...
"So that's why…" Scathach mumbled out loud.
Thor nodded in agreement. After the past month of being in a brutal training loop with his master, Thor figured out that under no circumstances could Scathach's fragment connect with her core soul across dimensions.
So in the end, he decided to sit down in a manifested living room and tell Scathach what had happened these past few years for him.
It took the greater part of hours to tell her all about it, but since then, his master had just been quietly thinking, occasionally mumbling a few words. He understood that, for Scathach to find out, he is not only trapped across dimensions, but he's also made enemies with a nigh 5th-dimensional being.
For Scathach, she had seen a lot of things in her long life, but to know her very own disciple would be in such a position, it pissed her off.
She glanced at her disciple. She now better understands that while he seems in control on the surface, he is barely holding back from doing something stupid.
If she somehow didn't give him the right consolation or advice…
"Hah…Thor." She said,
"Mm?" Thor turned his head up at her, staring straight into her eyes.
Scathach thought for a moment before speaking, "You have gotten stronger since you've been here, right?"
He nodded.
"Then keep going, you already have the intelligence and strategy." She stood up and walked over to him, placing a hand on his shoulder and leaning forward, bringing her face close to his.
Thor's expression didn't change; he still looked at her as if searching for the answer in her eyes.
"All you need, all you have ever needed, is strength. Enough strength to crush anything in your path, to trample it beneath your feet."
She let go of his shoulder and backed off. Thor, however, was only more confused at her words, tilting his head at her as if asking, 'Is that it?'
To which Scathach covered her mouth and chuckled, "Haha. It is Thor. It might not be everything, but it's 90% of it, and that last 10%, you already have it."
Scathach watched as Thor's expression changed, morphing into many different expressions in seconds. She always wondered what was so hard to understand about it. Hadn't she beat–Ahem! Trained him to adopt that mindset?
'Well, it's as they say, experience is the best teacher.' She thought to herself, 'I doubt Thor would have gotten to this point even in 50 years on Earth.'
Minutes passed from that point, and the whole time, Thor was stewing in his thoughts, clearly unable to grasp Scathach's 'Simple' explanation. Eventually, Scathach couldn't take it anymore and summoned her spear, pointing the tip at his head.
"Stop thinking for now." She said, and using the tip of her spear, tilted his chin up so he was facing her.
Thor stared at her for a few seconds before smiling, "Yeah, I probably should, huh?"
Scathach returned with her own smile, and soon enough, Thor's mindscape became a battlefield once more.
…
[WHAT DID YOU SAY?!] Sakura's enraged voice came through the terminal, making Su flinch at the pain it promised him.
Su rubbed his head and responded, "Ugh, can you not shout like that? But yes, Thor should be waking up soon. From Mobius' words, his vitals are showing signs of awakening, Eden has already gone to tell Elysia, Pardo and Rin are keeping Griseo busy…"
On the other end of the call, Sakura almost drew her blade and diced the terminal into thousands of pieces, but she held herself back. [I'll be there soon…] She tried to say calmly, but Su could already hear the slight anticipation in her voice, something that made him want to scoff.
"Sure, I'll have command informed that a glacier might suddenly appear." Su said. He heard Sakura give a hum of agreement before abruptly cutting the connection.
Immediately, he slumped over the table and groaned, "*Yawn* Finally… I can sle…ep…*Snore*" It didn't even take a minute for the sleep-deprived Su to fall into the realm of unconsciousness.
..
Elsewhere, Eden had already knocked on Thor's door multiple times, calling out to Elysia to come out, but so far, she had gotten no response, even mentioning that Thor could be waking up got her nothing.
This made Eden think, 'Maybe she isn't here right now? She might even be by his side already. I don't doubt that she would be the first to feel such a change in him.'
With that thought in mind, she pulled out her own keycard to Thor's room and opened it, and instantly her eyes widened at the scene before her. "S-so pink! …What the hell did she do?!"
Eden shouted. Thor's entire room was covered in some pink crystalline structure, something very similar to the crystals Elysia makes.
But besides that, her first thought was right, Elysia wasn't here right now, so she was either out doing her public appearance, or by Thor's side.
"Eh?" Just as Eden was about to turn and leave the room, she noticed a bunch of flower-like crystals all over Thor's bed. "Why do these…Look so familiar?"
Eden was going to reach out and pick one up, but the terminal in her pocket buzzed, snapping her out of the daze she was in. Quickly, she took out the terminal and answered.
[Eden, you can come back, Elysia is already here…] Mei's voice came through, but she sounded somewhat strange.
Eden frowned, but quickly shook it off and told Mei she would be right there before ending the call.
She took one last cautionary glance around the room before leaving and heading back to the lab.
..
"What happened to her?" Kevin whispered to Mei.
"I don't know if I did, you think I would have this face?" Mei whispered back, pointing at her own face that seemed to be stuck in an expression of shock and surprise.
Kevin chuckled awkwardly, rubbing the back of his head.
Beside them, Mobius' gaze was darting to the video feed in her hands and the scene before her. "She's not even showing on camera anymore…" She switched the video feed between many modes, thermal, UV, ARIS, and not a single one picked up on the pink-haired woman standing in front of the chamber housing Thor.
Since she had got here, she hadn't said a word to anyone, didn't even react when someone called out to her, and only stared at Thor's body as if in a daze.
Mobius thought about it and could only come to a single conclusion, "She did something, probably something to do with her connection to the Honkai…"
Around her, Mei and Einstein heard her and could only quietly agree. The former thought something similar to Mobius, and the latter just knew that the Elysia she's seeing now feels completely different to the Elysia she knew just a month and a half ago.
