The Ferret Universe

Chapter 3

Lula and I tumbled out of a white hole near the peripheries of Galaxy Prime. We jerked back as a flurry of Cosmic Warriors zoomed past us.

"Has it been 24 hours already?" I turned and hyperextended my gaze to the nearest glasslike sphere—the countdown time at the bottom of the scoreboard was at zero.

Yep, the 24-hour Galactic Cosmic Battle was over.

And of course, Jedidiah had won first place— he still had his name at the top of the scoreboard, with his unbeatable record of 10,000 SPH.

Lula and I were right below him, tied second place on the same row, beside the score of 8,500 SPH.

I turned to Lula with a grimace. "Hehe. Galactic Cosmic Battles are whatever. But once the Intergalactic Battles come up..." I swirled around her, giving her a daring frown-smile, "...I'm gonna surpass you so hard, you're gonna— AFFF!"

Lula blew softly at my face, releasing a white mist that had a super-intense gardenia fragrance.

I felt an instant wave of dizziness, followed by an echoing sound of Lula's giggling. I shook my head and hovered back—when I opened my eyes, Lula was swaying away, saying something that I couldn't comprehend through the echoing that still rang in my ears.

I quickly snapped back into focus and dashed after her, frown-smiling. Although I may have tied with her again, I still clung to my comment about beating her in the upcoming Intergalactic Cosmic Battles—those were more of a big deal. While Galactic Cosmic Battles (like the ones we just finished) involved competing against other Cosmic Warriors within our own galaxy, Intergalactic Cosmic Battles involved competing against Cosmic Warriors from other galaxies across the Universe of Ferretopia. During those Cosmic battles, the highest-scoring Cosmic Warriors from the Galactic Cosmic Battles would compete against the highest-scoring Warriors from other galaxy's Galactic Cosmic Battles. And while the Galactic Cosmic Battles were 24 hours, the Intergalactic Battles were 8 days—time was calculated in Galaxy Prime's Prime Planet.

But the next Intergalactic Cosmic Battle wouldn't come up until another 10 days. In the meantime, the least I could do was beat Lula back to the Cosmic Warrior Gathering Center on our planet.

I soared through the galaxy, occasionally using extra energy to summon black holes and speed up the traveling process. I passed by numerous air tunnels full of Cosmic Warriors as they also all returned from the Cosmic Battles.

Finally, I tumbled out of a white hole and was able to see Prime Planet in the distance.

I gave an excited smirk and felt a thrill course through me as I soared toward the planet I was proud to call home.

Galaxy Prime was a huge galaxy—it was the galaxy with the greatest population of, not just ferrets, but Industrialized Ferrets. On the other hand, most of the other galaxies in this Universe had an equal population distribution Industrialized Ferrets, Primitive Ferrets, and Feral Ferrets. And plenty galaxies had planets where the population of Primitive and Feral Ferrets was greater than their population of Industrialized ones.

But Galaxy Prime had both the greatest population of ferrets and the greatest population of Industrialized Ferrets. And that was because our galaxy had the strongest Cosmic Warriors—the stronger the Cosmic Warrior, the more spacerocks they destroyed during a Battle session, which meant more Elemental Stardust for the Warrior to inhale. The more Elemental Stardust ferret inhaled, the stronger their Elemental Powers became, which meant more ferrets could summon more advanced objects and resources for civilized living.

And again— that's why it was no surprise that superstars like Lula, Jedidiah, and I lived in the greatest luxury homes in the wealthiest cities on the wealthiest planet in the most prosperous galaxy.