4. Haimo: You've even taken control of Shanghai now? / 5. Ticket to the Theater of Domination

"After all, he's Herrscher ... I wouldn't dare to be presumptuous." Highmore smiled. "I've already set up quite a few things around him for surveillance."

"Furthermore, I invited him to my office for a private talk tomorrow, citing his promotion as the reason."

"So... is this a case of his joy turning into sorrow?"

"Of course... Hey hey hey? Wendy, what are you doing?"

"Although Highmore was indeed talking about serious matters just now, we've finished talking about them now, right?" Wendy gave Highmore a smile that sent a chill down her spine. "Then, as the price for teasing me just now..."

"Let's dig in!"

The next day, Highmore sat upright in her office, waiting for the member who was suspected of being transformed into a doll.

"So why am I hiding here?!"

Wendy protested, curled up under the desk.

"Ahem, isn't this convenient for us to physically flip the table?" Highmore made up an excuse. "We'll use smashing the cup as a signal, and once I give the signal, you can rush out and trap him."

"I think you've just been watching too much weird stuff lately..." Wendy muttered, then rubbed against the long, slender legs wrapped in white stockings next to her in a retaliatory manner.

"Stop fooling around..." Highmore's face flushed slightly. Just then, there was a sudden noise coming from the office door.

"Please come in."

As the office door opened, a man who looked somewhat listless walked in.

The members of this branch don't seem to be very old, and their positions are more like those that are dispensable.

The only interesting thing is that although his mental state was clearly abnormal, his steps were steady and powerful, not the kind of weak state that one would expect after staying up all night.

Interesting, has the body already begun to degenerate?

Highmore paused for a moment, then secretly activated the Sea Creatures cells within the member's body while casually chatting about some irrelevant topics to prolong the time.

Let me see how long you can withstand this internal struggle before you're exposed...

Ten minutes later, Highmore noticed an unusual bulge under the clothes on the side of the member out of the corner of her eye, and she couldn't help but smile mischievously.

Chapter Four: Highmore: You still control Sea Creatures?

"Um, Miss Vice Minister..."

Under Highmore's ambiguous gaze, the member who resembled a doll finally couldn't hide his changes any longer.

"Excuse me, could I leave for a moment?"

He looked pained, but still forced a smile and said, "I think I ate something bad this morning..."

"Is it really just an upset stomach?"

Highmore's gaze shifted to the mutated parts of his body that were now completely out of his control. "But... your stomach doesn't seem to agree with you. Look, it seems a little angry."

In an instant, under Highmore's control, the tentacles and chitinous shell that grew from his body began to expand rapidly, instantly piercing through his already overburdened shirt.

"As expected..." Highmore's gaze turned serious. On this man, joints had begun to resemble those of a puppet. "The Thousand-Man Herrscher..."

"Hehe, it seems you already knew~"

The man let out a shrill laugh that was completely unlike his own, "Well, there's nothing we can do then... As expected, you're the monster, even more of a monster than us!"

"Hehe, I'm not playing with you anymore. Monsters like you can have your fun by yourselves~"

The doll, no longer bothering to conceal its true nature, turned its head literally. Several threads seemed to appear behind it, constantly pulling it into the void.

"Hmph, trying to escape?"

The large desk flew up instantly, and a blue tornado swept up the doll.

She wasn't worried at all about killing this unique doll sample; Wendy had already witnessed enough of the regenerative capabilities of the Sea Creatures cells.

"It's useless, huh? No matter what, you can only attack physical objects." Pulled by the threads, the doll's body began to blur. "You think you can stop me from returning to the theater? Hehehehe."

Then, the doll stopped laughing.

It discovered that its body was beginning to solidify; to be precise, the threads on its back could no longer pull it.

"What, what is that! You cheated! That's not yours!"

Highmore slowly put away a key, then walked slowly into the storm and placed her hand on the doll.

The road to the Theater of Domination was blocked for a short time. With the combat power of a single puppet, it was naturally no match for the Highmore, not to mention that it also had a lot of Sea Creatures cells in its body.

