It was as if celestial saints were soaring through the boundless cosmos, their forms clad in a radiance like spewing imperial flames.
For the two combatants, every clash was an explosion in the void.
The mere radiation from their attacks, the slicing air currents, tore through the clouds in the firmament above. The massive holes were then filled by more nebulae, creating a dreamlike tapestry of light and shadow.
With her main body being forced to fend off the real Otto's relentless assault, the authority Ella could wield was dwindling.
Combined with the fact that the Burning Triumvirate had already reached the level of a Grand Herrscher in terms of destructive power, Fuli should have been crushing her under the tide of his attacks.
And yet, he wasn't.
Even though he had pushed Ella to the brink countless times in their clashes, the AI girl, a master of calculation, always managed to find an opportunity to escape death's clutches.
Not only that, her mastery over this body was growing more and more proficient, to the point where she could even spare the effort to launch a few decent counterattacks.
This was incredible. Even though Kallen was an S-Rank Valkyrie, one only had to look at how the Herrscher of Thunder had suppressed Theresa.
And Fuli, in his Burning Triumvirate state, was far stronger than the Herrscher of Thunder was back then!
"She's evolving! She's transforming into one of the legendary three Vipralopa(Apocalypse)-class Honkai Beasts—the Brahma of a Hundred Beasts!" Otto, from within the Void Archives, quickly found the answer to Ella's power-up by searching the library of knowledge.
It was common knowledge that Honkai Beasts were divided into lower and upper tiers. The lower ones were basically cannon fodder. The upper tier was further divided into Emperor-class and Judgment-class.
What few knew was that there was a third rank among the upper-tier Honkai Beasts: Apocalypse-class.
Apocalypse-class wasn't necessarily stronger than Judgment-class; they were fundamentally anomalous individuals with some kind of rule-breaking trait.
Take Vishnu, for example. Its trait was [to grow infinitely stronger by devouring Honkai Beasts].
In theory, given enough nourishment, it was only a matter of time before it grew into a planet-devouring, universe-destroying Honkai Beast.
But when it was first born, its combat power was merely Emperor-class, and it was easily subjugated by the Current Era's Schicksal to be used as fusion material for Theresa's birth.
As for the Brahma of a Hundred Beasts, it wasn't a naturally born Honkai Beast, but a product of Previous Era scientific experiments.
Through a multi-paragon gene fusion technique called the [Chimera Project], they implanted multiple sets of genes into a MANTIS who should have only been able to coexist with a single Honkai factor.
Parvati, Sesha, Mayuri, Asura, Garuda...
After implant after implant, the surviving warrior actually fused with all known Honkai Beast factors, gaining all their corresponding traits.
At that point, he became the Apocalypse-class Honkai Beast, the [Brahma of a Hundred Beasts].
Or, to use a more familiar name: Chimeric Kevin.
As Kevin's descendants, the Kaslanas carried this potential hidden in their genetic code.
Take Siegfried in the Second Honkai War, for example. Forced by various external interventions to activate this part of his genes, he wielded Shamash with abandon, devoured Honkai Beast flesh, and single-handedly chased the Second Herrscher across heaven and earth.
Of course, not every Kaslana could achieve this.
It ultimately came down to talent.
And Kallen was clearly qualified in this regard.
When she devoured the dragons earlier, she had already displayed a bestial state similar to Siegfried's.
On top of that, her body was currently being controlled by the legendary AI, Ella. Aided by the computational power of the Celestial Neuron Assembly, her combat strength was increasing at a visible rate!
CLANG!
The clashing chimeric claws and the Black Swan erupted in a shower of sparks. The cold, gleaming blade reflected their two faces, locked in fierce opposition.
The erupting Judgment of Shamash split the energy beam Ella had fired. Seeing his opponent regenerate the half of her body he had just obliterated in the gap between his first and second strike, Fuli quickly spoke in his mind, "Brother! Are you done yet?"
