Audience / Activation ...

Chapter 108: Audience

With World Serpent's withdrawal, this city's information blockade against Schicksal finally came to an end.

The moment she connected to Schicksal Headquarters, Rita immediately reported all the information to Otto. But Otto had no mind to look into World Serpent at that moment. He stared intently at the screen, where a livestream was being conducted openly.

All this time, to prevent ordinary people from falling into panic, Schicksal and Anti-Entropy had kept all news regarding the Honkai under airtight lockdown. As long as the internet detected even the slightest discussion concerning the Honkai, it would immediately be controlled.

But now, communications with Sky City had only been cut off for one day, and discussions about the Honkai had begun springing up like mushrooms after rain. Within just a few hours, at least one-third of the city's several million residents had learned of the Honkai's existence.

And now, the matter was no longer confined to Shenzhou. Some people had even attempted to use the global internet to livestream the Honkai incident currently unfolding in Sky City.

A second or two later, the livestream signal was cut off, and the account that had posted it was banned and placed under investigation. But although less than a minute had passed, quite a few people around the world had still seen that information.

Some of them came from cities currently suffering Honkai attacks. They did not know exactly what those monsters were, so they had given them all sorts of names.

But now that there was a specific term for them, those who had suffered the attacks finally understood that the monsters appeared alongside an event called the Honkai, further accelerating the spread of the information.

"World Serpent's people are all insane!" Without a doubt, only World Serpent could have done something like this. He quickly skimmed through the report Rita had submitted and immediately discovered the mad proposal known as the Stigmata Project.

Now that Shencheng Pharmaceuticals had been destroyed, World Serpent had even more justification for spreading talk of the Honkai. This was retaliation!

As for Rita's minor speculation regarding Kiana, he simply ignored it. As the most crucial part of Otto's plan, he understood Kiana even better than she understood herself. Cunning, calculating, farsighted... none of those words could possibly have anything to do with K423.

Fortunately, the situation had not yet spiraled out of control, and Durandal would soon arrive in Sky City. As long as the Herrscher of Void was captured and brought back, those spreading rumors could sooner or later be suppressed again.

Within the signal tower's range, the World Serpent mechs that had been lying in wait under stealth finally launched their last counterattack. A dense storm of bullets wove an impenetrable net of death, determined to tear Kiana apart here.

When the gunfire erupted, the watching citizens finally realized how serious the situation was and no longer dared to linger.

As for the magical girl? She was so strong that she could definitely handle those robots.

If she died just like that, then she had definitely been a fake.

They were only ordinary people, after all. A bullet would surely kill them. At a time like this, why should they worry about some magical girl whose identity they did not even know was real?

Under such overwhelming firepower, even Kiana found herself caught in a dilemma. Not being able to use the Herrscher of Void's powers meant she could not even create Spears of the Void.

But the Honkai Bomb's energy leakage was growing stronger and stronger. Before she knew it, it had reached a level capable of infecting humans with Honkai. If it continued to intensify, even if the bomb was successfully dismantled, many citizens would still die.

"I can't stop here." The Herrscher of Void's erosion and the massive loss of stamina made every breath Kiana took feel as though flames were scorching her lungs. Yet she still gritted her teeth and smashed straight through a thick concrete pillar. Using that small obstacle as cover, she pounced toward the group of mechs.

Boom—

A burst of fire suddenly exploded, and thick black smoke rose continuously, completely concealing Kiana's figure.

Optical detection and thermal sensing both temporarily failed. The mechs could only infer Kiana's possible position based on probability.

But Kiana was even more decisive than the mechs. She did not even dodge, charging straight into the mech blockade in the most direct way possible.

Boom—

Boom—

Explosions rang out one after another until there was no longer any sound of gunfire. Shattered rubble sprayed everywhere, falling to the ground with searing heat.

Then, with a hiss, it evaporated the blood dripping onto it.

Blood continued to drip as Kiana emerged from the smoke and dust. She was injured.

