The Heavens: A Qing, the Yue Girl at the beginning

Raindrops fell on the laurel leaves, splashing up a cool, refreshing sensation.

Accompanied by wind and thunder, it drifted silently within and beyond the boundaries of Xia Mi's perception, just like the thousands of years of her past.

"...I think I understand what you mean."

She couldn't help but think of Nidhogg, the Black King—as the ultimate fear, wasn't His vow of return itself the pinnacle of loneliness and despair? No allies, no companions, only hatred and loneliness enough to drown the stars.

It is a chilling coldness that even death cannot end, a coldness that accompanies the depths of the underworld, carried by unparalleled power. When His sky-covering membrane sweeps across the world once more, all things will fall into an eternal abyss of darkness beneath the shadow.

Without a doubt, among all known beings, this Black Emperor is the symbol of despair, and He also possesses the most incredible power to control fate, which is quite fitting.

Isn't she the same way?

Having witnessed the rise and fall of dynasties and the changing of the guard, she remained an outsider, with very few kindred spirits she could truly confide in.

Sometimes, sitting on the top of a tall building watching the traffic, I feel like a ghost behind a pane of glass. The liveliness belongs to others, and only when I count the years do I remember that I am still alive.

Over time, when loneliness accumulates to a certain level, it truly solidifies into something tangible. It seems that this gives rise to the ability to see the tributaries of fate and the divergence of world lines, rather than being something one is born with.

This is probably the blood tragedy of high-ranking dragons: the stronger they are, the lonelier they become, and the lonelier they are, the stronger they become.

It is as powerful as a wall that isolates everything, and as lonely as a wall that no one cares about.

It's as if you're shouting at the ends of the earth, your voice tearing through the clouds, only to have all the echoes swept away by the wind. The world ignores you, going about its own joys and sorrows, and slowly turns away.

You try so hard to grasp something, like a falling leaf or a brief greeting, but it all slips through your fingers and vanishes into nothingness.

"So... this is fate! Wherever the door opens, sorrow and bewilderment fill the space, like a fleeting ephemera under the moon, a starry sea rising and falling in a dream, a wooden boat chasing the light in the land of the dead..."

Xia Mi spoke softly, raindrops wetting her hair, her eyes filled with a wistful realization.

"In fact, in a strict, deeper sense, loneliness is not just a simple emotion."

Zhao Qing said calmly, "The derivative that measures it is the product of subjective information entropy and subjective time flow rate in conscious perception. Otherwise, how could it become one of the three primary colors tainted by obsession?"

"When solitude reaches a state similar to 'heat death,' it gives birth to an extreme clarity that is detached from the world, and gains the power to invade reality, enabling one to pry open the cracks and peer into fate."

"Now I understand that the reason I have been unable to grasp the true meaning of destiny is precisely because I have never been truly alone, and I have cut off all ignorance, and all my obsessions are just illusions. I am following a different path of spiritual practice that is completely opposite in direction and fundamentally different."

Just like neutrinos without electric charge, they freely travel between molecules and atoms, but they can never understand the existence of electromagnetic force and can never resonate with or interact with it.

It's not that the level of understanding is insufficient, but rather that the paths taken are different.

Strolling on the beach by the ocean of Tao and Dharma, the creations and ideas of pioneers and the infinite mysteries of the world are as readily available as seashells. How can the heartfelt joy that arises at any moment be covered by loneliness?

"The 'blood sorrow' of hybrids and dragons is a bewildering sense of destiny already predetermined, yet it can also have a reciprocal effect on fate itself. Once trapped in the web woven by fate, unable to break free, one can try to pull it along in the direction one desires..."

Those who bear heavy burdens of fate are often the loneliest. Unlike her, who can leave at any time, casting aside the influence of this world and transcending the five aggregates of karma.

Because he was too "light," almost like a ghost no longer subject to the pull of fate, Zhao Qing, after careful deduction, realized that if he wanted to master this key ability, he had to find another way.

For example, one might substitute one's own will for the will of Heaven, using the inner universe of the six stages of Qi to interfere with the outside world, or one might use the known "heavy ones" to pluck the strings.

This is the way to make good use of external resources and leverage external forces to control the law.

“Speaking of which, I do know a method for measuring the values ​​of loneliness and despair.” Xia Mi was silent for a moment, then suddenly spoke: “Although it is an invisible emotion, it can still be quantified—by using weights made of spiritual elements, it is primitive and effective.”

Deep within the Nibelungen of the BJ subway, Fenrir tamed a weasel into a dealer. Those who stumbled upon the game sat at the poker table, and the more loneliness they felt... the more chips they could win.

If you lose the gamble and use up all your loneliness, you'll have to go back to the subway and endlessly go around in circles.

“Such a pure and polarized obsession can obviously be used as a special kind of energy and resource,” Zhao Qing replied understandingly. “It may be indirectly used by some powerful beings, or even extracted and harvested to be made into weapons for attack.”

