Chapter 7237: The Unmaking

A small part of Venerable Rosa Orfan recognized that she was dying.

Darkness and disorder had taken over much of her body.

Her limbs had fallen entirely to the strange miasma that defied her understanding.

Her torso had largely fallen to its way, with only her heart and part of her lungs still remaining in pristine condition.

Her head also remained her own. As the center of her mind and will, she was better able to resist the advance of darkness.

Helping to resist the encroaching darkness was her companion spirit, yet this addition only delayed the encroaching tide.

How long could she fend off the invasion?

She had already lost a lot of strength. Her willpower continued to deflate while her resolve weakened with every passing second.

Her fighting spirit grew dull while the fire in her heart threatened to snuff out entirely.

She was not doing a good job of serving as a model for all mech pilots at the moment.

An expert pilot was not just a warrior. He or she was meant to serve as a symbol and a source of inspiration. Each of them exemplified the possibility that every mech pilot possessed a seed of greatness in themselves.

For an expert pilot like herself to falter and become consumed by her own doubts was an intolerable flaw.

Though Rosa Orfan still possessed enough of a willingness to live that she was able to stem the foreign invasion that had taken over much of her manifestation, her resistance continued to weaken.

Perhaps the only reason why her will and personality had not fractured entirely at this time was because the invader had slowed its pace in order to digest the parts of herself more thoroughly.

Memories started to fade. It became increasingly harder to maintain what scrap of awareness that was left. She knew that she was being unmade, starting from her most vulnerable portions of herself.

She should be fighting back against this encroachment. She should have defied the attempt to take over everything that made her Rosa Orfan and repel the invader. A true expert pilot would push back no matter the price and fight for any chance of survival, no matter how fleeting!

Rosa Orfan understood all of that, yet could not gather the motivation to resist.

It was as if this part of herself had gotten devoured first. She was unraveling with every passing second. Her humanity had turned into a buffet which the foreign invader devoured at a slow but inexorable pace.

“Yes. Continue to wallow in your weaknesses and your failings. You disgust me. As soon as I have completed my absorption of everything that belongs to you, I shall take your place and become the sole and undisputable master of the Riot Mark III. Not even the mech designers of this weapon of war shall deprive me from claiming this superdimensional mech.”

Rosa raised her head just enough to see that Saint Dise and Venerable Jannzi had disappeared.

They no longer voiced their criticism and disappointment at Venerable Orfan. They had stopped caring for the woman they once regarded as a close friend and comrade. They couldn’t be bothered to waste their time on her. She was a lost cause to them as far as they were concerned.

That only left one more individual to describe her failings.

Herself.

The mirror version of Rosa Orfan possessed a completely different demeanor.

It, or she, looked like her, but in a less definable way. Her body and expression were difficult to observe because they were subjected to a slightly familiar interference effect.

That made it a lot harder to read their meanings and intentions. This shrouded version of herself did reveal enough of her face to understand that she was grinning in a gleeful manner.

“You are weak and unqualified to pilot the Riot Mark III.” The alternative Rosa spoke with sadistic undertones. “Your first at interfacing with the mech is a catastrophe. You completely lack the strength and mental fortitude to tame this machine. How pathetic. The Riot Mark iII is made for you. Despite the irregularities that occurred, you should still have been able to take control over it. Instead, your negative progress condemns you. It is clear that you are not ace pilot material.”

“…”

The real Rosa Orfan slowly narrowed her eyes. She knew that she had to feel an intense emotion at this time, but she could not come up with the idea of what she had exactly lost.

That only made the false Rosa Orfan more gleeful. “You have done your duty, if only barely. Your career is over, and so is your life. Let me take over in your stead. I am stronger, more confident and will never make the mistakes that have dragged your heels. Let me be your successor. You no longer deserve to live anymore. Embrace your death so that your body and your willpower can be used for greater purposes.”

The foggy miasma continued to devour the real Orfan’s torso, even beginning to penetrate into the heart.

However, since her manifestation was not a real physical body, the heart did not play an especially great role.

What truly mattered was her head or more specifically her brain.

This was the true remaining bastion of her personality, her life and her existence.

Rosa truly thought about handing it all over to this invader who had taken on a distorted version of her visage.

What was the point of further resistance?

She had recognized that she was unworthy to become an ace pilot.

Her grand attempt to corner herself into breaking through was a plan made out of hubris from the very start.

She lacked the strength and conviction to earn her way to sainthood. If her confidence crumbled so easily after a single round of self-reflection, then what was the point of resisting any further?

At least this invader would be able to do a better job. Whether the conqueror of her own strength and body would be willing to pledge her loyalty to the Larkinson Clan was not her problem anymore.

She couldn’t bring herself to care about the Larkinsons. Perhaps she never really cared about them in the first place. She had few friends among them. Her relationships with her closest peers had weakened due to distance and other reasons. She wouldn’t be missed. She was certain of that. She was too worthless to make anyone shed a tear for her passing.