Under the touch of Haimo, @] Luba Qiqi H7 Lingmeng and these Haisi elves[, Meng[first.] hair cells received enough support and began a crazy counterattack.

Soon, the doll-like body on this person's body began to be continuously covered by dark blue light spots. In order to increase the strength of these Sea Creatures cells, Highmore also specially covered the doll with a layer of the Mark of the Sea.

"Done, that's a wrap."

Finally, the doll was completely Sea Creatures by the Highmore, and a Herrscher Core was squeezed out of its body by the Sea Creatures cells, as if saying, "Get out of my house!"

The core shook unwillingly, trying to escape into the Imaginary Space, but Highmore was prepared and caught it in an instant, then threw it into the system space.

Why did you rush straight into the tornado?!

Wendy then dispersed the blue whirlwind that had swept through the room, saying, "If I hadn't controlled it so meticulously..."

"It's okay, I believe you..." Highmore added the second half of her sentence: "I believe your tornado is on the right track."

"You're the one who's like a tornado facing off!"

Wendy playfully tapped Highmore on the head, then looked curiously at the doll in her hand. "This thing... it's completely become Sea Creatures now? What about its core?"

"It escaped." Highmore said without changing her expression, "Its core just disappeared directly; it must have escaped into the Imaginary Space."

"This is really troublesome..." Wendy had no doubts; after all, if it weren't for Highmore, it probably would have escaped with its body intact. "So what do we do now... about this..."

"Let's tell Dean Theresa and Durandal first. We're not familiar with the World Serpent, so let's leave it for now," Highmore said after thinking for a moment.

"As a fully ascended Herrscher, as long as the Thousand-Man Herrscher are of sound mind, they certainly wouldn't be the first to attack you."

"So, since even our area has been infiltrated by puppets, what about the areas around the others...?"

"Ugh, what a disgusting way to fight..." Imagining the feeling of someone constantly watching her from a dark corner, Wendy couldn't help but shudder.

"Then I'll go contact them first. You can dispose of this doll Highmore yourself... or you can keep it for them to use for research?"

With that, Wendy hurriedly left the messy room.

"Hoo..." Highmore exhaled a breath of stale air and asked in the channel, "Is this core okay?"

"I think it's alright, but let's check it again when everyone is here tonight."

Xia Ling, who had been observing the whole thing and offered some support along the way, suggested, "After all, Doctor. Maybeom's method only exists in theory. Although I trust her, it's best not to act rashly."

"At least everyone will be here, so that we can handle things if something unexpected happens."

"Okay, I'll listen to you." He placed the core into a separate, isolated space within the system and said, "Then remember to all be here tonight. Those of you with girlfriends, don't be late."

"You should worry about yourself first... You always get pushed by Wendy, yet you still provoke her every day. It's hard to doubt that it's not intentional."

Feeling offended, Flame Willow retorted, after all, she had been absent more often recently.

"Moreover, Rabbit arrived at Coral Island yesterday... Although she came to confront me, I am sincerely grateful to her for rescuing me from those two guys."

"However, since I have solid evidence that I have a doll here... then you probably have one too. You can suggest that Rabbit do a screening; maybe you can catch one alive."

"By the way, where is she? What is she doing now?"

You mean the new clone?

Xia Ling had just replied to Kiana's message, interjected, "She's still getting used to her abilities in Rogue. Given her condition, she can at least manage to solo some fights."

"After all, these are clones we're planning to use to fuse with the core... Although with the case of the Thousand-Man Herrscher, any of us could achieve the same effect by fusing with them, considering the rationality, we still need to add another person."

"Then it seems she can only rely on herself..." Highmore sighed, "After all, her ability... there's no one in the Elysian Realm who matches her expertise."

Chapter Five: The Ticket to Theater of Domination

Seeing that things had come to an end with Highmore, Xia Ling turned her attention back to her own situation.

Kiana just messaged her, asking if she wanted to go get dessert together. They've already finished the shopping and coordination, but Xia Ling declined.

After all, judging from how things unfolded, they probably wouldn't have even had a couple of bites of their ice cream before an accident happened.

