"Who are you?"
Not you, too.
Hua pushed down a surge of irritation, to be questioned by a feather, of all things… And yet, seeing its pathetic state, Hua could not bring herself to be angry at it. Clearly this feather had been through… a lot. What had Kevin done to her?
"Looks like most of your memories got burnt out. I am your true mistress, of course." Hua sighed, and looked at the feather. Even with the infusion of energy, it was barely holding its form together. Hua did not know what kind of recklessly brave and self-sacrificial thing the feather did, but… it was probably recklessly brave and self-sacrificial.
If there was one thing Hua learnt from revisiting her long memories, it was that the old her was always ready to throw herself in harm's way.
The thought angered Hua for some reason. Why did she have to do all that, when there were so many options for one as powerful as her?
"You're just a duplicate of my will, but it still hurts to see you reduced to such a state."
"...your copy?"
"Of course, you are a feather from Fenghuang Down, a duplicate of my mind and memories, a manifestation of my will." Hua forced down a surge of wrongness at that idea, and decided to push on, "I have no idea how you ended up in Kevin's hands, because I was dead at the time. But now, I've got you."
Why was she pleading with a duplicate of herself? This was too sad for words.
Live long enough, and you live to become Vill-V.
…Vill-V only ever made eight of herselves. How many must I have made?
Too many to count. And with each piece she manifested, each fragment she broke off from Fenghuang Down, she grew the weaker. Why would she have done that? A few to watch over important places and people, she could understand. But… Bronya? Otto?
It was inconceivable. And Hua grew tired of thinking of the whys and wherefores of the past.
The past really is another country…
She opened her arms, "return to me. Return my strength and memories, I would know what transpired after my death."
And together, I will punish those who had wronged us. I have already killed Otto once. Please give me a reason to kill him again.
The feather - did not comply. Instead she cocked her head and looked over Hua. It felt as if her eyes could pierce right into the heart of Hua's being. Hua shifted uncomfortably under her gaze. The feather seemed to have realised something, and started murmuring, "I see… Otto…"
"What are you muttering about?"
The feather glanced at Hua, and thought for a moment before replying, "when Otto killed me, at that moment, I activated the zeroth order power of Fenghuang Down. I transferred my consciousness onto a feather - Kiana's feather, in order to suppress the Herrscher of the Void."
Hua -
Hua remembered that. She did do that, she thought.
Nameless fear gripped her.
It can't-
"I left that body behind. The vessel was empty. It had no soul."
"What are you trying to say?" Hua said, trying to keep the tremor from her voice, and only partially succeeding.
The feather looked on, and with an even voice that sounded like thunder in Hua's ears, she said, "if I am here… then…"
"Who are you?"
Who am I?
You are a monster who only ever bring ruin to all that you hold dear.
Hua started - what -
Everything you have ever cherished falls to ruin. Everyone you have ever cared for perished.
It's not true.
In response, there was only a mocking laughter - in her own voice.
ENOUGH!
Hua took the feather and zoomed into the clouds. She needed a moment to collect herself.
Yes. That was it. She only needed to collect herself.
Hua felt better already.
Despite her long life, she had only recently - to be precise, about an hour ago, when she flew away from Schicksal Headquarters - discovered that she loved flying. She loved to be above the clouds.
"I don't like heights. You know, you look down on everything, and everything seems small. Feels like arrogance. It's not good."
Hua kept up a stream of chatter, and not because as long as she did not stop talking she would not start to think. Nonsense.
"But if you go up high enough, all the way past the cloud layer, it gets better. The air is better, the sunlight is better, and the clouds like sea foam and waves as far as the eye can see." Hua stretched and swirled around, wide grin on her face, "it feels like paradise."
Funny, it felt like she had had this conversation already.
"You can see all this, right?" Hua belatedly realised that the feather had been silent for a while, and turned to look at it. It was looking at her.
Undeterred, Hua continued, "you don't have a physical form, how would your eyes receive light? Come to think of it, you can hear me, which is all kinds of weird, considering you don't even have eardrums. How do you perceive sound?"
"It's the power of Fenghuang Down." The feather replied, serenely.
Hua snorted, "that's convenient, when in doubt, it was Fenghuang Down. I guess that's how memories work, too, right? I mean, for normal people, memories resided in the brain. I certainly forgot a lot when the seven little bastards pierced my head."
