I am the former civilized hero.

"It's all my fault for getting carried away. I should have saved some strength earlier. I wasted more than an hour of his time for nothing."

"Don't blame yourself. It has nothing to do with you. People like him and Mei are hard for us to follow. To put it bluntly, they are too suspicious." Su made a gesture to keep quiet and stood aside quietly. No matter how Edwin urged him, he would reply to wait a moment.

Ryan ignored the two of them and quickly went over the entire incident in his mind. The more he thought about it, the stranger it seemed.

This timely response was due to Calis's reminder. The overall operation went smoothly, and the Honkai beast was disrupted before it evolved to the critical point.

Every step was arranged very reasonably, just as the previous research had shown. If they were allowed to merge and evolve, a terrible enemy would emerge at a critical moment, and this enemy was not included in the plan.

But it was too easy, so easy that it was abnormal. As a chess player of the same level, you didn't even have any countermeasures and just let me hunt everywhere?

"If you just want to slow down my growth, you might as well break it up into smaller pieces, or let all the Honkai beasts in the world self-destruct."

Ryan had just obtained a huge amount of Honkai energy, which was much more efficient than chopping them one by one. Most people would probably be very excited, thinking that they could take this opportunity to continuously collect chips to fight against the End, which was a big bargain for free. However, as a fishing expert, he smelled a strange scent.

"A sweet bait that made me fall into greed. In the final analysis, it was just too coincidental. How come one after another appeared, with no problem in intelligence but giving people a familiar feeling?"

Calis, coincidence, the herald of fate...

Several key words emerged in his mind. He knew that this authority could not affect him, but it could achieve an indirect effect by manipulating the fate of others. This thing was obscure and silent, and difficult to detect. If he was wholeheartedly pursuing something, he would instinctively ignore it.

He glanced at the other side of the sea, where there happened to be a Honkai beast hiding in the desert. For him who possessed the authority of rock, it was like sending meat, and the so-called cost was nothing more than the time spent.

"Ying, have the communications between the teams been restored?" Ryan suddenly looked up and asked.

"Not yet. According to the last news sent back by Kevin, they found part of the Honkai beast under the Antarctic ice sheet. It is indeed interfering with global electromagnetic waves, but its true body is unknown." Sakura answered immediately. She had been following this matter.

"Just like a base station, if many relay points are deployed and activated one by one, it will be difficult to find them in a short time." Ryan's frown suddenly relaxed, and he muttered to himself, "That's right, a smart enemy will seamlessly switch between prey and hunter, using both real and fake to conceal his true purpose."

The three of them looked at each other, still not knowing what Ryan was suspecting, but they also became serious, feeling that something was wrong.

"Brother, guess..."

"It's not a guess, it's a bold assumption. Be careful to verify it." Ryan corrected. He handled everything with a scientist's attitude. "Su, bring the tactical map and connect to Prometheus. Let her predict the known Honkai beast trajectories."

"Oh, wait a minute." Su's mind was full of question marks. Seeing Ryan's unfriendly expression, he knew it was not as simple as he thought.

It would take several days for humans to analyze the huge amount of data, but Prometheus only took one minute to mark it out on the tactical terminal.

Countless red solid and dotted lines covered the map. Some had been captured by the hunting team, while others were predicted by Skynet after its trajectories were detected. There were hundreds of them.

They are spread across the continents and oceans, and most of them move underground, forming crisscrossed or scattered tracks. For example, in the northern part of Shenzhou, there are several red lines converging, twisting into one, and finally ending in Canghai City.

This is 'Godzilla'. With reference, there is credibility. Ryan kept shrinking the map and looking at the whole world, and then his eyes twitched.

"What's wrong?" Ying poked her head out. There was no pattern to the dense red lines because most of them were wrong.

"Look at the direction of these lines, especially the broken ones. They are not destroyed, but the detection system has lost its trace." Ryan felt his heartbeat gradually speeding up, and said decisively, "Prometheus, extend these broken red lines and converge the end points."

"Yes."

The super-fast calculation speed produced the result in just a few seconds. Sakura watched from the side and saw many red lines intersecting, extending, and finally intersecting again at the next place, extending again, and their end point -

"Europe? Alicia?"

Ying's reaction was also extremely fast. She instantly realized that this was a complicated chess game, full of sweet baits, and in fact Ryan took the bait. Beneath the stormy waves, there was a treacherous conspiracy.

A good hunter often disguises himself as the prey. She finally understood what Ryan meant by his mumbling just now.

