Chapter 834

The young man looked as if to say, "You guys are modern people, why are you so feudal?"

To be reasonable.

He really did swipe these stone statues from some world of gods, didn't he? They really can steal the power of gods; they are legitimate sub-god-level war weapons.

If they really fought, these few newbie magical girls might not even be able to beat them if they teamed up.

It counts as one of the major capital investments he made into the "Chaldea Heavens-wide Trouble-making" project.

After all, this project is indeed quite good; the Divine Authority Jade earned so far has basically broken even, and everything from here on is pure profit.

"Everyone here is a member of Chaldea, or a reserve. You must understand that as investigators sent by Chaldea to various realms, you need to face different world-views, different customs, and different situations.

You need extremely high personal quality..."

Leading the group through the giant display cases, the young man said nonchalantly: "What we need is someone who can mingle with the Father of Ultra, chat freely with the Emperor on the Golden Throne, picnic in Silent Hill, and sacrifice their reputation to cuckold Saeki and put a hat on Kayako—these kinds of rule-based vengeful spirits—to let them rest in peace..."

Wait, did I hear something strange?

Kitahara Iori's face stiffened.

Asuka felt a chill all over, hurriedly grabbing the young man's sleeve, her lips trembling: "Are we in Chaldea also responsible for catching ghosts?"

The young man patted her little head: "Different worlds, different situations. There are always some worlds that are worlds of the five turbidities, where evil is fierce, the Dao recedes, and demons rise. There are only vengeful spirits like Sadako and Kayako, but no gods or Buddhas, directly threatening the continuation of human history.

That is why Chaldea needs to intervene to safeguard the existence of human reason.

The situation in the world of vengeful spirits is still considered good; there are some rule-based horror worlds where any random one is an enhanced version of Kayako or Sadako.

They don't have initiative, but their rules are absolutely stronger, and they can even cut gods down to ordinary people to play a battle royale.

If you want to survive, besides using absolute strength to drag out the non-corporeal rule-based entities and hammer them to death, you can only crack their killing rules to survive."

There are worlds like that?

At this, everyone felt a chill.

Even just imagining it, they could see a bottomless despair, devouring all light and hope.

Very well, they could already fully imagine how "wonderful" the days ahead would be.

Kitahara Iori already had the serenity of someone who had attained Buddhahood.

Asuka, the future boss's wife, might only need to sit in the command center, but he, the general manager of miscellaneous affairs, would 100% need to be at the forefront, fighting on the front lines.

After all, he was the big brother recognized by Shinji Ikari; he couldn't let the child go to the front lines to fight while he hid in the back.

Walking to a display case that was clearly a few sizes smaller, he pointed to a mass of pitch-black hair tangled like seaweed in the case.

"Look, this is a specialty brought back from that world."

"It looks like ordinary hair from the back of a woman's head, but it is actually a rare type of 'ghost' with a physical form, codenamed 'Nightmare,' possessing special killing rules.

Once it touches a woman, it will parasitize her, causing her to encounter bad luck continuously in a short period, and then be killed by the most cruel means, only to revive as a vengeful spirit seven days later.

On the surface, it's just an ordinary back-spirit.

It's just that from any direction, even if you cut through space, all you can see is the hair on the back of the head.

At this moment, at least if you blink or your attention shifts for a split second, it will appear before your eyes, drilling into every pore of yours, deep into your internal organs, and even every corner of your bladder.

We even have a sample where even the cell walls were penetrated..."

Holy crap.

Everyone felt a chill; imagining hair growing inside their bodies gave them the illusion of trypophobia.

"But this is not fatal. What's fatal is that after contact, you will be dragged into a deep dream, belonging to 'its' 're-enactment of death'."

No matter how powerful you are in reality, in the dream, you will only be that ordinary boy or girl from the beginning, and you will be killed in the most cruel way, just like 'it'."

The young man exclaimed in admiration: "The world is truly vast, and there are all sorts of wonders. Before encountering that horror-story universe, we never imagined such an incredible existence...

We also had to invite an innate god to fully contain it; essentially, we utilized the differences between worlds to crack it."

The others retreated several steps in unison, rubbing their arms, which were covered in goosebumps, and laughed dryly: "An innate god... well, that way there's never a weak moment."

"Of course, now it's just a containment object, quite safe."

