Ganesha's teeth were quite good.
At least, much better than the Soulium used to make the Divine Keys.
This wasn't Vill-V cutting corners. The Flame-Chasers had greater needs for her time, energy, and money. Wasting more time and more expensive materials on mass-produced Divine Keys was clearly not a wise choice.
The crude sound of chewing echoed through the dilapidated ruins.
Compared to the harmless ant beside it, Ganesha chose to finish its meal as quickly as possible.
"Bam!"
A bleeding fist slammed into the ground.
"As I thought..."
"I can't do anything!"
Hua was not a Fusion Warrior.
But her circumstances were not much better.
Hua's squad had been completely wiped out in the disaster of the Seventh Herrscher. As the sole survivor, she had always been treated as a companion to the witch and was ostracized. The death of Himeko had made Hua lose almost everything. Only by seeking the reason for her captain's transformation into a Herrscher could Hua persevere until now...
"Swish."
Ganesha ate very quickly.
It swallowed all eleven Keys of Domination in just a few minutes. The Soulium alloy encasing them had been torn to shreds; what it ate were the purest Herrscher cores.
Digestion might be a bit slow, but without a doubt, all of this would become nourishment for Ganesha's growth.
Now, it was preparing to eat its final snack.
A deep purple light in Ganesha's opening maw grew increasingly captivating, and just then—
"Fwoosh!"
An orange-red flame streaked across the sky.
Facing the Emperor-class Honkai Beast, Hua, who had already given up her last resistance, seemed to see Himeko's former figure in that ball of fire.
"Cap... tain?"
Flames had devoured her captain's body, but flames were also the proof of her captain's existence.
In this ruined wasteland, Hua seemed to see the scene of her captain smiling as her body was pierced by ice lances—
"AHHH!!!"
Golden flames erupted from within Hua's body!
Her blue-silver hair turned the pure white of frost, her azure pupils transformed into a burning crimson, and a pair of crimson-gold wings wreathed in soaring flames burst forth from her back!
The Tenth Divine Key plunged into the ground—a golden greatsword, two-chi-one-cun long with a double-edged blade—rapidly disintegrated and reformed under the baptism of flames, finally condensing on Hua's fists into the form of the [Grips of Taixu].
Using the genes of the Emperor-class Honkai Beast "Garuda" as a blueprint, Hua successfully completed the Super-Metamorphosis Experiment and became a Fusion Warrior. And Garuda's ability, "Agelessness," would forever lock her body at the age of 17.
"Scree!"
Wings spread, soaring high.
Amidst a faint cry of a bird.
Hua's body transformed into a giant, ascending firebird. Amidst a shower of golden light that scattered across the sky, she charged straight towards Ganesha—
"BOOM!!!"
The streets were leveled.
The original ruins were nowhere to be seen. All that remained was a giant, deep pit where flames burned unceasingly.
"Captain..."
"Captain!"
Hua was not immersed in the joy of defeating an Emperor-class Honkai Beast.
She didn't even pay attention to her own physical state. To be able to "resonate" with a Divine Key right after completing her transformation and unleash such a level of destructive power was extremely rare even among Fusion Warriors. The corresponding consumption and overdraft went without saying.
Hua was certain.
The stream of light just now was no illusion!
The moment she was about to be killed by Ganesha, she had indeed seen a figure nearly identical to her captain. Belief could stimulate the power of the meta-morph factors, but what had just happened was not that simple.
"Click."
A pebble rolled from the edge of the deep pit. A scorching and familiar aura, as if born from nothing, came from behind Hua...
"Cap—"
Joy and voice came to an abrupt halt together.
In that instant, Hua was reminded of the fact: her captain was already dead. Her Herrscher core had been made into the [Seventh Divine Key · Judgement of Shamash] in Kevin's hands, and the core that constituted that Divine Key had been taken by the Black Emperor.
What appeared in Hua's vision.
Was a human female with an orange-red ponytail.
"A civilian?"
Hua quickly dismissed her own guess.
There were no humans left alive on the Australian continent. Moreover, the shockwaves created by both Ganesha and herself could have easily crushed an ordinary person to dust. It was impossible for someone to appear so calmly at the edge of the pit.
"Reinforcements?"
After discovering the Emperor-class Honkai Beast, the Flame-Chasers had quickly dispatched reinforcements. This guess had some possibility, but Hua had seen every single Fusion Warrior in the Flame-Chasers with her own eyes... even the "volunteers" who had just undergone the fusion surgery.
What's more.
The feeling the other party gave Hua was not one of goodwill.
It wasn't hostility, nor was there killing intent, but a kind of... ineffable, superior feeling.
Hua's heart gradually sank.
After eliminating all impossibilities, the remaining answer was the truth.
The meta-morph factors had allowed Hua to bypass many of the preliminary steps required for fusion surgery, directly entering a half-human, half-beast state of "Over-Metamorphosis." Although she was still not quite used to it, Hua folded the wings behind her back, brought her fists, which were wrapped in the [Grips of Taixu], into a ready stance, and slowly placed them before her.
"A Herrscher."
Some individuals of the Herrscher of Domination would possess a weakened authority of one of the first nine Herrschers.
The reason this person exuding a fiery aura felt so similar to her captain was likely due to the weakened "Authority of Flame" she possessed.
If it was a Herrscher...
The Flame-Chasers had already established many mathematical models for the Herrscher of Domination. Their strength was usually at the level of a lower-tier Honkai Beast. Even the combat-specialized types among them would generally not exceed the Emperor-class.
Although killing the Emperor-class Honkai Beast just now had consumed a lot of her stamina, if she pushed herself to do it again... Hua was already used to forcing herself to do things. Doing it one more time shouldn't be a big problem.
Even if she couldn't defeat the opponent on the spot, she could still create the conditions for the Flame-Chasers' follow-up cleanup.
"..."
"Shing!"
The War Temple drew the greatsword from her back.
But only one... and she even held it with a single hand. Hua's reasoning was sound, but unfortunately, the entire premise was wrong. Although the "Authority of Flame" held by the War Temple did not come from herself, it was not something a counterfeit like the Herrscher of Domination could compare to.
An Emperor-class Honkai Beast?
A Ganesha of that level? The War Temple could take them down one by one with a single stroke, slicing them all into pieces to take back and make bacon.
If not for the orders she was under, she could have just flown straight down and killed both the human and Ganesha together.
Now—
According to the Emperor's instructions.
She was to personally test the resolve of the human before her.