"Just like this fragment of cosmic light connected by the 'World Tree Matrix,' and like the sorrow of blood flowing in the heart of every dragon and hybrid, the loneliness and other things they contain and produce may be taken away silently, like taxes, and returned to the origin."

One is the convergence and merging of spacetime bubbles, and the other is the return of those with special constitutions to the origin of heaven and earth after their passing.

“Alright, let’s focus on the other side,” she paused, then continued, “We just discovered a super giant catfish, about 300 meters long and weighing over 200,000 tons. It’s probably the biggest and most ferocious monster in the Arctic hatchery, at the highest trophic level in the local food chain…”

What do you think? What exactly is it?

"What is it?? I don't know... I can't be sure..."

Xia Mi frowned and replied, "I can only say that if we really can't find another powerful being, then this giant catfish should be the Black King Nidhogg... Perhaps it ate too much seafood, and when its genes were replenished, there was a lot of fish in it, which is why it turned out like this."

"He's really ugly," Zhao Qing objectively commented. "Compared to the 'previous generation' you remember, he's a deformed monster."

Although she lost many memories, Xia Mi could never forget the image of Nidhogg sitting high on the snow mountain throne, so great and magnificent, like an incomparable eternal god.

"Bone tentacles, two rows of compound eyes, flying fish-like fins... a combination of traits from many different creatures."

Xia Mi closed her eyes, as if sensing the scene outside the submarine: "For dragons, appearance is not the key, as it can change at any time. Size and strength are the key points—at least apart from the four monarchs of the super-evolved form, even ordinary first-generation species could not develop such a huge, mountain-like body."

"However, compared to Nidhogg at its peak, it is still much smaller, not reaching a million or ten million tons."

……

Time goes back to two minutes ago.

Shifting the perspective to the outside of the U-boat, this alloy vehicle weighing over 1200 tons has already reached its destination, near a strange sea eye with a complex fractal structure.

As it cautiously circled slowly on the outside, secretly releasing detection instruments and emitting radio signals, after a period of time, suddenly, a huge whirlpool rose from the seabed.

The suction was terrifyingly strong, and countless creatures, along with seawater and glaciers, were swept into the seabed by the whirlpool.

The crimson waves spread out in concentric circles, causing the glacier to tremble, crack, and collapse. Even the submarine, whose power far exceeded that of any conventional creature, could not resist it and was pulled from several kilometers away to within a few hundred meters, about to be trapped in the central vortex of water.

So Zhao Qing made his move.

Considering there was no need for a direct confrontation, she simply penetrated the bulkhead, moved outside the submarine, and magnified the mirror puppet several dozen times in proportion, blocking its path. This caused the latter to instantly break free from the suction force and continue slamming into her palm due to inertia. The stress wave reversed, offsetting the momentum. Seemingly having not seen such a large, high-end prey in a long time, and dissatisfied with the submarine being intercepted, a huge column of dust rose from the seabed. These were soft tentacles covered with bone and dragon scales, concealing writhing mouthparts within, coiling towards its midsection.

This thing was clearly not as bizarre as the previous sea serpent. A single tentacle was comparable in size to a submarine, and its "teeth" were certainly much more powerful. So the quadruple 37mm anti-aircraft guns opened fire decisively. Of course, it was just a disguise on the surface. In fact, it was firing miniature alchemical torpedoes, all in supercavitation mode.

Boom boom boom!
After several rounds of precise firing, the tentacles were only slightly repelled—no, actually the submarine was moved away slightly by the recoil—it was almost undetectable that they were affected, and there was not a single scratch on them, not even the texture of the dragon scales.

You know, this thing could have wiped out a cruiser in an instant! But it didn't even scratch the surface of the enemy!

During this period, it did not exhibit any changes in its incantation or elemental manipulation; it simply endured the attack.

It simply overwhelmed the opponent with its superior material strength, completely ignoring the spinning and cutting effect of the supercavitating torpedo and alchemical shrapnel.

"Take this!" Facing a formidable foe, Zhao Qing had no more hesitation and immediately launched a preemptive attack, aiming directly at its optimal point of impact.

She raised her hand, her five fingers loosely clenched, and two intersecting dark cracks naturally appeared in her palm, like ice being suddenly shaken by extreme cold, silently spitting out a cross-shaped darkness. The silvery, jagged crystal patterns flashed by, but extended to more than a thousand meters away, drawing out a magnificent brilliance.

With a hissing sound, the tentacles that were wrapping around the submarine suddenly broke in two, and dark red blood droplets, like molten iron, splattered out, spraying out like an inverted waterfall of crimson blood, which quickly dispersed into a thick mist, making the surrounding seawater scald.

Fine white ash floats in the mist; it is the remains of scales and bones that have been instantly vaporized.

A low roar came from the seabed, like millions of whales choking on water at the same time, or like a mountain collapsing in its chest. The sound waves, carrying sand and blood mist, twisted the entire surrounding sea into a giant drum.

The submarine was jolted and bounced up, its keel emitting a trembling sound as if a string was about to break.

