Lying in the warm infirmary bed, holding the fluffy Elysia Cat in her arms, the girl's consciousness gradually faded.
"See you in a bit, my dear Elysia."
While petting Elysia Cat, she used the two thousand cat biscuits she had earned from Elysia Cat defeating the Herrscher of Ice to exchange for the sixteen-hundred-cat-biscuit item, the Cat Transformation Magic Staff.
Cat Transformation Magic Staff
1600 Cat Biscuits
This magic staff can turn the user into a cat and send them to the world where the ruling cats reside.
At the same time, cuteness effectiveness increases by 30 percent, and the user gains some of the natural skill set of cats: Agility, Lightning Reflexes, and Affinity.
Due to the unique nature of this magic staff, you cannot be sure how the summoned cats will pet you after you transform. Use with caution.
The cat system had warned of possible dangers.
Because after turning into a cat.
The Affinity skill would make her like physical closeness with others, especially those she had close ties with, while also lowering her rational thinking ability.
She had noticed it too.
When in contact, normal Elysia was clearly smarter than Elysia Cat.
Elysia was a clever, mischievous girl. She was not on the level of MEI or Mobius, but she was definitely not stupid.
But Elysia Cat was already on par with March 7th. The whole cat radiated a silly, vacant aura.
If it were not necessary.
Kiyono Inori did not really want to spend sixteen hundred cat biscuits to turn into a cat. After all, it meant getting dumber, getting petted by Elysia, and going to a world even more dangerous than reality.
Even if going to another world while sleeping effectively doubled the available time, letting her interact with technology and Honkai energy from the Previous Era of Honkai Impact 3rd.
Still, sixteen hundred cat biscuits could also be used to pull another four-star Blessing. Whether it was worth it in the end was hard to say.
The main issue was that she had no choice right now.
She had underestimated just how potent the cat system's goods were.
After slapping a Destruction Blessing onto Elysia, in just a few minutes Elysia first killed the Herrscher of Ice's companion beast, then the Herrscher of Ice herself, straight-up stealing the kill that originally belonged to Master Qian in the canon.
And after equipping the Destruction Blessing.
They were completely disconnected the entire time. When the Blessing was withdrawn, Elysia even lost consciousness and had to wake up back in Elysia Cat's body.
This meant that under the influence of the Destruction Blessing, Elysia likely lost control.
The Fifth Honkai.
At this point, Honkai had not yet dealt any devastating blows to the civilization of the Previous Era.
Herrscher-level destruction was still limited to blowing up cities or districts. No Herrscher had yet succeeded in wiping out civilization on a continental scale.
Therefore, the system of the Previous Era was still intact, and the organization that fought against Honkai, MOTH, was at its peak.
Elysia was already strong to begin with, and now she had suddenly displayed power capable of defeating a Herrscher, all while not completely losing her sanity like a Honkai creature.
Kiyono Inori's judgment was this.
Given the level of the upper echelons of Honkai Impact 3rd's Previous Era, they would most likely treat Elysia as some kind of priceless prize.
If Elysia resisted, they might even label the pink piggy-cat as a Herrscher, turning the entire world into Elysia's enemy.
Endless lifespan.
Inhuman power.
How many heroes and kings throughout history had failed to resist such temptations? The mere possibility of obtaining them was enough to drive anyone mad. Let alone the corrupt elites of the Previous Era, who were still busy fighting among themselves right up until extinction.
So.
Although it was not intentional, the problem of Elysia losing control was something she had caused. And since Elysia Cat was so cute, she decided to take responsibility and take the risk.
Four-Star Blessing: Destructive Accretion
After transforming into a cat, Kiyono Inori activated Pioneer of the Stars' skills in advance and equipped herself with the Destruction Blessing, Destructive Accretion.
"Meow…!"
She closed her eyes in a very human-like way.
But the imagined side effects of the Destruction Path never appeared. There was no searing divine fire, no murderous impulse, no erosion of reason.
The power of the four-star Blessing was fully absorbed.
Inori Cat opened her clear blue eyes.
For a brief moment, she felt that the icy wasteland before her was an eyesore and wanted to burn it all down, but the strange impulse vanished in the next instant.
This felt… no different at all?
Was it because she herself already had a tendency toward Destruction, or because the cat system made the host immune to Blessing side effects?
