Herta did not hold back...
Perhaps the scheming with "The Family" and the "Corporation" had frayed her nerves, or perhaps the recent factional split within the "Sword of Salvation" was proving difficult to handle—
Facing the two Stellaron Hunters now, Herta swung the hammer in her hands with immense force, as if venting her frustration.
The moment the hammer moved, layers of deep blue ice formed around it, and a deep violet crystal materialized out of thin air in front of the hammer's head.
Herta swung the long-handled warhammer violently, the massive head smashing into the newly formed deep violet diamond, sending it hurtling towards Kafka and Silver Wolf with the force of an infinite, frigid wind.
If this diamond were to truly strike the two Stellaron Hunters, no matter how notorious they were, they would be instantly sealed in solid ice, to be handed over to the Interastral Peace Corporation to have every last bit of their value squeezed out.
But as top-tier criminals who had been wanted by the IPC for so long, the Stellaron Hunters, who hunted Stellarons across the cosmos, were naturally not so helpless as to be unable to resist an Emanator's puppet. They would not be so easily captured in an instant...
"This looks a little tricky..."
Silver Wolf muttered under her breath, her fingers flying across her keyboard like butterflies as a complex line of code flashed on her aetheric screen.
She casually input a set of coordinates, and the diamond, which had already flown right in front of them, suddenly dissolved into scattered data blocks and vanished into thin air.
Beside her, Kafka leaned on a long katana that shimmered with a purple aura, seemingly with no desire to fight Herta.
She looked at Herta's icy expression, maintaining the elegant smile that had been on her lips from the very beginning, and said in a slow, measured tone:
"I admit, the public perception of us has always been poor."
"Although for me, the Corporation's bounty is less of a mark of infamy and more of a high compliment... one must still consider those who are unfamiliar with us, otherwise, people will always misunderstand us."
As she spoke, her tone was sincere and earnest.
"I apologize for our uninvited arrival, but I believe that after hearing my explanation, you might forgive our audacity and reach some common ground with us."
"Listen to me—the religious factions within the 'Sword of Salvation' have nothing to do with the Stellaron Hunters. Even if the twelve seats at the Round Table Hall are occupied by twelve different factions of Salvation Knights, not a single one of them is related to the Stellaron Hunters..."
But Herta was unmoved, letting out a sneer.
"A word-of-power technique? Next time, remember to use it on yourself. Deluding yourself is more effective than trying to delude me."
"Only brainless idiots would believe you... This is New Belobog, not Jepella."
As she spoke, she raised her hammer once again, a trace of annoyance showing on her face.
From the moment Ron fell, Herta had not stopped working, all because of the deal she had made with him.
She had casually created numerous puppets and sent them to Jarilo-VI, simultaneously controlling an unknown number of them to handle New Belobog's troubles.
The design and supervision of New Belobog's reconstruction, the rewriting of its databank AI, the reformation of its power structure, the creation and oversight of its development plan, negotiations for cooperation with the Corporation and The Family...
She had been multitasking for so long, all to pull New Belobog back onto the right track and return it to a normal path of development.
Through her efforts, New Belobog had been thoroughly repaired, the half-destroyed city now shining with new splendor under her redesign.
A brand-new databank AI controlled all the city's mechanical intelligence. Under Herta's design, New Belobog's AI was protected by extremely tight security, completely eliminating the possibility of it being tampered with or breached.
To prevent New Belobog from being coveted by the forces of the entire cosmos due to the fall of the Aeon Ron, Herta had specifically sought out The Family and the Corporation.
Leveraging the minerals left behind when the Amber Lord descended upon Jarilo-VI, Herta managed to pull the Corporation to her side to pressure The Family, successfully reaching a cooperative treaty to protect New Belobog.
After all immediate dangers were resolved, she honored Ron's final wish to establish the "Sword of Salvation" Aeon faction. She built a city block thick with symbolism around the giant holy sword Ron had plunged into the planet—the Round Table Hall.
Within it, she constructed a huge round table council chamber, assigning twelve seats to the twelve individuals on New Belobog who had ventured deepest along the Path of [Salvation].
The future of the Sword of Salvation was clear. With Herta's arrangement, this Aeon faction would be explicitly led by the twelve most advanced Pathstriders of [Salvation] to carry out the will of [Salvation].
After doing all this, Herta had thought that the troubles on New Belobog were finally coming to an end...
External threats were deterred by The Family and the Corporation, internal repairs were complete, and even the Sword of Salvation religious order had a basic leadership framework. Guided by the will of [Salvation], Herta couldn't imagine what trouble could possibly arise.
But trouble arose all the same. The twelve Salvation Knights sitting in the twelve chairs of the Round Table Hall, despite all being Pathstriders of [Salvation], had somehow developed ideological differences.
Some embraced a more extreme Path philosophy, completely leaning toward the "Sword of Salvation" extreme tendency of the [Salvation] Path.
The rest were normal Pathstriders of [Salvation], practicing the bright philosophy of "firm hope, save the world," not leaning toward any extreme.
Initially, it was a simple difference in philosophy between the two sides. But since they were both ultimately carrying out the will of [Salvation], it didn't cause any major issues.
However, as time went on, the conflict between the two sides intensified, and inexplicable physical confrontations began to occur.
Because of Ron's influence, everyone on New Belobog had now become a Pathstrider of [Salvation]. When conflict arose among the twelve Salvation Knights at the Round Table Hall, the entire population of New Belobog naturally and subtly split into two factions as well...
This situation severely impacted New Belobog's development. Herta, who had been preparing to wash her hands of the matter and hand over governance to the Sword of Salvation council after resolving the initial problems, now had to remain at the forefront, trying to solve this bizarre new problem while stabilizing the situation...