He had already felt the strain from that last blow, and it hadn't even been thirty seconds!
This was the fundamental trait of the Brahma of a Hundred Beasts.
Every cell in its body was generating immense energy through positron-negatron collisions. Not only could it completely ignore most extreme environments, but it also possessed near-infinite regenerative abilities.
Every cell was a complete life form, allowing it to function normally even if most of its body was destroyed. As long as a single cell remained, it wouldn't truly die and could regenerate its entire body.
In addition, it possessed extraordinary learning and calculation abilities, able to quickly compute various outcomes and analyze its own information to find countermeasures. It could also consume any living being, or even information itself, continuously absorbing it to fuel its own evolution, simulating the acquired data to gain the abilities of its targets.
An immortal body, information predation, and infinite evolution.
Only by facing it directly could one truly understand what a monster it was.
And this was still an incomplete form?
From Fuli's perspective, it was truly hard to imagine how insanely powerful the complete MANTIS of the Previous Era was! And how much more powerful the Herrscher of Finality who defeated him must have been!
"Just give me a little more time!" Otto responded curtly, activating the mimicked Fenghuang Down fluttering in his palm for the 13,867th time, trying to break through Ella's mental blockade and contact Kallen.
The problem was, how could Ella, who knew of the Void Archives' existence, not be prepared for this?
The mind-interfering Mitra, and Mayuri, the companion Honkai Beast of the Previous Era's Herrscher of Sentience.
The Honkai factors represented by these two had long since laid an inescapable net in the mental world. No matter what Otto tried, it was useless!
Until a clear chime rang out.
Until sword ki filled the heavens and the earth.
"Fenghuang Down's First Rated Power: Liberated—"
A fierce wind howled, kicking up a storm of dust, as if the entire world was being torn apart by this power.
The distant clouds churned like ink stirred by a giant hand, roiling and surging as they poured down toward the earth.
In this chaos, one figure stood out with exceptional clarity.
A celestial maiden from Shenzhou, clad in martial attire, came striding on the gale. Her face was elegant and peerless, her gray hair fell straight to her waist, and the cuffs and hem of her clothes were trimmed with silver that glinted coldly, like the brightest star in the night sky!
One hand she pointed to the heavens, the other toward her foe.
Her aura exploded into a whirlwind. A dazzling blade, gathering the light of the seven luminaries, extended from her palm. The chaotic lightning around her condensed and spiraled, finally converging in Fu Hua's hand into a divine sword aimed at AL that could topple the heavens!
That's right.
The likes of Ironmaiden had been able to break through the defenses and hack into the virtual space by leveraging the shared legacy of the Four Horsemen.
If that was the case, why couldn't Fu Hua, the Azure Empyrea herself, do the same?
At this point in the timeline, she had already been assassinated by the Seven Swords of Taixuan.
Her right foot had been severed.
The tendons in both hands were destroyed.
All of her internal organs were ruined.
Her chest, the most heavily wounded area, had more than ten holes.
But the most fatal wound was to her head.
A sword, straight through the skull.
Even so, the young woman had dragged her wounded body here.
All for the sake of delivering this one, simple strike: the Taixu Sword God!
"Cousin!!!"
Seeing Fu Hua, Fuli's eyes shone with an unprecedented brilliance. The look of a believer seeing their god—a mixture of yearning, attachment, and adoration—was almost bright enough to blind Otto.
It was as if, to the boy, she was lightning, she was light, she was a myth; she was the May day of the mortal world, the great immortal in the heavens.
Even the object of his admiration herself was startled by his fervent tone, but the Blade of Taixuan, forged from burning memories, remained steady in her hand.
The first rated power of Fenghuang Down: burning memories to mend her long-shattered heart of the sword.
Fortunately, the body she was using was the virtual world's "Azure Empyrea," so she didn't have to worry about her real memories dissipating.
But even if it would have affected her real body, the young woman would still be standing here right now.
