Chapter 1088: NO．211：Moon in the Dream

NO．211：Moon in the Dream

"You shouldn't have come."

From the incoherent singing, from the surging roar of the heavy sea tide, Sikadi faintly heard such an expression.

But the honest, clumsy girl could not give any reply in the style of Gu Long.

She hadn't even considered replying.

For her, battle should begin within five seconds of encountering the Faction; just as her giant sword, leaping out of the waves, now easily tears a strip of soaring azure from the huge sea beast's body.

For a group like the Faction, where individual differences can be enormous, whether their blood is blue or red is not worth being surprised about.

The deep-sea hunter's movements are without delay; the surging tide will lend her a hand, allowing her to move with the waves in a way impossible on land to dodge the splashing azure.

Because the blood itself is filled with cells, and Faction cells are precisely those that can invade and assimilate other organisms.

Assimilated cells lose their original physiological functions, but due to the pluripotency of Faction cells, they quickly compensate for the lost functions, allowing the assimilated organism to continue living as if it were still in its original form.

But obviously, in that case, the organism's interior has completely become something else.

Especially since within the Faction population, individuals have differentiated into producers, consumers, decomposers, etc., you may not necessarily be allowed to retain your original form.

Fortunately, this invasiveness and assimilation is actually influenced by the organism's will.

There have also been cases of humans who, with strong conscious resistance to becoming Faction, resisted assimilation for decades.

But for deep-sea hunters whose bodies already flow with Faction blood, this time can become longer—yet it could also become shorter.

Because at first, many deep-sea hunters were unaware of where their power came from.

They would avoid Faction blood like ordinary people, even more so, and also avoid their own bleeding; when they actually came into contact with Faction blood, their panic from ignorance would instead cause those who already carried Faction cells to assimilate rapidly.

Rapid downfall.

But even those who know nothing can still persist in opposing reality, firmly denying the Faction; and those who know the truth, thus taking an even firmer stance, are also many.

Sikadi was once such an ignorant persister, but now she is one who knows the truth and is equally steadfast in her stance.

She is indeed a clumsy person.

But clumsy as she is, she is also a stubborn person not easily changed.

Not accepting defeat is her stubbornness; that stubbornness supports her as she moves here, she lifts the dripping blade, and swings forth a momentum capable of slamming even a beast weighing tens of tons backward.

And her body moves with the sword, slicing through tentacles, claws, and flesh attached with calcium carbonate.

In the Holy Terra Federation, there ought not to be even a single Faction.

But in this ocean of consciousness, they are endless.

The horde gathers around the Corrupting Heart, accepting His decrees of 'Exploration' and 'Struggle'; the massed lower-tier consumers build up the force of a legion, while the standout upper-tier consumers surge forward with their massive bodies at the vanguard of the attack.

But in the end, this is still a confrontation with oneself.

The boundless horde's essence is still this sea of consciousness.

That is the fighting heart manifested by consciousness in response to Yishamala, the blade of her will.

In the hand of the deep-sea hunter Sikadi, there is likewise such a thing.

That is the giant sword in her hand.

The giant sword is victorious wherever it goes; the giant sword cleaves everything.

Once in reality she was so muddled she could not tell self from other, but now, placed in this ocean filled with malice, she seems to have returned to her most familiar homeland.

Tide surges, tide withers?

No, it will not wither.

She will not let the ocean become corrupted!

She has never felt the ocean's vitality so clearly.

She has never felt such a light breath.

She can even sense the ocean's expectation, the supportive intent welling from every drop of seawater she can touch.

Amidst the surging black tide, there is only a patch of dark blue encircling her side.

That is her foothold, also her ocean; it is the foundation that sensibility, in opposition to reason, refuses to relinquish; it is her, now waving the giant sword amid the waves, the corpses she flings behind her growing ever more numerous, and her distance to the figure still humming the song growing ever closer.

Yet gradually, bit by bit, she does not avoid the blue and red that slowly stain the ocean.

"Don't come over…"

"... you will disappear."

