The Herrscher of Thunder had not flown far before she sensed dozens of missiles rising in the distance, streaking toward her.
She raised her palm, spread her five fingers, and grasped at the sky. Five serpents of lightning burst from the storm clouds, weaving between the incoming missiles and turning them into fireworks blooming across the horizon.
But it was not over. From within the exploding fireballs, smaller fragmentation rounds shot out, continuing forward with inertia and falling toward the Herrscher of Thunder like raindrops. The specially made pellets seemed immune to lightning, allowing them to survive the lightning serpents' assault.
She did not know how humanity had managed to design weapons specifically to counter her authority at just the right time, but the Herrscher of Thunder still could not be bothered to take them seriously.
This time, she did not even move. Layers of lightning swelled outward like bubbles, glowing as they blocked the fragmentation rounds' path.
The Honkai energy indicator displayed: "2000 Honkai Watts."
According to data from radial observation devices, the radiance surrounding the Herrscher of Thunder was a layer of plasma generated by intense electrical discharge. If she wished, she could coat her entire body in it like armor. It could not only block external attacks but also accelerate the healing of her own wounds.
In fact, those fragmentation rounds were soft gel pellets with no lethality whatsoever. Even if they struck a baby, they would cause no harm. Their only function was lightning immunity—meant purely to startle the Herrscher of Thunder.
Vill-V's assault had not ended.
The Herrscher of Thunder suddenly felt a jolt of unease. Gritting her teeth, she thrust her hands together before her chest, drawing out silk-like threads woven from lightning—dreamlike and ethereal. A silent glint of cold light materialized into an exquisite sniper round, suspended at the center as if time itself had frozen.
This sniper bullet was wrapped in some special substance. Light warped around its surface, giving it an indescribable strangeness. If it were allowed to detonate inside her body—or even upon her skin—no one could predict what would happen.
The Herrscher of Thunder acted with extreme caution and erased it outright to prevent future trouble.
"The snipe failed..."
Several kilometers away, inside a high-rise window, Kirsch—wearing soundproof headphones—spoke to Huck beside her.
The Honkai energy indicator displayed: "3500 Honkai Watts!"
The Honkai level had jumped by 1500 Honkai Watts in an instant!
Huck was horrified. Without time to think, he bent down, scooped Kirsch up, smashed through the window, and leapt out of the building—abandoning the sniper rifle worth millions behind.
Moments later, a violent explosion erupted above them. A shockwave laced with lightning blasted Huck farther away. Through Kirsch's goggles, she watched as the reinforced concrete skyscraper vanished without a trace beneath the radiance of thunder.
Fortunately, Huck and Kirsch narrowly avoided the lightning and landed on a prepared cushioning pad atop a nearby building. However, Huck—who had taken the brunt of the impact—fell into shock due to the violent force and lightning-induced paralysis.
Gritting her teeth, Kirsch struggled to haul Huck's massive body onto a nearby aircraft and fled.
The attack still had not ended.
After retaliating against the hidden "viper," the Herrscher of Thunder had no time to rest before several gigantic stone pillars—arriving alongside the earlier missiles—reached her position. They too had endured the trial of lightning serpents and now roared down from above.
This time, the Herrscher of Thunder did not repeat her previous tactic. The mass of the stone pillars was vastly different from that of the pellets. Plasma alone would not stop them.
She raised both hands toward the pillars. Lightning flared in her eyes. Sparks blossomed at her fingertips. Bright violet ripples spread outward as sinusoidal waves of electricity enveloped the surrounding matter.
With a fierce clench of her hands, the surrounding materials began to collapse and fracture—like the lunar surface struck by a meteor.
This phenomenon, resembling gravity manipulation, had long been anticipated by Vill-V.
"The Herrscher can already utilize large-scale Maxwell electromagnetic fields."
From a macroscopic perspective, a Maxwell electromagnetic field was the transformation between electromagnetic fields and force fields—converting microscopic electric charge into macroscopic pure force.
Compared to mere lightning, it had one advantage: even insulating materials could not escape the influence of a force field. All matter contained electrons. Nothing was exempt.
Just as she prepared to use particle-manipulated repulsion to blast the stone pillars away, the Herrscher of Thunder felt instability in the gravitational field within her grasp. The direction of attraction began to waver and shift uncontrollably.
That was because Expert Vill-V had installed a device beneath Chiba Academy—the "Thunder Devourer No.3 PLUS." Its primary function was electromagnetic absorption. Compared to the oceanic scale of Honkai energy wielded by the Herrscher of Thunder, this electromagnetic drain was like a feather. But even a feather could tip a lever—it could disrupt a delicate magnetic field.
To use an analogy: microscopic charges were like water. If the Herrscher of Thunder directly controlled electric charges, it was like scooping water with bare hands. Water would splash everywhere and slip through her fingers—highly inefficient.
Thus, she relied on Maxwell electromagnetic fields, which were like using a basin to hold the water. Controlling the magnetic field directly was far more convenient than manipulating individual charges.
And what Vill-V's "Thunder Devourer No.3 PLUS" did was turn that basin into a sieve riddled with holes.
If the original electromagnetic field had been a smooth, complete sphere, now several nodes were abruptly stretched outward by the device—becoming constantly extending and retracting spikes.
A magnetic field transformed into a hedgehog naturally differed vastly from its original nature. It could no longer provide stable repulsive force.
If it had been the Herrscher of Reason, she could have nullified such interference instantly with supercomputer-level computational power.
But the Herrscher of Thunder did not possess that level of processing capability. She could not stabilize the runaway magnetic field in the instant of ambush.
She needed time.
The massive stone pillars gave her none.
They broke through the plasma shield and crashed heavily onto her raised, slender hands.
She bent her arms and strained, attempting to withstand the force with her Herrscher physique and Honkai energy.
But these were no ordinary pillars.
They were Expert's creations—"Sealing Pillars · Thunder Guard." While devouring lightning energy, each pillar was also drawn together like magnets under a strong magnetic field.
And the strongest magnetic field at that moment was centered on the Herrscher of Thunder herself—though chaotic, it remained immense in scale.
Boom, boom, boom—
One pillar after another stacked above her head like building blocks. As their combined force converged at a single point, space itself seemed on the verge of tearing apart.
The Herrscher of Thunder nearly screamed. Endless lightning radiated from her upraised hands, the sparks generating terrifying heat that burned the surrounding air to nothingness.
The Honkai energy indicator displayed: "4000 Honkai Watts!"
In Vill-V's eyes, that mass of lightning had become a blazing sun. It pressed spiderweb-like cracks into the ground and was gradually forced underground by the Sealing Pillars · Thunder Guard—until it vanished from sight.