Transformed into the leader of an esoteric sect in Japan

Chapter 145, Section 147: A Lost History Recreated

Kurosawa Shizuki struggled to climb the collapsed ruins of the Shedding Club using the tentacles formed from black matter. Along the way, there were scenes of collapse and destruction everywhere. Vines, dead trees, and fungal carpets that resembled woodland had somehow covered the Shedding Club. Everywhere, there were collapsed altars of the Shindai-kai, dying Shindai-kai followers, and cracked murals of Mizusenko.

Of course, the Black Sun Cult's legions were also engaged in a relentless battle with the Thunder Warriors and fanatics of the Divine Age Society. The Black Sun Cult's legion lines clashed head-on with the Divine Age Society's chaotic demonic dance. Black flames and fluttering wings rose and fell, and the sounds of flesh being scorched and wings being torn apart could be heard everywhere. The two cults began to fight each other to the death, but the balance of power was gradually shifting to the Black Sun Cult's side, because the Divine Age Society was not only enduring the Black Sun Cult's offensive.

On the other side of the spirit field of the Shindai-kai, fully armed agents from the Anti-Suppression Bureau had also entered the fray. At the same time, various "insect-killing weapons" combining modern technology and secret techniques were able to carry out a massacre of Shindai-kai members with extreme efficiency. One after another, mechanical armors that shone with spiritual light spewed out scorching steam, crushing the wailing Shindai-kai followers row by row as if mowing grass.

It seems that the Black Sun Cult and the Anti-Suppression Bureau had indeed reached an agreement beforehand. The two attacked the Shedding Club from different directions. Despite being sworn enemies, the cult and the Anti-Suppression Bureau had not had any conflict. Both sides had their sights set on the God Generation Society, maintaining a rare restraint and compromise.

Both sides understood that this operation was merely a rehearsal for the future war. As long as the true form of the god-descended Mist Spring Child was not destroyed, even if all the minions of the God Generation Society were wiped out, the single god Mist Spring Child would be enough to raze the entire Heijō to the ground.

Kurosawa Shizuki was very clear that there were still missions in this war that only she could accomplish.

She walked toward the most dangerous battlefield. The battle between the King of Blazing Sun and Mu Zi was nearing its end. Mu Zi, whose personality and divinity had been split, had finally reunited as one. The fifth Chosen One was still successfully devoured by Wu Quan Zi. The King of Blazing Sun's incomplete power was no longer enough to suppress Mu Zi. Mu Zi, with her tiny body, fought against the King of Blazing Sun, who was as magnificent as heaven and earth, but it produced an extremely impactful effect.

Kurosawa Shizuki felt that the current Kuroko could even be called "One-Punch Kuroko".

Crimson mist swirled around Mu Zi. With each punch she threw, the crimson mist condensed into another massive fist, slamming into the Sunfire King's crumbling black body.

Each punch that struck the King of Blaze created countless ripples like water. The King of Blaze was repeatedly defeated by Mu Zi's simple physical attacks. In his agony, the King of Blaze transformed once more into the dragon form that Kurosawa Shizuki had first seen when she first met the King of Blaze. He twisted his body, trying to climb into the clouds to escape, but Mu Zi, with a cold laugh, raised her hand and grabbed him with her five fingers of a giant hand formed from red mist.

Falling violently from the clouds to the mortal realm, the ferocious black dragon's body crushed a row of city buildings. Mu Zi waved her ever-shining white cloak behind her, cleaving through the frail body of the King of Blazing Sun like a blade.

With effortless ease, Muko tore apart the King of Blazing Sun, like a little girl casually destroying a toy she had grown tired of playing with. The King of Blazing Sun's head, adorned with a golden mask, was severed by her and fell limply to Muko's feet.

Mu Zi's eyes were filled with utter coldness and cruelty, devoid of any human emotion. She slowly raised her left hand and gently flicked her finger across the golden mask of the King of Blaze.

The indestructible golden mask, in the blink of an eye, hundreds of cracks appeared. The next second, the mask collapsed and shattered, revealing a black head behind it that had no facial features, only a bottomless black hole.

