Kiana had just finished a game when she was called out.
She stepped outside and saw two little figures arguing at the doorway.
A verbal battle between Bronya and Sirin.
"Amber, what are they doing?"
"Mmm..." Amber watched Bronya and Sirin's argument, getting a general understanding from what they were saying.
"They're probably just fighting over status? Like, who's more important? The little aunt, or the goddaughter?"
Amber was no longer surprised by such matters.
Kiana spat, saying disdainfully, "What a bunch of shameless people! I'm leaving. Amber, you should ignore them too!"
Kiana casually walked to the edge of the floating island, leaped up, and jumped down from the sky.
Amber watched Kiana disappear into the clouds, then thought about Schicksal's massive, leftover administrative organization. The thought of having to do that kind of secretarial work again made her feel that this life was somewhat not worth the effort.
Amber pondered whether she should find a chance to trick Theresa into coming over to do the work.
That way, she might be able to resign.
The Academy City Kiana saw was vastly different from before.
In the past, when the Honkai crisis still loomed, the people inside Academy City still paid some attention to maintaining relationships with one another.
But now, Academy City was like a city in the heavens. There was no longer any need to consider alliances. At a time like this, there was only one voice left within Academy City.
Expansion! Expansion! And more expansion!
This expansion wasn't just economic; it was also about spreading Academy City's internal ideology and technology to every corner of the Earth.
For example, a man named Chen Tianwu, originally from Southeast Asia, had developed his Stigma power to the extreme while traveling as a merchant, even creating his own organization based on his Stigma power.
He had completely surpassed all other commercial organizations.
Through the exchange and attachment of Stigma powers, Chen Tianwu had even used his Stigma to create some sort of ambiguous, hybrid species.
He seemed to have found a special way to fuse human life with Stigma life.
And this time, Kiana was here to deal with this trouble.
Humans and Stigmas fusing together... wouldn't that make them...
Something similar to Misteln?
---||---
At that moment, inside Academy City, Toyokawa Shoko was undergoing a simple inquiry. The Academy City security force wasn't giving her too much trouble.
"Yes, I'm just an ordinary salesperson. I've only just recently come into contact with a Stigma Battlesuit, and I haven't seen the boss conduct any private experiments."
"Although we have collaborations with research institutes, they are all cooperative research institutes under the Anti-Entropy banner. All our collaborations have been certified through memory fragment extraction by the Kaslana Stigma."
Toyokawa Shoko skillfully recounted the situation at her workplace. Having chatted with many customers, she was used to laying everything out on the table.
Misteln didn't get any more information from Toyokawa Shoko.
Moreover, Chen Tianwu's situation seemed to be different from hers. One could even say he had gone down a different path of Stigma usage.
"Is something wrong with our boss?"
Toyokawa Shoko was a little worried. After all, she had a good relationship with her boss's younger sister. It would be troublesome if her boss had done something wrong and became an enemy of Academy City.
Misteln smiled reassuringly. "Don't worry, it's not a big deal with Chen Tianwu. Rather than a big deal, it's more like a small problem that has arisen after the end of the Honkai crisis."
'This is no small problem...'
Prometheus looked at the file she held on Chen Tianwu, which detailed the changes in his Stigma.
This thing was more like a new Stigma Body being constructed from the Honkai ICHOR factor within his body.
This trend had initially only appeared in the Kaslanas.
That is, by constructing Stigma organs, the Kaslana Stigma had made hereditary succession possible.
The Kaslanas had thus become the most powerful 'imperial clan' of the current era.
To put it bluntly, the privatization of hereditary Stigmas in the current era was something only the three great houses had achieved.
Even so, the Schariac and Apocalypse lines had gradually been diluted.
Only the Kaslana clan remained.
And Chen Tianwu's condition was somewhat similar to the Kaslanas'.
Chen Tianwu's Stigma power had clearly changed due to some special reason related to the usurpation of Finality.
That is, Chen Tianwu's body was gradually trending toward 'Kaslana-fication,' i.e., the privatization of hereditary Stigmas.
---||---
After comforting and sending off Toyokawa Shoko, Misteln and Prometheus began to discuss the results of their investigation.
"Misteln, the result... is not as good as we imagined."
Prometheus shook her head. "It's obvious. This change in Chen Tianwu clearly represents that humanity has gained the power to integrate with Stigmas. And they can control the new genes formed by their own Honkai ICHOR factor, completely passing them on to the next generation."
"This means that through the means of genetic control, a person can be born with a certain Stigma awakened. It's even a bit like the Cocoon of Finality's behavior of constructing a Herrscher's consciousness, only the result manifested in human hands is this situation."
Misteln hadn't expected to one day see the emergence of a being similar to herself.
The autonomous process of Stigma-fication in humans had not only failed to conform to all the directions of social progress laid out by Noldrei, but it had even begun to show a conservative evolution toward humanity's primitive form.
"Using the power of the Stigma to remember the genetic data of primitive humans, thereby allowing human genes to maintain stability through the mechanism of the Honkai ICHOR factor. The function of the Stigma on Chen Tianwu is more akin to an RNA polymerase under a Honkai factor mechanism."
Prometheus had clearly explained the existence of this new Stigma.
She very keenly realized what the consequences would be after the power of Finality was released.
"I understand what you mean. You're saying that after the authority of Finality was relinquished by the Will of the Honkai, it instead came to live within every person in the form of a Stigma. It completely disappeared from the forefront and turned itself into a part of the human Stigma."
"This has led to humanity having to face a new dilemma of Stigma privatization."
Misteln had understood what Noldrei meant by Stigma privatization.
But the privatization Noldrei spoke of was based on Stigma organizations as the basic unit. If the Will of the Honkai had really tampered with the Honkai ICHOR factor in the end and completely dispersed its power throughout human civilization...
Then it would transform from the privatization of Stigma organizations to the privatization of individuals. This would cause the entire Stigma society to continuously shift toward a state of conservative atomization.