After parting ways with Fuli, Anna followed her memory through the bustling streets of the Luofu and arrived at the Hyperion's temporary base. Because Kiana and Bronya, who were also participating in the Wardance, were out on missions, the base felt a bit deserted.
The only living person holding down the fort was Raiden Mei, who was busy in the Massive Electric Corporation's laboratory.
"Yuan has already briefed me on your situation."
Mei set down the tablet in her hands. Her deep purple eyes scanned Anna from head to toe, analyzing her like a precision scanner.
"Yuan?" Anna felt a bit uncomfortable under the older girl's piercing, almost soul-reading gaze. She shifted awkwardly and asked tentatively, "Dr. Mei, this 'Yuan' you mentioned... do you mean Teacher Fufu?"
Having learned Fuli's true identity, Anna had naturally done some digging, uncovering the courtesy name his parents had given him.
"Correct. It's a term of endearment." Mei crossed her legs, her beautiful, black-silk-clad thighs partially hidden beneath her white lab coat. She sat in her chair, her expression perfectly flat. "Why? Do you have an issue with that?"
"Not at all." Anna quickly shook her head, offering a shy, flawless, innocent smile. "The relationship between you and Teacher Fufu seems so wonderful. In Shenzhou, they'd call it... a golden boy and jade girl, a match made in heaven, right?"
Anna wasn't stupid; she knew better than to immediately antagonize the uncrowned queen of the Hyperion. Stealing a man from right under his main girl's nose was a high-difficulty operation that required strategy. Doing it quietly was the best policy. Openly showing hostility and starting a harem war right out of the gate was a foolish, reckless move.
Sure enough, hearing the flattery, the corner of Mei's eyebrow twitched upward, almost imperceptibly.
"Anyway, as agreed, I'll give you a full-body checkup first." Considering Anna was also one of the Hyperion's major financial backers, Mei's attitude gradually softened, no longer hiding a Gatling gun behind her polite words. She smoothly changed the subject, asking with a hint of curiosity, "You mentioned earlier that Yuan was taken in as a disciple by the Transcendent Flash—Jingliu herself?"
"Mhm! Right in front of me!" Anna nodded vigorously, making no effort to hide her longing and envy. "It's amazing... An S-Rank limit-breaker..."
If I could become that strong, I'd probably be able to easily subdue Teacher Fufu like Lady Jingliu did—no, wait, I mean I'd be able to become a reliable, supportive wife to Teacher Fufu, right?
The young girl's thoughts drifted quietly, though her line of thinking was entering dangerous territory.
"Indeed," Mei agreed.
An S-Rank limit-breaker was just one step away from the major Sequence Herrschers. Once Yuan reached that level, he'd have absolutely no excuse to reject the marriage registration forms she had already prepared for him.
---||---
About three hours later, Anna's comprehensive checkup was finally complete.
The door of the biological pod slid open. As she blinked her slightly groggy eyes, she saw Mei standing outside, holding a thick stack of medical reports, looking at her calmly.
"Two pieces of good news, one piece of bad news." Mei didn't bother beating around the bush. "The first piece of good news is that there are no traces of Honkai corruption within your Herrscher Core. The Holy Maiden's power purified it completely."
"The second piece of good news: Under the influence of the massive amount of Honkai energy provided by your core, the Ideal Form state you've been forcing yourself to maintain is subtly altering your ordinary blood, gradually replacing it with purer Schariac Holy Blood."
Her tone grew slightly heavier. "The bad news is that the extreme purifying properties of this blood coursing through your veins are fundamentally clashing with the Authority of the Herrscher of Ice. This is probably exactly what Yuan discovered with the Divine Mirror of Antiquity, and why he specifically sent you to me."
Anna blinked her large eyes, her head still feeling a bit heavy. "So... you're saying you have a way to fix my problem, Doctor?"
"I have a method, but it will require significant effort and cooperation on your part," Mei added coolly. "Alternatively, you could choose to abandon one of the two powers. For instance, you could focus entirely on developing your Holy Maiden abilities, or you could fully embrace the Herrscher of Ice's Authority and become a true Herrscher. You don't have to pursue becoming a perfect entity that wields both powers simultaneously."
"I want them all!" Anna replied without a second of hesitation.
After all, she was a veteran Valkyrie who had joined the Snow Lotus Squad and seen real combat; she understood the absolute necessity of power. Even without that experience, she understood the simple logic that 1+1 > 1.
Then, right before her eyes, Mei performed what looked like a magic trick. Seemingly out of thin air, she pulled out a massive stack of books and slammed them onto the table.
