Chapter 42: My Old Nemesis, We Met Again

Chapter 42: My Old Nemesis, We Met Again

At four in the afternoon, on the elevated highway leading from Deep Blue Metropolis toward the Coastal District, a plain-looking business van cruised steadily along. Despite its modest exterior, the interior was lavishly furnished—polished panels, soft lighting, and seats plush enough to make you forget you were on the road.

“Hey, ow—ow ow! Caroline, easy! That hurts!”

In the back seat, Tendou yelped as Caroline, her expression dark and stormy, firmly twisted his ear.

Up front, beside them, Chen Xing sat with her chin resting on her hand, staring blankly out the window as though her thoughts had drifted far beyond the passing skyline.

Chen Kong, on the other hand, sat right next to her—sneaking glances every few seconds at the driver’s seat, where the Coral Knight, Cromwell, handled the wheel with silent focus. His curiosity was practically written all over his face.

Meanwhile, from the passenger seat, Tachibana glanced back toward the rearview mirror. Seeing Tendou’s increasingly desperate “save me” look, she finally sighed and decided to intervene.

“All right, Caroline. Let him go. Keep that up and you’ll rip his ear clean off.”

At Tachibana’s words, Caroline’s lips tightened—clearly, she still hadn’t forgiven Tendou for tricking her earlier.

But after a few seconds, she released his ear with a huff.

Instantly, life returned to Tendou’s face.

He rubbed his sore ear, shot a cautious glance at Caroline—who had deliberately turned her head away to ignore him—and wisely decided not to poke the dragon again.

Instead, he patted Chen Kong’s shoulder and changed the subject, his tone a little too casual to be natural.

“So, Kong-kun—those last three shots of yours were something else. How’d you manage to blend your ‘Void Mark’ into the bullets like that?”

Everyone in the van knew exactly what Tendou was doing: steering the conversation as far as possible from his earlier prank.

But curiosity got the better of them anyway, and one by one, all ears perked up.

After all, none of them had ever imagined that Chen Kong—the one they’d all quietly written off as “dead weight”—would pull off something so unbelievable during today’s test.

And it wasn’t just them.

Even the audience watching from the dimensional screen outside the scene was buzzing with the same question.

If they remembered correctly, Chen Kong’s “Star Energy Nullification” could only be triggered through direct contact.

So how in the world did he manage to give that same effect to a bullet?

Feeling every eye on him, the socially anxious Chen Kong fumbled through a halting explanation—stumbling over words as he recounted how it had all come about.

As it turned out, the inspiration for it all came from his sister Chen Xing’s Star Core: the Bloodflame Beast.

The Bloodflame Beast’s activation principle was simple yet terrifying—it used either the user’s or the enemy’s blood as fuel, igniting into searing, crimson fire.

And that concept—blood as a medium—had sparked something in Chen Kong’s mind.

He began to wonder: if his own blood could serve as a conduit, could he use it as the trigger to activate the Void Mark?

Because if that were possible… then he could, in theory, wield both the Void Mark and his Dreamweaver ability at the same time.

Fueled by that idea, Chen Kong had gone straight to the Doctor to pitch his theory.

But, as life tends to go, things didn’t unfold as smoothly as he’d hoped.

After running several experiments, the Doctor uncovered the true nature of Chen Kong’s power.

The reason his Void Mark could nullify other forms of Star Energy was because the Mark itself was a highly infectious, attribute-less form of Star Energy.

Any “Star Path” that came into contact with it—no matter its composition—would have its energy assimilated, stripped down to its most primitive, unaligned form.

Essentially, the Void Mark didn’t just nullify; it reset.

Of course, there were limits.

Roughly speaking, a Mark containing 100 units of Star Energy could only assimilate up to 300 units from another source before reaching its threshold.

Even so, that was more than enough to show just how overwhelming—how domineering—the Void Mark truly was.

As for the relationship between “Star Paths” and “Star Energy”?

Well… it was kind of like the bond between spells and mana in a world of magic.

So-called, the “Void Mark”—at its core—could be seen as a mass of powerful, attribute-less Star Energy, possessing a terrifying ability to assimilate everything it touched.

But with that nature came an unavoidable problem.

While Chen Kong’s blood could indeed temporarily contain fragments of the Void Mark, the world they lived in was one where Star Energy saturated every inch of the air.

And the Void Mark did not discriminate. Its assimilation didn’t only target the “Star Paths” invoked by Starbearers—it reacted just as fiercely to the free-floating Star Energy particles in the environment itself.

Because of that, even though the Doctor eventually devised a method for bullets to temporarily carry Chen Kong’s Void Mark, it came with three extremely strict conditions.

Condition One:

The bullet casing had to be made from special, rare materials resistant enough to avoid being instantly assimilated.

Even then, manufacturing them was a nightmare.

Condition Two:

The Mark’s stability on the bullet lasted no longer than ten minutes.

Once that limit passed, the bullet would revert to an ordinary round.

Condition Three:

The bullet’s effective range was capped at roughly ten meters.

