Queen / Justice

In some ways, he looks more terrifying than the Honkai Beast from before.

Fortunately, the three children had seen the helmeted man before; he was the one Anna brought back that day.

"You, you are..." The children were even more confused after seeing both the monster from the story and, in a sense, a high-tech soldier in one day.

"Where are Anna and Binai..." Lin asked the three children listlessly, his voice hoarse and interspersed with low coughs.

Shouldn't they have gone to seek refuge? How could Anna and Binai have abandoned them?

"You're the one Anna brought back, right? Please, please go and save Anna and Binai!" The first to react was the boy in the lead. He didn't care about Lin's appearance anymore and knelt on the ground, tears streaming down his face, shouting to Lin.

"..."

After seeing the bodies of the Honkai zombie, Lin roughly guessed that the three little ones hadn't failed to take refuge in time, but had secretly returned. The reason for their return was probably Anna and Binai.

"What exactly happened?" he asked.

"Waaah... Anna... Anna said she had to save others... so she ran back..." The boy wiped away tears and snot, wailing, "And then... then Binai Anna... so she had the others take us away... and went to find... Anna... Waaah..."

"They still haven't come back..."

Binai and Anna, didn't... leave?

Lin looked at the frozen city, then looked down at the three children.

The other two were also disturbed by the boy and burst into tears. For them, who had been well taken care of by Binai, losing two elders who were like family members in one day and experiencing the feeling of homelessness was something they simply could not bear.

Lin Qiang, suppressing his near-fainting nerves, took a few breaths before saying to them, "You guys go back first... I'll bring Binai and Anna back..."

"Really? Really?" Hearing Lin say that, the most mature boy softened his sobs and looked at Lin with reddened eyes.

"Um."

"Then... then we must bring them back! We made a promise! We must bring them back!"

"Good..."

Lin no longer knew whether it was the body pulling at the soul or the soul pulling at the body. He looked at the boy's hopeful eyes on the screen and nodded gently.

"It's a promise..."

"Lin, the Fifth Herrscher has been confirmed."

After flying at low altitude for a while, Prometheus seemed to remember something and suddenly reminded Lin.

But that statement is actually redundant. Herrscher will be born at the same time as a large-scale Honkai outbreak, so there's no need to mention it again.

So what Prometheus really wanted to say was what he was about to say.

"The Fifth Herrscher's coordinates have not moved since its birth." Prometheus displayed the coordinate graph on Lin's view, and the bright red dot appeared in Lin's pupils. "The coordinates are... the orphanage in Tran."

Orphanage.

What do these three words mean?

Lin remained silent after seeing this.

"Lin, the Fire Moths are fully prepared for this campaign. According to my calculations, the success rate is over 90%, so you don't need to assist in the operation." Prometheus kept popping up the Fire Moths' battle plans as if deliberately trying to block Lin's view, but unfortunately, the permissions Lin gave her only allowed her to appear in the upper right corner.

"You don't need to kill your friend."

Lin Yiwei flew along. "..."

"You can go back to headquarters now for treatment. Maybe it will help you get back on your feet. Those three children won't know the truth about today. They will only think that you broke your promise and that their sister is dead. They won't know that their sister has become a murderous monster."

"You don't have to see Herrscher you know die in front of you, really... you don't have to."

Prometheus's voice lowered.

With Lin Buman's flying speed, in the blink of an eye, they returned to the snow-covered Tran, streaking across the sky like a bird's song.

The city, covered in snow, was silent and peaceful, like a dead city.

"Cough cough..."

Lin lost count of how many mouthfuls of blood he had coughed up. At first, it was a normal bright red, but later it was gradually replaced by pinkish-purple blood. Now he couldn't even cough it up anymore. His throat was burning and painful, as if there were worms crawling inside.

As he approached areas with high concentrations of Honkai Energy, his body became increasingly weak, and the symptoms of Honkai Sickness gradually worsened.

Some of the Charge-type Honkai Beast spotted Lin and immediately Lin Fei in droves, but Lin casually shot them all down with his Floating Cannon. They were frozen into ice blocks in mid-air and shattered upon landing.

It would take another three minutes to fly to the orphanage. The low temperatures at high altitudes and within the city of Tran caused frost to form on Lin's outer armor. If it weren't for the cold-resistant materials, he would have been frozen solid by now.

The orphanage, seemingly sealed in an ice coffin or encased in an ice cocoon, appeared in the distance, as if quietly awaiting someone's arrival.

"Lin, you can't change the fact that people are transformed into Herrscher. They are the chosen messengers of Honkai, and this is their fate that they cannot change."

"But you are different. You have two years left. You have already given your 'all' for humanity. Now all you have left is your life."

"I beg you, Lin, please go back."

Prometheus's voice, devoid of any fluctuation, uttered words that an Artificial Intelligence could never utter.

"No."

However, Lin looked at the world with a weak yet determined gaze.

This is the world Anna lives in, the world she says she loves, a world covered in snow.

Has he given everything for humanity?

He said:

"That's not all."

Chapter Four: Queen

"No support... what does that mean?"

When Kosma said those words, he felt a chill run down his spine, but it wasn't from the cold; it was a deep-seated dread.

Hen looked at the communicator and said, "Kosma, why do you think we formed this almost useless squad?"

"Why..." Kosma frowned, "I don't know why either... What is the point of this squad?"

