A Core Ship From The Start-Chapter 806 - 570

As the central hub was infected by the virus, the entire Reaper network began to collapse. On the battlefield outside, one could see the formerly coordinated Reapers start to flail their bodies wildly like they were having seizures, before suddenly exploding.

Meanwhile, in the Virtual Space, the ground also began to tremble, and the surrounding walls started to collapse. The Alien Creatures summoned to stop Duanmu Huai and Mary also disappeared. Clearly, under the spread of the virus, the entire Reaper communication system was beginning to crumble, and it was about to be doomed.

"Alright, things are settled, and we should head back now."

Duanmu Huai glanced at the task prompt on the system, then withdrew his gaze and waved at Mary, who promptly hurried over to his side. However, at that moment, the child that had appeared before suddenly showed up in front of them again, looking at Duanmu Huai and Mary with a perplexed expression.

"I don’t understand why you did this. The perfect cycle has been broken, and one day, organics will be destroyed by synthetics. What exactly did you do this for?"

"You’re right,"

Duanmu Huai shrugged his shoulders in response to the Catalyst’s question.

"Maybe in the far future, humanity will self-destruct, and then there will be some robot rebellion, followed by another Dark Age. It’s possible that humans will still be beaten miserably."

"Then......"

However, before the child could finish, Duanmu Huai interrupted it with a wave of his hand and glared coldly at the child before him.

"But, what the hell is it to you?"

"......... Huh?"

"Humans might perish, or they might not. Even if they do perish, that will be our own choice. Who the hell are you to come here and pass judgment on our fate? Let me tell you, I don’t give a damn about the future of organics. The Tribunal exists to protect humanity. If humanity ceases to exist, then so be it for the universe. Organics, synthetics, all that bullshit, I don’t care about it. If you dare destroy humanity, you’re gonna die!"

".............."

Looking at Duanmu Huai’s murderous expression, the child was taken aback.

"I don’t understand. You clearly know the consequences, yet you insist on this choice. It makes no sense at all."

"Who’s talking sense with you? Who’s being reasonable with you? Do you know? If I can’t beat artificial intelligence at chess, how can I win?"

As he spoke, Duanmu Huai reached out his hand, grabbed the child’s head, and lifted it up.

"It’s by taking a stick and smashing the AI’s chassis directly! Idiot."

No sooner had his words finished than Duanmu Huai squeezed his right hand forcefully, and in the next moment, the child’s head shattered into pieces, disappearing into the air along with its body.

"Hmph, an artificial dumbass is still an artificial dumbass."

Watching the dissipating light dots, Duanmu Huai snorted coldly.

"You want to reason with me? Unfortunately, humans are not a species that acts on reason!"

Could humans have survived to this day if they always acted on reason? You must be joking.

"Let’s go."

Duanmu Huai turned his head and didn’t even give another glance to the crumbling space behind him.

This damned place is already useless now.

With the control hub system destroyed, all the Reapers also lost their power completely. They burst into pieces, becoming scattered debris, floating through space or attracted by gravity to crash into atmospheres and burn up entirely.

And so, the war between the Star Union and the Reapers came to a complete end.

According to the post-war statistics, the Tribunal lost a fifth of its fleet, while the Star Union lost nearly half. Fortunately, most of the Star Union civilians were evacuated in time and were not eliminated by the Reapers. Of course, there were some unlucky ones, but that couldn’t be helped; after all, if some people are seeking their own destruction, who could save them?

In comparison, the Alien Races fared much worse.

The Tuggy, as the strongest military force of the Divine Assembly, made themselves a target and were the first to be annihilated. With Duanmu Huai also taking advantage of the situation to unleash a Blood Moon, it can be said that Tuggy had now become history in the universe.

The Salarians and the Ashali didn’t fare much better. The Ashali were also completely destroyed, and the Salarians... went down with them.

The Quillians suffered tragically as well. They were caught by Jaycee, who had sided with the Reapers, and their entire travel fleet was completely annihilated. Afterward, Jaycee was also taken down by the Star Union and the Tribunal, and so, these archenemies of the universe were hand in hand on their journey to oblivion.

It can be said that after this ordeal, all the Alien Races in this galaxy were nearly wiped out, with those few lucky survivors merely clinging to life, unable to continue their Race. From this perspective, the Star Union and Humanity could be considered to have won a total victory.

