A Snake for a Snake

"There's no time for you to verify that."

Lin did not want to argue over something so meaningless at a time like this. A string of bright red numbers flashed across his electromagnetically disrupted visor. As he adjusted the system to adapt to the environment, he continuously tried to connect to the combat department's monitoring system. He was blind right now. The Upper-class Honkai Beast was nearby and could attack at any moment.

"Put the operation against the Emperor-class Honkai Beast on hold for now. We'll escort the survivors..." After Himiko finished explaining the situation to Mei, she considered that they could not possibly fight the Honkai Beast while bringing Mei and the others along, so she intended to retreat for the time being.

But Lin's urgent shout rudely interrupted her. "No!"

Lin corrected the errors on his visor one by one. His damaged internal organs and thigh began to ache again. He coughed twice so faintly it was almost imperceptible, then looked at Himiko. "Captain, our squad is currently the closest to the Upper-class Honkai Beast. If we retreat, it may break out of the encirclement formed by the various squads."

The implication was that if their squad, which knew the Honkai Beast's precise location and held the initiative, withdrew, it would continue attacking the remaining squads that had no way to contact one another. Casualties would rise sharply.

Himiko pointed at the two of them. "But we have to escort them."

"..."

A choice...?

Lin silently looked at his two friends as static continued flickering across the screen.

Heavy rain struck his helmet with sharp cracks.

If they chose the escort, the Emperor-class Honkai Beast resuming its movements would cause incalculable harm to the remaining squads. If they chose to hunt it down, they would have to abandon Mei and Kevin.

Himiko stared at him solemnly. She did not give Lin an order. She knew that if it was an order, Lin would certainly obey, but she wanted to know what he would choose.

Hun nervously held her scythe in front of herself. She thought of the soldiers screaming miserably over the communication channel, then looked at the two people who had forced the heavily injured Lin to head for the front lines. Her expression was lost.

This was a question with no answer. No matter which side they chose, they would place the other in danger.

"I have a proposal."

Mei, who had remained silent the entire time, suddenly lifted her head and spoke.

Her gaze turned toward Lin.

Their eyes met through the screen.

The endless thunderstorm tolled the bell of destruction.

Mei could not die. Neither the High Council of MOTH nor every member of Squad Five would abandon the two survivors. Whether she lived or died was not hers to decide.

But one person could decide for himself whether to stay or leave.

Without needing words, the two of them silently understood each other's intentions.

Lin turned and placed the rifle in Kevin's bewildered hands. "Kevin, do you know how to use this? Just like those games we played when we skipped class. Pull the trigger."

"Lin..." The moment Kevin heard those words, he knew it really was Lin.

He did not know what Lin meant. Why was he giving him the gun?

Himiko's expression changed the instant she saw Lin's action. "Lin! You are not allowed to leave the squad! That's an order!"

"..." Lin did not respond with his back to her. He calmly instructed Kevin, "We'll talk when we get back. Protect yourself and Mei."

"What are you going to do?"

"...I'm going to save more people."

Even Hun, slow on the uptake as she was, understood what Lin intended to do. Her reaction was even more intense than Himiko's as she directly reached for Lin's arm. "No! If someone has to go alone, then I..."

"Hun!" Himiko's furious roar froze Hun's hand in midair.

Himiko took a deep breath, wiped her face, and walked to Lin's side. She looked up at the person a head taller than herself, wanting to see what expression he wore beneath that helmet.

But she could see nothing. Beneath that helmet, perhaps there was only emptiness.

She slowed her speech and said in the tone of an elder rather than a commanding officer, "Lin, there's no point in going alone. Besides, the High Council assigned us the primary mission of rescuing Mei. The mission is complete now. In your condition, there is no need for you to keep fighting. I'll hold back the Emperor-class Honkai Beast. You escort the survivors and find a way to contact the other squads."

"None of your armor is built for speed. I'm more mobile than you, so I'm the best choice. An escort needs one person to protect them and one person to clear the way. Holding it back only needs one person." Lin patted Kevin on the shoulder. He wanted to say something to Kevin, but in the end, he merely lowered his hand in silence and said to Himiko, "Captain, the mission is complete. What comes next is the best combat plan based on my rational judgment."

