The Fire-Chasing Herrscher Who Destroyed the World

The rain fell lightly, and the water droplets fell from a high altitude, drawing straight silver lines in the long space, which were particularly obvious in the gray sky. As for Kiana, she didn't even dare to let her eyes see those silver threads. Maybe they were really just misty raindrops, but she no longer had the courage to look at similar things.

The wind swept the flowers in front of the tombstone, and from time to time, two or three petals would follow the wind and fly away, leaving only more companions clinging to the original stems and leaves in the miserable wind and rain. But the fate of those departing petals is not to fly in the wind, but to flutter for a moment. They then sink to the ground under the impact of raindrops, and finally stick to the ground without a living.

Kiana slowly knelt down in front of the tombstone and gently touched the empty stone platform under the tombstone, but said nothing for a long time.

Mei closed her eyes and stood quietly behind her. Theresa and Siegfried stood side by side with her, but they just looked at Kiana's trembling back and didn't know what to say.

Behind the two of them, Xier held an umbrella in her hand, wiping her bangs that were wet from the rain, and hesitated whether to open the umbrella. Bronya bit her lip and tilted her head. The heavily armored rabbit floated behind her in a quantum state. With just a thought, it could materialize, and then used its wide and heavy mechanical arm to cover everyone from the wind and rain. However, she did not Do that.

Farther away, on the wall next to the gate of the cemetery, a Valkyrie in blue and white armor was also quietly looking at the place. The rain gave her long hair a heavier weight, but she just untied the ponytail and let it spread out. Other than that, she said nothing and did nothing.

Not all sadness needs to be resolved with care, and not all sadness can be resolved with care. Sometimes, silence is also a kind of power, and loneliness is also a means. Only in silence and loneliness can we understand the meaning of life and death. Only by understanding the boundaries and understanding the meaning of life and death can grief be truly resolved.

Otherwise, all the comfort, all the care, all the self-righteous love will be nothing but an illusion called "It's okay" in the end.

But obviously, wanting to do that kind of thing is not a simple matter of wishful thinking. Some people are unable to do it throughout their lives, and some people have never thought about similar issues throughout their lives.

In any case, this kind of thing is quite vague and weak when spoken, at least it is not something that Kiana can understand now.

She even couldn't accept whether death was real.

"Auntie, we obviously didn't find Jizi's body, right..."

Touching the rain-covered stone platform, Kiana whispered.

Theresa sighed first. She had long thought that Kiana would ask this question, but after thinking for a long time, until this moment really came, she didn't think about how she should answer.

The water on the stone platform slowly dripped into the gap in the middle, and the water flow gently moved the hands of time.

After holding it in for a long time, Theresa could only say this.

"Afterwards, before the Domination Theater collapsed, we sent another search team into the world bubble, but except for the remains of dolls everywhere and a large number of Herrscher cores that cannot be analyzed so far, we found nothing. ”

"..."

Kiana's silence made people panic. Theresa pursed her lips, but she had no choice but to continue speaking:

"After our testing, the strength of those doll remains is abnormally high, with hardness and toughness several times that of a normal human body. Some parts used for attacks are even as strong as soul steel weapons, so they can survive such attacks. There are no traces. If Jizi’s body was also in the theater at that time, I’m afraid..."

"..."

"And...Kiana. We all hold on to the hope that Jizi is not dead. Of course, it would be best if this is the case, but we also have to face reality..."

"What reality? Isn't it true that Jizi's body has not been found yet?"

"No, it's... In order to accurately locate the locations of all Herrscher of Dominance individuals, we installed a brand new positioning device on every warrior participating in the operation. This device also has other functions, such as real-time monitoring of users. pulse data, so... we actually also observed that Himeko's heartbeat had stopped before Hyperion entered the Dominion Theater... Kiana, we will not give up and continue to search for Himezi, but... you You also need to be prepared to face reality.”

Are these cruel words? For Theresa herself, it was difficult for her to say these words without being cruel, even though she had forced herself to accept this result a few days ago, even though she had experienced the death of her best friend many years ago.

If this is true for herself, let alone Kiana.

So, in the end, she couldn't help but give hope:

"But Kiana, there is some news that can be considered good news for the time being - we did not find the plague gem in the Domination Theater, which means that Himeko still has the possibility of survival."

"So this tomb was still erected when there was still a possibility of survival?"

Kiana's words were a bit harsh, but Theresa didn't care.

She didn't even dare to explain anymore. Could it be said, "Unless you are a Herrscher, it is impossible to store consciousness in the core and survive", or "In fact, we recorded Himeko's death time from the moment the instrument detected that the pulse returned to zero"?

Theresa quite understood her niece's emotions at this time.

Sadness, anger, powerlessness, and even not knowing who to blame because the Herrscher had been defeated - she had already experienced the same emotions when Cecilia died, so she knew what kind of pain it was.

