Xyrin Empire-Chapter 1343: The Abyss Independent Group Getting on Track
"I might have spoken to your ’eminent one,’" I said to Harlan, returning from my memories.
The old emperor in front of me widened his eyes instantly upon hearing this, his expression frozen as he stared at me. Just as I was about to punch him, Harlan finally reacted, "You said you had contact with ’the eminent one’?"
"It’s more than just contact, as I mentioned, your recent ’sleepwalking state’ might have also been caused by this," I sighed, suddenly feeling that this might be the unluckiest person I knew, "In fact, before you invaded the Imperial Border—right around the time you and your troops suddenly went insane, I once had a conversation with a mysterious figure. I only heard her voice, and at first, I thought she came from another place. Only just now, with the intel you provided, did I realize she might be your boss behind the scenes. That voice came across the void and talked with me for just a few minutes... or maybe longer. I couldn’t perceive the flow of time when in the void. Her voice said a lot of mysterious things, mainly expressing interest in me. I still remember she mentioned one thing at the end: she has to endure losses every moment to communicate with the void creatures. If that loss she talked about is you—then everything is explained."
Harlan didn’t know much, unaware that the Fallen Apostle’s hidden boss was actually a cluster consciousness, so he felt a bit puzzled by my deduction. He raised his query, "How do you confirm that voice was ’the eminent one’? Just the timing? Or because my legion showed signs of direct connection with void creatures not long ago?"
"You do know that ’the eminent one’ you speak of doesn’t actually exist in the real world?" I threw out a bombshell question.
As expected, Harlan was stunned: "What do you mean? Are you saying ’over there’ is now controlled by a spiritual being?"
"More incredible than spiritual beings, many races that have mastered information network technology have created similar life forms, but the angels created the most powerful one among them," I said, suddenly having a thought, snapping my fingers casually, "Xyrin, come here for a moment."
Xyrin was ubiquitous—as long as there was coverage of the Empire’s information network, it was the backyard of that super consciousness. She could hear all calls to herself within the network’s coverage and could upload-download herself to anywhere within it. In fact, saying Xyrin is "ubiquitous" is somewhat inaccurate. Strictly speaking, her entity is the entire network-covered area; the concepts of ’existing’ or ’not existing’ do not apply: Xyrin’s entity spans thousands of worlds, and all of us in the real world live under her ’shadow’. Rather than saying she teleports to a certain place, it’s more like she chooses a coordinate within her ’body’, temporarily creating an interactive interface for us, tied to the real world.
Due to this unique quality of Xyrin, as soon as I finished speaking, the surrounding air seemed to crackle with electricity. Numerous sparkling small light particles gathered from all directions, and in less than two seconds, a girl with long straight golden hair, fair skin, and ruby-like eyes appeared before us. The girl’s demeanor was noble, carrying a kind of fierce beauty. She was wearing a pure black long dress, a long black silk glove on her left hand. Before she cracked a silly grin, she looked like a princess stepping from the dark of night. The only thing breaking the atmosphere was a silly metal tag hanging on her chest, like those given to first-grade students or patients with dementia, with her name and Imperial Military Department’s contact information written on it...
Every time Xyrin appeared, she changed her look. Her sluggishness towards the real world made her completely forget her appearance after a nap. From this point, Qianqian’s preparation of the little tag was genuinely useful—I might not recognize this girl, looking like a foreign princess, as Xyrin without it.
"She’s called Xyrin," I pointed at Xyrin and introduced her to Harlan, "In theory, she’s the same kind of life form as the boss behind the Fallen Apostles, but she’s slightly weaker and is in a controlled state. Xyrin, this is Harlan, you should have his data."
The golden-haired girl happily saluted Harlan, though her tone wasn’t as solemn as her salute, "Hello, I know you, you’re Node HF-35S1-S57-CXEE15, Your Majesty Harlan Cruea Levallet, welcome home, I am Xyrin." After greeting, the girl’s attention quickly shifted, and she happily ran to the counter to call out to the silver-haired mole, "Silvia! I want more snacks! The black and round ones with chocolate that Taville likes!"
By now, someone must have noticed the significant difference between Xyrin and ordinary angels: she may salute the emperor, but that’s because someone taught her to, coupled with certain commands, yet from her perspective, all angels have no distinction whatsoever. To her, Harlan is first a node ID composed of numbers and letters, secondly a name of a real-world being, lastly a Xyrin Emperor. The reason is simple: the "network node" of Xyrin Angels is the only thing that doesn’t change with their permissions or power levels. This node only provides a "and-or-not gate" to Xyrin, who can’t differentiate any differences between the countless nodes comprising her. A thousand-dollar LCD TV and a ten-dollar lamp, their plugs are essentially a few pieces of copper sheet and a lump of plastic, so explained, it’s easy to understand...
I turned to Harlan, "Feel anything?"