Himiko gritted her teeth, yet could not say another word.

Lin was right.

Right in the same way those scum in the High Council were right, so right it made her want to punch him in the face.

There was no time. If they delayed any longer, the Emperor-class Honkai Beast would start moving again. They had to decide immediately.

"Lin."

Kevin glanced at Hun and Himiko, who had begun walking forward. He hesitated and stopped, looking at Lin's back as he drew the High-frequency Cutting Blade.

Lin paused, but did not turn around.

The azure blade sliced through the raindrops.

The torrential rain drenched the two boys who had reunited after so long.

One still looked the same as before, while the other was bound within heavy armor.

More than half a year had passed since Lin dropped out. When they met again, Kevin sensed something colder in Lin than before.

"So this is what you've been doing all along?"

"...If there's nothing else, leave."

"Why did you make this choice? No one would blame you even if you left."

Kevin did not have such noble ideals. He only wanted to protect those around him—not just Mei, but Lin and Su as well. To Kevin, all of them were irreplaceable.

Why exactly did Lin fight those monsters? Was it truly just for the so-called "fate of humanity"?

That kind of reason...

"Think whatever you want." Lin pressed the button beside his helmet. The world before his eyes was covered in information. He turned back indifferently and looked at his friend. A heavy voice came from beneath the helmet. "But if you only want to know the answer to that question, I already told you long ago."

I can't fight only for those who matter to me.

When I saw the tears shed by others, I realized I was no longer a spectator.

When I saw the blood spilled by others, I realized I could no longer remain still.

When I witnessed the passing of other lives, I realized I had to bear it.

I would flap my wings with all my strength toward the light. Even if my entire body shattered, even if I set this body ablaze, I still wanted to give everything I had to move toward that frail, tiny light.

He was destined to be neither a hero nor a beacon.

But he hoped to become the foolishest moth flying toward the light.

Everything belonging to the boy Lin had been buried in the night of that day. Now, soldier Lin was setting out.

"Roar—"

The roar of the Emperor-class Honkai Beast drew closer.

Lin turned and ran toward that flash of lightning.

An Eye for an Eye

The Emperor-class Honkai Beast was not the Honkai Emperor, the pinnacle of Lower-class Honkai Beasts, but an Upper-class Honkai Beast beyond even that.

There were two reasons these six words completely distinguished it from Lower-class Honkai Beasts. First, unlike Lower-class Honkai Beasts, which were still silicon-based lifeforms, Upper-class Honkai Beasts had bodies composed entirely of pure Honkai Energy. Neither their physical strength nor their control over Honkai Energy could compare to that of Lower-class Honkai Beasts.

Second was the uniqueness of Upper-class Honkai Beasts. They did not belong to any Honkai Beast species. Each was a singular species with only one individual. Even if a Honkai Emperor or Honkai: Overlord continued evolving, it could never evolve into an Emperor-class Honkai Beast.

That was what made Upper-class Honkai Beasts so troublesome. Lin had only fought an Emperor-class Honkai Beast once before. It had been an exceptionally unusual Honkai Beast accompanying the Second Herrscher, but that could not serve as a reference. This new Upper-class Honkai Beast was undoubtedly a monster with completely different abilities and methods of combat.

"Clang."

Lin fired his grappling hook and swung onto a rooftop. Crouching at its edge, he observed the coordinates of the Honkai Beast—the same direction from which the roar had come.

Silence.

With Lin's location as the boundary, the area nearly five kilometers ahead seemed to have been stripped away from Changkong City.

Other than the rain, nothing could be heard.

There were no low growls from Honkai Beasts or zombies, nor the restless crashes of collapsing buildings. Only greedy, eerie gazes hidden within the blind spots of his vision watched everyone who entered this area.

If post-eruption Changkong City was a beast cage concealing murderous intent, with zombies and Honkai Beasts stirring in the dense shadows, then the area before Lin was the territory of the true beast king.

Connecting communications... Failed.