If anyone else had tried to break through in such a reckless manner, there would have been nothing left of them but bones. Kiana had survived and wiped out an entire mech unit, but the price was wounds all over her body.

Her waist, abdomen, shoulders, and calves were all bleeding, making her look as though she had walked out of a sea of blood.

"Kiana!" In an unnoticed corner, Murata Himeko watched Kiana, drenched in blood, with unbearable heartache. She wanted to rush out and help her immediately, but Su Jue held her firmly in place. She could only be a spectator, unable even to let her cries escape.

She suddenly turned and glared furiously at Su Jue standing beside her. Himeko even wanted to rush over, grab him by the collar, and beat him senseless, but she had no choice.

"Aren't you afraid she'll find out someday?" Although she knew Su Jue held no ill will toward Kiana, he had let Kiana suffer such severe injuries over something that could clearly have been resolved easily. Himeko could not understand it.

Su Jue glanced at her without saying a word, but the threads in his hand had already begun to spread.

Looking at those familiar puppet strings, Himeko's body trembled slightly. After his golden eyes swept over her, she quickly suppressed the thought of going against Su Jue's wishes.

"She is stronger than you imagine." Just when Himeko thought Su Jue would remain silent, he spoke. "Murata, don't look at her through the memories of the past. She is no longer that reckless child who needed your careful protection. She is a warrior. She is a hero."

"You mean you understand her better than I do, her teacher who's been with her for years?"

"Of course... everything about her..." Su Jue did not finish. He suddenly realized he might have said a little too much. Himeko still did not know what he had done to Kiana, nor did she understand how twisted the relationship between them was.

In Himeko's eyes, Su Jue was still merely an aloof Herrscher with an unpredictable temperament. As long as he did not lay a hand on her student, she would not interfere too much.

"Hmm?" As Himeko was still pondering what Su Jue had meant to say, she suddenly lost control of her body, and then her consciousness sank into darkness.

When she came to her senses again, she had already returned to the Theater of Domination.

"I worked so hard as an actor for so long, and when the play finally begins, I can't even watch it?!"

Chapter 109: Activation

"Closer." Blood flowed continuously from Kiana's forehead, staining her vision red. Relying on her fearless courage, she successfully crossed the final blockade. More than a hundred meters above the ground, she kept leaping forward.

The wounds on her body still burned painfully, and the Honkai erosion was worsening. Every breath felt as though she were being scorched. Even so, Kiana did not dare stop, because she knew very well that once she stopped, she would no longer have the strength to keep running.

"Wait for me, Su Jue. I'll be back to find you soon."

Her teeth ground together, every muscle in her body tensed. From atop a building over a hundred meters high, Kiana stepped on the edge of the rooftop and leaped high into the air, flying toward the sky like a spirit chasing the moon.

Her takeoff point was more than ten meters from the signal tower. The night wind at such heights was harsh, and the slightest mistake would send Kiana plunging from the sky to her death.

Suspended in midair, Kiana instinctively lowered her head and looked down. The entire district had already fallen into chaos. Car alarms and honking even reached the sky.

As the Honkai Bomb's fluctuations grew increasingly intense, people finally understood what had been placed above their heads. They no longer cared to watch, desperately fleeing from the signal tower like rats thrown into boiling oil.

With their lives at stake, the instinct to survive instantly consumed everyone's minds, and order naturally vanished without a trace.

Everyone fled in whatever direction they remembered, like headless flies. As they collided with one another, they shoved and pushed, and anything standing in their way became an enemy.

No one paid any attention to the frail elderly or children anymore. They were knocked directly to the ground amid the crowd and gradually fell silent beneath miserable cries.

No one looked at what they had stepped on. Even if they did see it, swept along by the tide of people, they could only pretend they had seen nothing.

Before anyone noticed, blood had stained the soles of many people's shoes. Human civilization and order seemed extraordinarily fragile in the face of a life-or-death crisis.

High in the sky, Kiana looked down upon the earth as countless tragedies entered her sight without warning.

