"Take this! Grasp of Taixuan!!"
Without the slightest hesitation, Senti launched an attack on Fu Hua's frontal armor. Her hands curved into claws with terrifying momentum, as though she intended to crush those bountiful fruits in the very next second.
Compared to Fu Hua's pair of slimes, Senti realized that the ones she had molded for herself were ridiculously low-class. They were merely large, without the slightest trace of beauty beyond that.
Fu Hua's slimes, however, were perfect in both shape and size. They could be called a Best Match for Fu Hua herself, as though this were the figure she had been born to possess.
As expected of the "widely experienced" Elias. He had eaten and seen plenty, accumulating a wealth of experience. His craftsmanship was simply unparalleled!
But...
"Old antique! This is an unorthodox path. You absolutely cannot allow yourself to fall into depravity! What use is this completely useless excess flesh—no, these tumors? They'll only become burdens during battle. Hurry up and let me restore you to your original appearance!"
"I refuse! Besides, Senti, you have no right to say that."
Fu Hua immediately blocked Senti's Grasp of Taixuan.
She guarded her chest with one hand, her eyes brimming with determination. After all, aside from confessing to Elias, this was Immortal Phoenix's other cherished wish, one she had kept hidden for fifty thousand years!
Fu Hua felt that today was truly a joyous day blessed with two wonderful events. Not only had she successfully gotten together with Elias, but she had even obtained the perfect frontal armor she had always dreamed of.
Now she would see who still dared call her the Flat Immortal!
She would use Taixuan Eminence to split that person's head open!
Without the slightest hesitation, Fu Hua activated Artificial Cascade. She had decided that no matter the price, she would protect her chest at all costs!
At this moment, Immortal Phoenix's obsession and determination far surpassed even those of a certain Fool!
She looked as though she had fallen into demonic corruption...
"Tsk, tsk, tsk~ This is bad, Fu Hua. Senti is right this time. You've already strayed onto an evil path."
Elysia joined the battle with an equally grave expression.
As she gazed at the pair of headlights on Fu Hua's chest, the pink elf found them perfect, yet they also filled her with an indescribable sense of wrongness, as though something that could never possibly happen had somehow occurred.
This was an aberration!
A fantasy that should never have existed!
As a Flame-Chaser bearing the Signet of [Ego], Elysia declared that she absolutely could not stand idly by!!
(The most important thing is that Fu Hua is simply too destructive like this. No, no! Fu Hua is supposed to be flat. That is the law of the universe. That is the truth!)
Rumble—!!
Rumble—!!
Two peals of thunder rang through the clear sky, and the weather, which had been perfectly pleasant moments ago, suddenly became shrouded in dark clouds.
It was as though the Heavenly Dao had discovered someone committing an act that defied the natural order and intended to send down divine tribulation lightning to execute her.
Immortal Phoenix, however, declared that she was not afraid.
"I don't care! Today, I will defy the heavens! I will overturn my fate! Elysia, Herrscher of Transcendent Sentience, neither of you is allowed to interfere with me!"
Red light shone from Fu Hua's eyes. How could she casually abandon the perfect frontal armor she had obtained with such difficulty?
Not even Honkai itself could make her do it. She had spoken!
"How could people like you, who have never suffered from this problem, possibly understand my cup of sorrow? As the saying goes, do not urge others toward kindness without first suffering what they have suffered. I advise you both to stop meddling in my affairs! Otherwise, do not blame me for showing no mercy!"
Something that had once been possible only in her dreams had now become reality. Fu Hua truly had never imagined that one day she would possess the qualifications to ram someone with a pair of bouncing balls.
However, just as she prepared to battle the two of them for eight hundred rounds in defense of her slimes...
A hand suddenly landed on her shoulder. It was none other than the divine hand that had bestowed those slimes upon her!
"Ahem! Fu Hua, the same thing I said before still applies. It's not good to be too obsessed with this sort of thing. After seeing it with my own eyes, I've confirmed that your original appearance really is the most charming. So..."
