"And it looks like quite the commotion." Kallen watched the surroundings vigilantly. "As long as you two can protect yourselves, leave the rest to me."
"Don't hold back," Irene said, looking at Kallen. "I can sense that they aren't normal humans. Moreover, this is Yae Sakura's Stigmata Space, so these people are likely just memory remnants of Yae Sakura."
"They are merely being utilized by the Herrscher of Corruption, so do not have any misgivings."
"I understand. Thank you for your concern." Kallen smiled. For Irene to speak up at this moment, it was certainly not just to add to the lore, but also out of worry that Kallen might hesitate to strike.
However, Kallen wasn't so naive that she couldn't understand the situation. Carrying Judah in her hand, she stepped forward heavily. Judah was swung out, smashing a group of Corrupted Puppets with its sharp starry glints and immense weight.
The smashed Corrupted Puppets turned into clouds of black mist and melted into the ground. However, even more Corrupted Puppets surged forward like a tide, stiffly raising various farming tools in their hands.
Kallen pulled hard, and the Judah that had been thrown out quickly retracted, smashing back in front of her and knocking down the pouncing Corrupted Puppets once again. Looking at the large swaths of enemies before her, Kallen reached out and drew a chain of light from Judah.
Finally, she lashed it forward like a whip. The light chain seemed intangible, sweeping through the Corrupted Puppets and passing quickly as if it had caused no damage at all.
But the Corrupted Puppets did not advance any further; a layer of golden halos rippled across their bodies.
Seeing that the Corrupted Puppets didn't fly away, Kallen clicked her tongue lightly. "It seems there is no setting for planetary rotation here either. Otherwise, that move would be great for clearing trash."
"Nonsense." Irene wielded the Chakram in her hand, finishing off a Corrupted Puppet that lunged at her. "If you had told me before, I could have added the setting. After all, these things are clear to me now."
"But how would Yae Sakura know about planetary rotation, revolution, or the solar system?! Don't make things too difficult for Yae Sakura."
"However, this confirms one thing for me: I can't use Absolute Position Evasion here." Kallen watched as the Corrupted Puppets rooted in place were shattered by a swing of Judah.
In her many years of combat experience, she had become accustomed to using Absolute Position Evasion. It was indeed fast enough; even against super-wide-range attacks, she could dodge them.
Aside from the dodge direction being relatively fixed, it had no drawbacks. If the attack range was truly too large, using Absolute Position would basically allow her to dodge to the edge of the attack. Combined with Binding · Stasis, she essentially wouldn't take any major damage.
The effect was excellent. But in a mental space without such physics settings, she couldn't habitually use this move to dodge. Once her spatial position was fixed by the Binding, even she couldn't dodge; she would have to release the Binding first.
More critically, if Kallen were bound by Absolute Position, she wouldn't even be affected by the opponent's knockback effects—she would just stand there and take the beating.
It would be like activating Super Armor in a game and then eating the opponent's high-damage skills full-on. Binding · Stasis was not truly capable of ignoring all damage.
Its essence was still to use the Power of Binding to restrict the deformation of the flesh—constricting the shape change of the muscles near the wound to limit the injury to a minor level.
But if the damage received was intense enough, breaking Binding · Stasis would be a matter of minutes.
"Sister Irene, Sister Kallen, this doesn't seem to be working." Pardofelis punched a puppet away using the steel spikes attached to the grip of her Chakram, leaving marks on its body as if it had been clawed by a cat.
Compared to Kallen, who was focused on combat, the Cat observed more carefully. She discovered that no matter how Kallen attacked and cleared the puppets, several more would appear in an instant when they weren't paying attention.
It was as if their numbers had never decreased. If this continued, they would likely be bogged down here.
"Kallen, let's not stay here. We're going up the mountain to find Theresa." Irene delivered a spinning kick to knock down several pouncing puppets. Fortunately, she had cultivated Taixuan Sword Qi for a period of time.
It ensured her stamina and physical constitution didn't remain at the level of an ordinary person. Currently, her combat power in terms of physical attributes barely qualified as that of a relatively low-level C-Rank Valkyrie.
