After a night of slaughter, dawn quietly arrived, like a forgotten promise, bringing some hope to this broken world.
The first hint of fish-belly white gradually tore through the shackles of the night, as if a god had sketched the outline of dawn in the endless darkness with a faint brushstroke.
The color of the sky gradually changed, and a faint golden light began to overflow from the horizon. Everything on the ruins was plated with a layer of golden yellow. The broken walls and ruins looked particularly desolate in the morning light.
Li Mo did not continue to hunt. The ghost swarms had been devoured and were almost gone. He had to leave some breathing room.
This room was not for him, and certainly not for the ghosts, but for Sakura in the world of the cursed blade.
One day corresponded to one year. The eight hours that had just passed corresponded to four months in the world of the cursed blade.
There were seventy-nine ghosts that had been swallowed. Sakura might not be able to kill all of them in four months. Even if she could, she would have been greatly weakened.
If he continued to let ghosts into the world of the cursed blade, the one who survived would probably no longer be Sakura.
Next, he just needed to wait for a while in a safe place, and then eliminate the remaining ghosts one by one.
Li Mo put Rin down from his back. Rin did not resist and quickly landed on the ground.
The two of them shifted their gazes from each other to their surroundings.
This city was almost a dead city. Only a few survivors were hiding in the darkness. Obviously, those survivors would not be foolish enough to walk on the streets, and they might not even... have the courage to take a look.
The reason was very simple. Those who had hidden in their homes and tried to observe the situation outside had all been targeted by the ghosts wandering on the streets without exception.
When they saw the ghosts through the light, the ghosts would also return their burning gazes.
Those who survived were bound to be those who had always hidden in the darkness.
Therefore, in a short period of time, Li Mo and Rin would not be able to meet any living people.
Li Mo came back to his senses and found that Rin was pulling at his sleeve, staring straight at him.
Rin's lips pursed, as if she were struggling with whether to say it or not. After hesitating and looking down at the filthy and dilapidated terrifying environment around her, she finally made up her mind, "Brother, there are still survivors in this city. I can feel the surge of life."
"And then?"
"I want to save people."
"Alright."
"Let's make it clear first. You can't absorb the life of living people. They have managed to survive this disaster... I don't want to become a new terror."
"I never said I would let you absorb the life of living people."
"Is, is that so..."
Rin turned her head guiltily, not daring to look directly at Li Mo's eyes.
Li Mo did not say much. He knew very well what Rin was thinking. Her conscience made it impossible for her to lay a hand on innocent living people who were powerless.
Even though she was no longer human, she still wanted to live as a human.
For this reason, she was afraid to take that step.
But she would eventually take that step. Li Mo didn't need to urge her at all. The Yae Village of the future was the best example.
The value of life certainly could not be measured by quantity, but the human heart could not hide the brilliance of truth.
When Rin was close to losing control, she had no choice at all. Either kill everyone, or kill a very small number of people.
Whether it was for the greater good, or for survival.
From a certain point of view, there seemed to be no great difference between the bizarre and humans, and between humans and animals.
Or rather, the bizarre were actually more sacred, because they never slaughtered, but only acted according to the rules, without sadness or joy, without anger or resentment, like gods.
For humans to live better, it was also reasonable to eat animals.
In the end, this was the law of nature, the law of the world, and the will of heaven could not be defied.
Life was really a fragile thing.
The wind on the street carried a bone-chilling cold, rolling up the dust and fallen leaves on the ground, flying at the feet of the two. Occasionally, it blew through a broken window.
The sharp whistling sound was like the sobbing of a mountain ghost, making people shudder.
Rin seemed not to have heard it. Her gaze was always searching ahead, looking for possible survivors.
With Li Mo around, she was not afraid no matter how many ghosts she encountered.
The two of them walked past one street corner after another, through one ruin after another. The sound of their footsteps echoed in the empty streets, appearing unusually clear.
Suddenly, Rin stopped. Her eyes lit up, as if she had caught a faint sound of life ahead.
"Found it. There's a living person ahead."
Under a collapsed wall, a small, thin body was barely supported by a few broken wooden planks. Her face was covered with dust and tear stains. Her eyes were red and swollen, and her hands were tightly clutching a broken stone beside her, as if it were her only reliance in this desolate world.
