No Real People Were Harmed

Blade-tail and razor teeth, hunting fins and shimmering scales; concealed, it is intangible as shade, but rising, it brings tempest and storm; dancing like a mountain of blades, coiling like a spiraling shell! These words, taken from the Starry Text Illustrated Handbook of Knowledge Sea Creatures, fully captured the appearance and traits of the slasher fish dragon! In the Knowledge Sea, the slasher fish dragon was indisputably the most widespread and dangerous Void Realm creature. Because its method of slaughter was excessively brutal and bloody, many sorcerers killed by a slasher fish dragon developed lasting psychological trauma and had to seek therapy, earning it the reputation of a true "rookie crusher" throughout the sorcerer world. Nearly every sorcerer had run into a hostile slasher fish dragon at some point. It was an enemy every sorcerer had to take seriously, a shadow in the sea that demanded perpetual vigilance, a terror lurking in the white fog! The moment you glimpsed that bladed dark silhouette leaping from the waters, you were only a few breaths away from death— Smack! A massive flame halberd materialized in Weixi's hands, swatting the leaping slasher fish dragon right back into the sea! "This truly is..." Igola's sorcery mana churned violently, converting into warm golden heart-colored sorcery mana as fine red veins webbed his eyes. "Nostalgic." Harvey patted the coffin on his back. A slot suddenly opened at its base, revealing a pale arm as dark green death-colored sorcery mana surged, primed for release! Miracle: Visualization Superposition! Miracle: Ghost King Shackles: Dracolich Claw! Even when facing an old acquaintance like a slasher fish dragon, the two quasi-legends did not pull their punches in the least. Right from the start, they tapped into the Colorless Dream Secret Poison to convert heterochromatic sorcery mana and unleashed their signature lethal moves! In the Deceiver's sight, countless pitch-black Yaxius were dissecting the slasher fish dragon, every stroke of his visualization manifesting directly as wounds across its body. Meanwhile, the arm protruding from Harvey's coffin transformed into a gigantic skeletal dragon claw, tearing viciously down toward the creature plunged in the sea! Yaxiu almost felt like applauding. From Weixi to Igola, and then to Harvey, this slasher fish dragon was actually being attended to by three legendary sorcerers at once. It certainly could never have dreamed of such an honor! Yet before long, the sorcerers' expressions changed— The slasher fish dragon wasn't dead. Though mangled and coated in blood, it not only survived, but even unleashed an enraged roar, leaping up in a frenzied lunge straight toward the sorcerers! The attacks from Weixi and the others had seemingly done nothing more than breach its surface hide, failing to weaken its combat strength in any meaningful way! "Let me." The moment Yaxiu's words fell, he and Feili vanished without a trace. While the others were still staring in surprise, the slasher fish dragon suddenly burst open from the middle. Demon and sorcerer soared out from within, the spray of dripping fish blood splashing against a transparent circular Sanctuary without a single drop touching either of them. Demon Miracle: Observer Mode. Efficient, stealthy, brutal, and elegant. This was also the first time Igola and Harvey had witnessed Yaxiu and Feili's method of fighting, and both were stunned by the grim aesthetic of the slaughter. Yaxiu brought Feili into "Observer Mode" and burrowed inside the slasher fish dragon's body to burst out through its belly. While this combat technique was not as flashy as Weixi's, not as noiseless as Igola's, and not as overtly menacing as Harvey's, it was far more clean and decisive. And above all... it was impossible to counter. "Now you understand how I felt back then?" Weixi said beside the two of them. "This has already far exceeded the power cap of Ruby Mountain." "If you hadn't insisted on hunting Feili down," Igola remarked, "perhaps you would have been the one wielding that power." "But if I hadn't hunted Feili, I might never have become Master's maid!" Weixi tilted her head and said, "And we couldn't have that, could we?" The Deceiver could only marvel in disbelief. "If the day ever comes when Yaxiu can no longer control you, we'll have to kill you no matter what—or at the very least, kill you before you can ever grow strong enough!" Weixi spread her hands. "Can't you have a little faith in him? Who's to say I won't end up bowing before his personal charisma and becoming an infatuated maid wholly devoted to him?" "I'll believe that—if he becomes a Divine Lord." "Hahaha, you really do see right through me," the maid giggled. "Still, you understand just how important Feili is to Master now, don't you?" Igola shot her a sideways glance. "I understand." As they spoke, the heavily hemorrhaging slasher fish dragon finally breathed its last. Yet its carcass did not dissolve, nor did any sorcery spirit drop from it. The corpse simply drifted upon