As soon as she finished speaking, a test tube appeared out of nowhere in front of Himeko.
Himeko held the test tube in her hand with a perplexed expression, looking at it over and over, but she couldn't see anything special about it, much less know what it was for.
She knew that Cecilia, the S-rank Valkyrie who sacrificed herself in the Second Honkai Impact and was Kiana's mother, was a member of the Schariac family, one of Schicksal's three great families.
However, when the last name Schariac was followed by the words "Sacred Blood," she had no idea what it meant.
Himeko didn't understand it, but Theresa and Fu Hua, who had greater access to classified information within Schicksal, were very clear about what the Schariac Blood meant, not to mention that the version provided in the Q&A space was the final version.
In other words, this vial of Schariac Sacred Blood might be even more potent than the one Otto currently possesses.
Himeko naturally noticed the glances of Theresa and Fu Hua.
After thinking for a moment, Himeko handed the test tube to Theresa: "Principal, judging by your expression, this will be of greater use to you."
Hearing this, Theresa affirmed: "Himeko, there is hope for your health."
Himeko was clearly surprised by Theresa's words.
"We'll talk about it when it's over. For now, let's watch the video."
Theresa shook her head. The matter of the Schariac Sacred Blood was not something that could be explained in a few words.
Being reminded by Theresa, Himeko realized something: the answer that had tormented her for years was about to be revealed.
In fact, if she had entered the Q&A section immediately after learning of her father's death and answered correctly, she would never have been thinking about the reward.
It's not that she no longer cares about her father's death, but that after so many years of growth, she is no longer the impulsive, penniless girl she once was.
Therefore, when Himeko learned that Welt Yang was her father's killer, her first reaction was not to scream and demand revenge.
She is no longer a solitary woman who has lost her parents one after another. She has a charming superior and wonderful students. She has people and things she wants to protect. She is well aware that her impulsiveness can have irreversible consequences, which will cause pain to those around her.
As for the prizes offered in the Q&A section, they might well be related to the future of everyone present.
Only after considering all these things will Himeko deal with her own matters.
"Then let me see why that Anti-Entropy Alliance leader would attack my father."
Himeko had never met the mysterious leader of the Anti-Entropy Alliance, and no photo of him had ever appeared.
But it doesn't matter, soon you will be able to discover the other person's true identity through the Q&A section.
Once she has gathered enough information, she will undoubtedly take action herself...
However, this time, the video everyone was waiting for did not appear.
What happened?
Himeko looked at the holographic screen in front of her, which showed no video content, and thought: "Could I be so unlucky that this question doesn't come with a video?"
As soon as Himeko finished speaking, something happened: a small booklet with a colorful cover suddenly appeared in front of everyone.
Is this a comic?
Himeko reached out and took the comic with a strange expression, but her expression quickly froze upon seeing the two men on the cover.
Himeko recognized the blonde man in his elegant attire instantly.
"Bishop Otto?"
Then, the other man, with short brown hair and black-rimmed glasses, is...
Himeko was suddenly speechless.
To be honest, the name Walter is not uncommon in Western society.
Therefore, when Himeko learned that the leader of the Anti-Entropy Alliance was named Welt Yang, she did not develop any other connection.
Even now, seeing the man on the cover of this comic who appears alongside Otto, if she couldn't guess that Welt Yang is the same person as her former professor Walter, who taught her cosmology at Caltech, she would be indignant about her former genius reputation.
Not to mention that the man was holding a photograph that had been torn in half; it was the only photo she had with Mr. Walter.
Himeko never imagined that the Associate Professor of Physics at Caltech, whom she was infatuated with during her innocent and blossoming adolescence, would be the culprit in her father's murder.
Yes, in the period before her father's death, Mr. Walter—no, Welt Yang—did meet with her father.
With that in mind, Himeko eagerly opened the comic in front of her.
After seeing the cover, Theresa and Fu Hua, who felt their interests were related somehow, did the same.
As for Kiana, Mei, and Bronya, it is evident that they approached the matter with a different mindset.
As expected, they shared the hatred for the villain who murdered Professor Himeko's father.
However, because the cover displays Bishop Otto, the supreme leader of Schicksal, the three of them, as humble B-rank Valkyries from the Schicksal Far East Branch, also felt a sense of excitement at having glimpsed their boss's little secret.
These opportunities are rare!
The comic, as a whole, unfolds from three perspectives.
For Himeko, everything she knew was the most superficial layer of the story.
In 2005, after graduating from high school with excellent grades, Himeko rejected her father's invitation to study at a university in Europe and chose to pursue her dream of space exploration by enrolling at the California Institute of Technology in the United States.