What is Temperature?, Tracing the Depths: The World of Entropy, The Second Law of Thermodynamics, A Brief History of Information... there were dozens of thick textbooks!
Anna, who had graduated from Schicksal's Valkyrie training program at the age of twelve and had spent every day on the battlefield since, instantly went blank. She stared blankly at the pile of mind-numbing titles and asked in a small voice, "Doctor, what are these...?"
"If you want it all, you have to put in the corresponding effort," Mei stated coldly. "First, you need to digest all this knowledge so you can achieve a more refined, microscopic understanding and control over your Herrscher Authority."
Mei's demands stemmed partly from her own academic interest in researching the Herrscher of Ice's Authority, but also from a genuine desire not to see a potential allied Herrscher waste her natural talents.
Take Kiana, for example. That girl was the textbook definition of a meathead. Trying to force theory down her throat was useless; it was honestly more effective to just let her fight on pure instinct. After all, Sequence Herrschers essentially possessed the power to "make their wishes come true" to a certain extent. When it came to skills related to their Authority, they usually grasped them intuitively—it just cost them more Honkai energy.
That being said, Mei had initially tried to be strict and teach Kiana properly. But the moment it got too hard, that paramecium would run off crying to Fuli for protection. And that boy would always come up with a mountain of crooked logic to excuse her:
Failed Literature?
No problem! It means she won't spout nonsense and tell lies in the future!
Got a zero in Math?
No problem! It just proves she won't scheme behind people's backs!
Failed Chemistry?
Also fine! It means she won't be inventing toxic food additives!
Failed English?
Even less of a problem! It just shows how deeply she loves Shenzhou!
Wait, Kiana's European, why did she fail English?
That's just a pure stereotype!
Leaving aside the fact that Europe itself consists of over forty countries with entirely different languages, even a unified Shenzhou with over two thousand years of history still has wildly varying local dialects.
"So many books? I have to read all of them?!"
Anna reached out a trembling hand, picking up the topmost book—Out of Control: The Final Destiny and Fate of All Humanity—and carefully flipped through a few pages.
The next second, her eyes completely glazed over, as if her very soul had been sucked into a vast, unfathomable universe woven entirely from complex formulas, abstract concepts, and grand theories.
Mei could practically see the reflection in her slightly dilated pupils: convoluted neural networks, the birth and death of microscopic particles, and the majestic cycle of entire cosmic galaxies...
Yet, the doctor remained completely unmoved. "It's perfectly normal to find it obscure and difficult to grasp at first. It'll get better once you truly develop a reading addiction."
"A... reading addiction?"
"Yes, an addiction to reading," Mei nodded firmly, her tone carrying a rare note of genuine excitement. "Read a book a hundred times, and its meaning will reveal itself. When that time comes, you'll discover just how boundlessly vast the sky of knowledge truly is."
"Heh... hehe..."
Faced with Dr. Mei's deeply unsettling curriculum, Anna's lips twitched, forcing a smile that looked uglier than crying.
She silently pulled out her phone and sent a text message to Fuli:
[Teacher Fufu, if I die one day, please compress my ashes into a pair of dice. Whenever you feel lost, just roll them. You can treat the result as my advice to you.]
[But please don't roll them during an exam. Because I don't know the answers either.]
The message showed as successfully sent, but its status remained solidly on Unread.
This wasn't surprising in the slightest.
---||---
"Tyrant's Barricade!"
"Setsuna Blade: Four Rainlights!"
At this exact moment, deep within the ghost mansion, Fuli was wielding a gleaming, unsheathed longsword. Sweating profusely, he was engaged in intense, clashing "swordplay" with his pitiful, breathtakingly beautiful master, emptying his reserves to teach her everything he knew.
"HAHAHAHAHA! Good! Very good! Again!"
It seemed this Sword Immortal master was thoroughly satisfied with the quality of their "sparring session."
Especially when the effects of the Jizo Mitama's First Rated Power took effect on her body, the legendary Transcendent Flash suddenly let out an uncontrollable, high-pitched moan—a sound mingling absolute relief with trembling ecstasy.
"Traitorous disciple... in this spar... you win."
As if completely drained of all her strength, Jingliu collapsed weakly to the ground, panting heavily. Her pale skin was flushed with a glossy pink hue as she softly declared her defeat, drawing the curtain on this fierce battle.
Obviously, this was exactly what she had been seeking—the special "method" that had previously suppressed her Mara-struck state.
As a mass-curse/blessing inflicted by Shuhu, the conditions for curing Mara were agonizingly strict and complex. Simply put, one either had to achieve a state of being that surpassed Shuhu themself, completely obliterate Shuhu as the caster, or slaughter every single cursed resident born across the six great Xianzhou ships.