Naturally, the Star Union also laid out a grand feast to celebrate their victory over the Reapers, and they made sure to proclaim how the Tribunal had completely eradicated the Reapers — incidentally, the shape of that signal amplifier was something that everyone tacitly agreed not to mention.

Well, that’s pretty normal, considering that Lumiaire herself turned bright red and locked herself in her room, refusing to come out no matter who called after the battle ended.

That was basically social death.

And Duanmu Huai also held a banquet inside the Tribunal’s mothership, as a way to commend everyone———after all, they were all very tired.

Of course, the biggest heroes this time were Lumiaire and Mary.

"Well done."

Duanmu Huai picked up his wine glass and clinked it with Mary’s.

"You’re now a hero who saved humanity, how does that feel?"

"It feels......"

Upon hearing Duanmu Huai’s question, Mary’s expression turned somewhat complicated.

"It feels very surreal. I definitely had no clue what to do. I was still half asleep when summoned, then somehow followed Mr. Duanmu to that bizarre informational space...... To be honest, when you say I’ve saved humanity now, it only feels like I’m dreaming."

"You’ll get used to it."

"No, this isn’t something one can get used to."

Mary couldn’t help but retort upon hearing Duanmu Huai speak.

"If crises like this happened every other day, that would be terrifying."

"But in fact, we’ve actually saved the world more than once."

"......Huh?"

Mary was startled to hear this, and Duanmu Huai shrugged his shoulders, motioning for her to look behind.

"See Ann and Greiya over there? They’ve joined me in saving worlds invaded by Evil Gods and Demons, and then there are Ling’Nu and Kaname...... When their worlds were invaded by the Demon Clan, they followed me and we wiped out the demons. Oh, right, and there’s your teacher Lani. Her world completely collapsed because a deity was killed, becoming a lifeless place, and we helped bring it back on track......"

"Is...... it so?"

"Yes, the universe is full of dangers, especially for humans. We in the Tribunal are like a fire brigade, or you could say an ambulance. Normally, you don’t see fires breaking out everywhere or people suddenly falling ill. But for us, it’s just routine work. Don’t worry, next time I’ll take you to see other worlds on the brink of destruction...... or rather, if they weren’t about to be destroyed, we wouldn’t go. It’s the same principle that coffin sellers wouldn’t go looking for average people, right?"

"Uh...... I think there is still a difference......"

Listening to Duanmu Huai, Mary broke into a cold sweat.

However, thinking about it, crises that cause the destruction of the world, a normal person encountering one in their lifetime would be enough, but for the Tribunal to be dealing with world-ending, humanity-extinguishing crises 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, non-stop......that’s a bit frightening.

After a brief chat, Duanmu Huai let Mary go play with the others and sat down on the side, meanwhile opening the system.

Soon, a system prompt appeared in front of Duanmu Huai.

[Mission "Cataclysm of Destruction" completed]

[Mission Evaluation: Extremely Outstanding]

[Mission Reward: "God of Destruction" promoted to Level 10]

[God of Destruction has reached Intermediate Divine Power]

[Player obtains special skill——Instant Kill (Can designate a mortal target to obliterate or imprison their soul, 1 use/day)]

"Got it."

Looking at the skill tab in front of him, Duanmu Huai excitedly clenched his fist. Instant Kill is the most significant distinction between a deity and mortals. Unlike previous terrifying and mad appraisal, Instant Kill is a complete rule-based skill. Simply put, as long as you’re not a god or demigod, no matter how strong you are, if a deity decides you should die, you must die.

In the game, players couldn’t acquire this skill, but bosses could use it, and targeted instakill was also the nightmare of player raids. However, intermediate divine power still had its restrictions, like being able to use it only once a day, which was adequate to deal with one person. In the face of a group of players teaming up, that would be a different story......Well, otherwise, how do you think players managed to defeat bosses?

Even with instakill, you can only kill one person, and players can be resurrected anyway.

Therefore, this move is almost useless to players, except for testing their luck. Some people, when picked by the boss, think it’s good luck, and even go buy lottery tickets after defeating the boss.

Of course, for Duanmu Huai, this move is actually a bit redundant now, since anyone who is up to the task of fighting him is either a god or a demigod, making the skill basically void. For mere mortals, wouldn’t Duanmu Huai swing his hammer down faster?

Speaking of which......

Duanmu Huai silently glanced at another divine position.

[Pleasure God] is still at Level 1, isn’t it hopeless?

Forget it, if it’s hopeless, so be it. After all, I am the God of Destruction. Pleasure God or whatever, might as well pretend it doesn’t exist.