Herta Space Station, Blue Star System
"What's going on? Evan has been trapped inside the Unknown Domain for thirty-three system hours!"
Outside the Simulated Universe, the atmosphere around Herta Space Station had grown tense.
March 7th and Stelle had both arrived.
Even Dan Heng, who had been discussing station security with Arlan, had hurried over.
That alone showed just how serious the situation had become.
"I don't know either." Herta frowned. "The moment Evan's consciousness entered the Unknown Domain, it completely slipped beyond my control."
"The data stream there is chaotic—completely unreadable."
"Even now, we still have no way of answering that question."
"How exactly was the Unknown Domain created?"
Herta herself had already returned from the Unknown Domain.
Evan, however, had not.
His consciousness remained fully immersed inside it.
As for the body left behind...
It had become no different from that of an ordinary person.
Naturally, March and Stelle couldn't resist poking at him.
His skin felt surprisingly warm and soft.
Then March suddenly noticed something.
Evan's hand moved.
"March..."
"Stelle..."
"What are you two doing?"
"Huh?! Y-You're awake?" Herta immediately rushed over, looking him up and down. "How are you fine? Wasn't your consciousness trapped inside the Unknown Domain?"
She had entered it herself, but the passage of time inside had been completely different.
All she witnessed were fragments of history.
She had learned absolutely nothing about the origin of the Unknown Domain.
"Trapped?" Evan shook his head. "I just didn't feel like coming back."
"Turns out..."
"The whole thing was created by Aha."
Simulated Universe — Unknown Domain
As Evan followed Patavia toward the final answer...
She connected her consciousness directly to the Core.
Through quantum entanglement, every Scepter scattered across the Empire instantly linked together into a complete neural network.
Welcoming their long-awaited new sovereign.
But just before she asked her question...
A trace of self-doubt suddenly gripped her heart.
She looked toward the sea of flowers.
A sweet fragrance drifted through the air, accompanied by the silhouette of a woman dressed in candy-colored clothing.
Patavia had spoken with her several times before.
The mysterious woman always appeared indistinct, yet every word she spoke was concise and precise.
Her words were as sharp as a surgeon's scalpel.
Each sentence effortlessly cut through confusion and dispelled uncertainty.
And every conversation left Patavia feeling painfully inadequate.
"So you've finally appeared..."
"Genius Society Member No. 4..."
"Polka Kakamond."
Amid the ruins of Rupert II's Mechanical Empire, a woman dressed in candy-colored attire slowly descended from the sky.
A surgical scalpel rested quietly in her hand.
At the same time...
A star hurtled straight toward them.
This was Rupert II's tomb.
Meanwhile, Patavia had completely lost herself, frantically carving formulas across the massive gravestone.
Metal fragments mixed with blood as they embedded themselves into her palms.
Hovering high above wasn't the gaze of Nous.
It was the same figure Evan had once seen during the Genius Society gathering.
The woman who had revealed herself only as a distant silhouette.
The Fourth Genius.
Polka Kakamond.
"Why rush forward so impatiently, my friend?"
The moment her voice sounded...
Time itself froze.
The entire database instantly became encased in frost.
Patavia, who had been desperately recording data moments before, stopped moving altogether.
She stood frozen like an ice sculpture.
Then...
The simulated Polka Kakamond slowly turned toward Evan.
"Tsk."
"Genius Society Member No. 85..."
"The young genius personally acknowledged by Nous."
"You and Herta's little game of uncovering this secret..."
"It's over."
"Before my scalpel severs it completely..."
"Would you care to dance with me?"
Her face remained hidden beneath an impenetrable veil of mist.
She removed her scholar's robe.
The candy-colored skirt beneath swayed gently through the endless cosmos, becoming the only vivid splash of color in the darkness.
This was the second time Evan had seen her.
The first time, she had remained hidden in the shadows.
No one had ever clearly seen her face.
Somewhere Beyond the Known Universe
A woman slowly polished the surgical scalpel in her hand.
"Someone is tracing my footsteps?"
"...Such a familiar aura."
"The Eighty-Fifth Genius?"
A faint smile appeared beneath the mist concealing her face.
"It seems..."
"It's time to play a little game of cat and mouse."
The moment she stopped polishing the blade—
The Simulated Universe detected an unauthorized intrusion.
Even its firewall proved incapable of stopping her.
Unknown Domain permissions updated.
All access requests and visitor verification permanently denied.
Identity confirmed.
Genius Society Member No. 4...
No one truly knew where Polka Kakamond had come from.
Only that she occupied the Fourth Seat of the Genius Society.
The Society's rankings were determined not by strength...
But by the order in which its members joined.
The First Seat belonged to the individual who had created Nous.
Judging by that timeline, Polka had likely joined shortly after Nous's ascension.
Some estimated she had lived for hundreds of Amber Eras.
Like her origins...
She herself remained shrouded in mystery.
Over the countless years since the Genius Society's founding, many of its members had died by her hand.
Thus she became known as...
The Lord of Silence.
There was a story.
A butterfly.
A tiny, insignificant butterfly.
During a sporting event within the Easter Federation, it was struck by a competitor's racket.
The dust from its wings triggered a severe allergic reaction.
The athlete's repeated sneezing passed a common cold virus to the president he later met.
The resulting fever and headache shifted the president's decision-making by a mere two percent toward aggression.
In the end...
He signed the declaration of war against a neighboring nation.
Countless lives were lost.
When the president's personal physician learned that her lover had died on the battlefield...
She used a surgical scalpel to cut open the perfectly healthy man's throat.
Then, in despair, she hurled the murder weapon from a great height.
A passing assassin picked up the falling blade—
The very needle that had pinned down the butterfly responsible for the storm.
She gripped it tightly in her hand.
And that assassin...
Hunted geniuses.
When her scalpel closed in on its target...
Your best chance of survival was to hide inside a neutron-star fortress boasting a 99.99% survival rate.
Otherwise...
Death would arrive in the very next instant.
Ding! Ding! Ding!
Hidden Treasure Chest detected within the area!
Open it?
As the butterfly's wings began to flutter...
The faceless assassin silently appeared a short distance before Evan.
The surgical scalpel in her hand radiated a chilling cold—even within the simulated world.
A cold blade.
A colder voice.
And an overwhelming killing intent...
One capable of erasing any genius who stood before her.
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