"So the Omniscient Domain didn't activate again… interesting. Looks like this trick of yours doesn't work on me."
Blessing of the Hunt: A Star Aids the Moon's Chase.
Taking advantage of a brief opening to evade capture, four dark-purple magical arrows materialized behind Inori Cat, hovering for a split second before streaking straight toward where #4, the Lord of Silence, stood.
But—
Even though the Omniscient Domain clearly had not taken effect, an unusual fluctuation rippled across #4's body. The fairy-magic arrows passed straight through #4 as if striking empty air.
Inori Cat immediately sensed that something was off about this #4.
The danger she felt was absolutely real. She had already seen enough of the Omniscient Domain's causality manipulation to know that, if she had not introduced external variables earlier, she would likely be completely incapacitated by now.
But the problem was… was the Lord of Silence really walking the Path of Destruction?
After exchanging just a few moves, Inori Cat could feel #4's strength growing at an exponential rate. If the initial evaluation was 100 points, then now it had already climbed to 120.
"Going to the Star Rail world means there's a real chance of getting elbowed by #4 Polka Kakamok," she had thought earlier.
This was something Kiyono Inori had anticipated long ago.
That was why she had specifically prepared the Absolute Safety Equation to conceal the ripples caused by world-hopping, and also, using data stored within the Emperor's Scepter, devised several emergency plans specifically for dealing with #4.
But #4's appearance at the Herta Space Station was far too abrupt.
Kiyono Inori had never expected #4 to show up here at this exact moment. In simple terms, this was the type of Encounter she was worst at handling. The #4 contingency plan was still loading inside the Emperor's Scepter.
Still, judging from #4's current state…
It seemed that #4 also had not expected to run into her at the Herta Space Station, and might not even have known of her existence beforehand. The #4 who had arrived here was not the true, complete form.
"March 7th was summoned away while testing the Simulated Universe."
"Cat System!"
In less than a second, Kiyono Inori connected the entire chain of cause and effect.
March 7th had been summoned away by the Cat System during Simulated Universe testing. Herta noticed March 7th's consciousness was missing, so of course she would investigate. #4's appearance here was likely because Herta had actually uncovered something.
"Kiyono Inori: Was this your doing, my system?"
"Cat System: I'm just a cat system spirit, meow. I don't have control over the shop or gacha, meow. I don't know anything, meow!"
"Kiyono Inori: ..."
Forget it.
She didn't know how the Cat System's shop or gacha mechanics actually worked.
But expecting a system that had to steal power from the Emperor's Scepter just to run smoothly to grab someone out of the Simulated Universe right under Herta's nose, and still hide it from her, was clearly unrealistic.
At least she understood things now.
In the face of this sudden Encounter, she wasn't the only one preparing. #4 was probably preparing too.
For example, what had appeared here might not even be #4's true body. That would explain why fairy magic attacks were ineffective. If the target wasn't actually here, of course the attacks would do nothing.
#4 possessed abilities like this, and the Emperor's Scepter database did record them. The Second Emperor had even prepared countermeasures back then.
"An existence from outside the Domain. Even if you can partially resist the influence of the Omniscient Domain," Polka said calmly, as if making a prophecy, "it's regrettable, but you have already exposed too much information. Next… I will erase the chaotic possibilities you bring."
This cat could partially resist the Omniscient Domain, but that did not mean the Domain had completely failed. All Polka needed to do was gather, summarize, and incorporate the cat's information into the Domain's calculations.
Ultra-distance transmission progress: 47 percent.
A power that seemed to control everything erupted from #4. Under its influence, Inori Cat once again felt those invisible threads tugging at her.
This was the third time.
Every time that sensation appeared, she had to introduce a new variable to interfere with the Omniscient Domain's calculations. By now, she had already used one Destruction blessing, one Remembrance blessing, and fairy magic as well.
But as #4's power continued to grow, the method of adding variables could last for less and less time. Now she needed to introduce a new variable roughly every ten seconds. At this rate, Kiyono Inori's inventory box would not hold out for long.
Still.
In less than thirty seconds of back-and-forth, Kiyono Inori had exposed a lot of her own information, but #4, the Lord of Silence, had also revealed quite a bit. At the very least, she had now completely grasped #4's current state.
"…?"
Beneath #4's cognitive filter, her brows furrowed.
Facing a crisis that could mean death, that cute little cat was not struggling at all. Instead, it stayed quietly in place, as if its soul had already left its body.
Had it exhausted all its trump cards and accepted defeat? Or was it activating some unknown escape method again?
As much as she disliked admitting it,
As a genius bound by the Omniscient Domain, if that cat managed to flee back to a world outside the Domain, #4 really would not have many options.
For #4 to actively explore worlds beyond the Domain would be equivalent to breaking the intellectual boundary set by the Aeon of Erudition, and shattering the carefully constructed Omniscient Domain itself.
But if she did not explore beyond the Domain, that cat could return at any time and bring new chaotic possibilities, which would ultimately still break those same boundaries.
Left brain attacks right brain.
A single-track mind jammed at both ends.