"Everyone will be saved. Don't be afraid. Evacuate in an orderly manner." She tried to restore people's sense of order, but she was more than a hundred meters in the air, and no one could hear her. Even if they could, no one would stop.

In this tide of fleeing people, everyone was swept along. No one could stop.

The distance of more than ten meters vanished in an instant, and her trajectory had not deviated much. Fixing her eyes on the window, Kiana curled tightly around herself and crashed through the glass into the signal tower's control room.

Shards of glass pierced into her body through wounds that were already there. Kiana frowned tightly, casually pulling out a few larger pieces before ignoring the rest. The Honkai Bomb was about to detonate. Only by disabling it could the panicked crowd stop, and only then could those tragedies end.

She quickly climbed the signal tower's emergency passageway. The closer she came to the rooftop, the more severe the Honkai's erosion on her body became.

Before leaving, World Serpent had designed a locking mechanism for the Honkai Bomb. It was meant to prevent the bomb's premature leakage from alerting Schicksal, and also to buy time if anyone attempted to stop it.

But the Honkai Bomb's countdown had now entered its final moments. Even with the locking mechanism, the dense Honkai Energy had already penetrated the device, surging outward in all directions like a storm.

"Such powerful Honkai Energy." The energy contained within the Honkai Bomb far exceeded Kiana's expectations. The moment she reached the rooftop, more than half her body had already been eroded, and countless Honkai cracks began spreading across her skin.

That was only because she herself possessed compatibility with the Herrscher of Void. If it had been an ordinary person, they would likely have turned into a zombie long ago.

And within the storm of high-density Honkai Energy, the mental space that had barely remained stable also began to teeter on the verge of collapse.

The destructive will carried by the Honkai Energy continuously interfered with her mind, while the consciousness of the Herrscher of Void had already awakened and was trying to break through her mental barrier.

"How could I fall here!" Her consciousness began to blur, and blood spilled from the corner of her mouth. Yet Kiana's low voice carried unwavering resolve. "I promised him I would change all of this."

Supported by that determination, she finally crossed the last few meters. After breaking through the final storm, Kiana immediately seized the locking mechanism's release control.

Only a layer of thick tempered glass separated her from the Honkai Bomb. The bomb's alternating purple and blue lights were clearly visible. Her hands had already been mangled by Honkai erosion, so Kiana could only press her left hand against her wrist and desperately turn the mechanism.

Just as she was frantically turning it, a figure appeared nearby at some unknown time. The Honkai Bomb's storm still raged, yet he stood unwavering within the surging gale. Kiana could not see his appearance clearly, but she vaguely sensed that the eyes watching her were gray.

"Su Jue...?"

Even though she knew Su Jue could not possibly be here, Kiana still instinctively asked, "Su Jue, is that you?"

There was no reply. The figure simply stood there like a wandering ghost.

"This place is dangerous. Leave quickly."

She reminded him instinctively, yet she herself poured every ounce of strength into the mechanism without hesitation. At last, the heavy mechanical lock began to move. The sturdy locking device gradually opened, completely exposing the Honkai Bomb.

"As long as I deal with it... I can go back..."

"I'm sorry." The wind at her ear carried a young man's murmur. She raised her head in confusion, but the blurry figure standing nearby had already vanished, leaving Kiana alone in the entire world.

The Honkai Bomb—at the final second of its dismantling—activated.

"Why?"

No sound answered her. Only the faint sounds of the Honkai Bomb activating seemed to bid her farewell. "Why?!"

She desperately pressed the safety mechanism on the Honkai Bomb, but the activated bomb could no longer be shut down. In only a few seconds, it would completely release Herrscher-level Honkai Energy.

Honkai Energy of that level could instantly destroy the entire city. Even the remaining radiation would turn a considerable portion of Shenzhou into wasteland where humans could no longer farm.

"No!"

No longer caring about the Honkai erosion, Kiana immediately summoned the Herrscher of Void's authority. She removed the Honkai Bomb from the locking device, hugged it against her body, and forcibly absorbed the spreading Honkai Energy to prevent it from infecting nearby citizens after the locking mechanism was removed.