Muko reached into the black hole and pulled out a thin, middle-aged man who appeared to be Asakura Yuki's father from the body of the King of Blazing Sun. The middle-aged man was naked like an infant, but covered in a sticky black substance that was forever burning with flames. Muko sat astride the middle-aged man, seemingly not yet satisfied, and continued to punch the middle-aged man's face hard, smashing it until the face was completely unrecognizable.

Muko was completely unaware that Kurosawa Shizuki had arrived nearby, hiding behind the ruins and observing her. Muko seemed to have completely lost her senses, obsessed with simple battles and killings, with only the desire to completely obliterate the King of Blazing Sun in her heart. The King of Blazing Sun truly deserved his status as an immortal being; even in this state, he could still stubbornly and tenaciously maintain the flame of life that could be extinguished at any moment. Muko didn't seem to understand that such physical attacks alone could not completely end the King of Blazing Sun; perhaps she was simply enjoying the King of Blazing Sun's pain.

Only in the midst of the suffering of others can the eternal torment she herself endures be somewhat lessened.

As Kurosawa Shizuki watched the fierce battle between Muko and the King of Blazing Sun, she vaguely felt another figure silently appear around her.

The shadow girl reappeared, gazing at Muko's retreating figure with the same gloomy eyes:

"You know what to do next, right?"

"Do I need to weave a more beautiful dream for Muko? A dream that is more beautiful and more real than the woodland? Using this... power of false history?" Kurosawa Shizuki answered uncertainly.

Not long ago, Shizuki Kurosawa witnessed firsthand how beautiful, cruel, and powerful the so-called false history is.

False history, as the name suggests, is another hypothetical history constructed at existing historical junctures by burning the threads of time. What if someone had lost a war? What if someone who should have died had continued to live?

“That’s right. You need to create a new false history. In order to be able to bewitch the existence of divine beings, this false history needs to be infinitely close to multiple histories.”

History is destined to be composed of countless divergences and choices, but the infinite possibilities will eventually converge into a single history. If the gods are not satisfied with history, they can forcibly construct a new history at the divergence points of history. This is how multiple histories are born. Different branches of history run parallel without conflict, while also permeating each other.

"But given my status, is it really possible for me to create an existence that approaches multiple histories?"

"You already have the key to change everything. Creating multiple histories is not difficult, as long as you have a 'guide' who can weave 'history'."

However, people without divine status cannot compile multiple histories. Mortals can only "fictionalize" and "hypothesize" the course of history. The history they create is, of course, "false" and a "lie." Therefore, unlike multiple histories, which can expand and weave entirely new stories on their own, they need to be constantly injected with time to maintain them.

Those beings who act as the bearers of key historical divergences are called the "guides" of multiple histories. By changing the course of history, they can ascend to higher levels of virtue and status. This is the path to immortality pursued by the Secret History Order. However, once these masters of history perish, the multiple histories will also become castles in the air and collapse.

"Who can act as a guide? Who is qualified to be a guide? How many guides are needed?" Kurosawa Shizuki asked in fear. Could she really have woven a false history that could bewitch the gods?

False histories also have their own "guides," but compared to the singularity of multiple histories, most of the guides of false histories are almost unable to maintain an independent will. They slowly lose their minds under the erosion of history, some falling into madness, some becoming obsessed, and some turning into non-human beings.

Kurosawa Shizuki and Asakura Yuki once witnessed how the three "guides" of the forest met their ultimate demise. If the forest fairy, the pillar hermit, and the centipede sage had not perished in the forest, the forest would never have collapsed, and the little girl with the same name "Muko" hidden deep in the forest would never have been freed from this prison.

The boundary between false history and multiple histories is not so clear. Under certain circumstances, the two can transform into each other. For example, if the guide of the false history of the woodland becomes Wuquanzi himself, then Wuquanzi, as a deity, may guide this false history into multiple histories, or even truly ascend to a definite "single history".

Kurosawa Shizuki absolutely cannot allow this to happen, because Kirie's rebirth means her own destruction. She is also one of the chosen ones, a sacrifice chosen by Kirie. In the new multiple histories that may be born in the future, she will also forever suffer as a "guide," leading the divergence of history toward the direction Kirie hopes for.

“Muko herself is the most powerful guide. Kirie’s memories have begun to erode her consciousness. All we need to do is capture fragments of Kirie’s consciousness and use these fragments to recreate the history of the vanished Age of Gods.” The shadow girl said with a smile, “You can see it, right? We can see it, and we can understand it.”

