Going over Alignment now. This is a short story about Liege Maximo trying to become a god that's always been dubiously canon because it was never officially published. Except I just realized Ask Vector Prime just straight up said it's canon so I don't know why TFwiki deliberates over it so much aside from legal reasons or something.
Q: Is the Challenge of the GoBots cartoon canon for Transformers? Alignment? How about G.I. Joe?
A: GoBots are, yes, though in a very distant part of the multiverse. Gobotron is an aspect of Primus, and the Unicron defeated in Primax 703.02 Gamma hailed from that dimension. Alignment is canon for the Primax 984.0 Gamma universe. G.I. Joe is a complicated case. The events depicted in the G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero cartoon are canon for Primax 984.17 Alpha. So are C.O.P.S., Inhumanoids, even Jem and the Holograms. The events depicted in the 155 issue Marvel series are canon for Primax 984.0 Gamma. Otherwise, it varies.
As this is an official source this means the story is valid to consider.
One of the Liege Maximo's fleets can planetbust
At the very heart of the Hub, the Liege Maximo watched. A
vast energy shield had appeared around Cybertron, and for the
moment it was resisting the cull. No matter. The move
smacked of desperation, of futile last efforts. A mental
command diverted more ships to the shield, their combined
firepower now enough to destroy a whole planet.
Liege Maximo's hub network of connected cyberformed planets spans several light years
The Hub covered several light years of space, and only sheer
fluke had landed them this close to the mid-point of its
unfolding geometry. When they’d bailed out from their
crippled Hyperwave, the expanse of the Hub had yawned
before them in all possible directions. A three-dimensional
construct, it expanded across, up and down, such as these
definitions were applicable in outer space. Thousands and
thousands of metal planets, all identical except in mass, all
inter-connected via transit tubeways and filament arteries. A
web of little Cybertrons, stretching as far as the eye could see.
By examining and interpolating data downloaded from the
vast computer network that maintained and directed the Hub,
they had managed to identify a fairly critical junction, a
routing station for huge amounts of energy: J654.
Furman's Grimlock (his favorite character) is pretty funny, upon them entering the shielded space of the Hub, mind you they have no clue what it's for and who Liege Maximo is, Grimlock already wants to exploit being thought to be dead as an excuse for him and his autobots to
kill themselves blow the entire system up It was clear that the Hub served some purpose, to someone or
something, and that someone or something had shot them out
of the sky. That it believed them dead, and had not sent ships
to verify the kill, meant that it was either vulnerable or
overconfident, both weaknesses that Grimlock wished to
exploit. Junction 654, or simply J654, was also a weakness
Grimlock wished to take advantage of. It was, Perceptor had
calculated, the optimum point at which to initiate a
catastrophic chain reaction, or — in Grimlock’s parlance —
blow a very big hole in the Hub. That they wouldn’t
themselves survive the detonation seemed acceptable. They
understood, deep down, they were all now living on borrowed
time.
The concept of the 13 would not exist for some more years yet, but this established Liege Maximo is of the first generation made by Primus
Countless millennia and it all came down to this. It thought
back, allowed itself a rare moment of reverie. It was of the
first, born of the living form of Primus. The distilled essence
of a god had coursed through its systems, flooded its
consciousness. It understood, even back then, that its destiny
was not that chosen for it by Primus. It understood the Grand
Plan, but where others chose to sub-divide their physical
being, create further generations of Transformers, the Liege
Maximo did not. It contained its awesome power, chose its
own course, its own timetable. It understood what Primus had
not: that the universal balance demanded a yang for every yin.
The darkness was a living thing within it.
It shrank away from the light, let its few selective offspring
spread like a malaise through the Transformer race. And as
successive generations moved further away from their godly
origins, so the Liege Maximo sought to return to that state. It
watched as the Cybertronian nation evolved, saw its taint
move down through the generations to spawn first Megatron
and ultimately the Decepticons. And all the while, its own
researches into the dark origins of the universe continued,
revealing a pattern, a unique alignment of stars that signalled
the intersection of a much older reality with their own. Here
dwelt gods, and the Liege Maximo desired nothing more than
to ascend to that reality, to become a god. And so the building
of the Hub began, a resonant structure designed to open a
portal to the world beyond.
That their own universe would be destroyed in the process was
really of little or no concern to the Liege Maximo.
^^^ Liege's Hub plan and ascension to Godhood (note: in the DK TF Guide, Furman specifically says this is the same plane Unicron and the Dark Gods lived on) will destroy the entire universe.