The faster the bullet traveled, the more violently its inner Void Energy clashed with the surrounding Star Energy—accelerating its breakdown.

And the denser the Star Energy in the area, the shorter that effective range became.

Even with these suffocating limitations, the Doctor still praised the weapon’s potential highly.

Because when paired with Chen Kong’s natural low presence, those “Void Bullets” could create devastating surprise attacks.

Just like during his duel with the Coral Knight.

Had Cromwell not reacted the instant he noticed his shield behaving abnormally, had he hesitated even for a heartbeat—while he might not have died, receiving a severe injury would’ve been inevitable.

After all, the stronger a Starbearer was, the more absolute their faith in their own Star Energy became.

And in that sense, Chen Kong’s Void Mark was the perfect counter—a natural-born nemesis of every Starbearer.

An ability so outrageous it bordered on a bug—capable of letting the weak triumph over the mighty, and even pulling off a first-strike instant kill.

“Wait a sec—so the Void Mark is basically the cancer cell of Star Energy? I thought it was something like Kamijou Touta False Breaker kind of hax!”

“Hold up. If that’s its nature, I think I finally get why Chen Kong’s the protagonist of Stellaris! You think he’ll end up nullifying all Star Energy for world peace or something?”

“Bro, that sounds like a prophecy. Screenshot this!”

“No, but seriously—that actually sounds plausible! What if that’s how the story ends?”

“Impossible. If he really tried that, he’d make enemies of every Starbearer alive! Forget the rest—how’s he gonna get past Tendou? You think Tendou would just sit and watch?”

“Wait, true. Why do I suddenly feel like Tendou’s gonna be in trouble? Don’t tell me he’s gonna end up the villain?”

“Tendou, a villain? You know what—if that’s true, I’m all for it.”

Inside the van, Tendou’s eyes flicked toward the dimensional display showing the barrage of scrolling comments, and his heart skipped a beat.

He hadn’t expected the dimensional audience to piece together the future plot of Stellaris from nothing but the description of Chen Kong’s ability.

But the crazy thing was—they were right.

Chen Kong really would walk down that path someday.

And just as the viewers had guessed… Tendou himself was fated to stand in his way.

Not out of rivalry, or for the sake of popularity.

But for something far more personal—something he couldn’t yet say aloud.

Even without the existence of the “Popularity System,” Tendou still couldn’t bring himself to accept a world without star energy.

After all—whether the world was peaceful or not had never depended on the presence of Star Energy.

As a transmigrator, he had seen with his own eyes what a world stripped of its star energy looked like, and he understood better than anyone that an overly idealized world could only ever remain just that—an ideal, never reality.

Chen Kong wanted to create what he believed to be a dreamlike utopia.

But Tendou knew such a utopia was built on fantasy—detached from the way the world truly worked.

And in that sense, the greatest divide between Chen Kong and the rest of the cast in Stellaris wasn’t one of morality or belief—but one of ideological paths.

Their conflict wasn’t about good versus evil.

It was about the way forward.

Of course, at this point in time—during the events of Stellaris: Embers—none of those tensions had yet surfaced.

That wouldn’t come until the second season, Stellaris: Glimmer, when the rift between Chen Kong and the other thirty-five Children of the Stars would slowly take form—and then spiral completely out of control.

“All right, everyone. We’ve arrived.”

The Coral Knight, Cromwell, announced as he steered the van into a quiet residential zone in Deep Blue Metropolis’ Coastal District.

The vehicle rolled to a smooth stop before a luxurious standalone villa.

“This will be your temporary residence for the time being,” he explained.

Tendou was the first to hop out, his jaw practically hitting the ground as he stared at the villa’s gleaming exterior and ornate design.

“Uh, Old man… don’t tell me your filthy-rich boss bought this entire place just for us to stay in?”

Cromwell paused to think for a moment, then shook his head.

“Not exactly. This villa wasn’t purchased specifically for you. It’s just that… the entire neighborhood belongs to my master, Dorian. He merely picked one house for your use.”

“Wait, what—?”

Tendou tilted his sunglasses down, squinting at the sprawling rows of elegant villas stretching as far as he could see.

Most rich people owned villas by the house.

But Dorian—the richest man in Deep Blue—apparently owned them by the district.

This… this was what it meant to be truly loaded!

“All right, everyone,” Cromwell continued with his usual calm, professional tone.

“As for my master Dorian, you’ll be meeting him tonight. He’ll personally explain everything you need to know.”

“For now, please come inside. There’s something we must handle first.”

“After all, if you wish to enter Trilan Junior High, you’ll need proper, believable identities.”

“And nothing sells a fake identity better… than being exchange students.”

Under Cromwell’s lead, Tendou and the others stepped into the villa.

Inside, several maids were already waiting, each carrying neatly folded school uniforms and freshly printed student IDs bearing their new names.

Seeing those familiar uniforms, Tendou couldn’t help but feel a surge of nostalgia rise within him.

He exhaled softly, the corner of his lips curling up in a faint, wistful smile.

“Ah~ School… my old nemesis, we met again.”

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