The Honkai world.
Arc City.
Rain leaked down endlessly from the gray, overcast sky.
The entire city was soaked in this damp, watery mist. The puddles on the streets reflected the crooked neon signs, and stepping on them would kick up a tiny splash of murky water.
This rain had already been falling for three days.
The noodle shop on the street corner had few customers.
The owner leaned behind the register, looking at her phone, occasionally lifting her head to glance at the girl in the corner who hadn't touched a single bite of noodles from the moment she walked in.
Raiden Mei sat in the seat by the window.
Before her sat a bowl of plain noodles that had long since gone completely cold.
The noodles had soaked up the broth and swollen into a sticky, congealed lump, and a thin film of grease had formed on the surface of the soup.
She had split apart the chopsticks, but they merely rested on the rim of the bowl, never once picked up from beginning to end.
Her hair was wet.
Her long purple-black hair clung to her cheeks and neck, the ends still dripping water, pooling into a small puddle on the floor tiles by her feet.
She hadn't brought an umbrella.
From the moment she left at four o'clock this morning until now, she had been searching the southeastern district of Arc City on foot for nearly eight hours.
The white combat suit on her body, [Striker Fulminata], was drenched by the rain, clinging tightly to her, outlining the shoulder line that had clearly thinned from days of high-intensity combat.
The continuous days of intense searching had left clear marks on this young face.
Her eye sockets were slightly sunken, with a layer of grayish-blue shadow beneath them—ironclad proof of prolonged sleep deprivation.
A few tiny raindrops still hung from her eyelashes, refracting faint points of light under the dim yellow lamps of the noodle shop.
There was no excess emotion in those eyes, only a kind of exhaustion that came from being worn down to the absolute limit.
She replayed today's search route in her mind.
Arc City southeast district, ruled out.
Arc City port district, ruled out.
Every location she could think of where Kiana might possibly appear—all ruled out.
On the Honkai energy detector, the readings related to the Herrscher of the Void remained at zero the entire time.
It was as if the person Kiana Kaslana had never existed in this city at all.
The fingers tapping the table stopped.
Mei lowered her head, her gaze falling on the bowl of noodles that could no longer be eaten.
The congealed film of grease on the soup's surface reflected her own face, blurry and indistinct, the features impossible to make out.
"Can't find her."
Her lips moved slightly, her voice so small that even she could barely hear it.
"Can't find you anywhere—where on earth are you?"
The phone screen lit up for a moment.
It was a routine communications confirmation from the Far East Branch.
Mei gave it a glance, didn't reply, and locked the screen directly.
She flipped the phone over face-down on the table, then crossed both arms over her chest and leaned back against the chair.
Outside the window, the rain was still falling.
A police car drove past the noodle shop's entrance, the lights on its roof trailing a blurry band of blue light through the curtain of rain.
Just two hours ago, she had met with someone who made her extremely uncomfortable.
Rita Rossweisse.
Vice-captain of Schicksal's Immortal Blades squad.
An S-rank Valkyrie.
That woman, dressed in a wrinkle-free maid outfit and holding a long-handled black umbrella, had stood beside the bench in Arc City's Central Park and given the soaked, mud-spattered Mei an impeccable smile.
"Miss Mei, you look very tired."
Mei didn't respond.
Rita didn't mind. She folded her umbrella, spread a handkerchief on the bench, and then sat down.
Her movements were as elegant as if she were attending an afternoon tea party.
"Schicksal is also searching with all its strength for Kiana Kaslana's whereabouts."
"But regrettably, our search results are the same as yours. The Honkai energy reaction of the Herrscher of the Void has completely vanished from the skies above Arc City."
"No decay trajectory, no residual fluctuations—as if she had been utterly erased from this world by something."
Mei's fingers clenched within her sleeve.
"What are you trying to say?"
"What I'm trying to say, Miss Raiden," Rita tilted her head, "is that before we find Kiana Kaslana, there's no need for us to wear each other down. Don't you agree?"
"A ceasefire?"
"A temporary cooperation," Rita corrected. "After all, for both sides, finding her is the top priority. As for what happens after we find her..."
Her smile didn't change, but the warmth at the bottom of her eyes dropped a few degrees.
