8. A Miu Miu snuck in among the Thousand Herrschers / 9. Naturally, we should split into groups by ship

"However, the other side seems to have been on guard against me, judging from the doll limbs scattered all over the ground... Luckily, there's Yae Sakura."

"It seems that the other party wants to take this opportunity to lure you into a certain place. Just now, through the scope of the Seven Thunders of Retribution, I vaguely saw a theater in the Imaginary Space... It should be the Theater of Domination on this ticket."

"If you really get pulled in... without spatial abilities, it will probably take a lot of effort for you to come back."

"Isn't this thing very dangerous?"

Seele looked at the seemingly harmless receipt in her hand and exclaimed in surprise.

"That's right... Perhaps this thing can connect to that so-called Theater of Domination."

"So, I'll keep it safe."

Xia Ling held the receipt between two fingers.

"After all, besides me, only Kiana in the entire Salt Lake Base can easily enter and exit the Imaginary Space."

"Sister Xia Ling, please be careful..."

Seele's gaze held a hint of worry.

"Don't worry, I usually spend my nights with Theresa. Even if I get tricked, Theresa is still there. Don't underestimate the power of Judah's Power of Restraint."

Xia Ling smiled, not worried about the thing at all.

"However, let's deal with the Anti-Entropy cleanup department first... Seele, the report on the Doctor is yours, since I wasn't involved in most of your investigation."

"As for the cleanup department... sigh, I hope they don't use the gas explosion as an excuse again."

After processing all the reports, Xia Ling quickly reunited with Kiana, and the three of them returned to the Salt Lake Base.

Anti-Entropy wasn't surprised by the attack from the Thousand-Man Herrscher; instead, they felt a sense of relief that the battle was finally being brought to the forefront.

After all, if the thousand Thousand-Man Herrscher continue to ignore them and simply wreak havoc in the world, given their distribution and efficiency, they might actually cause them a lot of trouble.

Getting the other person's attention to you is also a good option.

Considering that the three of them had also been traveling all day, Ain decided to postpone the matter and let them go back to rest first.

This was exactly what Xia Ling wanted. Using overwork as an excuse, Xia Ling quickly crawled into bed and immersed her consciousness in the system space.

After all, tonight they were also planning to try to fuse the core of a Herrscher of Domination in the system space.

As soon as she entered the space, she discovered that all of her other clones had already arrived.

But...

"Huh? Where's today's main character?"

[Still undergoing the Water Moon themed trial, Host.]

The system answered her question and added some additional information.

Judging from her condition... you should be able to see her soon, host.

"What kind of encounter? Did you win, or...?"

To put it simply, she's cosplaying a hedgehog in Emergency Outbreak.

"Oh, that's really unfortunate."

Xia Ling sat down on the sofa with a gloating smile.

A moment later, an operator with flaxen green hair and bright yellow eyes walked in from outside the meeting room with a pained expression on her face.

Seeing that everyone had arrived in the reception room, she pondered for a moment, and then...

"Ciallo

"Alright, alright, stop being a pomelo fan and come here, MewMew."

That's right, the new operator Xia Ling recently drew is this quirky elf girl— Mulsus.

Chapter Eight: A MewMew Sneaks Among Thousand-Man Herrscher

Seeing that everyone had finally arrived, Xia Ling turned on the projection screen and the Domination Core, which was sealed in a separate space.

"Kal'tsit, tell me about the progress on your end."

"Okay." Kal'tsit nodded.

"In the past few days, I have cleared out more than two hundred dolls. Basically, all the dolls I have collected over this period of time have been cleared out."

"According to my previous intelligence, the Herrscher of Domination wants to replenish the puppets by relying on the core's self-selection... The puppets that are fully transformed will receive the call of the Theater of Domination and join it."

"At the same time, it takes time for the Herrscher of Domination to replenish their dolls... for at least a week, their dolls will not be at full capacity."

"That's fine. We just need it to have a window of opportunity when it's missing puppets... Two hundred or so is already more than enough."

"But this is good, at least... it makes my joining seem less conspicuous." MewMew was very happy about this.

"But I do find it a bit strange. If we just add a puppet like this, won't the other puppets get suspicious?"

