Inside Schicksal, every A-rank Valkyrie had earned the right to a nickname.
Take the Snow Wolf Squad, nearly wiped out more than a decade ago — every member besides the S-rank Valkyrie Cecilia Schariac had been A-rank.
They'd all had their own.
For example: 「Frost Swordswoman」 Cheng Lixue, 「Floating Sun Prominence」 Shigure Kira, 「Scourer」 Salome Jokanaan... and so on.
Each nickname tied to their combat style.
Edelweiss — also an A-rank Valkyrie — was no exception.
Her personal style leaned toward agility and versatility, and she handled her pair of ring blades with real skill, so the nickname she'd been given was: 「Spirit Butterfly」.
"Heh — someone who didn't know better might think she wandered off the Marvel set next door."
Inside the Theater of Domination, Ling Ke was remotely synced to a Domination Puppet parked in the control room, speed-reading classified files on the Silver Lotus Squad.
He wasn't worried about those 100 puppets losing.
After all, in the original HI3 storyline, even when the protagonist group was nearly at full strength, it still took enormous effort to put down the initial Domination Puppets — and those hadn't even seized any other Herrscher Authorities.
And what was that protagonist group's lineup?
Fu Hua after 「Crossed the Dust」. Seele with Stygian Nymph. Kiana, who had begun mastering the Herrscher of the Void's Authority. Bronya, who'd inherited the Herrscher of Reason's core...
Forget the rest — just those four. Which of them could a mere A-rank Valkyrie even dream of touching?
So...
"According to the files, among all currently active A-rank Valkyries in Schicksal, Edelweiss's combat rating is solidly mid-tier."
"Even after the Second Eruption — over more than a decade of Valkyrie armor iterations, including the addition of the Spacetime Fracture system — her score is still nowhere near the strongest A-rank of that era: Cheng Lixue."
If she couldn't even compare to Cheng Lixue, there was no point bringing up Fu Hua — whose body had already fully recovered.
And so——
"Damn it! Damn it! Damn it!"
Inside the West Asia Branch base, in a corridor that was far from narrow, Edelweiss was fighting off wave after wave with an expression that got uglier by the second.
Both of the B-rank Valkyries she'd brought were already dead.
Nothing to be done about it. As established: an un-upgraded 「Domination Puppet · Anby」 in her initial state already matched a B-rank Valkyrie's combat power. And now... a hundred of them had shown up at once.
Not to mention they could revive infinitely.
Edelweiss was drenched in sweat.
As an A-rank Valkyrie, she absolutely had the ability to take down one or two Anbys.
But every second of it left her heart hammering.
Case in point——
"Shua!"
Mid-leap, she let the ring blade in her hand spin horizontally with her momentum, sweeping across a short-haired girl's neck in a clean arc.
By all rights, that strike should've taken the head clean off.
But at the point of contact, all that appeared was a flash of rainbow-colored light.
Then the girl just slashed right back — a direct trade, injury for injury.
Against this kamikaze-style fighting, Edelweiss had no answer.
"Tch!"
She clicked her tongue, barely dodging another slash — but didn't dare press the attack.
Because even more short-haired girls were closing in from every direction.
Same face. Same outfit. Same weapon.
Edelweiss was starting to feel like she'd develop trypophobia if she stayed here any longer.
No — before that, she should probably worry about staying alive first.
She had no way of knowing that the Ling Ke watching from behind the scenes had already decided to spare her. Temporarily.
But for her — the one actually standing in the middle of it — that wasn't good news.
Anyone with half a brain could figure out a very simple truth: in front of someone who'd gone completely dark, death... was the luxury.
Meanwhile——
"This is exactly what makes Game Character Templates broken."
Inside the Theater of Domination, Ling Ke — who had watched the entire fight — couldn't help but let out a sigh.
The puppets swarming Edelweiss hadn't even tried switching to 「Billy」 yet.
Just the 「Anby」 template alone...
HP Mechanism. Infinite Stamina. Equipment Indestructible.
「Anby」 had plenty of Character Traits; those were just three of them.
The previously mentioned 「Character Switching」 was another.
According to the system, every Game Character Template came with its own set of 「Character Traits」, 「Game Skills」, and 「Background Talents」.
Setting the latter two aside for now.
「Character Traits」 were essentially the mechanical rules inherited from the original game — all the places where real-world physics got quietly ignored.
Take the characters in Zenless Zone Zero: in combat, they don't lose limbs, don't break bones, don't bleed out. Only when their HP hits absolute zero do they instantly lose combat ability.
That was the trait called 「HP Mechanism」.
「Infinite Stamina」 and 「Equipment Indestructible」 were even more straightforward.
Zenless Zone Zero had no stamina bar and no weapon durability — so as long as you weren't dead, you could fight until the heat death of the universe.
What Edelweiss was facing right now was exactly this kind of "monster."
Using tactics designed for fighting humans against them, she naturally found herself dancing on a knife's edge at every turn.
The reality was: if Ling Ke hadn't been deliberately using her as a sparring partner — testing the various traits of the Game Character Templates in real time — she would've gone down long ago.
"Has this woman seriously not noticed that, aside from the opening burst that instantly killed her two teammates, the vast majority of the puppets have just been standing around watching?"
The scene looked like something out of a Hollywood superhero movie where the CGI budget went completely off the rails.
A massive crowd ringing the edges. Encircling without engaging.
The ones actually fighting were two, maybe three 「Domination Puppet · Anby」 units at most.
The rest existed as insurance — to make sure Edelweiss had zero chance of breaking through the perimeter.
Cover. That was all.
Of course, Ling Ke was getting some twisted entertainment out of it too.
He'd been gradually dialing up the difficulty.
If one un-upgraded 「Anby」 couldn't beat her, he sent two.
Then three. Four...
"Wait, she can't handle four?"
"You're an A-rank Valkyrie, aren't you?"
"Whatever. Dragging this out any longer is pointless."
Ling Ke split his attention to check the other areas. "Oh — the rest of the 「guests」 have all been found."
"Perfect, then..."
He grinned. "Accept my 「invitation letter」, Miss Edelweiss."
"You don't get to refuse."
Just as his words fell——
"Puff!"
A bizarre sound — like blood plasma bursting — entered Edelweiss's ears.
She had no way of knowing that from the moment the fight began, while she'd been battling multiple Anbys, there had been a yellow progress bar above her head the entire time. Invisible to her. Slowly filling.
This was a mechanic from the original Zenless Zone Zero called the 「Daze Value」.
Once that bar filled completely, the corresponding unit would be fully paralyzed — temporarily unable to act.
And all incoming damage would multiply.
「Anby」, with her Stun Attribute, had a built-in bonus in this area — she could push a target into the dazed state even faster.
Honestly, if the current 「Anby」 template weren't still at Lv.1, and if those 100 Domination Puppets had all swarmed at once, Edelweiss would've been dazed a long time ago.
And at precisely this instant——
"Shua!" ×2
Two 「Domination Puppet · Anby」 who had suddenly entered the fight dropped low and swept past Edelweiss's sides at extreme speed.
She had no time to react.
The next moment, all she felt was her body locking up——
"Huh?"
Her field of vision suddenly got shorter.
She fell backward helplessly and collapsed onto the ground.
Through the pain, she instinctively raised her head and shifted her gaze...
What she saw were two legs. Only the bottom halves remained.
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!"
An agonized scream echoed through the corridor without end.
But all around, the only thing that looked back were cold, indifferent gazes.
Just like the way she once looked at the helpless Ling Ke, curled up in his underground prison cell.