A Core Ship From The Start

Gavi used threads to swing around the surrounding buildings, racing forward like Spiderman in the movies. Meanwhile, Duanmu Huai, holding Lorena and Ogis, activated his jetpack and followed her closely—the power armor’s jetpack allowing for short periods of flight, making things a lot easier.

Merlot was not left behind either. The mechanical wings on her back were not just for show. Although she didn’t know how they worked, with the help of these mechanical wings, she managed to keep up. Not only that, but while in flight, she even took aim at Gavi in front and pulled the trigger.

“Bang!!!”

Merlot’s marksmanship was excellent, but her attack seemingly had no effect as her massive puppet blocked her attack on Gavi like a shield. Seizing the opportunity, Gavi accelerated once more, apparently trying to shake off her pursuers. However, Duanmu Huai and the others were persistent, trying to catch her.

“We can’t fight in the city!”

The panic-stricken Lorena, who was being held by Duanmu Huai, shouted, it was quite understandable for her to worry. It was a busy time of day, and the streets were crowded with people. Unlike the curfew at night, a conflict here would undoubtedly lead to unnecessary casualties.

“Drive her to a deserted place!”

Duanmu Huai heavily landed on the ground, creating a crater in the flat street beneath him and inciting screams from the people around. However, he had no time to deal with these issues. He leaped up and activated his jetpack, continuing his pursuit of Gavi.

However, at this moment, suddenly, several dark figures emerged from the alleyways below and charged towards Duanmu Huai and the others, wearing masks and brandishing daggers—it was the puppetettes from the previous night!

“What annoying bastards!”

Duanmu Huai coldly snorted at the sight of them, but just as he was about to knock these puppets out of the way, a sense of danger suddenly surfaced in his mind.

Almost instantaneously, Ogis raised her hand, and the Guardian Puppet appeared in a flash, blocking the front of Duanmu Huai. Next, the masked puppetette’s dagger pierced the Guardian Puppet’s body, and immediately after, the Guardian Puppet burst into a pile of broken debris.

Damn!

Seeing this, Duanmu Huai’s hairs stood on end he quickly lifted his right hand, aiming at the masked puppetette. With the sound of gunfire, a massive shockwave instantly blew the masked puppetettes away. At the same time, Ogis, who was perched on Duanmu Huai’s shoulder, also swiftly took action. Her intertwining threads flashed past, directly slicing the masked puppetettes into fragments.

Although they successfully blocked the ambush, due to this brief obstruction, Gavi had already disappeared.

“Tch…what a nuisance.”

Looking at the now missing Gavi, Duanmu Huai could only shake his head helplessly, letting out a sigh of relief. Honestly, that blow just now had scared him quite a bit. Ogis’s puppet had an Attack of 6 and Defense of 8, ordinary enemies could hardly break through its defense. However, that masked puppetette had managed to destroy it in a single hit; she either had a strong attack power or a [Critical Hit] characteristic. It was a good thing that Ogis’s puppet had a [Guardian] characteristic, otherwise, things could have been bad.

But … when they faced these masked puppetettes before, there was no such situation … why suddenly …

In the end, they failed to track down Gavi, and even Merlot returned without success after being blocked by the masked puppetettes after a while.

However, Duanmu Huai didn’t care too much about this minor issue, after all, he had silently let the Reconnaissance Servo Skull follow her.

And now…

“Alright, let’s organize the information we have now.”

Duanmu Huai sat boldly at the table and knocked on it. Although Liam’s house was bombed, Merlot returned to the rubble afterwards and found some of Liam’s test notes and diary—indeed, Liam wasn’t anything good.

After all, who keeps diaries as an adult.

According to the diary, initially, Liam wanted to create a docile, cute puppet that would soothe his own existence.

Like an otaku wanting to create a robot wife.

However, he failed. Instead of the gentle and cute wife he envisioned, he ended up with a crazed, yandere psychopath … which was a considerable blow to Liam. However, at that time, a man named Iver appeared before Liam, praised Liam’s puppet-making talent, and bestowed him with the power to create puppets at will.

In return, Liam gave Gavi to Iver and promised to help him create puppets, which is why he moved to this city.

This shows that the creators of Liam and Ogis are entirely different. The Puppeteer Master who created Ogis is more like a scientist, creating a soulful puppet was his research task. However, Liam was more like a tech geek; once he obtained the data, he thought, “Wow, a wife! Fantastic!” and thus thirsted to create a wife, but when the result was different from what he wanted, he had an immediate mental breakdown.

