Ashborn & Higokumaru VS Sirin (1)

Ashborn used all of his powers to teleport directly to Earth, more precisely to the Anti-Entropy headquarters.

Under the soaring sun Ashborn came out of the portal in the shadows before a second later he fell to his knees while panting and even spewing blood.

*Blurgh!*

He felt his head throbbing, his vision was blurred and even his body was covered in cold sweat and felt numb, the only thing he could feel was that his internal organs felt like they were being stirred up right now.

This was the result of forcing the use of the 'Shadow' ability in a bad condition.

Moreover, each one of 'Sirin's' attack accelerated the decay of the wound and slow down its regeneration.

Really, if it wasn't for the fact that he was a MANTIS, the wound would have killed him long ago...

Welt who saw Ashborn's state then asked with a worried expression.

"Ashborn! Are you alright?"

They were currently at the airstrip, where the Arahato was built.

It had taken a lot of energy to teleport to this place that was over hundreds of thousands of kilometers away from the moon, let alone doing it while injured quite badly.

"Hah... Hah... Hah. It's okay, as long as I get enough rest enough, I will recover..." Ashborn said before standing up slowly, he then took out some kind of serum from his shirt pocket before injecting it into his neck.

"Urk!" Ashborn grunted before spitting out blood, afterwards his expression became lighter than before or you could say he had passed the critical period, but he still needed medical help, it seemed like the serum was similar to the Health Potion possessed by Kouro.

"Sorry... I guess I wasn't very helpful in the previous battle..." said Welt with a guilty expression looking at Higokumaru who was already in a lifeless state.

From the moment they were trapped in the [Imaginary Space] he had no chance to do anything which made him feel like he was useless...

"Don't blame yourself." That was all that Ashborn said before turning to the side where Tesla, Einstein and Ryoma were approaching the two of them with worried expressions.

"Sovereign, are you alright?" Ryoma asked, he looked Welt up and down with a worried expression.

Welt nodded his head stiffly in response to his question.

Tesla's expression visibly changed as she looked at the pale body of Higokumaru who was being carried by Welt, a bad premonition immediately filled her mind making her unconsciously cover her mouth with her hand.

"No way... Higokumaru... She's..." she muttered, stammering.

"Her core Herrscher has been destroyed by the Second Herrscher, no-, the Herrscher of The End." Ashborn said weakly, his expression unable to be seen, he had put on his metallic white mask at some point.

" The Herrscher of The End?! " x3 shouted Ryoma, Einstein, and Tesla with shocked expressions.

The last Herrscher who was said to have defeated all the human's strongest warriors and repulsed all remaining humanity to hide in despair?

Did that mythical Herrscher really exist?!

(E/D: She does and right now she is staring at a d**k.)

The three of them then put on serious expressions.

Tesla was clutching her twintail while biting her lips with a thoughtful expression, it was a rare thing for Tesla who was known to have a slightly childish personality to become silent like that.

Einstein beside her is also wearing the same expression before looking at Welt and Ashborn, she realized that Kouro who was with the two of them was not with them.

'Perhaps...'

Thinking of this she then asked with a grim expression, "Kouro... What about him? Is he also..."

Ashborn and Welt's expressions soured when they heard her question, they both looked down stiffly remembering Kouro's last words.

["Goodbye."]

When Kouro said that... They both somehow felt like Kouro was saying goodbye for the last time as if...

'No! I can't think negatively like that! I believe that he is still alive!' Welt thought with a serious expression.

Einstein looked at Ashborn and Welt who were in a bad state, especially Ashborn who looked like he had just made it out of hell.

'Judging from their state, that is a certain variable that the loss is severe' Einstein thought with a serious expression.

Einstein didn't realize that the arrival of Kouro who came from another dimension had brought significant changes to the future of their world.

Ashborn who was sitting on the ground did not say anything he just said with a calm expression, "Call Miss Sakura here, she needs to know how Higokumaru is doing."

Welt stared at Ashborn for a long time before nodding his head heavily and said, "Alright... but before that you should rest here first." Ashborn did not say anything and just nodded his head.

Seeing Ashborn accept his invitation, Welt let out a sigh of relief, he turned to look at Ryoma and Einstein and told them to take Ashborn to the medical room to heal him...

Ashborn then stood up and followed the two of them, no one knew his expression behind the cold metallic mask.

__

At night, around 8pm in the medical room.

Ashborn could be seen meditating on the medical bed with his body looking quite recovered, plus his right hand seemed to have grown back.

As a MANTIS as long as he had enough rest, growing a severed arm was easy.

He was currently waiting for someone while thinking about the incident he experienced earlier.

'I had previously sent a message to Dr. Mobius and Otto about the second Herrscher that had reawakened as the Herrscher of the End and told them to be on alert for a possible attack by that Herrscher.' he thought calmly.

