“Generally speaking, protagonists in novels and movies don’t tend to be as cold-blooded as you.”
The seriousness on the face of No. 2 was like a facade, instantly reverting to that cynical, playful mockery.
Lin Yu covered his face with both hands and let out a long sigh.
He really could not understand how his own face could make such an infuriating expression — one so annoying it made him want to punch himself.
In the end, however, he could only lower his hands helplessly.
“Oh, right,”
No. 2 said, as if just remembering his actual business.
“What I wanted you to see wasn’t these bugs.”
Under his guidance, Lin Yu moved forward step by step, forcing the tide of insects back until they reached the cave entrance once again.
However, even at the entrance, his line of sight was still blocked by the remaining swarm.
Though they were clearly trembling with fear, they stubbornly maintained a delicate distance, refusing to disperse entirely.
“How troublesome,”
No. 2 commented casually, while waving a hand nonchalantly.
An invisible, massive force slammed down.
The swarm at the cave entrance instantly disintegrated.
Countless scarabs burst under the pressure, turning into searing golden slush that splashed onto the rocks with a sizzling sound of erosion.
His vision suddenly cleared.
No. 2 considerately took off the illusory sunglasses from his own face and handed them over.
The moment the sunglasses touched Lin Yu’s fingers, they actually solidified into physical form.
“Put them on.”
Lin Yu put on the sunglasses and finally saw the “interesting thing” No. 2 had mentioned — A golden figure with a hawk’s head and a human body stood upon the coast, radiating a majesty that made the soul tremble.
“Ra, one of the important creator gods in Egyptian mythology. According to the Raymond Faulkner translation of the Egyptian Book of the Dead, he was self-born from the chaos of the primordial waters of ‘Nun.’ Then, through thought and speech, he created the air, moisture, the earth, and the sky, thereby establishing the world order.”
No. 2’s tone was as relaxed as if he were introducing a neighbor.
“He is the head and source of the Ennead system, and thus he is revered as the ‘Father of Gods.’ A hawk’s head on a human body, with a solar disk atop the head, is his most classic form.”
He paused, stretched, and added in a tone that completely ruined the atmosphere:
“But don’t you think his head looks more like a chicken’s than a hawk’s? He’s yellow and has a chicken head. Compared to Ra, I feel like the name ‘Yellow Chicken’ suits him better.”
A sense of absurdity instantly dispelled Lin Yu’s instinctive fear.
Under No. 2’s malicious guidance, that solemn deity actually overlapped with a certain figure from a game in his memory…
League of Legends’ Emperor of the Sands, Azir.
It was over.
Once he accepted this premise, the majestic and solemn creator god looked like an enlarged Azir no matter how he viewed him.
What little remained of his reverence vanished instantly.
“I’m not saying these things just for fun…”
No. 2’s voice turned cold, and a frigid light flickered in his dark gold pupils.
“I’m just reminding you not to have any reverence or fear toward this kind of thing.”
“Our goal is only one… to kill it.”
“Is there no other way?”
Lin Yu instinctively tried to avoid the conflict.
“It’s not that there isn’t…”
No. 2 shrugged.
“But if we don’t kill it, before long, everyone in this vicinity will be killed by that sun…”
Before he could finish his sentence, a figure suddenly appeared in the distance.
The figure was leaping strangely, backed by a vast expanse of gold — countless scarabs.
As the distance closed, Lin Yu finally saw the person’s true appearance.
It was that Asian girl with the blade at her waist.
Her gradient-colored hair was still eye-catching even in an environment like this.
The girl’s superpower seemed to be Teleportation.
Every time the insect tide was about to swallow her, she would blink forward to put distance between herself and the bugs once again.
Relying on this ability, she was drawing a massive swarm of insects alone.
However, the situation was already precarious.
Her body was covered in burn marks, and her movements had visibly slowed down.
Sure enough, after several more forced teleports, her distance from the insect tide grew shorter.
Finally, the golden tide swallowed the slender figure in an instant.
‘Should I save her?’
The moment this thought occurred, his body moved uncontrollably.
He didn’t even see how he had moved; he only felt a blur before his eyes, and he had already cut into the swarm.
