Personality / Joke

"So... it's all meaningless... just like Theresa asked me..."

So, what is the meaning of our birth?

It's meaningless.

Before the calamity called destruction, everything loses its original meaning.

The power of the Bishop of Schicksal, the long-cherished wish of five hundred years, the fanaticism of the believers... in the bubble of the Quantum Sea, they are nothing more than fleeting phantoms on top of the bubble before it bursts.

"So, what exactly did you do, and why did you do it?"

Lin looked at this man who seemed both unfamiliar and familiar. At this moment, he did not feel sorry for Otto, and the other man looked at him with calm eyes.

"I did what Otto Apocalypse was supposed to do."

"..."

"If our lives are like a play, losing their meaning the moment the performance ends, then our only meaning as actors is to perform to the best of our ability before the end."

Even if it's meaningless, Otto would still do it, not out of obsession, but simply because "Otto" would do it.

This World Bubble is like a tape that is about to finish playing. Otto uses the power of the Aether Anchor as a magnetic head to repeatedly erase and write the time within these three days.

The three-day cycle was like a birdcage, trapping Otto and everyone else inside.

"You..."

Lin seemed to understand. Looking at Otto's gradually dimming green eyes, he asked urgently, "You want to keep the World Bubble alive in this way? Right here in this cycle?"

Just as Otto built a cage for Theresa and Kallen, this time he built an even bigger cage for the whole world.

The cycle had already begun before Lin arrived. What he experienced was merely the tip of the iceberg of this World Bubble. The man before him had likely already gone through tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or even immeasurable cycles of reincarnation, serving as a solitary watcher and observer during these three days of repetition.

"Haha... Mr. Lin... You seem to have some misunderstanding about me... I am not a savior... To be frank, even if this world is completely destroyed by the Honkai, I won't care... But unfortunately, now, it can't even autonomously unleash a large-scale Honkai."

The blond man's blood-stained smile cast a shadow of gloom in the darkness.

"I just need to... use this cycle to experiment... and achieve my goal..."

"Theresa ... she is an 'unfinished product' that I created using Kallen's genes and the power of the Herrscher of Erosion ... After her experiment was successful... I began to try to combine the core of the entire Herrscher of Erosion with Kallen's genes..."

"I encountered some obstacles and setbacks along the way, but ultimately, I overcame the difficulties using the Aether Anchor..."

The replica of Theresa, Kallen, and the Herrscher of Erosion was created the day before Theresa and Kallen fled.

Herrscher who lacks self-awareness and can use his power to "erode data" as a magnetic head to rewrite "magnetic tape".

And so, Otto continued his five-hundred-year-long cycle of prayer, salvation, and lies, before an end that would never come.

Until Lin arrived.

The Herrscher, who was supposed to exist merely as a tool, awoke after the outsider Lin disrupted the unchanging Three-Day Cycle and was no longer under Otto's control.

But for Otto, this wasn't entirely a bad thing.

The Herrscher of Erosion's massacre of Canghai City was entirely within her expectations, and since she couldn't control her abilities as the "magnetic head," the Three-Day Cycle didn't stop there.

During this process, Otto was surprised to discover that the Herrscher of Erosion gradually gained control over the rewritten data through contact with outsiders, and ultimately, when she developed strange feelings for Lin, she completely stopped the three-day cycle.

A tool that can arbitrarily control the "data" used to rewrite the World Bubble tape.

This absurdity is the "ending".

After listening to Otto's fragmented account, Lin calmly leaned against the wall to get up and looked up at the dark sky.

The stars did not blink.

"I will take the Aether Anchor and the Moon with me. I will find a way to prolong the existence of this World Bubble."

After the unrestrained use of the energy of the Aether Anchor, this World Bubble is on the verge of collapse. Now that the Three-Day Cycle has ended, the World Bubble is very likely to dissipate completely.

The Hyperion has been searching for a way to save these dissipating World Bubble, and now all the clues point to the Aether Anchor. So, in the process of correcting the distortion, Lin is also responsible for collecting the Aether Anchor.

"Haha... Mr. Lin, do you think... this is the end of it all?"

"..."

Otto's words cast a shadow of gloom over his black eyes, which had just returned to normal.

"I'm telling you everything... as my 'repayment' for your help in completing my experiment..."

"And... what will be the fate of you and that Miss 'Moon'? Going against the 'rules' will only bring punishment, won't it?"

