By now, Kali could say with complete confidence that few understood humanity better than she did.
Devouring the scholars of the Mu Continent—and countless other humans besides—had given her far more than scientific knowledge. She had studied humanity at nearly every level: the workings of the body, the structure of consciousness, and even the social systems that emerged when individuals gathered into groups.
That was precisely why humanity's earlier, almost unnatural degree of unity had immediately struck her as suspicious.
And it was why she had become so adept at identifying exactly where to apply pressure.
In hindsight, MEI had made the right decision when she rejected Kevin's proposal to use the Authority of Death to accelerate the evolution of humanity as a whole.
Her concerns had been justified.
Kali had moved on to the next stage of her plan almost immediately.
There simply hadn't been enough time.
MEI was already stretched beyond her limits. Transforming the entirety of humanity within a few short days would have been impossible. Even if both Elysias worked in shifts, wielding the Authority of Death according to parameters MEI had prepared beforehand, they still couldn't have completed the process in time.
And speed wasn't the only problem.
There was another obstacle that couldn't simply be brushed aside.
Not everyone wanted to be transformed.
Some distrusted the process. Others feared what they didn't understand. Some resisted out of sheer stubbornness, while others invoked religious doctrine or ideology to condemn the entire proposal outright.
It would be too simplistic to declare all of them right or wrong.
The important thing was that those objections existed.
Something approaching the ascension of the entire human race could not simply be imposed without warning. If the Newborn World Serpent tried, Kali wouldn't even need to intervene; humanity could tear itself apart perfectly well on its own.
Ultimately, Aponia's Discipline had limits.
At present, she could forcibly constrain only the upper leadership of the major powers. If the mental imprint she planted could be extended across the whole of humanity…
Well.
It would be horrifying. Deeply inhumane, even.
But if such a thing were genuinely possible, many of their present problems would become considerably easier to manage.
Human society was simply too complicated.
Who hated whom? Which factions were bound together by shared interests? Who would change sides the instant the balance shifted? Who concealed genuinely antisocial impulses beneath an ordinary exterior? Who would cling to their convictions simply because they could not conceive of being wrong?
Emotions, ideologies, interests, loyalties, prejudices, and personal convictions overlapped in countless combinations.
Forget solving all of them.
No one could even claim to have completely mapped the tangled mess.
The Newborn World Serpent, unlike the Herrschers, could not simply disregard those complications and act however it pleased.
And therein lay the problem.
Unless virtually the entire human population underwent enhancement at once, increasing the proportion of Enhanced Humans would only magnify the casualties of another disaster like today's.
This time, there had been "only" several hundred million Enhanced Humans caught in the riots, with Kali's Spawn exploiting the chaos from within the crowds.
And in just two and a half minutes…
More than two billion people had become casualties.
If there had been more Enhanced Humans—
if those Enhanced Humans had been stronger—
then how many ordinary people, those who had yet to undergo enhancement, could possibly have survived?
Would there even have been an ordinary human population left afterward?
If one completely ignored human nature, then admittedly, transforming everyone remained a highly feasible solution.
But…
It was exactly as MEI had feared.
If the Newborn World Serpent attempted something like that by force, the organization itself would fracture before the plan could ever be completed.
And so, barely ten minutes after the disaster began…
The virtual conference room beneath the Newborn World Serpent Headquarters had fallen silent.
It was not the silence of contemplation.
No one simply knew what to say.
Eventually, Kevin broke it.
"How many survivors are left worldwide?"
He asked the question quietly.
Perhaps because everyone understood that it was the one number none of them truly wanted to hear.
MEI answered anyway.
"…Fewer than one and a half billion."
The figure came from Prometheus Prime's latest global assessment, compiled shortly before MEI entered the conference.
The actual report was considerably more detailed.
Prometheus had even calculated the probable percentage of surviving humans who were, in reality, Spawn of the Herrscher of Blood hiding among the population.
MEI didn't mention that number.
She couldn't bring herself to.
Silence descended once again.
More than two billion casualties.
In two and a half minutes.
And everyone present understood that the final toll would climb far higher.
The killing itself was only the beginning.
Suppose someone suffering from severe mental illness suddenly lost control and killed several innocent people with a kitchen knife.
Would the victims' families simply abandon their hatred once they learned that the killer had been mentally ill?
Probably not.
Many would still ask the same bitter question:
Why should the person who killed someone I loved be treated differently simply because they weren't in control of themselves?