Inori Cat did not know.
A cat's body was truly amazing.
She felt soft all over, able to curl into a neat little ball or sprawl into a puddle with ease. A human body could only curl up like a shrimp at best.
Then there was vision and reaction speed.
If her human form was like a 1080p, 60-hertz screen, then her cat form was more like 4K at 300 hertz. Her average reaction speed was at least four to five times faster.
But the drawbacks were obvious too.
Because her body was smaller, the power of fairy magic and her raw strength were reduced. And cat paws could not spread their fingers like human hands, making them less convenient.
After getting a basic grasp of her cat body.
Inori Cat looked at Elysia, who was unconscious in the snow. They had fallen asleep together, so why was she awake while Elysia was not?
She leaned in to take a closer look.
She found that the big pink-haired girl's face was flushed, her cherry-colored lips mumbling things like, "Hehe… kissing… more." She looked very pleased.
"?"
A question mark practically popped over Inori Cat's head.
I absorbed the Destruction Blessing specifically to take on the Herrscher's burden for you, and you are over here having a lewd dream? Who are you kissing, huh?
Even though the responsibility technically lay with her, Inori Cat still felt something strange stirring inside, a faint inability to suppress the influence of Destruction.
She really wanted to burrow into Elysia's arms and leave a few kitty bite marks on her pale neck.
Good grief. The cat system's products were way too pure. Did you source this straight from the Aeon of Destruction, Nanook?
Kiyono Inori prided herself on emotional control, with Self-Discipline at the Master level on her status panel, yet even she could not fully suppress the destructive urge. It seemed she would have to leave some kitty bite marks after all.
Inori Cat's face looked conflicted, but her cat body naturally moved closer to Elysia.
"Meow!"
Looking fierce, she was just about to pick a good spot that clothes would not easily cover when the sleeping Elysia suddenly murmured, "Inori-chan… so cute."
The influence of Destruction vanished instantly.
Inori Cat froze in place.
What was that? What just happened? Was I being used as dream material? And why is Elysia having this kind of dream in a frozen wasteland anyway?
She suddenly remembered how, in the infirmary, she had poked, pinched, and kneaded Elysia Cat, petting her until she was blissed out.
"…"
Inori Cat's expression grew complicated.
She decided that in the future, she should use Star Railblazer's weak-point analysis feature less, especially on her friends. This thing felt kind of improper.
So awkward.
Awkward enough that she wanted to dig out a three-bedroom apartment with her cat paws, bury herself underground, and never see anyone again.
Unfortunately, the snow here was piled far too thick. Even the sharpest cat claws could not dig out a three-bedroom apartment.
That aside.
The snowy landscape created by the Herrscher of Ice was really an eyesore.
"…"
Inori Cat extended her cat paw.
The seed of destruction roared within her chest, then burst forth. It was a flame granted by an Aeon from a parallel universe, capable of reducing everything to ashes in an instant.
Although this world was not connected to the concept of Paths, meaning the Destruction Blessing could not unleash its full power.
Honkai energy more than made up for it.
After the Herrscher of Ice's defeat, a massive amount of Honkai energy still lingered within the Extreme Cold Domain. This efficient, corrosive, destructive energy became the perfect accelerant.
And so, the flames appeared.
The Extreme Cold Domain was split apart.
The swirling snowflakes were the first to stop, followed by the near-absolute-zero ice of the Rosentina Archipelago, then the frozen western Pacific Ocean. Everything related to the Herrscher of Ice and her companion beasts was burned to nothing.
"Honkai energy is really convenient, meow."
Inori Cat sighed.
She did not have the power to blow up a continent. She was just an ordinary high school girl. But Honkai energy paired far too well with Destruction.
With just a slight push on one domino revealed by Pioneer of the Star's, it triggered a chain reaction.
She turned her head to look at the soundly sleeping Elysia. Under her precise control, the area within three kilometers around them was left completely untouched by the flames.
"My dear Elysia Cat classmate, the higher-ups should behave themselves a lot more now, meow."
Inori Cat licked her paw. "You just need to wake up soon, meow. If you do not, by the time you do wake up, I will probably already be playing with big sister Mobius, meow."
…
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Let me know if I got a name wrong. I know basically nothing about MyGO.