Blaster had been busy on the long journey to J654, preparing a
invasive transmitter, cobbled together from his own back-up
mechasystems. Powered by a tiny fragment of energon, it was
designed to feed new routing pathways to the main computer,
diverting the massive flow of energy through a smaller, more
vulnerable junction. The safety relays would burn out almost
instantly, creating a sudden surge into the local reactor core.
Instant meltdown. Such was the focal nature of J654, the
explosion would wash back through the system, gathering
force as it went. It would, Perceptor had calculated, destroy
nearly 0.5643 percent of the Hub, leaving a colossal gaping
hole the size of a small galaxy. In Grimlock’s words, ‘that had
to hurt!’
And indeed the small autobot group's plan to make it self-destruct would leave a hole "the size of a small galaxy"
It responded much like any living organism. The Hub was as
much a part of the Liege Maximo as its own physical form. Its
nervous and arterial systems spread throughout the length and
breadth of its resonant superstructure. The Hub had sensitive
areas, which — if attacked — instinctively reacted to the
threat, closing down pathways, releasing viral antibodies. Any
significant infection was purged in moments. Its conscious
mind was only peripherally aware of the threat at all.
The Hub itself is essentially just an extension of Liege Maximo. This would make his marvel avatar somewhere around solar system level and universal with prep.
Beneath the surface of Pyrovar, vast thermo-cyclonic charges
detonated, the planet dissolving into a fiery mass that seemed
to fold in on itself, mushrooming in reverse… before booming
outward in great waves of destructive force, ripping through
the atmosphere, pushing out into space. The forces on the
ground were gone instantly, the spaceborne ships a moment
later. Around the core of the explosion, gravity collapsed in on
itself, compressing local space into a superdense hole. In
moments, Pyrovar and the surrounding several light years of
space were gone.
The Decepticons weaponize one of their occupied planets by blowing it up so badly it becomes a black hole destroying everything within several light years. They did this because Liege's fleet had overtaken them as it had cybertron.
And as the throng neared, and gathered, it spread the fingers of
its one hand wide, gesturing. In response, countless thousands
of bodies lifted into the air, a suddenly suspended
congregation. The nearest figure to them, though some good
distance away in real terms, suddenly began to shudder and
twitch, its body spasming. Its chest seemed to warp, blister,
and then suddenly its Spark, its lifeforce, erupted from within,
torn out by unseen fingers. The Spark, a brilliant ball of
phosphorescence, hovered for a brief moment, and then was
sucked forward towards the creature in the dome.
Liege Maximo can pretty casually soulsteal large masses of Transformers
Around it the Hub shimmered into coruscating life, resonating
with the power of several million Sparks. What it had once
given… it now took back.
Confirmed to have been several million here.
Above, the stars seemed to glow brighter, as if some celestial
contact had been established. The Liege Maximo felt the first
wrench, a dizzying pull at the very substance of its being. It
knew it was changing, becoming different. The physical laws
that had bound it began to slip away, its consciousness
expanded across multiple plains to encompass the enormity of
other realities, other possibilities.
Above, the heavens themselves seem to warp, a tidal wave of
unreality spreading like a virus through the substance of space
and time. And at its epicentre, a portal began to form. It had no
substance, no shape, no definable event horizon, but it
assaulted the senses, pulling and tugging at the Liege Maximo
like some hungry predator.
Liege Maximo's mind expands across multiple planes of existence. We also get some clarification that this Alignment ritual causes some kind of "unreality" to flood throughout the spacetime of the universe ????
For a long, protracted period it resisted, fought, struggled,
hung on to the roots it had laid down in what it understood as
reality. If it was not ready, not fully acclimatised to its new
state of unbeing, it would be destroyed, consumed. It needed
time, while time still had any meaning, to encompass the
myriad contradictions and absurdities, it needed…
Just kinda backs up the state of existence Primus/Unicron are on is something beyond comprehension. Liege's pov outright states it is becoming a state of "unbeing" and time will no longer have any meaning. This unexplained higher realm exists in a state of impossible contradictions.
The savage howl snapped it back, fast, the connection broken.
It turned, confused, looked up…
… to see Grimlock dropped towards it, off one of the towers,
energo sword raised above his head. Grimlock howled,
screamed, and struck – a mighty blow, and one that in
actuality the Liege Maximo barely felt. But it had been struck,
and that thought burned with outrage and shock. This insect,
this tiny microbe, had attacked it. For a lurching moment, it
fought the pull of the stellar portal, resisted the change. It
needed but an instant more in this physical realm, a tiny,
infinitesimal moment…
… to snuff out a life.