If none of these three conditions were met, this blessing-turned-bone-deep-curse would persist forever.
However, just because it couldn't be completely cured didn't mean it couldn't be suppressed.
The Alchemy Commission actually offered services for exactly this. Regrettably, for someone like Jingliu—who had been deeply afflicted by Mara for a very long time—their treatments were practically useless. Furthermore, as a wanted criminal, she could hardly waltz into their clinics in broad daylight.
This was especially true now that a certain Vidyadhara healer girl had grown up; her face, identical to a dearly departed friend's, would only plunge Jingliu into an incredibly complicated emotional state.
That is, until she met Fuli.
In the Honkai universe, the root of all supernatural abilities was Honkai energy. And the source of Honkai energy was the energy conversion of the Cocoon of Finality. No matter what kind of ability it was, tracing it back to its absolute origin would ultimately lead to one of the Herrschers—the faceted projections of Finality.
For example, souls and minds belonged to the Herrscher of Sentience, while analysis and recreation belonged to the Herrscher of Reason.
And curses? By pure coincidence, they fell squarely within the Authority of the Herrscher of Corruption.
Unlike major Sequence Herrschers, who could wield their Authorities freely, once a Herrscher Core was forged into a Divine Key, its power became restricted by its Rated Powers. The Jizo Mitama was no exception.
Moreover, as a still-incomplete Divine Key, it had been constantly influenced by its master, its operational style steadily shifting toward a straightforward, brutally simple direction.
Perhaps the lingering consciousness of Rin inside the blade couldn't stand seeing Fuli waste such a perfectly degenerate artifact, brutally turning a prime H-manga mind-control tool into a hardcore meta-slave DPS weapon. While it was materializing its First Rated Power, Rin stubbornly hijacked the permissions.
She successfully birthed the Galactic Hegemon, a Rated Power that, purely through skin and mucosal contact, could achieve a massive array of effects: pleasure amplification, curse infliction, curse removal, memory manipulation, mind reading, memory restoration, brainwashing, hypnosis, deprogramming, absolute domination, physical body control, extreme healing, and more.
For a target burdened by the Mara-struck curse, this was practically a tailored countermeasure.
Although the method of application and some of its side effects were horribly unpresentable in polite society, the upper limit of its efficacy was astronomically high! If the Divine Key ever reached the PRI-ARM (Transcendent) domain, it could potentially even affect existences on the level of Major Sequence Herrschers!
True, the current Jizo Mitama was still leagues away from becoming a PRI-ARM. But Jingliu herself had absolutely zero intention of resisting it!
Furthermore, while the Galactic Hegemon technically only required the skin contact of a simple handshake to activate, the absolute most efficient way to maximize its effects was, as the euphemism goes, engaging in aggressive Tayzzyronth reproduction behaviors.
And so, under Little Fuli's relentless, "thrusting" efforts, his Master's violently agitated Mara was successfully suppressed once again.
Freed from its maddening influence, she returned to her usual aloof, rational, and composed self.
This was undoubtedly a massive blessing. Nobody wanted to live as a ticking time bomb of intermittent insanity, terrified of committing an irredeemable sin in a moment of lost control.
As for the downside? It mostly just meant that, at regular intervals, Jingliu would be forced to seek out this traitorous disciple to pacify the ever-expanding Mara curse inside her through his highly "specialized" method.
To be perfectly honest, if it had been the Jingliu of the past, even knowing Fuli possessed this ability, she would have absolutely refused to engage in such—ahem—indecent behavior that so blatantly violated the sanctity of the master-disciple relationship.
But alas, she had been dead drunk that day. Toss in Baiheng's completely shameless counseling, and through a series of wild coincidences, she had ended up rolling in the sheets with this traitorous disciple...
As the Daoist saying goes: The Dao produces One; One produces Two; Two produces Three; Three produces all things.
Once the seal was broken the first time, getting used to it the second and third times was only natural.
Of course, on the surface, the two of them still strictly maintained a perfectly proper master-disciple dynamic. Jingliu had no intention whatsoever of interfering with the young man's love life. She had long since passed the age of hormonal romantic drama.
Thus—
Early the next morning, a deeply sleeping Fuli suddenly felt a bone-chilling, almost tangible sword intent permeate the room.
He instinctively snapped his eyes open, only to find his breathtaking Master, radiating an icy aura, already fully dressed and staring down at him from above.
"Get up. Time to train your sword."
Her words were sharp, cold, and utterly devoid of any excess emotion.
