Bzzzz—!
From the palm of the Herrscher of Finality, a searing radiance replaced every color in Otto's vision. From within the halo of light, faint strands of dim purple-crimson fluorescence occasionally seeped out, resonating with the corrosive blotches on his soulium body.
"..."
Otto parted his lips, as if he still had countless words he wished to say to the Herrscher of Finality—wished to make her understand the value he possessed. Yet what ultimately emerged was nothing more than an indistinct murmur.
Herrscher of Finality... the ender of civilizations, the terminus of all things. No wonder, Will of the Honkai—so this is your choice.
When a person truly seeks to change the world, only then does he realize how insignificant individual power truly is. The saint gave everything for the people, yet what she received in return were merciless shackles and the gallows.
The world is so chaotic. It is neither fair nor reasonable. It persecutes heroes and nourishes villains. Ugliness flourishes everywhere, while beauty finds no refuge.
"I'm sorry... I failed... I was still useless after all. Five hundred years, and I never changed. Just a discarded pawn with no worth..."
At last, despair and regret flickered through Otto's eyes.
Just one step away! Five hundred years of preparation! Only that single step remained!
Had he attempted and failed, Otto could have accepted it calmly. But to halt at the final instant before the decisive kick—to stop at the very end of the journey without even attempting it—how could he possibly accept that?
"Why apologize? Why blame yourself? Otto Apocalypse should not be like this."
The sudden words echoing beside his ear made Otto tremble.
"You deceived friends, deceived family, deceived the world and the rules above it... Since you chose this thorn-covered path, then even if you die upon it, you must not regret it."
Seeing the "blood tears" continuously falling from Otto's lone eye, Selene spoke coldly, expressionless.
Such a cruel and rational man—yet the driving force behind his actions stemmed from something so simple and resolute: for a single person. Love?
Selene did not understand.
But she would not dissect it. She would neither praise nor condemn it. That was another person's private matter. It was enough to manage her own.
Sensing Selene's gaze, Otto jolted awake. In that instant, his heart felt unbearably bitter.
In the end, the one who truly understood everything he had done was his greatest enemy. What bitter irony.
"Hahaha..."
A self-mocking laugh escaped his throat. He raised his head. Before him, beneath the dazzling shadow, were the crimson pupils of the Herrscher of Finality.
Her voice, still as an ancient well, continued:
"To others, you are a notorious villain known across the world. But to her, you are a hero—a nameless hero who belongs solely to her."
His consciousness was already beginning to blur. Otto drew a weak breath. He no longer had the strength to even hold his eyelids open. Horrifying cracks covered his face.
Theresa... I personally stitched the archbishop's mantle for you. I had hoped you would use it to open an era of your own, to wash away the stains your grandfather left upon it. But alas, Finality has descended. Are you all safe?
My old friends—Phoenix, Li Sushang, Welt... are you well? I never thought I would be the first to go.
Bianka... my final student...
I manipulated your life, planned your destiny. I poured genuine effort into nurturing you, yet treated you as a chess piece to be used at will... Heh. A nameless monument is probably impossible now.
And most importantly... Kallen...
Perhaps only at the moment of death would he lay down his calculations and reveal his true face beneath the mask.
The former Overseer who had toyed with all living beings finally cast aside every layer of pretense.
At this moment, the man who had not wept in five hundred years—whose heart had been as firm as stone—cried helplessly.
Whether it was truly tears or not, who knew? Did a soulium body even possess tear ducts?
Drip.
Like a child sobbing, the "blood tears" formed from purple-crimson corrosive particles fell without cease.
Born into the illustrious Apocalypse family, with an archbishop for a father, young Otto had been frail and sickly, never favored by his elder brother or his father.
He lacked the talent to become an outstanding warrior. In other aspects, too, he was merely ordinary, without any remarkable brilliance. Members of Schicksal regarded him as nothing more than a sheltered young master ignorant of the world.
Ridicule and exclusion from his own family. Gossip and contempt from outsiders.
Undoubtedly, Otto's childhood was lonely and miserable—until the day she appeared.
Kallen Kaslana.
The first ray of light in his gray life.
This was the first time Otto had been acknowledged, expected of, needed. And so he fell in love with that pure and kind girl.
