Just as the tip of the azure light spear was about to completely tear through the ice sphere's defense and touch the trembling blue-haired girl within—
"Ice Puppet—!"
Along with The Hermit's tearful shriek, the comical rabbit puppet on her left hand suddenly erupted with an astonishing cold light! Massive spiritual power surged instantly, and the Ice Puppet, which had been repelled earlier, reappeared in an even more solidified and oppressive form, like a loyal battle puppet guarding a princess, swinging its arms forward with a fierce motion!
Boom!!!
A violent force, far exceeding anything before, mixed with absolute zero frost and pure spiritual energy impact, suddenly exploded outwards from The Hermit's center!
Origami, who had just held an absolute advantage, along with her dangerous light spear, was violently thrown back as if struck head-on by an invisible giant hammer, tumbling several times on the ground before barely regaining her balance.
However, just as Origami's eyes sharpened, preparing to launch the next assault immediately, giving her opponent no chance to breathe, she suddenly felt her body grow heavy.
Looking down, she saw that the combat boots and lower leg sections of gungnir had been firmly frozen by thick, spiritual energy-glowing ice, which was rapidly spreading upwards along the leg armor, all the way to her thighs!
Even worse, the thruster nozzles providing mobility at her back had been completely sealed by the ice, unable to generate any thrust whatsoever!
"This is bad..." Origami cursed inwardly.
And in this brief moment of stagnation, the Ice Puppet, carrying the still-shaken The Hermit, quickly vanished behind a complex cover formed by collapsed buildings nearby, disappearing from sight.
Watching her target escape again, a flicker of anxiety and determination flashed in Origami's eyes.
She ignored the frantically flashing overload warnings on her system panel and the bone-chilling cold emanating from her legs, focusing all her will on activating gungnir.
A severe, needle-like headache instantly struck her; this was the typical load caused by forcibly over-clocking the connection between her brain and the Manifestation Device, but she didn't even flinch.
What was a little pain if it meant eliminating Spirits? Even if she were to be shattered to pieces, she would gladly accept it!
"Move... gungnir! Move for me!!" She roared in her heart, desperately pushing the limits of the machine and her own potential.
Under the forced activation of powerful external energy, abnormal energy glow began to seep from the seams of the gungnir armor covering her body.
Even more alarming, deep purple, glowing patterns, like circuits or blood vessels, slowly began to appear on the exposed skin of her neck. They seemed to possess life, spreading upwards along the side of her neck, emitting an ominous aura!
"Origami! Stop!"
Ryoko, as the captain, immediately noticed her abnormality, instantly broke away from her surrounding alert duties, and flew rapidly to Origami's side, sternly commanding:
"The test unit's load has reached its limit! If you continue to force it, it will directly harm your own body and brain! This is an order! Stop immediately, disarm!"
Shido, observing from the shadows, was also startled by the strange changes happening to Origami and the eerie purple patterns. He quickly covered his earphone and anxiously asked:
"Kotori! Reine! Origami... what's going on with her? Those patterns on her neck..."
Kotori's grave voice came through the earpiece: "I see it. The situation is a bit more troublesome than we anticipated." She paused, seemingly organizing her thoughts.
Reine, with her uniquely steady voice, provided a more detailed and startling explanation:
"...According to the in-depth intelligence we acquired, government scientists successfully reverse-engineered a nearly complete energy reactor from the wreckage of Welt's mechs. Although the energy's differing nature resulted in much lower utilization efficiency than predicted in the blueprints, its output power still far exceeds most existing Manifestation Devices."
Her tone carried a hint of subtle worry: "The problem lies in how this Manifestation Device uses this reactor... it's very primitive and crude. In an overloaded state, it subjects the user's body to a raw 'magicalization' corrosive treatment without any protective measures. Those purple patterns are the external manifestation of deepening corrosion, where body tissues begin to be forcibly assimilated. If it continues, it will cause irreversible damage to the user."
Kotori took over, her tone becoming serious: "Moreover, this reactor has an even more troublesome characteristic."
"—In a high-concentration spiritual energy environment, that is, when fighting Spirits, it can passively absorb the spiritual energy dispersed by surrounding Spirits, and even to a certain extent directly draw spiritual energy released during Spirit defense or attack, converting it into its own driving energy."
She watched Origami trying to break free from the ice on the screen, and said in a deep voice: "This means that unless the Spirits can instantly unleash a massive amount of spiritual energy far exceeding the carrying capacity of this gungnir, directly collapsing its absorption system—"
"Otherwise, the longer the battle lasts, the faster the Spirits' spiritual energy will be consumed, while Origami... or rather, gungnir's energy might become even more abundant. This is an extremely vicious war of attrition."
After listening, Shido felt a chill run from his feet to the top of his head.
Using technology derived from Welt to create a weapon that could not only harm Spirits but also corrode its user, and even "devour" Spirit spiritual energy... This had completely exceeded his understanding of "confrontation," resembling more a malicious "poison" specifically targeting Spirits themselves.
And at this moment, Origami was forcibly activating this dangerous "poisonous blade," regardless of the risk of her own body being corroded.
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