Humans are in chaos, despicable outsiders.

"...Ouch, this is really going to collapse! Hey! Let go of each other!"

"it is good--"

The room returned to its original state; the golden twig patterns were gone, the deep, dark space was gone, and the signs of aging and decay had vanished.

"Tsk tsk... As expected of the Tree of Imaginary Numbers, directly wielding authority from the tree. You are the most outrageous human I have ever seen... No, are you really human? You didn't even pay any price...?"

"Likewise, my Lord Jiuxiao, you were just toying with time... If that archbishop found out, he'd probably slide tackle you to his knees."

"Forget it. Manipulating time doesn't mean resurrection, and simply rewinding is meaningless... If the anchor of the predetermined events isn't removed, it will only disappoint that guy once again."

"Alright... let me formally introduce myself—"

"I am Penglai Temple's Nine Heavens. Just as you guessed, I come from a universe similar to this one, where anti-entropy, destiny, and collapse are all present. In the end—I am no longer the savior."

"In my home universe, as it came to an end, at the moment when time and space shrunk to a single point, and paradoxes intertwined and twisted into a knot, a collection of desires and consciousness was reborn there—"

"I understand, Mommy loves me!"

"Hurry up and climb... Being your mother might shorten your lifespan!"

"By the way... as our home universe comes to an end... you wouldn't be tens of thousands of years old by now, would you?"

"Shut up! You shameless blondie!"

"Anyway, it's your turn!" Jiuxiao looked at the blonde girl in front of him with a bit of a huff.

"I don't know!" *A voice utterly self-righteous

"Huh?" Penglai Temple Nine Heavens looked at the blonde girl in front of her with a "you're kidding me" expression.

"I only remember that this power has accompanied me as I've grown since I can remember. At first, I could only reflect a sapling, but as I gradually grew, it slowly transformed into the World Tree you saw in Changkong City."

"...To be precise, that's the Imaginary Tree. Herrschers are born from Honkai, and Honkai originates from the Imaginary Tree. That's why you were able to suppress that Herrscher instantly and why your attitude towards her was so terrible."

"—Rank has its own way of crushing you, and besides, there's a company rule that subordinates aren't allowed to kiss their superiors on the lips," Jiu Xiao explained for Snow.

"Is it alright...?"

--

.......

"Hmm... I see a glimmer of hope in you."

"What hope?"

"The hope of resurrection, through your power, allows us to uproot the anchor of what is destined to happen from the tree and resurrect one of my friends."

"Let me guess, that little Sirin? But a Herrscher can be resurrected through the core, right... Herrschers are much easier to bring back from the dead than ordinary people."

"Assuming her Herrscher core is still intact... that child... the last fragment of her soul lies dormant in that Kiana Kaslana clone... that's why I'm here on this leaf."

"I came here following fragments of her past..."

"And will you become my companion?" Jiuxiao looked at the blonde girl with some anticipation.

"Hmm, I can't seem to find a reason to refuse," Snow shrugged.

"I definitely won't take advantage of you for free. Count me in when you're pinning your scumbag father against the wall and beating him up."

"How did you know... you were spying on me just now?!"

"Time travel? That's not spying! Ouch—! Don't pull my hair, it's going to fall out!!!"

A small alliance was formed between the two in a small room at St. Freya Academy.

--

Chapter Fifteen: Debate

"Speaking of which, you didn't even ask me to help you see your future. Who exactly is your father?"

"I bet you can't see it, otherwise you would have come and gloated in my face already."

"Tch... indeed, we can't see it. The interference from the Imaginary Tree is too great. The past, which is slightly further ahead, is manageable, but the future, even the next second, is a blurry, unlocatable axis."

"Oh, right, Himeko said I'll be sharing a room with you from now on."

With some time still to go before lunch, the two girls, one dressed in gold and the other in purple, chatted idly as they tidied the room.

This is a standard double room; it's not large, but it's not small either. Running around and playing in the room isn't a problem. Of course, neither of the two occupants seem to be particularly keen on this.

The temperature at St. Freya Academy in March wasn't particularly high, hovering between five and six degrees Celsius. Cashmere carpets covered the room's floor, and the temperature was just right for walking barefoot.

"Phew—it's almost done cleaning up," Jiu Xiao sighed, looking at the other half of the room that had been abandoned due to being uninhabited.

After hanging the screen and projector on the wall and ceiling, Jiu Xiao connected the projector's signal to the computer next to him.

A simple basic framework of the plan was projected onto the screen.

"Let's take a look. There's still some time before lunch, so let's refine this plan framework in some initial stages."

"First, we need to exchange the intelligence we currently have."

"First, there's our protagonist, a Herrscher clone combining Kiana Kaslana's genes and this world's Sirin genes, K423."

"There are currently three consciousnesses within her."

"—What we see so far, the consciousness that usually operates before us as Sirin's benevolent side; and the evil consciousness of Sirin, the Second Herrscher of this era, hidden in her dreams; and finally—the soul fragment of Sirin from another world, whom we will temporarily call Little Sirin, the target we are trying to resurrect."

"Our biggest challenge lies in ensuring that, unlike in this era, both Sirin's good and evil consciousness can remain active in this body." (⑥8 3,7,.02 !9 ,9!5)

"Little Sirin is completely inactive. If good is like a normal disk sector, then evil is the hidden, unpartitioned portion within it."

"So our target is the damaged sector, the one whose damaged portion cannot be read even by a body specially crafted for a Herrscher."

