Arknights, Suika's Messenger Journey

"What?!" Emperor was dumbfounded. The first part was one thing—while Terra had plenty of drunks, alcohol wasn't a necessity anywhere except the frigid Northern Frontier. But inexhaustible food? That was terrifying.

Seeing that Emperor did not believe her, Suika pointed at Yi Si, Emperor, and herself.

"There are exactly three of us here. I can show you."

"Please!" Emperor's expression turned serious as well. He wanted to see whether Suika truly could conjure endless food out of thin air.

The next second, with a snap of Suika's fingers, the bar was suddenly decked out in festive decorations, while all kinds of food and drinks appeared across the tables and counter.

Emperor and Yi Si both stared dumbly.

"This stuff is real?" Emperor widened his eyes and examined the food before him. His taste, touch, and smell all told him that the roasted Fowlbeast in front of him was truly real.

"You can try it." As she spoke, Suika picked up a bowl of braised beast hooves from beside her and started digging in.

Emperor tore off a Fowlbeast wing in front of him and put it into his mouth.

"It tastes pretty good...

Holy shit, this is real!"

One second, he had been judging the flavor of the food. The next, he had jumped up in shock.

After a while, he looked at the considerable amount of food left over and said,

"What do we do with all this extra food?"

Suika snapped her fingers again, and the unfinished food vanished from the tables as though it had never appeared at all.

Only their swollen bellies and the solid fullness in their stomachs clearly told them that what they had just eaten was not fake, but genuine food.

"No wonder, no wonder!

Can you teach this spell to others?"

Emperor asked with a serious expression.

"What are you thinking? If this spell could be taught to everyone, I wouldn't be keeping it under wraps.

More precisely, it's basically my innate talent. You get what that means, right? It's something no one but me can learn."

Suika raised the Ibuki Gourd and poured Emperor a little more alcohol to help him calm down.

"What a pity. If this spell could be taught to others, hunger might no longer exist on Terra!" Emperor said with a sigh.

"You're a penguin. Why do you care about that?" Suika tilted her head at Emperor.

"I've lived through those times too, alright? What haven't I seen?

With your ability, it wouldn't matter much during peacetime.

But Terra has been unstable for years now. Those foreign bastards next door are practically beating each other's brains out.

Your ability is a source of calamity. No wonder Wei Yenwu couldn't protect you."

Emperor sighed. Now he understood why Wei Yenwu had made such a strange ruling.

"Enjoy these next six months.

Once you leave Lungmen after six months, countless people coveting your power will probably come looking for trouble."

Emperor had no solution for that either.

He could do nothing about those who coveted Suika's power.

After all, he had people depending on him and had to consider the safety of his subordinates.

After hearing Emperor's analysis, Suika's earlier anger at Wei Yenwu for failing to appreciate the huge favor she had done him gradually faded.

So it wasn't that Wei the Second had refused to help her. He had already helped buy her six months, but that was all he could do.

After all, even if he answered Great Yan's calls but not its commands, Suika's ability was simply too important. Once word got out, even he would not be able to protect her.

"Fine, then I'll play and have fun while I can. As for what happens six months from now, I'll leave it to my future self to figure out!"

With that thought, Suika completely set her mind at ease and decided to happily enjoy these next six months.

One-Punch Suika

By the time Texas and the other two finished work and returned to the bar, the place looked like a crime scene.

Emperor was sleeping peacefully in a large platter normally used for massive assortments, surrounded by a circle of wine glasses. Yi Si was sprawled over the bar counter without moving, as if he had lost all signs of life.

Only a petite figure remained seated by the bar, taking occasional sips of alcohol.

"Whoa! What happened here?

We're done for, Texas! Boss... Boss is gone!"

Exusiai, who was walking in front, curiously went over to Emperor. She carefully reached out and poked his belly, only to see a stream of liquid spray from Emperor's mouth along with her movement.

She turned toward Texas with a mischievous look and spoke.

"Tch, how much did you all drink...? Even Yi Si..."

Texas frowned at the state of the room. The thick stench of alcohol made her grimace in disgust.

"Oh, you're back!" Hearing the commotion behind her, Suika slowly turned around and greeted the three.

Exusiai leaned closer.

"You're impressive. You got both BOSS and Yi Si drunk.

You know, Yi Si likes making cocktails, but he rarely drinks."

Suika chuckled.

"There's no such thing as someone who doesn't drink in front of me. Besides, Emperor wasn't drunk by me..."

Suika began recounting what had happened earlier.

After learning about Suika's situation, Emperor suggested they compete in drinking capacity to lighten the mood.

Suika had told him, "My alcohol is too strong. You'd be down after two cups, so there's no point competing."

She had directly said that Emperor's level was not worth looking at.

Naturally, Emperor was unwilling to be looked down on by a little brat in that regard. More importantly, he knew Suika was right.

Since Suika's alcohol would not work, they would use his.

So he had Yi Si take several bottles from behind the counter and told him to mix whatever he wanted. He and Suika would split every cocktail equally, and they would see who got drunk first.

Suika also wanted to test whether she could use her ability without relying on her own alcohol, so she agreed.

