Governor Jesmine de Ville is dressed in fine attire and stands tall, as if he were standing on the set of a live show around the world, or on the dance floor of high society.

Beside her, however, were rough stone reliefs, twisted alien statues, dust that floated freely unattended, and mountains of bones.

Used as a ritual sacrifice, twisted, mutated into an inhuman, soulless skeleton of a Jestar civilian.

This is the so-called "Ancient Ruins" located in the central part of the inner city of the first city of Jestal and is not open to the public. And the reason why this space is not open to the public is simple and straightforward:

It was the place where all kinds of rituals were performed with forbidden knowledge, and it was also the place where her sins originated.

It all stems from a desire to increase production, a serendipitous archaeology, a gamble of hope, and a once ambiguous connivance.

It no longer makes sense to look back and remember how she dragged herself and the entire planet down the abyss, step by step. The clock had struck midnight, the ninth day of the celebration had arrived, and Jaystar had been locked away from the outside world under the spells of Tzeentch demons, accelerated by another round of sacrifice.

Jessamine DeVille could sense it all.

This may be the kind of evil taste that the Tzeentch demon insisted on that had taken over Raj Hastin's shell, but had now mutated it to the point where it was completely unrecognizable. Somehow, it gave Deville, who was standing here, the ability to see everything that was happening on this planet.

She knew how all the inhabitants of the planet struggled under the radio speeches, how chaotic pollution eroded their souls with impunity, and how the dark sky in the middle of the night gradually dyed with the chaotic and magnificent brilliance of subspace when the bell rang.

She was forced to look at the fruits of the mistakes she had made.

She forced herself to keep watching. Not only because of Tzeentch's demonic spells that she could only watch, but also because she thought it was her duty to keep watching.

She could only watch.

These sights hurt her heart, drove her madness, made her want to scream, made her wish to stop - if she could seize every possible opportunity, she was sure that she would not hesitate to turn these ideas into reality, even if it cost her life, even if it was to crush her soul, even if it was burned by fire a thousand times, even if it was tortured by evil things for thousands of years.

But under the confines of spells, she couldn't do anything. She couldn't move, she couldn't speak, she couldn't cry, she couldn't even show anger.

She could only stand there like a living statue, silently watching everything happen, everything sinking, everything falling to the point of no return. The Tzeentch Demon, who was no longer human, was excitedly muttering whispers in place that she didn't understand and didn't want to understand, and she was deprived of even the right not to look at it by magic, and the only thing she was allowed to be free was her thoughts.

But what can a mere mind do?

Jaystar has become an isolated island, foreign aid cannot exist, and the defense force of the planet's native has long been polluted by rituals, and everything is held in the palm of the hand by the demon. After all, the moment she began to realize that something was wrong, she was actually already out of control.

Governor de Ville wanted to close his eyes in the silence of remorse. But she couldn't do such a simple action.

She was never a devout Anglican. In the early years, worship and prayer were only coping, and after taking office on the remote and barren planet of Jestal, he was unwilling to maintain even verbal respect because of all kinds of difficulties and grievances. And at this moment, she prayed silently with the unprecedented devotion in her life:

O God-Emperor, please punish my sins.

I do not ask for forgiveness, only for the Holy Flame to consume all the fruits of sin.

— and then, the flames fell from the sky, dragging their long golden trails towards her.

Immediately, there was a great earthquake.

-----------------

Fujimaru Rika used the flames released by Karna's magic power release skill as a power, and was quite stable suspended in mid-air more than ten meters above the ground, looking down at the big crater on the ground.

Heaven and earth conscience, this pit is really not all her responsibility.

She did descend directly from the height of low-earth orbit, and the potential energy generated in the process did give her a destructive power comparable to that of a meteorite falling to the ground, and she did deliberately smash herself on it after aiming at the target - but this crater was not a crater created by her "landing", at least most of it was not.

She had memorized the location when she had previously consulted the map of the First City: the "Ancient Ruins" of the Great Expedition, with a meeting square in front of it, a memorial that doubled as a museum, and then the ruins themselves that had sunk into the ground—of course, they were buried when they were excavated 10,000 years ago, and Governor de Ville obviously didn't want to spend manpower and material resources to move the buried complex dozens of meters above ground to the ground.

Therefore, this pit that surrounds the main body of the ruins originally existed. Rika Fujimaru could only claim that she was responsible for the nearby sculptures, decorations, or marble tiles that were smashed and blown into pieces by the shockwave, and that the pit itself had nothing to do with her.

-However, the impact of our landing was real, and it caused a subsidence of about 20 centimeters of the surrounding surface. -

-Karna, although I know that you are concerned about my physical condition, it is okay not to say this kind of thing so clearly. -

Rika Fujimaru folded her arms in mid-air, staring at the edge of the building's roof, glazed by the heat and impact.

Of course, it is impossible for this kind of chaos to use oneself as a cannonball without causing damage to oneself, but with sufficient energy, after unfolding Karna's Helama Armor Treasure, the protection of the Ortenus Lingji exoskeleton itself is completely enough to withstand the remaining little aftermath.

But it was to be expected that she herself was not harmed, and it was a problem that the ancient building that she targeted was unscathed: in all fairness, even if a meteorite of her size fell to the ground from 2,000 kilometers away, it would not only cause such a little damage, not to mention that in order to shorten the time required to land and increase the damage, she was still using magic to release the momentum of her own fall to push the afterburner.

In fact, the reason is not difficult to think, it is nothing more than that the building itself has been added with a spell shield. If it's a master who does this, it's really a matter of using psionic energy alone to make this kind of spell protection out of thin air like a void shield, if not, then make some limited compromises such as "only enter through a specific entrance" and deliberately leave the empty door, in exchange for an increase in the protection strength of other directions - this kind of protective enchantment type spell is almost the same no matter where it is, even if it is a different world.

