Her voice didn't rise. If anything, it was quieter than usual, yet each word was a nail driven into the air, driven into—
And into Raiden Mei's chest alone.
"Anyone but you."
"Why?"
Raiden Mei wanted to ask. More precisely, she already had—she had questioned her outright.
Why couldn't it be her?
Cyrene was clearly the more petite one.
Mei was taller, with longer arms. She was obviously better suited to give Jiang Cheng a steadier embrace.
"Anyway, you can't. I'm A-Cheng's guardian, and I say this kind of thing—"
"—is not allowed!"
The girl named Cyrene spoke each word slowly and deliberately.
"...I have to do this."
Raiden Mei raised her head. For the first time, there was no trace of evasion in her deep violet eyes.
It should have been natural for her to look away at that moment—just as the girl who had dodged other people's gazes countless times, who had chosen to lower her head and step back again and again, had done. Yet only now did she find her resolve.
"Only this way can I make up for it..."
In the rearview mirror, Kiana rested her chin on her hand, watching this silent yet taut standoff.
Her gaze shifted back and forth between the purple-haired girl with her head held high and the pink-haired girl who refused to yield even an inch.
Then she looked at Jiang Cheng and made a gesture with her eyes.
—Any way to fix this?
Jiang Cheng's expression said—
—Nope.
"Tch."
"Since you did at least save me from stumbling blindly into the Great Honkai... fine. I'll let you off easy."
She pushed open the car door, letting it—completely wrecked by the repeated impacts—fall away from the vehicle like scrap metal. Then she planted one foot on the ruined door.
"Creeeak—"
The grating sound didn't catch either girl's attention. Not until the girl who had seemed a little ditzy at first, her intelligence apparently dulled by an ordinary school life, strode without hesitation toward Jiang Cheng. In his dazed gaze, he clearly saw her soft, pale palm reaching out to him.
—She grabbed him.
Instantly refined away. (X)
With brute strength utterly at odds with her beautiful, delicate figure, she yanked Jiang Cheng into the air.
Her left arm went around his back, while her right swept beneath his legs and supported him below the knees, cradling him in a perfect princess carry.
"—?!"
By the time the two girls noticed, Jiang Cheng was already lying dumbfounded in Kiana's arms.
Azure-blue eyes.
Deep violet eyes.
Both pairs were wide with shock. They could only stare blankly at this utterly outrageous scene.
"What are you two standing around for?"
"One of you is barely as tall as an elementary schooler, and the other is covered in leaking Honkai Energy. If you carry Jiang Cheng, either one of his legs will drag on the ground or he'll turn to ash halfway there."
"In the end, I'd have to go to all this trouble anyway."
She shrugged impatiently and set off without hesitation, turning away at once.
She wasn't particularly tall, but her legs seemed to exceed the golden ratio. Once she started running—
In an instant, she had covered nearly a thousand meters.
"Ah—?"
The two girls opened their mouths in near perfect unison.
"What are you 'ah'-ing for? Keep up!"
Her voice floated back from far ahead.
"Do you think I want to carry this huge burden? Do you think I want to give him my first hug?"
"Even when I worked sorting packages, I never had to carry anything this weird."
Cyrene immediately ran after her.
Raiden Mei bit down on her lip, her slender jade fingers clenching together so tightly that blood seeped between them.
"Crackle—"
Her deep violet eyes closed gently.
It had been torn open.
The common sense she belonged to, the things she had tried to conceal, had been ripped apart without hesitation.
"Phew."
She let out a deep breath, then turned and followed without a moment's hesitation.
Only then did Jiang Cheng realize why he'd clearly seen Kiana's disdainful expression earlier.
He had to give her credit. Cyrene could have carried him too, but if he could be comfortable, who would willingly make himself suffer?
And though Kiana sounded thoroughly dissatisfied, he barely felt any jostling in her reversed princess carry. She considered the angle of every landing and how to absorb the impact with each step, even taking the obstacles beneath her feet into account.
