It was one of Mei’s and Aleph’s topics three months ago.
“How strong am I? Hehe…”
A hint of embarrassment appeared on his face. It articurly promi in Mei’s sight. After all, Aleph’s head was ying ohighs.
Like a cat, Mei ruffled his hair every now and then.
“Feel free to deploy me on any battlefield. If there aren't any avaible reinforts, I’ll still ha.”
“...You are that strong?” She asked.
“Yes, very. That’s why… when things e down to it, don’t hesitate to do as you deem fit.”
…
Objectively, deploying your childhood friend-ssh-lover on a dangerous battlefield alone seems chilling to most people. Hagen was chilled by it, and so were the personnel along with him.
It elicited both admiration and doubt. A leader who wouldn’t be influenced by aernal factors is a great leader. So long as their objective was to make the best decisions for humanity, she would be admired.
‘Was it this..?’
Mei’s thoughts went to her father’s words. He asked her to study in high school to see things beyond the ‘rational scope’. For the st three years, she went through things that could make her do irrational things. It was only a matter of self-trol—either rationality or irrationality prevails.
Fortunately…
Her man is extremely strong.
‘He’s supposed to e here today…’
The perfect baween rationality and irrationality was struck.
*****
Zoom-!
Boom-!
A bck figure streaked through the clouds.
Aleph, wearing the battlesuit given to him by Vill-V three months ago, could safely fly at Mach 50. The booming sound he made every time he passed through a city was akin to an intertial missile exploding.
The battlesuit itself did not have the ventional design of his prior iron suits. It was more apt to call them special clothing, something that could be found at a cospy store. It was a bck skinsuit with metallic vests, small gaus, aallic boots. It took the ‘sharp’ design quite literally.
It tained far more abilities pared to the prototype Aleph previously wore. Safely guarding him from Mach 50 was just one of them.
A thin transparent film was formed all around him. The source of them all was her than the simirly thior at his back. It glowed dimly with purple lights every now and then.
‘One dead and one severely injured. How did the seventh Herrscher bee this strong..?’
It serves to reason that the Seventh Herrscher should have been manageable with fh-level MANTISes trolling the situation.
However, things turned out far worse thahought.
‘The injured guy was with Hua when they held back the Herrscher. Only oher high-level MANTIS was left along with several lower-leveled oo evacuate the people at the stadium…’
He thought for a while.
‘...This means she’s fighting the Herrscher alone..!’
Mach 50.
Theoretically, this speed was enough for Aleph to take a round trip oh ihan forty minutes. Earth has a circumference of 24,900 miles, which roughly trao 80,000 kilometers.
The distance from Mu tio the pce where they held the cert, one of the tral cities of the Western ti, was more or less 10,000 kilometers.
As such, from the time he learned of the current situation up until now, less than five minutes had passed.
‘I’m already a quarter through. I’m at my normal limit. Unless I unveil that form now…’
Aleph had sed thoughts on revealing his Meta-Morph State. From the mome ‘targeted’ by the Co, he knew better than to expose his erength.
Mei’s three months of resear the Sea of Quanta as well as Aleph’s ‘Information Imprint’ opened up a lot of hings. They are mostly reted to quantum enta, a phenomenon tinuously used by Fire MOTH during middle to te stages.
As such, they specuted that this ‘Co of Finality’, disregarding its irregurities, held the power to see tless information.
‘I already revealed the Evolution Cube. This prig sensation in my neck…’
Aleph’s Deathly Intuition opped w since a month ago. Such a rea only meant that danger was creeping onto him.
‘These thoughts again. My mind is getting pyed a lot…’
In the end, his chaotic thoughts stopped. Several clear solutions came up as his mind was rid of these thoughts.
All of these thoughts took less than a sed to occur iime.
‘I should trust in Hua. Two… no, one minute.’
He came up with a solution.
‘For the minute, I won’t use all three of my cursed teiques. I won’t attay entities other than myself. I won’t use my Meta-Morph state…’
Aleph imposed a series of heavy restris upon himself. In an instant, his speed shot up at a sharp rate. It only took several seds of acceleration to reach Mach 100.
Such a speed was impossible for any humans—the current high-level MANTISes included.
However, that wasn’t the end.
Click.
A field of honkai energy emerged around him. These honkai energy began affeg the real world, increasing the lights’ damping coeffit instantaneously.
This phenomenon caused a Global Time Fracture.
It only had one effect: to cause an individual to move faster.
The retivity of time works in this case. The devi his possession gave him ara ten seds in the span of a sed.
In that duration, Aleph’s speed remaihe same in his frame of reference. However, to the outside world, the bck figure reached unpreted heights.
Zoom-!
*****
First, it was endless crimson. Then, everything begaing like rubber. The surroundings became exaggeratedly distorted. The extremely fast movements caused by numerous molecules produced extreme heat. Broken shards of gss turned into molten magma in mere moments.
The temperature required to do such a thing was beyond a thousand degrees celsius.
The thing they were fag was beyond that.
Boom-!
A rge hole ened up in the wall of fmes. The force it geed crashed into several burning buildings at once.
In that momentary gap, two gazes faced each other.
‘Agatha. Senior Fire MOTH researcher. She works in the sed institute…’
The brief information Hua found out before unication was cut off fshed on her mind.
‘This level of destru and application… She's profit in her authority.’
It was the worst case sario. Fire MOTH never faced a Herrscher whinally had plex knowledge about their authorities.
The First Herrscher was a vilge boy, while the Sed Herrscher was a high-school student. The Third Herrscher was a high-school dropout, and the Fourth Herrscher was a full-time caretaker.
The fifth did not have any stifiowledge, either. Only now was there a Herrscher with plete stifiowledge of the authority she wielded.
As such, her destructive power was off the charts.
Bam-!
Swoosh-!
Sou-!
An ares desded upon Hua, to which she deftly avoided. Her figure reappeared amongst the sea of fmes.
‘She did it.’
Hua’s gaze turned into her surroundings.
Boom-!
Rumble-!
She watched as a huge skyscraper was cut into half. That was what she pnned all this time.
Bam-!
A rge cloud of dust desded into the ground.
*****
A/N: Welp. I think I o take this arc piece-by-piece. Aleph’s current strength first, then his take on the sixth herrscher’s possible pns. If someohought of the ‘Gems’ and ‘Herrscher Cores’ not being able to exist at the same time, think of the differences between CE cores and PE cores. That, and the events in the feters would expin this.
