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

Chapter 45: What Have I Become?

As soon as we disembarked from the starskiff we rode to our destination, Qingque turned to us with a worried look and warned us about the many things that Fu Xuan found annoying, which turned out to be a lot of things.

“We’re just here for the questioning. We’ll leave as soon as it’s over,” Welt reassured calmly while March and I looked at each other in worry.

“Sheesh, the more I hear about her, the more I think this Fu Xuan is nothing but trouble,” March quietly complained to me as we walked behind the group.

“Hehe, she does give that vibe, huh? A short girl with quite the temper,” I whispered back in amusement.

“Shh! What if they hear us and they tattle to her?” March said back in a bit of a panic as she shot Qingque a small look to see her still talking with Welt about something, causing her to relax and slump in relief.

“You’re too stiff, March. Where’s the fun girl I know?” I teased as I bumped shoulders with her.

“She’s currently taking a backseat for the worried version of her that doesn’t want to end up running away from the authorities again,” she responded back with a pout.

We were forced to stop whispering to each other as more Fragmentum monsters and Mara-struck soldiers stood in our way that we quickly dealt with.

We eventually reached a door that, surprise surprise, was locked.

“Hmph, let me guess, the gate isn’t working?” March asked with an exasperated tone, already guessing the problem.

“Did you expect any different?” I asked with a bored tone, a little annoyed at this too since this wasn’t a game anymore and having to backtrack all the time was getting tiring.

“There’s no need to panic, okay? This isn’t the only entrance into the Divination Commission. I know an emergency access,” Qingque tried to reassure us.

“No need, I got this,” I said with a sigh as I stepped forward under curious gazes before activating my MS and phasing through the door, earning me a gasp from Qingque, who wasn’t aware of my abilities.

Once on the other side of the door I quickly fiddled with the mechanism to open it and wasn’t surprised at all that it worked like a charm, and the door opened a moment later.

“Problem solved!” I declared with a thumbs up, receiving one in return from March while Welt and Tingyun nodded at me in thanks.

“Way to go, Caelus! I almost forgot that with your new ability, we’ll never have to backtrack again!” March congratulated me, looking truly happy as she stepped forward and gave me a small hug.

“Eh, I hate backtracking too, so no biggie,” I shrugged with a small grin.

Qingque remained behind for a moment while still looking at me with wide eyes. “…Did you just phase through the door?” she asked as her brain rebooted and she quickly caught up to us.

“Yep, pretty handy ability, right?” I said back in a casual manner, only causing her to look at me more weirdly.

“I can’t even begin to describe how you could possibly do that, but luckily for me, I’m not paid enough to worry about such a thing~ All I can say is that your ability is very scary, honored guest,” Qingque chimed in as her frown disappeared and was replaced with her usual happy look.

“Thank you, but you haven’t seen anything yet,” I said, tooting my own horn for a moment, getting another blank look from Qingque.

“Yep, definitely don’t get paid enough for this. Now, come on, the Master Diviner should be waiting for you up ahead in the Matrix of Prescience,” Qingque informed casually, once more leading the way.

The Matrix of Prescience was a wonder of engineering and Xianzhou arts that basically used math to predict the future and read the past. Most of the information just went over my head, though, so I soon forgot about it.

As Welt and Qingque launched into a conversation about what the Matrix of Prescience was, I couldn’t help but notice that our other guest had been strangely quiet for a while now and turned my gaze toward her.

“You seem a little quiet, Tingyun. Is something the matter?” I asked calmly, letting nothing show on my face at the fact that I found such silence suspicious as fuck, since at this point I was all but sure that this was Phantylia in disguise.

My words startled her for a second before she masterfully covered it up in less than a second, but with my MS still on, she couldn’t hide from my gaze.

“Thank you for worrying about me, Benefactor, but I’m fine,” Tingyun waved my concerns away with a relaxed smile. “I was merely lost in thought about your abilities~”

“Hoh, my abilities, eh?” I asked with an amused raised eyebrow, disguising the frown that wanted to form on my face. “They’re pretty cool, right?”

“Hmm,” Tingyun studied me for a moment with a gaze I couldn’t recognize even with my abilities, before a smile grew on her face and she nodded. “Indeed, your abilities are very interesting, or ‘cool’ as you say.”

‘I want to run my sword through her chest, but I don’t know if that would be enough to kill her in one go, and if I fail, there’s the risk of our fight damaging the Matrix, which seems almost sacred to the Xianzhou,’ I inwardly thought, my finger twitching with the urge to summon Ryūjin Jakka before I willed myself to calm down.

‘Tsk, seems the best place to face her is in that place that’s important to the Vidyadhara, since there’s a lot of space to move around,’ I reasoned and just gave a smile to Tingyun, who giggled in response.