Currently, nearly everyone except for Griseo, Rin, Pardophelis and Sakura were in this lab, all waiting for the moment that their 'leader' woke up.
"Dr, how are his vitals now?" Kosma asked from behind Mobius.
With perfect muscle memory, as if she had done this exact action hundreds of times, Mobius brought up Thor's vitals, "It's close to his normal vitals now, probably just a little longer before he wakes up."
Kosma nodded and stepped back, his gaze staying on Thor.
..
The group didn't have to wait much longer for Thor to awaken.
It was no grand spectacle like Kevin thought it would be; instead, Thor simply opened his eyes.
The first thing Thor noticed was that he was in a fluid-filled medical chamber. The second was Elysia and her glowing diamond eyes.
Thor furrowed his brow at the change; even the way Elysia was sweetly gazing at him was off somehow. While he thought this, Mobius had already initiated the drainage sequence for the chamber.
As soon as Thor exited the chamber, he was met with Elysia's embrace, burying her face into his neck and holding him tightly. Thor smiled and hugged her back, stroking her long pink hair while staring around at everyone in the room.
As his eyes moved over all of them, he noted that almost all of them were exhausted, with dark circles under their eyes, except for Kalpas, who was just leaning against a wall with his mask on, not showing a hint of what the others showed outwardly.
'Did a Herrscher show up or something? How can they be like this after just a month without me?' Thor thought he knew Mei was a fine-ish leader, Kevin was her brawn, and he had told everyone to treat Mei as the boss if he wasn't around.
But before he could say something, Elysia spoke first. "You scared us, you know…" She said without showing her face.
Thor's expression became thoughtful for a moment, "Well… All I can say is sorry, I guess?" He was never really good with apologies.
Elysia, along with some of the others around, chuckled at his awkwardness, and when the pinkette lifted her face to stare into his eyes, he knew that Elysia wanted to talk with him alone about her sudden change. "Later, okay?"
"Mm." Elysia nodded and went back to sticking herself to him.
"So what happened while I was out?"
"...Uhhh, ask Mei," Kevin said, pointing at her with his thumb.
Mei sent him a glare before slowly explaining to Thor what had happened the past month.
As she did so, Eden, Sakura, and even Mobius gave him a warm welcome, yes, even the scientist who never shows a hint of warmth to anyone, kissed him on the cheek in front of everyone. Aponia sat back and did nothing but greet him; she had many things she needed to discuss with him, but now wasn't the time.
…
By the time Mei was done with her recap of recent events. Thor was already sitting on a chair, Elysia on his lap, Eden hugging him from behind, and he was ruffling Hua's hair.
Thor nodded as if understanding Mei's long-winded explanation, "But how are you all like this now? I still don't get that part."
"Didn't I already–"
"Yes, I know what you said, Mei. I wasn't around. Aura's been taken by the Honkai, Elysia underwent some kind of change, and everyone was under immense pressure. I understand that." Thor stopped ruffling Hua's hair, tapped Eden on the arm so she would release her hold on him before he stood up.
He gazed down at Elysia in his arms, kissed her on the forehead before letting her stand by herself and turned his eyes back to Mei. "From what I've seen from you, Mei, you are a great leader when you need to be, but how did you let it get this bad? What if a Herrscher appeared and you were all like this when it showed up?"
"..." Mei was silent; she had no retort to his words. Simply because she couldn't, on paper, she was the sole leader of MOTH, and she fulfilled the role perfectly in all aspects that should come with it, but when it came to their group, the Flamechasers?
She could barely get Kevin, Eden and Su to work with her, after the problems with project Stigma were revealed, except for Kevin; everyone else was holding something against her.
Seeing that Mei was silent, Thor let her be. He shouldn't be scolding her anyway; it was her first time being the leader of the group without any help. Honestly, he would feel a lot more at ease if Mei could have just been the leader from the start and taken some of the load off of him.
Like right now, the moment Mei told him about Aurora and her disappearance, he almost teleported to the site of her disappearance in that instant, but he held himself back, at least for now.
He had many things he needed to get in order, things that he now is going to rapidly speed up, because who knows what Aurora is going through at this moment; she could be locked in an endless battle for all he knows.
Thor sighed, "Hah…Don't worry about it, Mei. You are a good leader, just learn to put a bit more emotion into your leadership, alright?"
Mei adjusted her glasses and did a small nod towards him, "...Mm, I will."
"Good, now, can someone tell me about what we're doing for Aura?" Thor asked around now that Mei was handled.
[Ohh! I will, Father!] The AI AURORA appeared on a random terminal screen.
Thor smiled at his AI 'daughter' and gave her the go-ahead.
[Ahem, So–]
…
(Aura?) Alter probbed Aurora. The girl was sitting curled up on the floor, having lost their light.
"..."
(Aurora, answer me!) Inside their shared mine, Alter was gritting her teeth to the point they would shatter if she were a normal human.
Aurora showed no outward reaction that she could even acknowledge Alter. "...What?" Even when responding to Alter, Aurora's voice was dead, and her eyes remained hollow.
Alter bit her lip in frustration. (We do still need to leave this place and go home.)
For a moment, Aurora's eyes brightened, and she muttered, "Home…"
Alter caught that brief moment and pushed further, (Yes, home. With Thor and the others. How do you think he will feel if he sees us like this?!)
"..." Aurora thought for a moment, "...He would…Blame himself…"
(Then move.) Alter punctuated.
But Aurora remained still, as if her words did not affect her. "..."
..
Time passed, and Alter called out to her once again, (Aura?)
And as if to respond, Aurora uncurled herself and stood up, he eyes still hollow, but holding a small light within them. She reached out her hand, and lightning cackled around it.
Alter sighed in relief; she thought Aurora was going to just stay like that forever.
…