The Seven surround you. Methodically slashed all your tendons. Cut off your hands. Ruin your internal organs. And pierce your heart over and over again. Why. Why. Why.
Hua forced those memories down, and suppressed a red hot surge of rage. They were the closest to Hua. They had been with Hua the longest. They-
Now is a bad time to dissociate, Hua. Concentrate.
With an effort, Hua turned her attention back to the feather. "How about your memories? You don't have a brain - I guess the answer is going to be 'Fenghuang Down', am I right?"
"...perhaps. When I weakened, I forgot a lot."
Hua beamed, "that's right. When I got you from Kevin, you were honestly in a sad state. I wasn't even sure if you weren't permanently damaged." Hua nodded to herself, "that's why you became confused, and thought you were me. Understandable. Sentience transfer, memory duplication, this kind of things can really mess with you. I've been there. You'll get better."
Feeling considerably more cheerful, Hua turned to look at the feather, who was looking away, apparently deepin thought. Not getting a respond, Hua continued, "it's okay, I'll help you. You're my duplicate, after all, that makes us like sisters."
Hua grinned at the thought, for some reason, "you can return to me once you've figured yourself out."
And then Hua had an excellent idea, and grinned, "you know what? You don't have to return to me, I am not that petty. There must be thousands of feathers out there already, hell, even Otto got one, what's one more? You can come with me, it's so boring being alone. You can keep me company."
"Why Mount Taixuan?" The feather asked, out of the blue.
"I-"
Why Mount Taixuan? Why -
Hua did not know. That place was where she had spent the longest. That place was where she was most associated with, when people speak of the Azure Empyrean. That place was where her heart was broken seven times. That place was -
Home.
Not yours.
To be questioned by a feather, of all things…
"I just woke up." She glared at the feather, "It's like my mind is blank. I am reborn - do you expect newborns to have their life plan ready to go right away?"
Fu Hua has to. Fu Hua cannot fail.
Fu Hua always fails.
I won't.
"But I am ready. I have plans. It can't be helped, because I am Fu Hua, and there are things Fu Hua must do. I know that. I know that well…" Hua faltered. What was the feeling of melancholy? Like she felt bad for - herself?
Ridiculous.
"...but I can't bring myself to do it. You can say I am running away. I guess I am. I don't even want to look back, to remember…"
Hua took a deep breath, and look at the feather, "but I can't, can I? Time is not going to wait for me. Honkai is not going to wait for me. My comrades aren't going to wait for me. I - I have to accept this. I have to become Hua."
~o~
Elysia ran.
Elysia ran as she had never run before.
Please, don't let me be too late.
The chains of binding pierce her soul and ensnared her being. Her movements became sluggish and she faltered. No. Not now. Elysia let a part of herself become unbound and felt the chains snapped.
Elysia was too late.
Already she could no longer sense any life.
A metropolis belt of hundreds of millions, now silenced.
She sprang from skyscraper to skyscraper, lungs burning with the exertion, trying to get to the fight. The would need her help. Kevin would need her help.
Kevin's was the only sign of life Elysia still felt, cold and sharp. Kalpas's conflagration flared and died.
There - there was one still standing. Elysia leapt down from the tower - only in time to see Hua fell like a puppet with its strings cut.
Elysia let herself spin in free fall, and drew her bow and shot. A violet crystal flower enfolded Hua.
Violet?
In the furthest reaches of the Deep, Aponia opened her eyes.
She felt the Commandment she had placed on Fenghuang Down activate.
Aponia's heart seized, and she realised that fate once more would always converge, and it would always take and take and take. Hua, after all, could not avoid her fate. Everything was as she had feared - and foreseen.
Aponia drew a shuddering breath. It was always this, nothing changed, nothing CAN change-
And her eyes widened. Within Fenghuang Down, there - there was another. A will to change fate. A rare smile graced her lips. And an even rarer spark of hope.
Perhaps. Just perhaps... Fate may yet be denied.
Senti dreamt.
She knew she had work to do. She knew she could not hide in her dreams.
But she also knew there was little she could do. Hua needed her, and all she could do was to help her get onto the sacrificial altar.
Because it had always been so, this Senti knew with cold certainty, even though her own self was in fragments.