Grimlock pisses him off so much he temporarily stops him from ascending to godhood lol
In fact, it was over before Perceptor’s hand even made contact
with Swoop’s arm. The blink of eye, perhaps not even that.
Grimlock was there… and then he wasn’t. A gesture, perhaps,
from the creature? It was hard to be sure, but Grimlock just…
popped, exploded into his component atoms it seemed, and
was just gone.
Liege Maximo then atomizes Grimlock instantly
It began again, shrugging off its brief flirtation with anger,
focusing again on the widening portal. The universe around
them was wounded, crying out in pain, dying. Its agonies
assaulted its new senses, ran fingernails down its expanded
nervous system, but it remained resolute. Reality bubbled and
boiled away, became distant white noise. It reached out to
touch its destiny…
…and was rejected.
The universe cannot handle the ascension to godhood, this is something entirely different than when the Flaternity evolved, they just became imperceptible as they evolved to higher dimensions, same with the Omega Guardians. This is something a lot more abstract and fundamental. "Reality boiled away"
It fell, hard, back to harsh, unforgiving order and structure.
What had happened? And then it saw, the small, mushrooming
cloud from lateral transverse string D1089, an explosion. The
Hub had been damaged, the pattern disturbed. With a thought,
it began to repair the breach, a swarm of repair drones
descending on D1089. But as the flaw rapidly disappeared,
another blast, on the interlink world of Pi Omega4. Small,
again easily dealt with. But the situation clearly demanded a
more permanent remedy. It marked the position of the two
explosions, defined a possible search radius, and isolated the
enclosed area. Then it raised a cadre of troopers from the
fallen legion, restored their Sparks, and sent them directly to
deal with the infection.
Maximo resurrects the dead he had consumed the souls of before.
Furious, it turned on the nearest Warworld, charged its solar
compactor and fired. The Warworld weathered the blast… but
only just. Its shielding failed, and the energy feedback
punctured gaping wounds in its hull. The Liege Maximo
charged the solar compactor, fired again… and the Warworld
disappeared in a colossal fireball.
Liege Maximo casually destroys a WarWorld, these are repeatedly described as being the size of planets.
One shot, thought Megatron and fired. The creature was
turned away from it, mustering its defences for a
righthand attack. Megatron shot it in the left flank, the
concentrated beam of charged ions punching into its
armoured hide just below its arm, exiting at an angle
through the front chest plating. It staggered, roared…
turned towards him. He saw recognition, fear, anger…
and then only the savage white light of an exploding
sun.
A revived and superpowered on raw Energon Megatron actually manages to harm Liege, and gets instantly one-shotted by the cannon which is said to have...
He saw recognition, fear, anger…
and then only the savage white light of an exploding
sun.
The power of an exploding sun.
The Liege Maximo was hurt… it was actually hurt. The
sensation was new, shocking. Megatron. Its own
creation, its own twisted spawn. The savage irony of it
all. It had destroyed the offending creation, but the
damage was done. It was wounded, perhaps critically.
He had to leave this tired, battered physical form and
rise. It had to reach the portal, by sheer force of will if
necessary. His physical form slumped, and all that was
the Liege Maximo ascended…
… just as J654 exploded, a monumental eruption that
tore through the Hub. Airborne, Swoop hurtled up into
the sky, just ahead of the mushrooming fireball. It was
going to be close. Section upon section was consumed,
obliterated, until the dome itself was destroyed, the
Liege Maximo’s physical form along with it.
Above, the resonant portal collapsed, and all that was
the Liege Maximo was caught in-between, pure energy
with no place to go. As it dissipated, its screams echoed
across the vastness of space, reverberating in the audio
sensors of every Transformer present.
This actually stalls it enough for Swoop to mess with the Hub and get it to blow up while Liege is distracted, at the same instant he ascends, which results in him getting trapped between the universe and the plane of the gods, obliterating him.
So yeah, actually a lot of feats here and the story handles the "guys on the ground vs a cosmic god" better than actually...most stories I've seen in general. The way Liege jobs is because he's become so vast and arrogant they're able to capitalize on things too small for him to notice, and the majority of the characters instantly die distracting. Lot of planetbusting and star level stuff here too, and the millions+ soul feat backs up other stuff placing the 13's avatars at that degree of soul manipulation.
Liege's actual ascension is bizarre and not easily quantifiable, and mainly illustrates that whatever type of existence Primus and Unicron are, it's just completely and utterly beyond what is normally comprehensible, even to something as ancient as him.
