In Ruan Mei's eyes, the act of rushing into mass production with an uncontrollable force before even understanding it was pure irresponsibility.
The result of such negligence was clear: not only did it fail to let the Iron Cavalry harness the true power of Propagation, but because their physical forms were so fragile, they perfectly inherited all of its side effects instead.
They walked the Path of Propagation, yet couldn't wield a shred of its power; even their ability to expand relied entirely on mechanical cloning.
The only reason the Republic of Glamoth's creations weren't recognized as part of the Propagation by the outside world was simple: they were so pathetic that it was impossible to see any connection to it at all.
As for why the Iron Cavalry could suppress the Swarm on the battlefield?
That was purely the result of technological armament. When it came to biological science, Glamoth was a total mess.
To Ruan Mei, the nonsense about "intentionally leaving side effects to control the Iron Cavalry" was worthless.
Whether those people left them on purpose or were simply too incompetent to fix them was something they knew best in their own hearts.
"I imagine that even without the intervention of the Land of Light, the Iron Cavalry's rebellion and the Republic's collapse would have been inevitable. A branch of the Swarm isn't something that can be controlled so easily."
Because Ruan Mei was actively researching Propagation, she could state this with absolute certainty.
In the eyes of 'Robin' and Ruan Mei, the current Iron Cavalry were essentially like larvae that had yet to break from their cocoons.
If one followed this train of thought, then the end of Firefly's animated short—with the green flames and those highly impressionistic visuals—might suggest that at the moment the Glamoth Iron Cavalry perished, the individual known as Firefly truly broke her cocoon and was reborn.
Only then did she touch the Path of Propagation and truly become a Pathstrider.
The logic held up well enough. It just wasn't that easy to verify in reality. And even if it were true, they couldn't exactly replicate that path.
After all, up until now, Reveria hadn't truly realized the power of Propagation.
The only thing related to Propagation was her body.
To put it bluntly, if she replaced her body and her armor together, she would naturally escape the side effects.
But if she truly stepped onto the Path of Propagation, then even swapping bodies might not be enough to solve Entropy Loss Syndrome.
In the original game, Firefly's final self-awakening had, in a twist of irony, become the shackles that made her Entropy Loss Syndrome incurable.
However, looking at the current situation, Firefly likely wouldn't reach that extreme. It was hard to say if she would even leave the group at all.
The technical issues regarding the Glamoth Iron Cavalry had been largely demystified. To summarize in a single sentence: there was nothing wrong with viewing the Iron Cavalry as humanoid Swarm bugs.
However, progress regarding the Path of Propagation itself remained relatively limited.
They couldn't exactly use Reveria for direct human experimentation. To push the research forward, 'Robin' contacted the Land of Light to help secure a batch of live or dead bugs from Glamoth's territory.
At the same time, she reached out to Jade to ask if the IPC had any preserved remains of the Long-Life Species or Draconic descent.
The bugs arrived quickly, both living and dead. But since they were far from their hive, they would likely die soon if they weren't studied immediately.
The Land of Light even managed to get their hands on a fragment of a Propagation Emanator from somewhere and sent it over. It was a pleasant surprise for Ruan Mei.
As for the Draconic remains, things didn't go as smoothly. It was hard to tell if they truly didn't have any or if they just didn't want to give them up.
Regardless, Jade claimed that no such resources were available within the Strategic Investment Department's reach.
The route of using Permanence to repair Entropy Loss Syndrome was temporarily blocked.
Since Permanence was a dead end, there was still an alternative: Elation. It was just going to be significantly more troublesome.
After all, the Path of Permanence is very similar to Propagation; even if you don't have a personal realization of these two Paths, you can still use various Path-constructs to act directly on the physical body, granting you indirect mastery over that power.
But Elation doesn't work like that. It wasn't going to be easy to incorporate.
"I didn't expect such a surprise. This Emanator fragment should be very useful."
Ruan Mei looked at the remains before her with a hint of delight.
An Emanator of Propagation was undoubtedly a Swarm King—one who could lead a swarm of their own without worrying about Entropy Loss Syndrome.
