Chapter 99: A Dawn Amid Despair

“All right, all right, it was his fault. He should not have bullied you! Don’t cry, sis, I’ll punish him for you!” With a gentle hand, he smoothed Ruoxing’s hair. Yechen’s tone was soft, as though soothing a child, and he explained to Yexing, “Don’t mind it. Your sister has always been like this. When she’s bullied by someone familiar, she can’t bring herself to strike back, so this kind of thing happens. You’ll get used to it. Only you and Yechen can treat her like this. If it were anyone else, she would have rushed over long ago and beaten him flat!”

“Mm-hmm!” Ruoxing nodded in agreement, casting Yexing a deeply resentful look. Thinking carefully, even when she had once really laid hands on him, she had always known her limits. He had not even felt any pain.

“Cough, sorry.” He murmured an apology. Busujima Saeko, standing nearby, was very curious about whom Yexing was speaking to, yet she said nothing and gave him her fullest trust. She believed that sooner or later, he would tell her of his own accord.

“Let’s begin!” As soon as Yexing’s voice fell, everyone immediately sprang into action. Tachibana Kanade activated the Angel bloodline she had not yet fully mastered. The wings she had designed in the world after death fit perfectly with the angelic power, and a sacred glow settled over her pure white feathers.

Yexing closed his eyes and focused. Since he and Yecheng were, in truth, the same person, their cooperation was seamless, with not a trace of awkwardness. The instant the power of the stars was stirred, the magic circle beneath their feet also changed. Its lines, like the circuitry of a connected board, were drawn over once more by starlight. Beginning from the outer ring, a thread of radiance wound along the ground, redrawing the entire circle, until at last, through its intricate patterns, the starlight flowed to the other end of the formation.

After being transformed, it became astonishingly gentle, perfectly controlled within the range Kanade could accept. All three of them were utterly focused: one continuously supplied energy to Kanade, while Kanade devoted herself wholly to directing that power. Ruoxing and Ruoyan exchanged a glance and nodded as well. This magic circle had been taught to Yexing by them. Since it was his first time using it, there was a risk of failure, so the two of them had stood by, ready to step in at any moment.

But now their help was no longer needed. The coordination between Kanade and Yexing, Yecheng was exceptionally smooth, and Yecheng and Yexing kept switching off to lessen the difficulty. A few minutes later, the flowing light beneath their feet seemed to reach its breaking point.

The wings on Kanade’s back immediately spread wide, and light feathers drifted down softly. At the same time, visions appeared all across the world: a black-haired boy with violet highlights and a silver-haired girl standing in a courtyard-like place, both with their eyes closed, their feet planted upon a magic circle that the world would normally dismiss as superstition.

Even more astonishingly, behind the girl, a pair of white wings unfurled and gently beat the air. She was the very image of the angels of legend. In this despairing apocalypse, where people hovered daily between life and death, those who saw such a scene could not help themselves, whether they believed or not, and knelt in reverence.

Perhaps they wished to seize the last shred of hope left in the end of the world, to be saved and guided by an angel. In such a moment, countless complicated thoughts might arise, but the wish shared by the vast majority was the same: to live.

As though hearing the cries within their hearts, the girl’s red lips parted. A melody no one had ever heard, sung in a pronunciation no one had ever heard before, in a language that belonged to no nation on earth, yet carrying a power that washed the soul, bringing a glimmer of dawn through the blackest night, purifying everything in its path.

Its graceful rhythm, along with that sacred and benevolent aura, caused everyone in their hearts to define the song as a holy hymn. The zombies, upon hearing that hymn, all stopped in the middle of their hunt. Their grotesque, fearsome faces turned peaceful, and they lay upon the ground as if they had fallen asleep.

People nearby could see transparent figures one after another, smiling as they slowly dissolved into points of light. Drawn onward, they flew toward the illusory forms of Yexing and Kanade high in the sky, as though that place were their rightful destination. This scene repeated itself over and over across the world.

“A miracle! This is a miracle!” Inside a grand, towering cathedral, many figures moved about within. Most were nuns, priests, and other believers, who had prayed ceaselessly for God’s protection since the moment the apocalypse arrived. One priest looked at the changes in the zombies outside, then at the apparitions in the sky, and burst into tears. His whole body trembling, he suddenly clenched both hands and tore the thick Bible in his grasp to shreds.

“This is the true God! This is the God who saves the world and guides mankind! This song is the true holy hymn! It is the song of salvation!” With one man leading the way, the other nuns and priests immediately dropped to their knees and prayed, taking Yexing and Kanade for the god they believed in within their hearts.

“They must be! They must be the angels sent by God to save this hopeless apocalypse!” The believers’ eyes shone with fanatical faith. They longed to find the place shown by the vision at once, so they could serve at God’s side. That was the desire and glory they had pursued all their lives.

What Yexing, Yecheng, and Kanade had done shook the entire world and ignited a global fervor of faith. In the time that followed, churches were built everywhere, and whether in murals or statues, the world was made to remember the two who had saved it.

With such a tremendous spectacle, it was nearly impossible not to be noticed. Not only could the scene of Yexing and Kanade be seen elsewhere, but countless luminous screens before them also displayed events from around the world. Busujima Saeko stared in stunned silence at the sight before her. Even if she had never doubted Yexing and Kanade’s abilities, witnessing such a scene at close range was still enough to leave her shaken.

The zombies that heard Kanade’s holy hymn peacefully transformed into the purest spiritual force. Those points of light crossed the distance of space and gathered more and more densely around Yexing and Kanade. Once the spiritual power accumulated to a certain degree, Ruoxing and Ruoyan would remind Yexing and Yecheng to help the two of them absorb it together.

What they intended to do was not merely to destroy the zombies and save the world. More importantly, they wanted to use this enormous spiritual force, perhaps amounting to several billion souls, to break the solid barrier between Yexing and Yecheng and make their future reintegration easier.

With several billion people on Earth, even if only half were infected, there would still be at least a billion zombies. Moreover, compared with the living, humanity was far fewer in number than the zombies. The zombies relied on nothing but relentless infection to multiply, making it difficult for humankind to withstand them.

If the spiritual force of every zombie were gathered together, it would be an unimaginably terrifying power. Only such a force would be capable of shattering the barrier that Yexing and Yecheng regarded as unbreakable.

Countless points of light circled around Yexing as he absorbed them, gathering into what looked like the center of a whirlpool. Whenever part of the light was drawn into his body, new points would cross the distance and arrive beside him to take its place. Absorbing more than a billion souls was, without question, a time-consuming task.

During that time, Yexing had to remain completely focused. Even if he were attacked, he could not spare his attention to counterattack. That was why he had asked Busujima Saeko to guard him.