"Just like your memories, they are also eroding me, aren't they?" Kurosawa Shizuki's expression became increasingly dazed, and in her eyes, the silhouette of the shadow girl became more and more blurred.

"Why call it 'erosion'? We're just remembering things we've long forgotten." The shadow girl whispered almost into Kurosawa Shizuki's ear.

As Kurosawa Shizuki drew closer to Kureko's back, nearing the pale cloak that seemed to be burning behind Kureko, she began to experience various strange hallucinations. As she continued to devour the chosen ones, Kirieko's will began to erode Kureko's increasingly insignificant existence. However, compared to Kureko, who was once a mortal, Kirieko's will was far too immense, and eventually fragments of her memories would leak out and be read by Kurosawa Shizuki. Kurosawa Shizuki possessed eyes similar to her great enemy, and her memories were etched into the past, which she could also understand in the present.

In the distant past, before the birth of humankind, a moth clung to an ancient tree covered in pustules. She drank the tree's sweet sap, underwent seven transformations, and grew entirely new purple wings.

In an even more distant era, two high-ranking gods escaped the Netherworld and walked among humans as maidens. Unable to bear the suffering of all living beings from the eternal sun, they together shattered the scorching sun into pieces and forged a new pact with humankind.

On the brutal execution ground, a black-haired girl was nailed high to a cross by worms. Her beautiful wings were torn off while she was still alive. Countless worms gnawed at her remains with a mixture of joy and hatred. She died in eternal hatred because the person who had made a pact with her never came back to keep the promise.

"Which memory should we use to fabricate a false history?" Although what they witnessed was only the tip of the iceberg of Kirie's memories, it was still too vast and terrifying for Kurosawa Shizuki, and for a moment Kurosawa Shizuki even had the illusion of being lost in it.

Kurosawa Shizuki remembers that the Quadruple Technology in the game is developing a machine called "animus" that can trace multiple histories through the power of the Secret History Order. If the Quadruple Technology were to obtain the memories of Kirie Izumi that she is currently reading, how many secrets, myths, and truths could the Quadruple Technology read through the animus?

"Of course, it's the period of history that Kirie most wanted to change, most yearned to relive, and most regretted. In that flawed era, she was betrayed and abandoned by her most trusted companions, expelled from the realm of the gods, and executed by the very people she once protected. Only by reliving this history can we truly delve into Kirie's heart and leave an indelible scar there." The shadow girl stood behind Kurosawa Shizuki, gently pushing her forward.

It seems that the original owner knew about this fate long ago, and therefore she had been making corresponding arrangements for the birth of Wuquanzi. The original owner prepared a very exciting drama for the complete demise of Wuquanzi, even if the price of this drama was the demise of her own existence.

Kurosawa Shizuki understood that, just like the compiler who created the forest in the painting within a painting, she also needed to create a false history today. In this false history, none of the tragedies had ever happened, and the course of the story would be rewritten, even if it was just a false dream. But as long as Kuriko, or rather Kirieko, was willing to believe it, it would have an effect.

Only by ensnaring Kirie in the illusion of a false history can Kurosawa Shizuki have the opportunity to seize upon Kirie's fleeting weakness and magnify it into a fatal flaw, like Achilles' heel.

It was like traveling through time and space. Kurosawa Shizuki was directly pushed into the deepest part of Kirie's memory, into the history that she could never forget. At the same time, the time threads stored in Kurosawa Shizuki's body, which originated from the Pillar Hermit, began to burn wildly without regard to cost. Every second, at least one year of false time was burned away.

However, it was as if a long-forgotten history had truly reappeared. The next moment, Kurosawa Shizuki stood on the white marble square, the ground covered with torn wings, and black snow falling from the sky. Around the square, countless worms wearing beast masks turned around and looked at her with malicious eyes.

The girl, whose identity was indistinguishable from that of Muko or Kirie, had hair that was half deep black and half pale white. Her messy hair was also covered with black grime and snow. Her naked body was covered with dark purple crystalline flakes. She stood at the end of the square, under the burning wooden stakes of the cross, and slowly turned her head. Behind her, a white cloak shaped like wings slowly unfolded, as deep as the universe.

Yu Liyan slowly climbed up her ankles, cruelly and greedily licking her dying body.