Yet that hope became an even greater despair.
Otto's attempt to rescue Kallen during her execution indirectly led to her death. When hope dies, the bone-deep pain and heart-wrenching despair that follow remain forever.
Selene looked down at him. The final words had been spoken. It was time to end this.
"Farewell, great inventor of the Apocalypse lineage."
Before her words fully fell, perhaps because of that final address—or perhaps because of Selene's silver hair—Otto experienced a hallucination.
"Kallen..."
As death approached, the beauty buried deep within memory, the emotions suppressed for five hundred years, erupted all at once. Though his jaw had already largely disintegrated, he still shouted with all his remaining strength:
"Kallen!"
In a daze, the cold crimson eyes before him were replaced by gentle sky-blue pupils. The sharp, commanding brows softened.
That was—Kallen Kaslana.
Summoning every last ounce of strength, Otto struggled. His heavily corroded fingers reached toward Selene's palm, brimming with destructive power.
"I love you!"
It was the confession he had never been able to deliver.
His gaze, heavy with profound affection, fixed upon Selene's face without moving. Purple-crimson tear stains hung upon his cheeks.
What the hell? Selene was utterly baffled. By heaven's conscience, this time she truly had not added any filter to herself.
Pfft!
With that final confession, the man who had spent his entire life chasing one person's footsteps—who had committed every conceivable evil, whose crimes were beyond record, who had ruled Schicksal like a king—finally reached the end of his story.
Otto's fingertips brushed against the surging destructive force in the Herrscher of Finality's palm. In the blink of an eye, his soulium body was as fragile as paper scraps, erased utterly, body and soul scattered to nothingness.
The remaining head fell from midair. Faint fragments of dim light occasionally escaped from it, dispersing in an instant.
With a slight motion of her hand, a golden cube flew from the rapidly dissolving remnants of Otto's body into Selene's grasp.
The First Divine Key: Key of Revelation · Void Archives.
Lowering her gaze to the golden regular cube in her hand, Selene pondered silently.
A weapon crafted by Dr. MEI of the Previous Era using the core of the First Herrscher—the Herrscher of Reason. In its normal state, it appeared as a golden cube, yet it could transform into a fluidic form.
It could replicate weapons and tools whose structural principles the user understood. The same applied to Divine Keys, though the replicated Divine Keys were far inferior to the genuine articles.
Within it lay an almost infinitely extending knowledge space, storing the knowledge gathered by the Herrscher of Reason from the Previous Era civilization. Owing to the unique nature of the Herrscher of Reason's abilities, that knowledge had been preserved alongside the Herrscher Core.
"Little one... not simple at all. You've actually developed individual consciousness."
Sensing its fear, Selene curled her lips into a smile.
By the time of the Post-Honkai Odyssey, the real Otto had already perished after the great battle at Kolosten. The First Divine Key, Void Archives, trapped within Imaginary Space, would escape twelve years later. After the Honkai Eruption ended, it would occupy one of Otto's many soulium bodies.
Walking the outside world wearing Otto's face.
"The single greatest harvest. Dr. Stylish will be very pleased."
Naturally, Selene did not care about its individual consciousness. As per usual—she subjected it to deep Honkai energy corrosion, implanted the mark of Finality upon it, and then stored it away.
"Let me see..."
Closing her eyes, Selene activated the corrosion virus she had previously inserted into Otto's main consciousness. Through the resurrection network Otto had woven for himself, she located every soulium body he had hidden.
The solution was simple. Following the positioning signals of the corrosion virus, she opened spatial gates one after another and collected all of Otto's remaining soulium bodies.
Once she returned to the Imperial Capital, they would be handed over to the Imperial Science Bureau—to be melted down.
"Um... Queen, Arisa is curious."
Selene turned her head, looking at Arisa, whose mouth hung open in astonishment. Hooking a finger, she flicked the girl's little forehead.
"Curious about what? You're staring so intently."
Clutching Selene's wineglass, Arisa glanced left and right before whispering uncertainly, "Um... Queen... was that bad guy just confessing to you?"
"What kind of listening skills do you have? The one he confessed to was Kallen Kaslana, not me."