I was saved from having to respond as we finally reached Fu Xuan, who didn’t look too happy to see us, since it seemed she wasn’t the one to send Qingque to guide us here but instead the general Jing Yuan.

Nonetheless she was forced to bite her tongue and welcome us properly, since it seemed she needed help getting the Matrix of Prescience operational again by activating three terminals.

“Haah, of course it’s three,” I muttered with a roll of my eyes, getting an elbow to the ribs for my tone from March, which I ignored.

“Can’t they come up with another number? Why does it always have to be three? Why can’t it be one for a change, or two at least,” I continued my ramble, attracting everyone’s attention my way, with Fu Xuan looking at me with a twitching eyebrow for interrupting her.

“Please shut up,” March whispered to my side and elbowed me again, causing me to grunt with another roll of my eyes.

“Don’t mind me, I’m just pondering the secrets of the universe here. Please continue. You were about to ask something?” I said, waving away their looks and signaling for Fu Xuan to continue.

Taking a deep breath to calm her anger, Fu Xuan nodded before continuing where she left off. “Ahem, as I was saying, Qingque will accompany you. She’ll be in charge of restarting the terminals, and your job will be to guard her while she does so.”

Proving that March was a hypocrite, she suddenly leaned to my side and whispered to me, uncaring that Fu Xuan was listening to everything she said.

“Psst, Caelus… I hath divided our future, we’re destined to be errand runners… forever…” March said in a sassy tone, getting an amused grunt from me.

“They should really put that in the job description for the Nameless,” I said with a shake of my head before focusing on Fu Xuan again. “Anyway, I still haven’t heard the magic word.”

“…Wh-What? Which magic word?” Fu Xuan asked, looking truly stumped, as if we were being serious, getting a sigh from March before she answered.

“The universal one: ‘please,’” March answered with an exasperated tone.

Blushing in embarrassment, Fu Xuan became all tsun-tsun for a moment before taking a deep breath and muttering the word to where we just heard it.

“…Ugh… Please!”

“Haah, good enough. Come on, Caelus, let’s get this over with,” March said as she grabbed my sleeve and pulled me away.

“At this point, I should change my name to Caelus, the Unpaid Errand Runner,” I grumbled with a pout.

“Better get used to it. I don’t think that’s ever going away at this rate,” March muttered with a similar pout.

“You have my sympathies, Honored Guests. Truly.” Qingque muttered with an expression that she knew exactly what we felt.

Welt, the traitor, left us to the job under the excuse that he wanted to have a chat with Jing Yuan and Fu Xuan about something, and so we got to work.

“I can’t wait to be a senior member of the Nameless so I can pawn off this kind of work to the newbies,” I grumbled as we followed behind Qingque.

“Me and you both,” March mumbled in agreement.

=====

Several Hours Later

With some hard work and after taking out any enemies on the way, we soon finished restoring the temporal, spatial, and karma terminals to working order before making our way back to everyone.

As we reached Fu Xuan she turned to us with a smile for once.

“Well done, all of you. I can sense the Matrix of Prescience symbols re-illuminating. Now to interrogate Kafka. Those of you in the core may feel a few… impacts,” Fu Xuan said a bit mysteriously before turning to the side.

Just in time, Kafka could be seen walking toward us while being escorted by a bunch of Cloud Knights, and she sported the same amused smile from before, not seeming bothered at all despite her current circumstances.

“Hi mommy!” I waved cheerily toward her with a big smile on my face while cackling on the inside as a silence descended over the area.

Kafka even tripped for a second before regaining her footing and blinking at me strangely before smiling at me again, but this time her eyes clearly showed an amused expression.

“Fufufu, is that what you’re calling me? Not that I mind, but I’m afraid to say that I’m not your ‘mommy,’” Kafka responded calmly as she came to a stop before us.

I smiled wider at her and was about to respond with another cheeky remark, only to suddenly wince as a delicate hand came up and started pulling at my right cheek quite harshly.

“Could you please behave yourself for once!?” March whispered to me with a panicked glare as she nervously glanced at Fu Xuan and the Cloud Knights, who were still stunned at my words, before turning to me and pulling even harder.

“Do you want us to get arrested or something!? We finally got her to smile for once and then you go and pull this off! Apologize!” March whisper-shouted at me with a glare.

“Sowwy~” I muttered, my words coming out muffled due to her hand, but winced as March pulled harder.

“You don’t look sorry!”

Indeed, I didn’t. Why would I feel sorry for managing to get one up over Kafka and manage to actually surprise her to the point that she broke character for a second?

