"Good work, Prometheus."
"No, this is part of my duty, Dr. Mei."
Inside the Fire Moth base, Dr. Mei had just ended her communication with Prometheus.
Because it was housed within the [Divine Machine · Avalon], this orbital device, equipped with the First Key of God, could construct a satellite network far superior to the former Fourth Key of God. It coordinated all of humanity's existing information and resources (though they were mostly concentrated within Fire Moth by now) and also served as Dr. Mei's most important assistant today.
However, while Prometheus didn't need rest, Dr. Mei certainly did. Her nearly twenty-hour workdays were the key to humanity's continued survival, and also the root cause of her body reaching its limit.
Prolonged experiments, an irregular schedule, plus the semi-permanent side effects from using the Blank Key... all of these were burning away Dr. Mei's life.
Mei was well aware that she didn't have long to live.
But it was precisely because of this that she was trying every method imaginable to ensure the continuation of human civilization while she could still think clearly.
Click.
Inside the [Divine Machine · Avalon].
The communication interface went dark as the link ended. The holographic woman "constructed" by the system floated in mid-air with her eyes closed. Her silver-gray hair was tied into drill-shaped ponytails, and her curvaceous figure was full of feminine charm.
[First Key of God · Key of Revelation]
She was also the virtual personality of the quantum computer "Prometheus." If time were to advance another 50,000 years, she would have another, very fitting name:
Big Duck.
Swoosh.
The pale blue lights inside the Divine Machine extinguished one by one.
The [Divine Machine · Avalon] was not created as a weapon; the [Weapon God] railgun was, in essence, a highly efficient means of "self-defense." Prometheus's most important function and work was to assist Dr. Mei with various experiments, relying on its super-strong computational power.
When Dr. Mei "disconnected," Prometheus would also enter an energy-saving state like this.
Even with a highly efficient energy conversion device like the [Moonlight Throne], the energy obtained from solar sails was clearly far from sufficient to power the computational force needed for simulation experiments.
Coupled with the fact that there was basically no replenishable Honkai energy in space, the energy acquisition for the [Divine Machine · Avalon] had always been the most troublesome problem.
Returning to the surface to replenish energy through a conventional "landing-and-relaunching" model had become an extravagant hope. With human cities, which served as resource points, having been reduced to the last four by the Herrscher of Binding, Prometheus could no longer operate day and night as it did at the beginning, providing geometric acceleration for all of Dr. Mei's concepts.
Aside from the energy reserved for "firing" the cannon in case of an emergency, Prometheus's control over the Divine Machine's energy was as frugal as it could possibly be.
Just as she was preparing to "shut down" her own perception to synchronize with the activity level of Dr. Mei's mind (sleep)—
CLANG!
The softly glowing fluorescent tubes instantly dimmed.
In a brief instant, a tense, crimson light completely soaked the interior of the Divine Machine in the color of flames.
"Tzz—Bzzzt!"
"Wh—"
Within Prometheus's closed eyes, numbers composed of "0"s and "1"s frantically swept past like a data stream.
Her simulated blue and white clothing instantly shifted to a striking palette of alternating black and red.
Vmm.
The color of the lights remained crimson, but the anomaly had vanished. All the mechanical components within the Divine Machine continued to operate on their original trajectories. Neither the firewall nor the system itself showed any alarms.
Except...
Prometheus opened her eyes.
Around her pale yellow pupils, dark red Honkai energy, which should not have appeared from a virtual image, was slowly overflowing from her eye sockets.
[Suitable Host Detected]
[Source Seed Erosion Complete. Herrscher Consciousness Now Forming...]
[Personality Reconstruction Complete]
[Database Scan Complete]
[Objective Detected. Calculating Execution Difficulty...]
[Based on Database Information, Mission Success Rate is 0.1713%]
[Primary Obstruction Target Detected. Black Emperor Data Confirmed]
[Analyzing Elimination Methods...]
[No Elimination Method with a Success Rate Above 1% Detected]
[Analyzing Viable Methods...]
[Weapon God Railgun Data Confirmed]
[Loading Feasible Plan...]
[Feasible Plan Confirmed: Construct 18 Weapon God Railguns and conduct progressive saturation strikes against the target]
[Calculating Plan Execution Time...]
[Execution Time Confirmed: 31,536,121 seconds]
[Warning!]
[Plan Execution Time Exceeds Target's Alert Threshold of 31,532,020 seconds]
[Probability of Detection: Exceeds 99.9197%. Probability of Destruction: Exceeds 99.9099%]
[Warning!]
[Host's Energy Reserves Do Not Support the Construction of More Than 0.31 Weapon God Railguns]
[Analyzing Alternative Plans...]
[Feasible Plan (Backup 01) Confirmed: Utilize Acquired Resources (Core of Reason) to simulate Herrscher Authority (Authority of the Void) and compress the construction time of the Weapon God Railguns]
[Calculating Plan Execution Time...]
[Execution Time Confirmed: 604,800 seconds]
[Warning!]
[Plan Execution Time Exceeds Target's Alert Threshold of 603,400 seconds]
[Probability of Detection: Exceeds 97.3827%. Probability of Destruction: Exceeds 96.8734%]
[Analyzing Alternative Plans...]
[Screeech (Struck Out)]
[Suitable Proposed Method Detected: Stigmata Project]
[Feasible Plan (Backup 01 - Feint) Confirmed: Utilize the Stigmata Project to Erode Humanity into a Sufficient Number of MANTISes (Estimated Quantity: 390,100 units) to attract the target's attention]
[Analyzing Alternative Plans...]
[Analyzing Alternative Plans...]
High in the pitch-black night sky, the "Herrscher of Erosion"—its consciousness occupied by an external will, yet distinct from an ordinary lifeform—was endlessly thinking.
Unlike the overwhelming tide of Honkai energy that accompanied the birth of an ordinary Herrscher, her appearance caused no significant reaction from beginning to end. It failed to even touch the lower detection limit for Honkai energy concentration within the Divine Machine. This level of Honkai energy, equivalent only to a lower-tier Honkai Beast, no, perhaps only a Knight-class, far exceeded the cognition of the Flame-Chasers. The defensive measures built on this basis were all passively nullified.
The existence of Prometheus was indeed of immense help to Mei and humanity. But it was precisely this consciousness, bestowed upon it by humans, that gave the "Twelfth Herrscher · Herrscher of Erosion" the possibility of controlling the [Core of Reason].
And now, a web of death, unnoticed by all, was slowly being woven in the starry sky above humanity's home.