'But this is strange... Even up to this point I have not received a warning from Dr. Mobius or Otto that the Herrscher of the End had come to Earth... Does that mean Kouro managed to defeat her? No, if he had defeated her, he should have returned here or at least sent a message saying that he had defeated the Herrscher.'

Ashborn thought hard about why the Herrscher of the End did not return to Earth immediately.

'Is it possible because she would rather search for the remaining fragments of the Herrscher of the End's core rather than coming directly to Earth?'

This is the most plausible possibility, because Sirin previously obtained the second core fragment that possessed the consciousness of Herrscher of the End, therefore she may have been influenced by that consciousness and then chose to recover her strength first instead of satisfying her hatred for humanity.

Even so he felt that there was something off, he remembered the personality of 'Sirin' who although ruthless and cold but at the same time felt a little childish which was similar to the real Sirin.

It was as if... It was not Sirin who was influenced by the consciousness of the Herrscher of the End but rather the other way around...

At the thought of this, Ashborn immediately shook his head feeling it was impossible.

After all, Herrscher of the End is the strongest Herrscher second only to the Herrscher of Shadow who is capable of repelling humanity easily, there's no way it would mentally lose to an ordinary 12-year-old girl, right?

Just as he was thinking this, he sensed that there were several people who were standing in front of the door before entering inside and approached him.

Ashborn who had guessed who was coming then opened his eyes and looked at Welt, Einstein, Tesla and Sakura who were standing in front of him.

Sakura had actually come a few hours ago but did not come to him immediately because he was being treated in the medical room.

As for Ryoma himself, he was meeting his wife and daughter before bringing them to a safe place.

Seeing that they had arrived, Ashborn said, "Please sit down, I may know what you want to ask."

His eyes narrowed slightly with a bright purple light before recounting the chronology of how Herrscher Higokumaru's core was destroyed by 'Sirin'.

__

A few hours ago, in the dimension created by Sirin.

Ashborn opened his eyes and saw a beautiful but strange scene where giant purple-black colored debris was floating in the air with the lighting in this place also being a bit poor.

'This place... 'Imaginary Space'? Then this is serious, the development of the second Herrscher's abilities has exceeded my expectations...' Ashborn thought.

Even though he was thinking like that, his expression did not change at all.

He tried to look around and found no one anyone other than Higokumaru who was controlling Arahato...

Because the dimension they were in now had no vague gravitational attraction, the Arahato could easily levitate using the jets attached to its lower back.

'Kouro and Welt are not here, as for Higokumaru.... Well, she seems to be fine.... The problem now is that girl...' Ashborn thought calmly before slowly glancing at the Sirin that was flying in the air and looking at them with a haughty expression.

'I see, she's actually planning to separate us... This girl... Does she want to test me and Higokumaru? If she thinks that way that... She seems quite confident in her abilities in this place. ' Ashborn thought with a raised eyebrow.

He glanced at the robot Arahato before assuming an attack position facing Sirin with his eyes shining brightly.

'In that case.... Let's see how far her abilities have developed!'

Ashborn instantly shot off at high speed while moving in a zigzag manner using the purple stones around him as a pedestal.

*Swoosh!*

Sirin's Eye followed Ashborn's movements while firing hundreds of white spears that had been enhanced using the [Time] ability.

Unfortunately, all of her attacks which were fatal attacks only barely hit Ashborn.

Ashborn seemed to be able to dodge Sirin's fatal attacks even from his blind spot as if he had eyes in the back of his head.

'How is that possible?! That attack I launched had a speed beyond sound! But how was he able to avoid everything?' Sirin thought in surprise.

She subconsciously glanced at Arahato (Higokumaru) who had just been if a robot if not for the eyes that lit up and stared at her, she would have thought that Higokumaru had gone into hiding.

'Even so, I still have to be wary of her, no matter what... She has 50,000+ years of life experience...'

Just when she thought that her intuition suddenly felt a premonition of death nearby that made her breathing faltered.

*Ting!*

Her pupils stared at a knife that was a few inches away from her faltering face, luckily her energy shield stopped the fatal blow.

With a furious face, Sirin pointed her hand at the Ashborn before unleashing a storm of corrosive black mist.

[Vortex of Serenity]

The black mist that originated from Herrscher of Death's ability to reduce the body to dust, an attack that is fatal to all living beings except for Kouro who had full immunity.

Seeing the black mist, Ashborn immediately jumped backwards away, but unfortunately the mist followed him and quickly enveloped him.

["Ashborn!"] Higokumaru shouted in a worried tone.

"Hahahah~ That guy was not bad, but unfortunately he has drawn my ire and therefore died in eternal misery!" After saying that, Sirin then looked at Higokumaru with a confident smile.

"Really?"

"What?!" Sirin expression instantly changed, she looked back at Ashborn who was wrapped in a storm of black mist.

"Humph!" Ashborn opened his hands in sync, as the storm of black mist began to gather in both hands before spreading out quickly.

