He is the leader of the Tantric sect in Chagdu.

Chapter 119 [Karma and Crown]

Hume's value, an index that quantifies matter and mystery, a scale separating the real world from the Red Pool — sometimes also called the "reality correction value".

The higher the value, the closer the environment is to the Red Pool side; conversely, the lower the value, the closer it is to the real world. However, in the underlying logic of this world, a pure "real world" does not exist, and is almost impossible to exist.

Compared to the material world, the Great Ritual Pool is the more constant and stable foundation upon which this world was built: the realm ruled by the pool's liquid is more boundless, more profound, and almost bottomless than the present world. Perhaps the "mystery" flowing from the pool is the true essence of this world.

A Hume value of zero means that an area has completely broken free from the influence of the "Red Pool" and become a mysterious forbidden zone. This situation usually only occurs in high-level "research labs" where certain special experiments require this ideal environment.

But that was just an experiment.

"Check the connections of all ports on the Hume Tree, restart—still can't restart the system, damn it!" An assistant was following the operating procedure, retrieving the error return value, and trying to use the magic weapon of "restart" to fight the fault—

Unfortunately, the Hume Tree, which is maintaining the Advent Protocol, cannot issue this command yet.

"The Hume index has changed again! The initial quantification range is 7120-7365, this—" someone moved their lips.

—A four-digit value, a mysterious environment that can only exist at Depth 3—appearing here—is still nonsense.

In the next ten seconds, the line representing the real-world disaster began to bounce back and forth, shaking just like the heart rate curves of everyone present—with no transitional curves at each turning point.

A scene that defies common sense.

"Move aside, I'll do it."

With the direct connection of the key, the highest authority of the Hume Tree was instantly transferred to the old elf Monet, who took over the terminal database of the monitoring system, muttering under his breath, "Are the entry requirements for the Central District this low now? A bunch of useless trash."

As the command was input, the magnificent tree, rooted in the distant pool of liquid, swayed its branches in a boundless sea of ​​roots, its veins faintly glowing. A crisp notification sound accompanied this: [Monitoring component restoration complete, redundant library deleted, abnormal data corrected.]

"That's good—"

"Huh?!" The next instant, Monet froze on the spot, a string of characters flashing before his eyes.

[Hume value: NuI error return value! Mysterious medium could not be captured, process disconnected — Descent protocol offline, first retry — error return value —]

[Second attempt —]

Now even the numbers aren't displayed.

"————" In the utter silence, Monet quietly took off his glasses, carefully folded them, and placed them back on his chest.

After doing all this, he slowly raised his head, faced everyone in the Silver Hall, and opened his mouth: "It's over."

The outskirts of the city.

The moment the torrential rain began to fall, a strange unease arose from the depths of his heart—even through the thick outer shell of his spiritual body, Virtin still felt a strong sense of unease.

The intangible substance, almost solidified into a tangible form, reminded the girl of a scene from a month ago—the five-person group, who had ventured deep into the suburbs, had been blocked for a full half hour because of a sewage discharge. She still did not want to recall the pain and despair of that time a second time.

"Why at a time like this again—"

Before setting off, Wilting knew about the sewage discharge that would take place in the early morning, but none of the members of the action team, including her, took it seriously. Malice, as a medium, might interfere with ordinary occultists, but for a "super machine" that projected the full power of the Great Judge and had a perpetual motion machine embedded in its chest, its effect was negligible.

But the current situation seems a bit off.

"Abnormal Status Report — The discharge appears to have had an impact on me that exceeds expectations. Please halt the discharge process — Ensure the highest priority for special operations."

Wilting waited quietly for ten seconds, but the specially designed communication network remained completely silent.

"This is the arrival channel, requesting a response from the command system—"

The girl took a deep breath. The descending will had no tangible form; otherwise, she might not be so "calm" now.

.

From the outside, at least, the spirit avatar was still burning. Although the surrounding flames were mostly obscured by the rain, they still retained a strong presence—until a light screen displaying "No Connection Detected" popped up in front of her.

The inner consciousness affected the spirit, and the flames froze for a moment.

Wilding remained calm.

Clearly, the situation had taken an unexpected turn; the charter of action had not included this anomaly in the discussion, and the young minister was not prepared to deal with it.

But she knew one thing: trying to solve the problem by addressing the person who created it was definitely the right thing to do.

Then, in the next instant, intense flames burst forth in the rain, illuminating half the sky even through the rain curtain—a ball of light, beginning to expand violently, rose from the center of the dark world, and the wild heat began to scorch and melt everything around it.

The asphalt-like rain finally began to evaporate, turning into white mist that was dispersed by the intense flames, leaving behind a murky substance that ignited under the heat of the fire, emitting a pungent smell of burning organic matter.