Since they had the materials on hand, Ruan Mei could approach the problem from another angle. For example... researching why a Swarm King remains unaffected by Entropy Loss.
This side effect stems from the Path itself.
Looking at the Path of Propagation, a powerful will to survive and a loathing for solitude serve as its core colors.
Theoretically, from Tayzzyronth down to the smallest bug, every entity should be affected by this Path's nature.
This means that something like Entropy Loss Syndrome shouldn't be bypassed by any bug, regardless of their level.
Yet the reality was... even after the fall of the Swarm King, the universe was still teeming with Swarms hidden in its dark corners. There were two possibilities for this phenomenon.
First, the meaning of the Propagation Path has a deeper conceptual layer they weren't aware of. Once power reaches a certain level, one can simply shed the side effects of isolation and death.
The second possibility was that Tayzzyronth hadn't truly died.
Perhaps they were merely sealed by Preservation, which was why those Emanators and Swarm Kings hadn't withered away immediately.
But regardless of the reason, if they could discover something, they might be able to solve the Entropy Loss issue without needing to involve other Paths at all.
Ruan Mei's proposed solution was a bit of a "brute force" approach: instead of excluding the power of Propagation, she would enhance it.
Once she understood the difference between a Swarm King and a normal individual, she could modify Reveria's body to possess the traits of a pseudo-Swarm King.
This would allow her to bypass the syndrome entirely.
The research into Propagation pressed on. Aside from their joint study, 'Robin' also attempted to use cloned bugs to experiment with the effects of the Path of Elation.
As for Reveria, she was asked for her thoughts. For instance... whether she was willing to change into a new body.
"Is something like changing bodies actually possible?"
"Of course. But as a price, you will completely lose your identity as a Glamoth Iron Cavalry. It's hard to say what path you'll walk in the future."
'Robin' looked at the conflicted Reveria. It was only natural; everyone's self-perception is different, and not everyone can easily accept the idea of swapping out their physical form.
"There are many choices. You could be a Digimon-style entity like those from Amphoreus, an Intellitron, or a superhuman like little Rappa... though the species changes, the appearance can stay largely the same."
"Ahaha... to be honest, I'm still processing the fact that I'm technically a bug."
Seeing Reveria's reaction, 'Robin' smiled and shook her head.
"The point isn't the species; it's what you want to become. Species and appearance are secondary. You can take any form, but you must remain yourself."
"Um, just asking... if I do change bodies, what happens to this one?"
Reveria's question was met with an answer from 'Robin' that made her feel quite complicated: "If you don't mind, Ruan Mei and I would quite like to borrow your body for some experiments."
"...Please let me think about it."
For Reveria, more than the solution or the prospect of becoming a normal girl, she was reeling from the shock that she really was just a bug in a human skin.
Before deciding how to extend her life, she first had to make peace with herself.
Days passed. Research on Propagation wasn't going to yield results overnight.
Well... it wasn't entirely without fruit. Under their collaboration, Ruan Mei figured out the difference between ordinary bugs and Propagation Emanators.
It wasn't just a simple difference in energy levels; there were other factors at play. Perhaps there was a specific "thing" that decided whether an individual was a King or a drone.
However, full decoding would still take time. Once those elements were parsed, Ruan Mei could—just like in the game—try her hand at cloning a Propagation Emanator.
Meanwhile, 'Robin's' current role-playing duration was coming to an end.
--+--
[Role-Play System]
[Name: Bai Ming (Robin)]
[Lifespan: 1200 years (Paused) + 1 day (Role-Play)]
[Transformable Characters: Big Herta (Available), Acheron (Available), Celenova (Available), Jingliu (Available), Ruan Mei (Available), Sparkle (Available), Hertatomb (Charging: 71.1%), Lord Ravager - Jingliu (Charging: 35.3%), Young Herta (Charging: 20.1%), Cyrene - Fuli (Charging: 3.7%), Robin (Role-playing)]
[Available Pulls: 1 (35.9%)]
--+--
With only half a day left for the role-play, the harvest of emotion points was decent.