‘I only wish I thought ahead and was actually recording this so I could show Firefly and Wolfy later,’ I silently lamented as March finally let go of my cheek and huffed cutely while giving me the cold shoulder.

“Ahem, let’s proceed with the interrogation,” Fu Xuan said after a polite cough into her hand that caused Kafka to giggle, earning her a glare.

“Is this really necessary? I said I’d cooperate with you,” Kafka said with an amused smile.

“I have no interest in the words of wanted criminals, especially those skilled in the art of manipulation…” Fu Xuan responded back immediately before signaling with her head to the Cloud Knights, who escorted her to the center without a word.

Once Kafka was settled in place she turned to Fu Xuan and couldn’t help but tease her again.

“Then please, Master Diviner, witness my destiny,” she said almost mockingly, getting a huff from the petite woman.

Tired of her words, Fu Xuan stepped forward before her hands started glowing a deep magenta, and what appeared to me as a magic circle was suddenly visible over the whole platform as the machine started its work.

Kafka rose into the air with her eyes glowing a bright blue, but the woman remained calm as can be and even had the audacity to smirk at Fu Xuan as she was getting her mind read.

It was over in moments.

With a gasp, Fu Xuan suddenly stopped what she was doing and took a step back while breathing heavily and with wide eyes, seeming surprised at what she had found.

“That’s… why you’re here?” Fu Xuan asked with a broken gasp as she refilled her lungs with air.

Something happened then that caught me off guard, because I wasn’t expecting it and it hadn’t happened from what I remembered.

In one moment to the next, I felt a massive presence cast its gaze on me and didn’t have time to respond to the sudden shouts around me before my vision went dark.

When I could see again, I found myself in a familiar place. The same place where Nanook, and then Qlipoth, had gazed at me before.

I was seemingly floating in a sea of stars, and in the distance I could see a tornado of energy that seemed to call out to me.

Feeling the same gaze on me from before I lost consciousness, I turned around and suddenly froze in place and felt my shoulders become extremely heavy as a gigantic robot head glanced at me with its single glowing red eye.

‘That’s… Droidhead,’ I found myself thinking privately before wincing as a sharp pain suddenly hit my head, as if something was trying to talk to me but it was clear that our ways of communicating weren’t compatible.

As I held my head in pain, I was able to surprisingly make out a few words before I lost consciousness.

“Akivili… Is that really you?... What have you become?”

=====

Regaining consciousness with a loud gasp, I sat up while sweating profusely before I felt a gentle but firm hand hold my shoulders and a voice saying something to me.

Taking a moment to assess my situation, I saw that I was on the ground where I had been before, and around me were the worried faces of March, Welt, Qingque and Fu Xuan, who was looking at me as if I was the strangest animal imaginable.

“N-Nous,” I muttered as I finally regained my breath and calmed my breathing. “The Wisdomwalker gazed at me and I think wanted to talk to me,” I relayed, shaking the last of the dizziness I had.

“I-It talked to you!?” Fu Xuan was the first to ask, getting even closer to me and examining me closer with a strange look. “And you were able to understand what it said?”

“Not everything,” I said with another shake of my head, which caused her to relax for some reason. “It called me Akivili,” I revealed, getting a thoughtful hum from Welt and March to bite her lip in worry.

“What is it with you and always attracting the attention of the Aeons?” March asked gently as she grabbed my hand and gave it a gentle squeeze.

“I honestly don’t know,” I said with a sigh. “Maybe I’m Aeon catnip or something,” I continued with a lighter note, getting a snort from March but causing her to relax.

“Well, if you’re joking about something like that, then you must be fine,” March said, trying to sound reassuring, but the worried look never left her face.

“Never mind me, we can talk about that later. What about Kafka?” I asked curiously as I attempted to get up and was immediately helped by March, who offered her shoulder for support.

Before anyone could answer, my gaze was already seeking out the magenta-haired woman and found her in the same position, but with a clear difference.

I came to the realization that I still had my MS active, as I caught the clear look of worry Kafka was sending my way before it disappeared an instant later and was replaced by a calm look.

Giving her a subtle nod, I saw her shoulders become less tense and go back to her aloof attitude.

From the corner of my eye, I saw the new notification I had received.

[Feat Achieved! Nous of the Erudition personally gazed at you.]

[+1 Legendary Random Gacha Ticket.]

Combined with the Gold I had received from Tingyun, that made two tickets I had to roll.

That would come later, though, as now that everyone saw that I was fine and were no longer panicking as Nous was no longer casting its gaze on the Xianzhou, they all turned to me with different expressions.

None more worrying than the one Tingyun was currently giving me that caused a cold shiver to travel down my spine, since her smile didn’t look human at all.

‘Fuck, now what?’