Prologue

Brain Storage Depot (´?ω?′)ゞ

At 3:14 p.m., during the Previous Era, dark clouds blanketed the sky above Luoyan City. Rain mixed with snow poured down over the earth, but the two people suspended in midair were unaffected by the weather and continued their desperate battle.

With a muffled thump, the girl struck the shoulder armor of the man in white and blue armor, forcing him back several steps. Strangely, no bright red blood spilled from the wound. Instead, wisps of black smoke as dark as night seeped out.

"Kehehehe! You accursed Fusion Warrior, do you think you can defeat Honkai just by destroying me? Don't delude yourselves! Once I'm gone, even more powerful Herrschers will be waiting for you. And even if you manage to defeat them, so what? Before the Finality, you're doomed! Hahahahahaha..." The man sneered at the expressionless girl across from him.

"Have you said enough? Then face your death! Rise, sword!" The girl spread her left hand and raised her right as if to strike. A gigantic sword appeared out of thin air in the sky and came crashing down on the man.

The man spread his arms, facing death without a care. Before he was reduced to dust, his deranged laughter still rang in the girl's ears. "I'll be waiting for you in hell... Hahahahahahahahahahahahaha..."

The girl raised a hand and caught a fragment. After gently crushing it, she said, "The Herrscher of Finality, huh... We won't give up... Hello, this is Fusheng. Yes, the Herrscher of Judgment has been eliminated. I'll rejoin the team right away..."

"Ah!" The boy woke from his dream, gasping for breath. After calming down a little, he realized his clothes were drenched in cold sweat. With a helpless sigh, he got out of bed and went to the bathroom. He cupped some cold water from the tap and splashed it on his face. The shock of the cold water finally cleared his head, and he sighed again as he looked at himself in the mirror.

He had lost count of how many times he'd woken from nightmares since he was born. Ever since he could remember, he'd been plagued by the same nightmare for seventeen years.

In the dream, he was always a bystander, watching a man in armor whose face he couldn't see fight a girl in a gray coat. They clashed in midair, trading punches and blocks, evenly matched beneath the torrential rain. But in the end, the girl always summoned a greatsword and killed the man after he exhausted himself.

The boy had always wondered why he'd dreamed of the same scene for more than ten years. He often asked the people around him if they had the same dream, but all he ever got in return was ridicule.

As he grew older, he began to realize he had no memories from before the age of twelve. As far back as he could remember, he had lived in an orphanage in Changkong City, one of the many children left homeless by the Honkai outbreak.

After five years of peaceful, uneventful life, just as the boy had come to believe he would live out his days in quiet simplicity, disaster struck Changkong City once more.

One afternoon, without warning, Honkai Beasts fell from the sky and began slaughtering the people of Changkong City. Those struck by them were transformed into bloodthirsty creatures that attacked friend and foe alike, raising their claws against the families they once belonged to.

The city's forces fought fiercely against the monsters to protect the survivors, but they were gradually wiped out for lack of reinforcements. With no troops left to protect them, the people were slaughtered at will by the Honkai creatures, like meat laid out on a chopping board.

The same was true of the orphanage where the boy lived. No one knew exactly what had happened there, but by the time the Schicksal Far East Branch rescue team arrived, the boy was the only survivor in the entire orphanage.

The Valkyrie leading the team brought him back to the branch. After a thorough examination, the researchers were astonished to discover that the boy's compatibility with Honkai Energy was as high as ninety-five percent. Normally, very few males had compatibility above thirty percent, yet his had reached an astounding ninety-five percent.

After a brief discussion, Theresa, head of the Far East Branch and principal of St. Freya Academy, decided to enroll the boy at St. Freya Academy. From then on, he became the academy's only male student. Today was his first day there.

The boy gathered his thoughts, left his room, and drew back the curtains. The sun was just beginning to rise above the horizon, like a brilliant jewel lighting up the earth. He had no idea that his story was only just beginning...