KIANA found that the city of Singapore was much more peaceful than the hectic city that Sapphire had been.
It had been a month since she was at Sapphire, and she still found herself baffled at how chaotic that city was.
She walked the streets, relieved that she didn't have to deal with any Herrschers, or Pretenders, or stalkers, or anything like that. Here she was just able to enjoy herself.
From what she had found out, neither Schicksal nor Anti-Entropy had a presence in this city, due to some 'neutrality pact' the city had. That likely was the cause of the lack of any big events.
Of course, she was perhaps being a little unfair. Most places she had visited were very calm. Sapphire had been more the exception than the rule, but it was also one of the bigger cities she had been to thus far.
Singapore wasn't nearly as large as Sapphire, but it was still big enough that she had been expecting to run into something dangerous the moment she stepped into the city.
Luckily, nothing had happened. No Herrscher appeared suddenly, and from what she could tell nobody was following her around.
Here she was able to just enjoy herself.
Of course, then she sensed a buildup of Honkai energy nearby.
She stopped walking and located where the energy was being emitted from, a large building with a sign that said 'Hotel Royal • Queens'. She stared at the building, as if silently pleading with it to stop emitting Honkai.
It wasn't that much Honkai, surely not enough to cause an Eruption, right?
No, wait. The amount of Honkai was steadily increasing, rather quickly too.
She sighed, knowing that she'd have to put an end to it before it caused an Eruption in the city.
Her day had been going so well, too…
The hotel was rather crowded when KIANA entered. It seemed that there was something called a 'buffet' occuring on the 17th floor. KIANA would be tempted to go and see what it was about if it weren't for the impending disaster.
Everyone was wearing fancy outfits and were giving KIANA strange looks before moving on with their days. That was fine, KIANA didn't need to look fancy to save their lives.
But how to do that? Before locating the source of the energy, she needed to prioritize everyone's safety, which meant she had to get everyone out of the building.
Clearing the building of people would also allow her to search unimpeded.
She looked around trying to see what she could do. Could she start yelling that there was danger? No, it was already very loud, and there were other floors filled with people. She needed a way to reach everyone in the building. An intercom perhaps? She had heard those before in stores she visited.
She was looking around to see if she could locate where a microphone for an intercom could be, when her gaze fell upon a block jutting out of the wall. She had seen them before, just about every building had them, for safety reasons from what she could gather.
It was bright red, with a glass panel in the center. The panel read 'FIRE: BREAK GLASS- PRESS HERE'.
She had heard that these things made a very loud sound to alert people of fires.
KIANA smiled. She had found her intercom.
Fu Hua's plan could be said to be going quite well.
Sure, she had gotten captured by the enemy, but that was a chance to get information. She was more than strong enough to get out of this trap and beat up this creep.
She narrowed her eyes at the creep in question. He was the one who had attacked St. Freya trying to kidnap Mei. She had heard that Kiana and Mei were able to defeat him, or at least grievously wound him. Why was he here perfectly fine just a month later?
However he was able to be perfectly healed, he was being an absolute idiot. He had just straight up told her where the Gem of Serenity was being stored.
Now she was just biding her time and waiting for her opportunity to strike, regardless of how much gross behavior she had to endure from him.
And then the fire alarm went off.
"What the hell?!" The creep covered his ears as the sudden blaring caught him off guard. Unfortunately Fu Hua couldn't really cover her ears as her hands were being held above her head by his powers.
Once he was used to the noise, he glanced up at where the sound was playing. "That's too much of a coincidence to be an actual fire. Someone set that off to get people out of the building, not alert them to any fire." He glanced up at her with a smug smirk. "Friend of yours?"
'Dammit, Kiana!' Fu Hua had been confident that she would be too distracted by the buffet to make a scene. Had she figured out something was up and set the alarm off to evacuate the building? Fu Hua would actually commend her for that if it weren't done at the worst possible time!
She sighed. No matter, she got what she came for, now she just had to go get the Gem.
She jumped back, using her hands still held in midair as a stable point to swing her feet back and forward again in a quick kick to his chest.
The sudden attack caught the idiot off guard and she broke free of his gravity hold to land a Ki Shattering Punch on him.
"Gah!" He yelled out, stumbling onto the ground. "How did you recover from that voltage so quickly?! That was a megavolt of electricity you got zapped with!"
"Sorry, but I've got better things to do than answer your questions. Though I guess I should at least thank you for answering my own question." His eyes widened, realizing that just as she'd been caught in his trap, so too had he been caught in hers.
"Spiders! Take the enemy down!" He yelled out before falling unconscious. The Anti-Entropy spider droids next to him responded.
Fu Hua scoffed, as though such weak machines were enough to harm her.
Her memories were few and vague, but she remembered an old colleague that made much more impressive machines than these dingy orbs.
She pulled herself out of her recollection and looked around the now wrecked droids. She had barely put any effort into destroying them.