Because she was Fu Hua.
Because she was so kind it hurt.
"There's only one chance to save Kallen!" she shouted, gripping the Blade of Taixuan. "Get ready!"
Scorching, blinding lightning raged around her. A few bolts would occasionally shoot out, as if breaking free from a cage, and explode in mid-air!
The dazzling divine sword made the young woman stand out in this world of myriad things.
The patterns of Taiji, the two polarities, the four symbols, the five elements, and the eight trigrams, which contained the philosophy of life and death, could only serve as ornaments behind her.
"Divinity is the apex of change, the wonder of all things, something that cannot be questioned by form—"
[Formless, and needing no form.]
[This sword is space itself.]
[It cannot be blocked.]
[Without form, without boundary.]
[It pierces any tangible barrier.]
[Striking deep into the consciousness.]
[It cannot be perceived, cannot be comprehended.]
[From the inside out, a complete return to nothingness.]
"Blade of Taixuan: Eminence!"
Her face took on a grimace as fierce as a vengeful spirit, like the merciless god of death. The righteous Blade of Taixuan, like a million tons of magma about to erupt, its brilliance rivaling the sun, transformed into the reaper's scythe and surged toward the inhuman thing that had usurped another's body!
CRACK!
A sound like something invisible shattering echoed—the wail of AL's internal mental defenses being broken in a single blow.
Otto seized the opportunity, sending a single feather, carrying fragments of his and Fuli's minds, into the mental prison where Kallen was being held!
...
It was as if infinite space and time flashed before his eyes—exploding thunder, aliens screaming in the darkness.
By the time Fuli drew his sword, Otto's mental fragment had already charged out to battle the indescribable things.
"Go!!!"
The boy nodded wordlessly, turning and rushing toward the deepest part of the passage.
He passed through a thin membrane and, with a soft pat, landed steadily.
He looked around and saw a modern bedroom filled with a girly atmosphere.
A soft bed, a cute panda plushie, various trinkets scattered across the hundred-square-meter flat, and even a dedicated wardrobe and shower in the corner.
Kallen was currently squatting intently in a gaming chair, munching on potato chips like a hamster while binge-watching anime.
She wore only an oversized white T-shirt, its collar so loose one could easily see the deep cleavage within. On her lower half were thigh-high socks of the same color, which outlined an enchanting curve as her legs were curled up.
You call this imprisonment?
The words instinctively appeared in Fuli's mind.
He checked again, several times, to confirm this wasn't a trap set by AL before tiptoeing over.
Kallen was completely oblivious, a large pair of headphones hanging around her swan-like neck, her eyes glued to the exciting show on the screen.
Every now and then, her hand would reach out to the side, grabbing various snacks and stuffing them into her mouth with a crunch, crunch.
"Mmmph! Cough, cough, cough!"
She was choking.
A 2-liter bottle of Coke was promptly handed to her from the side.
Kallen snatched it and gulped down half the bottle.
"Phew!" She wiped her mouth. "Saved! Thanks a—AAAAAAAHHHH?!!"
The piercing shriek she let out could have rivaled Pavarotti.
Seeing this, Fuli opened his mouth: "AAAAAAAAAHHHH!!!"
He screamed along with her.
After that, it was a now-calm Kallen who became embarrassed first.
She looked behind her and saw that only her little bro had come here.
She scratched her head, shifted her butt, and made room on the gaming chair.
"Here, sit."
She then brought over some pudding.
"Let's eat together! There's plenty!"
"Okay."
Fuli sat down as told and naturally tore open a bag of spicy gluten strips.
Neither of them was particularly large, but it was still a bit of a squeeze for two people to sit in a single chair.
There was some unavoidable physical contact, which looked rather intimate, but neither of them seemed to mind.
"Um, little bro." Staring at the screen, the otaku Kallen chewed away. "Back in the Heaven of Venus, I was trying to steal your Jizo Mitama."