"Kiana, stop! You'll die like this." Fu Hua kept calling out to her from within Feather Dust, but Kiana could no longer hear anything.

A dense golden light had already spread through her right eye, and madness stained the cross-shaped pupil. As she continuously absorbed Honkai Energy, Kiana seized the massive Honkai Bomb and pushed it toward the sky. Like a reverse meteor, she soared upward.

She absolutely could not let it explode in the city.

Chapter 110: A Herrscher Who Fought for Humanity

Sending the Honkai Bomb into the sky was the only option, but Kiana would inevitably suffer the most direct impact. Already severely eroded, she could very well die on the spot if she endured this bomb's Honkai Energy.

Even if she did not die immediately, her lifespan would be drastically shortened because her body could not withstand such a load of Honkai Energy. In the end, she was still only a human girl who had mastered part of a Herrscher's power.

After Kiana flew into the sky carrying the Honkai Bomb, Su Jue's figure silently appeared atop the completely ruined signal tower.

Looking up at the sky, he watched the girl fly higher and higher. She was a meteor of the heavens, a burning spark.

His golden Herrscher eyes had lit up, and countless invisible threads of domination began to spread.

This was a grand performance. He had to make everyone see Kiana's greatness. At that moment, he was like a fanatical fan, willing to do anything to proclaim her beauty to the world.

The Honkai Bomb had actually already activated. Su Jue had merely suppressed it in advance with puppet strings. Otherwise, Kiana would never have had time to react, much less send the Honkai Bomb into the sky.

And the time he had deliberately left her was meant to let Kiana grow in desperation, to let her face her own heart.

Su Jue understood very clearly that even after his repeated deceptions, Kiana's understanding of herself had matured considerably. Yet there was still an unresolved knot in her heart that could never be untied—Murata Himeko.

Though Kiana had said nothing, she had merely buried that pain within her heart and borne it alone. Su Jue did not want her to continue suffering like this, so the Sky City meteor was inevitable.

If Kiana could successfully emerge from that knot in this incident, she would surely become even stronger and become Su Jue's sharpest blade against the world.

And if she failed to emerge from that knot, then Su Jue would replace Himeko and become the nightmare Kiana could never forget.

Hope was not the only choice for healing despair. There was also a deeper despair. As long as she suffered enough, she would forget all sorrow.

Of course, that was only a method he would choose when there was no way back.

She was the faint light that illuminated the world. Her courage, perseverance, and sense of self were things the Herrscher of a Thousand did not possess, and things the Herrscher of a Thousand longed for.

As the Herrscher of Domination, Su Jue was also one of the Herrscher of a Thousand. Do not forget that the puppet named [Su Jue] was still trapped within the Theater of Domination. That was precisely why he had gone to such lengths to abduct Kiana.

As long as light existed, Su Jue could maintain his consciousness. Otherwise, after falling into darkness, he would truly become a puppet controlled by the Honkai Will. By then, he would not even be able to die, unless, like Otto, he could find a parallel world on the Imaginary Tree at the instant he was killed. But Su Jue was not originally from this world. Even if parallel worlds existed, where could he find a place that would shelter him?

When light no longer existed, darkness would lose its meaning as well.

Therefore, the fire could not be extinguished.

If it was destined to go out, then he would be the one to drag the world into eternal night.

"Light up the night sky, Kiana."

In just a few seconds, Kiana had already sent the Honkai Bomb more than a thousand meters into the sky, but it was still not enough. Under Jackal and Raven's adjustments, this Honkai Bomb could cover nearly all of Sky City.

This was a world-class metropolis with several million residents. Even excluding the suburbs, it covered more than a hundred square kilometers. Even calculated as a circle, it would need to be at least five thousand meters in the air to ensure safety.

Yet the strength in her body was continuously draining away. If she relied solely on her own power, she could never reach a safe detonation altitude.