It's like setting a living creature on fire—as the flames singe away their skin, sizzling the sticky paste and blood, their cries rise from nowhere.

Veltin frowned—through her spiritual body, she shouldn't have a "sense of smell".

However, the girl now felt dizzy and nauseous, as if she were drowning in a murky swamp, her breath blocked by a layer of sticky, invisible substance.

—We need to hurry.

When the crimson flames coalesce into a surging tide, the area within a radius of a thousand meters—the rising white smoke stretches into an inverted ocean, like a column of salt formed from the solidified remains of suffering.

Veltin had never studied the principles of fire—he chose a Grand Judge as a projection template purely because of his extremely high stats and combat power. Even if the pilot was not skilled in controlling the fire, the power of the flames was overwhelming and sufficient to deal with any "sudden crisis".

Since he's been hiding, let's launch a full-scale attack!

The genius girl had already made a simple estimate of the exact range of the fog gate's transfer through the previous probe; now, all she needed to do was cover the entire area—

[Explosive!]

Air currents, water vapor, rocks, soil—what was ignited was no longer just matter; the all-pervasive flames seeped into the ground, swirling into the sky, their mad and wild behavior seemingly using everything as fuel for combustion—turning stubborn rocks into powder, and steel into molten liquid—the speed of the falling rain could not keep up with the burning; countless thick water vapors, rising up, were pushed back into the sky by the surging red tide, like another red dome collapsing.

"Found it————" The flames' touch was the Grand Judge's limbs, and the feedback they sent back was incredibly clear, instantly locking onto a location.

At that location, a massive cloud of gray mist was evaporating at a visible rate, thinning out in just a few seconds to reveal a delicate outline within.

Even if he is moved, he still cannot escape the area covered by the flames!

—Will we win?

Wilting could hardly remain calm. Even without a physical form, she could feel her heart pounding heavier and heavier: from that meeting, she knew that "Grey" was no longer the terrifying and powerful creature it once was, or at least no longer invincible.

The task force interpreted this information as a "self-protection mechanism" for the girl, a way to soothe her emotional trauma. But once Virtin realized how close she was to killing her inner nemesis—

And in the very next instant.

A sense of collapse traveled from the spirit body back to the projection of the Grand Judge, whose consciousness had descended into the interior. The eternally burning flames around him suddenly contracted inward—until a feeling of "exhaustion" took over Verjiang's will.

The tide of flames extinguished in the next second, abruptly like a red illusion.

Why?

Veltin tried to take a deep breath. The spirit did not feel tired, only "suffocation" when "energy was insufficient"—when this feeling resonated with the girl, she was infinitely confused.

—How is it possible that I'm running out of energy?

The 10% power of the final combustion engine—the output just now might be a one-time ultimate move for an ordinary third-stage mystic scholar, but for this "machine," it can definitely continue indefinitely.

"Heart of the Furnace——"

Soon, Wilting realized where the problem lay—or rather, it was another aspect that had not been considered.

[Arrival Protocol Notification: No critical component detected. Your module: Furnace Core is offline. Please ensure your network connection is stable and try again. Furnace Core not detected ————]

[Your remaining energy: 14%. Your spiritual body is severely overloaded and has suffered structural wear and tear—Please, driver, regulate the intensity of your secret energy usage!]

'

,

When the battlefield suddenly fell silent, all the strange noises seemed jarring.

Instead of fleeing away from the flames as before, the fog gate opened right in front of the descendant, and the next moment, a petite figure emerged silently from within.

"Hello." The boy, with fox-like features, wore an irresistible, adorable smile.

"Nice to meet you. I hope I can introduce you to our rules. Now that the situation has reversed, I will give you ten minutes to say what you need to say."

"————" The flames remained silent, making no movement.

"I wonder—what are your thoughts on our strength?"

He spoke in a conversational tone, raising his hand to let a drop of black rain fall into his palm, creating ripples like mud.

"Although I didn't complete it, you could say I did."

Just like every villain who gains the upper hand, Ai hovered in mid-air not far from the arrival of the invaders with an expressionless face, looking down arrogantly. For some unknown reason, she spoke softly to the unknown consciousness contained within the ball of fire.

"Remember this name, of course—that's what [he] told me."

One [Ominous Signs Quantification Project - Disaster Integration Port]

And from it, the great creation—

Ai's smile gradually grew arrogant and boisterous, accompanied by countless black sludge churning from the depths of the earth, endlessly—

A chilling, invisible substance rose up like a tide, a viscous, pitch-black substance climbed up his limbs, wrapped around his neck, and disappeared into his outline. The entire field of vision was covered by this resolute blackness. The existence at the very center was like a constantly beating heart, engraving the entire suburb, the entire nest, and even the entire world into his will.

