"Herta really knows how to operate... She truly is a genius. The film effect is quite good."
Watching the scene on the light screen, Ron tore open a bag of Wonder Snacks, chewing quietly as his gaze fell upon the text that had just appeared.
[The Path of [The Destruction] has sundered at Herta's hands—Lord Ravager [Phantylia] represented one of the seven extreme tendencies of Destruction. She died at Herta's hands, and died while suppressed beneath the Sword of Salvation. This sequence of events created the miraculous situation of this very moment.]
[The remaining Path of [Salvation], having been sundered by your own hands, has been thirsting for completion... Although the Path has no will, concepts will always collide and eventually merge into one.]
[Because your [Sword of Salvation] had long ago swallowed a portion of the [Destruction] Path's concept, and the Sword of Salvation was suppressing the Lord Ravager who came with the Antimatter Legion—Phantylia, who had been lurking on New Belobog all along—the moment Herta killed Phantylia with the Divine Authority of [Salvation], the portion of the extreme tendency belonging to [Destruction] represented by Phantylia was thoroughly sundered.]
[Then, following the convergence of Paths, it was absorbed by [Salvation]...]
[Now, the Path of [The Destruction] has been stripped and weakened, while the Path of [Salvation] has been improved to a certain extent because it swallowed the fragments split from another Path.]
[One wonders if Phantylia regrets it. Does she regret lurking after the Legion's main force was defeated at New Belobog, and after her own vessel was destroyed in your hands?]
[If she hadn't hidden here, and hadn't harbored greedy designs on this planet due to your death, plotting to usurp it, but had instead chosen to leave silently, perhaps she wouldn't have met this moment of despair...]
[But it has happened. Since she made the greedy choice, she must naturally accept the disaster that greed brings—]
[Phantylia has become a sinner in the absolute sense for the Antimatter Legion. She caused the Path of [The Destruction] to suffer a sunderance, and brought a new choice to the "Sword of Salvation"...]
[But Nanook, [The Destruction], is surely powerless to find trouble with her now.]
[The sudden sunderance of the Path of [The Destruction] has plunged Nanook, who was already heavily injured, into an even more dangerous situation...]
Looking at the text on the light screen, Ron munched on the snacks in his mouth, a look of interest appearing on his face.
"So Phantylia actually died back when I swung that sword... It's just that because of her unique nature, that wisp of soul fire remained."
"Then, because my simulated self fell and I didn't prepare to leave, she tried to rely on the Stellaron to control the planet while suppressed by that sword?"
Thinking about it carefully, Ron could understand Phantylia's actions.
After all, for Phantylia, the destruction that Nanook, [The Destruction], would eventually bring terrified her immensely. She had always been searching for a power that could escape final destruction.
In the past, she had sought the Ambrosial Arbor as a vessel, and now, wanting to take the entirety of New Belobog as a vessel was naturally logical.
After all, Ron had already exhausted his remaining Path and strength to turn the Sword of Salvation into a permanent fixture of New Belobog. If Phantylia could use the Stellaron as a core and, after a long period of planning, truly usurp the entirety of New Belobog without anyone noticing, the Sword of Salvation would naturally fall into her hands...
At that time, she would naturally have the confidence to turn traitor, no longer needing to fear the destruction Nanook would bring.
However, what Ron found interesting was not Phantylia's methods—
The death of an ambitious schemer was nothing more than a joke to him. What was truly interesting was the Path of [The Destruction] sundered after Phantylia's death...
"Because she was suppressed by the Sword of Salvation and killed by Herta using the power of [Salvation], the extreme tendency of the [Destruction] Path represented by Phantylia was sundered and then swallowed by the remaining Path of [Salvation]..."
"Is it because [Salvation] had previously devoured a part of [The Destruction], and then in the end, I didn't return it?"
Ron rubbed his chin, and an absurd premonition inevitably rose in his heart:
"If the current Path of [Salvation] can truly devour [The Destruction] without limit... then if we find the remaining Lord Ravagers and kill them, wouldn't we be able to keep sundering the Path of [Destruction]?"
