The Substitute

After Angela fell asleep, she entered a black space, exactly the same as the one Huang Hao had been in before.

Angela calmly looked around. "Is it you again? This trick won't work on me."

That nauseating voice reappeared, looping in Angela's ear, "That's not necessarily true. It all depends on what you desire."

Angela calmly rejected it. "I don't want anything. I'm just a machine."

Will of Honkai: "No, no, no, no. What you've been pursuing deep down has been revealed without reservation. It's not that simple to find out what you want."

Angela listened quietly, feeling indifferent, wanting to see what the Will of Honkai would say.

Will of Honkai: "What, are you looking forward to it?"

Angela: "What's there to look forward to? If I don't have it, I don't have it."

However, the Will of Honkai suddenly said, "You're just a substitute."

Angela shuddered and immediately tensed up, demanding, "What, what do you mean!"

The Will of Honkai laughed loudly, mocking Angela's previous confident lies. "You're just a substitute for your Father."

Angela: "You have no proof. Why should I believe you?"

Will of Honkai: "I'm not lying. You know it best. When you were created, you should have inherited all his memories. Even if not all of them, the most precious ones must be there."

Hearing this, Angela lowered her head, her expression extremely dim, because what it said was indeed true.

Will of Honkai continued, "In his memories, there was already a person named Angela. Your basic appearance was modeled after her. If I remember correctly, you are just a clone, a machine imbued with emotions."

Angela was gradually eroded by the Will of Honkai, and darkness began to surround her.

Angela kept thinking about her "predecessor," tears falling unconsciously, but she still managed to say with difficulty, "That's all in the past. Father remembers me now."

"Hahaha, are you kidding me? Think about what he's told you recently. He always reminisces about that time, and he always unintentionally says, 'Are you still lost in your own lies?'" The Will of Honkai laughed wantonly upon hearing Angela's words.

Angela remembered the phrase "I am X but not A," and completely broke down. Everything felt so familiar; Huang Hao had been the same. Except this time, Angela didn't resist the full erosion, and no one came to save the day.

"That's right! Join us! You will become even more wonderful!" The Will of Honkai shouted joyfully, looking at the masterpiece before it.

The darkness encroached step by step, completely consuming Angela.

Before being fully eroded, Angela weakly uttered her last words: "Father, where are you..."

After that, only darkness remained.

Meanwhile, at Moth to the Flame...

At Klein's strong insistence, Mobius reluctantly confined Klein.

Mobius, conducting experiments in the laboratory, said lazily, "What a bother. Without an assistant, I have to do so many small things myself."

Just then, an explosion suddenly sounded from outside, instantly putting Mobius on high alert.

Mobius: "What is this... No!"

Mobius reacted immediately, but Klein, who had already rushed out, was upon her and launched an attack...

On Qian Jie's side, thanks to Angela's reminder, Immer was pinned to the ground by Qian Jie as soon as she became a Herrscher.

However, Qian Jie was in great distress, unsure of what to do. But for his own selfish reasons, he secretly hid her.

(I have a question: why did an automatic rifle kill the true Sixth Herrscher, while Skyfire couldn't kill the weakened Authority of Death?)

The Tenth Honkai War officially began, with Angela's erosion as its starting point.