"So... you wanted to join this immature project as well?" She looked at the young man before her. "You should know that Mei proposed the Fusion Warrior Project. Even she couldn't guarantee the success of this technology, much less me."
The young man fell silent for a moment. "But aside from you, I can't think of any other way to become a Fusion Warrior."
She sized up the young man from the European branch. She had heard that he had originally been a member of that woman Elysia's squad, but for some unknown reason, he had left the team and transferred to the European branch.
"Let's make this clear first. I don't do meaningless things." As she spoke, she happened to be reviewing Mei's proposed Fusion Warrior theory. In her eyes, it might become humanity's path toward future evolution. Using a test subject in advance to get some practice in wasn't a bad idea.
"I understand. An equal exchange. If I die during this operation, you may use my body for research." The young man's expression remained blank. "At the same time, if the operation succeeds, then whatever you need, as long as I can obtain it, I'll bring it to you."
Heh. Interesting fellow.
The corners of her lips curled slightly. "Then it's settled. Klein, go prepare the relevant paperwork."
After signing the agreement, the young man looked up at her. "Dr. Mobius, how soon can the operation be performed?"
"Don't worry. You can undergo surgery at the same time as Kevin." She flipped through Mei's theories as she spoke. "But, little guinea pig, you'd better think this through. The theoretical success rate of this operation is currently zero. What you're doing is basically no different from throwing your life away."
"If I can't make it through this operation, then there's no meaning in my remaining in this world," the young man said.
Her hand paused. She looked at him with some surprise. The young man's face was still expressionless, but his gaze was exceptionally resolute.
"Fine. Whatever you want. Still, I'm curious. What exactly makes you so eager to throw your life away?" she asked with a hint of mockery.
The young man rose to leave. "I just arrogantly want to get closer to someone... If I can't stand by her side, then at least let me be qualified to fight alongside her."
Her? Was he referring to Elysia? After all, according to the information she had gathered on the young man, his record was quite impressive. But compared to Kevin and Elysia, it was hardly worth mentioning.
She scoffed. "What a boring reason."
After the young man left, his deputy came to her laboratory.
"And who are you?" She looked at the silver-haired woman. Why had so many people lately been recklessly wandering into her laboratory without fearing death?
The woman smiled and introduced herself. "Hello, Dr. Mobius. I'm Feng's deputy, Lilith. Feng seems to be preparing to join the Fusion Warrior Project, so I wanted to ask... is the project's current success rate really zero?"
"Would you, as his deputy, not know whether he intends to participate?" She lowered her head and continued her experiment. "The agreement has already been signed. Unless a miracle happens, you can probably start preparing to take over his position."
Lilith's voice was full of concern. "So the rumors were true? Feng really is something else. Even if it's for Elysia, he's being far too careless with his life."
{}
So it was Elysia after all.
That was what she thought, but she wasn't particularly interested in other people's gossip. She simply said, "If there's nothing else, you can leave."
Although Lilith's voice was filled with emotion, Mobius could still sense the malice and excitement hidden within it. Where had that guy found this deputy? Wasn't he afraid Lilith would stab him in the back someday?
The experiment arrived as scheduled. Compared to Kevin, whose vital signs had once dropped to zero during the operation, the surgery of the young man named Yu Feng went rather smoothly. At least, it looked that way.
The moment the operation was complete, the two immediately rushed to the Australian battlefield. One went to the Seventh Herrscher's location, while the other headed for the Judgment-class Honkai Beast Surya. Each of them killed their target alone.
Compared to Surya, the Seventh Herrscher Himiko dealt a far heavier blow to Fire Moth. Thus, at the celebration held afterward, Kevin, as the main figure, received everyone's praise and blessings.
Meanwhile, Yu Feng was lying in her laboratory for an examination.
"Little guinea pig, I have good news and bad news. Which would you like to hear first?"
He said, "...Tell me both."
"The good news is that your resistance to Honkai Energy has increased dramatically compared to before the operation. But the bad news..." She gave him the results of her examination. "The reason you're feeling burning pain throughout your body is that the Hypervariable Factor is constantly stimulating your nervous system. Compared to Kevin's extremely low body temperature, your side effects are even more severe."
Yu Feng said nothing. Perhaps the incessant burning sensation had left him in no mood to comment.
"Do you regret it?" She looked at the young man teasingly. "This pain will accompany you for the rest of your life, until the day you die."
"To be honest, a little," Yu Feng said. "After all, I'm not like Kevin. He's a hero favored by heaven, while I'm merely an ordinary man..."
If someone who can make it through such an immature operation counts as an ordinary man, then no one else even deserves that title.
She continued, "Still, considering that you brought back Surya's remains for me on your own, I can try developing a medicine that will suppress this pain."