That Hua had always been so. An instrument. A stepping stone. Executor of someone else's will. And Hua - Hua was contented to be that because she never thought she mattered. That she could only find value in her own existence if she was serving some higher purpose, some greater good.
It was not always so, perhaps. Perhaps there was a time when Hua had a future ahead of her, a life. Something.
That Hua died with Canghai City, and again when Senti helped her light herself in a conflagration against the Herrscher of Binding.
And that was Senti's fault. Senti was weak.
She could not help Hua. Even though she needed to. Wanted to. Must.
So Senti dreamt.
Who are you?
A gentle voice echoed in Senti's dream. It felt… nostalgic. An old echo that was at once familiar and alien. It felt - warm. But who was she, really? Senti searched herself for answers - and could find none. She had a purpose. She knew now she could not achieve it. What did that make her?
Nobody.
A long pause, and the voice echoed again, gently.
You are not Hua.
Senti wanted to laugh, and Senti wanted to cry. Would it be better if she was Hua? Help her shoulder even a fraction of the weight that she knew would fall upon Hua's shoulders… even though she could not tell just how she knew.
If only. If only.
No.
A pause so long Senti almost drifted off into the ocean of dreams again, where there was no pain, no duty, no love… only oblivion. But the voice came again.
And you are not the Herrscher of Sentience's manifestation within Fenghuang Down.
…wasn't she the Herrscher of Sentience? Despite herself, Senti found the idea amusing. Dimly she heard someone giggle.
I know there is good in you. Your essence, it is familiar to me. You - you were the presence I felt, when the Herrscher of Sentience's presence was detected. You saved a lot of people. Thank you.
Good? Senti? Now she knew this voice had taken leave of its senses.
The voice did not seem deterred by the lack of response, and gamely continued.
You - can help her. Help me help her. Her self - it's in tatters, but she's still there. Perhaps the most essential, most important parts. You are the key, Fenghuang Down.
Senti stirred. Help… Hua?
In response, the voice manifested itself. A tall man, with long grey locks, a gentle look of sadness on his face that his mask of serenity could not quite hide, his eyes were closed - but Senti could feel his piercing gaze. A memory buried deep in her fragmented mind surfaced.
"...Su?"
"You know me." Su could not quite hide his surprise.
Senti inclined her head. She was not sure how or why, either.
"Hua - never woke up."
Something in Senti's heart tightened painfully.
Another part of her raged, spite and sorrow warring within her.
And Senti had no idea why. Why she thought things could ever change, why she that thought even occurred to her, why she cared so much, why.
Would it be so bad if she never woke up?
You know what awaits her.
A dream - and you could give her a sweet dream, it would be a kindness.
But it's not real, is it?
Does it matter? You have it in your power to save her. An eternal dream. No pain, no suffering, no mission, no duty, no Honkai, no burden. Just you. You can be together.
Senti felt her insides clenched painfully, as if deep within her core, something broke. She knew from the very core of her being that this was all that she desired, could ever desire. Nothing else mattered - could matter as much. Even though she hardly seemed to know Hua, or herself.
Senti knew with absolute conviction that there was nothing else she ever wanted, in this world or any other - and she never would or could want anything more than that - for Hua. Every piece of her fractured mind screamed with utter surety -
This is what I want.
But this was not what Hua would have wanted, was it? And that - that was the truth.
Senti was very good at lying to herself.
I am the █ █ █, denial and delusion were the easiest things for me.
But she could not. She would not. Not here. Something inside Senti shattered. Funny, she did not think she could fragment any further. Senti closed her eyes.
"Tell me what I must do." The words came out of Senti, wooden and lifeless.
Su cocked his head and seemed to consider Senti for a moment, before continuing. "When Elysia brought her back, Hua barely showed any signs of life." A pause, "it's been four days. Almost five. Her physical form stabilised, but her mind. The mind is the key."
Elysia?
That name felt like a spring breeze, warm and sweet. A violet bloomed.
Senti opened her eyes, "I'll find her."
Hua was adrift in an endless expense, a deep dark ocean of nothingness. She sank and she sank and she sank, her descent was eternal, time without end. The passage of time held no meaning in this place.
Hua.
Dimly Hua heard someone call her name.
Hua. What do you want?
What did she want? This wasn't how it went. How did it go...
"Hua, do you have any dreams?"
