BZZZZ—!!!
A hum rose out of the very bottom layer of the universe, sudden and absolute.
In that instant, Caelus's body erupted with a radiance no eye could meet head-on.
At first that light was as pure and flawless as the dawn of creation itself — then, in the space of a breath, it flowed, it shifted, it resolved into a gorgeous, dreamlike maiden pink.
Every star in sight was steeped in a hazy, uncanny brilliance.
"What did he just do?!"
The little Herta dumpling shot straight up into the air.
As a developer of the Simulated Universe, she had not only the same ordinary viewpoint as any participating Tester, but the developer's view of the universe's raw data.
"Severe anomalous fluctuation in the Simulated Universe's underlying architecture!"
"Source Lock-On... it's that patch of unknown code buried deep in the primordial data core, the one we've never been able to run Analysis on! It's been activated! And it's trying to break past the dimensional limit?!"
The Herta dumpling was startled and delighted and grinding her teeth in helpless frustration all at once, plus a touch of meltdown, yanking away at the little flower on her head:
"Why?! The firewall is running at full power! Why does it not do a single thing against it?! Hold it back for 0.0001 seconds and I'd still call that working!"
"So that patch of unknown code... really is connected to Dear, then?"
The Ruan Mei dumpling hovered quietly to one side, gazing at the violently evolving mass of maiden-pink light that had been Caelus.
It was nothing but an electronic avatar, yet those eyes made of pixel blocks burned now with a fervor she had never shown before.
She hadn't been on-site when the Star Rail crew first tested the Simulated Universe, but the sky-shaking spectacle those two had kicked up inside it was known to every one of the four Genius developers.
Ruan Mei had poured effort into studying that code herself.
Her primary field was life science, but that hardly meant she came second to ordinary people anywhere else.
For a Genius, even an unspecialized field yielded attainments that left common researchers eating dust.
Of course, since even Screwllum's Analysis — running the Difference Machine sphere alongside the Simulated Universe's own computing power — had come up empty, Ruan Mei naturally returned empty-handed too.
And yet the Geniuses, Stephen included, had never abandoned the hunt.
Even without a breakthrough, merely studying the information flow bleeding off its surface had handed them one staggering revelation after another.
Ruan Mei had glimpsed in it the blurred outline of a road toward an entirely new equation of life.
"Conclusion: the essential energy tier displayed by this anomalous code far exceeds the range we can currently analyze or intervene in. Confirmed assessment — its source possesses, at minimum, power on the order of an Aeon's essence."
The Screwllum dumpling observed and processed the ocean of anomalous data at maximum efficiency, his tone grave.
This run of the Simulated Universe test had been richly productive, no question — but the thrill, the danger, and the sheer degree of things spiraling out of control had also blown past everyone's predictions.
The situation was completely out of hand.
With a crowd of Aeons in here, they couldn't even force the Simulated Universe to shut down.
"Incredible!"
The Herta dumpling had all but plastered herself against the purple holographic screens refreshing madly beside her, the waterfall of data lighting up her tiny face, her voice trembling with excitement:
"So that's it... this is absolutely incredible! Are you all seeing this? These data aren't simply invoking Imaginary energy — they're remaking it, rewriting part of the underlying essence of Imaginary energy..."
She spoke faster and faster, an explorer sighting a new continent:
"Wait! This oscillation frequency... why does it look so much like the Honkai energy on that little girl called Seele?"
"No — wrong! The external expression of the energy spectra overlaps by more than ninety-six percent, but the core essence is different. What drives it... comes from another dimension entirely!"
The Herta dumpling waved her stubby little arms in delight:
"Ahh, forget it, who cares! Record it! Record all of it!"
Herta had fallen headlong into pure, self-forgetting research mania.
"This guy... every single time we test the Simulated Universe he hands me a huge surprise."
A thread of heat entered Herta's gaze as she looked at the pink ball of light:
"For the sake of this data... all that abstract nonsense he pulled earlier, I'll be magnanimous and let it slide!"
The words had barely left her when the Herta dumpling froze mid-motion.
And not only her.
The Ruan Mei dumpling, Screwllum, Asta, and the Stellaron spirit all went still where they were, every one of them staring blankly at that gorgeous pink glow flooding the starfield — which was now receding at speed, like a tide going out.
Where the light drained away, a figure hung quietly in space.
"I knew kitting out a full set of maxed six-star gear would feel amazing, but I really didn't expect it to feel THIS amazing."
Long pink hair fell in the finest of waves, and the gorgeous red eyes looked steeped in honey.
