Kevin did not leave the area above the forest where Sirin and Kiana were hiding.
Immediately, he began to carefully sense any disturbances in the surroundings.
Then...
"..."
He found nothing.
There were no traces of Honkai Energy left nearby.
So...
"That teleportation ability, and... the strange situation just now."
"Does the opponent also have that... other 'brand new power' that MEI abruptly obtained earlier?"
Kevin secretly wondered.
A few days ago, MEI, who was originally on "forced leave," claimed that she had abruptly entered an incredibly special space.
There, she felt as if she were walking among the stars, observing its profound mysteries.
Then...
At some unknown time, she felt a sudden daze and returned to the room where she was recuperating.
At that moment, she immediately noticed that her body possessed a brand new, special energy that was not as harmful as Honkai Energy...
Using it, MEI could also accomplish many supernatural things.
For the past few days, she and Vill-V had often been together researching that brand new power.
Although there were still many related matters that had not yet been clarified, such as: How was this power generated? What were the conditions for obtaining it? What restrictions would be there when using it? Were there any side effects?
The answers to these questions were temporarily unclear.
However, MEI and Vill-V had already analyzed that the brand new energy was actually a type of Imaginary Energy.
It was like a purified version of Honkai Energy, harmless and even more powerful... well, it could also be said that its potential for development was higher.
In short...
"Raiden Mei, Durandal, and now... Kiana Kaslana."
Kevin obviously did not know that the person who awakened the Path today was not Kiana, but another consciousness within her body, Sirin.
But even so...
"Is this the reason they suddenly became stronger and could compete with us (Flame-Chaser-level MANTIS)?"
At this moment, the cold and sinister smile of that black-haired young man (Ling ke) couldn't help but emerge in Kevin's mind.
"..."
He guessed that the reason this brand new power appeared in the world must be related to that person.
Perhaps it was a "patch-like" gift bestowed by the other party to make the "Script" more interesting and to make all parties equally matched.
If that is truly the case...
"Sigh..."
To be honest, the feeling of being toyed with by that person was deeply unpleasant.
But Kevin was a rational man.
Therefore, he would not be like Raiden Mei, who had impulsively provoked a being she couldn't handle and suffered a painful price in the end.
On top of that...
"Even if you were truly granted something, I will not lose."
"I... cannot lose."
Kevin's face darkened.
He would not make the same mistake twice.
Last time, in the Dharavi Region of India, he had an unexpected encounter with Raiden Mei and failed to tie up loose ends properly, allowing the extremely dangerous Third Herrscher to escape.
And this time...
"The maximum teleportation distance she just used seemed to be less than ten kilometers."
While lost in thought, Kevin looked down at the forest below him.
This place was a mountainous region.
After their long chase, he and the white haired girl had already left Nagazora far behind.
Under this premise...
"To be safe, I will expand the area by five... no, ten times."
Kevin raised Shamash in his hand. "Burn everything in the surrounding area first, then see what happens."
With those words...
*Whoosh~*
The Flame Sword in his hand transformed into its more powerful form: Shuhadaku of Uriel.
At that very moment...
"!!!" x 2
Below, the real Little Sirin and Little Kiana, who hadn't dared to look at Kevin for long for fear of being noticed, both felt a terrible sense of dread wash over them.
Sirin acted decisively.
"Get back here, quickly!"
She rushed to the blue eyed girl beside her and clumsily, or rather, frantically canceled the Split ability.
When the two merged back into a single girl, though still in their miniaturized forms...
*Swoosh~*
A flash of light appeared, and the teleportation ability activated once again.
At that instant, even though Sirin wasn't using Honkai Energy, Kevin still captured the slightest disturbance in the air.
"So you're hiding nearby after all."
He surged forward, instantly appearing beside an ordinary tree.
Along his path, the branches and leaves ignited from the scorching heat of his advance.
*Crack~*
Kevin swung his left hand, the one not holding the sword, and a bone-chilling cold erupted.
The flames, not yet fully risen, were instantly frozen.
The entire forested area within a radius of several kilometers was also frozen.
Fortunately, the merged Sirin had already teleported out of this range.
But now...
She didn't dare to move.
She could only curse in her heart: "How is this guy's perception so sharp?"
She was barely larger than a few sesame seeds now.
Yet even so, the slightest movement of hers was detected by him.
And if he couldn't find her, he would resort to the most violent methods to destroy everything around him, just like he had just done.
The situation seemed to have reached a stalemate.
***
Meanwhile, in Nagazora.
"Tsk tsk~"
Ling Ke was still standing on the rooftop of the teaching building at Chiba Academy, having not left yet.
At this moment, just like when he personally arrived at that lookout tower within India's borders, although there were many people walking by whispering and arguing about whether someone had really jumped off the building just now... none of them noticed him, who was clearly an outsider.
It was precisely in this specific "invisible" state...
"Ancestor Kevin and Kiana... This... Heh~ Are they about to put on a classic "Powerful Old Monster Hunting Down a Young Genius" scenario that could normally drag on for ten or twenty chapters?"
"Although, for the current era, Kevin is the one on the righteous side, and the one he is hunting is the hidden danger of this era... Uh~ Not quite right."