"Because they are a mob... When they doubt you, you can completely doubt the person who doubts you, and then there will be people stirring things up, cheering, and watching the show... In the end, it will escalate into 'Let's fight! Let's fight!'"

Xia Ling looked completely unsurprised. (The following appears to be a separate, unrelated section. "The Eight Leeks of the Wild (VIII) Spirit Four Orders")

"More than what you look like or what your abilities are, they care more about whether you have a core and whether you are one of the losers. After all, not all dolls look the same. Kal'tsit should know that there are men, women, young and old everywhere."

"Okay... shall we begin the fusion?"

"Okay, let's begin."

Xia Ling nodded, then placed her hand on the restricted core.

Flame Willow and Highmore each pulled out a collectible item.

MewMew first came to Flame Willow's side, and then gently grasped the blood-red sharp horn in her hand.

Both of these items are from Sarkaz pigeons, or rather, they are the two most common items from this breed.

Leaving aside their inherent function, what Mulsus needed at this moment was the rich, almost viscous... emotion that they possessed.

The Hatred from the Age of Vengeance

My sister was bitten to death by the Bloodfiend, my father was taken away by the Carrion Eaters, and my mother escaped with me. I will never yield to the Sarkaz, and even if I must repent, I will wait until they are completely gone.

Even as she deliberately relaxed her mind, a blood-red emotion quickly invaded her brain, clouding her vision with a red hue.

Hatred, despair, pain... extreme negative emotions began to swirl in her mind.

Under such intense negative emotions, the core of the Herrscher of Domination quickly charged towards Mulsus like a shark smelling blood.

Then, it burrowed directly into her body.

"Kal'tsit, keep an eye on MewMew's fusion rate."

A vial of pale green medicine appeared in Xia Ling's hand, and she inserted it into a syringe.

After Klein, the psychic who understands the Serpent, died in the disaster caused by the Thousand-Man Herrscher... she has been dedicated to studying the Thousand-Man Herrscher, and how to maintain consciousness after being transformed into a part of the Thousand-Man Herrscher is one of the important topics.

However, since Elysia had not yet given the Herrscher humanity at that time, the research stalled on a non-technical problem.

In the current civilization, where Herrscher possess self-awareness, breaking free from control is extremely easy for Serpent.

"Alright, it's fully integrated with Lu Ba Jiu Wu Ling. We can no longer detect the Herrscher Core's signal here, just like those hidden cores in the outside world."

Several tens of minutes later, Kal'tsit suddenly spoke up.

"Okay."

Xia Ling's figure appeared in front of Mulsus in an instant.

"First... the system Neural Degeneration!"

As the Rejection Reaction subsided, the world before MewMew's eyes instantly turned icy blue, and her thoughts were stretched out continuously in a short period of time...

"And then this..." Highmore promptly handed over another collectible to counteract the negative effects of the Hatred from the Age of Vengeance.

Graffiti of the Hope Era

I am a Teekaz orphan. My parents died in Catastrophe, and I was adopted by Uncle Feline's family next door. They treated me like family. I can say with a clear conscience that I am a descendant of the Ancients.

Seeing the bloodshot in MewMew's eyes gradually fade, Xia Ling nodded in satisfaction. Once the crimson in her eyes had completely disappeared, Xia Ling decisively injected all of the Serpent's medicine into MewMew's body.

"Alright, we've done all we could."

Xia Ling clapped her hands. "According to Serpent, it will take more than a day for the potion to fully take effect... By then, we can get a Thousand-Man Herrscher version of MewMew!"

"Looking at it this way, MewMew and Qianren are quite a good match..." Highmore pondered, "After all, MewMew can create a whole bunch of water clones that are exactly the same as her original body and have considerable combat power, making them significantly superior to B Three Wolves in cricket fighting."

"It's a pity, though. I still think Xia Ling, you're best suited for the position of Thousand-Man Herrscher..." Xi said from the side. "After all, you have the Origin's Legacy, how can you not become a Herrscher?"

"To be honest, if we wipe out all 1,000 Herrschers and only leave MewMew, wouldn't she be the ultimate Thousand-Man Herrscher? At that point, we could just buy cores off the top of our head, we could each have two..."