He was completely cut off from everyone else. It seemed that only he and that Emperor-class Honkai Beast, somewhere in the darkness, remained in this area.

It seemed his judgment had been right. The Emperor-class Honkai Beast had turned this place into a hunting ground. Squad Five had already been within dangerous range. Aside from attacking the other squads, if they had left a few minutes later, or if the Emperor-class Honkai Beast had chosen them as its next target, the final outcome would have been Squad Five fighting the Honkai Beast while escorting the survivors.

Now, should he enter on his own initiative, or continue observing...

"Cough, cough..."

Several conspicuous drops of blood splattered across the visor.

Blood pressure detected dropping. Heart rate rising. Conducting internal organ exami—

Lin canceled the diagnostic system that was about to scan his body. That system had not been there when he last wore the armor. It seemed to be a new function added by the Head of Research and Development.

In an environment saturated with Honkai Energy, Lin's damaged body worsened every second. His high tolerance for pain did not mean it would not affect his movements.

"..."

Lin knelt on one knee and adjusted his breathing. He took out all the luminous green injectors he had received from Mobius and placed them in the armor's active unit, allowing him to control the unit through his helmet and inject the medicine directly.

"Hiss!"

A full injector emptied into Lin's body, the unusually colored liquid spreading through his veins.

"Haa..."

The pain vanished. At the same time, a ten-minute countdown appeared in the upper left corner of his visor. That was the duration written on the injector. Once that time passed, Lin would have to bear the side effects.

Five bottles remained.

Lin had no way back. He had to hold back or hunt down the Honkai Beast within this total hour.

Or trust that Himiko and the others could complete the escort, contact the other squads, and bring them here to hunt down the Emperor-class Honkai Beast within an hour.

Either way, go.

Lin opened his eyes, their pupils now luminous green inside the helmet.

A black dot leaped and darted between buildings. The Jetpack helped him move nimbly even across flat walls, turning him into a tiny spider amid the forest of steel.

The last confirmed signal from the Emperor-class Honkai Beast had been where Squad Seven lost contact. Lin quickly found the exact location on the map constructed from a three-dimensional model. He jumped down from above and landed heavily amid a pile of scrap metal.

Bloody water flowed past the gaps in the armor around his feet.

Entrails pulled from bodies, crushed eyeballs, and brain matter flowing from cavities mixed with rainwater among Powered Armor that crackled with sparks, creating a grotesque and horrifying sight.

Even without opening his helmet to smell it, Lin knew the air was thick with a bloody stench that even the downpour could not wash away.

This was where Squad Seven had lost contact. There was no need to say what had become of them.

But Lin had not come here to mourn them. He first roughly examined the area affected by the battle and the distances between the bodies, then crouched down to inspect the wounds on Squad Seven's soldiers.

Burns from lightning strikes, crushing injuries, penetrating wounds...

After taking a minute to examine every corpse, Lin had roughly determined the Honkai Beast's attack methods and range.

It was larger than an ordinary Temple-class Honkai Beast, capable of lightning attacks similar to those of the Third Herrscher. Judging from the deaths of several members impaled from below, it could also use an attack resembling earth spikes. Several bodies were separated by distances of ten to fifty meters, and there were signs of the Honkai Beast pursuing them. In other words, its attack range was roughly within that distance as well...

The battle had ended quickly, probably in less than fifty seconds. It was much faster than he had estimated.

There were still traces of a viscous fluid like black mud along its path of movement. That was...

"Hiss."

A faint, abrupt sound suddenly passed by Lin's ear amid the unbroken rain, as though the scales of something had scraped against a sharp edge.

He instinctively turned and drew his blade. The azure edge split the air and stopped in midair.

There was nothing behind him. On the street some distance away, transparent viscous bodily fluid secreted by something dissolved into the rain and disappeared.

"Splash..."

There was only the rain.

The feeling of being watched grew stronger.

Lin suddenly turned sideways, aiming his blade at the shadows beneath a broken wall beside him. Then alarm bells blared in his mind, and he spun around again to look toward the corner beneath a high-rise in the distance.