"It seems that this chess player really likes to hold the initiative in his own hands, or the most basic program prevents him from tearing up the test paper unless it is absolutely necessary. He uses coincidences to interfere with my judgment. Who knows if I can wake up with another coincidence?"

Ryan suddenly breathed a sigh of relief. The vague feeling of discomfort that had been lingering around him for some time finally disappeared. His guess was correct.

Thinking back to the process of waking up, he found it very strange. He should have taken the bait, but the reason he didn't do so was simply because Hua and Ying were fighting. Only then, as a bystander, did he have the energy to think again.

Wait, this is also a coincidence, it can't be proactive.

His thoughts became confused, but Ryan quickly ended his paranoia and now had to solve the problem.

"Who said dating can't save the world? You two did a great job."

Ah? We did something good?

Hua was a little confused, as if he had done nothing. He just asked hurriedly, "He wants to get rid of Alicia and let the end come?"

"That should be right. Alicia is the Herrscher who has truly lost control. If we get rid of her, Calis will no longer be a problem. But why would this guy help? Is it in his best interest to maintain the status quo?" Ryan was stunned for a moment, and suddenly a strange feeling welled up in his heart.

Is he leading this because he's afraid that I don't understand the real danger? Or is he afraid that my emotions will cloud my judgment?

If so, then...

As a double agent on the Honkai side, Calis might be too anxious, or he might know that Jian's patience is running out.

For the sake of profit, he must let the end come, not the other way around.

"Try to contact everyone and get closer to Team True Self. The three of you will stay in Haiyuan City. I'm not sure who the mastermind is yet."

Without any delay, even before the three people could answer, the man next to them had disappeared. The storm forced them to cover their faces, and when they opened their eyes again, the other party was already a thousand meters away.

His gray eyes reflected the moonlight and the waves, and he was not particularly anxious. Ryan was mentally prepared when he sent Alicia to fight. She was a precious key, but not a canary in a cage.

Do you think they should all hide under my wings? Like a thigh to hold on to through the end, or like a weakness to become my flaw?

Wrong, from the very beginning, this was not just my journey.

......

"Oh my, it's directed at me."

A 'volcano' was erupting right before her eyes, the roaring magma was reflected in Alicia's pupils, causing a hint of surprise on her bright face, with her little mouth slightly opened.

Right inside the volcano, a huge arm stretched out from inside. It was indescribably huge, and the palm seemed to touch the sky and grasp the rising sun.

"It's an ambush." ​​Aponia looked around vigilantly. This was the Alps in western Europe. It was a beautiful scene in late autumn, but it was instantly broken by the roaring volcano.

The magma erupting from deep underground ignited the pine forests, melted the snow, and caused the mirror-like lakes to release large amounts of white smoke, forming mist that lingered in the sky.

The [True Self] and [Discipline] teams chased here from Britain, but were blocked without any warning. Everyone was aware that this Honkai Beast had changed its cowardly character and took the initiative to fight. There must be something wrong.

According to Dr. Mei's tactical requirements, the two teams took turns attacking, and the captain would not take action if the ordinary team members could handle the problem. Therefore, after crossing half the continent, they were able to preserve their physical strength well.

The remaining combat power was enough to deal with any known mutated Honkai beast, until this giant hand broke through the earth. Judging from the size, the monster blocking the way was not among the known ones.

"The target has stopped, the interference source has expanded to ten places, and we have lost all communication channels!" Himiya stared at the tactical terminal, his voice becoming more and more urgent.

The original interference source in Antarctica caused intermittent communications. After Kevin led his men to solve the problem, a second interference source emerged. Everyone was used to fighting in this strong interference environment, but after the electromagnetic interference suddenly increased tenfold, any normal person would notice something was wrong.

There is a feeling that the real purpose is revealed, that is, this map is too long. More than a dozen powerful Honkai beasts have fallen. With such a luxurious lineup as a stepping stone, the expected reward must be huge.

Abonia, Joshua, and Himiko looked at Alysia almost at the same time. With the whole world as a chessboard and so many chess pieces lost, who else could give back except her?

Aponia spread her azure butterfly wings and stood in front of Alicia without hesitation: "We will cover you, you retreat to a safe area first."

Alicia didn't move, she looked at the butterfly's wings with admiration, and before Himiko got angry and started cursing, she smiled and spread out her palms.

"Of course I'm reluctant to leave you all, but I know what's more important. It's just that others have arranged such a luxurious stage play, how can I let the protagonist leave so easily?"

As soon as she finished speaking, before Aponya and the others could refute, a loud bang was heard.

