That Fleeting, Fragile Compassion

Kevin froze for a moment, then stared at Mei, whose face he could not make out.

"...Mei, are you the same now?"

"..."

The moment Kevin saw Mei raise her head, the confusion vanished from his eyes. He made his decision. "I understand, Mei. I believe you."

"Thank you, Kevin..."

Mei turned around and rearranged the data item by item, the screen's cold light falling across her face.

As she and Lin silently looked at each other, they both had absolute faith in one another as friends.

Lin believed Mei was the person most useful to Fire Moth. He believed Kevin could protect Mei, and Mei believed Lin could hold back the Emperor-class Honkai Beast.

Now, Kevin believed in her as well.

Sooner or later, Mei would cast aside the emotions that interfered with her decisions. But for now, she needed those feelings to open the door to a path with no return.

"Rumble!"

The spot where Lin had been standing was blasted to pieces by a bolt of heavenly lightning. He reappeared in the Third Herrscher's blind spot two seconds later.

Behind cover, he supported himself against a wall with one hand and panted heavily. His burned pores could no longer release sweat or heat, and heat was building up inside his body, worsening the strain on his internal organs.

"Two seconds..." he murmured.

That was how long Lin could use Phase Shift now—a full second shorter than the first time. It meant he had moved a shorter distance through that empty space than before.

Every time he entered that place containing nothing, Lin's mind was eroded. He could not use Phase Shift for long, and the lingering erosion accumulated. If he failed to control the duration, he would either suffer what had happened last time, when parts of his body had been severed, or go completely insane.

This was a battle of attrition. Lin wanted to stall until the Third Herrscher had no choice but to attack him with a high-consumption method. At that point, the drain on her authority would intensify, and the surrounding barrier would weaken. He could seize that instant to kill her.

Just like when he had defeated Snake Shadow.

"Thump..."

Suddenly, the ground beneath his feet began to shake. Lin froze for a second, then saw tiny black particles, almost impossible to distinguish with the naked eye, rising into the sky from all around him.

That was... iron sand?

The instant Lin recognized what it was, his heart clenched, and he activated the Phase Transfer Device.

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

A mass of iron objects and reinforced concrete crashed down on Lin's position alongside two bolts of lightning. If he had been any slower, he would have been turned into minced meat on an iron plate.

Manipulating electromagnetic fields... that really was a versatile ability.

The iron sand gathered into streams around the Third Herrscher. She controlled falling lightning with one hand and shaped the iron sand into spears with the other, her eyes searching for where Lin might appear.

"Cough, cough..."

Lin collapsed onto the ground, his body twitching out dangerous warnings. This time, he had not even lasted a second and a half inside. The next time, or perhaps the one after that, he might die in there outright.

Not enough...

Lin shouted inwardly.

"Whoosh!"

A flare suddenly rose in the distance.

Flares were a means of communication that had been phased out after modern communications became widespread. Fire Moth had considered the possibility that communications might be cut off, but flares could convey far too little information. Most of them carried only a few simple meanings.

Red meant attack.

Lin stared at the scarlet flare rising into the sky. Trembling, he forced himself to stand up one last time.

Lin, do you believe in me?

Mei raised her head and looked at the scarlet signal. Rain covered her glasses, hiding the expression in her eyes.

Taking the day off today. Starting tomorrow, three updates a day.

That fleeting, insignificant compassion

Lin dragged a trail of blood behind him as he staggered behind a wall. Simply remaining on his feet took everything he had.

The attack signal had been meant for him alone, because he was the only one near the Herrscher.

"Cough, cough..." He spat blood onto the wall, squinting at the filthy stain. Then he removed his helmet and threw it to the ground, splashing water everywhere.

"Thump."

His legs gave way, and his head struck the wall.

Lin could barely remember when he had first met Mei. He only remembered that they had gradually become friends while discussing fantastical technology. He was responsible for the wild ideas, while Mei alone examined their feasibility.

Once, Lin had casually mentioned something like the Titans from science fiction. A few months later, Mei had actually produced a Titan blueprint. Though it was only a conceptual framework, and most of its materials and power systems were beyond the technology of the era, that design eventually became the first draft of the real Titans.

They had been friends long before Kevin transferred to Chienyu Academy. Lin could even say that he understood Mei better than Kevin did.

So Lin knew perfectly well what the attack signal meant.

Mei trusted Lin. He would certainly guide the artillery strike toward the right target—with his... flesh and blood...

Then how was he supposed to signal the exact right moment for the artillery strike? And after the Herrscher's barrier was shattered, how was he supposed to end her life?

Lin did not know. By then, he would most likely have become ashes beneath the Honkai Energy Conversion Cannon. But Lin firmly believed that Mei had her own considerations and plans—meticulous, yet bold. That was how Lin understood this genius girl.

What he needed to consider was how to get close to the Third Herrscher.

The Phase Transfer Device could be used at most two more times, each for no longer than a second. Its range was limited, and Lin did not even know whether he could truly activate it one final time.

Assuming the worst—that the Phase Transfer Device could only be used once more—the question Lin ultimately faced was... where should he use it this time?

If he made himself the target of the cannon, he could use Phase Shift to leave before the attack arrived. That would accomplish the goal and let him survive.

But aside from Phase Shift, he had no way to approach the Third Herrscher.

It was not a difficult choice.

"How many squads can we contact at present?"

"So far... none."

The head of the command center wanted to say something, but he seemed unable to get a word in against Mei's command. Headquarters had also approved Mei's on-site command after being informed. Her temporary rank was lower than his, but her authority was equal to his.