His left hand caught the girl’s falling body while his right hand smoothly drew the long blade from her waist — the blade’s light sliced through the golden radiance like a crescent moon, forcefully tearing a gap in the man-eating tide.
The next moment, he brought the girl back into the cave.
“What are you doing? I never said I wanted to save her, and I didn’t tell you to use my body.”
“Sorry, my hand slipped.”
No. 2’s phantom lazily separated from his side and spread his hands with a face completely devoid of apology.
“If you really want her dead, I can just throw her back.”
“What do you say? Should I throw her back?”
No. 2 looked at him calmly with a smile.
He took a deep breath.
“… Shut up.”
He looked at the girl.
Even though No. 2’s reaction had been extraordinarily fast, the girl had still been severely burned by the scarabs and had fallen into a coma.
Some parts of her body were even making terrifying sizzling sounds.
Lin Yu finally remembered the ability he had just acquired.
He hesitantly placed his hand on the girl’s head, trying hard to recall the feeling of when he had healed Christina.
Just then, the entire cave began to vibrate violently.
Rubble fell from the ceiling, the golden light outside became even more blinding, and the temperature rose sharply.
“It seems our ‘Yellow Chicken’ friend isn’t very happy.”
No. 2 floated to the cave entrance and narrowed his eyes as he looked outside.
“What’s happening?”
“Nothing much. It’s just that it seems to have discovered us — oh, wait, I mean it discovered you — and now it’s heading toward the cave entrance.”
“Don’t worry,”
No. 2’s phantom turned around, a strange smile that was a mixture of excitement and reassurance on his face.
“It’s just a defective product with an Awakening Degree of not even 50%. It’s not a big problem. I just need to borrow your body again.”
“Don’t be afraid, it’ll be fine,”
his tone was light, as if they were discussing what to have for dinner.
“Just like Marvel’s Moon Knight, another ‘personality’ is just stepping onto the stage to work. You just take a little nap backstage. By the time you wake up, it will all be over. You and your Christi-whatever will be safe and sound.”
He looked at the eerily familiar yet utterly strange smile on the other version of himself, a strong sense of resistance and strangeness surging in his heart.
But there was no time to hesitate.
The vibrations in the cave were getting more and more intense.
He took a deep breath and finally reached out, gripping that hand made of dark golden light that belonged to himself.
The next moment, a drastic change occurred.
The spark in Lin Yu’s eyes instantly faded, replaced by an ancient and cold indifference.
Dark gold light glowed deep within his pupils, like molten metal.
Crack.
He simply stretched his neck and wrists, his joints letting out crisp popping sounds as if he were adjusting to a shell that hadn’t been used in a long time.
He looked up at the hawk-headed god outside the cave and clearly uttered a sentence in ancient, obscure Latin:
“SIC SEMPER TYRANNIS.”
Immediately after, a calm yet wild smile spread across his face as he spoke slowly, “Long time no see, you foolish god!”
He walked slowly out of the cave.
As control of the body was completely handed over, the insect tide no longer avoided him.
The terrifyingly high temperature of that miniature sun also acted directly upon him.
His skin immediately felt a sharp burning pain, and the smell of charred flesh began to permeate the air.
Ra immediately sensed the change, and a flicker of anger at being provoked by an ant seemed to flash across that hawk-like head.
No words were needed.
The massive golden tide of insects, like an army receiving an order, surged toward him with a roar!
However, facing this tide that was enough to swallow everything, he simply raised his hand gently and casually.
As if an invisible giant hand possessed supreme authority, the surging golden tide was forcefully split down the middle by an irresistible force amidst the deafening buzzing!
A straight path, composed of insect corpses and dissipated golden light, instantly pierced through the swarm, pointing directly at Ra in the distance.
Just like that, he walked slowly along the golden path he had carved for himself toward the hawk-headed creator god and the miniature sun above his head.
With every step he took, the cells of his body wailed and died under the terrible heat.
But at the same time, an even more frantic and irrational life force surged within him, causing charred skin to peel away and new flesh to cover it at a speed visible to the naked eye, repeating in a continuous cycle.