"I won't allow it. After nailing you into the Omniscient Domain, I will destroy this Herta Space Station," #4, the Lord of Silence, sighed. A blade born of causality had already pierced through the cat's neck.
But in the next instant,
Both the woman and the cat vanished from where they stood.
#4's vision suddenly went dark. Rhythmic audio mixed with the hum of computational currents echoed in her ears. When she opened her eyes again, she found herself in an extremely dark space.
Outside—
Logged into the Savior's Bucket #360 account, Kiyono Inori, now transformed from a cat into a mature, cool-type beautiful girl, sat upon the Mechanical Emperor's throne, calmly observing the colossal mechanical execution construct drifting in the starry void.
"Unauthorized login detected. Scepter administrator has permitted access. Visitor application under verification…"
"Genius Society #4, Polka Kakamok."
"Warning: This unit is listed as a high-risk blacklisted visitor, with numerous recorded violations. Warning ID: Niebelungen."
In theory, it was still possible to retreat back to her original world at this point.
But her goal of reaching the Star Rail world had not been achieved, and #4's current condition seemed… delicate. The innate intuition of the Pioneer of the Stars told Kiyono Inori that this might actually be winnable.
"Execute. Segment."
From the Mechanical Emperor's throne, Kiyono Inori issued the command. The Lord of Silence, who had been directly teleported into the execution device, immediately noticed the change.
Steam roared inside the mechanical construct. Jet-black tides surged from the walls, slowly creeping toward #4 on the execution platform, radiating an aura of utter despair.
"This is…"
Even as a genius bound by the Omniscient Domain, the Lord of Silence was not without curiosity. She simply confined her exploration to the circle of knowledge permitted by Nous.
Curious, #4 reached out and touched a bit of the black tide.
The highly corrosive tide instantly pierced through her palm. Blood splattered across her pale arm, and she immediately realized that it was spreading further.
Without the slightest hesitation, #4 brought her blade down. Her hand fell straight into the black tide below.
"Trash."
"Upon use, immediately causes the designated single target to lose an amount of HP equal to 15 percent of their maximum HP."
"A souvenir brought back by the Stellaron Cat from its adventure. It's the thought that counts. Please cherish it, meow."
From that brief contact, at the cost of one hand, #4 read this information. Staring at the data stream and the cartoonish chibi trash bag icon, her expression beneath the cognitive filter wavered just a little.
"So… what a dangerous creation. Treating something like this as a souvenir. That's really something, Stellaron Cat."
#4 judged Kiyono Inori's true name to be "Stellaron Cat."
"DEL Trash Tide."
That was the name the Emperor's Scepter automatically generated for this attack.
This mechanical construct was never meant for execution. It was originally a garbage station used to collect and pulverize the excessive trash gathered by the Star. After encountering #4, Kiyono Inori had hastily remodeled it into an execution device.
By incorporating an evolved anti-life equation, the final effect was simple. Any contact with the trash-formed black tide would reduce maximum HP by 15 percent.
Even someone as powerful as #4 would lose 15 percent of her maximum HP from deliberate contact, though she immediately recognized the danger and cut off the tide's spread within her body.
The damage was ultimately negligible. Losing a hand was trivial. She had tens of thousands of ways to reattach it instantly.
What mattered now was something else entirely.
With ultra-distance transmission still incomplete, the Lord of Silence existed on the boundary between being and not being. In simple terms, she could attack others through causality, but attacks from others would find it extremely difficult to affect her.
And yet… she noticed that the transmission progress had suddenly slowed to a crawl. What should have taken two or three minutes would now require at least six or seven hours.
"Such a familiar method… but facing only a cat, less than fifty percent output should be enough."
The Lord of Silence sighed. This was the second time she had faced this. The first was when she had elbowed #66, Emperor Rupert II.
That genius had used this very method to counter a skill set of "your attacks don't affect me, my causality blade deletes you." How had a being outside the Domain mastered the techniques of Emperor Rupert II?
This cat brought far too many problems.
But there was no longer time to think. The black tide of trash was already about to engulf her platform.
The Lord of Silence let go of her thoughts.
She looked at the mechanical colossus. That invisible gaze, like a specimen pin fixing a butterfly in place, locked a certain outcome into certainty. The execution device, hastily converted from a garbage station, began to collapse and malfunction.
"Six whole seconds… I thought you'd break free in two or three at most."
Before the Lord of Silence, the mechanical construct shattered and dissolved entirely into data. What appeared was not a cat, but a beautiful girl whose presence made it hard to look away after even a single glance.
"…You're human?"
That was beyond her expectations.
"Hah. A cat turning into a beautiful girl is pretty normal these days, isn't it? You've been quiet for so many years that you've become a fossil. Haven't kept up with the trends of the new era, have you, Fourth Seat?"
Enter the Bucket Algorithm plus Jin Lajitzde's Memoirs.
Kiyono Inori was not yet ready for a full confrontation with #4.
The Emperor's Scepter was running at full capacity, while the power the Cat System had stolen was running low. In short, the gacha draw was lagging. She was still stuck on the draw screen, not yet finished.