But even so, how to convey this emotion?

Theresa had no experience in how to use an appropriate way to convey words such as "I understand you, and I have experienced the same sadness as you, so we should cheer up" to the other party's heart.

In the end, Siegfried took a step forward and silently squatted beside his "daughter".

He gently rubbed Kiana's head, but for some reason, this familiar gesture made Kiana's body tremble suddenly.

Siegfried unconsciously touched the stubble on his chin, but after sighing briefly, he finally spoke:

"Kiana, let's go back first. No matter what you want to do...continue to search for Himeko's whereabouts, or something else, you shouldn't get wet here in the rain, right? No matter what the circumstances, Himeko As a teacher, she definitely doesn’t want to see her students not caring about their own bodies in the rain, right?”

"But...but..."

What responded to him was Kiana's increasingly trembling body and choked voice.

"Okay Kiana, if you continue to be stubborn like this, you will be considered willful. Forget about the little dwarf Theresa and I..."

"Hmph, cough, cough -"

The little dwarf coughed inappropriately at the side.

"Uh... forget it about Theresa and I. Look back, Mei Yi, Bronya, Xi'er, and even Youlandale, you can't let everyone accompany you in the rain, right?"

"Then...you go back first..."

As soon as Kiana finished speaking, her head was slapped hard by her smelly dad, which scared her so much that her nose spurted out in an instant.

"Kiana, how can we leave with peace of mind when you are here...We...cannot safely let you stay here alone."

She secretly wiped away the snot with her palm, and then wiped her palm twice on the stone platform in front of the tombstone where the urn was supposed to be buried to eliminate the evidence. After doing this, Kiana answered again in a muffled voice. :

"I will go back soon, but not now, okay..."

"Then let's..."

Just as Siegfried spoke, the wind direction around him changed. The wind that was blowing at an angle suddenly ran behind everyone, blowing all the cheers and celebrations in the base not far behind the cemetery to Ji Zi's ears. In front of the tombstone.

Siegfried suddenly didn't know what to say, and Theresa had no other choice but to follow and squat on the other side of Kiana.

Seeing that she was standing alone again, Mei turned her head thoughtfully towards the direction of the base, and quickly turned back after meeting Bronya's eyes.

This is not the anti-entropic Salt Lake City base. It has already been trampled to pieces by Mikael. If you want to rebuild it, it will take more than a year to fully rebuild it under the best circumstances. Therefore, after the battle against the Tenth Herrscher, the Hyperion loaded up the remaining personnel of the Salt Lake City base and drove directly to Anti-Entropy's secondary base in California.

Thousands of soldiers and staff here have never experienced the tragedy of the Salt Lake City base being destroyed, and they are only extremely excited and excited about defeating the Herrscher.

Look, mankind has defeated another Herrscher, and [I] and [We] miraculously did not fall into any danger. Isn't this worth celebrating?

If there's anything more worthy of celebration than victory, it's naturally "the victory you get without taking any risks", commonly known as lying down and winning.

Of course, a large number of Salt Lake City soldiers and even the wounded were mixed into the celebrating team - not coerced, but voluntarily.

They need to indulge, whether it is performance, alcohol or sex. In short, they must numb themselves as soon as possible and make themselves forget the tragedy of Salt Lake City as soon as possible. Only in this way can the idea of ​​continuing to fight arise in their hearts.

What is World Snake doing at this time?

As a Lord, even though she is chasing a duck to the shelves, even though she knows that most people in the organization probably only regard her as a mascot to maintain the relationship with Destiny, Anti-Entropy, and China, some special sense of responsibility still drives Mei. This organization she didn't like worried for a second.

But... I guess it's just a celebration.

It’s not just World Snake. At 8 o’clock this morning, Greenwich Mean Time, after experiencing the second wave of searches for the Domination Theater, and considering that there have been no more riots caused by Thousand Herrschers in the world for several days, in order to To appease the people, Otto has publicly declared victory in the battle against the Tenth Herrscher.

At this point in time, Shenzhou and Anti-Entropy should have announced the news, which means that at this moment, the whole world is partying.

After all, the destruction caused by the first, second, third, and even fourth Honkai can be described as tragic. In no case, the number of people killed was less than one million. Except for the unknown eighth Honkai, now The exact number of casualties caused by the commotion caused by the Thousand Herrschers this time is difficult to complete, but I am afraid they are much less than before.

What's more, it has only been half a year since mankind declared war on Honkai, and it has achieved a great victory with unusually small casualties. This fact is very conducive to boosting the morale of all mankind.

And soldiers without morale cannot fight.

And if the entire world loses confidence in fighting against Honkai, what can a few of them do?

