He had even included the entire area within a ten-kilometer diameter centered on Bai Ge in the strike zone, to prevent him from escaping with his authority over space.
Every heavy missile in Schicksal's arsenal was expended in an instant. Mixed among them were more than a dozen Honkai Energy Fission Bombs.
That was Otto's true trump card.
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The Most Beautiful Boy in This World
Missiles rained down from the sky.
This was the rain of destruction sent by a fool.
Schicksal's heavy missiles were far more powerful than ordinary ones. Every single missile could instantly turn a small town into a sea of flames, and now over a thousand were about to fall at once!
"Bishop, could it be that we..."
"No, this isn't real!"
"No, I don't want to die! Someone save me!"
"Dad, Mom, ahh, ahhhhh!"
Schicksal's Valkyries had fallen into panic as well. Only now did they realize that Otto Apocalypse had treated them as expendable pawns.
Their sole purpose was to keep the Herrscher of the Void pinned down until those thousands of missiles fell.
Otto: "As an unprecedented multi-core Herrscher, how could your destruction be ordinary? Let these hundreds of A-rank Valkyries and three S-Rank Valkyries be buried with you, Herrscher of the Void. No need to thank me, hahaha~"
Cecilia lowered Black Abyss White Flower.
Siegfried's Heavenly Fire Holy Judgment fell to the ground.
Theresa and Judas Oath had fallen silent.
Even though they possessed S-Rank combat power, there was no way they could survive such a barrage of missiles.
This overwhelming saturation strike was meant to wipe out the entire area. Once they had all been reduced to charred corpses, once everyone was dead—
Otto would reappear and pick up the only four remaining Herrscher Cores from the desolate earth.
If it were only me, I could still dodge them.
Bai Ge made his judgment in an instant.
If he were alone, he could still hide inside the Imaginary Space that came with the Herrscher of the Void's powers, then emerge calmly once the missile storm had ended.
But only he would make it in time.
Cecilia, Siegfried, Theresa, Sirin, and the others—at least half of them, perhaps even more, would be too late to save. Besides, Imaginary Space was an extremely harmful environment for ordinary people.
Imaginary Space was filled with Honkai Energy. Ordinary people would turn into Deadwalkers or Honkai Beasts within seconds.
In that case—
The answer to what he had to do was already obvious.
When Bai Ge opened his eyes again, his magnificent Golden Eyes stared directly at the storm of destruction falling from the sky. His existence was like an undying flame blazing fiercely amid a torrential downpour.
"Imaginary Barrier, Ideal Fluid Shield, maximum output, activate――!!"
He flew toward the sky.
The boy's raised hands seemed as though they were about to hold up the entire heavens. This was his choice. Bai Ge chose to face the destruction descending from above!
That posture was as magnificent and tragic as a moth flying into the flames.
"Herrscher of the Void, what are you doing?!"
"Everyone, get down immediately!"
"Bai Ge, are you going to do this again――?!"
"Master, your cores will break if you do this!"
The others' voices reached his ears, but Bai Ge had no time to spare for them.
He drove every one of his powers to its limit, using all his Honkai Energy for protection as he turned himself into an absolute line of defense against thousands of missiles.
"Just as I thought... you really did step forward."
Inside Schicksal's combat control room.
Otto sprang to his feet so excitedly that he knocked over his chair.
His eyes were fixed on Bai Ge on the screen. Before the missiles could be transferred away through spatial gates, he mercilessly detonated them in midair.
BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM――!!!
The sky over Siberia was blasted apart.
It was as though a thousand suns had appeared in the sky.
"Fuck! 凸(艹皿艹)!"
Bai Ge cursed loudly.
Stopping an unexploded missile was a trivial matter. No matter how dangerous an explosive was, as long as it had not detonated, it was merely a lump of metal. Teleporting it away was not difficult.
But stopping an exploded missile, on the other hand, required dozens of times more Honkai Energy.
Bai Ge could only grit his teeth and endure.
Back then, the first Herrscher of Reason, Welt Joyce, had constructed a shield over all of Manhattan to protect it. Yet just one Honkai Energy Fission Bomb had completely drained his power.
And now, although Bai Ge was a four-core Herrscher whose strength far surpassed Welt Joyce's, he was facing every heavy missile Schicksal possessed! More than a dozen of them were Honkai Energy Fission Bombs alone!
I can hold on, I can still hold on! The Ideal Fluid Shield won't break that easily. With the Imaginary Barrier cutting off the excess blast waves and heat, it'll be fine!
"Yaaaaaahhh!!!"
Everyone stared blankly into the air.
The Herrscher boy who had blocked every missile for them looked no older than fourteen or fifteen, yet he was facing this world-ending crisis alone.
He had protected everyone, even those who had been his enemies until moments ago.
The Valkyries fell to their knees one after another. Looking up at Bai Ge in the sky, their weapons long since dropped from their hands, they felt nothing but bitter guilt and remorse.
"No, Bai Ge, please..."
Sirin looked at Bai Ge through streaming tears.
She desperately reached toward the sky, but no matter what she did, she could not touch the boy.
Bai Ge's excessively radiant figure at that moment made her heart ache so badly that she could barely breathe. If she could, she wanted more than anything to take his suffering in his place.
"Just a little... more!"
Blood flowed from Bai Ge's eyes, ears, mouth, and nose. His body had already reached the very limit of its limits.
Although the Herrscher Gems were connected to Imaginary Space and could draw upon its endless Honkai Energy at any time, Bai Ge had already pushed all four cores to maximum output.
Cracks had appeared across all four Herrscher Cores, just like Bai Ge himself, who seemed ready to shatter apart.
"...Herrscher of the Void, you truly are admirable."
Otto watched everything with a solemn expression.
Reality really was a fucked-up thing.
The Herrscher who should have destroyed the world was protecting humanity, while Schicksal—the organization whose creed was "to fight for all that is beautiful in the world"—was bombarding the most beautiful existence in this world.
That utterly wicked man was dazed.
As Otto watched Bai Ge's selfless figure on the screen, he suddenly thought of the most beautiful existence in his heart, his only Saintess, Kallen Kaslana.
Exactly the same.
They really were exactly the same.
They were both noble, kind people. Both were powerful beings. Both were heroes who burned themselves away to save others when hardship came.
They clearly possessed the power to escape, yet they both disregarded their own lives to shield others from disaster. And even... they would both die because of Otto.
That, too, was exactly the same.
Otto hesitated.
Bai Ge's figure overlapped with Kallen's in his mind.
It was as though fate had placed that day from over five hundred years ago before this fool once more.
At that moment, this rational villain truly felt the urge to abandon the plan and stop the attack. Otto truly did not want to kill the Saintess a second time.
However—
"I'm sorry, Herrscher of the Void. In the end, what I loved was never some Saintess. It was Kallen. I was the one who harmed Kallen back then. To make up for that mistake, even if I must commit more mistakes, even if I must kill someone exactly like you, I will not stop."
What he loved was not some Saintess. He loved Kallen Kaslana. That woman was the selfishness of his entire life.
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