After speaking, Kowloon made a beeline for the Throne Eins. He could still see Sachez running toward the Throne Zwei and was now about to get into the cockpit.
Kowloon still felt that Sachez was worthy of being tormented by him; it would be a shame to just crush him with a surprise Mobile Suit attack.
However, just as Kowloon flew in front of the Throne Eins and opened the cockpit, he felt the hair on his body stand on end. Without a moment's hesitation, he jumped straight down from a height of about ten meters.
It had to be said, Kowloon was more beast than man in every sense of the word. Almost at the instant he jumped, a beam shot directly hit the Gouf's cockpit.
Xia Yulan had fired that shot. She wouldn't hold back now just because her opponent was the Kowloon from another world.
But Kowloon's beastly sixth sense only bought him another second or two of life.
From the others' perspective, the Hermes Zero, wielding a Beam Saber over ten meters long, suddenly appeared from above the forest on Kojima, sweeping horizontally toward the falling Kowloon.
Kowloon certainly didn't have the ability to stop himself in mid-air. Dodging the Blade Angel's beam with that leap was already a superhuman feat.
So, before the falling Kowloon could even hit the ground, he was incinerated by the Hermes Zero's Beam Saber, leaving not even a speck of dust behind. The same slash also lopped off half of the nearby Throne Eins's head and the Gouf's leg. At this point, the Gouf, whose cockpit had been directly hit, hadn't even exploded yet.
One could only say that Reid was well-versed in the principle of dealing with cockroaches: be fast, precise, and ruthless. Because if you don't critically injure it in one go, this kind of insect will scurry into a crack where you can never reach it at an incredible speed, making you feel like it could pop out from any corner at any moment, leaving you in a constant state of anxiety.
Or the cockroach will just fly right at your face, a perfect example of "if I can't kill you, I'll disgust you to death."
Fortunately, Kowloon was definitely dead this time. Reid had watched him get struck by his full-power Beam Saber. Unless the man was made of Nano-Laminate Armor, Reid couldn't think of any reason he would have survived.
Moreover, Kowloon's spiritual fluctuations had vanished. If he wasn't dead after all that, Reid would start to suspect if Kowloon truly had nine lives, capable of resurrecting elsewhere as long as not all of them were extinguished.
However, as Reid carefully scanned the ground, confirming that not even a trace of Kowloon's ashes remained, both Sachez and Nina were a bit dumbfounded.
The Hermes Zero had made its official debut in the Mollaria Republic, so both of them knew it was an SDP Mobile Suit.
But now, both were stunned.
By this time, Sachez had already entered the Throne Zwei and activated it.
Ribbons had already modified the access permissions before Hoshino Ruri's intrusion into Veda. After all, he didn't know when Sachez would be able to seize the Mobile Suit. If Sachez seized it at the critical moment when he was modifying the permissions, Ribbons wouldn't have had the time to deal with him.
Right now, Sachez was debating whether to engage the SDP.
Sachez was a villain, not an idiot. Last time, he was inexplicably captured and interrogated about Kowloon's whereabouts, and now SDP had personally taken action against Kowloon. Kowloon's identity was now obvious.
All the clues connected. Sachez had originally wondered why he had never heard of a high-profile, ruthless character like Kowloon before, and now he had his answer.
If Kowloon was from another world, then everything made sense. The ones who tortured him must have been the SDP.
No wonder they let him go in the end; he had no grudge against the SDP, and he wasn't from another world.
However, it was impossible for Sachez not to hate the SDP. He had endured that interrogation, and afterward, he even needed regenerative surgery to restore his last shred of masculine dignity.
If he could, Sachez wanted to capture that reckless little shorty and subject him to every form of torture he knew.
But Sachez knew very well that he had just boarded an unfamiliar Mobile Suit. If he really fought, he would most likely lose to the SDP's machine.
The reason was simple. The SDP's Mobile Suits were inherently more advanced than Celestial Beings' Gundams, and their pilots weren't like the weaklings from Celestial Beings who could only rely on their machines' superior performance and whose piloting skills were merely passable.
As for Nina, her mind was in chaos. She just wanted to express what kind of place she and her siblings had chosen to hide in. How could one weirdo after another keep showing up, and now even the SDP had appeared?
Fortunately, the scene didn't remain silent for long. Once Reid confirmed Kowloon was dead, he directly grabbed the nearby Throne Eins, which was missing half its head, preparing to take it as a prize.
As for the other two, Sachez still had his mission, and recruiting Nina would surely be a hassle. Besides, Reid didn't like her personality.
So, Reid prepared to ignore the two of them and leave with the Throne Eins.
However, when Sachez saw the SDP's Mobile Suit completely ignoring him, he couldn't help but broadcast on an open channel.
