Into the Cosmos (Star Rail SI, Chaos Gacha) (Patreon)

Chapter 31: Flames of Preservation

Caelus and Co. vs. Cocolia

‘What the hell? Did I just technically save the world without even defeating the final villain?’ I thought incredulously as I quickly noticed the notifications I had received after being healed by the Preservation and acquiring a new weapon.

[Feat Achieved! Qlipoth of the Preservation personally gazed at you.]

[+1 Legendary Random Gacha Ticket.]

[Feat Achieved! Saved Jarilo-VI from being turned into a wasteland of fire and ash by Firefly by not dying.]

[+1 Diamond Random Gacha Ticket.]

[Feat Achieved! Almost caused the destruction of a planet with your death.]

[+1 Platinum Random Gacha Ticket.]

‘Shit! Firefly was watching everything, wasn’t she?’ I thought in slight worry at what she must have been through emotionally before shaking it off. Now wasn’t the time.

‘Might as well roll ’em and see if I get anything useful,’ I decided with a determined frown, still keeping my gaze locked on the surprised Cocolia as everyone else recovered from the fact that I was still alive and no longer looking like a donut.

[Rolling…]

[Obito’s Mangekyo Sharingan Right]

|Legendary Ability|

Naruto - You possess the Right eye of Obito Uchiha, granting you access to half of the Kamui technique and all the benefits of the Sharingan such as incredible visual prowess and instant memorization. With the right eye, you get access to a short version of the Kamui at any time, granting you access to an endless pocket dimension in your Right eye. You can transport yourself into the Kamui to move across the real world by moving through it and leaving in a different location. You can also semi-transport yourself into the Kamui to render yourself intangible at the cost of stamina. Lastly, you can also send objects you are touching into the Kamui realm.

[Bankai - Ryujin Jakka]

|Mythical Item|

Bleach - Ryujin Jakka, the Blade of Ember is a Zanpakuto, a spiritual armament in the shape of a burnt blade bound to the user. The strength of this armament scales with the power of its user. With its Bankai unlocked, it has reached its most powerful state. It allows the use of 4 abilities based in cardinal directions, East allows all of the flames of the user to be concentrated only in the blade to achieve maximum destructive power. West allows the user to cloak their body in extreme heat as defense. South allows them to call upon the corpses of those they have slain to use as puppets. North is the maximum power of the ability that concentrates all of their power into a superheated slash. The potency and heat of the flames wielded by the sword scale with the user.

[Greater Purification]

|Elite Ability|

Allows you to bathe a target in a powerful purifying light, cleansing them of negative effects or foreign substances. The potency of the purification scales with energy spent.

[Ability Slot has increased to 4.]

[Greater Purification will replace weaker Purification. One Gold Random Ticket will be refunded.]

[Expert Communication]

|Elite Skill|

You are an expert in communication. You can always convey what you mean to anyone, be it the stupidest human or the lowliest beast; you can even live your life through gestures and not be misunderstood. You can tell when people lie and understand their true intentions by cold reading them; they don't even have to talk, you can understand what they want and what they feel just by extreme cold reading.

I quickly read over my new rolls while ignoring the brief sharp pain in my skull from the Expert Communication skill downloading a bunch of information into my brain.

‘I could use this,’ I thought, quickly slotting in the Greater Purification ability before turning to my friends behind me. They had finally gotten over their shock at me being alive. I gave them a reassuring nod.

I could tell with my new Expert Communication skill that Dan Heng and especially March were still extremely worried about me, with Bronya coming in next, but they were all able to disguise their concern for now.

While I could use Yamamoto’s Bankai, I ultimately decided to leave it for later as a half-formed plan came to me.

“No… It can’t be,” the figure of the ice monster Cocolia had become muttered in disbelief as she stared at my lance.

“The will of Preservation has made its choice…” Bronya said over the blizzard around us, a steely and determined glare aimed toward her mother. She had already guessed what had happened.

There were several big clues, after all.

The first was that the gaze of an Aeon was not something that happened regularly, and its presence would no doubt have been felt by a lot of people. There was also the lance in my hands, once belonging to Cocolia and made by the Architects, now burning with a new flame.

Finally, there was the fact that the huge robot, or Engine of Creation as the locals knew it, was no longer under Cocolia’s control and now obeyed me. Something that clearly tied back to my new lance.

“You know nothing of the plight of this world… nothing of the wait for its final end!” Cocolia continued in denial, her head turned toward me.

