While they spoke, neither woman's expression wavered.
Behind Tatsuki, Cocolia's finger tightened on the trigger.
"Zzt—!"
A crackling, lightning-like round spat from the EM pistol toward Tatsuki's abdomen—nonlethal placement.
Einstein and Tesla seemed to have expected it. They shared the smallest glance—no surprise at all—playing dumb to keep Tatsuki's attention.
"As expected of Anti-Entropy's executives—no one here is ordinary."
Tatsuki sighed, already moving. This kind of ruthlessness felt realer to him. Especially in Anti-Entropy, "good" and "evil" weren't useful labels.
Facing an intruder, neither Tesla nor Einstein planned to hold back.
"Good. That means I don't need to, either—though… sorry in advance, Old Yang."
Bang!
The bullet halted several meters short of Tatsuki, as if ripples in the air had caught it.
"!"
Cocolia went to fire again and found her finger wouldn't depress the trigger.
Worse—Cocolia raised her own barrel to her forehead, and Tesla's mechanical left arm pivoted and aimed at Einstein.
"Einstein! That's not me—I can't control my arm!" Tesla shouted, panic snapping through her. She tried to fight it back into line; it didn't budge.
"What did you do? Why can't I control my body?" Cocolia's composure finally cracked. The man before her was wrong in all the frightening ways.
"I don't like guns pointed at me," Tatsuki said mildly.
As his words fell, all the mechs in the room flashed red across their optics—then rotated their cannons to sight down the three women.
"…"
The whiplash reversal scrambled their thoughts. Einstein realized she too was immobilized—only her head still obeyed.
She looked up, eyes grave. "You've overridden our motor control and our mechs. Herrscher of Dominance?"
"Oh? You know the Herrscher of Dominance?"
Tatsuki was amused by Einstein's intel.
"Unfortunately, I'm not."
He tilted his chin toward the doorway. "Speaking of Herrschers—Cocolia, didn't you cook up a copy of the First Herrscher? That thing?"
A black-robed figure strode in, voice dripping arrogance. "Hah! Cocolia, why are you dawdling?"
"Against a mere intruder, you need this long? Pathetic."
He clearly hadn't read the room.
"Looks like I, the First Herrscher, will have to kill him."
He lifted a hand. An unseen crush pressed toward Tatsuki.
"…"
Tatsuki felt the force and couldn't be bothered to comment. Too weak. Barely a trash-tier lv 4.
"A proxy of the Herrscher of Reason, Welt Joyce—a copy, and a lousy one."
Why lousy?
Because there was no power of Reason in him. The push he used was nothing but the Star of Eden's gravity.
The true Herrscher of Reason's power is understand and recreate: once you fully grasp a thing's explanation, you can reproduce it by your own might.
Welt Yang, the second Herrscher of Reason, holds the same authority—he just uses it sparingly; Herrscher power exacts a toll on the body. His go-to in combat is the Star of Eden's gravity manipulation.
As for this "First Welt Joyce copy"—there wasn't a speck of Reason's authority in him.
Bored, Tatsuki swept his right arm.
"Urk—!"
A surge of gravity far beyond the copy's own slammed down—splat—pulping him on the spot.
No last words. No reaction. Gone.
Cocolia's eyelid twitched. Failed product or not, getting erased with a flick felt… obscene.
"Joyce—copied?" For once, anger cracked through Einstein's calm; its target was Cocolia. "You're doing clone experiments too? Using Joyce's genes?"
Cocolia met her fury with a snort. "And if I am?"
"You—" Einstein drew breath to condemn her.
Tatsuki had no interest in their argument. A golden starlight cut cold across his eyes. "Silence."
"…Yes, Master…"
Cocolia and Einstein bowed their heads in unison.
"Ma… Master?"
Tesla gaped. Even Cocolia and Einstein themselves trembled inside—fully aware that they couldn't resist his command at all. Thought remained, but the impulse to oppose him could not arise.
Only now did the three grasp the severity: they had become loyal servants with intact consciousness.
Tatsuki considered, then said, voice cool, "From this moment, Anti-Entropy is mine."
"I don't care if you're the reformists or the conservatives—you all will serve me unconditionally."
Between ideological rifts and fragile cooperation, Anti-Entropy had long split: Einstein and Tesla at the head of the conservatives, Cocolia leading the reformists.
The conservatives—early veterans from Anti-Entropy's founding—trusted Welt and devoted themselves to his ideal: destroy Honkai without harming people themselves. The reformists deemed Welt's ideal outdated—bad for Anti-Entropy's progress.
Now? Both camps would follow Tatsuki.
"Understood!"
All three answered at once—without a flicker of hesitation.
"…"
Inside, waves crashed. They were completely under his control.
"For now, continue the work of fighting Honkai as you have. If anything comes up, contact me through Kiana."
"As for who Kiana is—I've placed the data in your heads."
At his words, images of Kiana—face, name, profile—blossomed in their minds.
"!!!"
That shocked them even more. To insert information into another's brain seamlessly, with absolute naturalness…
As scientists, they immediately grasped the implication: he could as easily rewrite cognition and alter memory.
....
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