Just as Seele had said, Penglaiji Ryn didn't know the way either, but there was no need to.
ME Corp not only represented the world's most advanced technology on the surface, but its headquarters was also one of Nagazora City's most distinctive buildings. As long as you were within Nagazora City, you could look up and see the tall, H-shaped structure.
Ryn flew into the air with Penglaiji Ryn, heading towards ME Corp. Below them, the armed forces of Fire Moth advanced in a long, orderly serpent-like formation.
The black clouds press down on the city, threatening to crush it. The dense swarms of Honkai Creatures flowed towards ME Corp like a dark river.
There were no disturbances from ME Corp that could attract so many Honkai Creatures, yet all the creatures in Nagazora City were advancing on it in unison.
Honkai Zombies, Scythe Zombies, Honkai Zombie girls, Penguin Girls...
All sorts of bizarrely mutated Honkai Beasts, silicon-based lifeforms born directly from the Honkai, legendary mythological Honkai Creatures...
Their movements were uniform, like a disciplined legion. One couldn't help but feel a chill.
Faced with such a vast number of Honkai Creatures, Penglaiji Ryn's body began to tremble slightly, whether from the cold wind at high altitude or from fear of the endless sea of beasts.
Ryn was holding Penglaiji Ryn by the waist as he flew, so he immediately felt the girl's trembling body.
"Are you scared? There's still time, I can take you to Seele's side," Ryn said softly.
"No, I'm not scared..."
Penglaiji Ryn shook her head, then looked down at the Honkai Creatures with determination. "I'm just a little excited. This is almost all the Honkai Beasts in Nagazora City, isn't it? If we get rid of all of them, Nagazora City will be safe, right?"
"It will be safe, but only temporarily. As long as the death spot in the sky still exists, Honkai Creatures will continue to be born.
Even if we kill all the ones before us, they will regenerate to this scale in a short period of time, growing at an explosive, exponential rate."
"Is that so... Then to save this world, do we really have to kill Kiana?"
Penglaiji Ryn thought of the lonely and sorrowful girl from her dream, sleeping in that ruin for who knows how long...
According to what Raiden Mei said in the dream, that sleeping girl was the true culprit who destroyed the world, the one Bronya spoke of—Kiana.
"No. Anyone who wants to kill Kiana, I'll kill them first," Ryn replied without a second thought.
"Huh?" Penglaiji Ryn gasped in surprise.
Ryn asked in return, "You've seen her, haven't you?"
"Yes... if the world in my dream wasn't fake, then I've already seen her..."
"You understood what kind of person she is from the moment you saw her, didn't you? She's the type who would sacrifice her life to save the world...
If she chose to destroy the world, it only proves that the world betrayed her, drove her to complete despair. If that's the case, I will stand by her side without hesitation."
"What if it's not like that?"
"There are no 'what ifs.' A Herrscher's personality is born from the amplification of their desires at the moment of their Herrscher transformation. This means that when Kiana transformed, she genuinely had the thought of destroying the world, which is why her Herrscher personality is unswervingly carrying out her will...
One day, you discover that your entire life has been manipulated by others. Your friends, your experiences are all fake. Even your genes have been implanted with a setting to make you fall in love with someone...
Penglaiji Ryn, what would you do?"
Ryn lowered his head and looked seriously into Penglaiji Ryn's eyes.
"...I'm sorry... I don't know..." Penglaiji Ryn averted Ryn's gaze. She didn't know how to answer that question.
"You will know. Because this is a choice we must make."
Ryn looked away from Penglaiji Ryn, because he didn't know the answer to the question either.
Even if this Kiana wasn't the smiling, clumsy girl he loved, Ryn always remembered that it all began with the words, "Can you come and save me?"
In the Stigmata Space, Ryn had watched the entire life of God Kiana through the Stigmata's records...
All the joy in her life was merely a prelude to the despair at the very end. The girl's persistence, the girl's love, were all fake.
At that moment, she met Sirin, who had suffered a similar fate. Two people who had spent their lives searching for relatives they had unknowingly killed themselves, embracing and merging into one in the Herrscher Crucible.
The Herrscher consciousness followed their will at that moment and destroyed everything.
But the moment she killed her lover, the girl regretted it. She woke up, but it was already too late.
The girl knelt on the ashen earth, crying in despair, praying to the sky for someone to save it all.
A boy from another world received the summons, and so he chose to respond.
Not to condemn her, nor to end her life, but to save her, to tell her that even if everything was fake, the feelings born between people in life are real...
——————————————
The two landed in front of the advancing path of the Honkai Creatures, facing the endless swarm.
Ryn told Penglaiji Ryn to stay far away from him. Still lost in Ryn's earlier question, Penglaiji Ryn numbly retreated.
"Little sis, have you ever read the book *Dragon Raja*?"
"I don't know, maybe I have..."
"Then I'll assume you have. In that book, there's a Speech I really like. Although the effect I can achieve is different from his, now is the time to use this move."
Ryn spread his arms, facing the great army before him, and slowly walked forward.
He drew a circle with the edge of the Star Sword, constructing a black hole. The black hole began to rotate slowly, like an all-devouring vortex. The air, the rubble and dust at his feet, even the surrounding light was swallowed by it.
A vortex suspended high in the sky, from which not even light could escape. From a distance, it looked like a black sun.
Speech: Black Sun. When the user dies, the Black Sun will collapse into a singularity, devouring everything around it, creating a massive storm and forming a gravitational field.
Ryn's Black Sun, however, directly created a black hole... The gravitational field generated by the black hole pulled and collapsed the surrounding space. The air was compressed and devoured, causing a gale to sweep across Nagazora City due to the pressure difference.
The Black Sun hung behind Ryn. Like a walking god of death, Ryn mercilessly destroyed and devoured everything around him.
The air, the buildings, even the Honkai Creatures clinging tightly to the ground to avoid being blown away, were all torn apart like rags by the gravitational field, crushed into cosmic dust.
In the distance, Penglaiji Ryn, who was spared from the black hole's pull due to Ryn's attention, had a light gradually shining in her eyes.
This move... is so cool!