"How is that possible?! A secret technique? You humans are cheating!"

Sirin shouted with a look of disbelief.

Ashborn looked down at his palm which was slightly peeling from Sirin's attack and muttered, "I'm really bad at using martial arts. "

He then raised his head to look at Sirin and set up a fighting stance while pulling out a pair of knives before saying calmly.

"I'm not cheating, Sirin, I'm just using a human martial art that you consider weak."

"I admit it Sirin, the development of your strength has surpassed my estimation. Therefore, I will fight you seriously from now on." said Ashborn before the shadows under his feet spread out and formed 8 clones that had the same appearance as him.

He had added the concepts of [Mimicry] and [Puppet] to his shadow so that currently Ashborn was controlling the other 8 shadow clones using his mind.

Adding two concepts to his shadow was the limit.

Although he arrogantly said the basic ability of 'shadow' are to change concepts, add concepts, and distort concepts.

Ashborn's own skills in the use of basic shadow abilities are actually mediocre, he can only add or change the concept of shadows simply.

Although it looked similar, the purpose of creating 'shadow' ability was not the same as Herrscher of Reason who can manifest something that has been understood.

The 'shadow' ability is something unique that no other Herrscher has.

Ashborn, unfortunately, was not the Herrscher of Shadow so, he does not know the unique ability of 'shadow'.

He can only use the basic 'shadow' abilities, and this was not because Dr. Mobius' experiment failed but because the new Herrscher of Shadow had been predetermined from the beginning.

But that's okay, having the ability of a Herrscher is more than enough.

On the other hand, Higokumaru looked at Ashborn with her eyes slightly widened.

She knew the martial art being used by Ashborn.

[Edge of Taixuan]

A martial art created by Hua for the people of the 'Current Era' so that it can fight equally against the Honkai Beast.

But... When did Ashborn learn that martial art?

From what she knew, Hua had never again taught the true [Edge of Taixuan] to others ever since she was betrayed by her disciples, let alone to someone like Ashborn.

Hmm... Is it possible that World Serpent secretly learned the martial art? But somehow it didn't feel right... Perhaps...

The truth is that Ashborn was at one time taught the martial art by one of one of Hua's disciples.

Just as she was thinking this, he saw Ashborn's Ashborn's body that was enveloped in shadow before suddenly the air of his existence disappeared.

'What is he doing? ' Higokumaru thought, she currently wanted to help but her help was not needed.

If she forcefully helped, she would only become a burden on Ashborn, therefore she was only observing because she wanted to confirm something.

Was it true that the Will of Honkai was helping Sirin?

And if so, then why?

Because of these questions, she wanted to observe what Will of Honkai would do as Sirin faced a fateful death.

"I hope... I don't need to use that... "

...

Sirin stared at Ashborn with his indistinguishable clones and said haughtily, "Hmph! Little trick! No matter how many there are of you still won't be able to defeat me."

She instantly fired hundreds of white spears from various sides and not only that, but she also let out invisible wind bullets that were millions of times denser than ordinary air.

*Swoosh!!!*

Seeing the attack Higokumaru immediately picked up a purple stone with a diameter of more than twenty meters before throwing it towards Sirin or rather in the direction of her attack.

*Swoosh!*

The stone shot out like an arrow, but unfortunately the stone was instantly shattered into pieces upon hitting some of Sirin's attacks.

*Crack!*

But from the start, Higokumaru threw the stone not as an attack... Rather as a deterrent and sure enough...

Sirin who originally wanted to attack Higokumaru after interfering in her fight, suddenly had an expression of discovering that behind the thick dust the existence of Ashborn and his clones had disappeared.

"Where is he?"

Sirin looked around with a vigilant expression, as a result of the Ashborn's eerie disappeared by using the 'shadow' ability, she had no other choice but to raise her energy shield defense to the maximum level sufficient to withstand Kouro's ultimate attack without the slightest the slightest crack.

She also secretly made a [Vortex of Serenity] in her hand just in case against Ashborn's assassin attacks.

Sirin's moving eyes looked around before her pupils shrank, feel a speck of killing intent from behind her.

She instantly increased her reaction speed making the world come to stopped, no, slowed down before glancing back to see Ashborn with his knife that had pierced through her energy shield like tofu.

Seeing that her shield could be penetrated with such ease, Sirin raised her eyebrows, 'This guy... He Didn't fight seriously against me before?'

Thinking this, she then cast [Vortex of Serenity] towards Ashborn who was moving like a snail.

Not only that, to make sure Ashborn was really dead, she fired a wind bullet that could easily penetrate the strongest metal on earth, let alone a human body.

*BANG!*

Sirin could imagine Ashborn's body that was perforated by the wind bullets and corroded as if exposed to sulfuric acid.

"Die!"

(E/D: We are back in business boys. See you next time.)