"E-Elias, wait!"
"The trial period is over~ Cinderella's magic has expired."
Following Elias' declaration, Immortal Phoenix's slimes visibly shrank. Like two balloons leaking air, they returned to their original size in the blink of an eye—or rather, vanished entirely.
Fu Hua raised a hand and pressed against her chest. Then she dropped to her knees in a defeated slump, all color draining from her body.
Even the broad-minded immortal could not help resenting Elias' cruelty at this moment. First, he had given her hope, yet now he had taken it away again.
She had not experienced them for nearly long enough! Was Cinderella's magic not supposed to expire at midnight? It was still daytime!
"Hahaha~ Old antique, you deserved that~ Be obedient and accept reality. This is the real you."
"Edge of Taixuan: Eminence!"
"Waaah! I'm going to die, I'm going to die, I'm going to die!!"
Even after ascending into the Herrscher of Transcendent Sentience, Senti still could not escape the restraint imposed by Fu Hua—her biological mother in all but name.
The moment she saw the enormous flaming sword descending from the ceiling, the brat immediately stopped laughing.
Although she could not escape, Taixuan Eminence was no longer fatal to Senti now that she had entered the ranks of Transcendent Sentience. Even if it struck her, she would only feel a little pain.
Therefore...
Fu Hua: "I no longer need to hold back!"
A generous, all-you-can-eat serving of Taixuan Eminences descended from above.
Taixuan Eminence was certainly an ultimate technique, but just as Elias and Kevin could unleash Shamash Assault as casually as an ordinary attack, the current Fu Hua could also use Taixuan Eminence as though it were a basic strike.
To deepen the latter's terror, Fu Hua even deliberately altered the appearance of her Taixuan Eminences.
The enormous flaming swords transformed into feather dusters.
"Whew, this is definitely going to leave psychological trauma behind. Fly freely, Senti. If anything goes wrong, bear the consequences yourself."
"Tsk, tsk, tsk. What brat wouldn't tremble at the sight of feather dusters filling the entire sky?"
Elias and Elysia shook their heads with emotion.
"Come to think of it, Senti really loves dancing through Fu Hua's minefields. And even though she's the Herrscher most skilled at creating illusions and altering people's hearts, she's the one urging Fu Hua to face reality..."
"Ely, do you think it's possible that Senti actually likes Fu Hua very much? It's just that although this child is straightforward, she can occasionally be awkward and tsundere, so she deliberately makes Fu Hua angry to attract her attention?"
"Ohhh~ That's possible! How adorable!"
"Elias! Elysia! Stop talking nonsense! Who likes that old antique? I-I only..."
Like a cat whose tail had been stepped on, the Herrscher of Transcendent Sentience frantically blushed and shouted her denial.
She looked exactly like a kettle boiling over~
Elias and Elysia exchanged glances before simultaneously revealing indulgent smiles. Their expressions clearly said, 'Senti, you're so adorable. And stop explaining. Explaining is concealing, and concealment proves it's true.'
In another spacetime, who did not know that the Herrscher of Sentience loved Fu Hua more, more, more than anyone else? Besides, this degree of tsundere behavior and stubborn denial was still far inferior to Mobius~
Who knew whether she had climbed down from that streetlamp yet...
"All right~ You two can keep playing. Just remember not to go too far. And Senti, your original appearance suits you best too. Not everyone can handle Aponia's chest."
As Elias spoke, he used his authority to repair the ceiling.
Although the grown-up appearances of Fu Hua and Senti were both quite interesting, and Elias admitted he would also be interested in occasionally having fun with them in those forms, he still felt that he preferred their original appearances most of all.
After repairing the ceiling, Elias and Elysia left the dormitory. There was another place Elias wanted to visit today.
...
"Ahh~ It really has been a long time since we came back. Aside from the broken exit, everything is still exactly the same."
"Emmm, my feelings are a little complicated. The memories of everyone stabbing us in the back are flooding back."