The drifting words and the eerie smile lingered on the blond man's face, his dull pupils remaining frozen in the moment before they went out.

But Lin, looking at that stiff face, slowly raised his head.

"Tick-tock".

It's raining.

He reached out and caught a drop of "rain".

"Splash."

The torrential rain poured down on his head, extinguishing the flames and light.

The man lowered his head, watching the rainwater trickle down, washing over the blond man's motionless body.

Was that shocking color merely his imagination, or... the reality of this world?

Blood red.

Rain.

Chapter Sixty-Three: Character

All of this is finally over, isn't it?

The terrifying three-day cycle, the Blood Moon hanging in the sky, the Herrscher slaughtering indiscriminately—these "anomalies," these "distortions," these disasters should all become a thing of the past, and should be swept into the dustbin as garbage.

With the culprit dealt with, the damage to Canghai City was reduced to a minimum. Yue, as the Herrscher of Erosion, was even changing little by little, beginning to see life in a different light. After Lin brought her back to the Hyperion, he had plenty of time to teach her how to treat people properly. Perhaps in the future, she would become a girl who loves life.

This trip to the World Bubble ended without any major incidents. Lin only paid a small price by losing his right eye. When he gets back, he will probably be "praised" to the point of embarrassment by the smiling but treacherous maid with phrases like "Wow, that was great! Next time, should we put your left eye on too?"

But ultimately, it ended satisfactorily...

... or so?

"You don't look too good. It's like you ordered takeout that was 'Extra Spicy Death Flavor' without thinking, and then woke up in the middle of the night feeling a burning sensation somewhere. To make matters worse, you can smell the smell of your late-night snack—right in your bed and between your legs."

"..."

Himeko leaped up the edge of the broken staircase, her fiery red hair illuminating the night sky like a bright bonfire.

When she caught a glimpse of Otto's mangled body, her pupils dilated involuntarily, but she quickly calmed down and walked forward as if she hadn't seen him, squatting down in front of the pale-faced, dark-haired man.

When Lin looked up and saw Himeko's face, his pupils changed slightly.

"Your injuries have all healed on their own, so is this a time for reflection?" Himeko carefully examined Lin's wounds and found that his external injuries had all healed automatically, but he looked much weaker than an old man with his hair in the twilight years.

"...No."

Lin was indeed not very good... to put it more bluntly, he was absolutely terrible. His consciousness was as if it had been repeatedly submerged in a bucket of cold water, pulled out just before he could suffocate, and then pushed back in before he could catch his breath.

My alveoli ruptured, my mouth was filled with a sour, rusty taste, and I felt like my brain was filled with water.

He entered the World Bubble through consciousness mapping, so the damage to his consciousness was even more severe. At this moment, he was no different from a person who was about to die of old age.

"Yue, how is she..."

Lin tried his best to make himself look less... old. He didn't see the silver-haired girl and Himeko together, so he asked.

"She disrupted the communications of Schicksal, issuing many false orders, causing them to fly around the city like headless flies, unable to distinguish between their own intelligence and Moon's fabricated information." Perhaps thinking of that comical scene, she couldn't help but chuckle softly, even though the occasion wasn't suitable for laughter. "She should be here soon, you should rest for a bit."

"Um."

"The Archbishop of Schicksal is dead..."

Himeko looked at the man's body on the ground with mixed feelings. Some people in Schicksal had long thought that he was indifferent to life, but when she first joined the party, she met Otto by chance. This guy, who now seemed cold-blooded and dragged an entire city into the abyss, was one of the people who helped her to stay true to her path in life.

Now, like everyone who has lost their life, Otto has lost all the elegance and solemnity he once possessed; he is simply too quiet to utter a sound.

But the black-haired man beside her glanced indifferently at the corpse on the ground and interrupted Himeko's sigh, "No, he is not dead."

"Huh? He's not dead?"

Himeko looked suspiciously at the body, whose limbs had been smashed by Lin. The lifeless face and flat chest didn't seem to be faking death at all.

"It's just that his consciousness is no longer in this body. Before he died, he uploaded his consciousness to another place, and there is a possibility that he has a backup body."

Lin's unique consciousness made him extremely sensitive to consciousness transfer. He was able to sense that in the moment before Otto died, his consciousness left his useless body and went in a clear direction.

But this wasn't too surprising. Otto couldn't have lived from five hundred years ago to the present day using only his original body, so changing bodies was something Lin had expected.

