"You think you can defeat the Herrscher of Sentience in the realm of consciousness?!"
Along with the Herrscher of Sentience's somewhat savage taunt, in that instant—the heavens and earth changed color.
Mount Taixuan, still bright a moment ago, was now stained an ominous purple. The dim sky was like an omen of the apocalypse.
She violently waved her hand, and a colossal sword edge parted the clouds, descending upon the incredibly tiny figure of Jiang Qiao.
"Regret your arrogance and conceit!" With a cold laugh, Little Senti (Herrscher of Sentience) wore a gleeful expression, as if she had already foreseen the outcome of this strike.
This wasn't some child's play with knives and swords. Because she had mobilized her Herrscher authority in a fit of rage, this strike, if not her full power, contained at least ninety-nine percent of it. Its intensity was enough to instantly obliterate a person's consciousness.
She had absolutely no doubt about her victory. By now, she might even be thinking she'd overdone it, that her strike was too harsh. After all, even though this man before her was unappreciative, he was still Elysia's person.
But Little Senti, still fuming, thought of his earlier arrogance and couldn't help but pout—Hmph, who told this guy to be so arrogant? If he gets killed, he brought it on himself! Little Senti gave him a chance!
As for Jiang Qiao, he merely tilted his head slightly, gazing at the Herrscher of Sentience's sword of consciousness.
Facing this colossal entity almost upon him, feeling the oppressive force from the entire space, he was devoid of joy or sorrow, and just gently... blew a breath.
"Hoo~"
In that instant—the massive sword edge, so close, seemed to be affected by some power and instantly shattered, disappearing without a trace, as if it had never existed.
And the surrounding environment, once filled with raging winds, also calmed down.
Little Senti froze, her face a mask of disbelief. "...What did you do?!"
"As you can see, I merely erased it from the level of consciousness."
"You should be able to do something like this too, right?"
Faced with this calm retort, Little Senti was at a loss for words.
As the Herrscher of Sentience, she couldn't possibly fail to understand what had just happened. She just couldn't believe it—an attack containing ninety-nine percent of her power had been dispelled so easily.
How was this possible?
She was the Herrscher of Sentience!
But—she knew that even she wouldn't have been able to dispel that previous attack easily, yet this man before her had resolved it with just a light breath...
Undoubtedly, in truth, the other party did seem... ridiculously strong.
However....
Unwilling to admit it! Absolutely, absolutely unwilling to admit it! The child-like Herrscher of Sentience would never admit that as the Herrscher of Sentience, she would lose to a man she had just met!
Never!
"Again!" Little Senti bit her lip angrily. This time—she unleashed her full power.
Her desire to win even made her consider drawing power from the Dream of Paradise. If she could borrow power from Elysia, then she could wield the power of this entire 'Dream of Paradise'—which itself contained power equivalent to the number of humans sunk into slumber. And because of the special connection between Origin and the Cocoon, she could even use a portion of the 'Power of Finality' intercepted by Project Stigma.
However—
"Sorry, can't let you do that~"
A sweet, girlish voice chimed in, chuckling.
"Although I'd love to see Qiao in a difficult situation, but..."
"I can't let you cause any more trouble for Qiao, you know."
Of course—more importantly, it was probably because even if this power was given to the Herrscher of Sentience, the latter still couldn't possibly defeat Jiang Qiao.
"It's time to end all this."
"Herrscher of Sentience."
"Prepare to receive this strike imbued with the 'Power of Finality'."
"Huh?"
"What the—#*#!" Not only did she fail to borrow power from Elysia, but she also discovered Jiang Qiao using this very power. At this moment, the Herrscher of Sentience couldn't help but burst out cursing.
Weren't we supposed to be on the same side? It's one thing if you don't help, but you're helping this guy instead?!
She felt like cursing up a storm internally, but seeing the greatsword, glinting with crimson, searing light, that a certain someone had taken out, Little Senti instantly acted on pure instinct: "I surrender!"
Almost instantly, the flames dissipated into nothingness, and that terrifying power, as if facing the end of days, also vanished. Feeling the deadly threat disappear, Little Senti couldn't help but let out a sigh of relief.