"Huh?"
The boy tilted his head groggily for a second before instantly realizing exactly what she meant.
"Coming!"
With a swift kip-up, he vaulted off the bed, grabbed the Plasma Kagehide resting nearby, and gleefully launched a lightning-fast draw-slash right at Jingliu!
Time flew by amidst the sparking of blades.
It wasn't until dusk the following day that Fuli, his breathing ragged and his body pushed to the absolute breaking point, finally dragged himself back to the Hyperion's base.
Much like how he had "emptied his reserves" to teach his Master the night before, Master Jingliu had spared absolutely no effort in drilling her swordsmanship into him. And unlike her previous disguise as a mute Fragmentum Shadow, now that her vocal cords were free, her reprimands were not only razor-sharp but agonizingly venomous.
It made Fuli genuinely pity his "senior brother" Jing Yuan. He sincerely wondered how the man had managed to survive this hellish tutelage as a child.
Wait! If I do the math... doesn't that make Yanqing my martial nephew?!
Knowing that kid's personality, once he finds out the relationship between me and his revered master's master, he'll definitely have to cup his fists and respectfully call me Martial Uncle!
Bzz— Bzz—
A vibration from his pocket interrupted his train of thought. Pulling out his phone, he saw the caller ID: Theresa.
It really has been a while since I've seen her.
Thinking this, he accepted the video call.
A pale blue holographic screen instantly projected in front of him, displaying the petite figure of the Principal. She seemed to have just finished a meeting, as she was still wearing her dignified yet utterly adorable "Archbishop-in-waiting" attire.
Rumor had it that this outfit was painstakingly handpicked by Rita, originally intended for the day Theresa officially ascended to the position of Schicksal's Overseer. However, because the ensemble looked so incredibly good, Theresa had adopted it as her formal wear for important occasions as the Far East Branch Commander.
Putting everything else aside, Big Sis Rita's fashion taste was absolutely top-tier.
Staring at the exquisite white pantyhose Theresa was wearing through the hologram, Fuli couldn't help but recall the subtle, delicate sensation of when the two of them had accidentally squeezed into the same bed together.
He quickly shook his head, throwing those wildly inappropriate thoughts to the back of his mind.
"Long time no see, Madam Principal," he raised a hand, greeting her with a wide grin.
"If you know it's been a long time, then why haven't you called me on your own?!" Theresa pouted, her lips sticking out so far she could hang a lantern from them. Her resentment practically bled through the screen. "Is it because you're surrounded by so many young, beautiful girls that you've completely forgotten about me, your official fiancée?!"
Their status as an engaged couple traced back to the aftermath of the Third Eruption, when the Schicksal Senate had issued a warrant for Fuli's arrest. But the fact that Theresa was openly wielding the title now made her intentions painfully obvious.
"It's not that I forgot." Fuli's expression turned incredibly serious as he explained in a professional tone, "The Vishnu genes in my body have been acting up lately. I've been dealing with it as an emergency and just haven't had the time to report back to you."
This wasn't entirely a lie.
Following his trip to Jigui City—and especially after witnessing the phantom of Yunli from his previous loop—the Vishnu organ corresponding to the third phase of his Peerless Nine Transformations had been completely constructed within his body.
Unlike the Shesha and Garuda organs before it, the moment the Vishnu organ materialized, Fuli keenly felt it violently clashing with his Human Immortal Dao.
As the saying goes, two tigers cannot share one mountain, and a heretic is always more detestable than a heathen.
These two immense powers, both fundamentally tied to the concept of "Devouring," were currently at each other's throats inside his body. Although they hadn't caused a major catastrophe yet—thanks to Fuli actively suppressing them with his sheer willpower—if left unchecked, it would inevitably spell disaster down the line.
However, while this was all objectively true, it had absolutely nothing to do with why he hadn't called Theresa. The two things were entirely unrelated.
But "Prisoner" Fuli strategically brought it up anyway.
"Organ rejection?! Is it serious?! Are you okay?!"
Predictably, the moment she heard this, the Principal on the other side of the screen instantly forgot all her jealousy. Her large azure eyes filled entirely with frantic concern.
Her tiny body lurched forward, looking as though she was about to crawl right through the hologram as she demanded anxiously, "Is there something wrong with the Vishnu genes you took from me? Did I not cooperate properly during the extraction, leaving it incomplete?! Damn it, if I had known this would happen, I wouldn't have agreed to it..."
Mhm. It seems the subject change was highly successful.
"Scumbag" Fuli thought to himself. Outwardly, however, he hurriedly comforted the panicking Theresa. "It's fine, I have a way to fix it."
