Star Iron: Imaginary numbers? Dude, I play with quantum reconstruction.

The things before her eyes grew increasingly blurry... and a fire burned within her immature soul...

“I won’t regret dying at your hands, but I’ll regret dying like all the previous Great Guardians in this ridiculous rift… Come, Bronya… just like I ended my mother’s life… end me, with your gun, with the gun I gave you… end me…”

"End my life..."

"Kill me..."

"Shoot me, end the pain, let me die quickly."

"This is something every High Warden heir goes through."

"But I believe in you... your heir will not go through these things..."

Bronya was still struggling internally; she couldn't believe that every High Warden... had been inherited in this way...

"This is absurd, Mother...it's really...absurd..."

Hearing Bronya hesitate, Cocolia's voice suddenly turned serious.

"Commander Bronya! I command you! Take aim!"

“Aim…” Bronya knew that continuing to hesitate would only cause her and her more pain.

She picked up the gun with both hands, and the normally light gun suddenly felt incredibly heavy.

So heavy that her hands trembled...

"shooting!!!"

"shoot...."

"Bang----"

A gunshot shattered Cocolia's commands and pierced her mind...

"pat-"

"Plop—"

"shooting......."

Bronya's voice trembled, and tears dripped onto the heavy rifle.

As Cocolia's body slid down, Bronya's legs also hit the floor...

"To die as a human being... Mother... Rest in peace...."

As her blurred vision gradually cleared, the letter stained with red and carved on the wall appeared before Bronya as Cocolia slumped down.

[Bronya, by the time you see this, I should be finished off by you, or... die as a monster.]

Don't be sad... This is how it has always been for all the Great Guardians... I didn't want it to be this way either, but the Star Core can't do as I wish.

You must learn to grow. The star core is shattered; the rifts and blizzards are all its doing.

You don't need to care about my departure, nor about the star core. If you really want to know, go look at the documents in my drawer, the key... The erosion of the rift made me forget many things; you can break it open by force.

There's a lot of stuff inside... information on the great guardians of all time... and... I can't remember...

I trust the guardian spirits, and... that they will protect our Beloborg for me and for all the Great Guardians of the past...

Be a responsible guardian, but don't be as cold-blooded as I am.

Goodbye, new High Guardian—Bronya Rand.

"Mother...why...cough cough...wait..."

The glistening tears washed away the bloodstains from the corners of her eyes, and the red teardrops fell onto the viscous blood on the floor... without causing a ripple.

She slowly stood up, ripped off the wallpaper that had been torn by ice, and then used the bayonet on her gun to scrape the marks off the back of the wallpaper.

After doing all this, she left the confinement cell and let the Silvermane Iron Guards go in and take care of everything...

"Guards, give the former Great Guardian a proper burial... In yesterday's calamity... she was corrupted by the monsters of the Rift Realm..."

The acting commander of the Silvermane Iron Guard, at this moment, amidst his own tears and the blood of the previous Great Guardian, became the true commander, the true Great Guardian...

...........

Some inherit the throne amidst blood and sorrow, while others try on clothes in front of flowers and loved ones.

"Hey, Himeko-neechan, what do you think of this outfit?"

March 7th was dressed in a light pink outfit, while Himeko in front of her simply smiled and admired her.

"It's very pretty, Little March, but the old one still feels more familiar."

Upon hearing this, March 7th pouted somewhat displeased: "So, is it good-looking or not?"

Himeko took a sip of her coffee and replied with a smile, "It looks great, of course it looks great. How do you feel about this expansion?"

Recalling the events of March 7th, she felt that apart from Xingxiao's sudden attack, nothing else seemed like a major problem: "It was a close call. It would have been even better if Xingxiao hadn't come. Speaking of which, what exactly is the relationship between Hua Wu and that Xingxiao? The more I look at it, the more suspicious it seems. An antimatter army of over 8 billion... I've never even heard of it..."

Himeko was slightly shocked. She had seen that there were indeed many people in the legion, but she really didn't know there were more than 80 billion.

"Over 80 billion? I remember it was a huge event. I just heard a loud bang, and then the train started rolling, followed by a second... a third... The damage caused after that was negligible."

Himeko recalled that a crack appeared, from which many antimatter legions poured out, but in the end, they inexplicably shattered.

"I did see a lot of antimatter legions after that, but they were destroyed by something during their attack."

While looking in the mirror, March 7th casually remarked, "Hua Wu said that Xing Xiao shattered it himself."

Himeko was caught in a mental whirlwind. "She destroyed it herself? What was her purpose in doing so? Why did she do it?"

On March 7th, she pondered this and couldn't understand it. It couldn't possibly be that her subordinates were sacrificed to the heavens and possessed boundless magical power, could it?

