One Person for a Lifetime

Number Seventeen quietly watched her back as she turned away, and as usual, picked up the design drawings and prepared...

"Doctor, there is no one else here."

"Tick-tock".

Vill-V turned her head with a smile, "What do you mean there's no one else..."

"Tick-tock".

She looked down in surprise and saw a wet corner on the design drawing. Her vision blurred for some reason. She rubbed her eyes, amused, and asked, "What happened..."

The top hat she usually wore fell to the floor from a corner of the room. She paused for a moment, staring at the hat that the person had given her.

"Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock..."

Her hand stopped on her cheek.

Two clear streaks slid down her cheek as she stared blankly at Number Seventeen, transparent liquid dripping from her chin.

Her body suddenly lost all strength, and she collapsed to the ground. The smile on her pretty face twisted and vanished uncontrollably, and she covered her face, trembling...

"Ugh... Ugh wah wah wah wah—"

The suppressed cries of agony echoed far and wide from the Spiral Workshop ...

Vanished on an unreachable shore...

National Day Special: Spider Silk (Part 4)

"Have you all understood the mission?"

"This mission..."

"This time..."

His legs were shaking uncontrollably, and a sense of world-weariness was brewing in his heart. He clenched his hands and crossed them over his legs, feeling nauseous and as if he was about to vomit stomach acid.

Shut up.

"This time..."

Stop talking.

"This time..."

Unable to contain his surging emotions, he raised his hand and slammed it hard against the communicator—

Kosma gripped the communicator expressionlessly and replied at a strained voice, "Understood."

"Kosma, your fused Honkai Beast 'Vishnu' has been reclassified as Judgment-class Honkai Beast. Based on its characteristics, it may be classified as the second End of Dharma-class Honkai Beast in the future."

"But after your first Artificial Collapse, Vishnu's genes will fully awaken. If you don't continue to devour Honkai Beast, Vishnu's genes will gradually devour you."

Mobius twirled his pen, sat under the dim lamp, and gave a meaningful smile.

"So you now have two choices..."

He only has one choice.

A deep, low voice interrupted Mobius's sinister words. The man, wearing a helmet, walked in, glanced at the two of them, and pointed at Kosma, saying, "Kosma, from now on you are forbidden from having direct contact with Doctor Mobius. All contact with him from now on must be conducted under my supervision."

The sinister smile on Mobius's face vanished, "Wait, why!"

"Based on my assessment, you want to experiment with the technology of Artificial Collapse on Kosma. Since that technology is uncontrollable, you cannot use precious Flame-Chaser as test subjects."

"Artificial Collapse technology isn't tested on Flame-Chaser, then on whom should it be tested?"

"Cats, dogs, Lab Rat... whatever you want." The person said casually, arms crossed. "I'll keep an eye on you and won't let you use anyone around you on your own."

"Who gave you that authority?"

"High Council".

"..."

Mobius glared at the indifferent man through gritted teeth, and squeezed out a sentence through clenched teeth. "Then you'd better watch out, don't fall into my hands."

"Haven't I already been in your hands for a long time?"

After saying that, the man left with a strange-looking Kosma.

"Kosma, there are some things I want to tell you."

As the person turned around, a deep voice followed.

The transport plane came to a stop. Kosma heard the sporadic sound of rain on the plane, hesitated for a moment, then stretched out an arm like a demon's claw and grabbed a weapon leaning against the cabin.

A black and white lance.

Kosma paused for a moment as he grasped the weapon, gazing at the engravings on its pristine white body.

Like life, it blossoms upon this.

"The Black Abyss White Flower, if nothing unexpected happens, will be handed over to you to use in the future."

Kosma was stunned for a moment, looking at the back of the person standing in front of him. He didn't expect that person to say such a thing.

For that person, the Black Abyss White Flower meant much more than just a weapon.

"But this is... the Divine Key, the core of the Sixth Herrscher..."

"The core of the Seventh Herrscher is being used by Kevin, is there a problem with that?"

"..."

Kosma didn't know how that person could say those words so calmly; even he probably couldn't do it.

"The Black Abyss White Flower can suppress the Vishnu Factor within you. After careful consideration, it is more suitable as your weapon than I am," the person said in a businesslike tone. "Unless there are special circumstances, the Firemoth does not need a Flame-Chaser is prone to losing control."

"..."

"Do you have a lot to say?"

The person seemed to have seen through Kosma's little thoughts. His tendency to overthink but not like to talk about it was discovered, which startled him.

Upon hearing this, Kosma hesitated for a moment, then lowered his head in thought. Then, as if he had made up his mind, he said, "The Moth that Chases Fire..."

"Wait a moment."

The man covered his mouth with his gloved hand, then grabbed him by the back of the neck and carried him back into the room, searching out all the listening devices inside and out.

"Do you know that in ancient times, emperors could not be addressed by their given names, or they would be beheaded?" The man said loudly after he finished doing all this. "The situation with the Fire Moth is slightly better; they won't play a game with your family tree. But once you say certain things, it means you have betrayed the Fire Moth."

"Then let's forget about it." Upon hearing this, Kosma decided to stop talking.

"But as long as they can't hear it, it's fine."

"..."

How to put it? There's a subtle feeling of "following the rules, but not too much".

"What kind of organization do you think the Moths are? I feel lost about our goals and what we need to do next."

