"Yeah, yeah, I know, Auntie. I’ll be good... C’mon, Auntie, when am I ever not good?!"
After flying over Asia Minor, Theresa started nagging Kiana again.
She wasn’t there in person, of course; she was using the latest quantum communication device to contact Kiana, which also served as a field test for the rushed system.
Perhaps she had sensed sothing, or maybe it was her sixth sense, but alas, all she could offer were verbal warnings.
St. Freya High had too many matters demanding her attention, and she couldn’t get away. Of course, looking at it from another angle, maybe it was precisely because she’d sensed sothing that she couldn’t risk rashly returning to Schicksal HQ, to prevent any potential accidents.
The group boarded Otto’s "Hanging Gardens" on the evening of the fifth day after the end of the Fourth Honkai Eruption.
Now, looking down through the porthole thousands of ters below, they could still clearly see the last rays of sunset creating shimring scales of light on the boundless "White Sea." Glancing back, they could also make out the winding coastline, though the line was already visibly hazy as it receded into the distance.
Lifting their gaze slightly, they saw the fiery sunset clouds right before their eyes. When they contrasted that with the early morning ti displayed on the cabin’s digital clock, the girls felt a surreal sense of temporal dislocation.
Michael walked over to the digital clock and pressed a button beneath it. The numbers flickered and changed to "17:03."
"Mmm, that’s jet lag for you. Your previous missions were all along the coast of East Asia, so you never really noticed it. You must be feeling pretty sleepy now, right? We’ll be at Schicksal HQ’s floating harbor soon, so just hang in there a little longer. I’ll get you to your dorms as fast as I can. If you go to sleep then, you’ll be able to reset your body clocks."
The mont Michael finished speaking, the three girls, who hadn’t seed all that tired before, yawned in unison and began rubbing their sore eyes with their fists.
"Hey... Do you have to be so dramatic?" Michael scratched his cheek, at a loss for words.
"Yaaawn... Sorry, Uncle Michael. I didn’t realize I was sleepy, but now that you ntion it... I suddenly really want to sleep..."
It would have been abnormal if they weren’t tired. Although Valkyries have far more stamina than ordinary people to ensure continuous combat readiness, the three girls had barely slept the previous night. One had been watching over Seele, and the other two had been keeping an eye on Wendy. At this point, they were really struggling to stay awake.
Michael glanced at the three girls with a deadpan expression and suggested nonchalantly, "Well, we’re not far from HQ, but the final approach to the floating harbor takes a lot of ti. It’ll probably be over an hour before we actually land, and processing the paperwork will take another hour. If you’re tired, you can take a short nap. There’s no rush to adjust your body clocks right away. The promotion ceremony for all the A-Rank Valkyries will be held together, so you’ll probably be waiting at HQ for two or three days. You’ll have plenty of ti to adjust then."
"Hmm..."
The three girls fell into thought. i and Bronya didn’t really mind either way. The forr was never one to state her opinion first, preferring to go along with what others wanted.
As for Bronya, if it were up to her, she’d naturally seize any chance to rest. Body clock? What’s that? But she also had to consider Seele’s situation, so she didn’t respond imdiately amidst her brainstorming.
As for Kiana, who was usually the last of the three to want—or need—to use her brain, she surprisingly averted her gaze and began to think seriously.
"I’m finally going to be an A-Rank Valkyrie! Once I am, Auntie will tell where my stupid old man went... But... Schicksal HQ... Kaslana..."
A series of keywords popped into her head, and for reasons she couldn’t explain, they automatically linked together. "Since the Kaslanas were one of Schicksal’s three great houses, the archives at HQ must have a lot of records on the Kaslana family, right? And... not just the Kaslanas, but records about the Second Honkai Eruption, too..."
A golden glint flashed in her eyes as Kiana quickly made her decision.
The contents of that recent dream hadn’t faded upon waking like the countless dreams of nights past. On the contrary, the more ti passed, the more real everything in that dream felt...
She was no longer satisfied with just knowing her stupid old man’s whereabouts; she was now fixated on knowing everything about the Second Honkai Eruption.
And she believed she could find the answers in Schicksal’s archives. The only question was whether an A-Rank Valkyrie’s clearance would be high enough.
"Hmph... Well... forget it. It’s only two hours, I can handle it."
Kiana was the first to state her decision. What? Why not rest first, gather her energy, and launch a midnight raid on the archives to retrieve the files? The answer was simple.
The archives at HQ were probably just like the ones at the Far East Branch—Valkyries weren’t barred from entry, but the actual files required clearance to unlock.
Sneaking in at midnight would be pointless... After all, without the right clearance, she wouldn’t be able to access the information anyway...
It would be better to adjust her body clock properly, get a good night’s rest, and then drag i to the archives first thing in the morning to give it a try. If that didn’t work, she could just try again in a few days after getting her A-Rank clearance.
Kiana nodded, as if congratulating herself on her sudden spike in intelligence. She would never admit that her initial plan had been to sneak in during the dead of night, and that a sudden flash of insight had made her realize "there’s actually no need to be sneaky at all."
i nodded in agreent. She felt that while she was tired, it wasn’t unbearable. Bronya was indifferent.