Then Yi Si began mixing drinks.

For the first few cups, Emperor was still full of bold boasts. Later, he gradually began babbling nonsense. In the end, his legs kicked out and he slumped by the table, falling completely silent.

Meanwhile, Suika had accepted every drink with a smile and downed it in one gulp. Seeing everything, Yi Si had sighed that his boss had found an unbelievably powerful opponent.

"Can I plate him up?" Looking at the fallen Emperor, Suika cheerfully noticed a large serving platter by the counter that was used for fruit assortments.

Then she and Yi Si arranged Emperor into his current appearance.

After that, Yi Si became curious about how much more Suika could drink after all that, so he continued Emperor's unfinished endeavor with her, one cup each.

As for the result, it became the scene the three saw when they returned to the bar.

"Croissant, go hang the sign outside. We're closed tonight!" Texas turned to Croissant, who had no idea what to do.

Hearing Texas's words, Croissant seemed to find her backbone. She grabbed the closed sign and ran outside.

"Now that you're all back, I'll be going!" Seeing the three start cleaning up the aftermath, Suika patted her butt and prepared to leave.

"Sorry for the trouble." Texas nodded at her and watched her leave the bar.

After walking outside, Suika wandered around and arrived at the ruins of Granny Wang's home again.

Watching people come and go around her, Suika sighed. She lifted the Ibuki Gourd and gently poured out a cup of alcohol at the doorway.

"Granny Wang, I don't know what you think of how this ended, but things have come this far, so there's nothing more to say.

It's really ironic. You said before that you'd found several girls for him and planned to introduce them when he came back. Looks like there's no need now..."

She sat by the doorway until the sun set, then finally stood and walked home.

Over the next few days, aside from delivering letters every morning, Suika obediently stayed home in the afternoons, reading through the various books Swire had sent her.

"Come to the Guard Department training ground in two days. Don't forget!" When Hoshiguma returned home that night and saw Suika still reading, she spoke up.

"Huh?"

"Did you forget? I told you before that I wanted to see what you could do.

Swire said you were pretty capable in a fight."

Hoshiguma reached out and pinched Suika's cheek.

"Okay!" Although she had not trained much lately, her abilities did not need much training.

Abilities were different from skills. Skills would grow rusty after not being used for a long time, but abilities were instincts like breathing. People would not forget instinct any more than they would forget how to breathe.

The training ground, two days later.

After Hoshiguma brought Suika over, Suika looked around at the surroundings.

"Let's do a basic test first!" Hoshiguma led Suika to the starting point of the training ground.

"How do we do that?" Suika had never dealt with this sort of thing and did not know how testing worked.

Hoshiguma took her measurements for height and weight, then brought her before a sandbag.

"This measures punching strength. Don't you always say you're very strong? Give it a try! This sandbag is connected to an instrument that can measure the maximum force behind each punch.

By the way, the current record is mine."

Hoshiguma pointed to the display behind her, which showed 1999.

From what Suika knew, the limit of human punching force was only around 450 to 800 kilograms. Terrans were far stronger than humans on Earth on average, and with Hoshiguma being an Oni, reaching that number was not surprising.

"Then I'll give it a try!" With that, Suika walked in front of the sandbag.

Then she raised her fist. "An ordinary punch!"

Just as Hoshiguma was about to tell her that her punching stance was terribly unstandardized, Suika's fist had already touched the surface of the sandbag.

The next second, the previously intact sandbag exploded outright, scattering sand everywhere.

Hoshiguma's mouth fell open as she stared at the scene before her in disbelief, while the machine calculating punch force in the distance displayed 9999.

"Not bad!" Suika nodded in satisfaction. Though she appeared calm on the surface, she had not held back at all with that blow.

She had fully activated Density and Sparsity, maximizing her physique at the instant she threw her punch.

It could be said that aside from not using Three-Step Ruin, this punch had been no lighter than the furious blow she had struck Wang Ke with in front of Swire.

So this result had actually been within her expectations.

Turning to look at Hoshiguma, who was standing there in a daze, Suika asked with a cheerful grin,

"Are there any other events?"

Shocked speechless by Suika's show of strength, Hoshiguma took two deep breaths before pointing toward the track on the other side.

"The next events are speed and endurance: a hundred-meter sprint and a five-thousand-meter run. Do you need to prepare first?"

You Might Not Be Able to Handle This Punch

"Let's go! I barely used any strength. There's nothing to prepare for!"

Pulling the somewhat numb Hoshiguma along, Suika came over to the track.

Chen was standing there at the moment. Looking at Suika's happy face, as though this test were just some game, she simply could not connect her with the person who had blown up a sandbag with one punch moments ago.

"Officer Chen! Can we start? What do I need to do?"

After walking up beside Chen, Suika asked excitedly.

"Uh, it goes like this..."

Coming back to her senses, Chen began explaining the upcoming test events to Suika.

However, compared to her earlier one-punch display, Suika's performance in the following events was utterly ordinary.

Although the numbers did not look like something a child could achieve, they were only at the level of a normal adult.

There was nothing Suika could do about that. After all, Density and Sparsity provided no boost to speed or reaction time.