Madam Herta pinched the imposter's cheek,
her finger tracing across the delicate skin.
She seemed to be feeling the texture.
"Why not? I look forward to you continuing to run, and I will find you again and again until you surrender. Then, I will lock you in the Clockie Tower and properly teach you a lesson in humility."
"Hmph~ Such heavy feelings can scare people away, my dear other half~"
'Herta' snorted softly, seizing the opportunity to say something strange.
Then, she violently broke through most of the restrictions, and the Phase Shift flames instantly spread out.
But this time, the Phase Shift flames did not land on her own body.
'Herta' winked at the original:
"My dear, you forgot to lock yourself before you touched me~ Bye-bye~"
"You—"
The flames had already engulfed Herta. She only had time to get one word out before she was swallowed by the fire.
The flames sent Madam Herta hurtling back to the Space Station.
As for 'Herta', of course, she seized the chance to run away and find a place to switch to a new character card.
Once she disappeared,
where would Herta pursue her next?
'Herta' thought this and activated the Phase Shift again.
Except that this time when it was activated,
the staff that had fallen to the ground, as if calculated long in advance,
suddenly released a burst of shockwave, hitting the Phase Shift flames!
"Warning, Phase Shift was interfered with, landing location has undergone unforeseen deviation."
"Hmm?!"
'Herta' snapped her head back to look at the staff on the ground that was still buzzing.
Just before leaving, she let out a liberated smile.
Whatever.
Let it take her wherever it wants.
She still has a day left, which is certainly enough for self-rescue.
...
Meanwhile, on the other side.
Madam Herta, having returned to the Space Station, did not personally pursue her again.
Instead, she summoned a mirror and retrieved the staff that the imposter had deliberately left behind.
"Hmph~ You must think I only interfered with your landing spot, imposter. Run, run~ I truly look forward to the day I catch you."
Madam Herta gripped the staff.
She not only read the imposter's landing location but also precisely captured her position.
After this brief contact,
Madam Herta realized something: the imposter was definitely not an ordinary person in terms of knowledge and ability, and might even be truly comparable to herself.
But only limited to knowledge and ability.
In other aspects, she was clearly inferior to Madam Herta, who had lived for many years.
"The little imposter fish doesn't seem to realize I've located her, does she~"
The trap she had set during their previous physical contact.
The imposter seemed completely unaware of it.
A hint of a 'successful' smile appeared on Madam Herta's face.
The imposter surely didn't think that she, Madam Herta, wouldn't realize that she would be teleported away by the opponent.
Just as Madam Herta had said before.
With the brain of this imposter, even if she lacked experience in other areas, it wouldn't be a matter of a single day to completely catch her.
But no matter how interested Madam Herta was, she couldn't waste so much time on a game of cat-and-mouse.
Since she couldn't catch the slippery fellow right away,
she might as well intentionally show a weakness.
Madam Herta didn't mind playing a prolonged fishing game.
"Run, run. And let me see what you're up to, little fish~ But next... it's time to properly deal with this not-at-all-Herta acting Station Master!"
She would temporarily ignore the matter of the imposter.
Now that she was back at the Space Station,
Herta was going to teach this thing that called itself 'AI Herta' a serious lesson!
...
At the same time,
'Herta' emerged from the flames.
She found herself thrown into a vacuum.
But it wasn't a problem.
The automatic life support mode was sufficient to maintain healthy physiological functions.
'Herta' pouted and touched the ring on her middle finger.
Soon, a small silver snake attached itself to her fingertip and said plaintively:
"Master, we deviated about twenty thousand light-years from the original destination, but recent stellar system scans detected traces of a large-scale starship warp."
"I'm not blaming you; it was Herta who was interfering, after all."
'Herta' soothed the little snake.
Then, she looked at her panel:
[Character Impersonation System]
[Name: Baiming (Great Herta)]
[Lifespan: 85:00:26 (Paused) + 1 Day (Character Impersonation)]
[Available Transformation Characters: Great Herta, Acheron]
[Available Draw Count: 0 (13.5%)]
"Hmm? Something's wrong. The last action only added this much? No, no... there must be a problem. Herta's final move..."
'Herta' immediately fell into suspicion after seeing the change in her lifespan and draw count progress bar.
Compared to the previous increases, which were around twenty-something percent, or at least ten percent,
this time, it only increased by one hour and one percentage point.
Something was clearly amiss.
This meant that during that last teleportation, the real Herta didn't experience much emotional change.
"Hmm... Did Herta leave some kind of trick that I didn't notice? But she didn't chase after me. She probably got tired of the chase."
'Herta' wasn't overly panicked.
Because Madam Herta didn't immediately pursue her.
Considering Herta's capricious personality, she probably got tired of constantly playing the game of cat-and-mouse.
Hmm, this was one of the reasons 'Herta' thought she had a chance to escape.
And it seemed the reality was exactly that, and she had grown impatient even earlier than 'Herta' had anticipated.
"Eh, whatever. I don't care about her. I'll enjoy today while I can. No time to study what tricks Herta left behind."
There was only one day left in the Herta impersonation time.
She still needed to find a suitable stage for Acheron to debut.
And she needed to create a device that could resist the erosion of Nihility, just to see if it would work.
It's a shame she didn't get a chance to save up for a second draw.
In this current situation,
the problem was no longer about how to accumulate draw counts for the next thirty days.
It was whether she could withstand the erosion of Nihility.
The most terrifying thing was,
she had no choice.
She could only be grateful that Madam Herta's impersonation time still had one day left.
Floating in the vacuum like this, 'Herta' didn't waste time on anything else.
Instead, relying on the mind of a genius, she focused entirely on solving the problem.
Several system hours later.
'Herta', who had been meditating with her eyes closed, suddenly snapped them open, a satisfied smile on her face:
"Sure enough, a genius is reliable."
The problem of Nihility erosion that had been giving Baiming a headache had actually yielded a solution.
One could only say that a genius is indeed a genius.
"Time is tight and the task is heavy; I need to hurry."
'Herta' murmured to herself, pulling equipment from the ring and temporarily setting up a small laboratory.
She began to hand-craft the medicine needed for the next thirty days.