Before long, with everything finally settled, the group quickly finished their preparations.
At this moment, all of them stood before the Matrix of Prescience, each harboring their own thoughts.
Fu Xuan stood at the heart of the formation, hands weaving seals, her expression solemn.
Outside the main hall of the Divination Commission, intricate lines began to light up one after another. These were the foundations of the Matrix of Prescience, divination sigils reinforced by generations of Master Diviners.
After setting all the formation nodes in place, Fu Xuan turned to Cecilia and said evenly, "Lady Cecilia, the Matrix of Prescience requires causality as its guide. If you wish to find someone, you must provide either a token connected to them or exact information."
Cecilia nodded. She had already prepared for this. Reaching into her clothes, she took something out.
It was a pendant.
A silver chain, with a pale blue gemstone as its centerpiece.
If one looked closely, tiny words could be seen engraved upon the gem:
To my dearest Cecilia
"This was left to me by Sister Theresa," Cecilia said softly.
"She told me it was polished from the first Primal Core she ever discovered on her own. The only one of its kind in the world."
Fu Xuan accepted the pendant and examined it carefully.
"This pendant… is no ordinary thing. Workmanship like this must have come from a true master," Fu Xuan muttered.
Then she realized she had just stated the obvious, so she coughed lightly to hide her awkwardness.
"Ahem. What I mean is, the causal traces on it are indeed very clear. With this, our chances of finding her are much better."
Cecilia nodded, not bothering over Fu Xuan's momentary embarrassment.
"Then what do you need me to do?"
Fu Xuan pointed toward the two positions at the center of the formation. "Lady Cecilia and Mr. Welt need only stand in the core of the array. Leave the rest to me."
"That's all?"
"That's all."
She then explained, "The Matrix of Prescience works by using causality as a guide to trace the target. You and Lady Theresa share a direct causal bond, so you must be inside the array."
"As for Mr. Welt… your case is somewhat special. According to what Lady Cecilia said, you once came into contact with a counterpart of Lady Theresa from another world, so you too can serve as a causal anchor."
Welt did not refuse.
Before activating the Matrix, Cecilia had already told everyone all the information regarding Theresa.
A genius concealed by Mystery, a mind so brilliant she had created Nous.
Welt had no idea what the Luofu thought of all this or whether they believed it, but he himself was thoroughly bewildered.
Theresa. An Emanator of Erudition? The genius who created Nous?
Was that even possible? Was that really the Theresa he knew?
Well… no. It obviously was not the Theresa he knew.
But based on the precedent of meeting Himeko here, these alternate-world counterparts, though not the exact same person in essence, always seemed to share a great deal in temperament.
That was precisely why Welt had extended Cecilia such special trust.
Because with Cecilia's noble character, surely her counterpart in another world must also be someone worthy of faith.
Still, the present situation left him more than a little lost.
Had he misplaced his trust in this world's Cecilia… or had he underestimated the original Theresa?
But whatever Welt thought, the Matrix of Prescience was about to begin.
Compared to him, Cecilia was far calmer.
Because as things stood, not a single one of these people had given her any "coins."
It seemed none of them believed her.
But it didn't matter. Once the Matrix of Prescience produced its results, they would cough up something eventually.
After all, after so many rounds of world-building, Theresa and the groundwork around Mystery had already grown into something substantial.
Even if the Matrix could not reveal the truth outright, it should at least produce something impressive enough to frighten them.
Or, at the very least, show a glimpse of the future her fabricated history had already shaped.
With that in mind, Cecilia stepped into the core of the formation and waited for Fu Xuan to act.
Fu Xuan raised both hands in seals, and streams of mysterious light poured from her fingertips into the formation nodes.
"Matrix of Prescience—activate!"
Boom!
The instant Fu Xuan completed her motions, the entire Divination Commission trembled.
The intricate sigils lit up one by one, and Fu Xuan's pupils contracted sharply.
"How can this be? The Matrix's consumption is this enormous?!"
Her face turned pale at once.
As the Master Diviner of the Luofu, this was hardly her first time using the Matrix of Prescience.
But never in her life had she seen such terrifying rates of expenditure.
In only a few moments, half of the Divination Commission's stored resources had already been drained.
"Fu Qing?" Jing Yuan immediately sensed something was wrong.
"General, the Matrix's consumption is too great!" Fu Xuan said urgently.
At this rate, even if they drained the entire Divination Commission dry, it still might not be enough to sustain the calculation.
But what did that mean?
Could it really be just as Cecilia had said?
That there truly existed a genius hidden by Mystery—one at the level of Zandar himself?
No. Since she had already agreed to help, how could she allow this to fail here and now?
Seeing this, Cecilia frowned slightly.
She had not expected this either.
According to her design, Theresa's existence had been hidden by Mystery, so the Matrix of Prescience should only have been able to uncover limited information. At best, it should have shown a few blurry images.
But judging from how the Matrix was reacting, it seemed it was simply too weak for the task.
"Master Diviner Fu, if you can't hold it—"
Before Cecilia could finish speaking, a sudden change erupted.
Bzzz—
A mechanical figure appeared above the Luofu.
The Erudition Aeon—Nous.
"Omniscient Heavenly Sovereign?!" Fu Xuan, who was controlling the Matrix, froze in disbelief.
She had never, in her wildest imagination, expected Nous to appear at a moment like this.
A terrible realization arose in everyone's hearts at once.
Could it be that this Theresa truly existed—and the Mystery concealing her had extended so far that even Nous itself had been covered by it?
Yet the truly astonishing part was still to come.
Nous acted at once. The power of Erudition wrapped itself around Fu Xuan in an instant.
Clearly, since ordinary calculation had failed, Nous intended to take over the deduction personally in her stead.
"Fu Qing!" Jing Yuan instinctively moved forward, but the pressure of an Aeon forced him back before he could even get close.
In the end, he could only pray that Nous meant no harm.
Fortunately, Nous indeed had no intention of injuring Fu Xuan.
It had come here for one reason alone.
At last, with Nous's aid, the Matrix of Prescience finally produced a result.
A vast heavenly screen spread across half the Luofu.
At that moment, everyone lifted their heads.
It was an image—
An image that seemed to have crossed countless ages and countless worlds.
Within it, a small white-haired figure stood amid a brilliant sea of stars.
She wore a white dress and looked no more than thirteen or fourteen.
It was Theresa.
"This…" March 7th stared, eyes wide. "That's the person Lady Cecilia is looking for? Why does she look even younger than me?"
But no one answered her.
Because everyone's attention had been wholly captured by the vision overhead.
In front of Theresa, an arrow flew across the heavens.
The Hunt Aeon—Lan.
The Aeon worshiped by the Xianzhou Alliance had appeared within the vision as well.
"…No, that arrow did not come from the Reignbow Arbiter!"
Once he came back to himself, Jing Yuan was the first to cry out in alarm.
As one who had personally beheld Lan, Jing Yuan knew the brilliance of The Hunt better than anyone.
That arrow was equally terrifying, but its aura did not wholly belong to the Reignbow.
And in the next moment, the answer revealed itself.
To everyone's astonishment, above that divine arrow stood the figure of a woman.
And the arrow had come from her own hands.
Her appearance, moreover, was not unfamiliar.
Jing Yuan: The Marshal?!
Welt: The Immortal Red Kite?!
Ten chapters done. I'm spent!!!
From now on, the update time will probably be fixed at 10 a.m. If that changes, I'll post a separate note.
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In Star Rail, Ultra-Beast Armored — Have I Caught "Equilibrium"? l (Chapter 80)
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Becoming a Horse Girl, I Will 37
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