The anime playing on the screen was the fourth season of Hitori no Shita: The Outcast. Judging by the viewing history in the corner, she seemed to have binge-watched it all the way to this point.
Besides that, works like Natsume's Book of Friends, Dragon Ball, and Bleach were also in her history.
"The flow of time is just a parameter in the virtual world," Kallen said kindly, noticing her little bro's confusion. "When I used AL's authority to create this sanctuary, I just sped it up a teensy, tiny billion times."
Fuli nodded, then got straight to the point. "AL said Jizo Mitama could give you freedom?"
"Yep," Kallen said, scratching the braid at the back of her head. "You're a silly one, little bro. I told you to try it, and you just went ahead without any guard up. You were lucky it was me. Next time someone asks you to do that, you have to be careful."
"She was lying to you," Fuli said. "Even the zeroth rated power of Jizo Mitama can't grant a soul to someone out of thin air."
"She wasn't lying to me," Kallen said softly. "As long as the consciousness inside Jizo Mitama is erased, and my own memory data is inputted, then Jizo Mitama becomes me, and I become Jizo Mitama."
"But that 'you' wouldn't be you," Fuli shook his head. "It would just be another 'Kallen Kaslana' that has all of your memory data."
Simply transferring memory data was something even the Otto of the outside world could easily do, let alone Jizo Mitama.
His Soulium bodies relied on uploading his memories before death to be as resilient as a centipede.
But the question was, if a person acquires another's memories, do they become that person?
Here's a simple example: You're old and dying, so you use cloning technology to create another you to continue living.
When you open your eyes, you find you're still old, while the "young you" across from you is being celebrated by friends and family for their new life. Would you think that person is you?
Fuli didn't think so.
Kallen thought so too.
So did the virtual Otto, which was why he went to such great lengths to create the Equation of Life.
Even the Otto of the outside world held the same belief, otherwise he wouldn't have rejected the clones with all of Kallen's memories and instead painstakingly sought a way to resurrect the real her.
"Going by what you're saying, little bro, my stopping was the right thing to do?" Kallen laughed in spite of herself, her beautiful face troubled.
"Damn it, and I even let a boy touch my chest. No man has ever touched me there in my entire life!"
"What about a woman?"
"The real Kallen was probably touched by Yae Sakura? As for me, definitely not."
"Then I'll have to take responsibility for you, Sister Kallen. My mom said a girl's first time is super precious."
"Hey! Isn't it a bit much to so brazenly say you'll take responsibility for your brother's fiancée?"
"It's fine. Our brother is just part of our 'play.' He'll definitely forgive us—Ouch!"
"Don't say things like that again."
Retracting the hand that had pinched Fuli's cheek, Kallen huffed, hugged her legs, and continued to watch the sword fight on the screen.
The plot had progressed to the end of the Biyou Village arc. Several of the temporary agents were accompanying the dying Chen Duo as she walked through the streets.
"You probably haven't finished this part, little bro, so I'll explain it to you."
She spoke in a chant-like tone. "That girl, Chen Duo, had a hard life. She was taken by an organization called the Yaoxian Society to a remote mountain when she was just a baby. They wanted to train a group of children to master that damn Gu poison."
"As the days passed, the children died one by one. Until, of the forty-nine children, only Chen Duo was left, having endured the torment of various Gu poisons. She became the Gu Saintess that the Yaoxian Society sought."
"Heaven has eyes. A few years later, in a raid by an official organization, the Yaoxian Society was wiped out, and Chen Duo was saved by a kind old man named Uncle Liao."
"Unfortunately, the Gu poison in her body had already seeped into her bones. Or rather, she herself was the ultimate Gu. Just by being in the same space as someone, she would unconsciously infect them."
"So she was imprisoned in a secret bunker, far from the world, living a peaceful life. Her life was supposed to be spent like that."