Originally, there wouldn't have been a need to be so urgent, but this was not her Palace of Consciousness; it was Yae Sakura's Stigmata Space. She had no way to synchronize with Kallen or Pardo's physical stats.
She could only rely on her own physical qualities to fight. If she hadn't practiced Taixuan Sword Qi, and if her Honkai Adaptability hadn't been truly strong allowing her to grow so much in a short time, she would be in trouble.
But right now, in this place, the strength of a C-Rank Valkyrie was dragging them down. After being strengthened by the power of Erosion, every single one of these puppets was stronger than her.
However, combat wasn't purely about physical stats. If one were to compare relatively, the physical stats of a Honkai Beast were much stronger than those of a Valkyrie, yet the Valkyries could still win.
This was the function of combat technique. If she couldn't handle this group of puppets, who moved as stiffly as wooden dolls, with her current combat techniques, then she would have trained for nothing.
"Got it." Kallen pulled a vertical chain from Judah. The chain shot out, piercing into some debris around them. Retracting the chain, she brought the items to the side, and then Kallen used Binding · Anchor on them in mid-air.
Solid golden cubes radiated from those objects as base points, fixing them in mid-air. The villagers, who had just managed to bypass their companions who were fixed by Absolute Position, crashed into these items suspended in the air.
Kallen pulled those items over, and the timing of the fixation was ingenious, leaving almost no gap for even a single person to pass through.
"I'll open the path. Follow me." Kallen lifted Judah into her hand. This time, instead of dragging it, she fixed it onto her arm.
However, this time Kallen did not hold Judah upright. Instead, she let Judah assume the state of an inverted cross.
"Pierce them!" Kallen raised her hand, and the starry glints deployed on Judah instantly erupted. Like scattered starlight carrying powerful force, they directly pierced through the puppets blocking the way.
The blasting starlight penetrated several puppets in succession before hitting the ground or gradually losing momentum. Each shard of dispersed starry glint was wrapped in tiny chains; as they lost momentum, those chains automatically retrieved them, reassembling and fusing them back together.
"Oh." Irene looked at Kallen. "Another use for Judah. The Judah Shotgun... truly, you never know how many uses Judah has."
"Sister Irene, this isn't the time to be sentimental." The Cat followed behind Irene, guarding the rear. She couldn't very well let Irene run at the very back to face the puppets chasing them.
"Rather than being sentimental just now, I was actually observing the surroundings." Irene observed as she ran. "Was the Yae Village we saw from the mountain really this big?"
One had to realize they were advancing at full speed. Although she was dragging them down, her physical stats weren't weak right now. Yae Village wasn't that big in total.
At their speed, they should have exited the village long ago. Why did it seem like they were still inside the village?
"Eh? That's true." The Cat looked around as if realizing it only in hindsight. Looking down from the mountain, Yae Village only had a few households. Forget this many puppets—
The village wasn't even this large. Why hadn't they seen the exit yet?
"Are they playing tricks on us?" Kallen stopped in her tracks. "If that's the case, it's trouble. If I can't reach the shrine, I can't stop the Herrscher of Corruption at all."
"That's right. I can't let you go and cause trouble so quickly." Just then, a Corrupted Puppet suddenly spoke, the fox mask on its face becoming even more eerie.
"Especially you, Kallen." The Herrscher of Corruption slowly turned its head to look at Kallen, who was holding Judah. "Don't think about stopping me again..."
"Rin!" Pardo looked at the Herrscher of Corruption and called out urgently. "Don't make any more mistakes. Your sister wouldn't want you to do this. Sto—!"
Pardo hadn't finished speaking when the puppet appeared in front of her as if teleporting, punching straight at Pardo's face. Pardo hurriedly leaned back, dodging the sudden punch.
"Shut up! They killed me!" The bizarre aura on the Herrscher of Corruption became even more violent. "What is wrong with me wanting revenge?!"
"I clearly didn't do anything wrong! Why did they kill me?!"