The wordless words still flow within that humming, ever as if a bystander; Yishamala, who has never personally taken action, gazes upon the figure single-handedly battling the horde, gradually beginning to be covered in blood from head to toe, her eyes full of reluctance and sorrow.

She has always felt this is a deception.

Her overly sensual self has so easily stepped onto this land of death.

In this deep ocean of consciousness, everything belongs to Yishamala, and the false self forged from Sikadi's personality remnants will eventually, bit by bit, rust and peel away under the soaking of sea wind and seawater.

Revealing the essence that is also Yishamala's.

She wishes her sensibility would return to reality, but upon seeing her thus recklessly rush to the land of death, reason, unprecedentedly, feels a hint of regret, a hint of remorse.

She suddenly realizes that this might be like a dream as humans speak of it; she is gradually waking from the dream, yet will forever lose this dream.

There will not be a second time.

In the past, she dwelled within a gigantic body resembling a huge sea plant and sea eel, a monster truly deserving of the name in human culture.

Only after dedicating everything to the deep-sea hunter named Sikadi did she truly come into contact with human civilization.

She even came to believe herself a member of humanity, her heart brimming with thoughts and feelings never before experienced by a newborn.

But such a dream must eventually end.

The Corrupting Heart must ultimately return to the horde, and the horde's will cannot be separated from the Corrupting Heart's decree.

A dream imitating humanity, overly willful, ought to end here.

It should end in the process whereby the 'Sikadi' who waves her mottled, distorted and unrestrained sword blade in a blood-for-blood exchange is struck down upon the sea surface and gradually sinks.

Such a process would far exceed the other's imagination in speed, because she is ultimately not the true Sikadi, because just a few minutes ago, they were still merged with each other, indistinguishable.

Relying on the machine's convenience, and also relying on the opportunity she gave him, they achieved a brief separation, but it will gradually mend.

By then, the so-called hunter and the so-called monster will no longer be distinct from each other.

Just like now, as her posture becomes more unrestrained, her movements smoother, and her gaze aloof like that of a superior, her own blood relative will crush her.

Dragging her down.

Let everything finally settle into dust, let Aomo Lindun become an excellent aid for my return to the masses—his thoughts abruptly ceased, within that cold light that suddenly scattered from the dim heavens.

The sky, which should have been overcast with clouds, murky like a black sea tide, at this moment tore open a gap.

Pale, icy light fell from that gap, casting an arc-shaped glow upon the black sea surface.

Moon?

As Yishamala's rationality, it naturally knows everything that Sikadi has come into contact with, including humanity's definition of such celestial bodies.

Back home there were two, but here there is only one; its cycle of change also has some differences, but the phases are consistent.

That crescent moon, which only appears at month's end, looks so weak and narrow; even the light it sheds brings no warmth, like a hollow dream.

Could moonlight also be a dream of the sun?

They gazed at that crescent moon in the sky, and numerous human-like thoughts flickered through their mind; this might be a sign that the sensibility is merging from the sunk ones into this side.

When they thought that, they saw a flash of azure light from the sea below.

Boom!

That light rapidly expanded, and before they could react, it had already become a crescent-moon glow several meters long, simultaneously splitting the blood relative beneath their feet in half and also cleaving her diagonally at the shoulder, taking the arm with it.

They did not die.

They not only shed no drop of blood, but even that severed half-limb remerged with their body, and the damaged robe was also repaired.

Here, after all, is the world of consciousness—upon realizing this, they inevitably lifted their head again, gazing at the most anomalous entity in this world.

That crescent moon.

Unfamiliar yet familiar, even causing Sikadi to rise again from the ocean, wielding a blade that she vaguely recalls, seemingly a azure greatsword proposed from some game.

"So it's you."

They opened their mouth, produced sound with their vocal cords, spoke the first human sentence, toward that outline which had repeatedly rejected them yet never drifted away.

Then she lowered her head again, looking at Sikadi, who had already leapt forward and was swinging the great sword in hand.

"Is this your response?"

"A wholehearted effort to save…"

Before the pronunciation of the dream could be completed, it was cut off again by the descending sword.

That azure radiance flashed again, with a cold yet sharp arc, severing her from the sea beneath her.