“Even if we are doomed to destruction, we will go bravely, walking hand in hand into the darkness…” Bronya responded with even greater resolve.

“No! That end won’t come to pass while we’re around!” March intervened with her own glare and a shake of her head. She looked at Cocolia with genuine anger, something I was seeing from her for the first time.

“As March said, as long as we’re here, this world will see a new dawn,” I said with a frown, internally grateful that Qlipoth had also restored my energy reserves along with healing me and bringing me back to tip-top shape.

Without it I had no doubt I would be running on fumes and willpower right now.

“Now prepare for round two!” I declared before igniting my lance in flames and pointing it toward Cocolia. “Lance ablaze.”

“Flaming lance! Forward!” I yelled and took the lead. My lance ignited and launched me toward Cocolia like a missile, breaking and melting all of the ice constructs she made to stop me before hitting her dead-on and causing her to stagger back in pain.

With my opening move, everyone followed my lead and began attacking in tandem, but with a noticeable difference this time.

Anytime Cocolia created any huge constructs of ice or shielded herself in thick ice, I would command the Engine of Creation to help us. It would bring its fist down, breaking anything she had managed to create.

This gave us enough time to attack her without having to worry about our biggest threats and to whittle her down bit by bit. Though I did notice silently that March’s attacks were aimed at spots meant to cause the most pain, which was a surprise coming from the usually peppy and happy girl.

‘Cocolia must have really gotten her angry.’

My new weapon also came with its own special abilities other than creating flames hot enough to melt Cocolia’s constructs. Probably thanks to the power of the Preservation, it could also provide some kind of invisible shield to those I wanted to protect.

With the added defense on top of March’s, who had a similar ability with her Six-Phased Ice, as she called it, we had both solid defense and solid offense, and we made great use of both.

Add in my Gravity Jail to pin her down, and we were basically bullying Cocolia for most of the second half of the battle, if I’m being completely honest.

Not that I was about to show mercy to someone who had turned me into a donut, of course.

When we finally managed to deal enough damage for Cocolia to return to her original human form, I immediately made my move, knowing the woman was about to do something desperate.

True to my expectations, Cocolia started channeling the energy of the Stellaron in an attempt to self-destruct and take all of us with her.

“The Stellaron… …promised us the future!” she said weakly with a deranged smile as she started glowing.

“Shut up already with the crazy talk!” I interrupted her as I finally reached her, ignoring the force trying to push me away. Instead of dealing the final blow and ending her life, I took her by surprise and pulled her into my arms in a hug.

“Greater Purification!” I yelled, pouring a massive amount of my energy into the new ability. I began to glow in a similar but slightly different golden color from Cocolia’s.

Mine was clearly more pure—or holy—meant to heal, while hers was a sickly yellow meant to corrupt.

Slotting in Boost to replace Soul Arrow, the potency of Greater Purification gained a whole rank, becoming an Epic ability. Combined with my Cuddle Emperor trait, I hoped it would be enough to free Cocolia from the mind control.

“W-What are you doing, Caelus?!” Bronya’s voice shouted from behind me in a desperate tone. “Let me go, Seele! I have to get to her!”

I would have responded to reassure her that I wasn’t trying to hurt Cocolia, quite the opposite, but I was too focused on Greater Purification to pay any attention.

“Come back to your senses already, damn it!” I yelled straight into Cocolia’s ear, hoping to get through to her as I watched the light of the Stellaron slowly dissipating from her body.

“Haven’t you had enough of being controlled by something telling you to kill your own daughter?!” I continued yelling over the blizzard still raging around us.

“Caelus! What are you doing?! She looks about to blow! Get away from her!” March yelled from behind me, still clearly worried about me after what had happened earlier.

Still unable to answer them, I concentrated and poured even more energy into Greater Purification for one last push. I all but slumped forward in relief when I felt a pair of feminine hands hug me back. At the same time, the energy from the Stellaron slowly receded back inside her body before it was completely gone.

A moment later, I felt her lips lightly brush my ear as she whispered a small but heartfelt “thank you” before going unconscious in my arms.

Making sure I had a firm hold on the mature woman, I suddenly became aware of the two soft and full globes pressing into my chest now that the danger had passed.

‘Tsk… why do most female baddies have to be so hot?’ I thought to myself with a small roll of my eyes as I let out a sigh of relief. I finally stopped the ability and settled properly on the ground, a bit exhausted from all the energy spent.