A pink-and-white dress embroidered with golden stars — and adjust your viewing angle just slightly and you'd catch panties like a pure white cloud.
Dainty jade feet in pink princess shoes trimmed with little white wings; one leg sheathed in a pure white sock that traced a tender, lovely curve, the other wound in white silk ribbon strung with a small golden bell, like a gift wrapped with great care.
The adorable pink-haired girl's face blazed with excitement, and without a single thought for whether the body's original character concept was being demolished, she vented everything inside her in a roaring laugh.
"Saikou ni haitte yatsu daaa! Hahahahaha!"
Her slender fingers pressed to her temple and twisted, hard, and even when she gouged out blood she kept on cackling — the wound closing again at visible speed.
"Th-that's... who is that?"
Staring dazedly at the beautiful girl the vanishing light had revealed — cute, impish, and yet shot through with a faint beauty of divinity that belonged to nothing mortal — Asta murmured to herself.
"Holy shit—!!"
The Herta dumpling took one glance at the underlying data in the developer interface, and the pixel blocks representing her eyes multiplied like a detonation, nearly overflowing the display area.
"Caelus?"
"Oh, you absolute legend!"
Stelle's eyes snapped on like a pair of searchlights, her face lit with the rapture of someone unearthing a peerless treasure:
"You are an absolute legend, Caelus-cub!"
She rubbed her hands together, flexing her fingers:
"You were hiding a form like this the whole time?!"
Then something struck her, and Stelle stamped her foot, jabbing a finger at that pink-haired, hair-fluttering figure and howling out an indignant accusation:
"Kuso yaaargh! Caelus-cub! You're way too heartless!"
The Stellaron spirit's voice was thick with grievance:
"Why didn't you use THIS look when we were Propagating before?!"
"The hell are you smoking?"
The pink-haired girl's cherry lips parted, and what came out was crude enough to clash violently with that sweet face, without a shred of a pretty girl's reserve.
"How could I waste my trump card on something that boring?"
She snorted a laugh — and then a sly little smile surfaced on that small, exquisite face:
"Though now~ maybe the right line to say is this!"
The girl swept up her pink bangs with one crisp, swaggering flick of her small hand, and her entire presence turned over in a single heartbeat.
One second she was a swaggering thug of a man; the next she might as well have been a different person.
Her eyes went wide, wet, and innocent; her waist bent slightly; her toes lifted off the ground as she leaned forward into a textbook-perfect, impish wink.
"Ta-daa~! Magical Girl Momiji, making her fabulous entrance!☆~"
The soft, sweet-as-mochi voice, the pink hem flaring — the whole of cosmic space lit up on the spot.
That's veteran Masked Fool acting for you: aura swapped in a heartbeat, seamless, kid.
"M-magical girl?"
Herta's brain flatlined.
How did it turn out like this?
"Ahahaha!"
"Look! Look at what Aha has found! Oh! A magical girl — this is far too much fun!"
He wasn't laughing over anything so shallow as Caelus transforming into a magical girl. He was laughing because Aha could feel with perfect clarity the horror lurking beneath that pitiable little exterior — a power ample enough to snuff out the whole cosmos.
Aha cheered, roared with laughter, flailed His arms and legs:
"Decided! From this day forward Aha joins the Church of the Magical Girl! Masked Fool masks? Out of fashion! Aha is swapping every one of them for a sparkling magical girl transformation device!"
He swung an arm, pointing at that pink figure, His declaration ringing across the cosmos:
"Believe in Momiji! Long live magical girls!"
"I'm on board with that."
Caelus-Momiji's eyes lit up. She rubbed her smooth chin, then seemed to remember something and waved a hand, interest draining away:
"Wait, I think I've already got a mask. Never mind, then."
He already had one Magical Ruby.
He didn't need a second magical girl transformation device.
"All right, everyone — five-versus-five team fight, starting now!"
With a hand so soft and pale it looked like a pinch would draw water, Caelus-Momiji lightly lifted the "transformation device" hanging at her waist.
It was a pink heart-shaped item edged in gold and white and studded with glittering starlight — [Momiji Perfume].
Not merely a magical girl's transformation device, but Momiji's equipment from before her Divine Awakening.
"Pink Magic Gravel Heart~! Unlock!"
The girl's clear, sweet voice echoed through the universe.
The deep void heaved like a lake with a boulder dropped into it, and a colossal, blazing heart of pure pink energy — vast beyond imagining — surged into being, spinning and swelling like a supernova!
Uncountable torrents of pink light, tearing space-time as they came, poured in from the far ends of space-time like a hundred million furious galaxies!
