The moment the Cocoon of Finality locked its gaze onto her, Sa felt the death star above her head begin to flicker.
"Hey~ can we call it even?"
Sa very much wanted to say that — but she knew that for the Cocoon, which operated strictly according to its rules, begging for mercy was utterly useless.
Sure enough, the instant its gaze fell on her, a sensation of extreme and absolute danger exploded in her heart.
An incomprehensible force came crashing down, enveloping the divine body she had spent hundreds of millions of years constructing.
Crack!!!
Under the force of that power, her body began to crumble and dissolve.
Sa knew that if she wanted to survive, she had to start struggling.
Fortunately, her long-cultivated caution proved its worth in this moment — because even for something as critical as this operation, only a portion of her main body had been deployed to Earth.
In the Sea of Quanta, a portion of herself still remained — along with the Wisdom Eye, the thing most precious to her of all.
But even so, just a fragment of herself — if it perished on Earth, recovering from it would likely take hundreds of millions of years. And beyond that, the prophesied great calamity still loomed. The cost of losing this much of herself here on Earth was something she simply could not accept.
But first things first. She loaded back the human nature she had long since discarded.
Under normal circumstances, remnant human nature would only erode and fade over the endless stretch of time, eventually dissipating entirely. But in a moment of life or death, the survival instinct born from that humanity would give her a far greater chance of making it through.
The moment her human nature was reawakened and felt the crisis at hand, Sa's lips couldn't help trembling.
"This is bad, this is so bad — I'm going to die..." Sa pressed her hands to her head and forced her mind into overdrive. "My survival instinct — think of something, fast!"
Under the pressure of mortal danger, Sa erupted with astonishing potential.
"Oh~ I just had an idea!"
Looking at her body being erased by the Cocoon of Finality, Sa didn't think twice — she simply chose to kill herself.
The next instant, Sa's body went rigid, then dissolved into countless pale-blue points of light that scattered and vanished.
And after Sa died, the Cocoon of Finality's gaze paused for a moment.
Being thoroughly dim-witted, it had always operated in a rigid, mechanical fashion. Upon detecting Sa's death, it naturally abandoned the erasure and withdrew its gaze from Earth.
But the moment it pulled its gaze away, it suddenly sensed that troublesome presence disrupting its trial appearing again — and so it once more turned its eyes back toward Earth.
For Sa, death itself was not actually a problem. Though her body was on Earth, her true core resided in the Sea of Quanta.
Using the Wisdom Eye from outside, she could freely control the life and death of this Earth-side portion of herself.
"I'm alive!" Sa's form recongealed, and she opened her eyes.
But before she could even feel relieved, the Cocoon of Finality's gaze fell upon her again.
"...I'm dead again." Sa chose to extinguish herself once more.
When Sa revived again, she found the Cocoon of Finality staring at her yet again.
"So this approach can't shake the Cocoon of Finality's gaze." Sa sighed.
For her, dying and reviving carried very little cost in itself. Under normal circumstances, she could play this back-and-forth game with the Cocoon of Finality for hundreds of millions of years without issue.
But the key word was — normal circumstances.
Sa could feel it: with each death, the power within her body was being drastically reduced. And the root cause of all this was...
She looked to the sky. Golden chains locked down every direction — the physical manifestation of some kind of authority, continuously eroding the energy within her body.
If she couldn't deal with the owner of those chains, forget escaping — she would simply be ground down to nothing right here.
To leave Earth, she had to deal with those chains.
And so she looked up toward Kallen, standing high in the sky above, and asked: "Herrscher — why do you protect humanity?"
Kallen's voice drifted down from above.
"What kind of question is that?! If a Herrscher doesn't protect humanity, are they supposed to destroy it instead?"
What on earth are you talking about? A Herrscher that protects humanity?
Sa concluded that this person must have some kind of fundamental cognitive issue — meaningful communication was probably impossible.
Still, she could see clearly enough: Kallen's Binding Domain had its limits. With sufficient force, it could be blown apart.
So the next time the Cocoon of Finality's gaze descended, instead of choosing to extinguish herself, she shot upward into the sky.
She intended to self-destruct — using the instantaneous spike in energy from the explosion to burst Kallen's Binding Domain apart.
Kallen did not oblige. At the very last moment before the explosion, she wrapped Sa in the chains formed by her Binding Authority.
But then her expression immediately changed — the chains coiling around Sa began snapping apart at a terrifying rate.
"Lucius — I can't hold on!" Kallen cried out urgently.