Rin's heart was deeply moved by this scene. At the bizarre station, she had also hidden in the shadows in such a sorry state.
"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid. We are not enemies."
Rin carefully approached the girl and comforted her in a gentle voice. She gently brushed the dust from her face, revealing her originally delicate and pretty face.
Then she took off her coat and wrapped it around her trembling body, trying to bring her a little warmth.
Li Mo stood behind her without communicating with her. In his current state, if he walked up, he would only scare the other party to death.
The morning sun shone on the blood-stained scroll of the city, with broken stones and twisted metal. A corner of the once vibrant city was now only left with silence and desolation. Everything was covered by dust and ashes, as if time had stopped here.
A strange feeling...
Why did the damage here not match the buildings on the street?
Zzt zzt— Li Mo heard a faint electric current sound. This sound was very small. The human ear's hearing frequency range was 20 hertz to 20,000 hertz, and this electric current sound came from a distance, with a volume far smaller than the normal human hearing range.
Drip... drip...
A drizzle began to fall from the sky. The raindrops were like billions of stars falling, which was particularly obvious to Li Mo's hearing.
What followed was a clearer electric current sound.
"Rin, come back," Li Mo commanded, only revealing three extremely simple words, without any extra hints.
"Huh? Why?"
Rin was confused. The next second, a flash of lightning appeared. A lightning dragon opened its mouth wide. When Rin realized it, her chest had already been pierced by the electric current, forming a huge bloody hole.
In a flash, Li Mo had already rushed in front of the other party and kicked the girl who was showing a triumphant smile in the ruins.
The moment Li Mo kicked the other party, lightning intertwined and condensed a current barrier in front of the girl.
The moment Li Mo's leg touched the current barrier, it was burned into charcoal by the tens of thousands of volts of current.
Although this kick did not hit, the gushing wind still sent her flying.
Boom!!!
Boom!!!
The huge impact turned the ruins where the girl was into a deep pit, and she herself, under the influence of the impact, was shot out like a cannonball, crashing through hundreds of high-rise buildings.
She wasn't dead.
Li Mo calmly looked at the enemy thousands of meters away. His right foot, which had been burned into charcoal, quickly recovered.
"Wait here. I'll go kill her."
Li Mo walked forward unhurriedly. For him, an ordinary Herrscher was too weak.
If it weren't for the fact that Rin was within the attack range, Li Mo could have destroyed half the city with that kick just now.
Rin needed life force. If he didn't hold back his strength, and kicked Rin into a restart, she might directly lose her human consciousness.
"She is..."
"A Herrscher. The Third Herrscher, the Herrscher of Thunder."
Hearing the word "Herrscher," Rin's face turned very bad. The residual current was still running rampant in her body, but fortunately, she wouldn't die. It would just waste a lot of life force.
This was very fatal for her. Consuming too much life force to heal herself was actually a slow death.
Rin endured the intense pain in her chest, looked up, and reminded, "Brother, although I don't know what the specific abilities of the Herrscher of Thunder are, if she has mastered the physical laws of electric currents, then she can probably also master the electromagnetic force, one of the four fundamental forces of the universe. The elastic force generated when we touch objects, the frictional force generated by the relative motion between objects, and all the forces generated by pushing, pulling, and colliding are essentially electromagnetic forces."
"The vital signs of a living creature are maintained by a bioelectric field. The killing efficiency of electric currents is very high. A direct hit will cause paralysis and convulsions, leading to a loss of mobility."
"So please..."
Rin patiently analyzed the possible threats of the Herrscher of Thunder for Li Mo, but was decisively rejected by Li Mo.
Facing the powerful Herrscher of Thunder, Li Mo did not even draw the Crimson-Dyed Sakura from his waist, but just looked at the rising figure in the distant ruins with indifference.
Purple-black lightning intertwined and lingered around her body. A dazzling light suddenly tore through the darkness. The Herrscher of Thunder hung high in the sky, looking down at him like a queen.
Li Mo said in an extremely plain tone, "People die when they are killed."
"This time, she will not have any chance to resist."
Rin frowned in confusion.
The next second, Li Mo's figure disappeared. The lightning in the sky suddenly disappeared with a whimper, without a trace.
