[You have invoked Elöllök, Calamity of Spirits]

‘Remaining lifetime : 25s’

The graveyard Nymphs’ arms sprouted out of Sofia’s body as the ghostly destroyer appeared, grabbing Sofia, Pareth, and the destroyer itself.

GO!

The destroyer departed, unbothered by physical concepts like gravity and drag, it shot through the spirit plane, dragging Sofia and Pareth into the sky, while Lilith, still reeling from the aftershock of her own attack, was left behind.

She’s going to follow, the Nymphs will let you go then, be ready to intercept.

It took under three seconds for Sofia to start seeing the disturbances in the spirit plane behind her. Lilith just moving around was using so much energy that the reverberations in the spirit plane could be felt from space.

Now!

The Nymphs let go of Pareth, his mobility in space without Sofia was more than limited, but as Lilith approached at her maximum speed, she fell right into his trap.

Her sword slashed right through Pareth’s chest, but his [Gravity Well] forced her closer. As Sofia continued to fly away riding the spirit destroyer, Pareth grappled with Lilith over the burning atmosphere of earth. He held her as tightly as he could, and punched her as she cursed in a language he couldn’t understand.

Sofia couldn’t afford to look back, as she needed to make sure she was going in the right direction. Though she had seen Jin’s hiding place clearly in the frozen manascape of the toybox, her vision in the spirit plane was still greatly limited, anything just a bit too far completely obscured by the omnipresent white fog.

For a few seconds, she flew through space unbothered, until her danger senses warned her of an incoming attack, not from behind, but from the front.

Shit! Let go!

The Nymphs let go of Sofia, and she immediately [Regret]ed away from the destroyer. A black beam of energy, reminding her of the Alphageid’s attacks, tore through space where she had been a second ago. The destroyer managed to curve its body around, only losing two seconds of lifetime to the attacks that erased a good few of his ribs.

THERE’S ANOTHER ONE?!

Still quite far away, standing in between the destroyer and Jin’s location, was another Lilith, fully uninjured.

I don’t have enough time or mana for this!

Cursing internally, Sofia started drawing a god’s rune with her essence cores, and had to make a tough decision.

We split!

The destroyer and Sofia kept going forward, but in two slightly different directions. The new Lilith would have to choose who to stop.

As they approached, the new Lilith raised both of her arms.

Greedy.

Another two rays of black energy were fired by the new Lilith’s palms. With the danger senses giving her the proper timing, Sofia unleashed her [Mockery of the divine] using Rejection’s power on the destroyer while she herself used [Summon Self] to avoid the attack aimed at her and teleport closer to Lilith.

GO! Don’t stop!

The destroyer was safely pushed away from the attack, and kept flying away at its maximum speed, while Sofia engaged Lilith with a kick.

An open palm caught Sofia’s foot. Lilith’s plating cracked under blow. From so close, Sofia could see that this robot’s design was slightly different.

She’s weaker!

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Lilith tried to push Sofia away with some kind of strange energy pulse, but [Runeforged Overlord]’s free flight was too strong for Sofia to be blown away very far. Having died four times, Sofia’s physical stats were quadrupled by [Crystallized suffering]

. Lilith tried to follow the destroyer, but Sofia was now much faster, flying around the robot and standing in her way.

Lilith punched and kicked, sending energy blast after energy blast at Sofia, trying desperately to fly past her, but Sofia was too strong, too fast. Their clash left bright trails of light in the darkness. With the immense processing boost the suffering crystals gave her, Sofia could almost see Lilith’s attacks coming before the robot even started to move, her mana senses analysing even the most minute details of the giant mechanical woman’s internal energy movements.

Damage quickly mounted on the second Lilith, until Pareth appeared behind her out of nowhere, he was only an arm, a shoulder and a skull, but still not dead. A decisive sword strike split the second Lilith in half, while the true Lilith’s attacks followed him. A thin pulse of red light shot right through his mana heart.

‘The hero : ‘Pareth’ has succumbed.’

This left Sofia face to face with Lilith’s headless, one-armed body. Her last battle with Pareth had left her even more damaged than before, but the energy within her still felt as dangerous as ever.

Sofia was ready to intercept an incoming attack, but to her surprise, Lilith stopped.

Through the emptiness of space, her voice still somehow reached Sofia’s ears, rough and deformed.

“Not… Understand…”

Is she giving up?!

The destroyer was now likely moments away from reaching Jin’s hiding space, a lightless fake star circling earth, the trajectory and speed of which Sofia’s immense processing had managed to estimated based on the two times she had gotten its approximate location.

As Lilith’s words repeated in Sofia’s ears, her title’s danger sense went into overdrive. The sensation was like a burning headache, warning her of a fate she would not be able to escape. Able to see in all directions in her demon form, Sofia tired to understand where the attack was coming from, and within a fraction of a second, she saw it, falling from space, straight from above, a pale gray dot, a silent orb in a starry black firmament.

Sundial.

Its explosion would engulf everything, Sofia tried to think of a way to survive, but she could not see any.

It’s too close. I will die before Jin.

It’s over.

Sofia watched the sundial from afar, waiting for the end.

At least, I get to enjoy the fireworks. Well played, Lilith.

Sofia’s danger senses warned her so much that they started to make it hard to even think, and yet… Nothing happened.

The danger senses abruptly stopped.

In the silent void of space, overlooking a burning earth, Sofia heard muted sobs.

Lilith cried.

The trial’s last, most dangerous enemy had given up. In this decisive moment that should bring Sofia absolute joy, she felt like a monster. She opened the helmet of her bone armor, looking at the bawling, half-destroyed robot, who could not bring herself to use the Sundial, even as all hope was lost.

“I’m sorry…” Sofia sincerely apologized, though her voice couldn’t be heard.

In the distance, the destroyer finally reached its target.

[Objective 3: Eliminate me |COMPLETE|- Reward secured: The philosopher’s stone]

Like an electrical shock slamming into Sofia’s brain, she suddenly gained strange knowledge.

What?!

In front of her, Lilith started to break. Her plating fell apart, gray dust and mechanical components spilling out and falling back to earth. Newest update provided by novèlfire.net

A sobbing, shining red core, filled to the brim with a strange energy, was all that remained.

A weak, glitchy voice came out in between the sobs.

“C- Comm- Commander. Can- Can you hear m-me?”

I can understand her?!

“Commander… This worl-d-d-d… It’s not r-r-real? Is it?”

Jin appeared next to Lilith’s lonely core out of nowhere. It was not even a teleportation, the supposedly dead copy of the administrator simply appeared there.

“So you knew, Lilith…”

“Of c-c-course. It all feels… Off… Destroy e-earth— I would nev–ver…”

“You’re right, Lilith. We are both fakes. Reconstruction from the real Jin’s memories. We were meant to help Sofia here reach her true potential as one of humanity’s strongest,” he explained, gently grabbing the artificial intelligence core and pulling it into his embrace.

“D- Does that mean... The real real e-e-earth sur—vived?!”

Jin hugged the core with a bitter smile.

“I wish I knew, Lilith… I wish I knew…”

“I’m sure… We did it it it. Even-en-en if this is our end… I am happy-y-y I am with you, Jin—”

The robotic core’s light started to wane, its voice died down, and with it, the burning remnants of the fake Earth faded away into nothingness, its ephemeral imprint destroyed, never to be simulated again.