136: Chapter 136 Deer Hunting Operation (Part 2)

"Ma... Mash?"

Lin Lu's brain went boom, turning blank in an instant.

In a panic, she tapped the Servant formation interface below, clicking frantically on Mash's avatar.

However, that avatar frame, which usually featured a smiling face, had now turned a deathly, silent gray.

Over it was a cold label: [Retired].

"No... that's not right! This is impossible!"

Lin Lu's eyes reddened instantly, and tears poured out uncontrollably. "If we die in a Singularity, we can be sent back to the Chaldea medical wing! This is just a retirement! Yes! Just a retirement!"

Clutching at straws, she screamed heart-wrenchingly into the communicator:

"Doctor! Doctor Roman! Quickly, cut the Rayshift!"

"Pull us back! Quickly, save Mash! Doctor, say something!!!"

...

In the communicator, there was a deathly silence.

There was no reply from Roman.

Even the viewers in the livestream, who had come for the memes, felt a pang of sadness watching Lin Lu struggle so desperately in her despair.

"Stop shouting, Lu Lu... the Doctor, he can't hear you anymore."

"This is true despair..."

Inside the temple, Goetia looked coldly at the breaking Lin Lu, preparing to bring down the final divine punishment and completely erase this last Master of humanity.

Just as Lin Lu closed her eyes in despair...

Tap... tap... tap...

A set of steady footsteps echoed within the empty temple.

The man wearing a crumpled white lab coat, his orange hair always a bit messy, had somehow walked out of the Chaldea control room and stood between Lin Lu and Goetia.

"Do... Doctor?!"

Looking at that familiar back, Lin Lu's despairing pupils contracted sharply, and she cried out in shock:

"Why did you run to the front lines?! You're just logistics! Go back! It's dangerous here!!!"

She frantically pushed the VR controller's joystick, trying to rush forward and pull him back, but the system popped up a cold message: [Cutscene in progress, unable to move].

However, the moment Goetia saw the man, he looked as if he had seen something utterly terrifying, taking a half-step back in disbelief.

"No... impossible! How could you be here?!"

"You coward! You are clearly just a phantom, how dare you appear before me?!"

Under Lin Lu's gaze, which was a mix of confusion and panic, Doctor Roman did not answer Goetia's questioning, but instead slowly took off one of his clean white gloves.

On that slender finger, a golden ring emitting a mysterious halo sat quietly.

The tenth ring.

The King of Mages, Solomon.

"Doctor... what are you doing? Don't scare me..."

Lin Lu's voice carried an uncontrollable tremor and a sob.

An unprecedented panic, like a cold iron hand, gripped her heart tightly. She felt her heartbeat accelerating wildly, thundering against her eardrums like a drum.

Having consumed many literary and cinematic works, she instinctively sensed a fatal atmosphere from this scene that felt like a final farewell.

In the livestream, the comments that were just flooding the screen suddenly went blank in a tacit agreement.

The veteran players didn't even have the strength to send comments anymore; all that remained were countless pairs of red eyes in front of screens.

Doctor Roman turned his head back.

He looked at Lin Lu, his expression still that harmless, gentle, yet infinitely apologetic smile he wore when eating strawberry cake in the control room.

"I'm sorry... Lin Lu..."

"Weren't you always curious about my wish? This is my answer."

"This is a story of love and hope..."

The next second, Doctor Roman turned around, facing the arrogant Demon God King, and calmly recited the incantation that heralded the end:

"The time of birth has come, to correct all creation."

"The time of coronation has come, to enlighten all creation."

...

"Don't say it! I told you to shut up! Shut up!!"

Lin Lu wailed heart-wrenchingly inside the VR pod. The intense grief and emotional breakdown even caused her to experience slight heart palpitations, making her vision go dark and her breathing difficult.

She desperately pressed all the interaction buttons, trying to interrupt this damn cutscene, but it was all in vain.

"And—"

"[The time of parting has come, to relinquish the world (Ars Nova)]!"

As the final line of the incantation fell.

There was no earth-shattering explosion, no light and shadow tearing the universe apart, only an absolute rule called 'Conceptual Erasure' quietly operating within the temple.

Goetia's proud Immortality shattered inch by inch in that light. The Demon God King's massive body actually trembled violently due to extreme fear!

"Madman! You absolute madman! What are you doing?!"

Goetia's roar, filled with horror and incomprehension, exploded in the temple like thunder.

"You actually activated the First Noble Phantasm! Do you know what this means?!"

"You have given up your life, given up your past and future as a Heroic Spirit! You are completely erasing every trace of your existence, along with your origin on the Throne of Heroes, from this universe!!!"

"To strip me of my Immortality, you actually chose 'eternal annihilation' in the truest sense, where even reincarnation is impossible?!"

Goetia's despairing roar echoed before the empty Throne.

And the man named Romani Archaman—his everything, his existence, his spirit origin—all began to dissipate bit by bit in that soft light, like a weathered sand sculpture.

Listening to Goetia's screams, although Lin Lu was crying so hard her vision was blurred, she still held onto one last line of defense deep in her heart.

It was a solemn vow her roommate, Chen Jiajia, had personally made to her.

"Goetia is lying... Jiajia said so, the Doctor just completed his mission and retired."

"Yes! This is just cinematic flair! He just lost his power and became an ordinary person to live a peaceful life..."

"He'll show up in the ending CG in a moment, continuing to eat his strawberry cake!"

"Jiajia wouldn't lie to me!"

"Absolutely not!!"

Lin Lu sobbed and muttered to herself neurotically inside the VR pod.

She clung tightly to that fairy tale of the 'hero's retirement'; it was the only straw she could use to resist the boundless fear in her heart.

Outside the room, separated by a wall, her roommate Chen Jiajia, who had been anxiously watching the livestream, slapped her forehead in despair: "It's over, it's over, this silly girl has completely lost it..."

Looking at Lin Lu's convinced yet pitiful appearance, Chen Jiajia felt a strong sense of shame and helplessness.

But following that was extreme panic over the 'bad ending' that was about to arrive.

She swallowed hard, her hands trembling as she stealthily fished out her thickest winter down jacket from the bottom of the closet. She layered it on, praying fervently that this thick 'physical defense' could withstand the scratching of Lin Lu's nails when she eventually snapped.