Xia Ling turned the gun barrel, Seven Thunders of Retribution faithfully locked onto the target she had been paying attention to: a part-time college student wearing Hormu doll costume Seele Xia Ling.

At this moment, the mascot costume had silently deflated, and the people around seemed not to have noticed, or perhaps they had noticed but didn't care.

After all, he's a fragile college student; maybe he got heatstroke because it was too hot and went to find a place to rest.

However, Xia Ling, who had read the script, knew very well that this was not some fragile college student, or rather, this student was already dead.

What appears here now is merely a puppet connected to the Theater of Domination.

Sure enough, shortly after this person disappeared, the mechs that were originally used to launch fireworks in the square suddenly started moving and began attacking citizens in all directions.

However, since this type of mech, which is being retired and converted for civilian use, is already close to being scrapped, it has not been able to catch up with humans so far... after all, its body is just too bulky.

Seele and Kiana quickly rushed out of the dessert shop next door, while Xia Ling also pointed her gun at the mechs.

Given Anti-Entropy's level of expertise, these mechs themselves are naturally without any problems, so why would such an unexpected turn of events occur...? Xia Ling's gaze focused on the top of the mechs.

Through the Seven Thunders of Retribution's three-dimensional aiming method, Xia Ling could clearly see a golden core floating above these mechs, connected to several invisible threads that controlled them.

Of course, these aren't Herrscher Core; they seem to be just special energy nodes, things Xia Ling had seen quite a few of before in the game...

These are essentially a second life for these mechs; as long as this node is not destroyed, it can control a new mech or a human at any time.

However, this is not a problem in the face of the Seven Thunders of Retribution of Purification.

Xia Ling gently pulled the trigger, and accompanied by a barely perceptible flash of lightning, a bullet traversed space, heading directly towards the node in the Imaginary Space.

With the sound of threads snapping, a mech suddenly collapsed to the ground, regaining control.

This scene naturally caught Kiana's attention. Having witnessed Xia Ling's abilities many times, she quickly realized what was happening. "Seele, it's Sister Xia Ling! She seems to have a way to undo the control over these mechs!"

"So now we..."

"Seele, go save people. I'll take control of the mech's position so that Sister Xia Ling can attack more easily."

Kiana has far more combat experience than Seele. Disassembling these behemoths one by one would definitely take a lot of time, so she simply abandoned her dual pistols and started using the Herrscher of the Void's abilities instead.

Accompanied by golden halos, these mechs were immobilized and unable to move. Taking advantage of this opportunity, Xia Ling fired several shots, many of which achieved the effect of hitting two or three targets with a single shot.

Soon, the three men dealt with the rioting mechs, and the citizens, with the help of the quickly arriving guards, restored order.

"Sister Xia Ling, you're here! I'm so grateful for your help earlier..."

Seeing Xia Ling crawl through the cordon, Seele quickly called the guards to let Xia Ling in.

"Kiana is still over there talking to the person in charge who arrived, and the experts who arrived are also investigating the cause of the mech malfunction..."

"But we didn't find anything, right?" Xia Ling said definitively.

"Huh? Sister Xia Ling, how did you know...?"

"It's not convenient to talk about this here. I need to leave for a bit... Kiana probably won't be able to leave for a while either. Seele, can I ask you for a favor?"

"Of course, Sister Xia Ling, just give the instructions."

"Just now, a college student wearing HOMU outfit disappeared strangely in this area. He was the one who greeted you."

Xia Ling tried her best to recreate the original plot because she needed to get something for Seele.

"Go investigate him... This person is a bit strange."

Xia Ling flashed the Seven Thunders of Retribution on her wrist. "This is what I observed through this."

"The Seven Thunders of Retribution...?" Seele naturally knew that the Seven Thunders of Retribution could be observed from a higher-dimensional perspective.

Since Xia Ling said that, it means she must have seen something, but she couldn't say it because there might be other dolls nearby.

"I understand, Sister Xia Ling. I will do my best to investigate."

Seele nodded, put away her scythe, and quickly left the scene.