the black waters, clouding the dark sea even further. "Is this a fully mature slasher fish dragon?" Yaxiu asked. "Isn't it a bit too durable?" "No. Though it's huge, from its appearance it was at most in its growth stage." The maid looked somewhat perplexed as well. "Still, if Master hadn't used that demon miracle, we probably would have needed a dozen more minutes of fighting to put the beast down. Even the slasher fish dragons I encountered on Ruby Mountain weren't this tough, though it hasn't reached the level of a demigod slasher fish dragon either..." "It must be environmental mutation," Igola said, gazing deep into the white fog. "This place has bolstered the slasher fish dragon's combat power. If everything lurking inside is a Void Realm creature of this caliber..." Yaxiu noticed Harvey, coffin on his back, rummaging through the slasher fish dragon's belly. Curious, he asked, "You're interested in fish carcasses too?" "First, I treat all corpses equally; it's merely that my current research focuses on the remains of intelligent life," the necromancer replied. "Second, there isn't just a fish carcass here." Ssss! As Harvey sliced open the fish's belly, a foul, visible stench billowed out. Quick on his feet, Yaxiu reached out and immediately covered Feili's eyes! "W-what is it?" Feili didn't dare remove Yaxiu's hand, asking nervously, "What's inside?" "Corpses," Harvey answered her. "Corpses chewed to pieces by the slasher fish dragon, waiting to be digested." Inside the slasher fish dragon's abdomen lay the scattered, gruesome remains of countless human beings. Some had already been partially digested, reduced to mounds of minced flesh. A rough glance suggested that at least a hundred people had met their end in this fish's belly, spanning men, women, the elderly, and children alike. Their deaths had been agonizingly horrific, unmistakably devoured alive. Even Yaxiu and Igola, accustomed as they were to death, looked visibly sickened at the sight. Only Weixi and Harvey remained utterly unfazed. "Corpses?" Feili froze. Clinging tightly to Yaxiu with both hands, she asked in a trembling voice, "I... I remember this is Canaan City, home to a permanent population of a million..." Yaxiu scanned their surroundings. Through the dense white fog, not a single building could be seen, nor a single human voice heard. Meanwhile, Harvey stepped through the pooled blood and flesh of who-knew-whom, crouching in the fish's belly to sift through the human remains. At the sight, Yaxiu and Igola's expressions shifted, yet neither spoke, waiting silently for the necromancer to finish. "As I thought." From amid the mass of mangled flesh, Harvey fished out a relatively intact severed finger. Where his palm made contact with the finger, a sizzling burn hissed as though from acid. Before long, his palm was corroded right through, and the severed finger fell back into the sea. Harvey floated upward with a look of quiet satisfaction and glanced at the others. "Did you catch that?" "Mortal corpses are corrosive to occult entities?" Igola guessed. "Very close," Harvey said. "Earlier, when I read about the 'mysterious chains' in Heath's notes, I noticed a loophole. If someone wiped mortals out before they could mentally perceive an 'occult event,' wouldn't that prevent the mysterious chains from ever triggering? Would the Divine Lord of Stars really leave behind such a glaring loophole?" Weixi nodded repeatedly in agreement; she had thought the exact same thing. At first glance, exploiting such a loophole might seem difficult, but one had to remember that everyone allowed into the Country of All Stars was a legendary sorcerer. For them, possessing miracles capable of vaporizing hundreds of people in an instant was hardly unusual. Even an eccentric trio of legends like Yaxiu, Igola, and Harvey possessed numerous large-scale lethal miracles; a single Mind Shriek from Igola could render an entire plaza dead silent in a heartbeat. "This is His contingency." Harvey pointed toward the fish's belly. "Beyond 'mental cognition,' the 'mysterious chains' can also be triggered through 'death cognition.'" "'Death cognition'?" "You can think of it as the resentment left behind by the deceased," the necromancer explained. "If they know who killed them, that resentment will coil around the perpetrator. If they don't know the killer, it lingers within the corpse. Of course, that negative energy isn't necessarily harmful; it all depends on whether the sorcerer knows how to use it." "I know how!" Weixi raised her hand. "If you slaughter a million people within a month, the accumulated resentment can serve as the primary material for constructing a mental divine miracle!" Yaxiu promptly rapped the maid on the head and asked, "So, if a sorcerer kills mortals, it triggers the mysterious chains?" "Not entirely." Harvey held up his corroded, pierced palm. "It draws the mysterious chains, but the chains will only attack the 'occult entity' that comes into contact with the lingering resentment. It doesn't lock onto a specific target." "In other