Ling Ke thought for a moment. "Wait a second."
He sorted out the current situation and various clues...
First, considering that Sirin's mortal enemy now is Raiden Mei... Hmm, if Sirin discovered Otto, he would probably have to be counted too.
So, given that the Old Days (Current Era) had completely passed away, if Sirin succeeded in her revenge and subsequently won the battle of wills against Kiana, she would truly become the God of Earth.
"It seems as long as they can trust each other, there is no conflict that can't be resolved?"
"In this era, it seems there's actually a way to surpass Finality?"
"Hiss~"
Ling Ke couldn't help but want to lean back in a tactical retreat.
It seemed like he had hidden a golden path within the rules he set?
But then again...
Trusting each other?
Heh heh~
For many people, isn't that like an insurmountable psychological chasm?
Why is Kevin hunting down Sirin and Kiana?
Isn't it because he and the vast majority of the Newborn World Serpent members don't trust Kiana, let alone Sirin?
To put it bluntly, if Ling Ke were in Kevin's position... even if he weren't his current self, who trusts no one but himself, but rather his once naively foolish self, he wouldn't dare trust Sirin blindly.
Even back then, if he had known Raiden Mei wasn't the "Cooking Auntie" she would later become, he still wouldn't have trusted her.
Let alone Sirin... with her past reputation...
To let a revenger become the "God of Earth"?
Hardly anyone would want to see that happen.
Even now, Ling Ke could see that few people would trust his character rather than submit to his power.
He could only say he was lucky to have attained his current transcendent status. He no longer had to deal with petty nonsense like "You don't hate Huang Silang, you just hate that you aren't him."
As for others...
The high-ranking officials of the Moths Who Chase the Flames didn't trust the powerful MANTIS.
The former Hua didn't trust humanity's last leader, Dr. MEI.
The soldiers of the Moths Who Chase the Flames didn't trust an ordinary girl predicted to be the Twelfth Herrscher.
And now, countless ordinary people didn't trust the Moths Who Chase the Flames.
This "lack of trust" was simply too widespread.
It was just like that old line from the Gundam series...
"Humans can never truly understand each other!"
Ling Ke lamented, "Heh... if people in this era could truly understand each other, unite completely, and achieve such a fantastical miracle instead of messing around with those sickening counterfeits..."
"Then what's wrong with giving you all a chance to overcome Finality?"
With that thought, he stopped dwelling on the matter.
He had no intention of adding more patch-like rules.
He still preserved this most unlikely path to survival.
After all, achieving it was even more difficult than Ancestor Kevin, who mysteriously defeated Finality and obtained its power over fifty thousand years after the original timeline, then claimed he hadn't thrown the match.
At this moment, Ling Ke felt like Hisoka from Hunter x Hunter.
Just as he had told Kevin before...
He was the sole examiner and didn't need to take the test.
He disregarded others' free will. Only those he deemed "qualified" had a future.
As for those who were "unqualified"...
The Current Era, which had completely faded into Nihility, was the best example.
He clearly wouldn't mind learning from the Cocoon of Finality and initiating a few more brutal Time Reversals.
His attention returned to "watching the show"...
At this moment, Ling Ke clearly had no interest in continuing to watch Kevin, Kiana, and Sirin... that kind of back-and-forth battle of pure endurance, which became more boring the more he watched, eventually leading to aesthetic fatigue.
So, the "Omniscience" light screen in front of him flashed, instantly displaying the real-time situation from another direction.
That was the location where the Herrscher of Blood: Kali was hiding herself in some deep sea area.
He was just about to take a good look at the little girl's subsequent actions...
"Wuu~"
The alarm sounded.
Inside Chiba Academy, the atmosphere became somewhat chaotic.
As for the reason...
"Whoa, good grief."
Ling Ke turned his head and looked. In his field of vision, a massive tsunami had already formed and was rushing toward the coastal city of Nagazora.
This was the huge commotion caused by the aftermath of the all-out battle between Fu Hua and Raiden Mei in the sea area earlier.
At this moment, the former was seriously injured and no longer had the strength to calm these things down.
And as for the latter...
The latter's severed arm had been quietly taken by Kali as a trophy of war.
In short...
"When gods fight, mortals suffer."
Ling Ke sighed as he watched the massive tsunami close in on his position.
But he had no intention of interfering.
From start to finish, he simply watched calmly.
Just as the towering waves were about to engulf the city of Nagazora...
*Shing!*
A bone-chilling cold swept through the entire tsunami area after a flash of white blade light.
The giant waves were instantly frozen solid.
At that moment, anyone looking at the coastal area would see a woman who had appeared out of nowhere. She had two katanas at her waist, cherry-blossom-colored hair that reached her knees, and animal ears on her head.
With a single slash, she saved Nagazora from being swallowed by the tsunami.
She habitually flicked her blade and sheathed it.
Her expression was calm.
The people around her, who had been fleeing in panic, now stared at her in stunned silence.
The eighth Memory Body of the Thirteen Flame-Chasers, bearing the name "Setsuna" Sakura.
After tens of thousands of years, she had returned to her homeland.