Chapter 20: It’s Merely the Origin, Not the Herrscher of Human
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In the Nagazora City strategy that Jiang Qiao designed for Elysia and the others, after they dealt with Bronya, they had to attack Cocolia’s headquarters directly at the fastest speed possible.
If they didn’t do this, Cocolia would definitely discover something was wrong with her daughter very quickly.
When that cunning and treacherous mother fox became vigilant, it would be much more difficult to deal with her.
However, what Jiang Qiao never expected was that this mother fox would actually relax her surveillance of Bronya due to a moment of arrogance and overconfidence, this was something neither he nor Elysia and the others could have known.
But regardless, they had to strike directly at Cocolia’s headquarters.
To save Nagazora City, they had to crush that mother fox as early as possible. If they waited until the Honkai energy concentration rose to a certain level, even if they killed Cocolia on the spot, they would still be the losers.
Honestly speaking, Jiang Qiao had quite a headache when designing the plan due to such an urgent pace.
If he didn’t care about Nagazora City’s safety and only focused on dealing with Cocolia, he could have made much more detailed preparations. With the advantage of planning while the enemy was unprepared, Jiang Qiao was confident he could even deal with that Schicksal Overseer.
Unfortunately, that wasn’t possible.
Whether it was to ensure his own body’s safety or to fulfill that Pink Elf’s willfulness, he could only take risky moves and win through surprise tactics.
However—
Now things were different.
With the assistance of chat group friends, Elysia’s side would have additional combat power, greatly reducing the risk, even though this time-limited combat power only lasted for one hour due to the time-limited commission factor.
Especially.
“After gaining this power.”
Standing in the snowy field, Jiang Qiao looked at the pink light in his palm, feeling incredibly exhilarated and relaxed.
— I have completely mastered this body.
This somewhat crazy statement in the chat group was actually not a joke.
After receiving Elysia’s techniques for using Honkai energy, he had indeed surpassed Elysia herself in terms of how to use the body of the girl named Elysia.
This kind of thing sounded very magical, and even if he told others, they would only treat it as a joke.
Even if Elysia heard it, she wouldn’t believe it.
What a joke, are you Elysia or am I Elysia?
I’ve been using that body for so many years, how could you understand me better than I understand myself?
Unfortunately, this was the truth.
Jiang Qiao had not only mastered the techniques of using Honkai energy, but at this moment he had even discovered the authority of the Herrscher of Origin that Elysia currently didn’t know about.
The reason for this difference, he guessed, might be influenced by his own characteristics, but more likely it was due to the conceptual differences between himself and Elysia.
As the First Herrscher, the Herrscher of Origin was different from all other Herrschers.
As the Herrscher of Origin, Elysia was no different from ordinary people except for being very skilled at using Honkai energy, which was quite abnormal.
Even the most important authority of a Herrscher, she only understood it at the end of her life.
But this power definitely couldn’t be something that could only be effective at the moment of death, otherwise Kevin wouldn’t have said: “If we had discovered your identity earlier, the Previous Era wouldn’t have met such an end.”
So then.
What kind of change had Elysia undergone in between?
Jiang Qiao wasn’t clear about this, such questions could probably only be asked to the later Elysia herself.
But he had his own speculation, and this speculation had already been confirmed.
The prerequisite for mastering the authority of the Herrscher of Origin was — acknowledging one’s identity as a Herrscher, recognizing the reality that one is a Herrscher.
The initial Elysia didn’t know she was a Herrscher, the later Elysia vaguely sensed she was a Herrscher but didn’t want to believe it, until finally, she accepted her identity as a Herrscher and died as a Herrscher at her final moment.
“Truly worthy of being the Herrscher closest to the Herrscher of Finality.”
This change reminded Jiang Qiao of the trial of The Cocoon of Finality, to become the Herrscher of Finality, one must recognize oneself and step toward the future.
Then the Herrscher of Origin, whose essence was【Connection】, was undoubtedly the Herrscher closest to Finality.
Unlike Elysia who was still confused and unaware at this time, Jiang Qiao completely didn’t care about his identity as a human and clearly recognized his essence as the Herrscher of Origin.
This difference meant that Elysia’s body was just a Honkai energy manipulation device in Elysia’s own hands, but in Jiang Qiao’s hands, it truly stood in this world as a Herrscher.
“If Elysia saw her current appearance, she would definitely feel very surprised and unfamiliar.”
Looking at his ornate clothing, Jiang Qiao slightly tilted his neck, revealing the snow-white skin, and gently caressed the ray-type Honkai beast beside him through silk gloves, that was the companion creature belonging to the Herrscher of Origin — the Spirit of Origin.
He sighed:
“However, there are still some differences after all.”
Although both were Herrschers of Origin, Jiang Qiao could feel that this power, under his control, did not contain the concept or characteristics of humanity.
The current【Elysia】could only be called the Herrscher of Origin, and absolutely could not be called the Herrscher of Human.
He guessed this was probably because the essence of the Herrscher of Origin was extremely special and would change according to different people.
Only in Elysia’s hands could the Herrscher of Origin be called the Herrscher of Human.
But so what?
“I am merely the Herrscher of Origin, the word ‘human’ has no meaning to me.”
Jiang Qiao raised his bow, his pink glass-like eyes reflecting the distant figure, a touch of coldness tinting the base color.
He wasn’t like Elysia, who held an obsession with humanity.
At this moment, he was completely the Herrscher of Origin! Capable of confronting the 2nd Herrscher.
However—
“She really looks exactly like the pufferfish from 50,000 years later.”
Jiang Qiao looked at the purple figure not far away, gazing at that familiar face and couldn’t help but feel emotional.
The surrounding village buildings reminded him of Sirin’s background, a village girl who depended on her mother for survival.
According to what Zhi said earlier, the Fire Moth higher-ups had tried using high-powered weapons to eliminate the 2nd Herrscher the same way they dealt with the First Herrscher before deploying warriors, but the results were poor.
Could it be that she was consciously protecting this village?
Looking at the surrounding buildings that, aside from being affected by the Honkai eruption, showed no further damage, Jiang Qiao couldn’t help but form this speculation.
Meanwhile
In Nagazora City 50,000 years later, Elysia and the others, who had finished their preparations and stuffed the bound Bronya into an abandoned warehouse in the Raiden Residence, were now fully equipped and ready, arriving near the ME Corp building.
— At this time, Cocolia in the base remained completely unaware.