"I understand. Consider it part of the contract. If you need any experimental materials or test subjects in the future, you can come to me."
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"Oh? No hesitation at all? Getting involved with Mobius isn't exactly a good thing within Fire Moth, little guinea pig."
"I never cared about anyone's opinion. What they think and what they do have nothing to do with me." Yu Feng's voice was extremely cold.
She laughed. Suddenly, she found this young man genuinely interesting. At the very least... being around him didn't feel bad.
Not long after she developed the appropriate medicine for him, Yu Feng proposed another possible plan to her: the Chimera Project.
The plan that later made her wish it had never existed.
Based on Fusion Warriors, it involved incorporating as many Honkai Beasts as possible into their bodies as materials for secondary surgery, or even multiple surgeries. The final stage of this plan was the Project: Ascend to Divinity, a name she had personally chosen.
She watched the young man undergo operation after operation, and she watched the side effects he suffered gradually worsen. She had once asked him, "Is that woman Elysia really worth doing all this for?"
Yu Feng's answer was, "It isn't just for her. It's for more people I care about."
Tch. She couldn't hear even the slightest falsehood in his words.
"Your answer is even more boring than before... Heh. Since you can barely be considered a useful assistant, I suppose I won't call you little guinea pig anymore, Yu Feng."
"My honor."
Come to think of it, she was probably the only one who had personally witnessed Lilith's feelings for Yu Feng change. From the insincerity at the beginning, to their flawless cooperation later on, and then... in the end, her eyes filled with nothing but him.
"Doctor, it seems Lilith confessed to Feng." Klein spoke as she organized the experimental data.
"Heh, what does that have to do with me?" she said, though her mood inexplicably worsened.
Lilith became a Fusion Warrior some time before the Eighth Herrscher Incident. After the Eighth Herrscher Incident, she voluntarily applied to join the Chimera Project and became its second executor.
Yu Feng was Number Zero. Kevin was Number One.
At the time, she said something similar to what Yu Feng had told Mobius long ago. "I want to stand by his side. At the very least, I need to be qualified to do so."
Scenes of Yu Feng and Lilith kept surfacing in her mind from time to time, making her even more irritable.
"I suppose Yu Feng will accept Lilith as well. After all, they've been together for so long." Her tone was stiff. "Klein, there's no need to pay attention to such trivial matters."
Klein said, "...Understood, Doctor."
But I only heard it from someone else and mentioned it in passing. Does that count as paying a lot of attention?
During the Tenth Herrscher Incident, Klein died as one of the Tenth Herrscher's individual bodies. After that, Yu Feng basically took over caring for Mobius's daily needs.
After Yu Feng learned the truth behind Klein's death, he told her about it as well. She once broke down over having killed Klein herself, even cursing him for leaving Fire Moth and heading to Africa at that time. If he had been there, everything might have been different. Yet Yu Feng stood there from beginning to end, allowing her to vent.
He said nothing.
The battle against the Eleventh Herrscher was also The Tragedy of Binding. The Fallen Angel squad was almost entirely wiped out. Of the once enormous Fusion Warrior force, only fourteen remained. After killing the Eleventh Herrscher, Yu Feng brought the puppet Klein back and gave her to Mobius, then spent the night alone with the Fallen Angels.
"Don't you hate Elysia?"
"If she hadn't done that, she wouldn't be Elysia."
That was what he said. Lying inside the container, surrounded by the bodies of twelve Fallen Angels, he was about to undergo his most insane operation yet. Using Vishnu's characteristics, he would devour all twelve Fallen Angels to obtain his final "evolution."
After the operation, his side effects had grown increasingly severe. Even the medicine she had specially developed could no longer suppress that pain. She could only watch him remain sleepless night after night, enduring agony that no one else knew about.
During the Twelfth Herrscher Incident, he was shot with Honkai Energy interference rounds by soldiers while protecting Ling. The many Hypervariable Factors within his body consequently became mutually repellent, and he nearly died at the hands of the very people he had always protected.
Only when she discovered that he might die because of it did she understand what kind of feelings she truly held for him. Anger and regret drove her to reveal the pain he had always carried to every Flame-Chaser present.
She condemned their uselessness, condemned their incompetence, and also condemned herself.
In that battle against Finality, she saw the end point he had reached. She saw him ascend the throne of the gods with a human body. She saw the ultimate form of human evolution that she had sought.
And she also saw... the fall of the one who had ascended to divinity.
She had pursued infinity to the utmost, yet in the end, she couldn't even save a single person. The one who had traveled alongside her on the path toward divinity, the one she only understood at the very end... the one she loved, her confidant.
Infinity... If he was gone, then even if the future reached the place of her ideals, it would be meaningless, wouldn't it?
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