Those masked assassins were the product of Liam’s creation after obtaining that mysterious power. Perhaps due to his previous failure in creating Gavi, this time Liam chose not to give these masked puppetettes a “heart,” and instead let them attack and manipulate other souls possessing a “heart,” attempting to seize that “heart” from them.

Furthermore, what was most surprising was the unique characteristics of these masked killer puppetettes.

Among them, there was a core one named “Feiya,” but this core could not be killed——or rather, even if she was killed, she would resurrect from another masked puppetette.

Well … it sounded like some horror movie plot?

In short, to eliminate these masked puppetette assassins for good, they must all be wiped out. Otherwise, they will never die.

Then, the remaining question is …

“What does Iver want these killer puppets for? Who does he intend to kill?”

After reading the diary, this was what Duanmu Huai cared about the most. After all, if the diary was accurate, it meant that this Iver was likely the real mastermind behind everything. So, why did he want Liam to create killer puppets? What did he want to do?

He surely did not want to, like OTAKU Liam, manufacture a bunch of figurine puppets as wives, right?

At this thought, Duanmu Huai turned to look at Merlot. Noticing Duanmu Huai’s gaze, Merlot shook her head gravely.

“I’m sorry, the Archbishop hasn’t shown himself to others in a long time, I don’t know……”

That’s fine, this outcome was within expectations.

Hearing Merlot’s reply, Duanmu Huai shrugged without holding any expectations, then looked at Lorena again.

“So, Miss Lorena, is the church still unable to act now?”

“I..I’m sorry……”

Lorena seemed on the verge of tears at this moment.

“Although I have talked to the Archbishop, but without sufficient evidence… and Archbishop Evile is a core figure of the Mechanical Religion, acting rashly against him would likely trigger even greater chaos, so……”

“Not surprising, I knew it would be like this.”

At this moment, Duanmu Huai was calm. After all, as a player, most of the quests he encountered were like this: all those forces capable of resolving troubles were as steady as Mount Tai, waiting until the last minute, when the fire reaches them, before jumping up.

If the game follows the usual plot, what they could do next would be to track Gavi and the masked woman, wasting time in exhaustion until the final boss successfully carries out his plan, then the church panics, and then…… there’s no ‘then’ after that.

The whole city would be turned into soul shards, obviously it will all be over, isn’t it easy to predict?

So……

“Where is this guy called Evile?”

“What are you planning to do?”

Hearing Duanmu Huai’s inquiry, Merlot was immediately on guard. Duanmu Huai didn’t hide his intentions either.

“Nonsense, obviously I am going to confront him and find out directly.”

Simple, rugged, and straightforward.

Beat the grass to startle the snake? It doesn’t exist. Just bomb this place and the snake problem is solved.

From Duanmu Huai’s perspective, this world could only end this way, according to the “procedure”, in the end it would be Evile’s plans being successful and then the city destroyed, followed by another round similar to the haunted mansion.

But he didn’t want to go through it all again. On one hand, it would lower the mission evaluation, on the other hand, he got along quite well with the people in this city and didn’t want to see the tragedy reenacted.

“Where is this person Evile?”

“………”

Faced with Duanmu Huai’s inquiry, Merlot was silent for a moment, then stood up.

“Follow me.”

With Merlot leading, they journeyed through the city to a small island situated behind the mountain in the city.

“If I’m not mistaken, Archbishop Evile has been living in seclusion here……”

“Seclusion??”

Hearing Merlot’s words, Duanmu Huai looked ahead and then turned to look at Merlot.

“Are you sure this is called seclusion?”

It was normal for Duanmu Huai to have such doubts because in the middle of the island stood a Twin Tower Church. Although it didn’t look as magnificent as the Cathedral Church and the church of the Mechanical Religion in the city, it was bustling with activity. The bridge leading to the center of the lake was teeming with cloaked believers – even more than those in the church.

“I also don’t know……”

At this point, Merlot was rendered speechless, with a surprised look on her face. Obviously, she also didn’t understand what was happening.

“I, I have a bad feeling about this……”

Swallowing her saliva, Lorena murmured in a trembling voice.

“This church… gives me a very bad feeling…”

Duanmu Huai raised his head, gazing at the church. After a moment of contemplation, he gestured at the others.

“Then, I have a plan.”

Then, Duanmu Huai began to speak.