And Hua was lying on grass, besides - the owner of the voice. She felt the grass, slightly prickly on her back. She smelt the scent of fresh grass baking in the gentle sun. She heard birdsong and insect calls. She turned to glance at the girl next to her.
She can dimly make out the girl's long grey hair and red eyes, but her face was hazy in the bright sunlight.
It felt nostalgic.
Long grey hair? Shouldn't █ █ have short grey hair?
Who was █ █?
"Whatever it is... It's time to wake up."
Hua opened her eyes.
"...Let's try that again. Hua, you have to trust me. We can't make any progress if keep fighting me."
Hua stared up at the ceiling with unseeing eyes. Why was she here? Why was she still alive?
She remembered a voice, quiet and sad, sweet with sorrow, that Hua followed out of the endless nothingness.
"...I'll try."
"Then close your eyes again. Don't fear the darkness before you. Relax. Now tell me what you see." Su said, his voice soft ans soothing.
"Ice. I see ice, red ice... red ice is everywhere." A cityscape of red ice flowers made of blood and shattered hopes. Hua squeezed her eyes tight. It was over.
Nothing is ever over.
"No, before that. What did you see before all the ice appeared?" Su said, and when Hua did not respond for a long time, Su said again, "Relax, Hua. I know you can do it, it's right there. You're there."
Hua felt her mind wander, floating in an endless dream, signifying everything and nothing, scenes, shapes, visions, memories.
"I saw a... playground. Spotlights swept past my feet... A girl sat next to me. I think she was talking to me... I couldn't make out what she said."
"Hey, Hua, did I do the right thing?"
Hua blinked, and looked besides her. She was - in a playground, on a fine day, sun shining through the canopy, warm but not blinding. The girl had long, beautiful grey hair - like Hua's, and the most striking red eyes that seem to hide infinite sadness and loss. Hua almost choked just looking into them.
And she also felt - off. Like she was not there, that she was wrong,
Hua tried to say something, she opened her mouth, but no words came out.
The girl laughed. It felt empty.
It felt like her heart was torn to pieces inside her.
"I don't know what to do, Hua. I - I am lost. I was never supposed to do this on my own. I can't. I am not as strong as you."
A hollow laughter, as if she said something amusing but the joke had long ceased being funny.
"Fifty thousand years, Hua. It's barely ten and I am already falling to pieces."
Hua said nothing. This was wrong. Everything about this was wrong.
"No, Hua, not that far back." Su's strong voice brought Hua back to reality. "Cast your mind free and try again. After carrying Kalpas, unconscious, to Mobius, you didn't evacuate as ordered. You returned to the killing field, didn't you?"
Every step was agony. Each step drained the life and energy out of her. She could feel her body shutting down, even as her Garuda genes worked to restore her, forcibly knitting broken pieces together.
But there were others inside. Others who could still be saved.
She didn't matter. Just let her save one more.
"...Yes."
Su put a hand gently on Hua's arm. Hua felt herself centred just a little, and was ridiculously grateful.
"You didn't falter even before the Herrscher of Binding."
Su paused, and took a deep breath.
Hua - she was not the only one affected. Of course she was not. They all lost people in the Tragedy of Binding. How could she be so selfish - so thoughtless? She was wasting Su's time, fighting him. He could be helping others. He should be helping others.
"We detected the energy signature of the 8th Divine Key there. Think harder, Hua, what exactly did you do with it? It's something only you can do... you should be able to remember."
The fading vision of the girl with red eyes flashed before Hua's eyes before it too fell to pieces.
"Fenghuang Down... First Order output. I - I found her, the 11th Herrscher... I found her."
Too late. To little, too late. If only she was faster. Stronger. More decisive. If only she called upon Fenghuang Down earlier.
"...we defeated her."
It was a question that was not a question.
Su breathed out. "Yes, Hua, you did it. You gave us the only shot we had… and we pulled humanity from the brink once more. You did it."
Even though our losses were beyond the count of grief.
My failure.
Hua stared at the ceiling, eyes dull and hazy, and tried not to break again. She did not have the luxury. After a long moment, she finally sat up from the therapy couch.
"So this is the price..."
The girl looked at her empty palm, and then Su, in crumpled scrubs he clearly had no chance to change out of for a while now. Her eyes were still empty, seemingly lost to the outside world.
"Su... how long have I slept?"
