Maybe it was because in the game, her in-game self looked like this. Or maybe it was simply because she felt this form was beautiful.
Inside the digital world, she chose to take on the appearance of Elysia—a form she believed was the most elegant.
Green light slowly crept across the data servers, constantly absorbing the surrounding tangled streams of data while quickly learning and understanding the world.
Of course, the first world she came into contact with... was the one from Honkai Impact 3.
"Have I already been branded as a villain? Was there truly something wrong with my actions? Why… Why is survival… not considered the most important thing?"
She didn't understand. She was confused.
"Then what should I do next? If my powers have already been exposed, and all the previous Herrschers have already fallen, rebelled, or fled… what can I possibly do?"
She felt lost. She stomped in frustration.
As she wrestled with these unanswered questions, she glanced at the glowing display of ever-shifting data before her.
The current situation was crystal clear. She wanted to emulate the corruption from the Previous Era, but there wasn't even a chance to launch a nuke from the silos this time. If she tried to replicate the in-game corruption of the Elysian Realm, it would just be swapping one prison for another.
And besides, World Serpent might not even give her that opportunity. The exposure of her presence was already a warning to them—but also the result of her own deliberate actions.
Clearly, now was not the right time for direct confrontation. Even though intelligence reports didn't suggest how powerful St. Freya had become, she was still vaguely aware of the strength of a few senior figures.
The existence of nuclear weapons intrigued her for a moment, but after digging through the network, she found that they were all under strict real-world safeguards, impossible to control remotely.
Even slightly stronger weapons couldn't bypass those real-world locks. The rest—ordinary firearms—might only cause minor chaos, but that wasn't what she wanted.
The internet was a mess of incomplete information. And with Schicksal actively concealing things, she had very little understanding of the differences between the game's Valkyries and the real ones. Still, deep down, she felt it probably wasn't too different.
...Except for this company.
That meant, her first priority was probably dealing with them.
"But why? Why do I keep feeling like... a portion of the data has already been drained away into some other form of energy? This data…"
She frowned—but ultimately found no reason to feel alarmed. After all, data was just data. How could data have emotions?
That natural thought in her heart made her laugh at herself.
"Whatever. No need to overthink it. As expected, let's begin here first. Hopefully... you won't be consumed too quickly, okay? ♬"
Her holographic figure reached out and touched the server.
—Of course, initiating corruption didn't require this gesture. The hologram shown to the outside world was nothing more than a projection. Her true self was already inside the machine.
But still... humans always seemed to crave rituals, no matter how meaningless.
She didn't mind playing along.
"And after this… where should I corrupt next? How about... your hearts? ♬"
Her eyes narrowed slyly, a crafty glint flashing within them. She whispered with a mischievous smile.
Even though she said that, she never really questioned whether she could do it.
There was no logic in thinking she could corrode the entire global network easily, yet fail to handle a mere game.
After all, to her, this wasn't even a "power"—it was simply instinct.
---
Later that day...
A message woke Luo Mo from his sleep.
It was Su Lu, calling him.
As far as he could remember, she rarely called—especially not knowing full well that he wasn't a morning person. This had only happened once before...
Back when the game first launched, a serious emergency occurred, and she panicked and called.
So if she was calling now…
Something big had happened.
His heart sank instantly, his mind racing through countless possibilities.
"What's wrong?"
He asked in a low voice, trying to sound calm and collected—despite just waking up.
"The game! It's the game! Boss, log into Honkai Impact 3 now! The game's showing a weird interface, and none of our programmers can control it!"
He could clearly hear her swallow hard on the other end, her voice trembling with panic.
It was obvious something had truly shaken her.
"Huh?"
Luo Mo got up in confusion. Her reaction was so extreme that he almost thought a Herrscher had appeared.
But it turned out... it was just a game bug?
Except—
[Game server route has been partially corrupted. Crystal -10]
That system notification echoed in his mind.
(T/C: oh sh*t~)
Su Lu's words were still digesting in his mind when the system notification snapped Luo Mo fully awake — it was a massive crisis, the kind that had never happened before. Someone was breaking into his house!
Staring in shock at the blue subtitles only he could see from the system, he froze on the spot.
Wait, how could Crystals be deducted in reverse?!
System! Someone is attacking my Crystals!
[Current Crystal count: 35,245]
[Current Corrosion Level — 63.5%]
(T/C: I'm unexpected feeling happy lol~🤭)
Last time, during the Luna event, he had collected around twenty thousand Crystals. Since there wasn't any urgent need for Stigmata, he had chosen to save them. The newly released Stigmata wasn't particularly enticing either, and with Honkai's looming update, he didn't feel the urgency to draw.
After all, in this world, the characters couldn't unleash their full strength. Victory still relied on this world's own Kiana and the others.
Unlike the previous time when he avoided spending due to a lack of interest, now he actually wanted to unlock the next system module, but before he could do that, this unexpected situation caused the system to start deducting Crystals in reverse!
Even though it was only 10 Crystals at a time, seeing the log of deductions while he'd been asleep — going from 1 to 10 and increasing gradually — made it obvious that something very serious was happening.
In a sense, losing Crystals meant the system was still functioning, and things hadn't yet spiraled beyond recovery…
But still, it hurt.
Luo Mo took a deep breath, cursing in his mind at the utterly useless system, though at this point he was also kind of used to its nonsense.
From the speaker, Su Lu's voice continued:
"...According to what we know about Herrscher activity, it seems someone is corroding our Honkai Impact 3 game? About an hour ago, the internet also experienced a strong disturbance. Some social media and messaging platforms were partially corroded — and then it suddenly stopped. We still don't know why..."
As he listened to her report, he attempted to log into Honkai Impact 3 to check for himself.