Whatever the legal or moral answer might be, grief rarely obeyed either.
And today, nearly the entire human race had lost control at once.
Those hellish two and a half minutes had left behind more than corpses.
They had left hatred.
Guilt.
Families shattered beyond repair.
And countless survivors who had awakened to discover the blood of the people they loved most on their own hands.
Parents.
Children.
Friends.
Lovers.
For many of those still alive, survival itself had become another form of hell.
Then—
"Doctor."
Prometheus's electronic voice broke through the oppressive silence.
"Multiple faction leaders have jointly disclosed information concerning the Moths Who Chase the Flames' planned interstellar migration."
A pause.
"At present, more than eighty percent of all Base Cities have suffered a complete breakdown of essential functions."
"Rioting and civil disorder are—"
"…"
MEI stopped listening.
There was no need to hear the rest.
She knew.
Everyone in the room knew.
Once events had reached this point, the chain reaction was no longer something they could simply reverse.
Fewer than one and a half billion humans remained alive.
And those survivors were now sliding toward an internal conflict that might prove impossible to stop.
Social order had collapsed.
"Prometheus."
"I am here, Doctor."
MEI slowly exhaled.
"Immediately identify and destroy as many nuclear weapons with remote-launch capability as possible."
"Understood."
The super-artificial intelligence that had stepped onto the Path of Erudition almost from the moment of its birth immediately began carrying out the order.
No one questioned MEI's reasoning.
Humanity's descent into internal conflict could no longer be prevented.
So the least they could do was remove the worst weapons from the board.
Weapons capable of turning a single irrational decision into the deaths of millions.
Weapons with which ordinary humans could, quite literally, overturn the table.
Destroying as many of them as possible might preserve what little population remained.
As for what the Newborn World Serpent could still accomplish afterward…
MEI hesitated.
"What I'm about to say may sound… inappropriate."
Her expression remained grave.
"Please don't misunderstand what I mean."
Everyone turned toward her.
"The global population has already fallen drastically. And in the immediate future, it will continue to fall."
Her voice tightened slightly.
"We are no longer capable of preventing that."
"Therefore…"
MEI looked around the conference room.
"…this catastrophe has also created conditions under which we could initiate both Kindling Migration Plans simultaneously."
No one spoke.
Before today, every evacuation proposal had been forced to account for billions of human lives.
Now…
According to preliminary projections, once the present wave of violence finally exhausted itself, fewer than one billion might remain.
Billions had become hundreds of millions.
It was a monstrous way to phrase it.
But from the cold perspective of logistics, the burden had been reduced enormously.
Which meant—
"I'll coordinate with Dr. Einstein to—"
BOOM!
The entire Newborn World Serpent Headquarters lurched violently.
MEI's sentence died in her throat.
A heartbeat later—
VMMMM—!
Dense crimson-black rays erupted through the base.
They radiated outward from some unseen point, striking indiscriminately at everything around them.
Inside the virtual conference room, an entire section of wall suddenly exploded inward as dozens of those rays punched through, filling MEI's vision with streaks of red and black.
For an instant, they resembled the hidden arrow traps of some ancient ruin—
except these were no arrows.
"Move!"
Everyone reacted almost immediately.
None of them were strangers to ambushes anymore.
The two Kevins moved first.
The original raised the Judgement of Shamash.
His Sim condensed ice into a sword.
Flame and frost surged outward simultaneously, forming an improvised defensive front before the others as the crimson-black barrage hammered against it.
Exactly how fire and ice were stopping those beams was a question for another time.
Because MEI recognized them.
She had seen that attack countless times before.
The Girl Dolls of the Prometheus Cluster used the exact same weapon.
Gravity Rays.
But Prometheus had not betrayed them.
Which meant—
"Doctor."
Prometheus's voice sounded from MEI's personal communicator.
"High-intensity Honkai Energy fluctuations detected."
The virtual conference room was already collapsing around them.
"Threat classification confirmed."
"Herrscher-level."
MEI's pupils contracted.
"No—!"
Understanding struck her immediately.
"Everyone, get over here! Now!"
Golden-orange light erupted beside her.
Space folded open as MEI invoked the Authority of the Void, tearing open a portal large enough for everyone nearby to escape through.
There was no longer any question of defending the facility.
Whatever had just entered their base had already breached its heart.
MEI understood that much immediately.
The Headquarters was lost.