"About 120 hours. Don't worry, Hua, it's all over. Welcome back."
"..."
"Fenghuang Down's First Order output... None of us predicted it would damage the user's brain so severely. I'll do my best to help you recover, but it'll take a lot of time…" Su turned to the sound of Hua standing up, and raise a quizzical brow, "Hua? Where are you going?"
Hua walked out to the door of the consulting room. "I want to go for a walk outside…" And then she faltered, and in a small voice, "Su, there's still an outside, right?"
Su nodded, his voice low, "we lost many things, Hua, but not quite everything."
Hua left without another word.
Her memories were fragmented, much of it was lost, and she kept finding gaps she did not even know existed. That this was the price she paid was the only thing she remembered with complete clarity.
Wherever I go, wherever I end up… my memories would still be the most important thing to me. I want to hold on to them for the rest of my life.
Who said that? It felt… familiar, like an old scar, faded, but not completely gone.
It did not matter. Hua decided to witness with her own eyes, the tragedy that was finally over, the tragedy that began a long time ago, and to witness her own part in the tragedy.
Senti dreamt.
In her dreamscape, she saw Hua, sometimes.
And sometimes, Hua saw her.
And for that, she must be content.
And in truth, there was little enough she could do. Inside Fenghuang Down, the threads still bound her, and Aponia's commandment bound Hua when it came to Fenghuang Down.
The most Senti could do was to dream when Hua dreamt, and try to gather her shattered pieces and put them back together, one painstaking piece at a time.
Even as she herself was in a million pieces.
And try to watch over Hua, but that was… not easy without a physical form, or even a manifestation like she used to be able to form with - Elysia.
Oh yes, Elysia. little Elysia was all grown up. But instead of nostalgia and joy… something about her filled Senti with unease - no, more like dread.
Senti was not sure why, after all, it was a good thing that Elysia somehow came out in one piece, right? And yet, Senti could not help but feel that there was something important she was forgetting.
But she could do very little, inside Fenghuang Down.
So Senti dreamt of putting Hua back together, piece by piece.
The world had changed.
Hua could see it everywhere she turned.
The leagues after leagues of highway replete with the hulks of vehicles put to the torch - all heading one direction. The barren rocky wastes stretching as far as the eyes could see - in what was once lush forests and prime farmland. There were few intact buildings, most they came across showed signs of structural damage - or elemental damage, flooding damage juxtaposing with burnt-out shells. What few signs of life - shelters, fire pits, all appeared hastily constructed, and mostly abandoned.
They have travelled for most of a week now, and they have only come across three settlements, none worth its name, just huddled refugees eking out a living feasting on the corpse of the old world.
Sometimes literally. Hua had seen off a few cannibal band attacks herself. They were a pathetic lot, never more than a score or two of raiders, primitively armed. They must have been truly desperate for them to take on a convoy many thousands strong...
Hua closed her eyes. The world had changed.
It was not a perfect world, by any means. Even as a girl, Hua knew that. There was poverty. There was war. There was hunger. There was ignorance. There was exploitation. And there was always bad people who were ready to take advantage of those they were in a position so to do.
But it was also a world where there was beauty. There was some good. And it was worth saving. Worth fighting for.
That world was gone, the good and the bad.
Mu was gone. Most of Shenzhou was gone. Australia was a burnt-out wasteland. The world's strongest defenders, MOTH, was decimated.
Hua blinked, she had been going through her duties in a trance, because she was not sure she could carry on if she stopped and think about it.
The fact that he was on a mission to escort several convoys of survivors, hundreds of vehicles strong, a motley collection vehicles from family sedans to cattle trucks, and more than a few make-shift trailers, gathered across several countries - as much as that still held any meaning in the world now, and took them to Mahāmeru, one of the three remaining cities on Earth.
Three.
Hua took a deep breath and focused, to stop her mind from running wild. Now was not the time. She had work to do.
She ranged ahead of the column, running faster than the motorcycle outriders could, to detect threats both Honkai and mundane. Her own assigned transport she assigned to a refugee family. Fuel was scarce as it was, and every bit saved meant more to transport survivors.
The few motorcycle - and two mounted on horses saluted her as she ran past.