The young man smiled confidently, pointing to the display case: "We discovered that the material of its hair is tougher than Oham divine steel; as a defense, it is comparable to the material of a Noble Phantasm, and even more agile.

And as an attack, it can even fold space and cause a single-body temporal penetration; we found this degree is generally ten years in the past.

That is to say, if you hold it and face an enemy you can't beat, if the other party is quite young, you can attack them ten years ago and kill them when they were weak.

And if you have a relatively strong ability to accept it and let this hair meticulously penetrate and link to the inside of your body, it can support you like an exoskeleton power armor; even a god's physique can be strengthened to the limit, fully excavating your potential.

By then, you won't even be able to imagine how powerful you are; this is absolutely the most suitable biological colonization gear. You guys see who wants..."

Luo Shu coaxed them, looking around expectantly.

Are you sure this thing is biological?

Everyone felt a chill in their hearts and immediately looked left and right; even Kaji Ryoji, who had the most sense of responsibility, silently turned his head to talk to Shinji Ikari.

Afraid of being drafted to serve as a mount for this terrifying thing.

Yes.

This sounds like, if they load this, they are the ones being packaged as the gift wrapping, right?

"It's a pity that the number of horror stories in that world is not large, otherwise we might have been able to find one suitable for you. Otherwise, if everyone loaded rule-based horror colonization gear, I can't imagine who could stop us. By then, achieving great deeds and sublimating into Heroic Spirits would be highly possible."

The young man shook his head in disappointment and sighed: "It's truly a great pity for Chaldea."

"That is truly a great piece of luck for humanity across the realms!!!"

Everyone complained frantically in their hearts, once again feeling the danger outside the universe.

Suddenly, they didn't want to go out anymore; what was up with that?

And Chaldea... it really isn't a proper world-saving organization, is it?

451. Ultimate Fear, Causal Replacement

People like Akagi Ritsuko and Kaji Ryoji, who were considered human elites in their respective fields, were all a bit numb.

They felt that this lord before them, who was 100% a big shot among gods, was perhaps thinking too highly of them.

To be reasonable, although they were much more advanced in military technology compared to the average modern civilization, in the end, it was only at the level of landing on the moon.

Colonizing nearly a hundred planets of various sizes in the solar system was still a distant prospect. Talking about outside the universe and fighting against rule-based existences from other universes at this time—wasn't it a bit too early?

And this kind of horror-story colonization gear, which sounded fierce just by hearing about it, was it really something that small fries like them, who hadn't even left their planet, could use?

A group of human elites looked fearfully at the hair in the "display case."

As if looking at some ancient taboo, they didn't dare to look up at all, deliberately turning their heads to chat with each other.

At this moment.

"Can I try..."

A hesitant voice sounded.

Everyone turned their heads with a "holy crap" expression, only to be stunned.

It was actually Kitahara Iori?!!!

No, didn't you already obtain the power of a magical girl? That power of light protection should be much stronger than this underworld colonization gear, no matter how you think about it, right?

"That..."

Kitahara Iori also swallowed his saliva.

Honestly, he was actually a bit cowardly, after all, this thing was too underworld.

It's just that he still had some self-awareness.

The danger in this world was a disaster that even the strongest previous-generation magical girl hadn't been able to solve.

He still had self-awareness.

He probably couldn't even pass the most ordinary demon god.

His compatibility with the magic red and blue gems wasn't high. Previously, when he transformed into a magical girl to fight Shinji Ikari, he only relied on his background as an A-rank Mage to bully Shinji Ikari, an ordinary junior high student.

By the end, it was clear he was already struggling to suppress him.

In the end, he relied on tactical deception to divert Shinji Ikari's attention and took the opportunity to remove the blue gem embedded in his collar, which made him exit his mythological form (transformation form).

He probably understood the reason for that too.

Magical girls are still somewhat different from Magecraft.

That is the power of dreams and love; the more innocent and full of fantasy about the world a child is, the more they can fully exert its power.

Perhaps because of this, magical girls retire honorably before they are nearly adults.

In short, he felt he looked unreliable, but he actually still harbored light. But innocence, dreams—this really didn't fit an adult like him who was born in an era of rigid class stratification.

It's just...

Kitahara Iori looked back at Shinji Ikari and smiled dashingly.

He had dragged the guy into this, so he couldn't hide in the back, right?