There, she met Walter, a young, enthusiastic, and very charming associate professor.
Following her trip to New Mexico in search of extraterrestrial clues, which turned out to be a false alarm, Himeko clearly developed feelings for Welt Yang that went beyond the teacher-student relationship.
Himeko even invited Welt Yang to join the club she founded at school and invited him to her house for dinner, a dinner she prepared herself.
However, due to Welt Yang's deliberate distancing and the unexpected impact of Murata Ryusuke leaving only a suicide note before his fate became unknown, the two ended up like two intersecting lines that meet at a certain point, but their lives drift further and further apart afterward.
After her father's death, Himeko discovered information related to Destiny while going through his belongings.
Finally, Himeko chose to undergo the artificial Stigmata experiment and joined Schicksal's Valkyrie squad.
Her initial goal was to check if she could find the truth about her father's death in Destiny.
Of course, had it not been for the Q&A section, Himeko probably would never have known the truth about what happened then.
However, for Muryota Ryusuke, the whole story is a different version.
Ryusuke Murata is a man who values his dream of space exploration above everything else.
Therefore, even when his wife was seriously ill and his daughter was too young to take good care of herself, he deliberately ignored the doctor's advice that he should spend more time with his wife, pretending not to notice and immersing himself in his work.
At least from Himeko's point of view, her father was unaware of her mother's illness at that time.
On the other hand, Murata Ryusuke's wife overheard the argument between her husband and the doctor.
Upon realizing that her husband cared more about his career than her, she decided to let him go.
It is difficult to state that her subsequent death was not influenced by Muryota Ryusuke's decision.
If a patient suffering from a serious illness harbors resentment, their fate is already sealed.
However, despite Murata Ryusuke choosing to abandon everything, even his own humanity, he ultimately failed to realize his ambitions under the influence of destiny.
Neither Otto, the leader of Schicksal, nor his other research colleagues understood or supported Ryusuke Murata's persistent idea of finding clues to resist the Honkai by searching for extraterrestrial civilizations.
Leaving Otto aside for the moment, he also had his obsessions.
For others, the imminent Collapse is the greatest threat to humanity, while extraterrestrial civilizations and aliens are nothing more than unproven and ethereal phenomena.
The spacecraft development project that Murata Ryusuke had devoted so much effort to was finally suspended, and even the entire aerospace research and development department was laid off.
He sacrificed everything only to end up like this; he was unwilling to accept it.
That's when the Hughes mint chose him, and they became partners.
To fight against the Honkai, the Hughes civilization used all its technological power and Herrscher Cores of the time to build a fortress-shelter called Candy House.
Later, when the Celestial Beings attacked, the Hughes civilization, aware that it could not face them, chose to abandon its physical bodies and preserve its consciousness entirely in a shelter. Then, it moved to other planets to parasitize.
By merging the Hughes clan's original power with that fortress, they created a dimensional weapon that transcended the understanding and creation of the existing human civilization on Earth. Its essence was the same as the Key of God, and Murata Ryusuke called it the Outer Key.
Peppermint tells Murata Ryusuke that humanity is now threatened by Celestial Beings.
Before Peppermint Candy, another member of the Hughes clan called Black Sugar arrived in human society to try to help humans stop the Sky People, but for some unknown reason, they suddenly disappeared without a trace.
Therefore, this heavy responsibility fell into the hands of the mints.
After conducting an investigation at the Destiny headquarters, where Black Sugar had initially sought a partner, Peppermint Candy finally selected Murata Ryusuke as its companion, a man who appeared to be just like him, who always firmly believed in his inner goals and never gave up even when faced with obstacles.
Thanks to Peppermint Candy, Murata Ryusuke learned that the asteroid detected by Anti-Entropy and Destiny was not an ordinary naturally formed rock, but a scout star created by Celestial Beings to collect information.
Furthermore, the Celestial Beings' methods have evolved, and they are now capable of sending neural implants to Earth before the scout planet falls, controlling natives to collect information, and even destroying weapons that threaten them.
Therefore, both the Anti-Entropy faction and the Destiny faction believed that the asteroid posed no threat to Earth and consequently abandoned their plan to launch weapons to destroy it.
However, all of this was the result of employees manipulating data and being controlled by people in the sky.
If left unchecked, the scout star will pass through the atmosphere, causing a devastating blow to human civilization, similar to the Tunguska event. Then, the Celestial Beings will send troops to Earth to extract Honkai energy.
Faced with this bad news, the elder Konpeito, in the candy store, made the same decision as so many times before: escape to another planet. However, Peppermint insisted on joining forces with humans to eliminate the celestial threat.