words, killing is still on the table, just with far greater caution," Weixi summarized. Yaxiu breathed a quiet sigh of relief. Although he had no intention of killing anyone, with the chaotic angel hunt involving numerous legends looming ahead, he naturally preferred to have as few constraints as possible. A thoughtful Igola suddenly snapped to an epiphany. "Which means... He chose Canaan City on purpose?" "What do you mean?" "This slasher fish dragon was actually already weakened," Igola said. "Having devoured so many people, its innards were long since riddled with holes from the corrosion of the mysterious chains. If the angel hunt hadn't taken place here, but out in the unpopulated wilderness, these Void Realm creatures..." "...would have spread into other cities along with the expanding white fog," Yaxiu murmured. "So from the very beginning, an entire city was required as a sacrifice to give an upset stomach to whatever Void Realm creatures emerged from the white fog," Igola reasoned. "Since the white fog is an effect of the Prime Angel, these Void Realm creatures are likely the Prime Angel's hunting hounds. The Divine Lord of Stars wants to digest the Prime Angel's silver wings, so the silver wings called in reinforcements straight from their homeland to resist." Yaxiu blinked. "Homeland?" "This slasher fish dragon most likely came from the Knowledge Sea," Weixi chimed in. "A slasher fish dragon in its growth stage is rare even on the Time Continent, let alone Ruby Mountain. Only the shallows of the Knowledge Sea offer room for a slasher fish dragon to develop." "The Divine Lord of Stars probably anticipated this long ago, and the 'mysterious chains' were prepared precisely for it," Igola said. "To Void Realm creatures, every single citizen of All Stars is poison. The more they consume, the weaker they become. Naturally, the Prime Angel's silver wings will be left powerless to resist, meekly devoured down to the last scrap by the Divine Lord of Stars." "B-but what about the people of Canaan City?" Feili asked, her voice trembling. "Did they just... die like that?" "You'd better pray they're already dead," Weixi remarked. "Otherwise, right now they'd be waiting inside a fish's belly to be digested alongside heaps of rotting flesh, eyeballs, and guts." Feili buried her head behind Yaxiu. "That's... that's just too cruel..." The sorcerers exchanged glances. Setting aside a remorseless elf like Weixi, even Yaxiu's expression was slightly conflicted. If these were living, flesh-and-blood humans, Yaxiu might have felt rage and grief. The issue, however, was that the people of the Country of All Stars were merely projections. Even if a projection died, it only caused an emotional backflow, without the slightest impact on the physical health of the true body. In that sense, the Divine Lord of Stars' design could actually be considered exceptionally benevolent, even humane. He could even issue a public statement declaring that all the ordinary people who died in the angel hunt were projections, and that no real people were harmed. Yet for Feili, this place was the only reality she had ever known. Yaxiu patted Feili's hand and said softly, "I'm sorry." Feili rubbed her eyes. "Why are you apologizing?" "I don't know. Maybe because both the Divine Lord of Stars and I are sorcerers?" "Impressive—you actually managed to find common ground between yourself and a Divine Lord," Igola remarked dryly. "You might as well say you're both alive." Feili shook her head. "You don't need to apologize. I know... you're all good people." Apart from Yaxiu, who hadn't done much in the way of evil, the other three accepted the praise with absolute shamelessness. "Yaxiu, if I do my best to help you," the little lamb asked earnestly, "will that help save others?" Yaxiu paused, thought it over, and answered, "I'll do my best." "Okay." Feili clung to him tighter. "I'll work hard to learn how to fly, so I can fight alongside you as soon as possible." "Then I shall wait and hope." As the group pressed forward, Weixi suddenly murmured pensively, "There's still a flaw in the Divine Lord of Stars' arrangement." "What is it?" "Void Realm creatures like slasher fish dragons eat people, so they can be dealt with using the 'mysterious chains.' But there's another specialty of the Void Realm that doesn't eat people at all." The sorcerers blinked, then quickly caught on. "You mean..." "If the Prime Angel's silver wings can summon slasher fish dragons from the Knowledge Sea, there's no reason it couldn't summon sorcerer projections," the maid said. "Even with the 'mysterious chains,' the shielding cover of the white fog makes it very difficult for the chains to trigger. The Country of All Stars has no way to deal with sorcerer projections." "So, either the Divine Lord of Stars used another divine miracle to cut off the possibility of sorcerer projections appearing altogether, or..." She looked up, her gaze piercing through the white fog toward the distant starry sky. "...He arranged to deal with the sorcerer projections somewhere else."