Be Their Hero, in Honkai Impact 3rd — Part 24

"Mom, Dad, somebody save me... It hurts so much... Please let me go, I'm begging you."

Only they had escaped harm.

Similar screams and wails often came from the cells around them. Those heart-wrenching cries of pain constantly reminded Sirin and the others what kind of hell this truly was.

And just how fortunate they were.

Whenever the screams frightened them too badly to sleep, Bai Ge would tell them stories.

The stories the boy told before bed—"Snow White," "Cinderella," "The Little Prince," and so on—always managed to distract Sirin and the others.

They made them forget the terror brought by those screams.

But compared to those stories, Sirin and the others liked the boy's singing even more. It was a voice they never grew tired of hearing, one that soothed their hearts.

Even Galina, the most timid among them, would smile sincerely every time she heard him sing.

Bai Ge's calmness and reliability made them depend on him. Combined with the smile that seemed to always rest on his face, Sirin and the others had truly believed for a time that Bai Ge had not suffered anything too terrible.

Until...

One day, they accidentally saw Bai Ge's body beneath his clothes... There was barely a patch of intact skin to be found, and it was covered in horrifying traces of experimentation.

Only then did they finally understand.

Their safety up until now, all the good things they possessed, had been bought by Bai Ge sacrificing himself.

Sirin: "How could I be so useless? Every time, I can only watch Bai Ge get taken away. Why? Why... I can't do anything!!"

Fourth update. Send some free flowers, please~ The protagonist will become a Herrscher in the next chapter.

Bai Ge: I Am Honkai (New Book, Please Support)

Even the smallest happiness required an equivalent price—this was the truth that the fourteen-year-old girl named Sirin learned at the Babylon Laboratory.

"How could this be? This is too cruel."

When she saw Bai Ge's battered body, Sirin was utterly devastated, her heart twisting like a knife had been driven through it.

Cuts from blades, injection wounds, burns, frostbite, tears, puncture wounds, bruises, and countless skillfully stitched scars...

There was not a single patch of unblemished skin on his body. Just looking at it made her heart ache so badly that she could barely breathe.

Bai Ge was like a tattered doll—mended every time he was broken, then broken again after every repair, over and over an unknown number of times.

And he had put on clothes to hide that scar-covered body, refusing to let them see it.

Large tears streamed down Sirin's face.

The strongest of the four girls had now wept herself into a mess. She clung tightly to Bai Ge, too afraid to let him leave her sight again.

"This is too cruel... How could this happen?!"

"Why? Why would they do this to you?!"

"These demons... I'll fight them!"

Galina, Avrora, and Agata stared at those shocking wounds, feeling as though a giant hand had clenched around their hearts and was crushing them.

Every time Bai Ge returned in the past, he had acted completely at ease. That warm, healing smile had comforted them—and deceived them.

Until this horrifying body was exposed.

Each and every wound silently told them what kind of inhuman torture Bai Ge had endured where they could not see.

So everything they had received until now had been bought this way. Food, clothes, even the storybook in their hands—all of it was a bloody reward obtained through the boy's sacrifice.

In this hellish Tower of Babylon, Bai Ge had offered himself as a sacrifice to carve out a haven for them.

Once they learned this...

How could they possibly endure it any longer?!

"Bai Ge, please, don't do any more experiments. We don't want anything anymore."

"The clothes, the storybooks, the beds and blankets—we'll give them all back. Please ask them to stop treating you like this."

"I-I can undergo the experiments too. This time, let us take your place, okay?"

"Idiot! Bai Ge, you big idiot! I don't want those things. I only want you to be okay! Hey! You people outside can hear me, right? Use me as an experiment subject! Whatever you want, do it to me! You're not allowed to hurt him again! You're not allowed!"

"..."

Looking at the girls before him, grieving and crying because of him, even volunteering to undergo human experimentation in his place...

Bai Ge, who had not shed a single tear through blade cuts, fire, freezing, electrocution, and Honkai Energy injections, felt his nose sting as something blurred his vision.

Unable to restrain the emotions surging within him, Bai Ge opened his arms and pulled all those little angels into an embrace.

"Thank you. Thank you, Sirin, Avrora, Agata, Galina. I'm so happy."

In truth, Bai Ge had once felt a degree of distance from the girls.

After all, he was not truly their childhood friend. That was merely a lie fabricated by the system so that he could reasonably exist in this time and place.

But now, that reservation had vanished.

Even if the memories of the past were fabricated lies, the feelings they shared with him were undoubtedly real!

And that was already enough.

If Bai Ge had initially decided to save Sirin and the others out of pity for what they had endured, then now he genuinely wanted to protect these girls, who had become no different from family to him.

That was why he could not stop now.

"Give me a little more time. Soon—very soon—we'll be able to leave this place."

"Bai Ge..."

"Then we can live together. We'll find a better place, somewhere far warmer, full of sunlight and blooming flowers—a beautiful place where we can live happy lives."

"Mm."

Sirin bit down on her lower lip and softly agreed, but the pain and sorrow in her heart only grew. She understood what Bai Ge meant. He intended to continue undergoing those experiments.

The five of them spent that night huddled together.

Yet nothing changed.

When the iron door opened again the next day, the adults took the boy away once more, while the girls could only watch helplessly.

Sirin: "...I can't do anything."

The experiments grew increasingly intense. Even Bai Ge was beginning to struggle to endure them—or rather, the fact that he had lasted this long had already astonished the researchers.

But sympathy was impossible.

These demons had found a toy they could not break no matter what they did, and so they grew ever more delighted as they subjected him to even crueler experiments.

Some of them even made bets, wondering how many more days Bai Ge could hold out and when he would finally break.

(Break down? Before I kill every last one of you, before I take Sirin and the others to the place we promised and begin a new life, I will never lose!)

As Bai Ge listened to their words, he continued accumulating the power of Honkai within his battered body.

That power was becoming clearer and clearer. Before long, he would reach that level and gain the strength to take Sirin and the others out of this hell.

Yet no matter how firm his will was, Bai Ge's body truly was nearing its breaking point.

When that day's experiments ended, Bai Ge found that he could barely control his limbs. Every step left him gasping for breath.

And such high-intensity experiments continued for several more days, until he was almost completely unable to move and could no longer get down from the operating table by himself.

He could only be dragged back to the cell by those people.

Sirin and the others had never seen him in such a miserable state. Every one of them was terrified, and the emotions they had suppressed for so long finally erupted.

"No! You're not allowed to touch Bai Ge!"

"Get lost! Get lost! Don't come any closer!"

"Don't take him! I'll go with you instead!"

"Put him down! Give Bai Ge back to us!"

After that, every day, they desperately tried to stop Bai Ge from being taken away. With not even a stone in their hands, the girls could only clench their tiny fists and strike the adults who were trying to continue hurting Bai Ge.

But the outcome was obvious. Young and weak as they were, they could not stop the adults' atrocities. No matter how hard they tried, Bai Ge was still taken away in the end.

All they could do was cry for him, and when Bai Ge returned at night covered in wounds, hold his body tightly and do everything they could to make him feel warm.

Such days continued until today.

Inside the Babylon laboratory.

The lightless-eyed boy lay on the operating table as usual. In Bai Ge's current condition, these people could not even be bothered to strap him down anymore.

Bai Ge himself glanced around with a sigh. His blood had splattered every corner of this place.

But his days as an experimental subject for these beasts ended today!