The sword qi thundered like a rushing tide and then faded, leaving breathless silence.
Both duelists held their breaths. Until one of them spoke, neither could be certain how it had ended.
Fu Hua broke the quiet first. "…You didn't only have one strike of strength left."
"Yes." Li Sushang didn't deny it. "I used everything I had. But Grandmaster still held back."
Fu Hua exhaled. "Hmm…"
"I shouldn't have overestimated myself…"
In an instant, viewers understood.
It looked like Fu Hua had lost.
The outcome made a lot of sense, but it still hit die-hard Fu Hua fans hard.
The once-invincible Chi Yuan — ruler of battle a half-millennium ago, the one who routed whole Schicksal battalions and once sent a Herrscher reeling with the Taixu Divine Sword — had just been bested by her disciple.
Fans winced. What had become of Fu Hua? How badly had she been cut down?
Li Sushang knelt beside her fallen master and spoke gently. "No—Grandmaster, by a single-strike measure, I won. Your cultivation is far beyond mine."
"The reason the result went this way is because you didn't seek to decide the match," she added. "Your heart is set on going to help that white-haired girl."
Fu Hua didn't answer; her vision fluttered and then blackened. She collapsed.
Li Sushang breathed out a long, soft sigh.
"Ah…"
"In truth, this wasn't about 'victory' or 'defeat'. The only person who truly wanted to win was me."
"Grandmaster, if you thought more for yourself… for this moment… then the result might have been different."
She glanced at Fu Hua, who had lost consciousness.
"What now? I never thought I would win… Rascal didn't tell me this would happen…"
Li Sushang swayed, still unsteady. Her victory had been narrow. She looked at her hands in bewilderment.
"To think: thinking for partners, or thinking for oneself. Which makes one stronger? I don't know yet. Not from this one duel."
"But none of that matters now~" She smiled faintly, looking down at the passed-out Fu Hua. "Grandmaster, you've truly begun anew."
Li Sushang sat and tended to Fu Hua, quietly guiding breath and pulse, planning how she would care for her when the elder awoke.
The chat went wild.
"They lost?! So shocking—"
"I expected Fu Hua to at least stomp her. Even fused Warframes shouldn't lose to Li Sushang!"
"Bro, Li Sushang's S-rank too—don't underestimate her."
"Doesn't Fu Hua still have 'Forced Collapse' as a trump card?"
"Check the scene again—Fu Hua can't use 'Forced Collapse' now."
"Whatever, the duel looked gorgeous."
"Can the OST please be uploaded? I will pay triple."
Debate raged, but the gameplay returned to Kiana at the church gates.
Kiana worried for Fu Hua. "I hope Squad Leader is okay…"
She checked the detector on her wrist—no energy signatures where she and Fu Hua had split. A cold unease crept up her spine.
She felt the imprint of Taixu Sword Qi just now. Li Sushang's Divine Sword—Kiana could sense it had no destructive residue. Fu Hua must have found a way to counter it.
"No time to waste. I must press on." She readied herself to continue.
Theresa's comm pinged.
"Kiana, status?"
"I've reached the target, but Otto's not here."
They swapped intel. Things seemed to be shifting in their favor, yet both felt a tightening dread.
When Kiana tried to tell Theresa what she'd felt, the link died.
"What happened?" she said aloud, checking the device. It wasn't a transmission drop—her comm itself malfunctioned.
Then a whisper carried across the distance, a voice she could immediately identify.
Otto Apocalypse.
Across the servers, viewers leapt to their feet—this had to be the moment they'd been waiting for. Kiana, as the Flameborn Herrscher with Void power as well, should easily cut through Otto, right?
The camera panned to Otto himself.
"Now… a new piece should fall into place~" he murmured.
"Even where humanity cannot intervene, there is room to scheme. Not mere words."
"If my old friend arrives, things will be trickier. She survived that tragedy—she has experience."
Otto's words felt oddly off. A handful of sharp-minded players caught the detail: "my old friend" must mean Fu Hua. And "the tragedy she survived" — which catastrophe? A few possibilities fit, but only one matched this timeframe: the Binding Herrscher.
A few players whispered the name of the Binding Herrscher, and the idea trended through chat.
Yet the perspective shifted again—an hour earlier.
After Otto finished assigning tasks, Durandal couldn't shake the plan's danger. She decided to confront Otto. Rita suggested Durandal check with Changguang first — Changguang had assisted Otto and would know the full consequences.
But Changguang was unreachable.
They contacted Amber. Amber handed them a key Changguang had left—a special Genius key. "If contact is lost during the Bishop's plan, use this key to access the stashed recording she stored in the time-space interlayer."
Durandal and Rita activated the projector.
The recorded image flickered to life.
"Changguang? That's not—" Durandal started.
"Hi~ Did you miss me?" the "Changguang" on screen greeted, arms folded. "If you're watching this, I'm probably—"
Her voice rasped, as if she began to speak a farewell.
For a second, viewers tensed—Changguang had been so lively. She couldn't be gone already.
Then the recording shifted tone; Changguang pulled a prank: "—fired by Bishop Otto~"
Relief and irritation collided in chat.
Changguang laughed, then sobered and explained Otto's plan.
In short: history cannot be changed and time cannot flow backward. But if one destroys the present and uses that destruction as fuel, one can turn the wheel of history again—not as a parallel timeline, but by rewinding the world itself. In effect, the present becomes kindling. The reward: a restored past in which certain tragedies never occurred.
It was the "save-file" theory players had guessed: not a new branch, but a reset where the current reality is extinguished.
Changguang added that Otto claimed about a fifty percent chance of success, with a comparatively small cost.
Stark. Frightening. A ticking bomb of a plan.
But for most viewers, the real shock was the throwback to that earlier player who'd predicted the plot—people hawked "I told you so" and shouted to cut him down.
After learning the full scope, Durandal made a reckless decision:
She decided she would oppose Otto and try to stop him.
Before leaving, she handed Rita the World Bubble and the Holy Sword's hilt—an act that felt like passing an orphan into another's care.
Viewers remembered Otto's earlier soliloquy. What had he been holding? Black Abyss and White Bloom—the thing seen one hour later. That meant Durandal's excursion to find Otto… might end in betrayal.
Panic flooded chat.
"No way…"
"Durandal getting taken out?! No!!!"
"Otto the dog—drop dead!!"
"If Otto can beat Durandal, then Kiana going in is suicide!"
"What did Otto do? How can even Durandal lose to him?"
"Calm down folks, this is just speculation."
"Hope Otto gets owned (please!)"
The outrage and dread swelled.
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