"Sister Sakura, she doesn't..." Pardo wanted to say more, but the Herrscher of Corruption's attacks became increasingly violent. Even the surrounding space became unstable, as if the entire area was losing its color.
"Don't mention Sister!" The Herrscher of Corruption controlled the puppet to punch out again. This time, a faint blue glow rippled across Pardo's chest just as she was about to be hit.
Subsequently, her entire person seemed not to be in that space; the Herrscher of Corruption's fist passed straight through.
Seeing this, the Herrscher of Corruption punched again, this time aiming for Pardo's head. But at that moment, the sound of chains came from behind. Golden chains directly wrapped around the Herrscher of Corruption's hand.
As a layer of golden cubes instantly manifested, the Herrscher of Corruption's attempt to punch was immediately halted. The Herrscher turned its head to look at Kallen, who was gripping the light chain tightly.
"Do you take me for non-existent?" Kallen gripped the chain firmly, staring at the Herrscher. "Once caught by Binding, don't think about escaping so easily."
"Indeed, if caught by Binding, it's not that easy to escape." The Herrscher of Corruption looked at its trapped hand, watching the golden cubes rapidly extending up its arm.
"Outside, I would indeed fear your Binding." The hand of the puppet controlled by the Herrscher suddenly disappeared. The chains, losing their anchor, immediately scattered. "But here..."
"This is my territory!" The Herrscher of Corruption vanished instantly. When it reappeared, it was right in front of Kallen. Kallen looked at the Herrscher suddenly appearing before her and swung Judah directly to attack.
But with another flicker of pitch-black data shadows, the Herrscher of Corruption disappeared from in front of Kallen once more.
"However, I am curious—who are you?" When it reappeared, the Herrscher of Corruption was in front of Irene, its tone carrying confusion.
Irene wanted to counterattack instantly, but more gray-red cubes suddenly appeared around her, locking Irene's swinging arm.
"I don't know you." The Herrscher of Corruption looked at Irene, then turned back to look at Kallen, who wanted to attack it, and Pardo, who stood hesitantly in place.
"But I know them. Kallen, and Pardofelis." The Herrscher of Corruption's figure disappeared again. This time, it did not reappear; only its voice echoed in the ears of the three.
"Sister showed me your photo." Pardo felt as if she were being watched by someone. "She said she wanted to introduce you to me, but before we could meet, things had already developed to that point."
"Yeah! I'm Pardofelis! Sister Sakura's friend." Hearing the voice in her ear, Pardo shouted with a trace of hope. "So Rin, you should still remember, right?"
"Since you remember, then..."
"Remember? Of course I remember." The Herrscher of Corruption's voice, originally quite gentle, suddenly became cold and filled with resentment. "I remember that none of you came to save me!"
"I remember that I, who hadn't done anything, was killed by you people just like that!"
"I hurt so much!" The surrounding environment became increasingly chaotic with the Herrscher's roar. The entire area transformed into a blood-red space.
The original houses lost their colors as if game textures had been stripped away, revealing the wireframe models of the data grid inside. However, even that was almost entirely black and red.
"They left a massive amount of wounds on my body! They didn't want to kill me at all; they wanted to torture me! I tried to call for help, but no one saved me!"
"I clearly didn't do anything! Why did they treat me like that?!"
"Rin..." Listening to the voice, which sounded less like anger and more like wailing, Pardo simply didn't know what to say to quell Rin's rage.
She wanted to say this was anger twisted by the Will of the Honkai. But how could Pardo be completely unaware of what happened back then?
How could Brother Kalpas's rage toward Sister Nia afterwards have appeared out of thin air? Pardo had seen all of this; how could she not know what exactly had happened?
Boss Kevin holding Sister Sakura's corpse, asking where there might still be cherry blossoms... Pardo had wanted to use her own luck to fulfill Sister Sakura's final wish, pointing a direction for Boss Kevin. But that time, Pardo's luck didn't take effect.
After all, luck is just luck. If something doesn't exist, even Pardo's luck cannot make it appear out of thin air.
And in Sakura's hometown, that place had long since become a wasteland. There were absolutely no cherry blossoms left.
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