The Golden Apple was famous throughout the entire Assassin's Creed storyline.
Golden Apples weren't unique. According to texts she'd read in the underground bunker, Washington, Roosevelt, and Kennedy should have all possessed and used the Golden Apple now in Bella's hands.
Records showed this Golden Apple should have been lost when Kennedy was assassinated. Why it had reappeared in the White House—whether successors had found it again or it had never been lost at all—the truth was buried in history, beyond her knowledge.
Bella didn't directly touch the Golden Apple with her hands. This thing absorbed the user's life force—supposedly returning that portion later, but she found this pointless back-and-forth deeply suspicious and didn't want to risk it. So she wrapped the Golden Apple in psionic energy and carefully lifted it to examine.
Initially nothing unusual happened. But when she tried using her psionic senses to probe the Golden Apple's interior, an incredible scene unfolded.
The formless, substanceless psionic energy suddenly entangled with golden threads inside the Golden Apple. Two seemingly unrelated energies intertwined, spiraling together. Before she could react, some kind of homogenization occurred between them.
Golden threads tinged with silver light rippled outward with her as the center, forming countless geometric shapes—triangles, trapezoids, circles—infinite patterns layered upon each other in a special form of existence.
Bella quickly severed her psionic connection to her own mind, jumping aside in alarm.
She was genuinely scared, not even caring that she'd lost nearly a tenth of her psionic power. As if worried this distance was still dangerous, she retreated two more steps.
Without psionic support, the Golden Apple fell to the floor with a thud, rolled twice, and returned to its previous unremarkable state.
Though the mental contact had been extremely brief, she'd still glimpsed the Golden Apple's inner essence in that instant. This was high-end technological equipment that functioned by interfacing with neural transmitter networks implanted in human brains. Its basic functions were creating illusions, mind control, and energy blasts.
Honestly, Bella already possessed these abilities herself. For her, this thing was less practical than the magic carpet—at least the carpet could fly.
Since the Golden Apple seemed dangerous, she prepared to seal it away.
"Your Highness, if you wish to communicate simply in English, we can converse. I am not your enemy." A soft electronic voice suddenly sounded in Bella's ear.
Your Highness? Bella looked around, her gaze finally settling on the Golden Apple.
This thing could talk? In English? She only remembered the Shroud of Turin could speak—she really hadn't known Golden Apples had this function too.
"Are you talking to me?"
"Yes, Your Highness. It's me. Actually, thought communication would be faster."
Bella shook her head firmly: "No, no, I think verbal communication is perfectly suitable. Why are you talking to me now, at this time and place? I didn't see your previous holders record that you could speak. Does that mean you never communicated with them?"
She asked another question: "Do you have a name?"
"I am Number Three." Seemingly confirming her female identity, the Golden Apple's electronic voice gradually shifted to a female tone.
The Golden Apple spoke frankly: "Communication can only occur subconsciously and gets automatically forgotten upon waking. Their minds weren't strong enough."
So my psionic adept mind is strong enough? Bella felt a bit excited hearing this. Looks like I'm pretty powerful! Pride!
"I am an assistive tool, Your Highness. You need my help." Number Three spoke unhurriedly.
Bella waved her hands defensively in refusal: "I have no ambitions to conquer the world. If you want me to control a country, I'd find that more trouble than it's worth. Besides, I'm different from your previous holders. I can roughly see what your abilities are—I already have them. So you should go back to sleep. And stop calling me 'Your Highness'—it's so tacky."
She wanted to end this conversation and bury the Golden Apple somewhere hidden.
But one offhand remark made her freeze.
"Your DNA has mutated. Whether you acknowledge it or not, your bloodline contains Isu genes, and at a high concentration. In that distant age, the Isu would have given you a princess title to rule humanity. So the title 'Your Highness' is perfectly appropriate—it's an honor you've earned."
Bella, who'd been about to find a box for the Golden Apple, stopped in her tracks.
She had such an impressive background? She was skilled in magic—how did this connect to genetics?
Number Three continued: "You think your abilities are strong? You think they're innate talents? That's both right and wrong. Those abilities didn't appear from nothing. Your powers originate from Isu genetic fragments, which you've somehow strengthened through some method, creating who you are today."
The Isu! Thoughts raced through Bella's mind.
The Precursors. Creators of Earth's previous civilization. Super-technological civilization! All these could describe the Isu.
They'd created Neanderthals and Homo sapiens, the ancestors of modern humans.
What abilities did the Isu have? Humans had five senses, while the Isu possessed a sixth sense.
Modern science considered the sixth sense to be extrasensory intuition—receiving information through channels beyond normal senses, enabling precognition of coming events. Externally, it manifested as heightened sensitivity and nervousness.
Bella's expression grew serious. Thinking it over this way, the sixth sense matched many of her experiences right after transmigrating.
She'd always thought original Bella was talented, but never considered the source of that talent.
Thinking back now, explaining it with school bullying seemed forced. Plenty of people got bullied—why couldn't they resist vampire mind-reading? Why didn't they have death premonitions?
Before the vampire transformation, before becoming a psionic adept, Bella's predecessor had possessed an extremely small portion of Isu genes carrying certain abilities. Viewed this way, everything made sense.
Original Bella had manifested these genetic traits through vampiric transformation, while she'd now increased the Isu genetic concentration through transmigration and channeling, using magical means?
"Am I still human?" Her impression was that Isu were all eight-foot-tall giants. Though they lived much longer than humans, she still didn't want to become that. Too tall! Clearly abnormal!
"Of course. Even the constantly reincarnating Sages remain human. So do you."
Hearing she was still human, Bella secretly breathed a relief. She cared deeply about her human identity. Best not to change if possible. Lifespan could be solved with magic. Besides, given America's dire future situation, surviving twenty years would be lucky...