She looked at the unconscious creep and grabbed his jacket.
"Since you singed my jacket, I guess I'll take yours."
She began to think to herself. If Kiana had set off the fire alarm, then she was likely being intercepted by Anti-Entropy's forces. She needed to meet up with Kiana quickly.
Her attention was dragged out of her thoughts by a beeping from the droids she had wrecked. A beeping that was gradually getting faster.
They were about to explode.
'Maybe they're more like Vill-V's mechs than I thought.' She thought, though the name was gone as soon as it came, like a feather lost in the wind.
She jumped out of the window just in time for the explosion.
Dr. Magi watched as the white haired Valkyrie fell to the ground. He had managed to inject her with his Anti-Honkai serum in the confusion caused by the fire alarm and subsequent explosion.
The explosion he knew was likely caused by the man called Welt Joyce up on his private floor, the bait he had set for the gray haired Valkyrie likely reaching its last resort.
Technically, Dr. Magi should have been staying inside his room, waiting to be transferred to Cocolia's location. However, he refused to stand back and let innocent Valkyries like this one throw their lives away.
Like Lin had.
He shook himself out of memories of his granddaughter and of dust. He still had things to do.
The explosion was Joyce's doing, but the fire alarm was unexpected. Did the Valkyries actually have a third among their number?
He left the room, resolving to collect the white haired Valkyrie later and give her proper accommodations. Luckily the evacuation meant that no one would notice her.
For now he had to go and find this third Valkyrie before Joyce and the other Anti-Entropy members did. If they found her they would kill her.
However, Dr. Magi was going to save her. He needed to save as many as he could before his life ended. That was the promise he made to himself and to Lin.
He would redeem his sins by saving as many Valkyries as he could.
He made it to the bottom of the tenth floor's steps when he saw her, coming up the very same stairs.
He noticed just how similar she looked to the white haired girl lying unconscious upstairs. A sister, perhaps?
No matter, he would save both of them.
"Do you need any help? You should move faster if you want to evacuate in time." She addressed him.
Ha! This one had a bit of rudeness to her, though he could tell she didn't mean any harm.
She was only trying to save him, the stupid, foolish girl.
"Yes, I'm afraid I've gotten a bit slow in my age, could you lend me your shoulder?" He asked, playing the part of an innocent old man trying to evacuate with the rest.
She sighed, but acquiesced, letting him grab onto her shoulder. He saw his opportunity.
He stabbed the needle into her neck with all the pathetic might he could muster and injected the Anti-Honkai serum.
She froze as the serum made its way into her body. As with the other girl, she would then fall unconscious afterwards.
But that didn't happen.
She stood there, frozen, until she slowly reached up her hand to her neck. For a moment Dr. Magi was worried it didn't work.
And then energy burst forth from her as she screamed.
Pain.
Absolute, unfathomable pain.
KIANA had yet to suffer any real harm in this Era. Throughout her life, the only things that actually hurt her were the Selene cannon and the full might of the 7th Divine Key.
This was a different type of pain.
This attacked her from within, feeling as though she was being torn apart from the inside.
Her thoughts frantically tried to arrange themselves. It was the old man, right? The one she had tried to help.
And he hurt her for it.
From what little she could see out of her blurry eyes, he was clearly shocked by her reaction. That was good, he didn't know this would happen. Her single remaining strand of sanity was happy that he had not actively tried to hurt her.
But it still hurts.
She didn't even realize she was screaming, too busy focusing on the pain coming from her neck.
She managed to focus enough to try and draw upon her power, trying to see if there was something she had that could help her.
However, when she reached within herself, it felt as though the Cocoon was receding from her.
It was like her power was slipping away from her by the moment.
She desperately tried to ignore the pain and reached further into herself, just barely managing to grasp a Shade before it completely escaped her reach.
Shade of Finality: Void
She did not look for a destination, she just needed to get away from here.
She appeared on a roof, still letting off Honkai energy as it flowed out of her. Through the unending pain she desperately tried to stem it, just barely succeeding.
She tried taking a couple more steps, stumbling her way forward.
The Honkai energy leaking out of her was gone, but the pain was still there.
KIANA kept trying to walk forward, despite how much everything hurt. She managed to make it to the edge of the roof, looking down and preparing to float down.
However, trying to use any energy brought the pain back, and she blacked out before she reached the ground.
"Hey! Are you okay?"
KIANA woke up to someone poking her cheek.
Then the pain came back. Joy.
Luckily it was far less pronounced than it was earlier, but it was still far more than she was used to, and far more than she liked.
That pain, what was it? It felt like her power had turned against her, as though the Honkai that made up her being had been attacked directly, and made to lash out against herself.
It was similar to the Selene cannon, in that it attacked her power instead of herself, but in her current state it was far more effective. It made her feel powerless and helpless.