Then, she looked at Jiang Qiao, still looking unconvinced and unhappy.
"You don't play fair!"
"Hmph, let me be clear, I didn't lose! Elysia backstabbed me!"
"Oh really~ Is that so?" The pink-haired girl slowly materialized, asking with an ambiguous smile.
"You still dare say that! If you hadn't given him all the dream's power!"
"That's not so strange, is it?"
"After all, this dream was created by me—and as for giving its power to Qiao... What belongs to Qiao belongs to me, and what belongs to me belongs to Qiao. So, this dream I created naturally belongs to Qiao as well."
"You..."
Looking at Elysia, who made no attempt to hide her "insider trading" (siding with Jiang Qiao), Little Senti gritted her teeth.
They're showing off their relationship, aren't they! They're definitely doing a PDA flex!
Although she had a child-like disposition, through dreams and World Serpent, she had acquired a lot of knowledge about the world, even capable of creating all sorts of strange scenarios. The Herrscher of Sentience naturally understood, more or less, some human emotional issues—of course, for her, it was more from an observer's perspective, something interesting.
But when it was right in front of her, flaunted so openly, Little Senti truly felt just how awful it was to be the third wheel forced to watch their lovey-dovey display.
"Alright, because I gave Qiao the dream's power, you feel Qiao's victory was completely unfair, right?"
"Hmph."
"In that case."
Elysia smiled, then looked at Jiang Qiao and said softly, "Well then..."
"Isn't it time to reclaim those scattered parts of 'Qiao'?"
"Though I don't really mind Qiao's... wandering eye, but to divide 'yourself' among so many people like this, even if it's for the humans I love, I'd feel 'jealous,' you know."
Her knuckles traced across his chest, gently brushing, as she voiced her playful "grievances."
Just like Elysia, who loved humanity but also had a special fondness for cute girls among them, Jiang Qiao now clearly received similar special treatment from her.
Jiang Qiao didn't speak, but he nodded.
The next moment—
Countless points of light emerged from innumerable dreams, then converged, flowing towards Jiang Qiao.
Everything, it seemed, hadn't changed.
Jiang Qiao was still Jiang Qiao.
But...
As Little Senti looked at the man before her, her previously defiant expression faltered, and she gulped.
Thud—
With that sound, the Herrscher of Sentience promptly and decisively knelt.
One moment before—He only won against me, Little Senti, through despicable means because Elysia was covering for him.
The next moment—I'm sorry, I've offended Lord Jiang Qiao!
Something's wrong, something's wrong, something's wrong! This guy is definitely not right!
The trembling Little Senti exclaimed this inwardly.
He was fundamentally, absolutely not the "stronger human" she had perceived him to be moments ago—the purity and vastness of this consciousness... Ordinary people might not understand, but to an expert in the domain of consciousness like the Herrscher of Sentience, this guy named Jiang Qiao could no longer be called human.
At the very least, his inner substance had already surpassed the scope of humanity. There was no way to define him as 'human' anymore.
Even she, as a Herrscher, couldn't possibly compare—if the gap between humans and Herrschers was merely a quantitative change, then Jiang Qiao was a qualitative change... It was even difficult to see them as being on the same dimension.
His self was worlds apart from humans and Herrschers.
To try and shake him was almost impossible—before this self, he could even crush the collective consciousness of humanity with his individual will... And even that was merely an extremely tiny fraction of him.
To even attempt to challenge such an existence was an act of unparalleled foolishness.
Sensing Little Senti's somewhat terrified emotions, Elysia smiled, then narrowed her eyes, still smiling, and raised her hand to catch a few specks of light that seemed to be arriving a little late.
"If you do bad things, you have to accept the punishment, you know~"
Meeting Jiang Qiao's gaze, the smiling girl brought those few specks of light to her lips, savoring them as if they were a dessert, looking incredibly pleased.
This scene made Little Senti feel a bit numb—she was trembling.
Whether it was eating that 'self' or daring to eat that 'self,' both aspects terrified the Herrscher of Sentience to no end.
