Chapter 840: Remodeling the World
The intricate multi-party transaction was swiftly finalized under the negotiations between Black Butler and Morse. Given the staggering influence Kaito Shirogane and Yoko currently commanded across the entire Infinite Dimensional Space, even Fanmos and Aradu, who had initially been deeply reluctant to compromise, had no choice but to bow their heads. Neither could afford the catastrophic fallout of facing a joint offensive from both Avalon and the Paradise.
In truth, however, the top-tier Reincarnators of the other districts were far safer than they imagined.
Both Kaito Shirogane and Yoko were currently wrestling with a profoundly troublesome shackle. Their personal combat capabilities had scaled to a tier that the material world simply could not withstand. If they fought without restraint, the mere ambient shockwaves of their clashes would inflict irreversible damage upon planetary geography and global climates.
Under such constraints, even Kaito could no longer let loose with full force. In a sense, both Kaito and Yoko had been bound by invisible chains on Earth; catastrophic techniques like the Sixteen-Fold Kaio-Ken were entirely off-limits in the physical realm.
The power that could be unleashed on Earth had hit a hard ceiling, and that ceiling artificially narrowed the chasm separating monsters like Kaito and Yoko from the rest of the top-tier Reincarnators.
Once other high-tier Reincarnators began scaling toward continental plate-shattering levels of destructive output, both sides would fall into a bizarre mutual deterrence. Even if Kaito was overwhelmingly stronger than his adversaries, once an engagement reached that planetary magnitude, the ruinous aftermath would fall squarely on his shoulders.
Slaying an enemy at the cost of leaving behind a fractured, barren Earth and a Space stripped of its human recruitment base was an outcome Kaito refused to accept. Gradually coming to view both the mortal world and the Space as his personal playground, he held back from launching indiscriminate mass campaigns. Most of his interventions were kept to instantaneous decapitations relying purely on the pristine velocity of the Martial God's Ultimate Intent paired with high-tier Setsuna.
While the logistics of the multi-district trade were steadily processed, Kaito sat in his private quarters, cross-referencing telemetry supplied by Tianxiang and Jin Yue'an to formulate viable blueprints for remodeling the real world.
Altering a world was fundamentally different from enhancing an individual Reincarnator's personal stats; one could not simply pay Singularity Points to the Goddess to purchase planetary reinforcement. It had to be engineered through specialized relics, technologies, and conceptual artifacts harvested from various scripted universes.
Broad frameworks had long circulated in Kaito's thoughts. The most rudimentary approach was the pure technological route: executing a comprehensive, mechanical restructuring of the planetary body, whether through total cybernetic metallicization or deep core reconstruction. In certain hyper-advanced sci-fi universes, the total engineering of a planetary sphere was an established reality. It was equally viable to look beyond Earth and remodel neighboring satellites and celestial bodies within the solar system.
To Kaito, however, that path carried a fatal flaw: beyond demanding astronomical capital, it devoured intolerable amounts of time. Even if he dove into hyper-tech secondary or primary worlds and plundered the foundational blueprint archives, technological ecosystems could not be manifested overnight. Implementing planetary-scale terraforming required a complete, interdependent hierarchy of theoretical physics, precision manufacturing, industrial supply chains, and specialized alloys. Establishing that foundation would consume years of steady grinding.
Even if the combined administrative apparatus of the Paradise or Avalon deployed targeted tracking artifacts and mobilized countless cells to assemble the technological chain, the timeline could not be compressed beneath a year or two.
That temporal cost was wholly unacceptable to Kaito. It had been merely six months since he stepped into the Space, yet he had already rocketed from an exceptional mortal into an entity of cosmic threat. That violent rate of evolution made it impossible for him to idle away months waiting for mundane planetary engineering to crawl forward.
Kaito surmised that Yoko might have contemplated that technological route, which explained her obsessive crusade to forcefully unify the global Reincarnator factions. Once the operatives commanding real destructive power were consolidated under a single banner, Yoko would essentially hold absolute dominion over the planet. At that point, whichever evolutionary vector she chose for civilization would be hers to execute.
Meanwhile, within the surging ranks of the Golden Order assembly, that enigmatic woman, Amatsu, had pursued an esoteric, occult methodology.
She had directly planted an Erdtree on Earth, rooted the Golden Order into the planetary leylines, drawn the cosmic gaze of the Greater Will, and weaponized the fundamental laws of the Erdtree to manually sculpt an artificial Lands Between across the frozen tundra bridging the Eastland and the northern border. All manner of exotic energetic currents and outer divine forces would take root in that soil, steadily transmuting the subzero wasteland into a chaotic proving ground capable of sustaining high-tier sorceries and supreme Authorities.
Both Kaito and Yoko had tacitly permitted the Golden Order's existence, allowing the assembly to metastasize and siphon away Reincarnators from both their spheres. Neither leader launched retaliatory strikes; in fact, they actively reined in their respective subordinates from probing the territory. It was a live experiment, and both were content to observe its viability.
