"Shesha."
"Do you wish to avenge your master?"
"Or perhaps, you merely crave the power that can return you to your peak, or even allow you to advance further?"
Above the sea.
A chaotic vortex silently opened, and the figure of the Black Knight slowly solidified from within.
Lu Xing's voice resounded in Shesha's mind.
Ever since seeing Mobius, the little snake on his shoulder had become extremely restless—the desire for the Key of God in its vertical pupils even surpassed its fear of Lu Xing.
Fortunately.
The current Shesha was truly just a harmless little snake.
A palm-sized gravity field, pressed down lightly, directly extinguished its impulse.
"Hiss!"
Shesha didn't really want to answer this question, so it flicked its slender tongue "innocently," and then—
"Shesha, are you lu—"
"Power!"
"I need power!"
Shesha had already developed a stress response to the word "lucid." Before Lu Xing could finish speaking, it completely changed its previous attitude and became extremely cooperative.
"Is that so..."
"And then what?"
"?"
Shesha couldn't quite grasp Lu Xing's meaning.
"After obtaining power, what then?"
"You are a Judgement-class, but only a Judgement-class."
"You were eliminated by humans at your strongest. Even if you return to your peak, it will merely be a repeat of the cycle."
"You cannot suppress your destructive impulses. After obtaining power, you will sooner or later attack humans."
"And humans."
"Will absolutely not allow a Judgement-class to wreak havoc under their noses."
"This was true even before the Fusion Soldiers appeared."
"After humans gained even greater power... I have personally witnessed the birth of the Seventh Herrscher, and I have shivered in the crevice between humans and Herrschers locked in mortal combat."
Flames slowly ignited on the ring.
As a Herrscher's companion beast, Shesha could vaguely perceive the portion of power within it that also belonged to a Herrscher.
"Do you think."
"Even the Herrscher of Flame, who far surpassed your late master, could be eliminated by humans. With your abilities, can you truly survive in this world?"
"..."
Shesha fell silent.
Lu Xing was right. Even if it recovered all its power, it would only make itself a little harder to kill—to eliminate or capture it, humans would undoubtedly dispatch even stronger forces to subjugate it.
"Hiss!"
Its slender tongue flicked in and out, an unconscious action reflecting Shesha's agitation.
"What do you want me to do?"
After a long while, Shesha's emotions finally, gradually, calmed down.
"Very good."
"I am very pleased that you can understand these things."
The ring disassembled and reconfigured.
Four pairs of asymmetrical, dark gold wings were slowly unfurling behind Lu Xing.
"Your subordinates have long since fallen apart."
"Now, become a member of the Legion!"
"When the time comes, I will pave the way for you to return to your peak."
"..."
"Under your command?"
"Correct."
"You said just now that I am no match for humans... Through the previous battle, although not entirely clear, I can already make a judgment—"
"Your strength..."
"Is probably not yet at the Judgement-class."
"Correct."
Lu Xing affirmed Shesha's statement.
"However!"
"By the time you return to Judgement-class, my strength... will likely have already surpassed your imagination."
"..."
The hierarchy among Honkai Beasts was inviolable, not to mention the vast difference between lower and upper tiers.
But this one was different—though it appeared to be merely Temple-class, its strength was already equivalent to the more powerful among Emperor-class beasts.
If it truly possessed the means to advance.
It wouldn't even need to reach a higher tier; just advancing to Honkai Emperor would probably grant it the power to contend with a Judgement-class.
On top of that.
If it advanced further...
"How can I trust you?"
"You don't need to trust me."
To Shesha's final question, Lu Xing didn't bother looking for a reason—
"Because, truth is grasped in my hands."
Between Lu Xing's clenched fists, a massive knight lance silently appeared.
"Isn't it?"
"..."
"Correct, my master."
————
"What now?"
"Assemble the Legion."
The location Lu Xing had teleported to was not his intended coordinates—he still needed more practice with the ability of ultra-long-range "door opening" to become more proficient.
Therefore, Lu Xing had to fly a "short" distance.
"Below?"
"If my perception is correct, it should be here."
"Then I think..."
"You'll probably have to spend some time dealing with the 'trouble' below first."
Compared to the first teleportation back to the surface.
This time, Lu Xing's "door opening" was positioned using an "anchor point" in the mental world—the number of remaining Legion members wasn't too many or too few. Lu Xing didn't scrutinize too closely and directly locked onto the nearest one to begin teleportation.
Then.
He was teleported above a boundless ocean.
And then.
He sensed the presence of this large Honkai Beast... this fellow was an acquaintance of Lu Xing's, though it itself wasn't a Legion member, merely marked by the Emperor—now, this mark had been "inherited" by Lu Xing, unchanged.
Correct.
The first one Lu Xing encountered was none other than the meritorious contributor who had once assisted the Quillspike-class in ambushing and sinking the Columbia-class strategic nuclear submarine:
[Variant · Tide-class]
However.
The slightly problematic part was that Big Crab was currently being besieged by a fleet.
Five destroyers with wave-piercing hulls were speeding across the sea surface, massive plumes of water constantly erupting around them—
"Pff!!"
This was not a deep-water area.
The destroyers' anti-submarine weapons, whether torpedoes or depth charges, could very effectively strike underwater targets.
Normally.
Aquatic Honkai Beasts, especially Tide-class beasts with their powerful defenses, would absolutely not be forced to flee helter-skelter by these things—they only needed to surface to sink all the destroyers, one by one, with their crab pincers.
The problem was.
Less than ten nautical miles from here.
The main force of Shenzhou's "Xuanwu" fleet, dispatched to support the "1st Fleet" and responsible for monitoring the region from the South Indian Ocean to the Western Pacific, had already sealed off all of the Tide-class's possible escape routes.
While these "Jimeng"-class ocean-going destroyers launched their attacks.
Two "Xuanming"-class battlecruisers in the distance had already locked their superconducting electromagnetic main cannons onto this sea area—Shenzhou's electromagnetic weapon technology, far surpassing North America's, gave these main cannons more than double the accuracy and power of the "Georgia"-class.
Even for a Tide-class...
It might survive one hit, but more than five shots would absolutely leave it heavily injured and near death—this was experience Big Crab had paid for with its life.
And what truly made the Tide-class despair were not these large ship-borne electromagnetic cannons.
Three thousand meters above the sea surface.
The Taixu-class Skyship No. 2, "Taiqing," had already aimed its main cannon, "Sundial," directly at the Tide-class's location.
A brilliance brighter than the warm sun grew increasingly dazzling—
"OOMMM!!!"