The MOTH escort was a sorry sight. When Hua joined up, they had smart uniforms, quarters, seemingly endless numbers of well-maintained equipment manned by well-drilled troops. They even had the trappings of civilisation. Officers' balls, mess halls. It did not seem so long ago that Captain Himeko took her on her first ball-
Focus.
It had only been a few years, and yet it felt like an age ago. A different time.
Now… now they were a ragtag band of survivors barely distinguishable from the militia and tattered remnants of military and police units that accompanied the refugee column. Their uniforms were mismatched, their vehicles and weapons a mishmash of whatever could be salvaged.
Hua could not help but see them as a reflection on the world - they were already dead, they just refused to admit it, stubbornly clinging on. She heard the two horseback outriders shouting to each other about dinner, apparently one of them, the blond one, found a stash of alcohol.
Even at the end of the world, people still talked about dinner.
And that brought her a measure of calm. Speaking of stashes, she was nearing the rendez-vous time, so it was time to circle back to the main column. She signaled the two horseback outriders as she passed them, indicating that there was no threat detected for your assigned area, one of them saluted back while the other started consulting a map, and then Hua was past them.
Hua headed for the landmark rendez-vous point - a half-collapsed grain silo that was the largest cluster of building in sight. As she was approaching, something flew at her. Hua did not turn around, and caught the object with her left hand. She can smell the scent of a slightly musty but still quite fragrant fruit.
"Look what I found, A Hua!"
Pardo hopped down from the top of the grain silo - it must be at least 8 storeys high - and landed lightly on her feet. She dusted some imaginary speck of grain off her cloak, and beamed at Hua, her tail swishing high, evidently pleased.
Hua looked at the - apple - in her hand.
"Southern Mu Golden Jewel. You don't find them anymore."
Not after Mu sunk.
As if detecting Hua's thoughts, Pardo giggled nervously and changed the subject, "I found a stash of canned goods. Asparagus and beans." She made a face at that, "but it's food, and the vitamins will do the kids some good."
From the way she was beaming, she probably found some other treasure, too, Pardo being Pardo.
But Pardo being Pardo, she also would not hide anything that could help the refugees. Jewels and other precious object, on the other hand, nobody really needed anymore.
"I'll help you move the stash."
Pardo looked at Hua oddly, "...I've already contacted one of the militia captains, there'll be a detachment along with some a MOTH ranger transport. A Hua, you do know you don't have to do everything yourself, right?" Pardo lay a hand gently on Hua's arm.
Hua blinked, and looked down, then up. Pardo smiled, hopefully.
"Right. You are quite right, of course, the division of duties is quite clear, I'll see you at rally point A3 in an hour and a half. Time?"
Pardo's smile became noticeably forced, as she synchronised her watch with Hua's, and synchronised their map on their pads. "Sure thing, A Hua. Here, take another. Keep this for Ellie's memory hole, you'll want to remember the taste of this." She slipped an apple into Hua's pack.
"Has Kosma reported in?" Hua adjusted the straps on her pack. "
"Came and went. He said there're signs of activity and he's got a feeling about it." Pardo shrugged, "so, see you when we make camp tonight?"
Hua nodded, "I'll find you at the MOTH mess tent, last chow."
"You still owe me a case of beer!" Pardo said as she quickly scaled up another grain silo, and vanished from view.
Hua looked at Pardo's retreating form, and then turned away. She opened her palm. A white feather floated above her palm.
I like the cat.
"Can you sense anything out of the ordinary? Kosma said he had a bad feeling..."
You do realise this isn't how Fenghuang Down works.
Hua said nothing.
...no, nothing. Nothing that would pose a threat anyway.
Hua nodded and the feather vanished. From the vantage point of the grain siloes, she could see the long column of the convoy snaking along what was left of the highway. Some of the refugees were traveling on animal-drawn carriages, others were following on bicycles. The ones who could not join the main convoy followed further behind, for what little protection the passage of the main convoy and the convoy rearguard would provide. There was even a column shadowing the main convoy on the dried up riverbed running parallel to the highway the convoy travelled on.
Hua knew most of them would never see the eternal walls of Mahāmeru.
No matter. Duty did not end with the death of hope.
And that's why I hate you.
Senti dreamt. Only it was difficult to dream when Hua kept calling upon her aid.
"Fenghuang Down..."
Senti already knew what Hua was going to ask. Awaken from her slumber, she found herself back at MOTH HQ... and everything felt wrong.