She found that she did not like the feeling.
The man standing over her seemed to look into her now open eyes for a moment, jolting a little before shaking himself out of whatever seemed to shock him.
He took a long hard look at her before sighing, seeming to come to some conclusion.
"Goody, you're not dead." He said. "Are you able to stand?"
She pushed herself up with a grunt, ignoring the pain that came with the action.
The man looked at her with a disapproving look. "Don't try to push yourself if you're too hurt." He held out a hand and pulled her up to a standing position. "Don't be afraid to ask for help here and there."
She looked over the man that helped her and noticed that the arm he had helped her up with was actually the only arm he had, the other one was just a sleeve swaying in the wind. He noticed her staring and chuckled.
"Oh, that? Don't you worry, now. It's just an old scratch from a rowdy kid." He laughed off. He then looked her in the eyes. "Y'know, it's a good thing your eyes don't have crosses in them, otherwise I might have to kill ya."
He noticed her tense and laughed again. "I kid! I kid! It's just a joke! Kids these days have no sense of humor." He held out his hand again. "Name's Siegfried. Nice to meet you."
She stared at his hand in confusion. He had already helped her up, why was he holding out his hand again?
Not knowing what else to do, she took his hand again. He shook it lightly and then released it. Was that it? He just wanted to shake her hand around?
"Still a bit drowsy, are you? That's fine. I guess anyone would be after sleeping in such an uncomfortable place." At his words, she turned around to see where exactly she had been sleeping.
It was a dumpster. Specifically a dumpster roof, as it was closed.
It also had a noticeable dent in it.
"Seems like you had a bit of a tumble there." Siegfried laughed again. He seemed to do that a lot. "So what's your name, missy?"
"KIANA." She said simply. It hurts to talk. Everything hurts.
Siegfried stared at her for a few long moments with an indecipherable look before chuckling softly.
"KIANA, eh?" He said quietly. "Small world, I guess. My little girl's name happens to be Kiana." He looked at her again, leaning in to stare at her face again. "You look a lot like her, actually. Was actually wondering if you were her when I first saw you. However, that's impossible since I know where she is. Lucky you, I guess. If I hadn't realized that I would have just turned the other way." That was odd.
"Why… turn away? Wouldn't you… want to see her?" The pain was slowly numbing, but it was still present and she was still tired despite just waking up.
He stood there silently, before speaking.
"It's… not safe for me to be near her. For her sake. Something bad could happen to her if I'm near her." He was being very vague, and KIANA couldn't understand his reasoning.
To her knowledge, parents hated being away from their kids, yet Siegfried was actively staying away from his?
She wondered how much he hated being away from her, even if it was his choice.
She wasn't in the mood to argue with him though, so she remained silent.
He spoke again. "Are you able to walk? Where are you planning on heading?"
She looked around before locating the hotel. She pointed at it as she spoke.
"There. Something… dangerous… is there."
Siegfried stilled. He stared off at the hotel, before looking back at her.
"Well, I guess you're more in the know than I thought." In the know? Was he already aware of the Honkai buildup? He motioned with his thumb in another direction.
He seemed to think to himself before seemingly coming to a decision "If you're also trying to stop that disaster, then you might wanna come with me first. I'm going to see some friends that also want to stop what's going on, even if they don't know all the details yet. If you wanna stop the disaster, then you'll want their help."
She was about to protest that she didn't need help, but the pain flared up, shutting down that protest. Ok, so maybe she wasn't in her best state right now.
She sighed and nodded to him.
"Great! Then let's get going!" He turned and began walking.
As they walked, KIANA noticed something off about him. Specifically on his hip.
As his coat fluttered, she saw a glimpse of a black, white and orange weapon. She froze.
Siegfried looked back at her, noticing her sudden stop.
"What's up? Something wrong?"
"That weapon…" She trailed off. It couldn't be…
"Oh? Oho! You really are something special, aren't you? First you know about the situation going on, then you know about these old things."
He pulled out his weapon in a non hostile manner. A breath caught in KIANA's throat. It really was…
"They're called Divine Keys, not sure if you've heard that term before. These are the 7th, specifically." He explained.
She knew that term all right. She knew what Divine Keys were.
But above all else, she knew that Divine Key personally.
Flames engulfed the Moon, cutting everything in their path to reach her.
That was the weapon of the Hero of Humanity, one of the only things that harmed her 50,000 years ago.
The pain from before returned. She wasn't sure if it was just acting up again or if it was a phantom of the distant past.
"Seems you do know about Shamash, then. Have you seen it before? But I don't think I've ever met you before…" He looked at her again. "And there's no way you're Sirin…" He muttered.
He shrugged and put the 7th Key away. "Oh well, not that it matters much where you've seen it before. Right now we ought to get moving before we're too late."
He turned and kept moving, and after a moment KIANA followed.
As she walked, all she could think of were flames.