With the pressure that had been keeping the others back finally gone, it only took seconds before I saw the forms of Bronya and March in my peripheral vision. I turned to them with a tired but happy grin.

“Sorry I couldn’t answer before, but there’s no longer anything to worry about. Your mother should be fine now, and more importantly, completely free from the Stellaron’s control,” I revealed calmly, pulling one hand free from hugging Cocolia and giving them a thumbs up.

“Mother!” Bronya immediately took her mother from my arms and started inspecting her before letting out a huge sigh of relief when she found that she was only unconscious.

Not offended that she hadn’t fully believed me at first, I was about to explain a bit more of what had happened when I was suddenly pulled into an embrace of my own, into a familiar pair of arms and a familiar scent.

“Idiot! Why do you never fail to make me worry half to death every time we face a major baddie?!” March demanded angrily as she pulled back a bit to look up at me with teary eyes and started hitting my chest with her fists.

“I’m going to end up getting gray hairs at this point because of you!” she continued ranting for several more moments. I just let her do what she wanted and smiled at her.

Beneath her angry tone, I could clearly see the immense worry and relief she felt for me, now more obvious than ever thanks to my new Expert Communication skill. If all I needed to do for March to get back to her usual happy self was listen to her cute rants and take a few hits on the chest that didn’t really hurt, then I would obviously do it.

“It’s finally over…” Seele said, drawing our attention. We turned to see her standing with Serval and Dan Heng, all of them wearing similarly relieved expressions.

“That seems to be the case,” Serval said, letting out a sigh of relief before turning to me. “By the way, how did you manage to pull off that last stunt, Caelus?”

“I have an ability that lets me cleanse others of negative effects. I didn’t use it before because I didn’t think it would be strong enough while she was at full strength, but it seems my plan worked in the end,” I explained simply without going into further details.

Serval and Seele nodded and thankfully didn’t ask for more details. March and Dan Heng, who were already aware of my abilities, nodded with understanding looks in their eyes. March finally, reluctantly, let go of me but stayed close.

“…Thank you for saving my mother even though you had every right not to, Caelus,” Bronya’s soft voice reached our ears. I turned to see her still cradling her unconscious mother in her arms while giving me a tearful but thankful look.

“I don’t know how I could possibly repay you for saving both myself and my mother from certain death.” She then bowed her head to me.

With my new Expert Communication skill, I could see just how much what I had done meant to her. I also noticed that she was now looking at me with a different kind of gaze than before, softer and full of affection. It made me realize that another one of my traits had played a role here: In Shining Armor, which caused any damsel I saved to develop feelings for me.

Waving away her thanks with a small smile, I decided to push those thoughts to the back of my mind for now. There was still something I had yet to do.

“Don’t worry about it. I told you before that you could count on me, remember? I was just keeping that promise,” I said with a small shrug as I slowly got back to my feet. March immediately followed and watched me like a hawk, probably worried I would collapse like I had after every hard battle before.

“Yes, I remember,” Bronya nodded as a blush rose to her cheeks. Suddenly she became unable to look me properly in the eyes, turning away and absently tucking a strand of hair behind her ear.

Noticing that everyone was giving us strange looks, especially March and Seele, I coughed into my hand, bringing all attention back to me.

“Anyway, there’s something I want to do. Do you guys mind if I leave the rest to you?” I asked politely, earning raised eyebrows from everyone.

“Of course. I already had a chat with Himeko and Mr. Yang. They should be here soon to seal the Stellaron,” Dan Heng said with a nod.

“Thanks, Dan Heng. Knew I could count on you!” I said with a grin, giving him a thumbs up.

“…What are you up to?” March suddenly asked me with a suspicious tone, hands on her hips.

Smiling in a teasing manner, I poked her nose, causing her to back away and slap my hand away with a pout. “That’s a surprise. Just prepare to be amazed~”

Giving everyone a grin, I silently slotted in Obito’s Mangekyo Sharingan and disappeared in a swirl the next moment, leaving gasps in my wake.

Appearing a distance away, I let out a sigh before finally pulling out a burnt katana. I looked up at the sky as the temperature around me increased massively and the ice and snow started evaporating from the heat.

“Now let’s see what this second Mythical ability can do about all this ice and snow,” I muttered to myself, ignoring how my body was slightly being crushed by its power and how it was heating up to dangerous levels.

‘I just hope Firefly doesn’t see me doing this… or I have a feeling I’ll get a scolding from her later.’