"It's simple, there's no reason why. People who destroy things aren't mentally sound. Sister Himeko, look at Hua Wu. I suspect it's because he's been in the Legion for too long. Otherwise, why would he be so annoying every day? He has to annoy us for no reason."

"He must have his own reasons. Don't talk about him behind his back next time."

"I know I was wrong, Himeko-neechan."

...........

(PS: I don't think I'm very good at handling this kind of plot, because if Cocolia were alive, not to mention the readers, even I would wonder why this leader who gives such chaotic orders should live? But if she's dead, the protagonist definitely can't be the one to kill her.)

So the only solution was to have her daughter Bronya kill someone, and then fabricate a story that previous High Wardens had all gone through this process. This also explains Cocolia's ruthless and callous nature in the original storyline.

After eliminating the previous generation, coupled with the double blow of the Star Core and the escalating war, what couldn't she do? With nowhere else to turn, she could only place her hopes on the Star Core.

My subjective malice was indeed problematic, but I don't believe that having a war criminal alive would improve the story.

(As a strong person, I am free, so I can update again tomorrow.)

Chapter 41 Blood and Tears, and the Throne

Bronya remained silent for half an hour, recalling many things. She still wanted to know what the so-called star core that could bring disaster was.

She returned to the High Guardian's office, and as she reached for the drawer... she discovered that the key... had been lying on the report from two days ago, covered with a thin layer of dust...

It tells the story of how it was forgotten...

She looked at the dusty battle report, picked up the key, and slowly inserted it into the drawer, but she didn't turn it open.

She sat down in that spot and looked at the battle report.

"This method of combat... was it... bewitched by that item called Star Core? No wonder Mother has been acting strangely for a long time... So Star Core... I need to see what you really are!"

"Cry-a-doodle-doo!"

The key turned, and the sunlight from the window fell on the slightly yellowed document, black words on yellow paper.

They were lists of the dead, each word written in faint ink, yet on the sun-yellowed paper, the words carried such a heavy weight...

"This is... the death list Jepard submitted to me?! And what's below that...?"

Bronya took away these heavy lists, and at the very bottom was a book, a very old book...

Bronya opened the somewhat tattered leather cover. The first page was a half-yellowed photograph, which appeared to show some kind of building.

“This is… the lower level? This place…” Bronya’s mind suddenly throbbed with pain as she recalled this. She remembered some things, but they were still vague.

"The orphanage...and what's hidden in the following pages...?"

She turned to the next page, and there was another photograph: Cocolia holding a child. The person next to her had long, light blue hair, but her face was obscured by an old, yellowed stain in the photograph.

"This child...is it me? My head is throbbing more and more...Bronya, you need to wake up, you haven't found any information about the Star Core yet..."

She continued searching, ignoring the photos from her childhood, until the photos were replaced with text.

[Belberg, I'm sorry. The Star Core's control over me has deepened... My mother never told me how to fight it...]

[Liar! Liar! Liar!!! Why should we bear the blame for the mistakes of the first Great Guardian?! Ridiculous!!!]

[There's no other way. If we don't follow what Star Core said... Iron Guard will perish even faster... I'm sorry....]

[The New World...I'm not wrong! Hahaha...They didn't die, they just arrived in the New World ahead of time.]

[Seven hundred years of perseverance, all for this moment to break free from the cocoon and become a butterfly! A new world...]

The text ends abruptly on this page, and the following pages are blank.

"That's it? What exactly is the Star Core?! All the Great Guardians throughout history... No, there must be other clues! There must be more!"

She frantically flipped through the old book until the last page read:

[Bronya, my child, I promise you: you will surely become the queen of the new world.]

Next to it is a photo of her joining the Silvermane Guard, in which she receives the gun from Cocolia with both hands. This photo... is very new.

"So...this kind of ending...what's the use of all this information other than making my heart ache even more? As for star cores, don't I still...know absolutely nothing about them?!"

Filled with resentment and sorrow, he punched the desk, leaving a bloody fist mark, but nothing else.

She didn't look at the extra information about the great guardians of past generations.

She simply tidied everything up, left the office alone, and walked into the sunlight in the corridor outside the door.

As she walked to the gates of Cripperburg and looked up at the sun, it rained—a rare occurrence—in Beloborg, which had been sunny all along.

She resolutely stepped out of Cripperburg to celebrate with all the people of Belloberg the first rain in seven hundred years.

The faint bloodstains on the clothes had long since disappeared, washed away by the rain...

The patter of rain grew louder, each drop hitting the ground and creating a series of bubbles. The long-abandoned sewer system was suddenly restarted...