Only Michael looked at the three girls with a puzzled expression, tilting his head. "Is this sothing you all need to agree on? It doesn’t matter whether you want to rest or stay up a bit longer. If you want to rest, then rest. If you want to stay up, then stay up..."
The three girls froze—he had a point...
It was just that as Valkyries, especially with an individual as... "prominent" as Kiana among them, they had always been taught to adhere to collectivism in both combat and daily life. For instance, they always had to reach an internal consensus before making any decision.
It was ironic that on the battlefield everyone ended up doing their own thing, yet for a trivial matter like this, they had managed a rare mont of unity.
But it was pointless to think about that now.
CLAP! CLAP!
Michael clapped his hands sharply.
The crisp sound jolted the three girls awake. They watched as he rubbed his own eyes before suggesting, sowhat listlessly, "Since everyone’s decided to stay up for two hours to adjust your body clocks, it’s still going to be tough to just power through it, right? Bronya, put away your ga console for a bit. We haven’t all just sat down and talked in a while. How about we chat to stay awake?"
"Chat?"
Seeing no other option, Bronya uncharacteristically complied and put down her ga console. In truth, she was only putting on an act.
Her mind was filled with worry for Seele; how could she possibly be in the mood to play gas?
Thus, she was the first one to speak, and her question surprised no one:
"Michael, if Schicksal HQ doesn’t have a way to cure Seele... what do we do?"
The mont the words left her mouth, she perhaps realized how much of a mood-killer it was, but there was no taking it back.
Michael fell silent for several seconds before lowering his voice. "Of course I know Schicksal might not have a cure for Seele. That’s why I arranged for her to stay at St. Freya. We already know the symptoms, so there was no need for her to co to HQ in person. If we can’t find a cure here, then we’ll... contact Mount Taixu and Anti-Entropy ourselves."
"Huh?"
It was no wonder Kiana and i were shocked. Their education at St. Freya had always frad Schicksal as the side of "justice." As for Shenzhou’s Mount Taixu, their textbooks selectively ignored it, offering almost no information beyond stressing it was a Schicksal ally. And Anti-Entropy was another story entirely...
Although i already knew that Corp was the so-called Far East Branch of Anti-Entropy, that didn’t stop them from viewing the organization as an enemy.
After all, the person in control of Corp now... was Cocolia.
Besides, they had clashed with Anti-Entropy more than once. It was impossible to say there wasn’t so bad blood between them.
One could imagine how utterly heretical Michael’s words would sound to any other mber of Schicksal. It was a good thing these girls had unique experiences and, in a way, trusted him...
Bronya gave him a complicated look before asking, "Then... what if Mount Taixu and Anti-Entropy don’t have a solution either?"
Michael pressed his lips into a thin line, lowered his head slightly, and said nothing.
In truth, it wasn’t that Bronya didn’t understand; she was just frantic with worry. And by now, having realized she’d been in a strange illusion, the wariness sparked by the words "be careful of the future " had gradually faded with ti.
But her question had plunged the cabin into a heavy silence. i’s lips twitched. She took a deep breath and tried to laugh off the topic to lighten the mood. "Uh, ah... Speaking of Mount Taixu, Michael, do you know much about it?"
Michael blinked rapidly, his expression suddenly turning a little strange.
After a mont, he said with so hesitation, "Shenzhou’s Mount Taixu... How should I put this? I have so... history with their founding master..."
"History?" i paused, taken aback.
"I heard that master left behind legends from five thousand years ago. Is that true or not... But... Teacher Michael, you have history with her?"
"You don’t need to know about that," Michael said, shaking his head. What else could he say? He couldn’t just tell them, "Actually, you all know her, too," could he?
"Still, it seems you’re quite interested in Shenzhou?"
Since i had brought up the topic, she nodded eagerly. It was hard not to be curious about the seemingly elusive Mount Taixu of Shenzhou. Moreover, Far Eastern culture was heavily influenced by Shenzhou, and as a child, she had heard many stories about the immortal, Azure Empyrea...
"Eh? Speaking of Shenzhou, isn’t the Class Monitor from there?" Kiana chid in quietly.
"It’s a bit of a sha. The Class Monitor ca here alone for her A-Rank promotion last year, and this ti she has to stay behind at the academy to help Auntie... Sigh... But, since the Class Monitor is from Shenzhou, why didn’t she join that... that Mount Taixu place, instead of coming to St. Freya? Uh... I don’t an anything by it, it’s just that she sotis talks about things that happened in her hotown... I don’t think she hates Shenzhou, so why would she... uh... seek sothing far away when... when... what’s the saying?"
"Seek far and neglect the near," Michael prompted quietly, raising an eyebrow.
"Ah, right, right! The Class Monitor is so strong, it shouldn’t be hard for her to join Mount Taixu, right?"
Michael gave her a surprised look. From what he rembered, Kiana wasn’t exactly subservient to Fu Hua, so why the change in attitude...?
Ah... It must have been from seeing Hua and him during their morning training that day.