"We can discuss that when the time comes—it won't be too late."
"Also, I must remind you of one thing: this city seems to be undergoing some kind of anomaly. Honkai Beasts are gathering in large numbers, which is highly unusual."
"Investigating this matter is also a Valkyrie's duty. If you have any intelligence, please don't hesitate to share it."
She spoke a string of numbers—Rita Rossweisse's exclusive frequency.
Mei stared at Rita for a long time.
At last she stood up, turned, and walked into the rain without looking back.
"I will."
She dropped these words and vanished into the curtain of rain.
Inside the noodle shop.
Mei recalled the conversation from two hours ago, her fingers beginning to tap the table once more.
Rita was right.
The Honkai energy fluctuations in Arc City were indeed continuously intensifying.
Before she came, she had assumed it was the Herrscher of the Void core inside Kiana's body drawing the Honkai Beasts to gather. But now Kiana's trail had completely disappeared, yet the Honkai Beasts kept surging in endlessly from all directions.
Something was wrong.
If it wasn't Kiana drawing them in, then there must be something else inside Arc City.
Mei's brow furrowed.
She fished a palm-sized communications terminal from the inner pocket of her coat, preparing to connect to the Hyperion's channel and report the latest situation to Theresa.
Just as her finger brushed against the comm key—
On the terminal screen, a channel icon that had been silent for a long time suddenly lit up.
It was Bronya Zaychik's exclusive encrypted channel.
Mei's fingers froze in midair.
Bronya should be carrying out a mission in Sea Abyss City right now.
Her communications channel had been cut off for several days due to signal interference from the Sea of Quanta.
Why would it suddenly be restored at a time like this?
Mei pressed the connect key.
From the comm channel came a flood of electromagnetic noise and the static of distorted signals.
Amid that harsh noise, a familiar voice—obviously weak and gasping—squeezed through intermittently.
"Big sister Mei..."
Bronya's voice.
Mei's spine instantly straightened.
"Bronya? Are you all right? Why did the signal suddenly come back? What happened over in Sea Abyss City?"
Another burst of harsh electromagnetic noise came over the channel.
Then, Bronya's voice rang out again.
This time, in the voice of that silver-gray girl who was forever calm to the point of being deadpan, there appeared something Mei had never heard before.
Trembling.
"Big sister Mei, Bronya got the Herrscher of Reason core. But there's something even more important."
Mei's hand gripping the comm terminal tightened.
"What is it?"
"Bronya, in the Sea of Quanta..."
The signal cut out again for half a second.
Then.
"Bronya thinks... she saw Kiana."
Inside the noodle shop.
The hand holding the comm terminal suddenly clenched.
The bowl of completely cold plain noodles on the table was bumped by her elbow, which she'd accidentally knocked into it; the broth sloshed, splashing a few drops onto the wooden table.
Outside the window, the rain was still falling.
"She opened the Imaginary Space and blocked an attack for Bronya. Bronya didn't mishear—that was the voice of the idiot Kiana."
Bronya's comm signal kept breaking and reassembling under the interference of the Sea of Quanta.
Mei stood up.
The chair legs let out a harsh scraping sound against the floor tiles.
The owner was startled, lifting her head from the phone screen to see that the purple-haired girl who had been sitting in the corner the whole time had now stood up, staring fixedly at the palm-sized black device in her hand.
Rainwater was still dripping from the ends of her hair.
"Kiana is in the Sea of Quanta?"
Mei's voice forced its way out through her teeth.
"Schicksal's satellites clearly showed the Herrscher of the Void vanishing last in the skies above Arc City. If she went to the Sea of Quanta..."
Her gaze swept across the rain-soaked city outside the window, a city whose every corner she had already turned over.
"Then what on earth have I been searching for all this time?"
The comm channel was left with only electromagnetic noise.
Mei stood there holding the terminal.
The dim yellow lamplight of the noodle shop shone on her soaked coat, casting an elongated shadow in the puddle at her feet.
The broth from the bowl of noodles on the table was still slowly dripping down from the rim, drop by drop, falling onto the floor tiles with an extremely faint sound.
Mei's mind was a tangled mess.
