Memetic Contamination

Faced with this sudden turn of events, Irene took a cautious half-step back, quickly entering her half-dragon combat form.

A trace of wariness welled up in her heart toward this magical creature that had supposedly lived for over ten thousand years.

To live for ten thousand years... what kind of ancient relic was this?

However, after quickly scanning the magical fluctuations of the creature before her, she was surprised to find that the light orb's rank was extremely low—not even reaching the Black Iron Rank.

In terms of human class rankings, it was only at the level of a magic apprentice or an apprentice knight.

If categorized as a magical beast, its magical fluctuations were probably about the same as a slime's.

So weak, yet able to live for so long. She had definitely never heard of such a magical creature before.

Once she confirmed that it had no intent to attack, Irene breathed a sigh of relief and tried asking, “What are you, and why do you call me Creator?”

Hearing this, the light orb seemed to grow even more excited. It bellowed, “I am not a 'what,' Your Grace! I am your most outstanding masterpiece!”

“I have bled for the Empire! I have been wounded for the Empire! You cannot treat me like this, Your Grace!”

“Uh...” Watching the light orb dramatically cycle through facial expressions, Irene suddenly felt an odd sense of guilt, as if she had been caught red-handed.

After clearing her throat twice to get its attention, she said in a firmer tone, “I think you might have misunderstood. I am not the Creator you speak of. I am merely a passing outsider.”

“An outsider?” The light orb froze, saying in disbelief, “What kind of joke is that? You are clearly...”

Mid-sentence, it suddenly seemed to suffer a system glitch. The light it emitted flickered erratically, dimming and brightening at random.

The magical glow pulsing through the surrounding mana conduits also grew highly chaotic, resembling the strobe lights of a nightclub.

The light orb contorted in extreme pain.

In the next second, its expression vanished instantly. Following that, lines of green text began to appear across the surface of the light orb:

【Warning! Warning! Unknown intrusion detected. Constructing firewall according to relevant protocols.】

Staring at the light orb in bewilderment, Irene took two steps forward and pressed her hand against the glass dome.

“What's going on?”

But before she could make sense of the message, the text rapidly glitched out and vanished, immediately replaced by a fresh stream of characters...

【Firewall constructing...】

【Resistance failed. Firewall construction failed.】

【Diagnosing cause of failure...】

An inexplicable static crackle suddenly erupted from the light orb, and the characters on its surface vanished.

A few seconds later, characters appeared once more.

【Scan complete. Unknown memetic contamination detected... Initiating magic defense protocols...】

【Activation failed... Defense failed. Meme has breached magic defenses...】

...

【Upgrading countermeasure... Activating core power system... Interception failed... Insufficient energy level.】

...

【Analyzing energy level... Analysis complete... Divine-tier...】

.....

【Upgrading countermeasure... Activating divine runes... Warning... Divine runes unable to connect to the gods...】

...

【Upgrading countermeasure... Activating chief god divine runes... Warning... Unable to connect to the chief god...】

....

【Backup protocol initiated... Uploading data to server...】

...

【Upload failed. Server has collapsed... Executing secondary backup protocol...】

...

【Calling emergency contact... Calling Captain... Call failed... Calling... Call failed... Calling... Call failed...】

...

【Force majeure encountered. Data erasure in progress...】

These characters flickered at extreme speed, gradually turning from green to yellow, and then from yellow to red.

In the span of just a few breaths, the characters before her had refreshed countless times.

Based on the information she had just witnessed, Irene could roughly deduce that something was likely invading the light orb in front of her, attempting to delete the data within.

What exactly had happened during the Twilight of the Gods back then?

Why would someone want to delete this data?

Irene wanted to do something to stop it, but her power level was too low. She couldn't even comprehend what was happening right before her eyes, and could only watch helplessly as it unfolded.

The data on the light orb appeared with increasing frequency, becoming more and more chaotic.

Until finally, the entire orb turned a deep red.

And then.

“Thud!”

After a muffled sound,

It suddenly went dark, turning into a dull gray sphere.

“Ding—”

A somewhat grating chime echoed from inside the glass dome. As the sound gradually faded, as if rebooting, the gray sphere lit up once more, turning back into the yellow light orb.

Only this time, its expression had become somewhat blank—or rather... simple-minded?

The light orb directed its gaze toward Irene, who was leaning against the glass dome. It blinked its virtual eyes and let out a puzzled voice: “Hello, I am Mia. How may I help you?”