Resolving such an ideological conflict could be both difficult and simple.
For the faith factions of other Aeons, it might be extremely difficult. For example, within the Interastral Peace Corporation that worships [The Preservation] Qlipoth, no one knows how many factions with different philosophies are vying for power, and no one can resolve these countless ideological conflicts.
This is because each of their factions represents a department, and each department represents trillions of employees across unknown numbers of star systems. The interest groups represented by this vast public will provide endless power, allowing them to fight forever...
But on New Belobog, it was very simple. Ron had only just fallen. Right before his fall, he had planted the seeds of hope in everyone, making them all Pathstriders of [Salvation]. This was a time of peak unity.
Even if there were ideological differences, with Ron's fall being so recent, the conflict was absolutely confined within the boundaries of the [Salvation] Path...
As the Emanator personally appointed by Ron before his fall, in the absence of the Aeon of [Salvation], Herta was the authority on the Path.
As long as she declared her support for one faction, then even with ideological differences, the people would quickly amend their own beliefs and trust Herta's judgment.
Because Herta herself had been elevated to an Emanator of [Salvation] by Ron through the "Sword of Salvation" extreme tendency, and was a proponent of it, she had already been prepared to support the extreme faction...
But she discovered that she herself seemed a bit too moderate.
She found that most of the Pathstriders who had veered toward the "Sword of Salvation" extreme tendency were displaying a very obvious paranoia.
They would obsessively strike down any potential threats, any possible evils, even if it meant losing their own sense of justice. As long as they could eliminate sin, they would pay any price.
Since there was little actual evil to be found on New Belobog, they began to attack their political opponents, using various severe methods of struggle against the moderate faction. A short while ago, it nearly resulted in a fatality.
This was clearly not normal... No matter how extreme the "Sword of Salvation" tendency was, it was still an extreme within the Path of [Salvation]. It must strictly adhere to the harsh rules Ron had set for the Path when he was an Aeon: be ruthless to enemies, and gentle to friends.
But the extreme faction had now even begun to physically harm the moderate faction, which was a clear violation of the Path of [Salvation]...
Herta knew someone was pulling the strings behind the scenes, and she had been looking for the troublemaker.
But unexpectedly, after just a few days, the mastermind "walked right into her trap," triggering the access authentication in the museum and being discovered by Herta, who had complete control of the databank AI...
Looking at the Stellaron Hunters before her, Herta searched her memory and recalled the "Jepella Rebellion" case she had read about on the Corporation's website.
It was said that Jepella had descended into internal chaos because of the Stellaron Hunters, a situation strikingly similar to New Belobog's now.
The fools of the Annihilation Gang were played like fiddles by the woman in the black coat. The entire city was consumed by the flames of the Jepella Brotherhood's internal rebellion, yet the high-ranking members of the Annihilation Gang were still sitting in a tribunal judging the Stellaron Hunters at the end, completely unaware that the fire of civil war had already reached the Jepella Palace.
Theoretically, if the factional struggle within the Sword of Salvation continued to spiral out of control, in a few months, New Belobog, without a leader, might also descend into severe internal conflict...
The Salvation Knights in the Round Table Hall would start a war, countless people would participate, and all of them would be abandoned by the broken Path of [Salvation] in the process.
If they really did start a war, it would surely violate the philosophy of [Salvation], and they would never again be able to draw power from the Path.
But that was just a theory...
What happened on Jepella occurred because the Jepella Brotherhood that controlled it was merely a branch of the "Annihilation Gang," those fools who sought power from [The Destruction] Nanook but were despised by him.
But the one in control of Jarilo-VI, of New Belobog, was the "Sword of Salvation," and it was her, Herta.
Herta had no idea where the Stellaron Hunters got the confidence to think they could recreate what happened on Jepella here in New Belobog, and casually walk away with the Stellaron...
In fact, the Stellaron's infinite energy wasn't actually that important to New Belobog. Herta had plenty of technology to solve energy problems; there was no need to keep something as dangerous as a Stellaron on the planet.
She had even considered getting rid of the Stellaron completely while she was repairing the cosmic metropolis.
If the Stellaron Hunters had approached her for a proper business deal, she might have even sold the Stellaron to them for an ideal price.
None of this needed to go this far, but the Stellaron Hunters' actions had signed their own death warrant...
Why do they dare to do this? Do they think I'm as easy to fool as the Annihilation Gang?
The more Herta thought about it, the angrier she became. Looking at Kafka's elegant smile, her face darkened, and she put more force into the swing of her hammer.
"...According to the script, there are two possibilities from here—"
Facing the imminent hammerhead, Kafka showed no fear, speaking in her slow, measured tone.
"The first is that you seal me in ice before I finish speaking and send me to the Interastral Peace Corporation, but the schism within the 'Sword of Salvation' grows ever more severe, eventually erupting into war..."
"And the other possibility—"
The wind from the hammer blew Kafka's hair aside. Herta's face was grim.
"Continue... What does the 'Slave of Fate' have to say?"
Kafka, seemingly oblivious to the hammer that was a hair's breadth from her face, calmly recited Elio's script:
"The other possibility... is that you leave now. Beneath the sword plunged by the Aeon of [Salvation], you will find a 'flame' that was coincidentally suppressed, and you will engage her in an unfinished battle."
"My companion Silver Wolf and I will enter the Stellaron Energy Hub, take the Stellaron, and halt the process of the Lord Ravager, [Phantylia], using the Stellaron as a core to usurp the entire Ideal City of New Belobog as her new body."
She brushed a strand of hair from her forehead, looked at Herta's contemplative expression, and smiled.
"Madam Herta, which possibility do you desire?"