Why would Kiana be in the Sea of Quanta? What on earth had happened to her? During this time, had she eaten enough? Had she stayed warm? Was she still silently bearing everything alone? Was she—
She didn't dare think any further.
Raiden Mei stuffed the comm terminal back into her pocket.
Then she picked up the sheathed blade resting against the back of the chair and pushed open the glass door of the noodle shop.
The rain struck her face.
A cool patch of it, with a few drops falling into her mouth.
Slightly bitter, yet with a trace of sweetness—the sweetness of finally getting news of the person who mattered most.
Happiness Community, Unit 302.
The living room was dim, with only a few threads of neon light coming in from outside the window, pulling twisted shadows across the floor.
The person on the sofa suddenly sat up.
Long white hair slid down along her shoulders.
She gasped for breath in great gulps, her chest heaving violently.
The dazzling golden pupil of her right eye was especially conspicuous in the darkness, and the deep blue left eye that originally belonged to its owner was now also completely devoured by golden light.
Sirin raised both hands.
By the faint light, she slowly turned her palms over, then clenched them forcefully into fists.
No resistance.
No obstruction whatsoever.
That power, like a tumor clinging to the bone, that had at every moment contended with her for control over every inch of muscle—it had vanished cleanly and completely.
This body now belonged entirely to her.
The emotion of ecstasy had just begun to surge in her mind when she immediately recalled the scenes she had seen earlier in that absurd dream.
The Sea of Quanta, the Herrscher of Reason, and that girl called Bronya.
That man hadn't lied—they really could return to their original world.
As long as she went back, she could trample that man and this idiot beneath her feet, and repay every humiliation she'd suffered during this time a hundredfold.
Sirin pulled the corner of her mouth into a smile.
But the smile froze on her face.
It was too quiet.
The consciousness space was dead silent.
That consciousness which usually curled up in the corner like a frightened stray cat, forever on guard against her—at this moment there wasn't even the faintest fluctuation from it.
"Hey."
She called out in her mind.
No response at all.
"Stop playing dead in there! Get out here!"
Still only deathly silence.
Sirin stood barefoot on the floor.
The icy touch of the floor tiles shot straight up from the soles of her feet to the top of her head.
She walked over beside the coffee table.
On it sat half a glass of flat cola and a few sheets of scrap paper covered in strange code names from a planning proposal.
If that idiot's consciousness had completely dissipated...
A sentence abruptly surfaced in her mind.
[If she dies, you'll have to die along with her.]
That was something the man called Su Yu had said.
When that man looked at her, his eyes had been as calm as a pool of stagnant water, without the slightest hint of joking.
Sirin swept the scrap paper off the coffee table with one motion.
The papers scattered across the floor with a rustling clatter.
"What on earth are you doing?!" she snarled at the empty living room, her voice slamming between the walls.
She clawed at her hair in irritation, rumpling the originally smooth white hair into an utter mess.
She didn't understand. Just now, in that dream, it had clearly been this body's owner who had actively torn open the space—so why was she now utterly unresponsive, like a dead person?
Just handing over control of the body for nothing like this?
How dare she!
What did the death of that woman Murata Himeko amount to?
What did surviving like an idiot in this run-down apartment all this time amount to?
Sirin began pacing back and forth in the cramped living room.
Her heels pounded heavily against the floor, making a dull thudding sound.
Her breathing grew more and more ragged.
The Herrscher of the Void had never felt anything so absurd.
She had longed countless times to completely occupy this body, to wipe out that weak consciousness.
But now, when all of this had actually happened, what she experienced was not victory, but an overwhelming, all-encompassing panic.
She stopped at the entryway, her gaze fixed dead on that tightly shut security door.
Outside the door there was only the occasional sound of wind drifting through the corridor.
She clenched her teeth, her back molars grinding with a creaking sound.
Her fingernails dug deep into her palms; the pain barely kept her clear-headed.
Where the hell had that bastard man gone off to die?
That guy who was always droning on annoyingly in her ear about some game, some setting—why, of all times, was he not here at this very moment?
Sirin stared fixedly at the door handle.
Her chest heaved violently, her fingers unconsciously gripping the edge of the wall.
Hurry up and come open the door, you bastard!