"If this goes on, Nanook, [The Destruction], will be constantly weakened, and the Antimatter Legion will wither because of it... until the very end, when the entire Path of [The Destruction] is swallowed by [Salvation], Nanook will inevitably fall."
The more Ron thought about it, the more he felt his idea had no issues. Although the idea felt incredibly absurd, careful consideration showed it was quite logical and indeed had a possibility of success.
"Now, Nanook, [The Destruction], is heavily injured. Because the Path has split, his state has become even worse. He clearly has no ability to personally descend onto the field..."
"Therefore, as long as we kill the Lord Ravagers first, and then kill Nanook, there is a real possibility of success—"
He arrived at a bold conjecture—
"That's right... Nanook, [The Destruction], is the youngest Aeon. Aha, [The Elation], beat Him into a cripple, and my simulated self also tore apart His Path. Now is the time when He is at His weakest..."
"The youngest Aeon has fallen into the weakest state... Is there any Aeon easier to kill than Him?"
"Could it be that after my death in the simulation, given enough development time for New Belobog, there's still a chance to fight a War of Gods?"
Ron muttered to himself, intense interest growing in his eyes. He looked at the light screen before him with great fascination, his heart filled with anticipation...
He knew clearly that Herta would choose to try and continuously sunder the Path of [The Destruction]—
After all, the secrets of the Aeons were Herta's most important pursuit right now.
Originally, she wanted to attempt to explore everything related to Aeons and make certain contact with them, which was why Herta wanted to sponsor the Simulated Universe.
The information obtained from the Simulated Universe would be somewhat vague due to the limitations of the simulation itself, and much information would become a bit unbelievable due to the gap between simulation and reality...
But now, Herta had the opportunity to personally sunder the Path of an Aeon in reality and attempt to fight against a God—what reason did she have not to do so?
She only needed to realize that she could completely swallow the Path of [The Destruction] and kill Nanook, [The Destruction], through the situation of the Path sundering after killing Phantylia, and she would definitely try it...
And as an Emanator of [Erudition], what Herta lacked least was wisdom.
As a bystander, Ron could understand the situation with a simple glance. Herta, at the moment she swung the hammer, naturally understood it as well.
The text on the light screen gradually faded, and the image on the screen confirmed Ron's thoughts...
Herta had indeed figured it out.
A new image appeared on the light screen:
Herta, holding the hammer in her hand, silently watched the yellow-green soul fire dissipating before her. Phantylia's power was not considered strong; without a physical vessel, the Lord Ravager Phantylia was absolutely the weakest among all the Lord Ravagers, the [Destruction] Emanators.
And facing Herta, a dual Emanator of [Erudition] and [Salvation], Phantylia didn't even have a chance to fight back...
Suppressed beneath the holy light of the Sword of Salvation, she was unable to flee. She was fixed in a predetermined death by Herta using "Hope Manifest," and then personally annihilated by Herta, hammer blow after hammer blow.
And after Herta annihilated Phantylia's soul fire, she suddenly froze, a very bizarre scene flashing before her eyes—
Her consciousness suddenly ascended, arriving at another realm far above the mortal world.
She walked upon the withered branches of the Path and saw a dilapidated hut.
The material of the hut was broken, but light shone from within.
Through the hole in the hut, Herta could see a broken lantern. The flame beneath the lampshade was about to go out, burning only on red-gold candle wax, barely maintaining its combustion...
But now, red-gold fragments flew from nowhere. These fragments pieced themselves onto the broken lantern, filling the gaps in the lantern's structure—
Although these fragments were but a drop in the bucket, and the completely shattered lantern could not be fully repaired by this, they at least pieced together about one-seventh of the framework...
The candle flame in the lantern also became slightly brighter. The rekindled flame burned somewhat more fiercely, and the light it emitted was brighter as well—
Herta's consciousness fell rapidly, plummeting from that lofty realm.
She came back to her senses, slowly opening her eyes, a complex look in them.