As Kaito weighed the possibilities, his thoughts drifted through various archetypes until a specific figure crossed his mind.
Snap!
He snapped his fingers. A physical vessel reconstituted from All the World's Evil began taking shape within the private chamber.
Spiritual bodies revived from Kaito's Sea of Consciousness were categorized by the Space as pseudo-summoned entities, stripped of the standing to operate as independent Reincarnators. Yet within the Space, they retained the potential to be manifested and empowered directly by Kaito.
Short black hair, long bangs, and beneath their dark shadow, a pair of eyes that perpetually seemed to churn with scheming calculation. Hakumen had enjoyed free mobility within the astral depths for quite some time, and being summoned back into physical manifestation left her momentarily disoriented.
Soon, she realized she was standing within the Infinite Dimensional Space. As a former operative—and one who had once held a specialized Card sequence—the atmosphere of the Space stirred deep nostalgia within her.
Her pulse fluttered for a fraction of a second before she clamped down on the involuntary reflex. Yet she realized immediately that before a monster like Mercenary Tao, such physiological concealment was entirely futile.
Hakumen exhaled softly, allowing her heartbeat to resume its elevated tempo, that quickened pulse laying bare her inner excitement.
"My, my. Has Lord Mercenary Tao run into another dilemma that requires the humble talents of a wicked woman like me?"
As a Reincarnator, Hakumen's aptitude for direct martial combat had been remarkably mediocre. In the eyes of Kaito and Satoru Gojo, she lacked the baseline qualifications to stand among the strong. In strategic manipulation, however, she possessed exceptional strengths. During her lifetime, those cunning talents had allowed her to thrive within the Space, repeatedly crushing high-potential Reincarnators who boasted superior martial builds.
Kai of the Fifth Element, the operative who wielded the Surge of Murderous Intent, remained distinct in Kaito's memory; while not peerless, he had been a promising talent scouted by several Sovereign Monarchs of the era. Yet Hakumen had systematically dismantled him and driven his squad to the brink of extinction.
"The real world is far too fragile," Kaito said, tapping the empty air before him. Concentric ripples of kinetic force expanded outward, his unconcealed energy signature causing Hakumen's eyes to widen in shock. "That is inconvenient."
Though Hakumen maintained a sharp tongue, she had begun to accept the worldview shared by the two anomalies, Kaito and Gojo. While drifting within Kaito's Sea of Consciousness, she had spent endless hours contemplating what archetype of Reincarnator the Infinite Dimensional Space truly demanded.
Witnessing Kaito's absurd rate of ascent, she had grasped the cold truth: her intricate schemes had merely been a trivial detour.
She recalled the sovereign she had once served, Eternal Destiny. Though that man projected an aura of unfathomable foresight, manipulating the currents of mission worlds from the shadows, in the end, he had consolidated every shred of power into his own vessel. That absolute might standing above all laws was the only true foundation of a Reincarnator.
Hakumen's mind spun at blinding speed. She caught the core dilemma behind Kaito's statement immediately. As a former high-tier operative who had barely grazed the threshold of the Fierce tier, hearing another Reincarnator genuinely fret over the inconvenience of his own power shattering the planet felt utterly absurd.
Yet because the speaker was Mercenary Tao, the grievance became chillingly reasonable.
"A total overhaul of the world so that it cannot be easily obliterated, is it...?" Hakumen mused, tapping her chin. "Discard technological solutions entirely. Physical engineering has hard structural ceilings, and the developmental timeline is far too slow."
"Occult and magical doctrines are naturally the superior choice. Take, for instance, the Phases from the A Certain Magical Index universe..."
"If we can decipher and replicate that mechanism, layering a sufficient density of Phases over the material world, the physical sphere will comfortably absorb the destructive output of Reincarnators, no matter how powerful you become."
"Alternatively, return to the Little Garden and forge an artificial, localized Little Garden anchored to the physical world. That would serve as a genuine haven for Reincarnators, though it wouldn't technically be the original world anymore..."
"And then... there is the Root!"
Hakumen's words tumbled out rapidly, her thoughts organized and decisive. She had contemplated similar grand-scale dilemmas long ago, allowing her to pitch multiple viable pathways within moments. She effortlessly dismissed the technological concepts advanced by Tianxiang, swiftly arrived at the Phase-stacking framework that others had labored over, and pushed the conceptual envelope even further.
Kaito leaned back into the sofa, tilting his head and gesturing toward the seat opposite him. Hakumen took the couch across the coffee table, leaning forward on her elbows to continue her analysis, knowing she had earned his engagement.
