The Great Sage's silence cast a repressive atmosphere over the underground palace's main hall, but the high-ranking technomancer standing closest to him noticed another complex emotion beneath the Great Sage's gloomy expression. It was more than anger—it was thought tangled with doubt and gravity.
The high-ranking technomancer instinctively turned back as well, gazing with the Great Sage at the scene displayed in the holographic projection.
It was the final scene the clone had seen before its death: a woman in a black dress with red eyes floating in the sky, destructive light gathering at her fingertips.
The entire scene was covered in rich, dazzling colors, as though the recorder's brain death had caused a "rendering error" through neural chaos. The woman's blurred figure was outlined in great swaths of black and blood-red, while rings of deep-purple or dark-red contours rippled outward across the sky behind her. It was as if a colossal shadow had been cast from behind her onto the clouds, gazing down toward the viewpoint.
"...First, report everything that happened here to the Holy Land, including the raw data of these memory fragments," the Great Sage suddenly said. "Continue trying to restore the information in these fragments here... especially the information about this 'doll.'"
The high-ranking technomancer bowed deeply. "Yes."
The Great Sage gave a quiet "Mm," then rose from his seat. A mass of cables detached themselves from behind him, like tentacles that each possessed a life of their own.
He turned and walked toward the depths of the underground palace's main hall. When he passed the cultivation chambers, however, he stopped and slightly lowered his head to look at one of the containers.
A deep, faint hum came from the tubular container fixed at an angle to the floor. Its surface lights blinked rhythmically, indicating that