At that moment, Lucius's voice sounded in her ear.
"Kallen, what are you saying? You still have lives left, don't you?"
Kallen turned — and found Lucius floating right beside her, looking at her with a puzzled expression.
Lucius handed her a small bottle containing capsules and said: "This is an upgraded version of the Revival Shot — a Revival Capsule. Swallow one capsule, and the gates of the underworld are a stranger to you forevermore."
Saying that, Lucius gave her a thumbs-up with a bright, sunny smile.
"As a favor to me — use your pseudo-divine power on Sa, Kallen!"
Kallen took the bottle of capsules, then delivered a headbutt that sent Lucius flying.
She then tossed a capsule into her mouth. A terrible roar erupted from deep within her body.
"Beast sleeping in the depths of my genes — by my command, awaken!"
The Vishnu Super Mutation Factor within her body activated, and Kallen began rapidly expanding in size.
Lucius, lying on the ground, watched as her size increased — and even her clothing changed in both size and style.
He found this entirely unremarkable.
The wonders of Honkai energy were boundless. Changing an outfit was the least of it.
In an instant, little Kallen had become big Kallen.
Her previously azure eyes were now suffused with gold. From her back, brilliant white wings unfurled one after another — like an angel spreading its wings.
At the same time, the chains that had been binding Sa finally shattered completely.
A torrent of terrifying energy erased everything on the ground beneath it, surging toward the outer edge of the Binding Domain.
The Binding Domain from just a moment ago would naturally have been unable to withstand Sa's self-destruct at that energy level.
But after Kallen activated the lingering pseudo-divine authority within her body, the Binding Domain underwent a qualitative leap in strength.
The shockwave from Sa's self-destruct slammed into the outer boundary of the Binding Domain — and was held steady.
The aftershock quickly dissipated, and Sa's body recongealed.
When she opened her eyes and saw that the Binding Domain still stood firm, she was genuinely surprised. But her attention was quickly drawn to the waves of power radiating from Kallen.
"What is that power?"
Sa was transfixed by the pseudo-divine force emanating from Kallen. She had no doubt: if Kallen could sustain this output, she herself would very likely perish here on Earth.
But she wasn't panicking — because she could see that Kallen's body was already dissolving into points of light.
"A temporary power-up method?" Sa had no difficulty guessing Kallen's current state.
The power was formidable in the extreme — even a body fused with a Honkai Beast's Super Mutation Factor couldn't bear it for long. Which meant all she had to do was wait for Kallen to die, and she'd be free.
At that moment, the Cocoon of Finality's gaze descended again. Sa cleanly chose to extinguish herself.
"When I open my eyes again, you'll be dead — and I will be free..." Sa smiled as she died.
Very quickly, she returned from death and opened her eyes — and sure enough, Kallen was fading away. The suppressive force of the Binding Domain surrounding her was also rapidly disappearing.
"Good — now is the moment. Tear open the seal, then tear open the gate back to the Sea of Quanta..."
Sa was just about to act when she found the Binding Domain that had been on the verge of dissolving suddenly become powerful once more, pushing back against her attempt to tear it open.
She looked to the sky — and found Kallen, who had been fading away just moments ago, now looking as lively and spirited as ever.
"..."
Sa felt something had gone seriously wrong with her plan. Evidently, her opponent could also revive. She said with genuine feeling: "To push me into such a situation — you are all very strong."
But then her tone shifted: "But do you truly think that I, a being of supreme wisdom who has existed for hundreds of millions of years, have spent all these years asleep?"
Being a competent performer, Lucius gave the enemy her emotional due. He materialized beside Sa, clapping slowly while smiling as he asked: "So then, Sa — what are you trying to say?"
Sa paid Lucius's sudden appearance no mind. She settled into a cross-legged float in midair, allowing the Cocoon of Finality's gaze to fall upon her.
Then she accelerated her own thought processes, stretching the span of a single instant into something much longer.
Through the power of the Feather of Dust, Lucius could enter a similar state.
And so, in a gap of time nearly frozen still, Lucius and Sa held their conversation.
Sa's lips parted slightly, and she spoke in a tone tinged with a certain zen-like quality: "Though a hundred thousand kalpas pass, the deeds one has wrought do not vanish. When causes and conditions converge, their fruit must be received..."
"Can you just speak normally?"
Sa shot him a glare. "...You have absolutely no spiritual insight."
But after Lucius's interruption, her zen air completely evaporated. She spoke bluntly instead: "I want to make a deal with you. Release your binding and let me leave — and I give my word not to interfere with Earth again."