Speaking of which, Michael still found that day a bit strange. He had thought that the physical contact during their training would have eased the tension between them, and in fact, it had. Although Hua had been utterly rciless during their spar, he had definitely seen her smile. But after they parted ways that morning, the distance he had worked so hard to close had opened up again. Thinking back, had one of the other Fla-Chasers contacted her that day? [T/N: The Fla-Chasers were humanity’s strongest warriors from the Previous Era.]
Even though he knew he shouldn’t overthink it, he couldn’t shake the uncomfortable feeling in his gut...
"Uncle Michael... Uncle Michael? Uncle!!" Kiana waved a hand in front of his face when she saw him spacing out.
"Ah... oh. About that... Is it possible that she’s already a mber of Mount Taixu?"
"Huh?"
"Schicksal and Mount Taixu occasionally have exchange students. The forr Schicksal A-Rank Valkyrie, Cheng Lixue, was the final disciple of the master Azure Empyrea. Fu Hua is the sa. Otherwise, how do you think the Hyperion, a Schicksal battleship, was able to enter Shenzhou airspace to fight during the last Honkai Eruption in Nagazora?"
"Huh? Why?" Kiana looked completely lost.
"Hey, don’t tell you don’t even know Nagazora is in Shenzhou territory."
"Wha—? What? I... I knew that! I just didn’t have ti to think about it!" Kiana bared her teeth, flustered and annoyed. That’s right, she wasn’t dumb, she understood everything. She just didn’t have ti to think, that’s all!
"Hehe!"
i covered her mouth and giggled. Even Bronya, weighed down by her worries, couldn’t help but crack a smile.
"At the ti, Shenzhou’s forces had already established a solid defensive line to prevent the Honkai from spreading. It was Fu Hua who communicated with Shenzhou’s side, which ultimately gave you the chance to join the battle. After all, that strange battleship was constantly transmitting a signal to Schicksal, so we couldn’t just let it be."
"Oh..."
Kiana leaned back lazily in her seat.
"So people from Shenzhou are that easygoing? Or are they all like the Class Monitor... uh, you know... ticu... ticu-sothing?"
"ticulous?"
"Ah, right, right!"
Leave it to the master wordsmith.
"I wouldn’t know about that. I haven’t had much contact with Shenzhou myself. But maybe on the trip back, we can ask Theresa for so ti off and have her arrange for Fu Hua to take you all to visit Mount Taixu."
"Yay!"
Compared to their earlier drowsiness, the girls were visibly more energetic after the brief chat. But this energy was clearly borrowed. After a few more sentences of excited chatter, they all grew dizzy and tired. Their heavy eyelids drooped, and they finally drifted off into quiet darkness.
"Yaaawn—"
Michael yawned and rubbed his eyes. After confirming that the three girls were sound asleep, he slowly closed his eyes as well.
"Sleep... sleep. If you sleep now, you won’t be able to sleep tonight."
---||---
"Ngh... Aaaah!"
Kiana kicked off the heavy blanket and shot up in bed.
This was a single dorm room assigned by Schicksal HQ, so she didn’t have to worry about waking anyone else.
She fumbled in the dark for the switch on the wall and flipped on the lights. Shielding her eyes from the stinging glare with one hand, she walked to the fridge from mory, pulled out a pack of beef jerky, and started chewing.
The accommodations HQ provided for B-Rank Valkyries awaiting promotion were actually pretty nice. The single dorm was like a deluxe studio apartnt, fully furnished with all personal necessities. The fridge was even stocked with cooked als and snacks.
It was just... she couldn’t tell if it was the unfamiliar surroundings making her anxious, the nap she took in the evening, or a combination of both, but Kiana felt wide awake.
She gently pulled open the curtains. The moon outside was much larger than she rembered, reminding her once again that she was on Schicksal HQ’s floating harbor.
Her expression softened as she gazed at the bright, round moon that seed almost within reach.
For so reason, her heartbeat grew louder and louder, until it was clearly audible in the silent room.
She reached out a hand toward the moon in a daze, but—THUD—her fingertips hit the unyielding glass of the window. The pain was negligible, but it was enough to snap her back to her senses.
"Sigh..."
Coming to, she pressed her palm against her eyes. After a long mont, she lowered her hand and opened them. Her eyes didn’t feel the least bit sore.
"Looks like... I’m not getting any sleep tonight..."
Maybe it was ti for Plan B?
The thought flashed through her mind. What Plan B? If she had one, it was a plan that had been concocted in her head just a second ago.
Since she couldn’t sleep anyway, why not... take a stroll to the archives?
The only question was whether the archives were even open at this hour... Besides, she could go alone, but her clearance level might not be enough to access anything useful. If she could drag soone along, they could at least chat to pass the long night, even if they didn’t find anything...
For so reason, this ti i wasn’t the first person who ca to mind.
Gazing at the moon, so close yet so far, an image of Michael appeared in her mind.
"Uncle Michael and Auntie Hiko are both teachers, so Uncle Michael should have clearance similar to an A-Rank Valkyrie, right? Yep, yep, I choose you, Uncle Michael!"
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