"Does that mean we'll have to fight again?" Himeko felt a chill run down her spine when she heard that Otto had changed his body as if he had shed his skin like a snake. "Should we just run away?"

"... He won't be coming to us for the time being. Only he can control Yue, and he needs time to adapt to his new body."

Lin clutched the tattered clothes at his chest, crumpling them into a ball. He felt the restraint on his chest tighten, and the damage to his consciousness from being killed by Yue multiple times before erupted all at once, making his head dizzy and painful, both clear-headed and confused.

"Hey, are you okay? Why did your nose suddenly start bleeding again?"

A blur flashed before his eyes, and the red-haired girl split into three groups, each looking at him with concern. In his daze, Lin saw one of the many scenes that had nearly made his brain explode during the battle.

"Himeko..."

"What should I do? I know first aid..."

"No need, I'm fine." Lin shook his head and refused Himeko's clumsy attempt. He stared intently at the red-haired girl who still looked somewhat young and naive. Her energetic high ponytail was still styled in an intellectual way.

He observed silently for about ten seconds, and as Himeko looked on in bewilderment, he coughed up blood and asked in a weak, hoarse voice, "Himeko, if one day in the future you were to die in a battle against the Honkai, what would you be thinking now?"

"That's normal. This isn't some traditional shonen manga; this is reality. Even before I joined, I had already thought about the possibility of sacrificing myself in the future."

Himeko chuckled indifferently, her eyes showing no sign of backing down.

"All Valkyrie chose this path with the same awareness. It's not that they became Valkyrie first and then had the courage to die, but rather that they first had the responsibility to die for humanity and the courage to shoulder that responsibility before deciding to become Valkyrie."

"What if someone told you that you will definitely die in the future?"

"..."

"..."

"..."

"You've already passed away before you've gotten the truth you wanted."

"Haha... What you're saying is so strange, it's like you've seen my future with your own eyes."

The red-haired girl scratched the bright flames on her head, leaned gently against the wall, and smiled thoughtfully as she looked up.

"But that was my choice, wasn't it? Even if I could do it all over again, even if I already knew the future, I would still choose that path."

"What determines our fate is not destiny, but simply our character."

Chapter Sixty-Four Jokes

"Lin, we haven't known each other for very long, have we? My previous behavior might have led you to misunderstand me." Himeko stretched her shoulders, then lifted Lin off the ground. She waved her free hand and chuckled, "A passionate and unrestrained good woman... I guess quite a few people see me that way, and of course, I think so myself too."

"... Is that really how you see yourself? I think you're just an alcoholic, middle-aged man who picks his toes."

"Your face is expressionless, but your words are quite sharp."

Himeko chuckled and smacked him on the head, then carried the struggling Lin forward, her lips curving into a smile, "Actually, before I joined Schicksal and took the Honkai Energy adaptability test, they told me that I wasn't suitable."

"..."

The scene of the two men's battle was a complete mess; within a two-kilometer radius, there was hardly a single intact building to be seen, as if God had seen the towering edifice of human greed and had unleashed divine punishment, shattering the edifice built on sin with a single blow.

The surroundings were completely silent and deserted. During the battle, the nearby residents had scattered and fled, leaving the area looking desolate, like an ancient battlefield.

"Now that things have come to this, you're not going to admit you were wrong, are you?" Noticing Lin's gaze, Himeko asked with a light laugh, only to be met with Lin's dismissive shake of his head.

In this situation, it's impossible to hold back and control the extent of the damage, and he certainly can't abandon the fight with Otto for the sake of damage. Letting Otto go would result in the entire World Bubble together, and then it wouldn't be as simple as just a few kilometers of buildings collapsing.

If there were a way, Lin would naturally use it, but the fact is... there is no way.

"Let's continue our previous topic. I'm not very suited for combat, and my talent in various aspects isn't particularly high." The girl with the red high ponytail recounted her past, which she rarely talked about with others. There wasn't a trace of gloom in her expression, but deep in her eyes, there was a very helpless and complicated feeling.

"So, unsurprisingly, I was told that it was best to finish my studies, which were considered very promising by others. Maybe I would meet a good man in the future, and if I was lucky, I might never have any contact with the Honkai again in my life."

"Does this sound familiar? Do you think I chose this path without hesitation, full of vigor and perseverance, resolutely pursuing the truth in my heart?"

"Hehe..."