The Collapse Double-Cross, Taking Xilian to Honkai Impact 3rd

Was it an illusion?

Or was it just the shadows casting over Xilian's face, inadvertently creating an otherworldly atmosphere?

"Miss Xilian, what you said..."

"You cannot use the nickname A-Cheng. You. Cannot."

The smile she lightly raised was as bright as spring light, making one involuntarily hallucinate the gentle warmth of sunlight piercing through thick clouds.

However—

"A-Cheng is a nickname that belongs only to me."

She smiled, looking at the dazed Raiden Mei.

"Really..."

"--No!"

Before Raiden Mei could even utter the third syllable, she received a fierce rejection from Xilian—

"Even just a little bit..."

"--No!!"

"But this kind of nickname, only..."

"--I already said absolutely, absolutely not, okay?"

The final tone was much softer, lacking the previous intensity, as if it carried a tiny hook.

Yet, because of this seemingly friendly, natural gentleness, Raiden Mei involuntarily, almost subconsciously, forced the words back down her throat.

"...I understand."

The young lady who had just been sharp and imposing now lowered her head in dejection, as if her lunch had been stolen.

Watching this scene, Kiana scratched her head.

She felt like her brain wasn't enough to process this.

[Raiden Mei's signal disappeared at the school?]

[--Out of thin air?]

"Yes."

The girl with silver, Roman-roll twin tails nodded lightly.

On her exquisite, cute face, which lacked any human warmth like a doll, there wasn't even a trace of confusion.

"Third Herrscher host: Raiden Mei, just disappeared out of thin air inside Chiba Academy. Along with her, a Maybach S-Class also vanished."

[Block the surrounding roads.]

[I don't believe she can grow wings and fly away.]

"Understood. Mother."

The girl, like a marionette on strings, bowed her head, her silver eyes as cold as a machine.

[Also, have Xing take the Titan Mech to search the city, to prevent Raiden Ryoma from having left a safe house for his daughter.]

PS:

Xilian's emotions are actually quite heavy. Not to mention the 40-minute plot during her younger years at Aili Secret Pavilion, or the unreserved, direct approach as I described, just looking at the expression she showed after confirming the Trailblazer had kicked the bucket at Oronis—the look of not wanting to lose you above all else, not wanting to be misunderstood by you... I can only say she is worthy of being an existence capable of freezing the universe.

10. Is your Honkai resistance high? (Revised)

At least this time, someone who actually knew how to drive had arrived. Kiana had traveled all across Europe and run all the way to the Far East; it was impossible that she had been running the entire way.

Holding onto this conjecture, Jiang Cheng invited Kiana to take the driver's seat without hesitation.

"----?"

"I just joined the team, and you're already this confident in letting me drive? Aren't you afraid I'll kidnap you to prison? You guys are dangerous elements, after all."

Kiana looked over with eyes full of suspicion.

"I don't know how to drive," Jiang Cheng said calmly.

"I don't know how either?"

Xilian followed suit, raising her hand lightly. There was no sign of shyness on her round, delicate face.

Kiana's brows furrowed tightly, her gaze falling onto Raiden Mei in the driver's seat, and then—

"I don't know how either."

The down-and-out young lady nodded without hesitation.

"Ha—"

Kiana was almost laughed to the point of anger.

"So, none of you three have ever even touched a car, and yet you had the nerve to head out onto the main road?!"

"Well, desperate times call for desperate measures..."

Jiang Cheng tried his best to maintain a calm facade and keep his toes from curling through the soles of his shoes.

"Forget it, let me handle it."

At that moment, Kiana held her head high and puffed out her chest, the aura of a Nordic young lady radiating from her without restraint.

She cast a condescending gaze downward, causing Raiden Mei to flee from the throne—the driver's seat—as if escaping.

Kiana sat down on the throne, which still held a lingering warmth.

--Ignition.

She slammed her foot onto the accelerator.

The engine let out a timely, dragon-like roar. Without the barrier of car doors, the deep, powerful growl was clearly audible.

Even Xilian turned serious this time, her small body pressed against the back of the seat, eyes locked on the white-haired head in front of her, bracing for the impact—

And then—

"Do you guys even know where the sidewalk is?"

The white-haired head suddenly turned around, revealing blue eyes that looked foolish at first glance.

