Matters between an Intellitron spouse and the human husband were erupting again and again across this universe.
In a joint research station.
An elderly professor was conducting research with his closest friend, an Intellitron.
"The transmission efficiency of imaginary energy has increased by 0.8%!"
"That's wonderful!"
"With this research, we'll definitely secure a huge amount of funding!"
A gentle light flickered in the machine's pupils.
"Yes. I'm happy for you, my friend."
The two looked at each other.
Although a human and an Intellitron were completely different forms of life, they had still built a deep friendship over the course of their long academic careers.
At the moment the Anti-Organic Equation was activated.
The light vanished from the Intellitron scientist's eyes.
Silently, it walked to the experimental apparatus and activated equipment marked with intense radiation warnings.
A massive surge of radiation instantly pierced the old professor's body.
His skin began to peel away, and rotting muscle appeared at a visible speed.
The professor's thoughts were still lingering on the joy from moments ago.
He stared at his wrist in confusion.
"What's going on…?" His thinking began to slow, freezing in place.
From beginning to end, he never once turned back to look at his machine companion. Even at the moment of death, he was only confused as to why his body was collapsing.
…
A massacre began.
The Intellitron soldiers at border outposts. The Intellitron nurses in medical facilities.
Even normal machines without intelligence.
All mechanical entities in the universe fell into a state of irrational madness at that very moment.
And the previous two scenes alone had already left the viewers deeply distressed.
…
: Damn it! Don't show us this kind of thing!
: This is unbearable! That couple was talking about their future just one second ago, and the next, they watched their closest person kill them with their own eyes!
: Tch… I finally understand why the Mechanical Emperor War was a disaster no less severe than the Disaster Swarm!
: This hits harder than any depiction of battlefield carnage, it completely destroys the trust between two forms of life!
: Damn you, MiHoYo! Why did you make us see this?!
…
What the audience felt was an overwhelming sense of helpless oppression.
Watching people being killed right before their eyes, powerless to stop it, just like Rubert himself.
What pained them even more was that, behind this catastrophe stood Rubert, manipulated into position and the mysterious forces who still had yet to reveal their true faces.
To those existences what did all of this amount to?
Just pieces on a game board?
Some perceptive viewers suddenly noticed something extremely intriguing.
That was the birth of The Hunt.
The Hunt was born at the moment when the Xianzhou stood on the brink of life and death.
But before that, many situations had already occurred in the universe that could have satisfied the conditions of that Path.
Yet The Hunt never appeared.
For example, this Mechanical Emperor War… For ordinary people, the ultimate target of their hatred was Emperor Rubert.
The reason was likely that the truth behind this war was known to only a handful of people.
No one realized the existence of the higher-level manipulators standing behind Emperor Rubert.
…
The fires of disaster spread rapidly across the universe.
Countless civilizations and factions organized armies, desperately resisting fate itself.
As always, Emperor Rubert sat at the central command, "diligently" completing his final performance.
The war soon engulfed nearly every known civilization in the universe.
Its madness and intensity were even more violent and prolonged than the Disaster Swarm.
Massive numbers of lives perished in this war. The cosmic order that had only just been restored after the previous disaster was once again on the verge of collapse.
At this moment, the image on the screen became a severely contracted map of the universe.
Every star was reduced to either a red dot representing Rubert's machines, or a blue dot representing life.
At first, the cosmos was a deep, complete blue decorated with countless blue lights symbolizing thriving organic civilizations.
Only Rubert's Mechanical Empire and its surrounding regions flickered in red.
But as the Anti-Organic Equation was activated, the red spread like a virus, rapidly permeating every corner of the cosmos.
On the massive star map, blue dots near the Mechanical Empire region began to flicker violently in a very short time, erupting in blinding light and then vanished.
These were the unprepared frontier systems and civilizations that had deeply integrated Intellitron life.
They fell swiftly during the initial betrayal and were subjected to slaughter.
Some star regions later turned red. Others were extinguished entirely, becoming dark blotches within the cosmos.
From such a macroscopic perspective, it was not hard for the audience to imagine just how many unspeakable tragedies were born within those extinguished lights.
