There's Nothing I Can't Do

Ultimately, Elysia had been written as an excellent character.

The moment Elysia showed even the slightest flaw, it would be endlessly magnified and attacked.

Those people who smeared Elysia and called her a manipulative pick-me were truly narrow-minded!

What Otto meant was that Su Nian held herself to exacting standards. She did not merely want to create a good work.

When it came to the Elysia under her pen, she had ambitions far beyond that.

When parents loved their child, they planned for their distant future.

Though the relationship in that saying was a little off here... the meaning was roughly the same.

For some authors, their work was like their own child.

And Su Nian had now revealed a certain idea.

Ambition!

They had not been wrong to sense it from the beginning. Su Nian truly had the ambition to turn this story into a masterpiece.

Su Nian had already invested so much into it and had glimpsed the signs... no, it should be called a possibility!

And the chances of success were not low!

This was not empty talk. It really could happen.

Otto admitted that he had underestimated Su Nian. He had originally thought she still needed more polishing, but now it seemed that he had been wrong.

Guidance?

Did Su Nian really need something like that?

Ah, then one of his few advantages was gone too. That meant he could only compete with Eden in...

Money power!

Eden might have been an artist of the civilized world, a woman wealthy enough to be called a rich lady.

But Schicksal was no slouch either.

They were a church, with devout followers all across the world. They were also a financial conglomerate, and under Otto's vigorous development, Schicksal's influence could not be underestimated.

He had the strength to fight.

Otto was now brimming with fighting spirit. Eden had just gotten ahead of him, so he absolutely had to win a round back!

This time, he would not lose again!

He would stake Welt's reputation on it.

Su Nian continued. The other perspectives had all been written, and now it was time to return to Raiden Mei and Elysia's perspective.

"I can't believe Mei got to see such an immature memory of mine. I'm practically blushing."

"But saying I wasn't happy would be a lie too. After all, Mei said she wanted to know everything about me and take our relationship a step further, so of course I welcome that..."

Elysia continued teasing Mei, but just as Mei was about to keep learning about Elysia, the Typewriter seemed to break down.

It had been smashed apart by Fairy Ai Li's physical attack.

After being strung along once more, Mei's exploration of Elysia came to an end for now, shifting instead to Griseo, Cosmo, and Aponia.

Raiden Mei wandered around to clear her mind, only to stumble upon their tense confrontation. Then Elysia and Fairy Ai Li arrived again with the repaired Typewriter.

Griseo printed out a painting. It depicted Cosmo with his body twisted into a bizarre posture.

Of course, Cosmo's somewhat... tsundere? personality was also displayed through the Typewriter.

What Cosmo typed out was a scene of Elysia "transforming" together with Hua, witnessed by Cosmo.

(...Cool.)

Cosmo was not merely a hot-blooded youth; he also had a bit of chuunibyou in him.

Before such a massive audience, every one of their actions could resonate with the viewers.

Of course, those were merely minor interludes.

What truly brought a corner of certain matters to the surface was...

"Griseo, do you want to go somewhere else to sketch? I just found a place with beautiful scenery."

"...You should go with Aponia. Be careful. There's something I want to investigate."

When Raiden Mei had arrived just now, they had been on the verge of clashing, and the details had been shown in Griseo's chapter.

Eternal Paradise was far less peaceful than it appeared.

I Can Do Anything

If Kevin's earlier experiences had been written directly by Su Nian, combining the timeline, events, and her own outline...

Then what Elysia showed Mei now were events of extraordinary significance to herself. This was Elysia's perspective.

But her situation differed from Kevin's. What Kevin's character needed was force of presence, unmatched martial strength, and an unwavering heart in fighting Honkai.

Elysia's charm, however, lay in every aspect of her being.

So she had to be written in greater detail.

The distinction between an "outline" and the "main text" was actually rather blurred when it came to Su Nian.

After all, if they had to read both, there hardly seemed to be any difference anymore.

If every Thirteen Flame-Chasers storyline were this long, then each of them could indeed have their own installment. Unfortunately, that idea was not feasible.

The one who remained present throughout the Previous Civilization was Elysia, while Kevin, the Previous Civilization's greatest combat force, survived until the end.

Beyond them, it seemed no one else had received such extensive characterization.

The writers of Honkai Impact 3rd excelled at using long-form stories to build characters. After Shaoji went next door to write Penacony for Honkai: Star Rail, just one major version was enough to make Aventurine a wildly popular character.

His influence had been immense. Su Nian had happened to see fans adopting peacocks and buying aventurine stones and such.

The audience did not focus on the principles of writing, but on the story itself.

Thinking back, Elysia had always appeared unexpectedly in everyone's memories. Every Flame-Chaser's life had countless threads connecting them to her.

Raiden Mei had seen stories from one stage of her life after another.