Hakumen held an insatiable obsession with the hidden mechanics of scripted universes, driven by a manic urge to unearth the foundational truths buried beneath surface narratives. Though she had never pursued such research for the mundane purpose of planetary reinforcement, she had archived extensive theoretical frameworks. That analytical engine was precisely what had enabled her to orchestrate the Taishan Fujun Sacrificial Rite in the Jujutsu universe and initiate the Human Instrumentality Project in the Fate realm.
Right now, Kaito required Hakumen to enter that precise manic state—to architect a grand, reality-altering ritual on Earth.
"If you deliver an actionable, working framework, I will grant you direct empowerment," Kaito offered. Toward genuinely capable subordinates, he was consistently generous; beyond physical autonomy, he was entirely willing to bestow raw power. Having earned his approval, Li Qingzi had long enjoyed the freedom of autonomous enhancement.
Hakumen didn't pause to celebrate; her cognitive gears were spinning at full capacity. Beyond the concepts she had laid out, another pathway lingered in her mind, though its execution difficulty was immense.
"If you could convince that Saber of yours to completely unseal the Holy Sword of the Planet, we might possess a window to re-anchor the Age of the Gods directly into the physical world."
The moment Hakumen's voice fell, Artoria manifested beside them. Frowning, she looked down at the blackened, corrupted blade resting in her hands.
"This is no longer that Holy Sword of the Planet."
Kaito was well aware of that limitation. The blackened Artoria's peak destructive ceiling fell short of her untainted form; while the mud of All the World's Evil granted her boundless reserves of magical energy, she had lost both the true Star-Forged Holy Sword and the ultimate defense of Avalon, the Everdistant Utopia. She was utterly incapable of unmooring reality the way Black King Rhongomyniad had done in the Marvel cosmos.
Hakumen gnawed on her thumbnail, her scalp prickling from the cognitive strain. She promptly discarded that avenue; attempting to pry the authentic Spear That Shines to the End of the World from the hands of an apex entity would prove troublesome even for someone like Mercenary Tao. Such planetary anchors could not be claimed through ordinary measures.
Yet reflecting upon the cosmology of the Nasuverse sparked an alternative revelation within her mind.
Within Type-Moon's cosmological architecture, the World did not merely rely on the Counter Force; it was elevated into a metaphysical, theological concept. The world itself was conceptualized, making it resilient against absolute destruction. No matter how immense a destructive force might be, obliterating the core concept of the world remained near impossible, and the planetary will would naturally manifest heroic counters tailored to neutralize the crisis.
Hakumen pushed herself to her feet, convinced she had locked onto the optimal direction.
At that exact moment, Black Butler stepped through the portal into the private space.
"Lord Mercenary Tao, the transaction is complete."
[You have acquired Material: Fractured World]
[You have acquired Artifact: Anchor of Causality]
"Heh. What an utter fool you are, Tan Zhishan!"
With her hands shoved casually into the pockets of her light trench coat, Midnight strolled through the snow-swept streets of a northern Siberian metropolis. Pedestrians bundled against the bitter cold hurried past, none sparing a glance for the woman braving the freezing tundra in such thin attire.
A mocking smirk curled on her lips, her eyes completely devoid of the golden radiance of the Erdtree.
Her decision to enlist within the Golden Order had been aimed squarely at the woman named Amatsu. The so-called boons of the Golden Order were beneath her contempt; undying warriors and returning to the roots were crutches embraced only by fools. No matter how resilient one's immortality might be, lacking the absolute strength to back it up meant being systematically butchered without end. In the B711 world, that was precisely how the Sage had been ground into dust by Mercenary Tao.
Furthermore, returning to the roots was hardly an elite tier of immortality; it was simply a psychological refuge for low- and mid-tier cowards fleeing mortality.
What Amatsu truly sought to drag onto the board was the descent of the Outer Gods!
Yet Midnight had found that Black Butler's intelligence was accurate: Amatsu possessed brilliant analytical foresight. Midnight had extracted a cultivation blueprint from the woman's framework—a methodology that would allow her to scale her combat capability rapidly without falling behind the vanguard!
After reviewing the mechanics once, Midnight had fallen in love with the blueprint.
She looked up into the pale winter sun; her current hybrid cursed-spirit biology remained entirely unaffected by the harsh light. Cursed spirits were far more functional assets than she had initially credited them for.
Her immediate objective was to orchestrate terror and systematically cultivate the birth of cursed spirits!
She intended to force the advent of the jujutsu ecosystem right here in the northern tundra, and then mercilessly hunt down every Reincarnator who had invested into the jujutsu sorcery tree. By weaponizing the overarching equilibrium mechanism native to the Jujutsu universe, paired with her unique physiology as a half-curse, half-sorcerer hybrid, she could establish an organic feedback loop of self-reinforcing passive empowerment.
While matching Mercenary Tao's current stratosphere was out of reach, reclaiming her standing among top-tier Reincarnators would be child's play.
Best of all, she had secured that specific Innate Technique! For Reincarnators, acquiring hereditary techniques was far more accessible than it had ever been for the natives of that world.