The dark heart beat slowly, gradually synchronizing with Ai's long, drawn-out breaths.

The gray fog did not stop the process, because this calamity already had a master, who would be conceived within the black mud and, upon hatching, would wield the great power to touch the very foundation of the world, reshaping the definition of "evil."

until-

When a corner of the pristine white robe reappeared from the shrouded darkness, when a human-shaped figure stood in the filthy swamp, when a tender and beautiful face emerged from the filth, when black mud slid from his white skin, flowing down his slender neck and limbs, spreading along his petite body, endlessly growing into a more magnificent silhouette—it was as if a primordial being was born from the murky pool:

Infinite holiness, flawless purity.

When the black mud had all flowed away, a crown was found encircling his forehead and skull.

—The crown is pure white, incongruous with the pitch black, its edges metallic yet covered with soft fibers resembling plants or flesh. This contradictory and conflicting form is unlike anything ordinary, like a burnt thorn flower, like withered, frost-covered grass. —

The crown's countless sharp spikes, grotesque and cruel, jutted out from the edges and grew along Ai's skull, yet they could never pierce his soft skin.

Malice is a persistent stinging pain — Ai gives it a definition, and then a name.

"Industry."

He said, "The mercy I have promised is measured by the amount of karma; from this point on, it is the currency of the name I have branded, the 'value' you need, the equivalent of love and blood."

His understanding and anchor—all things and mediums associated with evil—possesses the most "solid" and most "correct" definition, which is the "harsh law" imposed by "severity".

Furthermore, it leaves its mark on the bottom of the world.

"I wear a white crown, which hangs over you like an eclipsed sun, like a sharp sword—I will forever hang it above your heads."

""

Ai's smile, set against the backdrop of the black mud, was pure and moving.

"The crown grows around my authority, the coronation is beautiful because of my benevolence!"

The crown was filthy yet vividly colored!

The newly created singularity—

【King of Karma】

"The core module is offline, and the Descent channel has been completely disconnected."

—Why?

"Unknown interference————"

[We just received an error report—regarding this bizarre "systemic failure," it seems the Hume Tree terminal database made a mistake with some mysterious constant during connection establishment, causing the system error—I told them this is utter nonsense—Hume Tree error? Are you fucking kidding me? The probability of such a stupid failure occurring is so high you could write a lifetime's worth of zeros after the decimal point!]

—But it just went wrong, for no reason at all—including the think tank. According to a report sent back by the think tank's head seven minutes earlier, the intelligent self-regulating terminal of the large database also reported an error almost simultaneously, also diagnosed as a "systemic error." This return value failure caused it to cut off a critical power bus. Just a hair's breadth away from an unprecedented blackout for the entire Hallownest—and that's the think tank! Their probability of making a mistake is several zeros smaller than yours!

Therefore, this malfunction also triggered the furnace core's emergency procedure, automatically revoking all external permissions and returning them to the factory quota.

"That's so strange," Monet said.

A power that manifests itself by distorting reality, rewriting logic, and disregarding rules —

"The fifth energy level?" someone whispered.

"Impossible, the coming of the Great One is never so gentle—" This was the voice of rebuttal.

"The outskirts—that forbidden realm, why can't it be truly magnificent?"—"Are we fighting against a god?"—"I've already said, how can the arrival of a magnificent being be controlled? The mere impact of it rising from the bottom of the pool is enough to trigger a catastrophe. If we were truly certain that the true form of a living god had entered the nest, the committee would have already initiated the final resolution!"

Various speculations were raised, and then ruled out.

—Then what else could it be?

In the deathly silence, a voice, seemingly coming from some unknown corner, and from some unknown assistant, squeezed out two words through gritted teeth.

"Singularity".

One second passed, two seconds, ten seconds — one minute.

In the dead silence, no one looked up.

"Are you done talking?"

Monet gave a half-smile, struggling to control the spasming muscles in his face, and blinked his increasingly deep, dark blue eyes.

"Go and inform the think tank's management that they also bear responsibility. Don't forget to share the blame when they're dividing the spoils." The old elf walked with his hands behind his back to the gate of the central area. This time, no one stopped him.

"By the way, say hello to the committee." The old elf chuckled twice.

"Tell them that if they still harbor thoughts of annihilation, they shouldn't hesitate to pay the price—if they continue to hesitate, then we can celebrate ahead of schedule."

He took a deep breath: "Celebrate—this world built on ruins has finally gained another foothold in reality."

The sound stopped the moment he stepped out of that door.

"A newborn"

Wings of the World