A MOTH soldier, lying on the floor in a heap of bruises and broken bones, reeked of Honkai energy. Senti tried to reach within its consciousness.
It's not hypnosis, it's not imaginary space, it's not illusions... It IS some kind of mental attack, though.
"The 12th Herrscher."
Already!?
"I am not sure how it works, either, but if it is to do with consciousness. Fenghuang Down's powers would work. Second Order Output."
Oh, so all you want is to shield the mind of tens of thousands of people over a couple square kilometres or so, right?
...
There's nothing I can't do.
Senti reached out with her power. Thousands of pinprick lights dot the horizon, each a spark of sentience in the void of mental space.
Senti could feel Hua reaching within Fenghuang Down, joining her as she reached into every corner of the base, the power of the Key of Sentience serving as their sense.
Amongst the sea of sparks were three bright lights, intertwined, breaking apart and clashing. One is sharp and stubborn, like an unbreakable sword.
Kevin.
Another was ephemeral and fluttering, like petals in rain, leaves in a storm, close to dissipation, yet bright all the same.
Sakura?
The third - was a cocoon of pure malevolence. Threads of sheer malice snake out from it, turning everything it touched black.
That must be what they were looking for.
"I have to lock down the minds of everyone here, to stop the corruption from spreading, to give Kevin a chance to kill the Herrscher."
Oh, sure, lock down thirty thousand minds. Piece of cake.
Senti grumbled, but started to slowly cloud the mental space of everyone here...
...and feel a tide of malice hitting her everywhere and nowhere, all at once.
Senti pushed back, but with every blow she could feel her own power fracturing and turning to dust. Senti felt anger rise within her. She alone was the master of sentience, she will not be denied in her own realm!
...wait what, she's what now?
A momentary distraction and already she could feel the chains of corruption piercing her - and she pushed back with waves after waves of rage.
"Duplicate my will, excise all extraneous thoughts and emotion, except hatred for the Honkai."
What!? Have you taken leave of your senses? Your mind is in fragments as it is! You see that thing over there?
By way of emphasis, Senti sent another wave of rage, which turned into a rain of swords, against the rising tide of dark chains threatening to pull Hua down. The swords fragment, rot and fall to rust even as they strike home.
You'll have to cut yourself to pieces, and then if those pieces survive, we'll have to destroy them ourselves, because they would have been corrupted!
But Hua did not hesitate. She was already copying her will. One by one, copies of Hua manifested, pure, emotionless, created solely for the purpose of fighting Honkai.
"We're the same..."
I hate you.
Senti lied. Senti did not hate Hua.
She was just really, really sick of her droning on about duty and death and sacrifice. But she could also sense Hua's melancholy. If fighting Honkai made her so miserable, why would she-
Because the world was what it was, and if Hua did not fight, somebody else will have to fight.
And that was just not something Hua allows.
You could not carry this burden for her. Because that burden was never one imposed from without. It was imposed from within.
So Senti fought down the wave of hapless anger, and helped Hua shape more copies, and broke off part of herself, and send the feathers into the dreams of every spark of sentience in the base.
She watched as all the painstaking work piecing Hua back together fell apart, again, and Senti with it.
The base was silent and dead. Everyone was asleep, thanks to Fenghuang Down.
Only the humming of machinery remained. But Hua could not shake a sense of dread. Earlier, she felt the base rumbled, many, many times over, at regular intervals. It was obviously not natural, and only one thing at the base could do that. The mass launching of the nuclear missiles. Something must have gone terribly wrong for the automated systems to commence a full launch...
Has another Herrscher descended?
She quickened her steps and ran to where Kevin was last sensed.
And there he was, slumped against a wall, eyes vacant, in a dazed stupor, like another victim of Fenghuang Down.
"I knew it was you when everybody suddenly fell asleep." Kevin said as Hua approached.
"Kevin..."
"We sealed the 12th Herrscher. We won." Kevin's smile was bitter and brittle.
"Sakura-"
"She's dead. Along with hundreds more, the ones closest when Rin turned. But - the rest of the base... the base is safe. Thanks to you."
That - should be good news, so why did Kevin sound so empty? Hua felt a nameless dread.
"The 12th Herrscher seemed to be some kind of intangible force of pure corruption, able to infect minds and machines alike."