The continuous mountain peaks shattered before my eyes, countless rocks were thrown into the sky, and some pale bones-like things drilled out of the ground, looking like the vertical ridges on the back of some animal.

Starting from them, a circular red film wrapped around the mountain basin, like a big bowl upside down on the ground, and even the sky showed a faint red light.

The Raven II ship following behind happened to hit the wall of light. The solid alloy armor was instantly twisted and deformed, and the whole ship was compressed towards the front, finally turning into a bright fireball.

Gulu.

Himiko swallowed her saliva. It seemed that she didn't need to test the strength of this thing herself. Just as Alicia said, others had prepared a big meal, so how could they allow the guests to leave at will.

"Can Ryan come over?" she asked subconsciously, and then no one could answer.

According to the intelligence received a few hours ago, the commander-in-chief was hunting on the other side of the earth, eating so much that his mouth was full of grease. At least a normal person would not react quickly.

"Don't think too much, he will definitely find out, because Ryan is second only to me in intelligence." Alicia was still smiling, in sharp contrast to her companions with serious expressions around her, and then slowly raised her head.

"It's quite big..."

The ground was torn apart, and the owner of the giant hand came out. It looked somewhat similar to humans, but without skin and muscles, only bones that gleamed with metallic light.

The pale skull had crystal-like colors flashing in the hollow eye sockets, and there were braids of hair hanging down from the head like iron chains. The ribs spread out forward like swords, and on the back were two pairs of bone wings covered with crystal decorations.

This giant, no, it was half a giant. Even though his body below the waist was still in the mud, he looked to be six or seven hundred meters tall. It was several times larger than the Honkai beast they were hunting.

There was complete silence, and the only sound was the rumbling sound of the mountain collapsing. The natural oppression brought by the huge structure made people's mouths dry, but the skeletal shape gave people a sense of déjà vu.

"This is the one from South America, the one that fought against the Commander-in-Chief. You can see that its left arm is obviously shorter." Joshua whispered, finally connecting many things.

This conspiracy had already begun long ago, and could even have come before the Ruler of Constraint, which was to have the Fire Moths start a hunt, and then look for the most important one among them after the hounds were dispersed.

Thus, the prey will become the hunter. As for the consumed chess pieces? Honkai beasts never have a morale setting.

"Find a way to escape. It has far surpassed the Apocalypse level and is not something we can fight against." Aponia seemed sober. The Cocoon of the End had gathered all the 'garbage' on the earth. Let's not talk about Ryan for now. If they couldn't even deal with them, wouldn't it be a comedy?

Before she could give the order, dozens of fusion warriors raised their weapons at the same time and, with the help of power armor, released dazzling beams of light.

Each one was as thick as a human waist, but as small as a hair in front of the giant, and the light it emitted was negligible. Instead, the giant opened his mouth, and the black light ball that gathered out was so big that it made people's scalps numb.

"spread!"

call out--

The daylight was dyed black, and the strong light suppressed everything, like a sharp knife stabbing into cheese, cutting a canyon in the earth.

It does not have the skill of the Herrscher's authority to make light of heavy things, but it has astonishing destructive power. This canyon, which is tens of kilometers long, is bottomless, the rocks have a lava-like texture, and the air has become scorching hot, giving people the illusion of being in midsummer.

"How many Honkai beasts has this big guy fused with?" Alicia was floating in the air. The entire team was scattered everywhere, and those who didn't have time to dodge just now didn't even leave a particle.

The monster didn't seem to know how to answer. The crystal ornaments on its huge bone wings shone brightly. Alicia quickly retreated while holding up her pink shield. Then she saw hundreds of beams of light erupting and sweeping towards her.

Boo hoo hoo...

The screaming sounds of energy and air friction merged into one, and the huge basin was almost filled with light beams. They cut through the mountains, swept through the forests, and split the lakes, shattering this beautiful basin in the blink of an eye.

Not only more, not only faster, but also more powerful.

Alicia pursed her lips and watched ripples appear on the pink shield one after another. The impact force pushed the body back continuously, but the monster's main body was dozens of kilometers away, just like a fixed turret.

"It's too far away for me to hit. Fortunately, most of these attacks are aimed at me."

Alicia simply stopped fighting back and dodged in the dense barrage of bullets. It was like a waltz, most of the light was avoided by her, and even if it hit her, it was refracted.

Taking advantage of her attracting firepower, the scattered soldiers began to counterattack.

Da da da......

With meticulous footsteps, the engine spewed out azure flames, and the power armor allowed ordinary fusion warriors to reach a speed close to the speed of sound. Under the leadership of Himiko, they plunged into the dense light.

beep.