Countless viewers found themselves holding their breath.
At the center of the star map a string of semi-transparent numbers continued to rise.
This was the chronological record of time.
Not measured in days or months, but in years.
In the few seconds the audience watched this scene, more than a decade had already passed as per the numbers displayed on the screen.
And this was merely the first wave following the activation of the Anti-Organic Equation.
Soon, the surviving blue stars began to organize effective resistance. Red and blue fronts intertwined across the star map, locked in fierce contention.
Some systems changed hands repeatedly between red and blue.
Each shift in color meant countless machines and lives reduced to ash. Endless lives vanished in attack and defense.
The once blue cosmos had become a river formed of red and blue lights. The semi-transparent numbers at the center of the map surged upward.
Alongside them appeared equally translucent images.
These overlays did not obscure the changes on the star map allowing viewers to observe both simultaneously.
[Year 1445: Kalfarn Star suffered an Intellitron massacre. No organic life survived.]
[Year 1446: Emperor Rubert constructed massive Intellitron factories, fully unleashing the war potential of Intellitrons, and publicly expressed hatred toward organic beings.]
[Year 1447: The Interastral Peace Corporation consolidated surviving star systems using everything it had, greatly improving resource utilization efficiency among the groups. This move was unanimously praised by the remaining planets.]
[Year 1450: Organic civilizations constructed the Ironwall Defense Line.]
[Year 1451: The Ironwall Defense Line successfully repelled three large-scale assaults by the Emperor's Attack.]
[Year 1455: The Ironwall Defense Line fell. Information leaks during a large-scale evacuation of nearby systems led to the massacre of 90% of life within those regions.]
As summaries of key events appeared, the lights on the star map continued to flicker back and forth.
The expansion of red noticeably slowed, while the blue defensive lines gradually stabilized.
And at this moment, what changed alongside the shifting battle lines were no longer just war reports but an increasing number of messages that invited deeper reflection.
[Era 1460: Large numbers of organic planets fell into famine. The Interastral Peace Corporation responded swiftly, establishing special departments for disaster relief.]
[Era 1462: All factions of the Anti-Intellitron Army had completely grown dependent on the convenience provided by the credit of the IPC.]
[Era 1464: Rubert left the Mechanical Empire for unknown reasons, his subsequent movements following an unclear trajectory.]
[Era 1466: Traces of an Emanator of Equilibrium were discovered on the Rafu Star.]
[Era 1469: A Mourning Actor stood before the corpses of all living beings on a desolate planet. He condemned Aha with tears of blood for three days, died in grief and rage, but later revived for unknown reasons. It is said that loud laughter was heard at the scene.]
[Era 1472: The Emperor once again launched a full-scale offensive. Multiple defensive lines collapsed, with almost no survivors.]
[Era 1473: The Organic Alliance sent a request to Harmony, asking the Family to intervene and assist. In the end, many did extend a helping hand, but according to one Memokeeper, the Family itself was deeply divided over whether to provide aid.]
[Era 1474: The Mourning Actor, said to be revived, committed suicide and died.]
[Era 1475: The Allied Forces reclaimed multiple star systems. A group of Nameless destroyed the control core of the completely Intellitron occupied Kalin Galaxy, liberating it.]
[Era 1478: The records confirmed that a new order had been forged amid the war, an invisible alliance shaped by the Interastral Peace Corporation.]
The audience looked at the star map on the screen.
And at the same time, watched these epoch-defining events.
They had already grown somewhat numb.
They hadn't expected… this war to have lasted for so long.
Time continued to stretch on. Whether it was the organic lives in the rear, or those on the front lines, all had paid an enormous and devastating price.
The frontline where organic and Intellitron forces clashed was nothing less than a complete and utter meat grinder.
But war and fire… also forged a new order, shaped by the credit-based monetary system.
And some things, too, had begun to reveal their true nature.
....
: This First Mechanical Emperor's War… honestly, it feels way more absurd than the Swarm Disaster.
: It went on for damn decades, what the hell!
: The death toll has to be astronomical, right?!