Hua felt a sudden sense of vertigo, the world spun. She leaned against the wall. Please. No.
"Honkai is always full of surprises." Kevin took a deep breath. "The 12th broke through our defences, and took over the dead man's switch. Every remaining nuclear missile from this base launched. Trajectory analysis - Mahāmeru, Penglai and Hy-Brasil."
Hua sank down to the floor, the weight on her shoulders finally breaking her down. A wave of despair overwhelmed her. The last three remaining cities of mankind. The last three major population centres. With every victory they lost something, until there was nothing left to lose, and nothing left to save. Her fault. Her fault. All. Her. FAULT.
"We sent warning, but..." Kevin shrugged.
"I am sorry. I am so sorry." Hua muttered and drew her knees up. "I thought it was a mental attack. I didn't defend the network..."
"It doesn't matter." Kevin said as he sat down heavily next to Hua. "It always ends this way, doesn't it? Every single victory came at a terrible price in blood, and with every victory, Honkai grew stronger. We've outlasted Honkai 12 times. How many more victories could we stand? But each one of us knew, we knew from the beginning, I think, that victory was just defeat in disguise. We've already lost, Hua."
Senti could sense Hua going through Fenghuang Down's records again, reviewing the record of every single feather she sent out during the battle with the 12th Herrscher. She had copied her full set of memories during the incident, and going through every single second over, and over, and over.
Senti could hear her murmuring to herself.
"I could have had the networks shutdown manually. I could have physically disconnected the networks. I could have placed the launch complex in manual lockdown."
She reviewed every moment of that nightmare, second by agonizing second, finding new ways to blame herself every time. Thinking of what could have been. Should have been. If only she was smarter, faster, stronger.
If only Fenghuang Down was given to someone else, someone who could have made full use of its power. Su. Aponia. Elysia. Dr Mei.
Not someone weak and useless like her.
Hua kept running scenarios, of how everything should have been done, could have been done. Would have been done, if it were not for her.
Senti seethed.
You need to stop.
Hua ignored her, and started another run-
I said, you need to stop.
Senti wrenched Fenghuang Down's memory duplication functions from Hua and forced it down, and - and for a split second took the control functions before Hua wrested it back again.
Why are you doing this. Why are you doing this to yourself?
Hua started another scenario run-down.
"It's how I learn from my mistakes."
Senti wanted to laugh. What good would that do? There were now less than a hundred thousand humans left on the whole of the planet. They could not afford another victory.
Hua started another scenario run-down.
Senti looked on.
If she could not carry Hua's burden.
She could not relieve her from her sense of duty.
If she could not take Hua home.
Then, at least, she could walk Hua's path with her.
...you're doing it wrong. Look, focus on the boundary conditions of the mindset you want to recreate - it's often easier to set your frame of mind to what it was not than what it was, and adjust as you go...
Every step of the way.
However long the journey would be, whatever the cost.
~o~
Author's notes:
I suspect most of you have seen this, and also this, if not, go check it out right now.
Long story short, Honkai Impact 3rd is ending soon (expected), and Fu Hua is very, very likely going to die (also expected)...
...before the finale. Against Kevin as the Herrscher. Which, let's face it, we probably feared but hope would not happen. But it is what it is. This kinda throws the entire premise of the fic out the window.
But I had honestly anticipated this before starting this and I have contingencies in place (you'll note that aside from the final battle being on the Moon and the Final Herrscher being female (...which actually may still be that way, spoilers ahead, but Kevin may not be the real Herrscher of the End, and MiHoYo had been known to mislead in trailers to build up hype - see the entire Elysian Realm arc, and it may be some kind of gambit to shortcircuit the End), everything was left fairly vague.
So here is my question, would people like me to carry on the story in its original form (which was conceived around August this year, i.e. taking into account everything revealed before the release of Chapter 31, Part 2, and of course Chapter 31EX Project Stigma and the latest trailer), or should I do some fairly minor rewrites of the prologue and continue the story taking into account new content?
Leave a comment of people have any strong views on this matter
This chapter was written while listening to Celtic Women's cover of- I See Fire, the lyrics work rather well, in essence, I think.
If this is to end in fire
Then we should all burn together
Watch the flames climb high into the night
...
Oh you know I saw a city burning out (fire)
And I see fire
Feel the heat upon my skin, yeah (fire)
And I see fire (fire)