The most distinctive feature of this team is that it is composed entirely of useless recruits. They are neither a group of soldiers with outstanding individual abilities nor the most conscientious soldiers. Their greatest significance is that they are meaningless.

To fight Herrscher like this, without any support, is simply suicide...

Sending someone to their death...

Kosma's fingers froze.

"It seems you already know." Hen glanced at him, then deliberately raised his voice and said, "That's right, the purpose of this squad is to 'send them to their deaths.' The orders given to me by the Fire Moth were to lead you to your deaths."

"..."

It happened in an instant.

Before Hen's voice had even finished, the crowd, who had been worried from the beginning, scattered and disappeared without a trace, except for Kosma was still standing there in a daze.

However, Hen simply gave a smile that was not usually seen on him.

Even if his mission has failed and all the members of this hastily assembled team have deserted, they probably won't return to the Firemoth.

"You can go too, Kosma." Hen let out a sigh of relief, picked up his gun, and smiled at the stunned Kosma. "What's wrong? Scared?"

"Are you serious?" Kosma was clearly still reeling from the shock of the fact. He asked, "Is the purpose of this squad to 'die'? Why?"

Why would the Fire Moth send soldiers who fight for humanity to their deaths?

"Why...? Maybe it's to get some Herrscher information from unimportant people, or maybe it's some other reason... but it's probably because someone thinks 'dying' is a meaningful act when necessary." Hen was no longer as stern as before, but much more relaxed. "It's my duty as a soldier."

Kosma looked sternly at the man who had turned away, abandoning his past honors and simply to carry out orders and fulfill his duties.

"Don't let Kevin know about this. He's still young, just like you, and like that kid... He can't accept decisions like 'sacrifice'... Heh, I'm probably the same way." Hen chuckled self-deprecatingly as he thought of the young man he had sent back to headquarters on the transport plane.

But Kosma showed no intention of moving to catch up with the fleeing group. He said to Hen, "If this is your duty, then why did you reveal everything at this critical moment... You have essentially betrayed the orders and missions they assigned you, and you are about to betray your own life."

"Because they are as young as you, and you have your own lives to live, I can't let you embark on this path when you are completely lost. So I'm telling you this so you can choose for yourselves." Hen smiled and said, "Whether you choose to move forward or retreat, there is nothing wrong with it. They just chose the smiles of their families."

"But if you do that, you'll never see your family's smiling faces again," Kosma said with a determined look in his eyes. "There's no point in you dying alone. If we fight together, we can survive."

"You might be able to do it, but they can't. If that's your conviction, then don't forget it. But I still suggest you think more about others; there's nothing wrong with being a backstabber."

Hen saw the same persistence in Lin, but that person also paid a heavy price for it.

If Lin had been able to back down from his many options, he wouldn't be in this situation today.

"I'm leaving now, Kosma, you'd better get going." Hen shook his head, throwing away any unnecessary thoughts.

"No, Hen, you're wrong."

"They are not cowards, but heroes."

"However, now is the moment that will determine who they are."

Hen turned around in surprise.

At this moment, scattered footsteps gathered from where the soldiers had left, and all those who had fled returned and regrouped.

Kosma smiled slightly at Hen, his smile quite smug.

But the next second, his smile froze like the rain in the cold wind.

"... This is... Lin... I will be providing combat support... Please... do not... attack..."

A weak, feeble voice came through the communication channel, which was why those people were willing to come back.

"There's support!" the returning person said to Hen with delight.

They didn't notice how fragile Lin's voice sounded. No, they did notice, but the joy of not being abandoned had overshadowed their doubts about Lin's weakness.

Everyone will believe what they want to believe, even if it's a lie they've constructed themselves.

"Lin?" Hen grabbed the communicator in shock and immediately called Lin, "Lin! What are you doing!"

"Call----"

A gust of wind swept over their heads, and before everyone's eyes, a black shadow flew at high speed from behind them toward the frozen orphanage.

There are no Honkai Beast.

The area around the orphanage was eerily quiet. Logically, this should be the place with the highest concentration of Honkai Energy, where many Honkai Beast should be born or high-level Honkai Beast should be nurtured. However, it was like a graveyard with no movement at all.

The entrance was blocked by a thick ice pillar. Lin controlled the three Floating Cannons to carve out a door using high-output cutting mode, and then flew straight in.

Minus ninety degrees Celsius.

The coldest place on Earth is Antarctica, where temperatures can drop to nearly minus 60 degrees Celsius. For humans without proper protective equipment, it is a hell where death is a real possibility.

But now, in an orphanage in the central city of this human world, the temperature is a full minus ninety degrees Celsius.

Even though Lin's protective equipment technology far surpasses the current level of human capabilities, it began to stiffen under this extreme cold.

A small, transparent ice cocoon was hanging upside down from the ceiling of the orphanage's lobby.

The ice-blue tassels were frozen into a beautiful shape, a long dress rippled outwards, long hair glistened in the ice crystals, and fair skin was displayed in this transparent case like a work of art for people to admire.

This is the Fifth Herrscher.

However, when Lin saw the Fifth Herrscher, when he saw her face, he froze and murmured—

"Binai?"

Chapter Five: Justice

Not everyone is a hero, and not everyone can be saved by a hero.

Many people often regret that they were just a little short of success.

Yes, it was just a little bit short.

The Fifth Herrscher is... Binai?

How could this be...?

Lin's chaotic mind paused for a second when he saw the girl who had taken off her Nun's clothes inside the ice cocoon.