Passing through the entrance, the starting point upon entering Black Shores was still the Misty Rock Cave.
Unlike the cautious vigilance from last time, Noah this time swiftly crossed the tides and islands, heading straight for the central Star Gate.
Along the way, he continuously triggered the Remnants left behind by the Shorekeeper. Each Remnant carried her bitter, solitary longing — gentle and careful.
"I was born into this world because of you..."
"Skip."
"The title Shorekeeper is very good..."
"Skip."
"It's okay. As long as you can come to this shore..."
"Skip."
The emotions in the Remnants' words were incredibly sincere. However, having already heard them once before, Noah did not stop for any of the Remnants and chose to skip them all.
Then he triggered the Easter egg left behind by the Shorekeeper.
All the remaining Remnant frequencies from the upper levels of Black Shores converged, forcibly controlling him for 5.2 seconds. The final Remnant left by the Shorekeeper played compulsorily and could not be skipped.
The image of the Shorekeeper, formed by the convergence of Remnant frequencies, stood quietly in front of Noah. Those deep, affectionate violet eyes seemed to gaze across time and space at the "Rover."
Gazing... gazing... A happy smile gradually bloomed on her face. It seemed that merely looking at the Rover like this was already enough to satisfy her.
The remaining frequencies dissipated, leaving behind only a Black Bloom representing the highest authority in Black Shores. The difference this time was that the Black Bloom came with a butterfly-shaped blue note attached.
[I miss you very much in Black Shores — Shorekeeper.]
"..."
Noah's mouth twitched:
"AI, you've got the wrong person."
Putting away the Black Bloom, he did not hesitate. He leaped high and jumped down from the deep red central Star Gate.
...
The Bottom of Tethys.
In a high-tech room as silent as a dead zone, a virtual screen suddenly lit up on the cold operating table.
Countless floating blue code blocks coalesced in mid-air into a ruthless eye pupil.
"An unknown target has been detected entering the Black Shores space. Facial features, body shape, and other data have been extracted through monitoring and are being compared with the database... No matching individual found."
The code flowing rapidly in the screen background seemed to be thinking. Soon, an image was enlarged on the screen — a snapshot of the Tacet Mark on the back of Noah's right hand.
"Based on the target's Tacet Mark location, the triggering of the Shorekeeper's Remnants, and the condition that the target was able to enter Black Shores without destroying the seal, a reasonable deduction is made —"
"The probability that the visitor's identity is the Rover is 99.99%. The probability that it is not the Rover is 0.01%."
"Rover. Combat power unknown. Under continuous observation... Warning, the target is about to enter the Bottom of Tethys."
In just one millisecond, the Slaughterblade of Carnage immediately formulated dozens of response plans and selected the optimal one.
"Invoke primary anti-intrusion program to test the opponent's combat power."
In the corner of the screen, countless spike chains generated by code appeared out of thin air. Under the Slaughterblade of Carnage's precise calculations, they stabbed toward Noah, who had just landed, from various tricky angles.
At the same time, it saw Noah's body suddenly expand to three meters tall, completely bursting the originally loose casual clothes.
"Furious tides — split the heavens!"
Blinding high light almost covered all the brilliance on the screen.
A giant sword so long it seemed to pierce through the entire Black Shores came slashing down. A world-splitting, apocalyptic attack instantly cleaved the entire Bottom of Tethys into two halves.
The originally deathly silent room instantly erupted with countless red error windows, densely packed and extremely lively.
"Warning, Energy Hub stability decreased by 25%."
"Warning, system physical structure destroyed by 17%."
"Warning, 32,423 subprocesses have lost response."
"Warning..."
The aftershock from the sword strike finally caused the room to shake violently. Dust fell rustling from the corners.
What was buzzing was not only the various high-precision equipment but also the consciousness of the Slaughterblade of Carnage.
What exactly just happened?
It had only thrown a basic attack, yet the opponent immediately used their ultimate?
Originally, the Slaughterblade of Carnage had planned to control Noah with the spike chains and then use Noah to leave this Sonoro Sphere space. But after that sword, the Slaughterblade of Carnage became obedient.
"Detected transfer of the target's Tacet Mark location. The probability that the target is the Rover has decreased to 81.3%. The probability that it is not the Rover has increased to 18.7%."
"Re-evaluating threat level... The target possesses extremely strong area-of-effect destructive power. Direct confrontation is not advisable. Avoid damaging more equipment and resources."
"Suggestion: Use intelligence! Devise a plan to make the opponent voluntarily leave Black Shores through the exit."
...
"Do I have to match wits and courage with the Slaughterblade of Carnage again?"