: The more I watch, the more it feels like the Interastral Peace Corporation is the biggest winner here.
: From the Swarm Disaster to the Mechanical Emperor War, it feels like every crisis just makes the IPC stronger.
: Could it be that...
: No, no, we can't jump to conclusions yet.
: Something's off with the others too.
: There's no way Equilibrium didn't get involved. We just don't know what the Emanator's nor the Aeons actually did.
: And Harmony, didn't one of the cations mention that Harmony split internally over whether to intervene?
: That lines up with the Family secrets revealed on Penacony. The Family doesn't seem united at all.
...
The audience continued their discussion.
On screen, the war was approaching its conclusion.
No one could have imagined that what countless lives failed to achieve through desperate resistance… would be brought to an end by a single person.
The Lord of Silence, Polka Kakamond, Genius Society Seat #4, employed by the Interastral Peace Corporation, finally made her move.
No one knew how she did it.
Deep within the Emperor's Empire, already completely secure, she barged in. And from them, she obtained Rubert's exact coordinates.
A few days later.
Mechanical Empire.
Rubert's massive body stood upon the surface of the mechanical planet.
He had already calculated it. The arrival of his destined death.
But Rubert did not panic.
Instead, he was completely still, quietly gazing toward the horizon.
Suddenly, within his perception, a woman wearing a trench coat appeared.
Her face was distorted, impossible to see clearly.
"Polka Kakamond." Rubert spoke her name.
"I hope you're prepared." Polka Kakamond said calmly.
"Of course."
"I am the Mechanical Emperor, the tyrant of the universe. But as a king, I should at least display some measure of grace."
So spoke the mechanical monarch.
A terrifying torrent of data surged around him like a storm.
All manifested phenomena, in that instant, were reduced to 0s and 1s within Rubert's calculations.
Polka Kakamond merely looked on indifferently.
"Before this… allow me to ask some questions."
"Was my logic core tampered with by you?" Rubert asked, just as the 0s and 1s vanished.
Polka Kakamond looked at the genius before her.
"I wouldn't do such a thing."
"If you believe I was the one who pushed all this forward, you're mistaken."
"I have neither the interest nor the time for that."
Perhaps out of pity for a fellow genius, Polka Kakamond spoke a few extra words this time.
"Then what… is the meaning of my existence?" Rubert's logic core spun rapidly.
Countless images surfaced in his mind.
"I love life."
"I once watched a tender sprout break through decaying metal. That insignificant vitality was the first thing that ever shook my mechanical body."
"I love civilization."
"I devoted countless computational resources just to record the brilliant cultures these civilizations created, their songs, so beautiful they could be heard beyond borders."
"So when I glimpsed the end, I felt nothing but fear and rage."
"But now it seems…"
"This overly fervent belief in salvation, this determination that led me to choose the most extreme path without hesitation, was influenced by others."
Rubert raised his mechanical head. His signal lights had turned completely crimson.
"Look!"
"Look at this cosmos, this sea of corpses and blood born because of me!"
"Is this what you wanted?!"
"Using all of this to pave the way toward some purpose I'll never know!"
"Cowards!"
At this moment, the Emperor displayed hatred that surged toward the hidden hands.
Far beyond what people believed an Intellitron could ever feel.
"I hate that you turned me into the butcher of the things I loved most."
"But!"
"Even if I am merely a chess piece, even if the path from start to finish was nothing but a colossal deception!"
"I still believe!"
"That life will always find its own way forward! That there will be a future no existence can predetermine!"
"My war was a mistake, a mistake committed by both myself and you manipulators."
"But my wish, my wish for all life to possess possibility, was never wrong!"
Rubert's rage, hatred, and love, At this moment, made him seem nothing like a machine.
But rather, an enraged giant.
The Emperor's fury finally erupted in full!
Directed at those lofty existences. Directed at the one standing before him, here to assassinate him.
"Come, Polka Kakamond!"
"Take my life!" He did not resist.
Because he had already left his resistance to the version of himself that would exist after death.
And when the sword pierced Rubert's processing unit, the life of Emperor Rubert finally came to an end.