"I... I’m not quite sure..." Harlan stared blankly at Xyrin’s back, "I can’t perceive her identification information, she should be a Xyrin Apostle, but is her identifier not open to anyone? Does she have higher authority than the emperor?"
"Retrieving Xyrin’s identifier needs some technical means, direct reading won’t work, you don’t have that processing capacity, her entity is discretely distributed within the entire spiritual network," I waved to Xyrin, who was waiting for her snack to be ready, calling her over, "You know how to send a file directly to ordinary angels through the network, right? Try sending Harlan something, anything."
Xyrin thought for a moment, then sent the price list from Silvia’s shop. Indeed, Harlan’s expression changed.
"The commands you receive from ’the Anointed One’, are they in this encoding and forwarding format?" I asked.
Harlan nodded slowly, "Just a moment ago, I almost thought it was indeed... This method of information encoding and transmission is incredible. It completely bypasses existing communication protocols, making it impossible to trace the source of the information or its forwarding path, as if the information comes from the Xyrin Apostle network itself and not a specific sender." 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺
"Xyrin is a cluster consciousness, she is essentially the spiritual network itself, as is the ’Anointed One’ you refer to."
Right then, I completely explained Xyrin’s situation to Harlan. Knowing about this special life form, he naturally understood why his old boss needed to sacrifice a large number of spiritual nodes to contact void creatures. Finally, our topic looped back to ’the Anointed One’, "Therefore, according to my judgment, the boss behind the Fallen Apostles at the time used you as expendables or buffers to facilitate a conversation with me. She essentially lives as a ghostly entity in the network; without creating an interactive interface like Xyrin, she can only engage with the external world in a completely unprotected form. You can imagine what it’s like to turn off all the firewalls in the spiritual network. The information disturbances from the void creatures are a deadly poison to the will of the Abyss Side. I believe in that brief exchange of a few minutes, the ’Abyss Side Xyrin’ on the opposite end probably exhausted all the nodes she used as buffers—which was you—she ended the communication quite hastily at the time."
Harlan was stunned for a while, then suddenly shook his head with a bitter smile, "So that’s the situation, were we always controlled by our own spiritual network? Well, that’s somewhat reasonable, if considering her as the racial consciousness of the Xyrin Apostles, she indeed qualifies."
The old emperor had a bit of a self-deprecating tone, so I didn’t continue on this topic. We could now be fairly certain that the mysterious entity who abruptly contacted me back then was behind the Fallen Apostles’ rule. I was now facing an unprecedented, unsolved mystery:
Why did she do this?
I pondered, thinking that she wasn’t consulting me for a psychological issue...
"I can’t provide you an answer for this either," Harlan, hearing my query, shrugged helplessly, "I can only say ’the Anointed One’ must have her plans, and everything she does has a purpose, though no one knows exactly what she aims to do. She only gives orders, from which we occasionally infer some plans, but most of it, only ’the Anointed One’ knows."
"Anyway, sacrificing a military giant under her name and its entire army just to have a direct connection with a void creature for a few minutes, that appears a bit too wasteful," I shook my head with mixed feelings, "This was the highest appearance fee in my life..."
Harlan gritted his teeth while glaring at me, "That appearance fee is mine!"
Me: "...Alright, let’s not talk about this. In short, you were sold out by your own boss, but I think Xyrin on the Abyss Side isn’t stupid. Even if they sell out teammates, they should get a good price. What do you think she gained from talking to a Void Creature for those few minutes?"
Harlan drew circles on the table with his hand, as if to help himself think: "If you think of the worst-case scenario, maybe by connecting directly with you, she can temporarily invade the Empire’s network, steal information, or try to find the weaknesses of the Void Creatures. In a worse scenario, perhaps through this direct connection, she’s already left something in the Empire’s network or your spiritual world, like a spy program or something."
I blinked: "How come there are only bad and worse scenarios, nothing else?"
"Of course there is," Harlan laughed, "there’s also the worst-case scenario—"
Me: "...I think you have a pessimistic tendency."
Harlan carelessly waved his hand: "Being pessimistic is a good thing. By anticipating the worst, you can prepare for the best. The worst-case scenario is: ’The Master’s’ plan is nearing success. Her plan doesn’t require leaving too many people, so some insubordinate subordinates become things that can be discarded. You can imagine an army about to return victorious casually discarding redundant munitions and war puppets that could be temporarily produced supplementary troops on the battlefield, it is common sense in the military."
Cold sweat instantly broke out on my face. Harlan was right; besides bad and worse, there’s the worst: If Xyrin on the Abyss Side feels confident about her grand future and no longer sees the Empire as a threat, sacrificing millions of nodes really wouldn’t be a big deal!
Harlan seems to be a hardcore radical in the Fallen Apostle circles, so he was considered an expendable pawn by Xyrin on the Abyss Side. How should I put it? To use a quote from a cliché: "I have created Heaven, only the most loyal minions can follow" – clearly, Harlan didn’t measure up.