The former went without saying—although not as 'heavy' as in reality, even on the 'consciousness' level, this was somewhat like dabbling in forbidden arts.
As for the latter... Given Jiang Qiao's unique nature, was his 'self' something that could be casually eaten? Seriously scary, are you tired of living or what! This was like trying to swallow a star; it wasn't like eating a lollipop, but more like ingesting a 'neutron star'.
Normally, it wouldn't be strange to be directly overwhelmed and burst.
And Elysia actually looked so happy... even seemed to be enjoying it...
These two have issues! Definitely major issues!
Little Senti trembled, afraid she too would become a snack.
—Of course, this was clearly a misunderstanding.
Although, without a doubt, that portion of the late-arriving 'Jiang Qiao' was indeed intercepted and "consumed" by Elysia.
But in reality, for her, it was more like a 'snack' similar to 'chewing gum.' Because its essence was Jiang Qiao, she definitely couldn't eat it or digest it—this wasn't like the heavily used data the Herrscher of Corruption picked up, or the first-hand data from Elysian Realm's Elysia.
Yet, she still loved to do it.
After all...
Just like chewing 'gum,' Elysia loved the process—Jiang Qiao's 'love' felt so close, and because it was a part of him, she could also receive Jiang Qiao's 'sweetness.'
What could be a better, more delicious little snack than this?
As for backlash—Perhaps for ordinary people, that would be the case.
But...
Since that self belonged to Jiang Qiao, how could it possibly harm Elysia?
Miss Elysia was particularly obsessed with this feeling of Jiang Qiao being completely helpless against her, only able to let her take the reins, to be "toyed with" within 'Elysia'.
The Herrscher of Sentience's defeat meant that Project Stigma's last safety catch had been removed.
"You lost."
Jiang Qiao stated the current situation to the Golden Serpent.
After everything within the dreamscape had been resolved, the other bargaining chips World Serpent possessed, especially the Gray Serpent system, were meaningless to him.
After all, Gray Serpent, which was difficult for ordinary people to eliminate, was, for him, merely a matter of whether he wanted to do so or not.
It was just that he had always lacked interest in eliminating Gray Serpent. After all, the latter was ultimately just a form of mechanical life. Out of respect for it being one of Mobius's few works in which she had invested her hopes for 'infinity,' even if it was just a defective product, he would still respect Mobius's choice.
"Yes, I lost."
"You won."
There wasn't much struggle, because it was unnecessary. For a mechanical lifeform like the Golden Serpent, regardless of success or failure, there was no need to display a pathetic posture; that would only make it look uglier.
The loser meets their end, the correct one leads the future. It wouldn't find meaning in resisting this point. After all, the Stigma life created by Project Stigma, in which the Golden Serpent had placed such high hopes, was precisely such an existence.
Perhaps humans would be more attached to the continuation of individual consciousness, but for Stigma life—the continuation of the individual is temporary, insignificant on the cosmic scale. Only civilization... the culmination of the efforts of all individuals, this 'fruit,' is what must be defended with all might, no matter what.
There would be no hatred, much less unwillingness.
Just as the Golden Serpent would want to go to great lengths to eliminate Jiang Qiao merely to remove an obstacle to Project Stigma—without a shred of personal grudge—Jiang Qiao did all this merely to adhere to the path he believed in.
One answer was wrong, and the other answer proved its correctness.
It was just that simple.
The Golden Serpent vanished.
It didn't even require Jiang Qiao to do anything specific; deeming itself to have lost its meaning, it chose self-deletion.
This, of course, did not mean the demise of the Gray Serpent system—after all, although the Gray Serpent system was a product of Mobius to assist Project Stigma, it itself could also give rise to exceptions like 'Master Gray,' Raven's very humane adoptive father, who walked towards the 'infinity' Mobius had hoped for.
After the dim night passed, bright sunlight would pierce the eyes of people awakening from sweet dreams, also heralding a new day, a new page for this planet.
Cradling the Fat young lady who was lounging on him as if he were a cushion, being quite restless, Jiang Qiao, with a sense of helplessness, gazed at it all.