"Even if... data does exist in that sector, our most important goal is to reawaken her consciousness; this is the core foundation of the entire plan."

"Little Sirin must undergo the resurrection ritual while her consciousness is awakened—"

“Otherwise, we’ll just end up with a vegetable, right?” Snow pointed out the crux of the problem.

"Of course, a person in a vegetative state."

"Perhaps we can use Feather Dust..."

"The Key of God is indeed a good method, but, Snow, our goal is not a complete soul consciousness."

"This is the last remaining fragment of her consciousness. No matter how much control the Divine Key exerts, it is still too brutal for a mere fragment."

“We need a true Herrscher, a controllable Herrscher of Consciousness, and we must ensure that in this generation, the consciousness of Sirin, representing the evil side, dies.”

A brief silence fell over the room. To extinguish one of the three consciousnesses within a person without harming the other two—such an operation was unheard of before.

The means to destroy consciousness do indeed exist. On the battlefield of the Second Honkai Impact 14 years ago, if it weren't for the so-called god blocking a fatal sword for the Second Herrscher, there is no doubt that the Second Herrscher's self-consciousness would have been mercilessly shattered by the Void Sword God.

"...The Great Void Sword God? No... using something like that to chop people is fine... but we need to perform precise consciousness excision, we can't possibly use a cleaver to perform surgery." Jiu Xiao muttered under his breath and shook his head.

Recreating the miracle of the First Herrscher? Snow thought dangerously that the myth forged by the will of 300,000 ordinary people, if guided and adjusted to impact the consciousness of evil... no, with a little guidance, it might even awaken the consciousness of the target...

"Cough cough cough, stop your dangerous thoughts," Jiu Xiao seemed to have seen through something and interrupted the blonde girl's daydreaming.

"Let's set aside the fact that we recruited over 300,000 people from somewhere, then used methods comparable to brainwashing to manipulate their thinking, and then wiped them out in one fell swoop..."

"If we do this, not only will we make enemies of the whole world, but little Sirin won't agree either!"

"...This is the safest method. Whether it's 300,000 people or the means of wiping them out, it's insignificant in this civilization filled with suffering...The only difficulty is how to guide their thinking...The Herald of Knowledge might be a good choice." Snow raised an eyebrow in dissatisfaction.

"...You bastard! Think of a normal way! What kind of new Otto are you?!" Jiu Xiao glared at the pouting girl, then pushed the blonde girl down onto the bed, grabbing her cheeks with both hands.

"Ku...Fang Kai Wu...!" The girl, whose cheeks were being pulled, protested incoherently.

Seemingly having had enough of pinching and squeezing, Jiu Xiao finally released her hands from Snow's cheeks, letting the blonde girl rub her ravaged face. However, the purple-haired girl's lecture didn't stop at all.

"Even if I, the Nine Heavens of Penglai Temple, have not been the savior of the world for many years, I will still 1000% disagree with your method of sacrificing others to achieve your own goals!"

"...Foolishness. The quality of the process is ultimately just an embellishment; the most important thing is achieving the goal."

"..." Jiuxiao fell silent, then spoke again.

"You care about the people around you, even if they only have the simplest connection with you, you're willing to go all out, right?" Jiu Xiao looked at the girl in front of him.

Indeed.

"So you can comfortably manipulate, control... and trample on everything that has nothing to do with you or your friends?"

Indeed—

“How cruel, Snow—you are in some ways a worse guy than Otto Apocalypse, at least he had some awareness of being a villain.”

"And you—you're like a child playing with their beloved building blocks, and when they wear out, they just take the blocks off from the less important toys around them..."

"—Go and attach it to your most beloved toy, then discard the unimportant building blocks once again..."

"But this is highly efficient—"

"You bastard...!"

"Aren't you tired?" The blue-eyed girl calmly looked at the purple-haired girl before her, and the blonde girl asked a seemingly unrelated question.

".....What?"

"Having traversed countless worlds, searching for the dawn of life, yet bound by self-imposed limitations, you still yearn to hold up that glimmer of light—traveler, aren't you tired?"

The argument in the room fell silent again after the blonde girl's questioning. Jiu Xiao looked at the blonde girl still lying on the bed beneath him, placed his hands on her shoulders, and looked intently at his companion with his amethyst-like eyes.

"Then, this is the first lesson from the Savior, Lord Nine Heavens—Little Snow, please remember it well..."

"...Perhaps the journey will accumulate pain, but this does not mean that there is only suffering. The so-called 'pilgrimage' is the arduous journey of the saints, but also the glorious brilliance of their faith—"

"If you abandon all your bottom lines and principles—even if you hold that glimmer of light in your palm, it will slip away in an instant..."

"Efficiency is worthless and meaningless in the face of some things."

Silence enveloped the room once more, until the sound of the door opening broke the stillness between the two.

"Jiuxiao, Snow, it's time to eat... Excuse me, you two continue." Mei looked at Snow, who was pinned down by Jiuxiao and had his shoulders pressed against her, and their slightly disheveled clothes. Her face turned red, and she quickly closed the door.

"......"

"Wait a minute!...Mei-kun, it's not what you think!" Jiuxiao screamed as he scrambled out of bed and shouted towards the door.

"Jiuxiao, don't explain anymore, I'll keep it a secret for you!"

"Understood... I will reconsider the feasibility of other options," the blonde girl, who had been deep in thought for a long time, said earnestly to Jiuxiao, who was shouting outside the door.