Perfect Half-Star

"Hey, Tiandao..."

When Tiandao returned to the group, Caroline immediately gave him a light bump with her shoulder.

Blinking her jade-green eyes, she lowered her voice and asked curiously, "Were the things you just said to Kong true?"

Tiandao adjusted his sunglasses, a sly curve appearing at the corner of his mouth. "You tell me?"

Caroline frowned. After pondering for a moment, she gave her answer.

"Although the failure rate of Star Core Surgery is very high, everyone who survived the surgery table and persisted until now must have already adapted to the Star Core implanted in their body."

"Although Chen Kong hasn't displayed any Star Core-related abilities in the past two years, he also hasn't shown any rejection phenomenon toward his Star Core. He's as normal as an ordinary person who never underwent Star Core Surgery."

"But looking at it from another angle, Chen Kong being too normal makes him seem rather abnormal."

With that thought, Caroline immediately looked curiously at Chen Kong, who stood not far away.

It was hard to imagine that someone who looked weak no matter how one viewed him had apparently deceived everyone.

Could it be that, just as Tiandao said, Chen Kong truly possessed an unusual Star Core and merely lacked the right conditions to activate it?

Sensing Caroline's gaze, Chen Kong immediately lowered his head somewhat awkwardly, not quite daring to meet her eyes.

After all, although Caroline had not bullied him much.

Like Chen Xing, Caroline was the sort of person proud to her bones.

The difference was that Caroline's pride was restrained and subtle.

Chen Xing's pride, on the other hand, was overt and flamboyant.

Thus, both Caroline and Chen Xing looked down on the weak Chen Kong from the bottom of their hearts.

Only out of consideration for Tiandao did Caroline refrain from saying anything harsh to Chen Kong.

More specifically, she hadn't spoken to Chen Kong at all over the past two years.

It was as though, in Caroline's eyes, only Tiandao was a person, while Chen Kong was merely air.

Cold violence was violence too.

As for Tiandao...

In a sense, Tiandao was even more arrogant than Caroline and Chen Xing.

It was just that his arrogance differed somewhat from theirs.

Tiandao's arrogance was equal-opportunity arrogance.

He looked down on everyone equally.

To put it in Tiandao's own words, whether it was Chen Kong or Chen Xing.

There was not much difference between them to him.

Because no person cared which ant in a colony was bigger and which was smaller.

It was precisely because of this that Chen Kong could clearly feel "respect" from Tiandao.

Though it was a little humiliating to say.

Tiandao, who regarded him and everyone else as ants, was indeed the only one among the 36 of Stellaris who did not reject him and never treated him as an anomaly.

Seeing Caroline studying Chen Kong curiously, Tiandao smiled and took a mint candy from his pocket, tossing it into his mouth.

A distinct glint of amusement flashed through the azure eyes behind his sunglasses.

Of course he had not lied. As a transmigrator, he knew better than anyone just how extraordinary Chen Kong, the protagonist, truly was.

At the end of the day, the reason Chen Kong had failed to awaken his Star Core ability.

Was not because his Star Core Surgery had failed.

Quite the opposite—his Star Core Surgery had been a great success.

So successful that among everyone present, he was the only Perfect Half-Star besides Tiandao and Chen Xing, with one hundred percent compatibility.

But unlike Tiandao and Chen Xing, whose Star Core compatibility was apparent.

Chen Kong's Star Core compatibility was hidden.

The cause of all this lay with the siblings' mother, whose identity was unusual.

Their mother was not an ordinary person.

She was a rare Humanoid Star Beast that had lived among human society for a long time.

Thus, if Tiandao and the others were Half-Stars created through Star Core Surgery after birth.

Then Chen Kong and Chen Xing were born Half-Stars.

It was only because of certain special reasons that Kong's bloodline leaned more toward his father's human side, while Xing's bloodline leaned more toward her mother's beast side.

That was why one of them looked ordinary and was weak.

While the other was strikingly beautiful and exceptionally powerful.

In truth, if Tiandao had not stolen the spotlight ahead of time.

Then in the original story, the true strongest among the 36 of Stellaris was not Tiandao, but Chen Xing, Chen Kong's older sister.

The strongest sister and the weakest younger brother—standard Alternate Dimension Anime setup.

Therefore, Tiandao, who knew the entire plot of Season 1 of "Stellaris," understood very clearly.

Though Chen Kong currently looked no different from an ordinary person, that was only how he appeared.

The truth was that this so-called "human-like" state was actually Chen Kong's innate ability.

An absurdly overpowered ability capable of nullifying all Star Energy.

Yet it was precisely because this ability was too outrageous that it even affected Chen Kong himself.

It completely suppressed and rendered ineffective the Star Core implanted in his body.

But as long as Chen Kong realized this.

He could briefly suppress his Star Beast bloodline and thereby activate that Star Core's ability.

From this perspective, Chen Kong and Chen Xing, this pair of siblings, were genuine anomalies among the 36 of Stellaris.

Because everyone else, including Tiandao, possessed only one Star Core.

But these two effectively had two.

One was their innate bloodline, while the other was the acquired Star Core implanted through Star Core Surgery.

They were openly cheating.

If Tiandao had not also activated his own cheat early on, there was no way he could have suppressed the innately max-level Chen Xing.

As for Chen Kong, Tiandao did not pay him much attention.

Although this fellow possessed equally astonishing potential, before experiencing the plot of the Final Assessment.

He simply could not grasp the "Key" that unlocked his own abilities.

This was the original plot of the first six episodes of "Stellaris Prequel: Embers."

A mainstream plot built around sibling conflict.

But that plot was based on Tiandao never appearing.

Now that Tiandao had appeared here, he naturally would not let these siblings steal all the limelight.

After all, although you two were the protagonists of Stellaris.

Who said the protagonist had to be the most popular character in an anime?

He, Tiandao Siming, was determined to claim the number one spot in popularity!

Just as Tiandao and the others waited for Yun Meng to announce the contents of the Final Assessment.

In a VIP Room within Ember Organization Base 13, one hundred meters underground from them.

Many unfamiliar figures who were not members of the Ember Organization began arriving one after another.

There were men and women among them, some young and some elderly.

Yet they all had one thing in common: every one of them possessed the aura of superiority cultivated through years of holding high positions.

Regardless of their identities in the outside world, they had come here for only one purpose.

To see just what kind of thing the epoch-making Star Project Ember had spoken of truly was.

If this project was really as miraculous as Ember claimed.

Then they would not mind contributing some resources to join this great project in advance.