Most importantly, he was already among humanity's elite commanders. Yet he had no idea how the girl, a whole generation younger than him, calculated the things that came out of her mouth.

For example, whenever Mei directed someone to do something, she would provide every single detail, down to the microsecond when a signal should be sent. From the perspectives of mathematics and physics, she could tell them where to launch a flare so that the maximum number of squads would see it. And when she recited those figures without a moment's hesitation, one could not help wondering when she had calculated them.

What was astonishing was that Mei's command had not disrupted the normal functioning of the combat department at all. After the preparations were complete, aside from frequently asking the monitors about squad movements, the entire operations division ran in perfect order.

"Three minutes remaining."

Mei's finger slid down from the bridge of her smooth nose. Numbers flickered across the screen reflected in her lenses as she murmured softly.

The Third Herrscher's Honkai Energy readings were rising layer by layer, showing that she was continuously using her authority. She was also growing more impatient and beginning to invest greater amounts of energy. It was estimated that she would reach the threshold of the Third Honkai War in three minutes.

There was only one chance. If they missed it, they would return to the situation where every other squad was blind in the dark.

Kevin stood in the corner, his gun leaning against the wall. He looked around at the people whose faces were full of anxiety, and his heart was filled with emptiness.

Lin was fighting. Mei was fighting too.

Only he could do nothing.

Mei would join the organization called Fire Moth. Would that mean that from now on, she would only drift farther and farther away from him? She and Lin fought for humanity in places no one knew about, while he was one of the "humans" they protected?

"I envy you, but I can't do what you do."

Lin's phantom stood before him, looking at him with those distant eyes.

Kevin's fingers clenched until they turned white, and light gradually returned to his eyes.

That was right. Since Lin's answer was the same as it had been that day, then his response would be the same as well.

"If it's to fight for the people around me, to fight for Mei..."

Lin crashed through a doorway, lightning exploding behind him as shattered stones flew over his head.

He moved his legs and sprinted up the stairs toward the top floor, but the violent shaking of the entire building quickly stopped him.

Without further thought, Lin abandoned that route. He turned and leaped out through a window.

"Boom!"

It took only one second to destroy the entire building. An attack condensed from high-purity Honkai Energy was far beyond what modern human society could withstand. A casual strike could match Fire Moth's highest-output Honkai Energy Conversion Device.

Lin reacted quickly and grabbed a swaying streetlamp outside the window. Using his body weight, he easily snapped the already nearly broken lamp post, swinging smoothly down to the ground.

Those violet-black eyes that judged sin stared coldly at Lin. Her long sleeves fluttered around both arms, purple wings of light grew from her back, and her eyes suddenly lit up the night sky. The iron objects around Lin trembled, and then she clenched one hand, sending them flying at him in a dense barrage like bullets.

There was no way to dodge. His body could not keep up.

Facing certain death, Lin's dim black eyes calmly watched those "bullets," which did not seem quite so fast in his vision. Lightning was about to strike from above. He rapidly memorized the layout of every projectile, then charged forward without hesitation, making evading the lightning his priority.

"Screech—"

A steel bar pierced his shoulder, and iron sand tore away a chunk of flesh from his left leg. But the remaining lightning bolts and projectiles caused him no further injury.

As long as he chose to evade only fatal wounds, he had many more movements available to him.

He rolled across the ground several times, then flipped over and rose into a half-crouch. His pupils were unfocused, and his pounding heart nearly drowned out every sound around him.

Lin's extensive burns and severe blood loss continued to worsen. Some of his wounds had even dried out. He had lost nearly fifty percent of his blood. Ordinarily, no matter how strong Lin's will was, he should already have gone into shock.

But Mobius's toxin kept his mind intact. His consciousness alone was dragging his body into motion now. All it would take was one final straw, and he would die.

"Rumble!"

But fortunately—or perhaps unfortunately—what Lin wanted arrived.

The violet-black pupils were completely consumed by pure violet. The churning thunderclouds expanded to a distance Lin could not evade, while before the Third Herrscher, a ten-meter-wide sphere of purple energy threaded with lightning was ready to fire.

The stench of death drifted from within it.

Lightning would blanket every nearby area, while that beam of destruction would vaporize every obstacle in its path before killing Lin completely.

If the Honkai Energy in that attack were released instead of compressed and fired at Changkong City, half of Changkong City would vanish from the map in an instant. At the same time, the Third Herrscher would enter a period of weakness.

Such an attack was actually being used just to kill one human.

This time, Lin did not hesitate. Before the carpet-bombing attack arrived, he pressed the Phase Shift button.

"Boom—"

The skyscraper collapsed. Within the white light, everything vanished with the thunder.

The Third Herrscher looked impassively at the land flattened beneath her feet. That human could not possibly have survived such an attack. Even if he had used that strange device, he could not have escaped the attack's range.

She turned, preparing to leave.

"----"

Suddenly, an indescribable sensation welled up inside her—a feeling that should have been impossible for a Herrscher like her, a being nearly equivalent to a higher life-form.

A pair of black eyes silently met her violet-black gaze.

She could not see any fear of her in those eyes, but there was another emotion within them. It was not directed at her, but at the original owner of this body.

It was compassion.

She suddenly wanted to raise her hand and catch him.

Like the residual nerve response after a creature's death, she did not know why, but she reached out toward the man falling from the sky.

But her hand stopped halfway, because she saw a light shine in the man's black eyes, clear as a mirror.

"Boom!"

A brilliant white Particle Cannon blast struck the Third Herrscher in the back without mercy, engulfing Lin as well after he had used Phase Shift.