That included the time in Paradise Hall when she proposed establishing the Thirteen Heroes of Fire, only for the proposal to be rejected by Moth of the Fire's higher-ups.

"More than half of the members cannot be recognized as heroes."

For the first time, Elysia revealed a [lonely] smile.

Elysia's image now seemed to have reversed somewhat. At least so far, she appeared to have held no ill intent at all...

If she had harbored malicious intentions, then the Flame-Chasing Heroes would not have treated her like this, would they?

Everyone spoiled her. No one could do anything about her...

So was the problem related to the time of her death?

They suddenly recalled what Aponia had said before: the fate of dispersing ten days later.

What kind of dispersal did that... mean?

And that term representing "misfortune"—Moth of the Fire's higher-ups—had appeared once again.

Whenever they were mentioned, nothing good ever happened.

They had been pondering the plot, but the instant they saw those six words, they felt intensely uncomfortable.

Moth of the Fire's higher-ups, you've done every evil deed imaginable!

What do you mean, they didn't allow it? Our rules are the rules, and you're talking about permission with the top combat forces? They've got some nerve.

The reason no one made a fuss back then was obviously because the Previous Civilization was already at the end of its rope. If humanity still could not unite, wouldn't they really be doomed?

A man lives between heaven and earth—how could he remain depressed under another's rule for long! Ah... no management talent? Then never mind. Forget it.

Infighting at that time truly would not have been wise, but those higher-ups were just too infuriating. Honkai erased civilization, while the higher-ups stole away hope!

But in a sense, "Flame-Chaser" itself was a kind of "privilege." Once it rose to the organizational level, it would involve many issues, wouldn't it?

To borrow a famous line: I've fought wars my whole life, can't I enjoy myself a little?

They were filled with righteous indignation for no other reason than that they could not stand seeing characters they loved being wronged.

Nor could they stand useless teammates constantly dragging everyone down.

They instantly relived those blood-pressure-spiking moments from carrying one versus nine in MOBA games, immediately firing up their microphones to rant.

At the very least, Moth of the Fire's higher-ups were truly excellent at raising blood pressure.

Perhaps Moth of the Fire's higher-ups really did have their own considerations, but wasn't that statement simply too chilling?

They were all warriors fighting Honkai, yet they refused to acknowledge them as heroes.

It was only natural that they got cursed at.

All Elysia wanted was recognition of their identity, not any kind of privilege. That was why, in the civilization that came after, their successors still acknowledged them, thanked them, and sang of their deeds.

The story of the founding of The Past's Paradise passed once more, and this time they finally reached... the truth Elysia had promised.

This was the final stretch.

Starting from the hall of The Past's Paradise, Mei had met Elysia. She had met the others among the intricate architectural scenes, then beneath the great tree where Su and Eden often stayed, at Pardo's shop...

This tone felt like some kind of post-match recap...

Something felt off, as though this story was about to end here.

Damn! Aren't you going to string us along a little more? This isn't like you!

No way... such a good story was ending this early? It would be painful if the length was not enough too...

I'd rather Su Nian kept dangling us along.

Short stories are normal too. After all, time is incredibly tight, and Su Nian still has to revise the manuscript afterward, right?

She still has so many plot holes left unfilled! Wouldn't her conscience hurt if she ended it like this?

The Flame-Chasers' perspectives were all preparing for different things, so it obviously would not end so soon. This was just a feint. Whenever these novelists reach the end of a volume, they make it seem like the whole story is about to end...

This rhythm instantly made them realize that it felt like a signal of closure.

To revisit the past once more.

But the resentful masses harshly criticized Su Nian for digging so many unresolved plot holes.

"Everyone, foreshadowing is indeed a difficult writing technique to control. Su Nian avoided discussing these matters afterward precisely so you would overlook them..."

Eden explained on Su Nian's behalf. This was actually a commonly used method.

If a part was not written well, then it had to be hidden.

As long as no one noticed it, it could not count as a real plot hole.

As long as it was not discovered... but now too many had been discovered. It was difficult to hide them and pretend not to care, while Su Nian could not see the comments and revise her work in time based on reader feedback...

It truly was a glaring weakness.

She wrote too quickly, so she had no time to mull things over?

Looking at it that way... Su Nian still had flaws after all.

Now she seemed more like a person, rather than a robot with an entire library of world literature in her head.

"Look, we've reached the final stop of this journey."

At first, Raiden Mei had thought the prison where she met Aponia was The Deepest Place, but upon arriving here, she discovered that it looked more like a sanctuary.

"Ah... we've really walked such a long, long road. There are clearly still so many things worth remembering, but we... seem to have reached the end."

Passing through the final gate, Mei, who had undergone this journey, seemed to have found her answer as well.

"Even those outside their group all held different purposes, concealed their own secrets, and even had conflicts with one another, clashing against each other."

"But... from these people, I can feel a shared belief, or perhaps... an 'obsession.'"

"—The will to fight for something."