The tightly shut security door remained motionless for a long time.
Sirin closed her eyes in irritation, letting her consciousness plunge rapidly downward, sinking into that silent space that had originally belonged to her.
She had to figure out what exactly had happened to this body.
In the deep, dark depths of the sea of consciousness, that white-haired girl was curled up just so, quietly, as if asleep, her chest rising and falling evenly with empty breaths.
And between her slightly overlapped hands, that glowing Herrscher of the Void core was pulsing with a rhythmic flicker.
As long as she's alive, that's enough.
However.
Sirin let out a cold laugh. What that man had said could very well be understood from another angle—as long as Kiana's consciousness wasn't extinguished, Sirin wouldn't be dragged to the grave along with her.
In that case, if she seized this chance to lock Kiana's consciousness here forever, taking control without erasing Kiana's consciousness—
Then not only would she not die, she could also completely gain mastery over this body.
She tried to reach out and seize that power that should have belonged to her in the first place.
The instant her fingertip touched that layer of halo, a powerful and utterly exclusive will instantly rebounded back.
Sirin abruptly stepped back half a pace, her golden vertical pupils contracting violently.
She simply couldn't wrest it away.
In that bizarre Sea of Quanta, this idiot whom she had always regarded as weak and incompetent had not only not been devoured by the power, but had instead forcibly seized the greater part of the core's dominion.
That will locked the core down tight as solid bedrock; no matter how Sirin tore and pulled, it didn't budge in the slightest.
"What is this supposed to be..."
Sirin looked at the sleeping girl in the consciousness space, her voice cracking with the extremity of her rage.
"You're in there sleeping soundly without a care, dumping this whole mess on me?!"
If that lunatic called Su Yu pushed the door open right now and saw that she had completely occupied this body yet couldn't wake Kiana, he would absolutely fight her to the death without a word.
Sirin's eyes snapped open, her consciousness returning to reality.
The extreme agitation and panic made it nearly impossible for her to control her emotions. She whirled around suddenly and swung her arm down savagely.
"Crash—!"
The glass cup that had held cola, sitting on the edge of the coffee table, was swept off and smashed hard against the floor tiles, exploding into a scatter of glittering shards.
The crisp shattering sound was infinitely amplified in the deathly silent night.
Sirin panted heavily, her chest heaving violently.
At that very moment, from outside the door suddenly came the dragging, disordered sound of high heels treading on the stairs.
Immediately after came a rustling scrape of metal.
"Click."
A key turned in the lock.
The door opened.
A strong, pungent smell of alcohol mixed with perfume instantly poured into the cramped living room.
Every muscle in Sirin's body went taut in an instant, her golden eyes like a beast poised to strike, fixed dead on the doorway.
The door was shoved open roughly, and a staggering figure leaned slanting against the door frame.
A head of long red hair was draped somewhat disheveled over her shoulders, her cheeks flushed an abnormal red, a pair of high heels she'd taken off still dangling from her hand.
Himeko.
The instant she saw that face, it was as if a thunderbolt had struck down in Sirin's mind.
That was the face of the woman who, once before in the Imaginary Space, had wielded a flame-burning greatsword and utterly shattered all of her arrogance and power—Murata Himeko.
The instinct belonging to the Herrscher of the Void almost instantly took the upper hand. A thick killing intent erupted in Sirin's eyes; she abruptly raised a hand, wanting to mobilize her spatial Authority to grind this ant before her into pieces.
However, nothing happened.
Forget tearing open space—she didn't even have the strength to condense a single Subspace Lance.
A wave of intense dizziness struck from the depths of her brain, and the muscles in her four limbs ached as if they were about to be torn apart.
In the Sea of Quanta, that idiot, in order to save someone, had drained nearly all of this body's stamina and spiritual strength without any restraint.
Right now, in this excessively peaceful world, she was even too weak to stand steadily.
"In the middle of the night... what are you smashing things for..."
Himeko let out an alcoholic hiccup, muttering indistinctly.
She hadn't noticed at all the killing intent aimed at her in the darkness, simply assuming these two youngsters were squabbling again.
She casually tossed her high heels by the entryway and walked into the living room on bare feet with somewhat unsteady steps, squinting as she looked around.