"You, from the SDP! Don't you have anything to say to me? You're just going to leave like that?"
Reid could feel Sachez's indignation, but he couldn't care less about the guy's thoughts. He used the same voice he had used to communicate with Kati Mannequin and broadcasted back.
"My objective has been achieved. You may continue."
After speaking, Reid directly had the Hermes Zero take off, dragging the Throne Eins with it. The Blade Angel vigilantly watched the Throne Zwei and Throne Drei slowly take off, only bursting into speed to catch up with the Hermes Zero after seeing that the two suits made no move to attack.
In truth, Sachez really wanted to fire a shot at the Hermes Zero's back, but in the end, he chickened out.
Thus, Sachez could only vent his frustration on the nearby Throne Drei.
Without any warning, the Throne Zwei's Greatsword swung down directly at the Throne Drei.
Nina's attention was not focused, and by the time she noticed Sachez raising his sword, it was a little too late.
Since the GN Shield on its left shoulder had been destroyed in the previous battle, Nina could only use the shield on its right shoulder to block.
But the Throne Zwei's GN Buster Sword was a weapon made for fighting other Gundams. The Throne Drei's GN Shield didn't buy much time at all.
Although it avoided being cut in two, the Throne Drei's entire right arm was severed, and the Mobile Suit was sent flying by the impact of the GN Buster Sword.
At this point, the Throne Drei had no combat capability left. Sachez only needed to land one more casual blow to end the fight.
Unfortunately for him, although Nina had a terrible personality, she had a good eye for people. The effect of her stealing Setsuna's first kiss now manifested. (Purely for comedic effect, there's no romance between them, but the original work's portrayal absolutely allows for this line of thought.)
Just as Sachez was about to make his move, the GN Assault Container carrying the Exia descended from the sky, ramming into the Throne Zwei and sending it flying. The Exia also leaped out from it, slashing at the Throne Zwei.
In reality, Setsuna had no idea what was going on. Seeing the Throne Zwei attacking the Throne Drei, he simply chose to attack the Throne Zwei, the aggressor.
Meanwhile, Reid, after stowing the Throne Eins in the Hypersonic Transport Plane, returned with the Blade Angel to watch the battle between the Exia and the Throne Zwei.
The reason Reid came back out to watch this time was mainly because after returning to the transport plane, he asked and found out that Hoshino Ruri was still in a stalemate with Ribbons, and was even gaining a huge advantage in the information war.
If Aeolia Schenberg didn't help Celestial Beings activate the Trans-Am System, leading to the Exia being shot down here, Reid would be in for a big laugh. So, he had to watch.
It couldn't be helped. Reid was piloting the Hermes Zero and hadn't brought Nein with him, leaving her on the Gran Chaos.
Hoshino Ruri was originally just trying to hack into Veda as per Reid's orders, but the current Veda was even weaker than Reid had imagined.
So, after breaching the fourth-level security, Hoshino Ruri, seeing the light of victory, decisively called in Nein for support.
Although Nein herself had no hacking functions, she was a strong Artificial Intelligence, and the black-box technology that made up her core was completely inexplicable.
It was impossible for Veda's capabilities to counter-hack into Nein's database; at most, it could drive her out.
This was like a hard rock falling into a small stream. The current could wash the rock away, but a normal stream's flow couldn't possibly shatter the rock in an instant.
So, Hoshino Ruri directly let Nein enter Veda through the data pathway she had opened.
Then she had Nein create a data-body avatar to frantically download information within the already-acquired access levels.
With such a large foreign object entering, Veda naturally had to try and expel Nein, but where would it find the extra processing power now?
This was where Veda's weakness as a non-strong Artificial Intelligence was exposed: it didn't know how to be flexible.
Right now, between the two intruding data streams (Hoshino Ruri's offensive data and the data-body avatar created by Nein), it judged Nein's data-body avatar to be more powerful. So, it diverted a large portion of the processing power that was resisting Hoshino Ruri's intrusion to expel Nein.
However, Nein was just downloading data; the actual threat she posed to the system was not as great as Hoshino Ruri's.
Once Veda's resistance processing power decreased, Hoshino Ruri naturally broke through the next firewall with ease, obtaining fifth-level access and beginning to confront Ribbons, who had sixth-level access.
Ribbons had truly put himself in an awkward position. Now, he couldn't even withdraw from this cyber battle, roll back all the previous permissions, and let Veda use all its processing power to resist the enemy's attack.
Because Ribbons knew that the moment he retreated, Veda's sixth-level security would be instantly breached, and Veda's capture would become almost inevitable.
However, the processing power Ribbons could command at this moment, combined with what was left after Veda went to deal with Nein, was only barely enough to contend with the processing power Hoshino Ruri was deploying, but their skills were worlds apart. As people who could both project their consciousness into a computer for combat, Ribbons could only be suppressed by Hoshino Ruri.