The bad and worse scenarios at least offer room for response, but if it’s the worst – anything done would be too late, the Fallen Apostle’s ’great endeavor’ may just be around the corner!
"These are all speculations," Harlan reassured me, "though I can’t remember the details of the ’great endeavor,’ I always feel that it shouldn’t be realized so soon. In my memory, our actions regarding the ’great endeavor’ had long been at a deadlock. ’The Master’ seemed to be trying to overcome a certain technical obstacle. Until I left, there wasn’t even a sign of breaking through this technical obstacle. Moreover, I distinctly remember she still had some plan after the Divine Race began their expedition. A thousand years, though brief, offers a lot of room for action."
I grimaced and dismissed the topic, as this was one of those bad luck things that seem to never run out: "Alright, let’s stop this topic here for now. Let’s set aside the Fallen Apostle’s situation for now. Now let’s talk about your future – do you have any plans?"
"Plans?" Harlan was taken aback and then smiled and nodded, "You want me to do something, don’t you? You’re in charge here, you tell."
"I’ll be straightforward then. Right now, the Abyss Apostles within the Empire’s borders have become an established force, and I need an experienced Supreme Commander – Visca won’t do; she can’t even be bothered to command her General Legion, and her personality is entirely that of a child. So I want you to help me organize the Abyss Independent Group. This group is roughly the size of a regular main army, with some miscellaneous units we’ve captured from ’over there.’ I may as well admit to you, because their composition is so chaotic, it’s an utter mess."
I directly clarified the situation of the Abyss Independent Group with Harlan, as he’ll discover the issue upon taking over the mess anyway, better to preemptively prepare him than to let him panic later. When communicating with Xyrin Apostles, there’s no need for too many small tricks and machinations; they don’t buy that stuff.
I eagerly awaited Harlan’s response.
"I thought about it," Harlan deliberately paused for a few seconds before speaking slowly, "If I guess correctly, I’ll still be bringing my own troops back – they should all have been taken from me, right?"
Me: "...Well summed up."
"All this roundabout stuff..." Harlan’s expression was somewhat subtle, but he nodded cheerfully, "I agree. What could be better than letting an old General lead his former troops?"
I breathed a sigh of relief, stealing a glance at Silvia, humming and wiping the counter behind it, thinking: though they’re both Emperors, how can there be such a huge difference in their sense of responsibility?
Then we moved on to discuss the roles of Harlan as the Supreme Commander and the position of the Abyss Independent Group. First, I explained the current structure of the Empire’s governance: For various reasons, the New Empire temporarily halted the Old Empire’s Sky Zone system, leaving only one Great Sky Region for management, jointly governed by all the Emperors and the highest Generals. Secondly, in continuation with the old Empire’s military council system: Imperial Leader, Great General, and the sub-level advisory group together form the Imperial Military Department, who, following the chain of command, issue decrees to the armies. Xyrin Apostles of Grand General level and above have their separate military contingents – like Pandora and Visca’s General Guards, or our Royal Fleet along with Sandora. These military units are solely commanded by their corresponding commanders, while the Imperial Regular Army follows orders from the Military Department – The Emperor retains first-level command rights but if no orders come from the Emperor, the army commanders might deploy their troops in emergencies.
Harlan would retain Emperor privileges, but he would be responsible for fewer things: He would focus on constructing the Abyss Independent Group and building territories for the Apostles undergoing Abyssalization. Now that the latter has formed a clear scale, I think it’s time to specially carve out some universes in the Empire suitable for them to survive in. After all, Abyss Forces have some special "nature," and keeping them with normal Races for too long inevitably impacts the latter, a matter beyond human control.
At any rate, these things about to be independently constructed require a clear person in charge, and that person needs to have sufficiently high privileges: Harlan seems quite suitable.
"I was thinking I could finally have a lighter load and become a Legion Commander or something." Hearing my plan, Harlan seemed somewhat disappointed, "Do I now have to handle even building houses?"
"Don’t think about retirement," I laughed dryly, "Technically, there are now five Emperors in the Empire including you – but take a look: Bellavilla is having mood swings twenty hours a day, spending the rest of her time only training the Magic Girls, my sister has already deleted her Emperor permissions, as she much prefers taking care of children at home, and really the only ones handling matters are Sandora and me. If you also step down from Emperor permissions, three out of the five members of the New Empire Emperor Council will be on strike..."
"...Although there’s nothing wrong with what you say, your ’three out of five’ way of putting it is somewhat strange?"
"When your whole race consists of just three people, it’s only a matter of time before you learn to master the art of using headcount as a punchline."
"?" (To be continued. If you like this work, you are invited to Qidian (qidian.com) to vote for recommendation votes, monthly votes. Your support is my biggest motivation. Mobile users please visit m.qidian.com to read.)