Most of it had actually come from Robin herself; during these few days of experimenting on the Space Station, the points hadn't grown much.
It was time to swap character cards.
Although she considered playing Big Herta again, she thought about the possibility of having to fight Celenova. It might be better to use a character with stronger combat capabilities.
"Well... let's just pull and see."
'Robin' decided to just use up the pull. There was no point in hoarding it.
The points hit zero, the gacha screen appeared, and the familiar train sped past.
A golden light shone through the cabin door, and then—an unexpected voice whispered in her ear:
'I ask of you, are you my Master?'
"...?"
Looking at the blonde girl who appeared before her, standing with her hand resting on the sword from the lake, Bai Ming fell into a moment of hesitation.
So, her gacha pool actually included characters from other worldviews... wait, these were collab outfits.
This was the collaboration Artoria; she indeed appeared in the game before. But it turns out collab characters count toward the pool too?
Bai Ming found herself deep in thought. A game collaboration can ignore the worldview, but if a few Heroic Spirits actually pop out in reality, the implications are entirely different.
And there was another issue.
If she remembered correctly, even as a collab character, this Artoria appeared as a Heroic Spirit Servant. Even if it was a collab, the Holy Grail, Servants, and Classes all existed.
This meant this character card carried a very interesting piece of "technology": the ability to let a deceased soul manifest in the modern era.
In this world, such a thing might not matter much to others.
After all, to this universe, souls are more like Memory Bubbles or Memoria. But Bai Ming's situation was different. She truly existed as a clump of soul-matter.
Could this technology... work on herself?
Artificially constructing a vessel for her own soul by mimicking the construction of a Servant? It might not be the absolute best way, but it felt like it would at least be functional.
And putting that aside, the concept of a Servant could also be used to solve Entropy Loss Syndrome.
Not that she would just turn people into Servants—there's a big difference between a Servant and the Materialization of the Soul.
Bai Ming was thinking about the "Saint Graph." If she recalled correctly, a Servant's Saint Graph is the component that constructs the body, and the Graph itself is made of magical energy.
This meant that if she could decode the technology, she could use the method of creating a Saint Graph to provide the specific Path power they wanted for Reveria's body.
For example, Elation. That way, Reveria wouldn't have to step onto the Path of Elation herself; Bai Ming would just need to craft an "Elation Saint Graph" to let the power manifest stably.
"This pull... it looked weird at first, but it's actually quite useful."
It was just a shame that the collab characters didn't include beauties like Medusa or Medea.
Otherwise, she'd really be looking forward to pulling them. Now? Hard to say, but there was no need to keep her expectations too high.
Bai Ming brushed these idle thoughts aside and chose to swap her character card:
--+--
[Role-Play System]
[Name: Bai Ming (Artoria)]
[Lifespan: 1200 years (Paused) + 30 days (Role-Play)]
[Transformable Characters: Big Herta (Available), Acheron (Available), Celenova (Available), Jingliu (Available), Ruan Mei (Available), Sparkle (Available), Hertatomb (Charging: 71.1%), Lord Ravager - Jingliu (Charging: 35.3%), Young Herta (Charging: 20.1%), Cyrene - Fuli (Charging: 3.7%), Robin (Charging: 1.4%), Artoria (Role-playing)]
[Available Pulls: 0 (35.9%)]
--+--
[Reward Settlement: Left behind works with a profound influence on the universe and induced the young Robin to leave behind abstract "dark history." You may inherit Robin's singing voice and partial Harmony talent.]
--+--
Her outward appearance shifted from the gentle Robin to a blonde girl with a sharp, commanding aura.
As for the reward settlement: Robin's greatest strengths were her talent for Harmony and Order, followed by her singing voice.
Regarding Harmony, Bai Ming had already inherited some of Celenova's talent, so the boost was only average.
As for the singing voice... she was more curious about how a physical talent like a voice would be fixed onto her soul-body.
Whatever, minor details.
--+--
T/N: If you want advance chapters, you can find it at [email protected]/AspenTL