The difference lay in the fact that this authority was completely known.
Such authority would never be exposed. When any emergency arose, one would always retain the ability to correct it afterward.
Moreover, even true mythological giants could not achieve absolute omniscience. At best, they attained complete knowledge: all that exists can be known, but that which does not exist cannot.
What happened this time was, in truth, a miscalculation on his part—and an outrageous one at that.
Xiao had constructed a fusion furnace immediately after the Qi Training Stage.
That was an operation that skipped an entire major realm, leaping directly from Qi Training to Golden Core—yet he had still succeeded.
There was no mystery to it. Xiao possessed absolute control over cyber aura. The moment he willed the construction of a fusion furnace, the cyber aura simply compensated for every missing resource on its own.
Others, however, could not do this. They could rely only on the original power within their own bodies, which meant they would never be able to complete such a structure.
Even for Xiao himself, forcibly building the fusion furnace back then had left his foundation unstable. The massive delay in energy transmission alone was a fatal flaw waiting to happen.
By contrast, the realm the Mechanicum advanced toward step by step was extremely rigorous—there was no such thing as an unstable foundation.
…
…
After rewarding the priests of the Mechanicum, Xiao finally turned his attention inward. He began carving meridians and acupoints within his body, preparing to construct the fusion furnace once more.
When golden radiance rose again from within the furnace, it marked Xiao's return to the Golden Core Stage.
This time, however, supported by a complete system of meridians and acupoints, there was no longer any sense of obstruction in the flow of energy.
All power circulated through his body instantaneously—no delay, no resistance. Qi moved exactly as he willed, fluid and unimpeded.
At this point, the cybernetic cultivation system Xiao had created officially possessed three realms:
The Qi Training Stage,
the Foundation Building Stage,
and the Golden Core Stage.
During the Qi Training Stage, cultivators decompose all things, absorb energy, and expand the cyber aura within their bodies until it envelops them completely—granting durability beyond mortality, overwhelming dominance, and a lifespan of up to one hundred and twenty years.
In the Foundation Building Stage, cultivators construct meridians and acupoints—power pathways—within the body, open the Dantian, refine their spiritual temperament, and achieve a tenfold increase in all-around capabilities. Their internal prosthetics undergo unknown evolutionary changes, extending their lifespan by another three hundred years.
As for the Golden Core Stage, all spiritual energy is condensed, and a Golden Core—a fusion furnace—is formed within the Dantian. Energy becomes virtually inexhaustible, while the limits of strength remain… undefined.
"Tyrant System—activate!"
Xiao triggered the Tyrant System without hesitation. Scorching heat bloomed along his spine, pushing his neural acceleration to the absolute limit.
Yet before that heat could exert any real effect, it was instantly converted into pure energy by the cyber aura and circulated throughout his entire body.
In that instant, the world in Xiao's eyes seemed to freeze.
He stood up and moved casually, but even the faint wind pressure generated by his slow steps completely disrupted everything in the room.
Simply walking normally, his speed had already surpassed his former Mach 42 limit, entering an entirely new realm.
Ordinarily, someone who had integrated cyber aura would not produce a sonic boom even when activating a Sandevistan and moving at supersonic speeds.
This was because cyber aura absorbed the kinetic energy generated by air resistance—one of the reasons the Mechanicum could so easily break the sound barrier without harming themselves.
But Xiao's current movement speed had exceeded even what cyber aura could absorb.
If he wanted to move freely without destroying his surroundings, he now had to activate his superpowers as well, absorbing all the excess kinetic energy produced by his supersonic motion.
Otherwise, the sonic boom clouds alone from Xiao's movement would be enough to reduce Night City—buildings and people alike—to rubble.
Xiao opened the window with one hand and snapped his fingers.
"Music."
Several speakers instantly unfolded from his shoulders and back. In cyberspace, music from Xiao's memory was reconstructed, edited, and played aloud.
Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This).
A track perfectly suited for speedsters—the exclusive background music of Quicksilver.
With the familiar rhythm pulsing through him, Xiao stepped onto the beat and extended one foot out the window.
Gravity no longer had any meaning.
His feet adhered effortlessly to the glass as he ran straight up the building's exterior, moving vertically along the surface.
"Woohoo—!"
Accompanied by the trombones and pounding drums, Xiao raced through the nearly frozen Night City, admiring the halted expressions of pedestrians along the streets.
Whenever he encountered a scavenger, he would casually brush past them—and vanish without hesitation.
The moment Xiao disappeared, those scavengers exploded into countless motes of silver light, scattering into nothingness in a spectacular, almost beautiful death.
The sheer intensity of the run brought ultimate exhilaration. Xiao sweated with excitement, savoring the rush of wind tearing past his ears.
Only now did he truly understand why speedsters loved to run.
It felt too good.
He had no idea how long he'd been running—only that he kept getting faster, faster still, until he could barely stop.
In a single breath, he nearly circled the entirety of Night City. Whether in Pacifica or the Badlands, his footprints were everywhere.
Along the way, he also wiped out several marked Voodoo Boys cells.
The Voodoo Boys were a gang formed primarily by Haitian natives, with their headquarters on the western edge of Pacifica.
Despite their numbers, they were widely considered the most dangerous gang in Night City—because almost all of them were hackers.
They possessed their own supercomputer, a powerful Poseidon system, and an independent cyberspace. Their favorite pastime was exploring ancient networks and advocating the release of AI sealed behind the Blackwall.
Like the Maelstrom Gang and the Animals, they pursued transcendence—but theirs was the digitalization of the soul: abandoning flesh, ascending as data.
In Night City, they had secretly implanted data viruses into countless people, using them for blackmail—and burning out victims' brains when payment failed.
They had committed every conceivable atrocity.
Recently, they had even attempted to breach the network of Vought, seeking to steal the secrets of the dimensional chip.
But with their level of technology, how could they possibly penetrate Xiao's cyber defenses?
Instead, they were marked by him.
They had planned to hire cyberpunk mercenaries—but since Xiao had run into them tonight, he decided to handle it personally.
As Xiao ran wild through the city, he had no idea how many urban legends he created that night, nor how much trouble he caused.
The mysterious deaths of scavengers and Voodoo Boys alike—bodies vanishing completely after death—bore striking similarities to the methods of the Mechanicum.
Yet no culprit was ever seen.
For those who were saved, there was only one possible explanation:
It was the God of All Machines.
It was Om Messiah, watching over them.
Crack—
Xiao was just about to head home after his exhilarating run when a sudden arc of electricity flashed across his neck. A wisp of black smoke rose into the air.
His vision snapped back to normal.
Fast mode disengaged.
…
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