After all, there are wrongly given names, but never wrongly earned nicknames. Hoshino Ruri hadn't earned the title "Electronic Fairy" by just boasting.
Ribbons had never felt so panicked. He even regretted getting involved with Kowloon and helping him hide out of a fit of pique.
This Reid guy was clearly the type to hold a grudge. Why did he have to provoke him at a time like this!
Meanwhile, outside, Setsuna, who was fighting the Throne Zwei, was also being pushed back step by step.
It could only be said that Setsuna at this point in time was truly no match for Sachez, even though he had improved a lot compared to the original story. But that only allowed him to last a few more rounds. Facing the Throne Zwei, which Sachez was piloting for the first time and which had less than thirty percent of its GN-T Drive's particle reserves, he still had his weapons knocked away one after another.
It was a good thing the Exia had so many different swords, or he would have been defeated long ago.
But at this moment, Setsuna and Ribbons were in the same boat, both struggling on their last legs.
Fortunately, Ribbons was defeated a little faster. Hoshino Ruri, relying on her own powerful computational abilities, managed to crack the sixth-level firewall where Ribbons was located, gaining the same level of access as him.
However, when Hoshino Ruri went to attack the seventh-level firewall, Veda seemed to trigger some hidden mechanism, and the entire computer shut down instantly.
Yes, Veda just shut down. With this move, it directly cut off Hoshino Ruri's intrusion, and even Nein's data-body avatar naturally dissipated due to its connection with its main body being severed.
The next second, Veda rebooted. However, all its port information had changed, making it impossible to connect through the Gundam Nadleeh Trial System's line.
At the same time, inside Veda's main computer and in all Mobile Suits with Original GN Drives, a recording of Aeolia Schenberg appeared and began to play.
"Veda's final security level has been breached by an external force, which proves one thing: the world I had hoped for has not come to pass.
"Humanity remains foolish and warlike, attempting to seize everything from Celestial Beings and lead the world to ruin.
"However, I still believe in humanity, and I wish to entrust my power to them.
"Because the world, and humanity, must change."
As the recording finished, the Trans-Am System in the activated Original Furnace Gundams automatically engaged.
When Reid saw the Exia suddenly go three-reds, he knew that the world was still proceeding along its original course. He then went to ask Hoshino Ruri what had happened on her end.
He received the rather comical answer that Veda had solved the intrusion by unplugging the network cable and shutting down.
Indeed, high-end cyber warfare only requires the most primitive of responses: unplug the network cable and shut down. It can counter any electronic intrusion that doesn't involve mystical abilities.
Reid could guess what would happen next. Could Veda be shut down so casually? It must have triggered a final firewall mechanism that forced a shutdown.
After all, in the original story, Ribbons bypassed the firewalls using his existing permissions to tamper with higher-level access, unlike Hoshino Ruri's brute-force intrusion.
But the result was the same. One of the conditions for Aeolia Schenberg to help unlock the black box for the Original Furnaces, activating the Trans-Am System and hidden technologies, was that Veda was no longer reliable.
The destruction of his hibernating main body and a brute-force intrusion into the system's final security level could both be attributed to Veda having a problem. (Because only those with seventh-level access could see the main body, destroying the main body proved that the one in control of the seventh level had betrayed him, meaning Veda was now controlled by a traitor.)
That was why the World Change Fluctuation Value hadn't changed when Hoshino Ruri was hacking Veda.
Reid had originally thought there was no change because if he had truly taken control of Veda, he would have definitely helped Celestial Beings unlock the black box data for the Original GN Drives.
And as long as he didn't go crazy and destroy Veda, after he left this world, Veda would surely be taken back by Ribbons, and nothing would have changed.
Although he ultimately failed to capture Veda, it was not without its gains for Reid. According to Nein, she had downloaded a considerable amount of data before being kicked out, including Veda's construction blueprints.
It couldn't be helped. No one could guarantee that Veda wouldn't suffer hardware failures over two hundred years. To allow future generations to repair Veda's hardware, these construction blueprints certainly couldn't be placed in the seventh security level, or even in a particularly high one. Otherwise, if the hardware broke, the Celestial Beings organization wouldn't even know how to fix it.
So, Nein had managed to snag the blueprints this time. Reid could build a Veda in the CE Universe when he got back.
Although quantum computers were standard in the CE Universe, one as large as Veda was still extremely rare.
Moreover, Reid could combine the technologies of the two universes later on, making it ship-mounted. The next time he came to the AD Universe, he wouldn't have to worry about Ribbons, who would have complete control of Veda, engaging him in electronic warfare.
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