As for what he felt—
If he had to describe it—
It was like "two mounds of freshly whipped, delicious cream jiggling vigorously behind him."
The silver-haired beauty's body was firm and supple, yet those parts were soft and yielding, like vanilla ice cream that could melt in his palm at the slightest touch. The moment they made contact, even through the nearly nonexistent layer of thin fabric, he could feel the delicate smoothness of a young woman's skin without restraint.
She really was treating him properly as an injured person.
She seemed careless on the outside, but she was thoughtful underneath.
No wonder she had been the Kiana he'd devoted himself to for three years, only later losing out slightly to Elysia.
Because of the traffic jam, running on foot let them pick routes inaccessible to vehicles, as well as shortcuts. They seemed to be moving even faster than before.
Jiang Cheng did his best to search the shaking view for anything useful, observing his surroundings.
A sea of people.
A surging tide of bodies.
Beyond the noisy arguments and heaps of clutter, right at the edge of his vision, he finally saw—
The expressway exit.
Personnel in black uniforms were setting up roadblocks.
Metal barriers, caution tape, yellow signs forbidding passage, and the faint outline of something bulging at their waists—something they wouldn't reveal lightly.
There was no Miracle Orb left behind that would let them travel between past and present within the current area, nor any large-scale equipment to amplify the power of their prayers.
He was only using prayer as a method. He wasn't a demigod himself, nor had he become a Remembrancer and embarked on a Path. Even if he prayed again, he couldn't easily get past the blockade—
With his amateurish prayer skills, the connected monitoring devices would probably detect him after just a few more steps.
The fight was about to begin.
Jiang Cheng took a deep breath.
He began to imagine a scenario that would make Kiana, Raiden Mei, and Cyrene attack them—
"Bang—!"
Yeah, figures. jpg
Chapter 14: Immediate Combat, Slaughtering the Enemy
A sharp impact, as if bones were grinding together, came with a violent jolt. Jiang Cheng's train of thought broke off instantly.
Reflected in his pupils was an enemy kicked flying through the air, now hurtling backward in a horribly twisted pose before crashing hard into the wall.
"Yikes..."
He couldn't help sucking in a breath.
—Once they landed, the soft, yielding sensation at the back of his head was the opposite of the impact. It was like tender, melting cream.
But he couldn't spare any attention for that now.
"Cyrene."
His voice came out with a distinct personal flair. His gaze met the two girls' in an instant.
"Can you still use that invisibility power of yours?"
"Yes. I'll do my best to divide up the battlefield so those big metal things can't get through~"
The naturally lively, pink-haired girl nodded, suddenly so serious she was almost solemn.
"Mei-senpai."
"I... won't hold you back again."
"Draw back the curtain of time; stir the ripples of the past."
Only Jiang Cheng could clearly understand the soft prayer as it was spoken once more.
The Glazed Realm, shrouded in mist, appeared once again.
Unlike every previous manifestation, this time no crystals appeared directly.
Instead, nearly endless mist took their place.
—It spread across every inch of their sight, every patch of ground they could see. Even when they looked up, they couldn't glimpse the bright sky.
"Tap, tap—"
Kiana's footsteps carried her forward at a quick pace, her white sneakers scraping out crisp sounds.
Both her arms were occupied, holding the dazed boy tightly against her. Even so, her mobility wasn't affected in the slightest. Her long legs cleared the ground with ease, and—
"Get out of the way!"
The sole of her sneaker slammed into a worker's helmet.
The combined weight of the two, pulled down by gravity, compressed the worker against the ground like a spring.
Right behind her—
Raiden Mei had found a steel pipe somewhere and slammed it into an employee's head. Then she took the katana from the employee's waist and wielded two blades.
Cyrene was even more direct. She brought out the Ritual Sword again, its sharp blade flashing coldly. Every time she struck, blood was drawn.
She simply avoided aiming for vital areas.
Before you continue