I Am Honkai

Chapter 913: Beasts and Beasts Are Different — Sometimes the Gap Is Greater Than Between Anything Else

"Hey, Kiana, didn’t you eat your fill? That was pathetic. Seriously weak, okay?"

"Forget catching up to the Honkai Legion under your royal sister that guards the Honkai Dimension—even this level of output is nowhere near the force the military’s auxiliary troops use when they call in Honkai Eruption strike support. No improvement at all. You’re using your ’Herrscher authority’ like this? Watch me instead..."

Beyond Teyvat, within the boundless void, a sharp female voice full of complaints echoed through space.

"Enough, enough. Senti, take it easy. We’re here to find someone, not to pick a fight. Why are you summoning Planet-class Honkai Beasts? This isn’t an extermination order. If we weren’t in a hurry, I wouldn’t even be using this authority."

On the outer deck of an Imperial Governor-class heavy shuttle, atop the radiant double-headed aquila insignia, Kiana opened her increasingly imposing golden eyes. With each breath she took, violet-red strands of light coiled faintly through cracks in space-time, scattering from the gaze of the Herrscher of the Void and stretching toward the edge of the cosmos.

"This is a trial world designated by the Empire’s Central Interior Ministry. It still operates under the ’old era "Honkai" assessment laws.’ It hasn’t yet been anchored under my royal sister’s decree toward optimization and harmlessness. Searching for someone while also stabilizing the released Honkai energy within safe limits is exhausting."

Kiana shot an annoyed glance at the Herrscher of Sentience, who was surfing her sword through the bizarre, shimmering hyperspatial tunnel.

"Besides, my royal sister is my royal sister. I’m me. How can we even compare? You really overestimate me... If you want, you can do it instead. But remember—no messing around. Suppress the mutative, aberrant side of Honkai energy and keep it stable."

"Pass. I don’t do thankless work," Senti replied, shaking her head vigorously. Releasing it freely was satisfying. Bottling it up like this? No thanks.

"Honestly, what a hassle. If you ask me, why bother? Along the way, there are only a few small worlds in this region with intelligent life. They’re not Imperial citizens anyway. Drop some Honkai on them—maybe it’ll even give rise to a different kind of civilization. Doesn’t the Empire love doing that sort of thing? Yet you insist on exhausting yourselves... Sigh, how bitter."

With her hands folded behind her head, Senti watched as Kiana once again split her consciousness to meticulously trace clues, clicking her tongue.

Inside the control room, Fu Hua and Raiden Mei exchanged helpless smiles at Senti’s impatient grumbling.

They knew perfectly well that simply unleashing Honkai and letting it expand freely would be the most efficient method.

But no meant no.

This was Kiana’s conviction—and theirs.

It had nothing to do with status.

They, too, had once suffered under Honkai Eruptions and lost much in the process. Now, to casually rain Honkai upon others like predators high in the heavens? No.

They—and the many Valkyries now fighting for the Empire, the auxiliary troops of Schicksal—weren’t their hopes and wishes to make the world better?

Perhaps the Sacred Selene Empire had never been truly beautiful. They had no right to criticize the allied forces and comrades from other dimensions under Imperial rule, nor the Empire’s certain customs and ideologies...

Even that broad ideal of ’fighting for all that is beautiful in the world’ had, for many, narrowed into ’fighting for the beauty of the worlds sheltered and unified under the Empire.’

But the meaning of beauty itself had not changed.

They would still uphold their beliefs, promote them, and do everything in their power to influence more people within the Empire—to make it better.

Look—hadn’t the Valkyrie units already established relatively positive relations with the Imperial Astartes First Legion Dark Angels, the Third Black Templars Legion, and even the Death Angels among the ’First Three Legions’? Even the Punishers who had once fought alongside the Valkyries had tempered their methods somewhat. Wasn’t that the very motivation behind their persistence?

Encouragement from the Ninth Legion Blood Angels. Support from the Thirteenth Legion Ultramarines. The Eighteenth Legion Salamanders leading by example...

That was enough.

"Senti, don’t twist the argument."

With a single step, Fu Hua appeared beside Senti mid-flight. She brought her hand down—smack!—"Ow!" Amid Senti’s yelp, the Immortal Phoenix stood with her hands behind her back and spoke calmly. "They are they. You are you. Since when has the great Herrscher of Sentience gone with the flow?"

"Who says I’m going with the flow?! Tch... Old relic, I’m not done with you!"

Just as Senti bared her teeth, plotting retaliation—

Kiana suddenly let out a soft sound of surprise. "There are life signs. A world that has developed a considerable level of civilization. The Honkai Beasts dispatched for reconnaissance entered it and suffered stepwise losses?"

After sensing for a moment longer, she extended her hand thoughtfully. "The Honkai energy there is being suppressed to a certain extent by some kind of device... That feeling is familiar."

"It’s the Ark."

Looking up with certainty, Kiana pointed toward a direction, unable to stop the faint upward curve of her lips. "Haa..." She exhaled softly, gesturing to Fu Hua and Senti. "Found her!" The joy in her voice was unmistakable.

Seeing her expression, the last trace of worry in Fu Hua’s heart vanished.

Clearly, Kiana had located little Griseo.

And little Griseo was still alive.

Bang—!

"Then what are we waiting for? I’m dragging that disobedient little brat back and spanking her! She sure can run!"

