Kalpas’s sense of restraint was merely the difference between beating someone to death directly or beating them half to death.
“Take her away.”
“Mm, don’t you want to go take a look?”
Watching Kalpas turn to leave, Elysian Ellie couldn’t help but ask, but the only response she got was:
“Not interested.”
“Oh my, just like Mobius, both of you have such dishonest personalities.”
The girl found it somewhat amusing.
— If you said Kalpas didn’t care about her original self, that would be absolutely impossible.
In the realm, any Flame-Chaser who sensed her arrival probably harbored great interest in her original self, right?
“Hmph, don’t compare me to that beast.”
A sweet yet somewhat sinister girlish voice rang in her ears, sounding like a snake spitting apricots licking at her earlobe, making one’s heart tremble involuntarily while also being curious about what kind of person the voice’s owner really was.
Elysian Ellie turned to look, and saw a green-haired young girl wrapped in a long dress like a snake’s belly, riding on a strange vehicle, staring at her with displeasure. To this, the former responded carelessly with a smiling tease:
“Oh my, you’re rarely not staying in your laboratory. This is quite unusual~ Mobius?”
“Mm-hmm~ Could it be that you missed me? If that’s the case, I’d be very happy~”
“Stop being so conceited. I just noticed the commotion here and wanted to see what that beast was up to again.”
Green-pink gradient snake eyes fell on the sleeping Ducky with the kind of gaze used to examine consumables. Filled with excited colors expressed through words, Mobius’s lips curved into a slight arc:
“Mm~ Look what I’ve discovered — a Herrscher… and the Herrscher of Reason at that. This is truly rare experimental material.”
“Speaking of which, that Gray Serpent fellow really has sent me quite a lot of rare experimental materials.”
Herrscher of Reason, Herrscher of the Void, Herrscher of Thunder, and Herrscher of Wind… and even…
“I can understand Dr. Mobius’s excitement, but treating such beautiful girls as experimental materials is rather lacking in romantic sensibility.” After a crisp snap of fingers, the sleeping Bronya disappeared from her location — Miss Pink Elf, who was good friends with Aponia, could borrow Aponia’s power to complete some rapid transportation, though she rarely used such methods before.
The reason — probably because it felt too unreal?
Mobius didn’t mind.
Next, she would have many opportunities to interact with these interesting lab rats.
But now.
“What interests me most is actually you, Elysia~”
“Such a direct statement. I quite like it. I just didn’t expect it would be Mobius saying this. Has anyone told you that you’re particularly honest today, Mobius?”
“Heh, it’s not you I’m interested in.”
Mobius’s seemingly contradictory words carried implications.
Someone who should have died yet lived again, even appearing in this Elysian Realm.
Regarding this point, aside from Miss Elf’s two good friends, she was probably the most concerned about the details.
Of course, she definitely wasn’t interested in that because she wanted to see her.
She was only interested in what that identity represented.
If it weren’t for this, she wouldn’t want to see that annoying woman again!
Looking at this snake-like behavior, the Elysian version of Miss Pink Elf’s smile remained unchanged.
— Mm… it must be an illusion. Mobius really is as dishonest as ever, isn’t she?
…
“The results from Dr. Mobius regarding the Herrscher of Domination are in, Elysia.”
After Jiang Qiao finished dealing with the disaster victims and patients infected with Honkai sickness, MEI’s intellectual voice rang out in the communication image. From her expression, she seemed somewhat troubled.
Because Vill-V had to handle political matters while Dr. MEI was responsible for coordinating and stationed at the center, the issue of the Herrscher of Domination ultimately fell to Mobius.
In fact, she was currently the person with the deepest research into Honkai within Fire Moth — even MEI couldn’t compare, well, after all, she was still too young.
“Mm, what is it?”
The pink girl, who had helped MEI share part of her duties while also fulfilling her role as the Flame-Chaser 【Elysia】 as a frontline commander, asked casually.
“We haven’t reached conclusions about all of the Herrscher of Domination’s abilities, but just the parts we’ve discovered are enough to give us headaches.”
“Those tens of thousands of Herrschers of Domination you eliminated — they actually can’t be called Herrschers of Domination. A more appropriate term would be: Herrscher of Domination embryos.”
“…Is it contagious?”
【Elysia】 instantly realized something, raising her delicate eyebrows and voicing her speculation.
“You could say that.”
“The Herrscher of Domination has infectious characteristics. It spreads to people with extreme emotions in their hearts, generating new Herrscher of Domination cores upon contact — those particles of sand you brought back.”
“But those cores are actually incomplete products. As you saw — they don’t even possess imaginary singularities.”
“What’s the difference?”
Faced with this question, MEI on the other end of the communication shook her head:
“We don’t know about that part yet — so far, we haven’t discovered any ‘true Herrscher of Domination.'”
“However, we have explored the effects of the Herrscher of Domination core embryos.”
“They make the host’s negative emotions more intense than usual. It’s fine for normal people — doesn’t cause major problems. But if it’s someone with already powerful negative emotions, like criminals…”
“Let me explain its effect in simple terms: Herrscher of Domination cores make the host’s desires harder to control.”
“How strong is the effect?”
Just hearing the effect, Jiang Qiao already understood how disgusting this new version of the Herrscher of Domination’s authority was — unlike previous Herrschers, it seemed designed specifically to test humanity through non-combat means.
But what concerned him more was just how strong this Herrscher’s interference could be.
As the saying goes, discussing toxicity without dosage is just being unreasonable.
Since this was a Herrscher authority that targeted human emotions and instincts, it must have a measurable range.
The Cocoon’s purpose was to test and select kindred spirits capable of embracing it — it couldn’t possibly create an unsolvable test aimed at directly destroying humanity to end this examination.
Therefore, they absolutely needed to determine the strength of the Herrscher of Domination cores.
MEI naturally understood this point and continued explaining:
“Perhaps because the cores are too weak, their interference level isn’t actually very high — at least for the ordinary embryos Mobius discovered, under the core’s influence, their desire fluctuations are about 20% higher than normal people. From a crime assessment perspective, slightly higher than average.”
“However, if this core falls into the hands of someone who’s already a heinous criminal, the only case we have so far is assessed at least 80% of the original, meaning the embryo becomes much worse than before.”
“Of course, there’s good news — this core seems to have a judgment mechanism. If it falls into the hands of someone who can reasonably overcome desires, the Herrscher of Domination’s effect becomes negligible, and it even brings certain benefits to the host — for example, Honkai resistance increases somewhat, and their body becomes healthier.”