Soon, Li Mo came back to Rin's side, carrying the Herrscher of Thunder's head and body in his two hands. He threw the head and body on the ground and said coldly, "Absorb her life force."
However, Li Mo's command did not receive a response. Rin was stunned on the spot, looking at the Herrscher of Thunder on the ground who was already as dead as she could be, in disbelief.
Are you kidding me?
This was a Herrscher... didn't the news say that Herrschers were extremely dangerous, and one person could easily destroy a city, a country, or even a continent...
What exactly happened just now?
Rin's brain had shut down. She couldn't understand what had happened at all.
Before she could react, the Herrscher of Thunder was left with only a corpse.
No wonder Li Mo had said before that she had no chance to resist. Not to mention resisting, she couldn't even react.
From the moment Li Mo disappeared, to the moment the lightning let out a mournful cry, it was almost the same time.
The two were separated by a distance of several kilometers. This killing efficiency... who was the real monster...
"Brother, how... did you do it?" Rin asked hesitantly. She had thought that Li Mo would say all kinds of operations and means, such as what kind of bizarre rules, what kind of rule abilities, and so on.
But in reality, what Rin got was just a light and breezy sentence from Li Mo, "I ran over and cut off her neck with my hand."
"Just... like that?"
"I think you have a great misunderstanding of my strength. When I was killing ghosts before, because you were behind me, if I ran at full speed, your body wouldn't be able to bear it. Although you have obtained the recovery power of the bizarre, your physical body is still the frail body of a living person. And without any scruples, I can naturally let go and fight."
"So that's how it is..."
Rin was still immersed in the terrifying scene just now. Only after Li Mo's repeated urging did she start to absorb the Herrscher of Thunder's life force.
It was like a timely rain after a long drought. After absorbing the Herrscher of Thunder's life force, the huge bloody hole in her chest recovered as before, and even her appearance was refreshed.
The life form of a Herrscher was different from that of a human. Although the foundation was built on humans, all aspects of her data were far superior to those of humans.
Therefore, the life force she gave was not something that a living person could compare to.
"You have a call~ You have a call~"
Li Mo's phone rang. This phone was specially prepared for him by MEI from this world for convenient contact. The one that MEI from the original world had given him was still in the future Yae Village.
Li Mo answered the phone without making a sound.
Li Mo: "..."
MEI: "..."
Call duration: 00:30.
Li Mo: "..."
MEI: "..."
Call duration: 01:00.
Li Mo: "..."
MEI: "..."
Call duration: 01:45.
MEI: "If I don't speak, you really won't say a word, will you?"
Li Mo: "I can't rule out the possibility that a bizarre is calling me. Answering is already the biggest concession I can make."
MEI: "Alright, it's good to be cautious. I have something to remind you. There is an abnormal Honkai Energy fluctuation in that ghost city, exceeding 2000HW. It is very likely that a Herrscher has been born. If you see a Herrscher, don't act rashly. Although the bizarre can make you immortal, the Herrscher is also powerful. If you are not careful, you may be controlled to death or killed instantly."
Li Mo: "Is there anything else to say?"
MEI: "I have already sent a team of soldiers from the Fire Moth to your location. Gather information, and then I will formulate a complete plan before we move to eliminate the Third Herrscher."
Li Mo: "Then you can let them go back. The Herrscher of Thunder is dead."
MEI: "...You did it? How did you do it?"
MEI's tone was the same as Rin's, but the degree of surprise was not as great.
Li Mo was like a doll, repeating what he had said to Rin to MEI on the phone, "I ran over and cut off her neck with my hand."
MEI: "..."
Call duration: 03:00.
MEI on the other end of the phone was silent for a long time and did not speak for a while.
Li Mo did not interrupt and waited silently.
MEI: "It seems I still underestimated your combat power. I originally thought that most of your combat power came from the original rules of the bizarre and the cursed blade left by Beichen. After all... the reason why most ghosts are difficult to deal with is because of their immortal and indestructible characteristics, plus the rule of instant death upon triggering. Their physical strength varies, but the strength to destroy them is not easy to control, and it is easy to be offset by the rule of restarting."
"You are different from other ghosts. I don't think this is an ability you should have. Do you... understand what I mean?"