Therefore, the deal between Peppermint and Murata Ryusuke was that the latter would complete the campaign against the Scourge Star and, in return, would allow Murata Ryusuke to connect his spirit with the collective consciousness of Hughes.
After all, Murata Ryusuke's body has been severely eroded by Honkai energy due to his years of research work, and he is currently in a state where his days are numbered.
By transferring his spirit to the Outer Key, Murata Ryusuke could continue living by abandoning his physical body, just like the Hughes clan.
This is a very good offer.
Ryusuke Murata readily accepted Peppermint Candy's proposal, and both parties officially formed a cooperative relationship.
With the help of Peppermint Candy, Murata Ryusuke managed to deceive the suspicious Otto, escaped Otto's hypnotic control using the Mimetic Feather Dust from the Void Treasure, resolved the Mimetic Feather Dust's feather countermeasure, and obtained permission to travel to the United States and take a vacation.
Meanwhile, Murata Ryusuke used the key of the Fourth Divine Key and a supposed secret destination to launch a plan to attack the east coast of the United States using the Fourth Divine Key, in exchange for the opportunity to contact Anti-Entropy.
The Fourth Divine Key is a legacy from the era of the previous civilization, and its purpose is to repair the Earth's ecological environment after it was destroyed by the End.
Meanwhile, the research institute where Murata Ryusuke works has been working for five years to repair the Fourth Divine Key, and has successfully improved the ecological environment of the Siberian plains that were damaged in the Second Collapse.
Ryusuke Murata's original intention was to go to the United States to contact Welt Yang. He told Peppermint that only Welt Yang had the strength and authority to destroy Scout Star when the enemy deliberately destroyed the weapons.
As for his true purpose, it was to gain Welt Yang's trust, and after the latter completed the campaign against Occult Star and Peppermint fulfilled the agreement to connect his mind with the Outer Key, he would take advantage of the moment the other party lowered their guard to kill him and take his place.
After obtaining the Herrscher of Reason Core, he could impersonate Welt Yang and take his place.
If he managed to become the leader of the Anti-Entropy Alliance, his dream of space exploration would no longer be just words but would become a tangible reality.
In Murata Ryusuke's opinion, if a civilization as inferior as the Celestials can control and use Honkai energy by mastering space exploration technology, then if humanity does the same, the result will only be better.
The cost represented only 80% of the national strength of the United States at that time, which was insignificant in Murata Ryusuke's opinion.
Ryusuke Murata's idea may be right or wrong, but there is no doubt that his actions were seriously problematic and despicable.
Fortunately, thanks to Einstein's caution, he did not meet Welt Yang as expected.
However, by sheer coincidence, Murata Ryusuke discovers that Welt Yang has become his daughter's university professor.
Thus, Murata Ryusuke allowed the mints to betray their presence to attract Welt Yang's attention. Then, he went out of his way to behave like a good father to Welt Yang's student, thereby improving his image with the latter.
Of course, not everything was an act.
At least out of the guilt he feels toward his ex-wife, Murata Ryusuke has always wanted to make amends for his mistakes with Himeko.
Only genuine feelings can deceive people.
When Murata Ryusuke felt that he had sufficiently increased his favorability rating and believed that Welt Yang would not resist too much, or even turn against him if he ignored him, he confessed his intentions, as well as the matter of the mints and the Hughes clan.
To gain Welt Yang's trust, Murata Ryusuke even took him to the candy store to meet the Hughes family.
With the testimonies of the elder Konpeito and other members of the Hughes clan, and the manifestation of the magical dimensional space of the Candy House, Welt Yang chose to temporarily believe Murata Ryusuke.
After leaving the Outer Key, both unexpectedly discovered that Himeko had been corrupted by a neural implant from the Celestial Beings.
Murata Ryusuke felt immense remorse and guilt for what happened, convinced that he had been the one who had harmed Himeko. He argued that had he not been absent, Himeko would not have suffered such a calamity, as the Celestial Beings' target should have been him.
Welt Yang immediately took Himeko to the Anti-Entropy hospital for surgery.
Thanks to the efforts of Tesla and Einstein, the neural implant was successfully removed from Himeko's body. However, the cells in her body had deteriorated, and the deterioration was continuing. With the medical methods available to Anti-Entropy at the time, it was impossible to stop it.
In other words, Himeko's independent consciousness will disappear completely in just three days.
Seizing the opportunity, Murata Ryusuke provided the information he possessed, which allowed the Anti-Entropy people to understand that the celestial explorers were sending signals that could control the process of erosion within Himeko's body.
In other words, there are only two paths to choose from if you want to save Himeko.