Mei understands this quite well, because her exploration in the Paradise of the Past is very close to the end. Although there are still many places where the records are missing, she has also witnessed the last uprising of pre-civilized humans from the perspective of a latecomer.

Should I call it irony? Fifty thousand years ago, in the riot that took away the hope of the entire world, Himihu was disabled and could only survive in the paradise of the past. Fifty thousand years later, her clone used its own life to gain hope for mankind.

Yes, this is a hope that was not available 50,000 years ago.

Probably because she has seen more, Mei has become more sensitive to the situation in the world.

When Otto declared war on Honkai on behalf of mankind, the world could only be regarded as a mess. But through this battle against the Tenth Herrscher, the relationship between Anti-Entropy and Destiny has become less rigid, and the cooperation between the two parties will surely become more and more intense. Much, at least until defeating Honkai. Perhaps, people in this era really have a chance to become more united than in the previous era, and only with the backing of all mankind can these warriors fight with confidence and boldness.

But...how to tell Kiana...

The sound of celebratory music still floated in waves with the wind, and the rain could not extinguish everyone's enthusiasm. On the contrary, the rain made the rhythm of the music become faster and louder. Mei didn't know if Kiana had thought of what she thought of, but what could she do even if she knew.

Her thoughts were being pulled between rationality and sensibility every minute and every second. She was probably just forcing herself to think rationally to avoid the emotional sadness caused by Himeko's departure.

If it were Mikael, what would he say?

For some reason, Mei suddenly thought of the man who was the culprit.

What would Mikael, who was once a hero, say?

He would probably say: "Wuxianta Jizi is undoubtedly lucky. She at least died as a famous hero. Until a hundred years later, when humans recall the war against Honkai, they will still remember this name. . Everyone has two deaths. As long as someone remembers her, she will live with the world. And those ordinary soldiers who died in the ruins of the Salt Lake City base did not even have a chance to leave their names. "

No, not roughly, if he were present, he would definitely say this.

Even though he knew that this would poke holes in Kiana's heart, that person always liked to force people to admit reality, and there were only a few people who could make him make an exception.

Mei Yi didn't understand the reason before, but after seeing what happened, she could understand.

"The world will not give people a chance to be sad and decadent, not even for two or three days. You never know when the next collapse will come - Raiden Meiyi, I paid for this with my own blood experience of."

Well, if I watch those memories too much, Mikael-style words like this will always pop up in my mind for no reason, and sometimes there will be dubbing of Mikael's voice.

But suddenly, Mei's face turned stiff - it would have been better if she didn't think about it, but when she recalled it carefully, it seemed that she herself was one of the few people who could make an exception for Mikael.

As expected, I couldn’t think about it any further.

"Uncle Siegfried, let's do this. You take the principal, Bronya, and Seele back first, and let Hollander leave as well. You each have a lot to do, so leave me here. Just stay with Kiana here.”

"They are indeed...but I am just an idler, what can I do...uh..."

Halfway through Siegfried's words, he looked at Mei Yi's serious eyes and quickly came to his senses.

After all, his identity is [father]. In interpersonal relationships, parents are undoubtedly the closest link, but almost no one chooses to confide in their parents or reveal their true feelings.

Because the closer the relationship is and the closer the distance, the more afraid one will be of the sharp thorns on one's own body piercing the other person, and the more one will be afraid of the sharp thorns on the other person's body piercing oneself. From this perspective, parents are undoubtedly the closest strangers in everyone's heart.

Although the same goes for the rest of the characters.

There is one exception.

Siegfried looked at the cold-faced girl in front of him with a complicated expression.

He opened his mouth several times, but in the end he could only say:

"Then Kiana will be left to you, Mei."

"Uncle, just don't worry."

Mei Yi nodded slightly, but that title made Siegfried feel relieved a lot.

Soon, only Mei and Kiana were left in front of Himeko's tombstone.

A lot of human voices are missing. Even though most people just make the sound of breathing most of the time, the ears will only pick up the difference after people have left the scene.

In short, a large number of people's voices were missing, and the cheers and music seemed even more harsh.

Mei bit her lower lip and finally took a step forward to Kiana.

She did not squat down, but kept standing upright, and a cold voice immediately sounded in Kiana's ears:

"I'm leaving soon."

"……ah?"

Kiana was stunned for two or three seconds, and then she let out a confused cry.

The corners of Mei Yi's mouth raised slightly.

"If you say busy, I'm probably the busiest one. I just inherited the position of Lord of the World Snake, and I don't have any prestige in the organization. I don't know how to clean up the mess after I go back. And there are The most important thing... I have an intuition that the final battle is not long away. Before that, I have to read the records in the Paradise of the Past. Maybe there is a way to defeat Mikael. "

"Is that so... then..."

"So, Kiana, aren't you going to send me something?"

In the increasingly fierce wind and rain, the girl stretched out her hand to another girl. (End of chapter)