After leaving the dormitory, Elias and Elysia opened a portal and arrived in Everlasting Elysium.
Aside from the entrance to Elysium, which Mobius had blown into a collapse before Elysia dug straight through it, everything was exactly as Elias remembered.
The two of them sat down in Elysium's aerial garden and admired the crimson-pink sunset. Although it was not real, it was breathtakingly beautiful.
It was still morning in reality, with the sky painted a clear blue, but time within Everlasting Elysium was permanently frozen at the most beautiful period of the day—the hour of sunset.
This world belonged solely to Elias and Elysia. It was named after them and had been constructed from their shared memories. It was the only flawless paradise in the world that would remain eternally unchanged.
Everywhere was filled with elements of romance, beauty, eternity, and happiness. It could be called the complete opposite of the Nation of Domination.
"All right. It's about time we handled some serious business~"
As Elias spoke, he opened Imaginary Space and withdrew a golden gemstone. It was none other than the Gem of Domination, formed after the million Herrscher Cores of the Herrscher of Million fused into one.
"Eli, you're really going to absorb it?"
"After all, I'm probably the most suitable candidate. Sigh~"
Elias sighed. He stared helplessly at the Herrscher Core in his hand as though he were looking at a troublesome burden, then buried his face in Miss Pink Elf's chest as though attempting to escape reality.
Elysia wrapped both arms around Elias' head and gently stroked the back of it, gazing at the Core with the same helplessness.
It was no exaggeration to say that this Gem of Domination was currently the most dangerous of all Herrscher Cores.
After Honkai strengthened it, the authority residing within had become different from the original plot. Anyone who touched it could seize the authorities of every Herrscher except the Herrscher of Finality.
Keeping it anywhere would be a terrible idea. Even if there were only a one-in-a-hundred-million chance, they could not allow it to fall into an outsider's hands. Otherwise, who could endure another birth of the Herrscher of Million?
Therefore, the best solution was to have a reliable and powerful person absorb it, thereby creating a Herrscher of Dominance aligned with humanity. Once that happened, everything would be resolved.
However, this Core presented another problem.
"Maybe you should reconsider, Eli. The authority contained in this Core doesn't merely seize other authorities. It's also a Core connected to the malice of all humanity. If you absorb it..."
"I'll be corrupted by all humanity's malice? It's fine, Ely. I've already prepared myself. At the end of the day, what I need to do is simple. I merely have to refuse to yield~"
Elias tossed the Core lightly in his hand.
(It would be wonderful if this Gem of Domination didn't possess such a dangerous authority and were merely a beautiful gemstone. Then I could turn it into jewelry and give it to one of my girls.)
"Sigh~ My dear Eli, you make it sound as simple as asking what to do when it rains and answering that you only need to open an umbrella. This won't be nearly that easy. You're trying to act tough again."
Elysia spoke with heartache and reluctance.
"Uh, there's no other choice, is there? To withstand the malice within this Core, I have the highest probability of success because I possess the Signet of [Eternity] and the Meta-Morph factor of Maheśvara, with its characteristic of immutability~ Besides, I have confidence in myself."
Moreover, he was also a vessel of Finality who had once shouldered the sorrow and despair of an entire era. Elias believed that his resistance to negative emotions was the highest among them.
"Following that logic, I think the Signet of [Ego] could accomplish the same thing. I also possess Maheśvara's genes, don't I? On top of that, the authority of Origin can suppress the authorities of other Herrschers, so..."
"Rejected~ Ely, are you an idiot? How could I possibly let you fuse with a Core overflowing with malice?"
Elias rolled his eyes at Elysia, thinking that the pink elf before him truly lacked self-awareness.
(Don't you know how important you are to me?)
Then Elias stopped hesitating and fused the Gem of Domination into his body. At that instant, he felt as though he had plunged into a dark abyss, where all the evil in the world attempted to corrode him.
Elias: "Th-This is a little too intense! Ahem, Ely, lend me your authority of Origin!"