The girl, staring at Kurosawa Shizuki, let out a howl like a wounded cub: "Sister...why, why did you abandon me?"

P.S., I've fallen into my old habit again; I don't even know if this chapter has explained the plot clearly.

Chapter 146, Section 148: An Incurable Wound

Kurosawa Shizuki embraced "Muko," feeling the surging power within the child in her arms, more powerful than the ocean tide. It was as if she were holding a ferocious beast ready to devour her at any moment. Her body stiffened, and she realized that she was now standing on the edge of an abyss, where the slightest mistake would lead to utter destruction.

However, "Muko" seemed completely oblivious to anything amiss, only letting out childlike sobs. "Muko" trembled in Kurosawa Shizuki's arms. On the pristine marble plaza, layers of black snow, resembling cinders, piled up. The masked nobles whispered among themselves, their voices inhuman, as they looked at Kurosawa Shizuki and "Muko" with ill intent.

The shadow girl stood between Kurosawa Shizuki and Muko. Her form was so distant, blurry, and unreal, like an illusion emerging from flames, a constantly shifting fire, fleeting and ephemeral.

"Sister, why is your body so cold? There is an inextinguishable flame burning inside you..." Mu Zi's hazy eyes glistened with tears as she carefully examined Kurosawa Shizuki, the emotions in her eyes both familiar and strange.

Kurosawa Shizuki did indeed feel a chill, an unprecedented chill. With this awkward and unexpected embrace, she came into contact with Yuri Yan. However, this sacred flame originating from the King of Yang Yan only brought a bone-chilling cold to Kurosawa Shizuki. The icy flame had no warmth whatsoever, yet it made Kurosawa Shizuki feel as if she were touching death itself.

The smiling shadow girl, her body also engulfed in flames, yet she continued to smile. Her beautiful, youthful face twisted into charred remains in the flames, but she seemed to feel no pain whatsoever; bathing in the flames was an unparalleled pleasure for her.

Kurosawa Shizuki couldn't even confirm whether this shadow girl was the same shadow girl she knew... Was the shadow girl really just a remnant of the original owner, as she usually assumed? Why did Kurosawa Shizuki feel that the current shadow girl seemed to be possessed by some larger and more terrifying being, residing within the shadow girl's body and speaking through the shadow girl's mouth?

What exactly is that has been lurking within Kurosawa Shizuki's body all along?

Countless masked nobles gathered from all around the square, emitting sharp curses. Although this was merely a fabricated illusion in a false history, once fragments of memory from an existence at Mu Zi's level were mixed into the illusion, even a false illusion would possess real power. Beneath each noble's mask was a hidden worm, each worm possessing a status comparable to a god. Even now, as only a remnant image remained, its aura was still no weaker than that of the centipede sage.

“Because my flames will not burn those I love, what I want to destroy is only that unchanging old world,” the shadowy girl’s phantom appeared behind Kureko, speaking slowly, while Kurosawa Shizuki’s mouth involuntarily responded almost perfectly in sync with the shadowy girl’s lip movements, “Change… comes with the flames. We will all follow change.”

Kurosawa Shizuki realized that the people communicating now were not Kureko and Kurosawa Shizuki, but two ghosts who should have disappeared from this world long ago.

In the vast, white square, amidst the black snow, the temperature suddenly soared, as if a bleeding sun had fallen to earth. All the worms screamed in agony in the black flames, which rose layer by layer, instantly engulfing them and turning them to ashes. It was as if countless invisible hammers were striking and smashing them a thousand times, deforming and annihilating all the worms in the flames.

"Change, the change you promised, sister, when will we finally see it? Last time, even until I died, I couldn't see any hope of change." Mu Zi's big eyes were filled with fear and confusion.

"Of course you won't see it, my dear..." Kurosawa Shizuki's smile grew increasingly sinister, her embrace devoid of warmth, only chilling to the bone, "because from the very beginning, you were destined never to return to your homeland."

"Sister...you, what did you say?" Mu Zi's eyes widened, the light in her eyes suddenly froze, and her body stiffened.

"It's impossible for everyone to get what they want. If you want to get something, you have to sacrifice something. Our hometown can't accommodate everyone. Otherwise, why do you think we were banished here?" Kurosawa Shizuki's voice was extremely cold. As she spoke, the shadow girl was manipulating Kurosawa Shizuki's body to hand something to Muko's arms.