The flower-like appendages on the seabed trembled violently, and the tiny sea worms hidden in their roots scattered and fled.

The expected counterattack did not come. The remaining tentacles just waved wildly a few times before slowly retracting into the depths of the vortex, and even the waves they stirred up weakened.

Zhao Qing lowered his gaze and understood the other party's true nature from this action: the roar was not anger, but rather like a giant beast being disturbed in its sleep, grumbling with a damp drowsiness.

"It simply feeds instinctively, periodically devouring nearby dragon subspecies, silently developing and growing..."

Xia Mi sighed and transmitted her voice: "This... it can't even be considered a juvenile, it's just an embryonic form. It seems that it hasn't even awakened its consciousness yet, it only has brute strength, unparalleled physique, and the most basic habits of a young beast..."

In their perception, the severed tentacle was still twitching, the rings of sharp teeth in its mouth were unconsciously snapping together, and the scales were opening and closing, propelling the water flow, yet it couldn't even find the right direction to approach the mirror puppet.

The whirlpool gradually closed, the water walls making a sticky, sucking sound as they closed, like a giant tongue licking the bottom of a bowl. Soon, only slow ripples remained on the surface of the sea, shimmering with broken ice, as if nothing had happened.

The submarine's propeller started spinning on its own, and it sailed away in reverse.

"In the Northern Sea there is a fish, its name is Kun." Xiao Shi said to liven up the atmosphere, "Young Kun can transform into Peng, and I believe that the catfish in the Arctic also has such potential and can be upgraded to a giant dragon."

"But this process can't be completed overnight, can it?"

Zhao Qing sighed softly: "Even though I have confirmed its size and estimated its power to be at least over a billion tons, with an unknown upper limit, by using the vortex and the subsequent shockwave, it is almost impossible to fully exert its power due to the limitations of the surrounding materials, and it is very easy to miss."

"This... is really unworthy of the title of the ultimate BOSS."

To put it simply, it's like a monster with the strength of ten thousand tons. When he stands on the ground and wants to unleash a full-force attack, he finds that the ground beneath his feet may not even be able to bear a thousand tons of weight. Before he can even throw a punch, he will break through the rock and sink into the ground, and his energy will be wasted and dissipated to a great extent.

An attack with a force on the order of billions of tons would instantly pulverize any ordinary matter it touches, leaving it with nowhere to land, much like a fluid environment lacking stable support.

Similarly, the power of a punch thrown in water is nowhere near that of a person standing firmly on land, and it would be much weaker if the person were suspended in weightless air.

"Although it is said that the battle between kings can only end with bloodshed, without the mastery of elements as a foundation and the constant manipulation of intricate force fields, it is ultimately just a whale trapped in shallow waters within the cage of reality, possessing the potential to destroy the world but unable to unleash even a fraction of it," she concluded.

Xiao Shi found a photocopy of a giant oil painting, an essential item in the orientation course for new students at Kassel College: a prophetic image of "Ragnarok," in which someone glimpsed a corner of the future through a psychic vision and commissioned a top painter to depict it.

Beneath a sky a mix of iron blue and flames, a single giant tree stood, its withered branches stretching in all directions, weaving a dense net to support the cracked heavens.

The wasteland was littered with withered bones, and a black behemoth rose from the depths of the bone pile, its wings covered with skulls. After spreading its huge membranous wings, it looked up and spewed black flames to the sky.

This painting is indeed very close to the reality.

The dark blue color is the background of the current aurora skirt.

The flames correspond to the divine punishment created by the explosive combustion of red mercury.

The World Tree has begun to appear, revealing its magnificent form.

The wasteland also has its own interpretation, and its location has been found—the land that was once beneath the White Moon.

The origin of the skeletons was also reasonably explained—the countless Valhalla warriors who charged to their deaths and sacrificed themselves.

The pieces of the puzzle gradually came together, and a massive project costing billions of dollars was launched one by one, creating an unprecedented defense line.

But no one expected that Nidhogg, the absolute "protagonist" of the entire apocalyptic event, would inexplicably transform into a catfish-shaped embryo? It just doesn't make sense!

……

Zhao Qing raised his eyes, reached out and drew a straight sword beam towards the sky. It lingered for several breaths, then remained still. He watched as the rain curtain closed again in the distance, like a thick velvet curtain drawn in a theater.

Could it be that all our efforts and preparations over such a long period of time, made with one heart and one mind, were in vain and nothing but needless worry?

She quickly composed herself. After all, the catfish monster might just be a sophisticated disguise, and no one knew if it could suddenly upgrade, mutate, and transform into the Lord of Despair.

Instead of dwelling on our doubts, let's focus on implementing the four strategies first, just in case. We can also think of another way to test the waters.

The group discussed for a while, and although they all felt disappointed and empty, they decided to stick to a conservative strategy and wait until Christmas Day before making a real move against the catfish and cutting it hard.

During this period of uncertainty and anxious waiting, several minor and major events occurred at Marston Royal Mechanical Academy.

……

Night, at the church. (End of Chapter)