Galaxies were ripped open, the orange-red suns of the cosmos were dyed pink, the wall of Preservation was blown apart, and into the hundred million voices of Harmony a very strange sound wormed its way.
"Payment successful thank you boss Momiji here I come! Pulling you right now! Ah! Ah! Ahhhhhhh!!"
"!!!???"
The Herta dumpling's eyes went huge.
You're telling me THIS is a magical girl?
This is straight-up blazing a [Magical Girl] Path!
The power spec on this STARTS at Aeon tier, come on!
What in the actual hell!!!
"..."
The serene, elegant pixel blocks forming the Ruan Mei dumpling's mouth flickered and warped violently, like a signal breaking up — proof enough that this beyond-reason power had shaken her out of her usual composure.
"Logic overload: an energy tier of this order..."
Screwllum, rarely, lost his poise: "It already overturns fundamental physical models... this is difficult to believe..."
"Hahaha! Fun! So much fun!"
Aha was howling with laughter.
Uncountable atoms were granted Elation; stars split their mouths wide in laughter as they fused, spitting out prominences and solar wind, trying to give Magical Girl Momiji a joyful hug!
Caelus-Momiji, smiling brightly, reached under her skirt and pulled out a second weapon — an outrageously cute pink assault rifle that looked like it had been lifted straight out of a fairy tale.
"Tide of Disorder: Clamor Sanctum!"
The trigger came down.
BOOM!
A pink torrent brighter and purer than a stellar flare erupted from the muzzle.
It swallowed the deep base color of the universe in an instant, becoming a boundless barrage of red energy as dense as a blizzard.
Bullet counts on the order of 10^24 and 10^28, spiraling and interlacing into a pink sanctum that covered the universe.
Endless light galloped across the starfield, drowning out the deep black; countless red rounds bloomed like driving snow; pink stars great and small numbered in the septillions and octillions, and the whirl of those Stellaris formed the sanctum.
Stars annihilated. Elated atoms pinned down.
"..."
Herta looked out at cosmic space now dyed one uncanny shade of pink from end to end — even the background radiation had gone pink — and numbly produced a few words:
"This... is a bit too ridiculous, isn't it?"
"So you're having all the fun without me, huh. This grudge, I'm writing down!"
Stelle planted both hands on her hips in Eula's classic pose.
When this was over she was going to squeeze Caelus-cub dry, and she wasn't stopping until he called her Mommy!
"Abaaba."
Everything unfolding in front of her had somewhat exceeded Asta's worldview. A human being was taking the offensive against Aeons — and the key point was that the human was at Aeon tier!
"Holy: Cream Binding."
Caelus-Momiji extended a slender white hand and swept it elegantly across the heart-shaped dial of [Momiji Perfume]; starlight spilled down like a waterfall.
The pink sea of stars churned and heaved up towering waves that blotted out the sky.
Look closer, though — was that seawater?
It was thick, heavy, richly sweet-smelling pink-and-white cream!
The cream came in like a tide and swamped Aha, Preservation, Harmony, and the bot Akivili.
Qlipoth's warhammer, heavy enough to reshape galaxies, was seized and glued fast by several writhing tendrils of cream.
Xipe struck up a pure movement of Harmony, and the hundred million notes had barely poured out of Her before the squirming cream engulfed them and froze them into multicolored candy spheres bobbing in the cream sea.
The cream hardened and blocked off the road of Trailblaze...
Aha, meanwhile, was doing the freestyle in it.
With six six-star emblems and weapons equipped, Magical Momiji's power could beyond any doubt reach Aeon tier — but saying she could just casually hold the other side down and beat them wasn't quite that absurdly true.
Mostly it was that Qlipoth and Xipe hadn't expected Caelus-Momiji to unleash power on this scale — call it underestimating the enemy — plus HooH, lurking in the dark, hadn't made a move.
Aha wasn't going all out either.
So Caelus-Momiji had, seemingly with ease, locked down two Aeons and one bot.
A brief lockdown was all she needed.
In the short window while Preservation and Harmony were shackled, Caelus urged Tayzzyronth and the Swarm to keep Propagating. The Swarm King paid no mind to Caelus's earlier betrayal — even now there was nothing in His head but Propagation.
Propagate!
Propagate!
I'm gonna spawn spawn spawn spawn spawn!
The Swarm King and the whole Swarm Propagated together, and in what was practically a blink they filled the last of the empty space.
The entire universe was packed with the Swarm, so dense there was no counting them.
Caelus-Momiji saw it, and smiled, satisfied.
"Familiar Summoning — Kagura Hikari!"
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