"But the kind Uncle Liao didn't give up. He fulfilled his duty as a parent and encouraged Chen Duo, letting her wear a protective suit to isolate the Gu poison and interact with others."
"Under Uncle Liao's care, Chen Duo gradually grew into an adult."
"Seeing the girl blossom and gradually gain control over the Gu poison in her body, Uncle Liao's thoughts grew more ambitious."
"He wanted this little girl, whom he saw as a daughter, to live like a normal person, to interact with others like a normal person, to live under the sun like a normal person."
"To this end, he used every means at his disposal, trying every way he could to apply to his superiors to let her leave the bunker and breathe fresh air."
"He succeeded. They agreed to let Chen Duo carry out missions as a temporary agent, on the condition that all living things around her were isolated and she acted alone."
"Uncle Liao was thrilled. He knew it had to be done step by step. As long as things continued like this, Chen Duo would one day become a normal person."
"Sure enough, another five years passed, and Chen Duo gained the right to live alone outside the bunker."
"And then, Chen Duo killed Uncle Liao."
"She defected."
At this point, Kallen turned her head.
"Little bro, do you know why she defected?"
"A good life was just around the corner. She was about to return to modern society and live like a normal person. She could get her nails done, read books, go to the mall to watch movies on the weekend, and even meet up with friends every now and then to complain about how clueless the boys she liked were."
A lock of hair fell by her temple. She opened her arms. "Listen, what a wonderful life that is!"
"A pity." Kallen lowered her arms, her ice-blue eyes filled with melancholy. "A life like that doesn't belong to us."
"Until the very end, Uncle Liao kept telling Chen Duo to hold on. He fought with his life to get her back to a normal life."
"But what about Chen Duo? Did she really want this life that you see as a given? Did she really want to live as a normal person?"
"Or was what she (I) missed the most, from beginning to end, the boring life in the Yaoxian Society's cave during her childhood, being filled with Gu poison (from beginning to end, in this familiar world), just sitting there blankly with nothing to think about?"
Fuli wanted to speak.
But he couldn't open his mouth.
An invisible force bound the feather that housed his mental fragment—the restraining power of the Oath of Judah.
"You don't have to stay behind for a pile of data like me." Kallen said in a tone that seemed to sever all ties. "Go. With your strength, even now, you can definitely break Ella's seal and return to the real world where you belong."
"Compared to an old-fashioned, stubborn, inflexible medieval country bumpkin like me, that Otto guy is clearly a much better fit to be the Hyperion's onboard AI, right? The glimmer of light born from the endless cycles was him! He's the ultimate AI you're looking for! Sacrificing him to save me is very unfair, isn't it?"
"Besides, you two get along so well. In the words of Shenzhou, you're kindred spirits, right? If you really don't like that he's a guy, you can just change his model. A virtual AI doesn't have a fixed gender, and he's not the type to care much about that sort of thing anyway. If you ask, I'm sure Miss Otto would happily become a girl and tease you."
"You're brothers. After your bro gender-bends, shouldn't the first thing they do be to... let their bro have some fun?"
The girl smiled mischievously, reaching out to pull the immobilized Fuli into her arms.
She leaned in and planted a fleeting, butterfly-like kiss on the boy's forehead.
"Consider this your payment for all your hard work along the way!"
She stepped back two paces, her hands behind her back, a smile on her face. At the same moment, the shell of the sanctuary disintegrated.
Screech!
Shriek!
Gorgeous morpho butterflies and peacocks flapped their wings—manifestations of the Mitra and Mayuri factors controlled by Ella.
Kallen raised her hand. The Oath of Judah descended from the sky, crashing to the ground.
Chains of obsidian tore through space, freezing it in place, blocking the two mental-type Honkai Beasts that sought to destroy Fuli's spiritual fragment here.
"So, goodbye, little bro."
She smiled over her shoulder, then resolutely charged toward the enemy.
"This adventure with you all... I was truly, truly happy!"
...