Sakura's sword light illuminated the sky.
A brilliant rainbow hung high in the firmament.
It came as Aponia burned all her power and memories—that's right, the reason Fu Hua's [Sword God of Taixu] could generate such immense power was because she burned all the memories she had accumulated during her awakenings over thousands of years.
Aponia didn't know what it would take to kill the Black Emperor.
So.
All she could do was offer her everything.
All the memories belonging to the existence known as Aponia, from the moment she could remember until now.
"Ooooh~"
No, that wasn't a rainbow.
It was the fluttering wings of a butterfly.
With a clamorous roar of wind, a butterfly—resplendent to the point of brilliance, beautiful to the extreme—descended from the heavens, towards the motionless Black Emperor—
SCHLIIIIIIICK!!!!!
RUMBLE!
An endless light washed over everyone's vision.
Bathing in it felt as warm and reassuring as returning to a mother's embrace.
The silence did not last long. Amidst the sound of a colossal body crashing to the ground, amidst the lifelessness in Aponia's eyes...
The Black Emperor.
Had fallen.
There was no sign of life, no mental fluctuations, no spatial ripples, and none of the tell-tale signs of [Infinity] being released.
Only a shell remained, and the Honkai energy stored within.
Aponia had succeeded.
The Eighth Key of God had successfully obliterated the Black Emperor's spirit. A normal Honkai Beast's death would see its shell rapidly disintegrate and vanish.
But the Black Emperor's did not.
The colossal shell still existed. This was the best proof that their plan had succeeded.
The Black Emperor's body, along with the Herrscher Cores within it, would become humanity's most precious treasure. With them, the hope of completely eradicating the Honkai was no longer so slim!
Although...
The price was far too heavy.
The Flame-Chasers.
No, after losing the Mu Continent and almost all of the Flame-Chasers' top combatants, the coming void in humanity's strength would be an incredibly difficult period to endure.
And—
"Aponia."
Su had no doubt; he didn't even need to look.
Aponia's mental fluctuations told the whole story—her existence as a human had been entirely poured into that last attack.
From this day forward...
Crack.
A strange sound from an unknown source reached Su's ears. Before he could even register what had just happened—
"Kosma!!"
BOOOOMM!!!!!
"Wh-what?"
When his vision returned... no, Su wished he had never seen that last scene. Never.
It should be said.
Whether it was Su, Kalpas, or Kosma.
They couldn't believe what they were seeing before their very eyes—
A pitch-black fist had leveled everything. When the ink-black, night-dark pillar moved away from its original spot, they could no longer recognize the original forms of their old friends.
There was not a single sound.
The feather-like "Eighth Key of God" fluttered to the ground.
Before Su's eyes, all that was left was a black-and-white nun's habit... and butterfly wings shattering like glass.
Before Kalpas's eyes, his comrade with the pink fox ears, the companion in the Flame-Chasers who understood him best, had already been reduced to a pile of meat paste and a red stream, covered by clothing.
And before Kosma's eyes...
It should have been him who died. Yes, it should have been him.
At the final moment before the [Annihilation Iron Fist] fell, Griseo had used all his strength to shove Kosma far away. Griseo's senses were exceptionally sharp, extraordinarily so... just as he had demonstrated in the previous battle.
As for the culprit behind it all...
The Black Emperor.
Stood up.
As expected.
Yes, as expected.
Whether it was Sakura's [Myriad Phenomena, No Illumination] or Aponia's [Sword God of Taixu]—at this point, the "First Power" of Yudu Chen probably didn't have a formal name, but since the "fusion ability" originated from Aponia's Discipline, if Hua could use it, it was impossible for its original wielder, Aponia, to be unable to.
This was also why the Emperor had locked onto Sakura as his target from the very beginning.
Without [Myriad Phenomena, No Illumination], the [Sword God of Taixu] could never have hit him.
But he had never expected that with Aponia's cooperation, Su's [Illusion] would actually manage to deceive him.
One thing was correct.
[Infinity] was indeed no defense against that move.
Once the "First Power" of Yudu Chen hit, Lu Xing wouldn't even have a chance to use [Infinity] before he was reduced to a mindless puppet.
However.
Lu Xing's abilities were not limited to just [Infinity].
Consciousness... with [Species Iteration], he could just split off a few more.
The consciousness currently inside the Emperor's body had been directly transferred from the Black Temple in the Great Rift.
And as for how many of these clones...
Lu Xing had prepared, no one knew.
BOOM!!!
A blinding cannon blast shot over from the distance!
The surging impact directly caused the entire landmass to shake violently!
"Can't maintain his sanity anymore, can he..."
Kosma had gone berserk.
Witnessing Griseo's sacrifice firsthand, Kosma had completely crossed the threshold of Artificial Honkai Eruption—not the kind of eruption Mobius could control with drugs, but a complete transformation into a Honkai Beast form, a true "artificial" eruption.
His power skyrocketed.
The price was the complete loss of his sanity.
However.
Lu Xing had no intention of "dealing with" this mad dog for the moment. The power of [Aegis] formed a massive wall of light around the Emperor, blocking all attacks!
His Honkai energy reserves were still the same.
It wasn't that he didn't want to annihilate all the Fusion Warriors at once, but that he could only focus on killing the most threatening ones.
After three [Annihilation Iron Fists].
Lu Xing had to save enough Honkai energy to deploy this absolutely impenetrable [Aegis] to buy time.
Buy time for what?
That's right.
From the moment the Emperor appeared until now, his most powerful weapon for group battles, the spacetime crystals—no, to be precise, the [Subspace Lances]—had not appeared at all!
Where were they?
This was where the last of his Honkai energy had gone—
"Second Plan..."
BOOM!
RUMBLE!!
One hundred and twenty-eight [Subspace Lances] formed a circle, appearing simultaneously directly above the light wall created by [Aegis]!
And within that circle!
A Honkai energy rift, more exaggerated than 'large', one that could only be called 'gigantic', gradually revealed its true form!
An immeasurably vast tide of Honkai energy surged forth!
In the time it took to draw a single breath, the Emperor's aura had returned to its unstoppable peak.
"...begins now."
At the same time—
"Cheche!"
THUD!!
A lance of interweaving black and gold stabbed violently into the earth before the Emperor!
Relying on only a part of the Authority of Sentience had, after all, allowed these psychic-type Fusion Warriors to find an opening. But now—
The core, the weapon, and also the comrade, the [Radiance], had returned to his hand.
Who else...
Dared to stand before the Emperor?