Chapter 3: The Perfect Half-Star

Chapter 3: The Perfect Half-Star

“Hey, Tendou…”

As soon as Tendou returned to the team, Caroline nudged him lightly with her shoulder.

Blinking her emerald-green eyes, she lowered her voice and asked curiously:

“What you just said to Chen Xing… was that true?”

Tendou adjusted his sunglasses, a sly curve tugging at his lips.

“Take a guess.”

Caroline frowned, thought for a moment, and then offered her conclusion.

“Although the failure rate of Star Core surgeries is very high, anyone who can walk off the operating table alive and make it to this point must have already adapted to the Star Core implanted in their body.”

“Chen Kong may not have displayed any Star Core abilities over the past two years, but he also hasn’t shown a single sign of rejection. He’s as healthy as someone who never went through the surgery at all.”

“But if you look at it from another angle, him being too normal… makes him a little too abnormal.”

Her thoughts turned, and Caroline glanced toward Chen Kong, who was standing a short distance away.

It’s hard to imagine that someone who looked so… weak, so ordinary, might have deceived everyone all along.

Could it be that Chen Kong really did possess a unique Star Core, as Tendou claimed—only lacking the right conditions to awaken it?

Sensing Caroline’s gaze, Chen Kong immediately lowered his head nervously, avoiding her eyes.

After all, though Caroline had never openly bullied him… She, like Chen Xing, was the kind of person whose pride ran deep into her bones.

The only difference was that Caroline’s pride was restrained and subtle—while Chen Xing’s was loud and flamboyant.

And so, whether Caroline or Chen Xing, both looked down on the weakling Chen Kong.

Only out of respect for Tendou had Caroline refrained from harsh words.

In fact, in the past two years, she hadn’t spoken a single word to him.

As if, in Caroline’s eyes, only Tendou was a person—while Chen Kong was just air.

Cold indifference was a kind of violence, too.

As for Tendou… In a sense, he was even more arrogant than Caroline or Chen Xing.

But his arrogance was different.

Tendou’s pride was equal-opportunity pride.

He looked down on everyone equally.

In his own words: whether Chen Kong or Chen Xing, it made no real difference to him.

After all, humans don’t bother distinguishing which ant in the colony is bigger or smaller.

And it was precisely because of this that Chen Kong, unlike with anyone else, could feel a certain kind of “respect” from Tendou.

It sounded pathetic to say aloud—but Tendou, who lumped him together with everyone else as ants, was also the only one among the 36 trainees who never shunned him, never treated him as an outcast.

Seeing Caroline’s curious gaze fixed on Chen Kong, Tendou popped a mint candy into his mouth, amusement flashing in his azure eyes beneath his shades.

Of course, he hadn’t been lying. As a transmigrator, he knew better than anyone just how special Chen Kong, the story’s protagonist, truly was.

The reason Chen Kong had never awakened his “Star Core” abilities… wasn’t because his surgery had failed.

On the contrary, it was a complete success.

So successful, in fact, that among everyone present, Chen Kong was the only one—along with him and Chen Xing—whose compatibility rate with his Star Core was 100%.

He was one of the rare “Perfect Half-Stars.”

But unlike him and Chen Xing, whose compatibility was obvious and outward—Chen Kong’s compatibility was hidden.

And the reason for that lay in his and Chen Xing’s uniquely special mother.

Because their mother… was no ordinary human.

She was a rare “humanoid starbeast” who had long lived among human society.

If Tendou and the others were Half-Stars created through artificial Star Core surgery—then Chen Kong and Chen Xing were innate Half-Stars.

Only, due to certain special reasons, Chen Kong’s bloodline leaned more toward his father’s humanity, while Chen Xing’s leaned toward their mother’s beast.

That was why one turned out plain-faced and frail, while the other grew into someone beautiful and monstrously strong.

In fact, if Tendou hadn’t “stolen the spotlight” ahead of schedule, then in the original plot, the true strongest of the 36 trainees of Stellaris Program wasn’t Tendou at all—but Chen Xing, the elder sister of the weakest.

The strongest sister and the weakest brother. A textbook setup straight out of an anime.

And because Tendou was familiar with every beat of Stellaris Season One, he knew the truth.

Chen Kong might look indistinguishable from an ordinary human now, but that was just appearance.

His so-called “human-like ordinariness” was, in fact, his innate ability.

An outrageous power that could nullify all Star Energy.

But because this ability was so broken, it even backfired on him—suppressing the Star Core implanted in his body, rendering it completely inert.

Still, once Kong realized this truth—he would be able to briefly suppress his Starbeast bloodline, and awaken the power of his implanted Star Core.

From this perspective, the siblings Chen Kong and Chen Xing were both undeniable outliers among the 36.

Because everyone else, Tendou included, had only one Star Core.

But these two? They practically had two.

One born of their bloodline.

One implanted through the Star Core surgery.

That was blatant cheating.

If Tendou hadn’t unlocked his own “cheat” early, there was no way he could have suppressed Chen Xing, who had been “born max-level.”

As for Chen Kong… Tendou didn’t care too much.

Yes, his potential was terrifying.

But before the Final Assessment arc, he wouldn’t have the “key” to unlock it.

That was the setup of the original plot of Stellaris: Embers, Episodes 1 through 6.

A mass-appeal story built on sibling rivalry.

But that storyline only worked if Tendou didn’t exist.

Now that he did—there was no way he would let the siblings hog all the spotlight.

Sure, they might be the “protagonists” of Stellaris.

But who said being the protagonist guaranteed being the most popular character?

No, the man known as Masamune Tendou was determined to claim the throne of popularity for himself.

And while Tendou and the others waited for Tachibana to announce the contents of the Final Assessment—

One hundred meters beneath them, in a VIP chamber of Ember Organization’s 13th underground base…

Strangers who were not members of Ember began to gather.

Some men, some women. Some young, some elderly.

But they all shared one trait in common— 

The air of highborn authority, refined from years of sitting in power.

No matter their identities in the outside world, the reason they were here was the same.

To witness for themselves the so-called “Stellaris Program,” which Ember claimed had epoch-shattering significance.

If the project was truly as miraculous as Ember claimed, then they were more than willing to invest some of their resources early, and join this “grand endeavor” ahead of the curve.