The Emperor's Scepter of Emperor Rupert II.
Even though it had been modified beyond recognition, Polka still saw through the essence of this world.
As long as the other party had not stepped outside the circle of knowledge and could still communicate, there was no rush to fight. That said, geniuses each clung to their own obsessions, all convinced that their own hypothesis was the only correct theory.
Thus, for the Genius Society,
Communication equaled no communication.
#4 had grown somewhat interested in this cat that could casually turn into a beautiful girl, but the other side clearly had no intention of stopping.
#4 leapt high, charging along the slanted steps toward the cat girl seated on the mechanical throne.
But as she advanced, the steps kept rising, and the girl on the throne rose with them.
#4 instantly recognized the stalling trick.
Under the authority of the Omniscient Domain, the illusion created by the Emperor's Scepter plus fairy magic was shattered in less than 0.1 seconds. As the illusion broke, what appeared before #4 were several garbage bins of different colors.
The Emperor's Bin.
The Savior's Bin.
The Stellaron's Bin.
Using the brief moment provided by the illusion, Kiyono Inori operated the Cat System's gacha with one hand while using Jin Lajitzde's Memoirs to convert the Emperor's Scepter data into these strange garbage-bin heroes.
They respectively borrowed data from a simulated Emperor Rupert II, Savior's Bin #360, and a simulated Stellaron Cocolia.
Ordinary Emperor's Scepter data would shatter like bubbles before #4, but with the joyful conversion from Jin Lajitzde's Memoirs, the situation changed.
"Emperor: Anti-Life Interpretive Discourse."
Seeing #4 Polka, the Emperor's Bin reacted most violently, immediately unleashing its signature equation-based conceptual strike. Under its influence, the Lord of Silence's form even showed faint signs of phasing.
"This is—"
The power of Trailblaze and Elation?
She identified the Paths of the garbage bins. In all her long life, #4 had seen animated trash bins on dream planets, but never ones this strong.
Before the Omniscient Domain, there was no randomness in a deck of cards, no uncertainty in a coin toss. Particle storms, stellar collapses, all were outcomes already known to the Domain.
But today… the cat she unexpectedly encountered at the Herta Space Station brought her not just surprise, but genuine shock.
"Savior's Bin! Use 360 Secure Desktop!"
Kiyono Inori meowed her command. With time so tight, meowing was more efficient than normal speech.
360 Secure Desktop was Savior's Bin #360's signature skill. In gameplay terms, it deployed an absurdly powerful domain that dealt massive damage.
While the Emperor's Bin was being elbowed aside by #4, computational power surged through the data world. The Lord of Silence was dragged into the Secure Desktop, where countless unknown icons flooded the Domain of Secure Desktop.
One second. Two seconds. Three seconds…
At the sixth second, a violent explosion erupted inside the Emperor's Scepter. The domain was torn apart, and Savior's Bin's body split cleanly down the middle, shattering into two halves.
Stepping out of the domain, #4's skirt hem was smeared with some grime from the exploding garbage bin. She frowned, clearly displeased by the mysterious black stain on her clothes.
Then she rushed straight toward the girl on the high platform.
This time, Kiyono Inori did not resist at all. A confident smile had already appeared on her face.
Five Blessings of Destruction, three Blessings of Erudition, two Blessings of Remembrance, one Blessing of Propagation, one Blessing of the Hunt.
Pioneer of the Stars: Weakness insight. Enemy action success rate reduced. Skill hit rate reduced.
Rupert III Is on the Way: Home-field buff of the Emperor's Scepter increased, with additional true damage to organic life.
Meeting Yesterday Again, Paying Homage to the Divine Machine, Impulse of Destruction: Increases adaptability to Remembrance, Erudition, and Destruction blessings.
The glow of buffs flashed continuously.
Because the battle took place inside the Emperor's Scepter, Kiyono Inori also benefited from administrator authority bonuses, and additional base stat increases from stacked Erudition blessings.
When the distance between them closed to within three meters, #4 could already feel the astonishing pressure radiating from her opponent, and—
"Heh. With the transmission progress stuck at fifty percent and the Omniscient Domain temporarily down, Fourth Seat, you're already trapped," the cat girl said, her face twisting into a manic grin.
The Lord of Silence neither agreed nor disagreed.
The Omniscient Domain had lost its effect, but the calculations of a genius still ran. At this moment, victory or defeat was uncertain.
If the other side pulled out something even stranger, the scales would unquestionably tip in her favor. Only about fifty percent of her power and data had been transmitted here.
While fifty percent loss would not cause #4 to fall, a fifty percent quality loss to the Omniscient Domain was absolutely unacceptable. That would be equivalent to temporarily damaging the Domain itself.
"So that's it. A trap prepared specifically for the Omniscient Domain…" The candy-colored killer spoke in an icy tone.
Kiyono Inori blinked.
What? Sure, she had made preparations based on the Emperor's data, but you were the one who insisted on barging in. She had not planned to run into #4 this early either.
…
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