"Ahh—ow, ow, ow! My Queen, Arisa was wrong!"
Selene tugged her ear, drawing a pained cry from her.
"Enough. Prepare to return. It's over," Selene said irritably, releasing her.
Yet casting a glance at the pit where Otto had perished, Selene murmured silently—
A tragic, lamentable fool in love. To devote oneself to a single person so completely... I could never do that.
With Otto's conditions—his devotion, his resolve—such a lover would likely be impossible for the vast majority of women in the world to reject.
As for whether Kallen, a woman who loved women, was worthy of Otto's unwavering devotion—well, one willing to fight, one willing to endure. Selene would simply watch from the sidelines.
No suspicion. No praise. No curses. No pity. No eulogy.
Because Otto did not need it. He did not need anyone to judge the merits or sins of his life. He had never cared how others saw him.
In his childhood, he had possessed no grand ambitions. Back then, he had merely wanted to become her great inventor...
That was all.
Finally, for the five hundred years of Archbishop Otto Apocalypse's life—and the dream he pursued unwaveringly—let there be a toast.
Taking out a rare vintage from her private treasury, a tribute from the provinces, Selene poured it across the gray-black earth.
"Here, according to commoner rites, erect a tombstone of the lowest specification. No inscription is needed. A blank monument."
"Yes!"
Thereafter, tearing open a spatial rift, Selene grabbed Arisa and turned away without hesitation.
Crack... crack...
Just as Selene stepped into the dark rift, faint sounds drifted into her ears. Her figure paused for a brief instant, a subtle curve appearing at her lips.
Hundred-Flower Wine... as the resting place of Otto's blank monument, it would not disgrace him.
From the corner of her eye, clusters of vibrant green grass and multicolored blossoms emerged from the gray-black earth like shy children, swaying gently in the breeze.
Within mere seconds, illuminated by surrounding lights, the sea of flowers bloomed in brilliant color.
Farewell, creator of my mortal flesh.
...
Meanwhile, at Schicksal headquarters.
"Kevin and the others are already dead. Among our comrades now, only the three of us remain... uh, four," Fu Hua said, rubbing her brow as she looked at Senti, who wore an expression of "What about me?"
"Kevin? Hah, if he's dead, he's dead. He was always doing pointless things anyway."
"And you!" Senti snapped irritably. "Tch! Why is a snake like you here too?"
"Oh my~"
Mobius appeared greatly interested. Looking at Senti—so similar to Fu Hua yet far more "lively"—she flicked out her tongue.
"Why wouldn't I be? You should be quite familiar with me. What else could it be, if not evolution?"
"Hmph. You still haven't given up that ridiculous theory of yours?" Senti sprawled across the table like a delinquent girl, tossing her head disdainfully.
Watching the exchange, Fu Hua inexplicably felt a kind of "old mother's" melancholy.
"Since you and Hua share memories, you must be quite familiar with me," Mobius said, biting down heavily on certain syllables. "We're friends, after all... Would you like to be my little test subject?"
"In your dreams! Stinking snake, if you dare lay a finger on this immortal, I'll smash your snake head to pieces!"
"Still such a child," Mobius replied coolly. "Do you know why you were able to become a MANTIS? That was all thanks to evolution. Without me, how would you have survived the meta-morph surgery?"
At the mention of evolution, the excitement in Mobius's eyes intensified. Her gaze wandered around the room.
"And here—they are the evolution I seek. The direction of humanity's evolution."
Turning to Fu Hua as if appealing to a parent when a child refused to listen, Mobius spoke meaningfully.
"The meta-morph factors of MANTIS soldiers are based on Honkai Beast DNA. But them—based on my observations, they were modified using a form of DNA with extremely strong environmental adaptability as the catalyst."
Pointing to her dark-golden eyes, Mobius continued:
"No matter how inhuman their physiques appear, they are still predominantly human at the genetic level. There is no chaotic mixture of extraneous DNA added in."
"There are no detectable traces of surgical alteration or experimentation in them. They are as natural as if they were born that way. Do you understand what that means?"
"They are closer to being human than MANTIS soldiers. Not only is their adaptability higher, but their scalability is far beyond what meta-morph surgery could ever achieve!"