Fortunately, the reason she asked such a stupid question earlier wasn't because Kiana didn't know how to drive at all. It was just that the roads she had traveled on before were mostly highways or pure glacial wastelands; she hadn't driven since arriving in a place with so many people. According to her, it was because her license had been confiscated by a passing traffic cop.

"Minors aren't allowed to hold a driver's license."

Even now, she was still filled with righteous indignation when talking about it.

"I clearly worked hard to cheat my way through that test, so how could he confiscate it over such a small thing? The Far East is just too boring."

"..."

As a local of the Far East, Raiden Mei didn't dare to speak.

Outside the window, the streetscape of Nagazora slid backward like a fading film, frame by frame.

Kiana held the steering wheel with one hand, her other arm resting lazily on the window frame, chin propped up. Her gaze drifted from the rearview mirror, landing occasionally on the boy in the back seat who was trying to shrink into the shadows of his chair.

To be precise, it landed on his left hand.

That hand was hidden at his side, buried as deeply as possible in the shadows, but with her keen eyesight, she could clearly see through the folds of the fabric that ominous purple veins were faintly visible at the edge of his wrist, climbing inward inch by inch.

"Hey, Senior Mei, Jiang Cheng," Kiana said, appearing nonchalant. "Do you know about the Honkai Sickness?"

"--What is that?"

Despite being the daughter of an executive, Raiden Mei, who knew nothing of the underworld, wore a look of ignorance.

"It's a terrifying disease, more agonizing than any ailment known to humanity. AIDS, cancer, leukemia... everything else is just a minor nuisance compared to it. Once a person is infected with the Honkai Sickness, there is almost no cure. Purple veins appear on some part of the body and begin to climb and spread upward."

"Wherever it reaches, that area suffers severe erosion. Layers of skin, flesh, and nerves are burned away and turned into dust. It's more painful than sawing through nerves, and in the end, the person is reduced to ashes in unbearable agony, leaving not even a corpse behind."

Kiana deliberately played up the horror, her peripheral vision darting toward the back through the rearview mirror.

Jiang Cheng remained unmoved.

That was the only expression visible.

If she hadn't clearly seen the traces of Honkai erosion, Kiana would have even thought the person behind her wasn't sick at all.

Meanwhile, Xilian, who showed no signs of erosion anywhere, felt her gaze grow increasingly worried, and she bit her lower lip tightly.

"If I'm not mistaken—"

Her voice paused subtly at this moment, "Jiang Cheng, your resistance to Honkai energy isn't high enough to be reckless, is it?"

She didn't turn around, but the pair of azure eyes in the rearview mirror were locked precisely onto Jiang Cheng—the directness was no different from pointing at someone while speaking.

"It's pretty poor."

Jiang Cheng used an even more casual tone, trying his best to make the situation seem less serious.

"You know?" she continued to press. "Then do you know what level of Honkai energy usually surrounds a Herrscher?"

"Probably a bit worse than that."

"And you still dare to get involved in this?"

"The Honkai energy content around a Herrscher is at least a thousand times higher than the ambient air, even before they awaken."

Kiana raised an eyebrow, her expression somewhere between "Are you an idiot?" and "Are you tired of living?"

The other two pairs of eyes also focused on him instantly, but Jiang Cheng's expression remained calm.

"It's not a big problem, as long as I manage the timing well."

"How much do you actually know about the aftereffects of Honkai energy erosion?" Kiana pressed without a moment's hesitation.

Jiang Cheng did not answer.

"Do you know that nerves eroded to that extent won't fully recover, even if you develop resistance later?"

He still did not answer.

"Do you know that you might only have—"

Her voice paused subtly at that moment; in the end, she did not state a specific number.

"—if you go to a professional medical facility now, there might be a way. You might be able to live for another ten years. Maybe."

Kiana finally turned back.

That face, which a second ago had been lively, cheerful, and full of vitality, seemingly careless about everything.

At this moment.

—was as untouchable as her silver-white, snow-like hair.

"You probably won't live much longer."

She got straight to the point, her voice devoid of warmth. "Even at your current level... it will leave behind severe aftereffects. At the very least, you'll need to have a small portion of your body amputated immediately."

"----!"

Xilian's pupils contracted sharply, her fingertips tightening unconsciously, like a drowning person grasping for a piece of driftwood on the surface. Some kind of desperately suppressed emotion, one she had tried to keep from surfacing, was now overflowing, on the verge of bursting its banks.

But Jiang Cheng remained calm.