Story Reader / Main Story / 13 Fake Ascension / Story
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Lucia can see Luna through the transparent Energy Core at the top of the Polyphage.
The revelation that Luna was an Ascendant during their encounter in the Kowloong Metropolis had Lucia shaken back then. Her thoughts tangled up in her M.I.N.D. like a disordered ball of yarn.
The Ascendant who could manipulate the Punishing Virus was a far cry from the little girl who held her hand. Her idea of her "sister" has since become uncertain and fractured.
It is only until now that Lucia has a chance to take a closer look at the Luna in the present.
Her pale cheeks are almost translucent, her brows frowned, her lips spurting brief and repressed gasps.
She no longer finds the little girl that has been refitted, then reshaped by the virus, and then evolved. But Lucia knows this expression. It is one she found on Luna's face when she slept alone.
She would sleep with her battered doll on a cold bed, waiting for her sister as she scavenged for food. She always looked lonely and scared, her eyelashes dotted with tears of fear as if a nightmare was haunting her.
But if she hugged her and held her hand tightly, the little girl would smile with ease, readily falling asleep again in her sister's arms.
Now, Luna is trapped in a chamber akin to a cultivation pod, her eyes shut, her limbs bounded by the hunting claws of the Polyphage. She is so close, and yet so far away.
Even with all her power as an "agent," she can still look so fragile.
An unspeakable pain tears through Lucia's heart. She cannot help calling out her name.
LUNA—!
Lucia nods and raises her katana, ready to thrust it into the Core. But then—
—!!
Like a violent storm, a biting scythe cuts across Lucia's right arm in the blink of an eye, launching her to the edge of the platform that contains the Polyphage's Core.
The ashen Hetero-Creature that appeared next to Gabriel is now descending from the air, hovering before Lucia with its wings spread.
Get out of my way!
Lucia swings at the creature, but it counters her strike with the same attack at almost the same angle. The Hetero-Creature may even have the upper hand when it comes to a contest of pure strength.
It's mimicking my move...
No one knows if the Hetero-Creature born from the Punishing Virus is "self-aware," but...
It's pointless if you can only copy what's on the surface.
Lucia takes a deep breath and adjusts her grip. Then she displays an unfamiliar battle stance, one in the vein of several different Constructs she knows, without strictly adhering to one.
Let me demonstrate with my blade—and then I will destroy you!