—The Star-Forging Furnace.
It looked like a cross between an industrial material crusher and a smelting forge, built in an elegant, intricate Baroque Steampunk aesthetic. By paying a massive amount of energy, one could throw in two or more materials containing supernatural elements, and it would synthesize equipment or items based on their compatibility. Forging gear took time, heavily dependent on the quality of the final product.
Much like the Mineral Conversion Box, the Extra Ability: Command, and the Planet Cracker Array, it was a special item Fuli had refreshed from the System Shop back in London, right after receiving Pardofelis's blessing.
Back then, the Star-Forging Furnace possessed a heavy restriction: The final product's quality will inevitably be one or multiple tiers lower than the Furnace itself. Later on, through God-knows-what kind of tinkering from Mei, that restriction had been completely removed.
In exchange, the forging time for the Furnace was drastically increased. In Fuli's eyes, this was undoubtedly a blessing, because it completely shattered the upper ceiling for his final creations.
"I'm planning to condense the conflicting Human Immortal Dao and the Vishnu genes into two separate Light Cones and extract them from my body. Then, I'll toss both into the Star-Forging Furnace to fuse them together," Fuli explained meticulously. "When it's done, it should produce an upgraded version combining the best of both. I'll use that as the foundation for my third transformation."
"You can do that?!"
Theresa stared blankly at the screen, absolute shock plastered across her youthful face. She looked like a relic of a bygone era who had failed to read the latest patch notes.
"I can, but I'm feeling a little insecure about it. I was really hoping I could get some heartwarming encouragement from Madam Principal." Fuli continued to spout utterly straight-faced nonsense.
He might doubt the gods, but he would never doubt Kiana's EX-rank luck! All he had to do was ask her to hit the "Synthesize" button, and success was practically guaranteed.
But looking at Theresa's slightly parted lips and overwhelmingly adorable expression, his natural instincts just wanted to tease her a bit more.
"Encouragement? Gu... alright then."
Theresa bit her soft lower lip, a bright blush spreading across her cheeks. Looking as though she had made up her mind, she hopped off her chair and struck a hyper-energetic, magical-girl pose.
"Oath of Judah, sealer of the dark forces, manifest your true power here and now!"
The girl formed a heart with her hands over her chest. "The power of miracles turns to starlight, the magic of light converges in my heart! Dimension Sonata! I'll TeRi-TeRi away all of Fuli's bad luck~!"
"..."
Witnessing this live spectacle, Fuli descended into a long, profound silence.
It wasn't until Theresa couldn't handle the suspense anymore, peering at the screen with nervous, expectant eyes, that he slowly raised his head and gave the screen a completely straight-faced thumbs up.
"Madam Principal... you are the cutest in the world!"
"W-What?! Cute?! Don't be ridiculous..."
The girl's face flushed a deep, atomic red. Muttering words like "Lolicon" and "Pervert" under her breath, she happily cut the video feed, feeling incredibly sweet inside. Completely forgetting that, based purely on chronological age, she was the one technically committing the crime.
Dr. MEI, who had been spectating the entire exchange from within his mind, suddenly spoke up.
[Host.]
"What's up?"
[Good job!]
Looking at how things are progressing, it won't be long before the grand plan—having the Host seduce every high-ranking female leader and uniting their factions to crush the Honkai—will finally be complete!
Fuli had long since grown accustomed to her sudden outbursts. Unbothered, he voiced a lingering doubt in his mind. "I still don't get it. Are Light Cones—an ability that busted—really a function generated by the System?"
Just thinking about what Light Cones represented—the terrifying ability to materialize abstract concepts and sheer power into physical phenomena—felt completely absurd to him.
To this, Prometheus answered concisely, [Every single function of the Finality Coordinator system is fundamentally derived from the unique properties of the Meta-Morph factors that awakened within your body right before your death in the previous loop. Rather than saying they are 'System-generated,' it is more accurate to say that you, the Host, inherently possess this potential.]
"Even the Gacha pulls and the System Shop?"
[Correct.]
"Alright then. I guess my potential really is pretty insane."
"I'm back! I'm starving to death, hurry up and make me some good food!"
Fuli shrugged. Right on cue, Kiana pushed open the main door and waltzed in. Following the plan he had just bragged to Theresa about, he had Kiana toss the Light Cones into the Star-Forging Furnace.
"A whole week's crafting time. Looks like the drop is going to be solid."
Staring at the timer displayed on the furnace, the boy smiled in satisfaction, affectionately patting his lucky charm, Kiana, on the head.