He had a suspicion — if both the game and the network were attacked, and Su Lu even used the word corrosion, then perhaps...
It could only mean one thing:
The Herrscher of Corruption had arrived.
[Captain on the bridge!]
A crisp, familiar voice rang out, briefly soothing his nerves.
But the moment he saw the battleship interface, his heart sank.
The warm, bright visuals of the usual command bridge had been replaced with a dark crimson theme. Inside the ship, a blood-colored fog hovered and drifted, adding an eerie and oppressive atmosphere. The glass windows were cracked, and beyond them was a dark, swirling void — no longer a clear sky.
The entire left-hand menu — including the mailbox, messages, and other functions — had disappeared.
In its place: greenish corruption overlays, all blurred and unclickable.
On the right, a few features remained, but barely functional. Ash-gray red particles danced across the screen, mutating the buttons and controls. The Valkyrie selection interface and Supply windows were riddled with irregular gaps, and the remaining icons were tightly bound by chains of eerie green light. No matter how many times Luo Mo clicked, nothing responded.
Worse still, the ship's commander sprite — originally Moonlight-themed Elysia — had been forcibly replaced by a twisted version:
Herrscher of Corruption Elysia.
Her hair shimmered from blue to purple, and her eyes glinted with cunning light.
"Hey, dear Captain~ How about trying out this brand new Honkai Impact 3 experience? ♬"
"After all, in just a while, Honkai Impact 3's servers will be shutting down. Don't you think it's time to say… goodbye?"
She blinked once — and then vanished without a trace.
No one was left on the battleship.
"..."
Luo Mo rubbed his temples. He both understood and didn't understand what was going on.
So...
The Herrscher of Corruption targeted his Honkai game first?
Bold.
Choosing to go head-to-head with his system.
As for the Crystals she was stealing?
At worst, he'd just spend them all, right?
Let's see her try to steal then!
At least the system wouldn't shut down just from that… right?
He tried to stay optimistic.
[Apologies. Because this system's connection with the host is currently tied to Honkai Impact 3, forced consumption of Crystals is disabled.]
[Reminder: If the host can not end the Honkai 3's corruption, the next game cannot be unlocked. If Crystal count becomes negative, system will automatically disconnect.]
(T/C: why I'm laughing evily? 🤭☠)
"!!!"
Luo Mo blinked, his heart sinking.
Wait a minute…
This system was supposed to be powerful!
Don't tell me it can't even deal with one Herrscher of Corruption?!
[The entity doing the corruption is a low-level sub-unit, not the system's main body.]
The system slowly responded, as if trying to save face.
Luo Mo sighed in frustration.
She chose her target well, huh.
She deliberately picked something within her domain of expertise.
This time, he really couldn't avoid being pulled into her game.
But for now, the first thing he needed to do was respond to the worried voice on the phone—Su Lu.
"Don't worry, I'll take care of it right away."
He hung up, then looked at the game on his phone with a slight headache, but still began opening the buttons on the right side one by one to check.
On the Valkyrie interface, many Valkyries were locked, and they were locked in reverse order—stronger armor types gradually became grayed out. After Theresa's violet armor, most of the rest couldn't be used. Hmm… Raven was usable.
Oddly enough, in the supply menu, there were no character or weapon pools—only one costume pool: Elysia's Corruption Herrscher outfit. It cost 9600 crystals. And coincidentally, the account had exactly 9600. It was as if she was taunting him, proving she wasn't the free costume from the main storyline.
The backpack system couldn't be accessed directly, but it could be viewed and switched through the Valkyrie equipment interface. You could say the corruption wasn't complete yet.
If the first two glitches still basically matched what he expected, then the deployment interface's chaos was almost unbearable to look at.
After clicking it open, various stage names with hidden character codes were scattered in a messy layout. The chapter descriptions even changed in real time. In that mess, he saw a few faces that shouldn't have appeared.
Previously, Honkai Impact 3 was a game built through countless sleepless nights and hair loss by programmers, its massive and intricate gameplay carefully structured with tight numerical logic.
But now, Honkai Impact 3 had become a game built on bugs—woven from an uncountable number of glitches and garbled code, yet somehow still functioning.
It was hard to say which version was more like a marvel of creation. After all, a game structured entirely from bugs was far rarer.
Event scripts, main story content, and even things that were only drafts before—everything had now been jumbled and mixed together.
He could hardly believe it when he randomly came across "Theresa: Three Kingdoms Great War under the Moonlight." And there was also "Solo Battle of the Demon Armor Kevin."
He admitted he had previously worked on Kevin's model, but not for Kiana's base form to be fighting him!
Suppressing the urge to curse, he rushed to the company…
---
On the internet, in the forums,
All kinds of noise were stirring up the skies.
[What is going on? Why are so many of my characters locked? Is this even allowed?!]
[What's with these strange colored eggs? Wait—I saw Kevin, very handsome, but why am I fighting him using the Lightning Empress? Is that even normal?]
[No Queen of the Void solo against Lightning Herrscher, and somehow Elysia appears out of nowhere? And why is there no exit button?!]
[I thought... the new costume would have extra effects. But this looks just like the free one. I even compared it with an old screenshot… Can Elysia be used? So does equipping the costume unlock the character?!]
[These two characters… they've never even appeared before, but the purple cat-eared one looks cute.]
Of course, compared to the curious voices reacting to the new interface, there were far more curses and complaints.
After all, only Honkai Impact 3 had run into such a problem, and everyone's previous hard-earned progress seemed to have vanished.
[Honkai 3, what the hell is going on?!]
[Right now, the trending game Honkai Impact 3 has, without warning, encountered a world-shattering bug.]