"Hm? Where's that brat Su Yu? Why are you here all alone in the pitch dark?"
Sirin stood frozen in place, listening to this woman who wore the face of her arch-nemesis speak to her in such a familiar tone. A sense of unprecedented absurdity, mixed with humiliation, surged into her heart.
She clenched her teeth, her voice as if forcibly squeezed out from the depths of her throat, terrifyingly dry and hoarse: "He... isn't here."
"Knew it."
Himeko not only didn't shrink back at this cold tone, but instead sighed and walked straight up to the sofa.
She plopped herself down, then naturally reached out and grabbed Sirin's arm, yanking it down hard.
Sirin was already weak to begin with, and this sudden brute force pulled her straight down so that she tumbled onto the sofa, landing right beside this woman reeking of alcohol.
"What do you even understand, Kiana..."
Himeko didn't notice in the slightest the murderous gaze of the person beside her. She leaned back against the sofa, head tilted up, and began pouring out her grievances.
"You have no idea... that old geezer of mine has really gone off the deep end today. After seeing the scene Eden made, on the way back he practically grabbed me by the head and told me to go throw myself at Su Yu!"
Himeko irritably rubbed her messy red hair, then turned her head to look at Sirin, speaking earnestly and gravely.
"It's not that big sis here dislikes that brat Su Yu—the kid really is decent. But big sis knows you like him, so I can't go doing something like stealing a man right out from under you, now can I?"
Sirin's brain had already completely crashed.
What was this supposed to be?
She, the supreme Herrscher of the Void, was now being held by the hand by a mortal drunkard, chatting here about what...
Throwing herself at a man? Jealous rivalry?
"Hey, listen, you—you're just way too lacking in vigilance!"
Seeing Sirin say nothing, Himeko assumed she'd been wronged, and poked Sirin's shoulder with a finger, exasperated like iron that wouldn't become steel.
"Didn't you see the whole scene at the banquet today? Elysia I could let slide, but that Eden... oh heavens, you should have seen the look in Eden's eyes when she and Su Yu came back from the back garden!"
Himeko leaned in closer, her alcoholic breath blowing straight onto Sirin's face.
"Do you know what the number one factor is when a woman develops that kind of feeling toward a man?" Himeko lowered her voice mysteriously. "It's finding him interesting!"
"The way she looked at Su Yu was just like she'd spotted some peerlessly fun piece of prey. Wise up a little, you little girl. Big sis may never have been in a relationship, but a woman's intuition is never wrong—that Eden is absolutely a dangerous element!"
Sirin held her back ramrod straight, her whole person like an ice sculpture that had been frozen solid.
She felt a torment more terrifying than death eroding her dignity.
This utterly illogical worldly nagging, this earthy, defenselessly mundane tugging—to a Herrscher like her who was accustomed to destruction and high pressure, it was simply the highest grade of spiritual execution.
She wanted to resist, but that pitiful bit of stamina couldn't possibly break free from the grip of this drunken grown woman.
She wanted to lose her temper, but feared this woman would seize the chance to make a scene, drawing in even more uncontrollable trouble.
"Hm?"
Himeko seemed to finally sense that something was off with Sirin. She leaned in even closer, her somewhat hazy gaze straining to focus on Sirin's face.
"Kiana... how come both of your eyes have turned golden?"
Himeko stretched out a finger, seemingly wanting to touch the corner of Sirin's eye.
Sirin's breath abruptly halted.
"Oh... did you buy colored contacts? Why'd you buy such an eye-catching color—it's actually kind of scary to look at in the middle of the night. Still... it's pretty good-looking, though."
Himeko didn't actually touch her, but instead yawned and leaned back against the sofa again, still muttering under her breath about the gossip concerning Su Yu and Eden.
Sirin stared fixedly at the dim ceiling lamp, the muscles at the corner of her eye twitching slightly beyond her control.
Su Yu, you bastard! Where the hell have you gone off to die!?
Didn't you keep insisting you'd be this Queen's partner?! Didn't you say you'd help me before I returned to the Honkai world?!
Croak! Su Yu, you bastard!
Save me! Hurry up and come save me!!
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