Grinning impatiently, Senti rubbed her hands together. She stomped on her greatsword—whoosh!—skidding like a surfboard through the hyperspatial tunnel with a drifting spin before vanishing into the writhing void where masses of Honkai Beasts gathered.

Buzz.

...

Teyvat.

Fontaine. The disaster site on Erinnyes Island.

Boom—!

Violet-red Honkai energy raged. Flocks of tiny sparrows were trapped by cages woven from Honkai Beasts, their escape routes severed. In the searing heat, amidst gunfire and interwoven energy shards and pulse beams, they were torn apart midair—or reduced to drifting ash.

Graceful black-winged geese, noble snow-winged geese... countless famous scenic animals of Fontaine failed to escape. Beneath the furious counterattacks of the Fontainians and the savage roars of alien beasts lay swathes of small animals—faces twisted in agony, bodies charred black.

The once-adorable Blubberbeasts, formerly so round and lovable, were now covered in wounds and terror beneath the aftershocks of war. The ocean that embraced all and sheltered every life lay so close—yet impossibly far. The shattered coastline, riddled with craters and strewn with sparks, left them nowhere to hide.

As for the hilichurls who dwelled here, they had no time to comprehend what was happening—eating hotpot and dancing one moment, swallowed by flames the next. Their crude wooden towers were trampled by Honkai Beasts, splintering into debris that sank into the earth.

"Corpses littered the field" would not be an exaggeration.

Even the marine creatures were not spared. It was as though countless frenzied beasts were baring their fangs and claws, thrashing wildly. Towering waterspouts clashed against mountain-like Honkai Beasts. Sea otters, armored crabs, seahorses, and stingrays were hurled about in droves. Rootless bullet barnacles were flung everywhere. The air reeked of a fishy stench mixed with rust.

"Roar—!"

The shockwave from a titanic collision blasted fist-sized chunks of rubble into the air, pelting the stone wall where the silver "sprite" of Silver Companion hid with rapid staccato of sharp impacts. That alone was enough to make Paimon tremble uncontrollably.

"Aether!" Paimon cried out in alarm.

At the very front of the ever-reinforcing clockwork meka forces stood the disheveled blond youth, retreating step by step.

With him as the eye of the storm, paving stones, lampposts, and evenly spaced roadside trees snapped at the waist as if struck by a hurricane. Not a single structure taller than a meter remained intact around him.

"Hah—!" Bracing his dull blade with both hands against the Chariot-class Honkai Beast attempting to shove him aside, Aether’s face twisted under the strain. Every muscle in his body was taut to the limit.

"Roar!"

The Honkai Beast let out an impatient bellow. Its glowing eyes locked firmly onto the collapsed cliff behind the opera house’s defensive line—the Ark. The command issued by its superior existence was clear: find it.

It was thoroughly fed up with the insect blocking its path.

Its primitive intelligence might not allow it to mourn the deaths of fellow Honkai Beasts or lower-tier units, but that did not mean it felt no irritation toward anything obstructing its mission. Though ordered not to recklessly initiate slaughter, the outsiders had attacked first.

Buzz—

It slammed its forelimbs into the ground, crushing the clockwork meka attempting to reinforce the line into scrap metal and forcing back the advancing Gardes. Its entire body trembled as violet light flickered across it. At the luminous nodes along its frame, uneven motes of light began gathering—brighter and brighter—until Aether’s vision was swallowed in radiance.

Alarm bells rang wildly in his mind.

He had to dodge.

But...

From the corner of his eye, Aether saw the wounded behind him—those who had not yet been evacuated.

He could not move.

If he dodged, they would die.

The Honkai Beast gave him no time.

Boom—! With a furious violet flare, the world in Aether’s eyes turned purple-red—and then black and white.

"Aquacrest Art—Rising Waters!"

Aether roared, fists clenched tight. Veins bulged along his arms as he pushed himself to the absolute limit.

Splash—splash—splash! Floating foam wrapped around his body. A dusky spiritual sting merged with the edge of his blade. Energies of luminous alignment intertwined with the surrounding water elements within a hundred-meter radius, surging outward.

Whoosh! In an instant—boom!—it felt as though colossal laser beams were firing from every direction at once. Aether could feel the sting across his cheek, the scorching heat searing his skin.

Just as his vision seemed on the verge of being stripped away—

"Good work." A soft female voice, devoid of strong emotion.

It was Griseo.

Shhk! Shhk-shhk-shhk—!

The violet-red beams that had shattered clockwork meka scattered like dust. Under the shadows, blades of blue light shimmered as they silently brushed against the towering beast’s pink-white hide. Accompanied by the wet sound of slicing flesh, the Honkai Beast was carved into dozens of pieces before Aether’s eyes.

"Your target is me, isn’t it?"

With the Anchor of Voyage upon her back, Griseo held a blue-bladed lightsword and swept her gaze across the surroundings. The battlefield seemed to fall into momentary stagnation at her appearance. Pairs of "hungry" glowing eyes locked onto her.

"From you, all I see are the colors of blood and fire."

Before her, the vast army of grotesque Honkai Beasts was shrouded in a crimson hue. Calamity, pain, struggle, plunder...

A completely different underlying color from the pure Honkai Beasts she had encountered during her drifting through space—on Green Star, on Ice Star, on Dark Star. The forms were similar, but within, the difference was like heaven and earth.

Silently withdrawing her gaze, Griseo made no attempt at communication.

With resolute eyes, the girl moved her lips softly.

"Ark, activate."

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