Tatsuki reached out and casually crushed Himeko's tactical monocle. The eyes revealed beneath glimmered red—sign of imminent deadwalkerization.
"Miss Himeko, how about reconsidering my earlier proposal? Right before you is one of the finest men alive; miss this shop, there won't be another."
"…" Himeko couldn't fathom this man's brain circuits. "Can't you tell I'm about to keel over?"
She was on the verge of becoming a deadwalker—surely he didn't have that kind of kink? Though… never having given her first time away was, admittedly, one of her larger regrets.
Tatsuki gently caressed the face twitching from pain. "I can tell. And I can cure it—if you say the word."
"?" Himeko eyed him with deep suspicion. "You're taking advantage of a crisis, aren't you? What else do you plan to demand?"
Tatsuki nodded, dead honest. "Of course. From the moment I saw you stripping on the battleship, I knew—this woman is the one I'm going to marry."
"…"
Himeko, who'd read a thousand people, stared blankly at him. From micro-expressions to tone and posture… the result she read was—truth?
Wracked by pain, she lay back on the deck with a twitch at the corner of her lips. "You're almost offensively honest."
Tatsuki chuckled, flashing white teeth. "Sincerity is the ultimate finisher."
Even through the pain, her smile stayed wild and rakish. "Do it. If you can keep me alive, this body is yours."
"No, no, no—your heart comes with it."
As he spoke, Tatsuki lifted her with one arm and sealed her blazing red lips with his.
Himeko didn't dodge—she leaned in harder than he did. That was the kind of woman she was.
Beyond the heat of the kiss, she felt an immense energy surge into her body, easing the pain and mending the parts the erosion had ruined.
Crack! crack!
Fissures raced across her armor.
A heartbeat later—
Boom!
Her whole suit shattered, and a pair of pristine white wings unfurled from her back.
Not just Himeko—Tatsuki, too, was surprised at the halo above her head. In the middle of applying salvation and healing, he'd discovered a sliver of possibility and simply turned it into an angel.
"What… is this…?" Himeko glanced at the wings at her back. She had never felt so light, so brimming with power.
"Congratulations. You're now my Angel of Salvation."
Saying so, his eyes frankly drank in the flawless body before him, not a thread to be seen.
"Angel… that's a curious word."
Recalling the wings and halo with a thought, Himeko had long since noticed the heat in his stare. Her lips curled into a bewitching smile. "Tatsuki, you said you were watching me on the Hyperion before I stripped?"
"That's right."
"Then you heard what I said, didn't you?"
"What did you say?"
"I'm a woman who, once I take off my clothes, goes all the way! If you want my heart satisfy me first!"
…
[Ding! Honkai source detected eliminated; all deadwalkers and Honkai beasts in Changkong City have been purged. Expedition complete!]
[Tatsuki gains 500,000 Apocalypse Points; Silver Wolf gains 100,000; Kiana gains 80,000; Furina gains 10,000!]
…
St. Freya Academy.
A Schicksal-built academy that accepts only girls from around the world with strong Honkai adaptability—training that adaptability and various martial skills while they're still in bloom. They are the future Valkyries, humanity's key fighting force against Honkai.
St. Freya doesn't only teach ways to slay Honkai beasts and deadwalkers; it also teaches their types and weaknesses, and humanity's history of resistance—things this school has long preserved. Its headmistress is Theresa Apocalypse.
Outside the headmistress's office, a red-haired woman massaged her sore body and grumbled, "Honestly, it's been three days and I still ache all over."
"You used the still-in-R&D Nexus system, then forced maximum output to block a Herrscher's attack. Be grateful you aren't bedridden with serious injuries," came the reply.
"…"
Himeko very much wanted to say it had nothing to do with Nexus or the artificial stigmata—she'd just fought too long for her first time.
"You loose-cannon bombshell!"
Theresa sat on her desk, jabbing a finger up at Himeko in scolding—only she was so short that from Himeko's angle, only the top of her head peeked over the desktop.
"Ah! Headmistress, you're here—so petite and cute, I almost missed you~"
Theresa flushed and exploded. "Cut the chatter! Report!"
"Ahem." Himeko slid a hand into her cleavage.
"…"
With a playful curl of her lips. "To keep it from getting found by others in the organization, I put the data… somewhere safest."
Veins popped; Theresa pounded the desk with tiny fists. "Enough! Hand it over!"
"…It's still warm—how disgusting." Theresa took the data disk, opened it, and said, "Then summarize what happened over the three days, Major."
"Yes, ma'am."
…
Fontaine, the Tribunal. Furina stared at her own hands, dazed.
"Did I truly cross into another world?"
The memories of those three days were crystalline. She saw things wholly unlike Fontaine. A ruined city of strange style. A calamity called Honkai. Monsters wandering the streets.
A Herrscher birthed in thunder. And a steel warship that sailed the sky.
Everything was carved into her mind like truth. Yet back at the Tribunal, it all felt like fantasy again.
She opened the group chat; seeing everyone's messages, a smile blossomed on her lips. It had all been real.
Kiana: "Furina, Silver Wolf, Tatsuki—did you all return safely?"
Furina: "I've returned to Fontaine. What an amusing trip."
Silver Wolf. "+1."
Kiana: "Good. What about Tatsuki?"
Kiana: "Tatsuki, the mission's over. We're all back. Where are you?"
Tatsuki: "I'm back too."
Kiana: "Emmm, what were you doing these three days? You didn't show up once."
What stung most was Mei repeatedly asking after him; every answer put a faint dimness in her eyes—enough to make Kiana gnash her teeth with jealousy. I met Mei first—why won't you worry about me, huh!
Tatsuki: "Nothing much. Just discussed your next arrangements with Himeko."
Kiana: "Auntie Himeko?"
Silver Wolf. "Hehe."
Silver Wolf had already seen through it all.
Kiana: "So us joining St. Freya Academy—you plotted that behind the scenes!"
Tatsuki: "Mhm."
He left it at that. In truth, it was Himeko's own arrangement. After their night of indulgent battle, Tatsuki had handed her things like the Six Styles and Senzu Beans—and tuned certain sensory parameters on her body via Dominance.
No outsider, be it eye or instrument, could detect any physical change.
As for Cocolia, Tatsuki simply sent her back to Anti-Entropy for work, banning all taboo experiments.
Now, he rather hoped the end of Kiana's world would hurry up and show itself. He wanted to see whether this "Honkai" and "Cocoon of the End" were the old setting's test from the Imaginary Tree for its leaves, or the new setting's byproduct of alien civilizational meddling.
Either way, this Apocalypse Journey had yielded plenty.
....
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