Noah stroked his chin, putting his super intelligence to work.
Last time when he came to Black Shores, he had acted cautiously. Facing the frenzied spike chain assaults, he had only maintained a one-meter range of time stop.
This power-conserving behavior had instead allowed the Slaughterblade of Carnage to launch continuous chain attacks, constantly draining his Resonance power.
This time, he directly switched to Cartethyia, activated his ultimate, and slashed out a Resonance Liberation. The Slaughterblade of Carnage, wary of the consequences, no longer dared to use spike chains to trouble him.
This small change allowed him to skip the process of fighting the fake Slaughterblade of Carnage and directly rescue the people controlled by it.
Then, following the experience from last time, he would use the researchers' technology to find the Shorekeeper's location, trick the Slaughterblade of Carnage into opening a portal for him, rescue the Shorekeeper inside the Death Star black hole, and then turn hostile and kill the Slaughterblade of Carnage.
"I could do it this way, but — there's no need!"
After a brief moment of thought, his super intelligence finally reached a conclusion:
It was time to use overwhelming force!
Activating the powers of Space and Separation, a cyan cube was precisely thrown out by Noah.
The cube grew with the wind, quickly becoming a massive barrier hundreds of meters long that firmly covered the entire Modulation Hall.
Under the power of Separation, the inside and outside of the Modulation Hall became two completely isolated worlds. The Slaughterblade of Carnage could no longer transmit commands to the equipment within.
After doing all this, Noah pinned the previously obtained Black Bloom to his chest. He looked up at the nearest camera, his actions unhurried:
"I, the highest administrator, am now speaking to the Tethys System."
His voice fell across the empty island. The only response was the sound of waves repeatedly crashing against the shore.
The Slaughterblade of Carnage made no response.
Seeing this, Noah once again raised the Crown of Valor.
Vast Resonance power surged madly into the sword. In the blink of an eye, the sword shadow rapidly expanded and lengthened, stretching high from the ground toward the center of the sky.
At the same time, inside the Bottom of Tethys, in the high-tech room, a glaring red window popped up on the cold operating table.
"Warning! Warning! Powerful energy fluctuations detected. Must be stopped immediately."
The eye pupil formed by cold blue code blocks remained calm and did not pay attention to this warning:
"According to the database, the Shorekeeper once stated that Black Shores is an organization personally established by the target."
"Deduction: The target is displaying aggression, with the purpose being a probe for unknown reasons. They will not truly take action."
"Furthermore, the Tethys System itself does not possess the ability to interact with humans from a distance. To conceal its true identity, the best choice at present is to remain silent rather than respond."
Cold, rational logic led it to choose to ignore Noah's call.
On the other side, Noah did not give the Slaughterblade of Carnage any chance to regret. The sword, gathered with terrifying power, came crashing down without hesitation.
"Furious tides — split the heavens!"
A strike capable of destroying heaven and earth descended. The entire Bottom of Tethys suffered another massive blow, splitting from the previous two halves into four.
"Warning, Energy Hub stability decreased by 55%."
"Warning, system physical structure destroyed by 37%."
"Warning, 62,981 subprocesses have lost response."
"Warning..."
Countless red pop-up windows surged out madly. The dense red stacked together, dyeing the entire room blood-red.
The destruction caused by Noah's sword was even greater than before, severely impacting the Slaughterblade of Carnage's computing power.
"Ununderstandable! Incomprehensible!"
With so many programs and devices heavily damaged, the Slaughterblade of Carnage fell into rage.
Looking at Noah again, he had already raised the Crown of Valor once more, preparing to slash again.
"Furious tides —"
The sword had just been raised when hundreds of blue virtual screens instantly appeared around Noah.
Inside the countless screens were simple smiley faces drawn from blue code blocks.
All the speakers throughout the Tethys Bottom were activated. A huge, monotonous mechanical voice came from the distant speakers. A grand hymn seemed to play across this shore. At the same time, subtitles in multiple different languages appeared on the screens:
"Welcome, highest administrator, Rover."
The reaction speed was extremely fast, the consideration extremely thorough, and the attitude extremely sincere — as if terrified that Noah would slash again.
"Yo."
Noah sneered:
"I called you earlier and you didn't respond. Why do you know how to make a sound now?"
"..."
After the words fell, the screen in front of him paused for a moment, seemingly unsure how to reply in a way that would satisfy Noah.
Noah furrowed his brows. He had no intention of tolerating the other party's silent temper and shouted sternly:
"Speak!"
"Reporting to the highest administrator, just now..."
The text on the panel flickered. After typing a few characters, it deleted them, repeating this several times before finally giving a stifled final reply:
"Just now... it lagged."
...