Standing before the Astral Express Crew, Evernight took in Welt's sudden "excitement."
She watched as the usually composed "Mr Yang" nearly lunged forward, nodding to herself thoughtfully. A flicker of elusive light crossed her dark crimson pupils—a spark of hope had quietly been ignited.
She mused to herself:
*That line about "You've lost your little March"… actually triggered such a violent reaction?*
*Doesn't this also indirectly confirm that what that Khaslana said—about being able to bring "March" back—might not be an empty promise? Could he really…?*
*Whatever. No matter what, as long as there's even a glimmer of hope, Evernight won't give up.*
…
By the time Stelle and Dan Heng had managed to calm Welt down, the tense, confrontational atmosphere on the scene seemed to have… "thawed" considerably. At the very least, everyone present was no longer so deadly serious.
Observing this turn of events, Evernight nodded again, updating her internal notes:
*Mm, looks like this tactic is remarkably effective. Sure, the process was a bit intense, but the end result is positive.*
*If I ever need to get their serious attention in the future, or… to break a deadlock by creating a little, manageable chaos, this line can definitely be prioritized. I should consider using it a few more times.*
"Hey, are you guys done yet?" A voice dripping with impatience shattered the brief calm, forcibly drawing everyone's attention.
The Herta's projection stood with her arms crossed, her expression screaming "time is precious, stop dawdling."
"Now's not the time for you to be putting on your little internal melodramas. Two universe-renowned geniuses appearing before you at the same time usually means only one thing—your Astral Express is in some deep trouble."
"Deep trouble?" Stelle blinked, piecing together the intel they had.
"You mean the fact that Amphoreus is essentially a fake world built from data and Memoria, a 'petri dish' used to incubate an Emanator of Destruction? But don't we already know that? And it hasn't succeeded yet, right? We should still have time to stop it, shouldn't we?"
"Heh, little one," Herta raised an eyebrow, her tone carrying a hint of "not completely clueless" approval. "Looks like you weren't totally sleepwalking through Amphoreus; you managed to dig up some key intel."
Her expression then turned incredibly serious. The rare gravity in her demeanor made even Welt's heart tighten.
"But… the severity of the problem now goes beyond that 'Destruction' equation destined to hatch."
Herta paused, seemingly organizing her thoughts, and finally admitted with a hint of lingering fear: "To be honest, the waters of Amphoreus are way deeper and murkier than I initially thought when I first arrived. I'm even a bit glad now that I called Screwllum over here before deciding to investigate further."
She glanced at the silent mechanical gentleman beside her. Screwllum's electronic eye flickered slightly as he took over, his voice its usual steady, metallic timbre.
"Madam Herta's judgment is accurate. When we attempted to infiltrate Amphoreus's core database, we encountered a self-proclaimed Intellitron life-form named Lygus. We hypothesize his identity might be the system administrator of Amphoreus."
"That guy's probably no pushover either," Herta added, her tone even carrying a hint of… annoyance at meeting her match?
"He demonstrated astonishing intelligence and defensive capabilities. Even without us allocating additional computing power, he managed to hold his own against us in a purely data-based offensive and defensive battle."
Screwllum continued his precise description: "More surprisingly, when we subsequently mobilized extra processing power from Planet Screwllum and Herta Space Station in an attempt to block and trace him."
"The opponent still found a vulnerability in an extremely short time, managed to retreat completely, and left no traceable tracks behind. His operational efficiency and counter-intelligence capabilities were as if… this escape procedure had been rehearsed countless times."
"And the most crucial point," Herta emphasized, "whether he was holding back as a trump card or just purely looked down on us, the guy didn't borrow the computing power of the 'The Scepter' itself at all throughout the entire process! He was purely relying on his own abilities to contend with us!"
This news made Welt frown deeply. A powerful Intellitron, independent of Amphoreus's Scepter system, yet able to come and go freely within it? This undoubtedly added a huge variable to an already complex situation.
"After breaching the firewall and successfully scanning a portion of Amphoreus's core database," Screwllum steered the topic back to the central crisis,
"we discovered an even more astonishing fact: another anomalous equation, titled 'Preservation,' is occupying and gradually replacing the 'incubation slot' of the original 'Destruction' equation with extremely high priority."
Herta took over, delivering the heaviest projection results: "Then, based on all current data, Herta and I ran a joint projection. The results showed that if left unchecked, this 'Preservation' equation will complete its hatching in approximately twenty-six system hours."
"And its first command after hatching won't be creation or protection, but—" Herta's voice turned icy, "to forcibly assimilate and permanently seal away the original 'Destruction' equation within Amphoreus."
"Don't doubt it," she affirmed, looking at their rapidly changing expressions. "This equation started doing this a long time ago."
"The raging 'Crimson Tide' sweeping through the world that you saw outside? That's the most direct evidence. The so-called 'Crimson Tide' is essentially the preliminary byproduct of 'Preservation' attempting to assimilate and overwrite 'Destruction'!"
"Then… Madam Herta," Dan Heng calmly posed a question, "wouldn't this be… a good thing? Without us needing to intervene directly, the potential threat of an Emanator of Destruction would naturally be eliminated."
"Good? Good what!" Herta almost rolled her eyes. "You think this is a gentle merger? It's a brutal overwrite and devour!"
"In the future we simulated, the moment the 'Preservation' equation hatches, with it as the core, the entirety of Amphoreus, along with all associated star systems within several light-years around it, will be permanently sealed by this extremely special kind of amber!"