Lucius said: "I'm actually not that interested in killing you. But — how do you expect us to trust you?"
"You can't verify it. But I can make you certain of this: if you don't divert your attention away from me, hundreds of millions on the European continent may die."
"Ah… besiege Wei to rescue Zhao, is it?" Since when do aliens know Sun Tzu?
Sa closed her eyes and said: "Civilizations ravaged by the Cocoon always bear uncanny resemblances to one another… I will tell you my plan. I'm quite curious — when my life and the lives of hundreds of millions on Earth are placed on the same scale, which will you choose."
"According to what was always destined, five hundred years ago the European continent would have been struck by a great plague — and its origin was Nicholas."
"He came to me because of an incurable disease — though what he didn't know was that his illness was no curse. It was a gift from the Cocoon."
"Following the trajectory the Cocoon had drawn for him, as his condition reached its most severe point he would have become a pseudo-Herrscher who could manipulate disease — and with his own pathogens, he would have unleashed a great plague across the European continent, killing tens of millions. I made a small intervention in this."
Sa raised two fingers and pressed them gently together. "A truly very small intervention."
"I suppressed his pseudo-Herrscher transformation and kept him as a chess piece until now."
"And now I will return to him the fate of becoming a pseudo-Herrscher that was always his. Very soon, the European continent will give birth to a pseudo-Herrscher capable of commanding lethal pathogens."
"An ordinary pseudo-Herrscher would be nothing to you. But after five hundred years of modifications by my hand, he is now usable as a bomb."
"Trust me — you do not want to test the potency of an extraterrestrial virus."
"So now — it's time for you to make your choice." Sa looked at Lucius and asked with a light smile: "Will you continue to hold me here indefinitely — or will you watch tens of millions on the European continent die to a plague?"
Lucius was silent for a moment. Then he suddenly smiled and asked: "Sa — have you ever heard the name Vita?"
"You actually know that name?" Sa was genuinely shocked, because that was her original name. "It seems you carry quite a few secrets..."
"So then — you're not trying to have a nostalgic chat with me, are you?" Sa said with a smile. "I don't particularly mind. My body can hold out a little longer."
"No no no — actually, I have a secret to share with you." The smile on Lucius's face was distinctly peculiar.
"Oh? What secret?"
"There is a fundamental rule in this world: characters whose names contain the syllable 'ta' are remarkably prone to eating dirt."
While Lucius and Sa were conversing —
Somewhere in the Sea of Quanta.
A woman seated in a meditative cross-legged posture opened her eyes. Behind her, space had been torn open, revealing through the rift an object resembling an enormous eye.
This was the portion of Sa that remained in the Sea of Quanta — along with the Wisdom Eye, the thing most vital to her existence.
"A variable." Sa's gaze seemed to pierce through the barriers of the Sea of Quanta, finding the part of herself trapped in the real world.
That portion amounted to nearly half of her total mass. If it was lost on Earth, she didn't know how many years it would take to recover.
Sa turned the matter over in her mind. The eye behind her rotated several times, finally locking onto Nicholas, far away on Earth.
Then, through the contingency she had previously embedded in Nicholas's mind, she released the long-standing suppression on his pseudo-Herrscher transformation. The destiny that had always been his — to become a pseudo-Herrscher — was now being returned to him.
Having done all of this, Sa closed her eyes again and began reviewing the failure of this operation.
Very quickly, Sa realized that her actions this time had been rather impulsive. Going by her original nature, she would never have entered the field directly even with ninety-nine percent odds of success.
"At this point in my existence — would I truly still do something this impulsive?"
Though this line of thinking bore a suspicious resemblance to making excuses for herself after the fact, she couldn't shake the feeling that something was off.
This feeling… was like having been subjected to someone's mental interference.
But after running the calculation through the Wisdom Eye, she found nothing out of place. Everything appeared normal.
As a deity of the Sea of Quanta, she didn't believe there was anyone capable of influencing her in the realm of consciousness.
So Sa set her mind at ease and turned her attention to the most pressing matter at hand.
"I can only hope the losses from this trip are kept to a minimum."
This harvest operation was a complete failure now. All she could do was aim for the smallest possible losses on withdrawal.
If all the power she had deployed was lost here, it might take her hundreds of millions of years to fish it back out of the Sea of Quanta.
After seeing to all of this, Sa thought back to the 'secret' Lucius had mentioned.
"Names containing 'ta' are prone to eating dirt… a claim with zero basis. Verdict: a bluff."
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