As an Emanator of an Aeon, Herta was able to touch upon quite a few secrets at this level... She clearly understood what she had just encountered.
It was obvious... that was the manifestation of the Path, a place only Aeons could go.
She remembered that lantern. It was the one Ron had held in his hand... As the manifestation of the Path, it was normal for it to become so broken after Ron tore it apart with his own hands and fell.
However, Herta hadn't expected the possibility of repairing it—
She had thought that to complete the Path of [Salvation], she would need to integrate the Path fragments of [Preservation], [Abundance], [Harmony], and [Remembrance] into [Salvation].
After all, these were the ones Ron had sought out to collect debts from before his ascension, and Ron had indeed returned a large portion of the Path to them. It was logical to need those Path fragments to repair [Salvation].
But she hadn't expected... that [The Destruction] could also be thoroughly integrated into the Path of [Salvation], becoming fuel for [Salvation]?
From the looks of it, as long as she killed more Lord Ravagers, the Path of [The Destruction], having been sundered multiple times, would become extremely weak, while the Path of [Salvation], having swallowed [The Destruction], would be repaired completely...
Then... whether it is the birth of a new Aeon of [Salvation], or the killing of Nanook, [The Destruction], perhaps both are possible.
A wildly ambitious thought was born in Herta's heart, but clearly, no one would stop her—
The Path of [Salvation] had only her as an Emanator. Ron had already fallen. If she really had the ability to repair the Path of [Salvation], it would be proper even if she ascended to the seat of the Aeon herself. Perhaps even Ron himself would be happy to see it happen.
As for killing Nanook, [The Destruction]... in this sea of stars, the disasters brought by Nanook, [The Destruction], were comparable to the Swarm Disaster of Tayzzyronth, [The Propagation].
And the Swarm King had already fallen. Died under the collective hatred of the entire sea of stars, died within the schemes of the Aeons, died under the hammer of Qlipoth, [The Preservation]...
Nanook, [The Destruction], would eventually meet the same end as the Swarm King. It was just that the moment for the Aeons to enter the game hadn't arrived yet.
Dying under the hammer of [Preservation] or under the sword of [Salvation], dying dozens of Amber Eras later or dying within the next few Amber Eras... what was the difference?
With these thoughts born in her heart, Herta found it difficult to suppress the desire to uncover all the secrets of the Aeons with her own hands...
Herta took a deep breath. The supreme wisdom contained in that mass of protein known as her brain spun rapidly, mapping out a new plan for her.
She knew what she had to do.
The image on the light screen faded, and new text appeared upon it:
[After killing Phantylia, Herta temporarily used Geomarrow as an energy source for New Belobog to drive the giant city's operation. Then, she immediately placed an order with the Corporation, purchasing a Vacuum Zero Point Energy Reactor pile to replace the Stellaron that had once served as an infinite energy source, linking it to New Belobog's energy hub.]
[The turmoil on New Belobog had not yet caused any impact before it was pacified by Phantylia's death... The extremists who had been persecuted by their paranoia came back to their senses, stopping their overly aggressive methods of struggle.]
[They were still extreme... but they had returned to the right track, regaining the justice and nobility proper to Pathstriders of [Salvation].]
[But the internal strife within the "Sword of Salvation" did not subside because of this—Phantylia had provoked their conflict, and their split had created two distinct factions. They had to fight until a victor emerged...]
[But Herta put a stop to everyone's disputes.]
[After preparing for a period of time, Herta publicly supported the extreme faction of the "Sword of Salvation," defining the primary philosophy of the "Sword of Salvation," and held a grand conference in the Round Table Hall. She summoned all members of the "Sword of Salvation" and produced a special protocol to unite the masses against disasters—]
[Because the content of the protocol was full of hostility towards the consolidation and suppression of galactic disasters, and full of hostility towards the disasters in the sea of stars, especially the Antimatter Legion, Herta simplified its complex full name, briefly naming it—]
[She called it the "Purge Protocol."]