weapon, or else it's on stun.

So, is there an instruction manual? I asked.

Just think about what you want it to do, Dad told me

Also, here's a railgun, Trix said to me as he handed me a large gun with a head of a lion at its end and was solid gold. 

Anything special? I asked.

It's a railgun. What else can you ask for? Trix told me.

Fair enough, I said.

Well bye, he