"So that's how it is..." A look of relief appeared on Mu Zi's face. "So I was abandoned a long time ago. But if that's the case, is there any hope for everyone?"

“If everyone had been saved, you wouldn’t have come back, and I wouldn’t be standing here continuing what we didn’t finish,” a dark blue gloom appeared in Kurosawa Shizuki’s eyes. “We who betrayed you have also been betrayed by another despicable fellow.”

The object appeared out of nowhere and was unexpectedly grasped in Kurosawa Shizuki's left palm. Yet, it felt incredibly familiar to her; its cold, rough texture contained the deep chill of death.

In a distant era, there existed a city in the far north, where a guardian of order fell into eternal slumber. A barber used a pair of scissors to first cut off his hair, then his fingers, and finally everything else.

Mu Zi clutched her chest, but couldn't dispel the chill in the slightest, for it had seeped deep into her bones. There was an unhealed scar on her body. In the woods, Jin Zhi had first pierced the scar, opening a tiny crack. And now, something else had pierced the scar a second time.

The fact that the same person reopened Mu Zi's scars both times is perhaps fate?

Muko slowly retreated step by step, leaving Kurosawa Shizuki's cold embrace. Dark blood dripped onto the ground as she retreated. She lowered her head expressionlessly, but dark red tears welled up in the corners of her eyes.

Muko saw a pair of scissors covered in verdigris, held in Kurosawa Shizuki's hand with a smile. Kurosawa Shizuki's fingers passed through her finger ring, and the moving and stationary blades of the scissors were like the upper and lower jaws of a wild beast, constantly snapping together.

"How... is this possible? These scissors should have been destroyed by now!" Mu Zi's voice trembled, and fear appeared on her face for the first time.

“Do you remember where we are now? Since everything is fake, anything is possible,” Kurosawa Shizuki walked step by step toward Muko. With each scissor scissor scissors closing, Muko’s long hair, which was growing continuously at the back of her head and was half black and half white, was cut off in half. “We don’t need that real pair of scissors. We just need you to believe that it is that pair of scissors.”

Illusion and reality can transform into each other, especially within a constructed false history. Relying on Muko's own fragmented memories, she summons out the scissors that should have been forever lost in multiple histories, recreating the process of killing the guardian back then, turning a healable scar into an incurable one.

Use the fear of the mist spring to erase the mist spring's immortality.

Mu Zi's long hair kept growing and breaking. She looked down at her outstretched fingers, her nails curling and breaking, with excruciating pain rising and falling. Then her fingers were cut off at the root, and each finger that fell to the ground transformed into a fluttering moth.

Countless moths, in a bizarre turn of events, rose from the surrounding black snow and swarmed toward Mu Zi, frantically gnawing at her face, limbs, cloak, and wings.

Kurosawa Shizuki held the rusty scissors upside down and plunged them deep into Muko's heart.

The pristine white marble plaza was now covered in black snow, which blanketed Muko's body. The entire world sank into an unfathomable darkness. Kurosawa Shizuki stood before Muko, who was covered in blood, her face disfigured, and still being devoured by countless insects. Kurosawa Shizuki's hair was also covered in snow that looked like coal dust.

The waning sun rose behind Kurosawa Shizuki's slender body, and the shadow girl stood behind her, her figure gradually disappearing into nothingness.

"Sister, you don't really think you can kill me in a dream with an imaginary pair of scissors, do you?" Mu Zi laughed weakly in the darkness, her body crumbling inch by inch. "I will not die until I return to the world and truly begin my revenge. No matter how many times it happens, I will come back. I will definitely take revenge on you, on everyone."

“That’s right, your return is a destiny written in this chapter of history,” Kurosawa Shizuki said. “But at least after your rebirth, you can be killed because I have etched an incurable wound in your heart.”

The scars of betrayal never heal.

The false history collapsed completely at the end of time and space. Everything that happened in this square that had long since vanished was nothing more than the most insignificant thread in the endless radiant threads of history.

But it could potentially change the course of everything.

P.S., I'm going crazy, I'm really going crazy! Why is this section so hard to write? Damn it. I can only manage a few hundred words a day…

Chapter 147, Section 149: The Tumultuous Night Ends