A deep sense of bewilderment about the future appeared in Kosma's eyes, not from the past, but from a sense of bewilderment about what was about to happen, something he already knew.

"I believe the Fire Moth is saving humanity, but it is conducting inhuman experiments, sending soldiers out to their deaths, and immediately suppressing any dissenting voices."

"Have we really been doing the right thing so far?"

"Will the things we do in the future really be things we want to do...?"

The man listened silently to Kosma's confusion, his murmurs, those words that were both painful and tangled.

Those... things he had pondered deeply.

"... Kosma, the world isn't black and white. Even a piece of paper has a front and a back, as well as a side." The person taught him with the tone of someone who had been there before. "You and I are very similar, chasing after the 'best of both worlds,' not wanting to make a choice between any options, just wanting to do your best to achieve it, just wanting to keep improving your abilities..."

Is this wrong?

"No... it can't be wrong."

The man gently stroked Kosma's horned head. Incredibly, Kosma, who always felt he was too old to let others touch his head, found the touch so gentle, like the care of an elder.

"Just like the Black Abyss White Flower, black and white coexist, and pursuing their coexistence is not a reason to be called naive."

"But..."

"But?"

That day, the person gently shook his head at him, but said nothing.

The boy sat in the cabin of the transport plane, his face smeared with the blood of Honkai Beast, watching the sun set and darkness finally fill the earth.

He was holding the weapon.

It had become a weapon of great significance to him at some point.

From that day onward, he was unable to disassemble the combined weapon, as if he were forever fixed on that day.

"Lin, what exactly were you trying to say that day... If only we could have finished what we were saying..."

The boy, who was chasing the best of both worlds, reminisced about the day when he could have had both evils as night fell.

Chapter 170 One Person for One Life

It's estimated that no one could have guessed that, a year after the Branch 10 Stargate Invasion Incident and the dispatch of the Squad Thirteen from headquarters to provide support, the entire Earth... has not experienced another Honkai.

Not only large-scale Honkai, but also small-scale Honkai and some abnormal phenomena caused by Honkai Energy did not occur as if they were isolated.

This eerie tranquility was a peace that had never been seen even during the almost annual series of large-scale Honkai. Besides allowing everyone to relax their guard a little, the progress of the Fire Moths during this peaceful period was also astonishing.

"The number of Flame-Chaser has exceeded two hundred." Hen came out of the room in his pajamas, poured himself a cup of hot coffee from the coffee machine next to him, and sat down in front of Lin, who was also having breakfast, with his terminal in hand. "The headquarters has really developed rapidly while we were away."

Lin carefully cut off a piece of steak, dipped it in the strange green liquid next to it, and put it in his mouth.

"..."

"Hmm? What's wrong? What are you eating?"

Hen hadn't noticed it before, but now he realized there was a pungent smell in the room, seemingly coming from Lin Zhan's sauce. After swallowing a piece of steak, Lin was silent for a few seconds before stopping and eating without the sauce.

Curious, Hen dipped his little finger in the mixture and put it in his mouth...

"Cough--"

His face flushed red instantly, then turned purple, and he rushed into the bathroom to frantically rinse his mouth with water.

Lin calmly ate his breakfast, paying no attention to Hen jumping around in the bathroom.

This is another "byproduct" of Mobius's theory. According to her, Lin's loss of senses may not be a true loss of senses, but rather a weakening of senses to the point of being almost unusable. So she decided to try this "100x concentration of mustard juice".

However, it was clear that he still couldn't feel anything.

The only thing he could sense was that Mobius was really free now. He had already done everything he needed to do in the past year, and now he had time to do this kind of thing to prank Lin.

But...

Two hundred Flame-Chaser...

Although subsequent Flame-Chaser did not reach the level of Kevin and Aponia, who were comparable to Herrscher, they were basically on par with or even surpassed Lin in all aspects. This means that the weapons and equipment that were tantamount to suicide for ordinary soldiers in the past will no longer be limited by the soldiers' physical fitness.

Furthermore, the discontinued Divine Key Project left behind crucial Soul Steel weaponization technology, leading to a leap forward in weapon technology and various other technologies.

The most crucial point is that the headquarters has finally been transformed into an aerial fortress. Anti-gravity technology and Honkai Energy conversion technology have been successfully applied to the transformation of the headquarters. However, Lin and his team have not been ordered to return this year, so they have not yet seen the drastically changed Headquarters Base.

However, Mobius's changes are quite obvious to Lin.

Literally, after Lin arrived at the Branch 10, Mobius made it a point to have at least one video call with him every day without fail, ostensibly to monitor for any abnormal changes in his body.

So Lin witnessed something extremely strange: yesterday, Mobius looked like a fifteen or sixteen-year-old girl, but today she had transformed into a loli-like figure of only about twelve years old...

The specific reason has been learned from her, but thinking that Doctor Mobius, who was much older than him at the beginning, has now become like this, it still makes people feel a bit complicated.

"Lin, have you finished breakfast?"

Just then, a girl with pink hair peeked out from the doorway and looked at him with a smile.

Lin swallowed the last bite of steak and put away his knife and fork.

Every day after breakfast, he would lead the team in training, then have lunch, and then have free time in the afternoon. He could read some novels, be dragged out shopping by Elysia, or urge the lazy Pardo on. After dinner, he would write a daily report, have a video call with Mobius, and finally go to sleep.