- Well, that's how it should be normally true, but how do you say it...... It's a little too uninspiring. -

After a brief observation of the procedure, Rika Fujimaru complains that she didn't see anything, but in reality, she didn't really need to see anything. She had only one purpose in mind - to smash the building that was the centerpiece of the ritual.

-Judging from the distribution of energy, it seems that there is a gap at the main entrance of the building that can be entered. -

-Why do you have to go in, I can imagine what kind of otherworldly murder maze it will be laid out inside. I don't want to do what the enemy wants. -

Rika Fujimaru raised her hand in midair.

-Judging from the fact that the aftermath of the impact did cause damage to the edges of the building, this protection is not expected to be too strong. Anyway, this time you don't have to think about the problem of mana reserves, and it should be easier to blow it up with force. -

Karna has no objection to this - he is not the only one that can be used on the offensive end:

A golden spear appeared out of thin air in Fujimaru Ritsuka's hand, and immediately after, flames gushed out from the tip of the spear, completely covering the entire body of the spear.

Fujimaru Rika raised the flame spear and aimed it at her target:

-Brahmastra Kundala, O Brahmastra Kundala-

-----------------

"Something is wrong! Wrong! That's not right! ”

Zes Chati flapped the newly grown wings on his shell, and let out a high-pitched cry like a clown.

It should have stripped away all possible variables, its plans should have been foolproof, but why—the Throne Envoy!

It realized its mistake in an instant, and it let out a howl of joy or anger.

Unforeseen changes! It had thought that the Throne Envoy was merely like the other Imperial Inquisitors, with the power to mobilize the majority of the armed forces, but not to worry about when alone. If she really has the ability to trace it all to its source, then Zes Chatty has prepared a good reception for her in this ruin—but, but!

Its nine pairs of eyes allowed it to peer through the dome of the building and into the distant canopy. It saw the golden thread speeding down from above, and realized that the ritual it had constructed to lock the entire planet was no longer perfect, but had been forcibly burned into a tiny hole that could connect to the outside world.

If it had been a few minutes ago, it would have dared to say that such a small hole was not a cause for concern. As the ritual itself progresses further, such a small flaw will naturally be healed by the gentle waves of the High Heaven. But—there is no need to be tempted, and Zes Chati is well aware that the golden thread is destined to be incomparably stubborn.

It was the manifestation of the power of the damned, the blessing given to the 'Throne Envoy'.

If it had known in advance that it was a lackey of the Corpse Emperor...... This kind of lackey who has been favored will inevitably be more attentive to the little thing that slams the door outside - alas, there is no what if.

The earth is trembling.

With the euphoria of "discovering an unforeseen change" and the regret that "the plan is about to fail again", Zes Chati screamed loudly in the throat of the shell, which had completely mutated to the point of being almost like a bird.

Immediately afterward, it discovered what was happening on the outside through its own psionic acuity.

It flung out its tentacles, tucked its staff back into its hands, and frantically chanted incantations to reinforce the building's protections—how could anyone who wanted to break the core of the ritual enter through the main entrance unruly and lift the roof instead! But the current situation is still in its favor: the ritual is still working, and the entire planet of Jestal is slowly sinking into the warm embrace of the High Heavens. As long as he can drag on time-

Then the earth shook again.

The second attack that landed on the ruins' defenses was much higher than the first.

In her terror, she could clearly feel that the barrier she had set up was shattering.

In the Tzeentch Demon, its achievements in spells can indeed only be regarded as mediocre, but that is also the result of a horizontal comparison among the Tzeentch Demons. In the evaluation criteria of human beings, the protective spells it sets up are naturally called extremely subtle and tight, not only in terms of defense power is at the first-class level, but even in the face of the attack of energy weapons, it can also absorb a part of the energy from the opponent's attack, and feed it back into the spell, making the defense stronger.

It was tested. After that, it complacently believed that the spell was impossible to break with a weapon held by a human. But now, it realizes that it may have drawn arbitrary conclusions without having seriously researched all the weapons in the Empire.

At the moment, its barrier was indeed crumbling: not because of its complacent defensive spells, but because of the energy it drew from enemy attacks—it had never thought about what would happen if its own spells absorbed the energy of the cursed.

It has to think about it now.

Zes Chatti twitched and danced wildly on the ground with a frenzied demeanor, and let out a loud shrill scream of cholera consciousness. It's hard to understand what it's doing so mad from a human perspective, only it knows that it's modifying its proud protective spells on the spot.

Nine syllables, nine keys, nine variations, nine deductions. The overlap of nine and nine gives birth to nine, and the nine branches of nine extend to infinity all around. Zeth Chati devoted all his energy to this one spell, and all of its mutated eyes stared into the void beyond human intelligence, scrutinizing the subtle changes in any of its psionic paths and their possible subsequent developments.

It's focused, and that's a good thing, because it's focused on stopping the decay of this protective spell and restoring the building's defenses; But this focus is also a bad thing -

Behind it, Jessamine Deville slowly picked up the ceremonial dagger on the altar.

Zes Chati was too focused. It threw itself so engrossed in the spells of wrestling with the Corpse Emperor's servants that it forgot that it had a prisoner who was also controlled by the spells.

In the education of the empire, a certain degree of cold weapon martial arts was quite promoted. Jesmine Deville was not intended to serve in any form of military service, so he did not take it seriously, and only learned a little about self-defense in his own youth.

But this little bit, driven by the flames of hatred and anger burning in her heart, was enough:

As if with divine help, she seized a fleeting moment and lunged at it, stabbing the ritual dagger deep into the demon's chest.