“I…” The real Rosa Orfan opened her mouth for what may be the last time. “I… give up. You win. You can have it all. I hope that you can do more with what I have than a loser like myself.”

Tears leaked from her manifested eyes, yet Rosa Orfan did not understand why she was shedding them in the first place.

Perhaps a fading part of herself recognized the gravity of her decision, but what little that she had left could not process such emotions anymore.

She felt nothing. Her capacity to feel emotions had mostly unraveled while her thoughts grew increasingly more foggy.

Soon, all of her thoughts and emotions would fade entirely. That would be the moment her existence passed on entirely.

As the manifestation of Rosa Orfan continued to succumb to the invader, the false version of herself saw no need to speak any further.

The intruder had already grasped the fruits of her victory.

As the tide of corruption threatened to devour the last scraps of light that was left of the original Rosa Orfan, it suddenly ceased.

This was not due to mercy on the invader’s end.

Rosa Orfan also did not manage to regain enough lucidity to put up a sudden resistance.

Instead, the final wave of conquest and subversion crashed against a barrier that thrummed with the power of space.

A third party had intervened.

This should not be possible.

As pathetic and weak as Rosa Orfan had become, a third party shouldn’t have been able to barge in and intervene in this power struggle.

What was happening?

The third party did not keep both sides waiting for long. The new presence emerged from the most core parts of Rosa Orfan’s remaining soul.

A small manifestation of Qilanxo had arrived.

The reptilian creature turned design spirit had detected Venerable Orfan’s dire state, and forcefully intervened to save the woman that she had bonded with many years ago on the surface of a forgotten planet from the old galaxy!

The small manifestation of Qilanxo did not just project a barrier to halt the invader’s progress.

The design spirit also turned to whatever was left of the real Rosa Orfan and encouraged her to fight back and survive!

The false Rosa Orfan sneered at the last-second intervention of a design spirit. “Begone, creature. You are not welcome here. This wretch is not worth your attention. She is a weak and pathetic failure of an expert pilot. I will do better than her. I won’t even need your protection anymore. As soon as I find the anchor of your connection to her, I shall relish the act of severing it. The mere fact that it still exists is another mark of failure. Expert pilots must rely on themselves to surpass their limitations. They can lean on design spirits such as you in order to save them from their own failings. Begone!”

Qilanxo’s alien eyes glared at the false Rosa Orfan with animosity.

“What are you looking at, you beast?” The apparent invader taunted the design spirit. “Do not think you can bluff me into surrendering. Your connection with Rosa is limited. You can only channel so much of your strength. Even now, your barrier is weakening by the second. I will have my prize sooner or later. Even if you combine your feeble power with this failure of an expert pilot, it is far too late for you to launch a counterattack. My conquest is inevitable.”

The design spirit could not refute the truth of this hostile entity’s words. She was indeed unable to bring more than a tiny fraction of her full might to bear. Just establishing this connection under the current circumstances was already arduous enough.

Yet Qilanxo never thought to rely on brute force. She disregarded the false woman and addressed the real Rosa Orfan.

The design spirit never communicated by verbalizing human words. She preferred to communicate in a more direct fashion by passing on entire ideas and impressions.

Though it was difficult for the real Rosa to interpret Qilanxo’s message, the method of information transmission made it a lot easier for her to understand the design spirit’s revelations.

According to Qilanxo, Rosa Orfan was not weak. She was strong.

“I… am not… weak.”

So what if she was not as skilled as Saint Dise? Every pilot had their own strengths. Mediocre skill was not the end of the universe for them. Ace pilots had other ways to excel in combat. Strong enthusiasm and guts could often compensate for careful planning and execution!

“I am not… worthless.”

Venerable Rosa Orfan mattered to the Larkinsons. She had fought to defend the clan when it was still weak and vulnerable. Her contributions to the early battles played a decisive role in letting it grow to a much greater height.

Even now, her importance was still significant, as she could still protect a lot of clansmen as an expert pilot and carried the possibility of becoming an even greater guardian.

“You… are not the intruder.”

Qilanxo divulged the truth. The multi-century old beast may not be as strong or full of knowledge like some of the other design spirits, but she had her own strengths.

The facade created by the false Rosa Orfan did not fool the beast for a second.

Now that the design spirit pointed it out, the real Rosa Orfan or what was left of her suddenly felt as if a fog had lifted from her eyes.

She suddenly realized the actual truth.

Venerable Orfan thought that the hostile ghost who appeared and took on the guise of Dise, Jannzi and a different version of herself was the demon that she set out to conquer.

Yet that was not the case at all. The truth was so much different from what she imagined.

The demon did not invade her soul directly. Instead, according to Qilanxo, the Prophet’s Bane had somehow tampered with a small part of her soul before sitting back and waiting for it to develop into a new and corrupted version of herself!

In other words, Rosa Orfan had actually been arguing with herself all this time!

A spark of anger ignited in the parts of her soul that remained untouched.

This spark rapidly turned into a blaze as Rosa suddenly managed to regain the ability to experience intense fury.

“You…. BASTARD!”

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