Uplifting Journey

It is difficult to say how much the current Diablo is related to "Diablo" and "Tobio" before the ceremony.

In the changes at the personality level, Tobio, who was weaker in will, was the first to fall under the active "corrosion" of the Scarlet King, and Diablo, as the "boss", was stabbed in the back by the parasitic subject's personality. It didn't last long either.

Originally, Diablo, who has a mission, should have shaped Tobio's soul into the appearance that the Crimson King needs and adapts in decades, so that the "boss" who is the underground emperor can become the Crimson King The fulcrum and incarnation on this world line.

However, due to some changes inside and outside the world, this soul forging ceremony, which lasted for nearly thirty years, was not fully successful, so that the Crimson King brutally intervened in the face of the strange number, forcibly reshaping the "boss" into another The crude carrier of consciousness.

As far as the result is concerned, there is not much difference between the two situations at first glance, but a gear that can be perfectly embedded in the main machine after running-in, provides its own strength and realizes the value of existence, and a gear that needs to invest more costs outside the main system Disposable parts for remodeling, maintenance, there is an essential difference between the two.

And for Diablo, the difference at the essential level is most evident in his soul and personality——

If he grows up smoothly and connects perfectly with the Crimson King, the "boss" who has been integrated into a larger system can actually retain all his consciousness, and he can slowly and gradually carry out higher-level development in a transcendent realm. Adapt and adapt.

But now, Diablo, who is forced to complete the ceremony, the emotions and desires that originally belonged to human beings are fading and diluting at a speed visible to the naked eye. The consciousness is completely obliterated and covered.

When this assimilation process is completely over, he will completely lose the name "Diablo", which is more similar to a code name, and lose the last bit of soul imprint as a human being, and he will naturally call himself the "King of Crimson".

"Actually, the saddest thing is that I don't feel sad about it at all."

In the wilderness at dusk, Diablo, who was measuring the land on foot, twirled a long crimson hair with his fingertips, and smiled self-deprecatingly.

His stand-in ability allows his eyes to look directly at the unpredictable time, and allows his hands to fiddle with fate at will, but all of this comes at a price——

The Crimson King is quite "stingy", and he doesn't want to invest more off-site costs in this world, so using the timeline editing ability of the Crimson King consumes his existing power in this world.

To put it simply, what is consumed is Diablo's "life".

This lifespan is not determined by the body, cells, etc., but the length of the time axis occupied by the power of the Crimson King in this world, the depth and breadth of the things it affects.

In this crazy world full of stand-in messengers, they are pushed together by fate, and their life trajectories are full of traces of being manipulated by higher forces. It is often not them who decide how long they can live and what kind of life they will live. Own--

In other words, it is not "completely" the "self" they subjectively identify.

Ripple messengers, stand-in messengers. The word "messenger" in the middle has already explained everything - they are not just users of power, but also messengers representing the will behind the power.

Although many messengers, and even the power represented behind many messengers, do not know their true situation.

Compared with those muddle-headed ones, the Crimson King, who actively influences and expands his own territory in various parallel worlds, is quite powerful.

However, this kind of strength will not change Diablo's current situation in the slightest—

Completing the ceremony and realizing the initial awakening has already consumed two or three years of his future, and only one year of the future is left in the available resources. When the "life" resources at hand are exhausted, even if his body has an extremely long lifespan Even the vampires in the world can't escape the sudden and violent end——

Out of the range of the Crimson King's power radiation, the malice overflowing in fate will swarm like a shark smelling blood, and use all kinds of unavoidable "coincidences" to completely devour his future. Not a single millisecond will be left for him.

In particular, the lingering King of Gold who has always competed with the Scarlet King for territory and has a great causal connection with him in various worlds. That guy will definitely use his real power without hesitation to completely wipe him out .

From another perspective, in fact, this kind of "killing" has always existed at the downstream end of the "territory" of the Scarlet King's time axis, and the King of Gold is just trying to push this time point upstream.

It's a pity that Diablo couldn't see things that far before he was completely assimilated by the Scarlet King and learned all the secrets. Even if he could, he couldn't see the specific situation at the end of the chaos.

But when he thought about it, he knew that if he could die in a fair battle when the demons danced wildly, it would be a very rare and decent thing.

"However, the so-called death of normal people is meaningless to me now, so... I will definitely 'die' in an ugly way. I am really curious about how much money those guys will pay, and they will not end up in person. ?”

Speaking of life and death, Diablo inadvertently remembered the question that the guy named Cheng Bin asked him curiously not long ago—"Why, you didn't respond to the word 'eternal life' at all? ?”

Back then when he faced this question, he was completely at a loss, but now he can give the answer——

For a life that leaves traces on the time axis is equivalent to "alive", there is no essential difference in whether the "death" in the lower reaches of the domain comes earlier or later.

As long as the Crimson King occupies this world for one second, Diablo will live in that second forever. What's more, in order to maintain his "occupation", the Crimson King must at least support Diablo. Twenty years before Polo's soul formed?

He has held immortality in his palm for a long time, so why would he be interested in the low-level immortality of vampires?

It's a pity that no matter what kind of immortality, you have to face the threat of the environment and external forces, and the powerful ability brought by the Crimson King also brings the same level of consumption.

"... To make more effective use of the limited resources at hand, you must first ensure that the internal operation of the power is good, and you must... unplug the nails from the upstream of the time axis in the domain in turn."

In the jump of the timeline, Diablo's footsteps fell outside the huge base deep in the wilderness of Germany. He looked up at the various buildings outcropping inside the towering walls, and a flash of memory came to his heart——

It was a long time ago, "Diablo" in the inexplicable restlessness originating from the Crimson King, excluded the power of the organization, personally tracked down and defeated Polnareff's memory.

"The Dark Marshal of the Alliance, the Silver Chariot Requiem, who took the initiative to liberate the odd numbers, what choice will you make?"