"It still feels like it's lacking a bit of ritual..."

The next day arrived quickly. Because of the attack by the Thousand-Man Herrscher the day before, Xia Ling and Seele were pulled into the office early in the morning to inquire about the situation.

However, to their surprise, they weren't the only ones awake at this hour. Not far from Xia Ling, next door, Welt had already begun Bronya's training for the new day.

"So Bronya works so hard all the time... She has to start practicing very early in the morning."

"After all, the abilities of the Herrscher of Reason are not like others, especially those of Welt and Bronya who inherited their core abilities."

"Unlike Joyce's innate ability to construct before understanding, Welt needs to understand the whole thing before he can begin to construct it."

"While Bronya's situation is somewhat better than Welt's, she still doesn't reach Joyce's level."

"Unless... never mind, it's too early to talk about that now."

Ain suddenly shook her head, steer the conversation back on track.

"Tell me, besides what's in the report, what else did you discover yesterday?"

In Chapter Nine, the groupings will naturally be based on CP (Content/Personal Combination).

"I never imagined that the number and strength of the Thousand-Man Herrscher would have developed to this extent."

After listening to Seele's report and Xia Ling's supplement, Ain suddenly felt a headache coming on.

Based on the known experience of Previous Civilization, the Thousand-Man Herrscher of Previous Civilization were also elusive and difficult to detect, and were able to control people or things silently.

But at least their direct combat ability is really weak, basically dependent on the host. The main problem of the Previous Civilization was that these things are like cockroaches in the house, impossible to get rid of completely.

This generation of thousands... while perfectly inheriting the stealth characteristics of the previous generation, seems to have also made significant progress in their combat power.

At least, judging from Xia Ling's description, the opponent has a home-field combat space called the Theater of Domination, and the large golden hand also indicates that the opponent has some considerable combat ability.

They've set their sights on Seele, meaning they think they can easily defeat Seele? And this is even assuming they know Seele's Stigmata conceal another power...

"Xia Ling, as it stands, at the Salt Lake Base, only your, Theresa's, and Kiana's abilities can somewhat counter the Thousand-Man Herrscher. Therefore, the next investigation may require you to be the main force."

"Given that the other party may have some manipulative tactics, it is best to conduct the investigation in pairs."

So... who will I partner with?

"Of course it's Theresa." Ain answered without hesitation, "Besides the tacit understanding between the two of you, your abilities and Kiana's characteristics also overlap somewhat. In comparison, it is more appropriate to let Theresa take on the responsibility of close protection."

There was one more thing Ain didn't say: if Theresa didn't keep an eye on Xia Ling, who knows what kind of plans Xia Ling would make with her this time.

She had already witnessed enough of Xia Ling's astonishing wisdom. It was effective, but if it happened a few more times, she didn't know if Xia Ling would be alright, but they would probably all be possessed by demonic spirits.

"Furthermore..." Ain looked at the report in her hand, "Based on the information I have gathered so far, the Thousand-Man Herrscher tend to incite people's hearts and exploit human nature when they carry out sabotage."

"From this perspective... Kiana is undoubtedly a target with a lot of weaknesses."

"Therefore, I plan to pair up two Fu Hua, Bella, and Kiana to protect each other."

"As for Seele... considering that they've already set their sights on you, you should stay with Bronya for now. With Welt and Bronya around, and since you're already near the Salt Lake Base, they shouldn't have the guts to attack you."

"Even if you are going to participate in the mission, it is best to act together with the other two groups."

"Okay, okay, Seele understands."

Seele nodded, then asked with some concern, "But... Doctor, what if the enemy launches a direct attack on the Salt Lake Base after we've sent out all our combat forces to investigate..."

"Generally speaking, we don't send out both groups of people at the same time," Ain said with a smile.

"Moreover, the Salt Lake Base is not without defensive measures. Don't underestimate Anti-Entropy's technology, especially when Welt himself is in the base."

"Alright, that's enough for now. Seele, you can go find Bronya now. As for Xia Ling... she doesn't have any missions for the time being. You can go with Seele and tell Welt about the situation."