Siegfried had been fighting for hours.
Ever since he was healed by Lee, he was feeling… different.
Much stronger.
During the second eruption, he had been forced into what Einstein had called an 'Active Honkai Reaction Form'.
Basically he had become part Honkai beast, and while it had greatly improved his fighting ability, and had allowed him to unleash Judgement of Shamash's true power, its Zeroth power, Might of An-Utu, causing tremendous damage to his body.
In the end however, it wasn't enough to defeat Sirin, and he had never recovered from his failure and his injuries.
After all, Cecilia, the person he cared the most about in the entire world, was killed by the Honkai Fission bombs dropped by Otto Apocalypse. In the end, Cecilia had sacrificed everything to unleash Heilige Lanze Welwitschia on all of Siberia, the Zeroth power of the Black Abyss White Flower, healing every single person affected by the Honkai energy released during the Second Eruption that was not already dead.
Otto Apocalypse had directly caused the death of Cecilia through that Honkai Fusion bomb.
After that, he had met with Einstein to return Welt Yang's core. Einstein had invited him to join Anti Entropy, which he had refused at the time.
He still had to rescue his daughter from Schicksal.
Of course, it ended the same way as the second eruption, another tragedy, another failure.
After that, he had just had the clone, K432, no Kiana.
She was truly his daughter, but inside, there was the horror of Sirin.
He had distanced himself from her, his appearance would remind Sirin of the second eruption, how he had tried to kill her.
He didn't want to unleash Sirin on the world again, nor let his daughter live with having killed him.
So he had run away, in the end. Given up on his dreams of becoming a true ninja, and even his promise to Cecila.
He was a failure.
His own inner self, that part of him that chased him in his dreams, seemed to know it better than he did himself.
But that voice had quieted, recently. He had felt… whole again.
More human, less Honkai beast.
Not to say that part of him that wasn't fully human was gone, far from it.
It was more integrated into who he was then ever before.
But it was less… alien, it had become more a part of him.
Less monstrous.
He was feeling better, and he knew what he had to do.
Purge the Honkai.
It was what that inner voice had been telling him ever since he had first activated the ICHOR factor.
While it had quieted, it was still deeply ingrained in who he now was. Another voice in his head for a decade, now quiet, but he could still hear the echo's.
Then, the eruption came.
In the end, Cocolia really didn't know what she was doing, unlike what Einstein had said.
He would not fail again.
While he had felt the Herrscher at first, right where his daughter was, he refrained from jumping into action.
He didn't want this to become a 2 v 1. Sirin joining in would be the worst possible outcome.
He had seen Lee, running in the direction of the Herrscher.
That ability she had used on him, he saw her use it on a zombie, and had watched as it had crumbled to dust.
Not even 10 minutes later, he could no longer feel the Herrscher.
They had come back down then, Lee, Kiana, and that girl Kiana was always obsessing over, Mei, Raiden Royma's daughter, along with that weird girl with the awesome robot.
They had been attacked by a Chariot-Class Honkai beast, which had been defeated by robot girl.
That was when he had made it his mission to defeat every single Honkai beast in the city that could threaten his daughter.
He had been at it for hours, from the moment he started he had been absorbing a massive amount of Honkai energy, enough to rival even the newborn Herrscher.
He had funneled it all into Judgement of Shamash.
Almost all the city was in ruins, besides the section he was protecting, where his daughter and her friends awaited rescue.
He would not fail again.
He was waiting for his friends in Anti Entropy to arrive, and hopefully rescue them.
However, the Hyperion had arrived first, after all, Anti Entropy had almost no presence in the far east.
That was okay though, Theresa ran the far east branch of Schicksal. Unlike Otto, she was perfectly reasonable. He knew her.
She had provided him with the top level keycard he had needed to gain access to the lab where Otto was keeping K-423, who he had mistakenly thought was Kiana, the original Kiana, now dead.
However, he was soon approached by a Schicksal patrol ship, which had landed nearby.
Murata Himeko had approached.
He knew Himeko, she was part of Ragna's Valkyrie Assault Squad. Its only survivor.
However, her first words surprised him.
"You must be the famous Siegfried Kaslana, I don't believe we've met." Himeko said.
This was rather strange, since they had worked together in 2010, the first time Sirin had reawakened in Kiana.
The very incident that had caused the Assault Squad to be wiped out.
"?" Siegfried was a little confused by this, but since Himeko didn't want to acknowledge it, he wouldn't push the issue.
"What happened with the Herrscher, Siegfried." Murata Himeko demanded.
He had been confused by that at first as well, but he had asked Einstein, and they had come up with a plausible theory.
The Herrscher was precisely Mei, Raiden Ryoma's daughter.
According to Einstein, Ryoma had consulted her long ago about a certain procedure he had been researching.
He had implanted the gem of conquest into his daughter in order to save her from being killed by her awakening of natural stigmata, which her weak body at the time was unable to handle.
Einstein had called it an incredibly idiotic idea, treating a disease patient with an incinerator, and expecting the patient to come out alive. But apparently Ryoma had data that pointed to the fact that Mei would survive.
In the end, Ryoma had carried out his procedure, without approval.
It had worked too, Ryoma's procedure had worked exactly as he had thought it would.
The conservatives had covered it up, disguising Ryoma's unauthorised actions to save his own daughter.
But Einstein had said that if there was enough Honkai energy gathered in one place, it could potentially awaken the Herrscher gem, sitting inactive in Mei.
This is obviously what had happened.
However, Mei had somehow returned from her Herrscher state, and was now with Kiana and the others.
Siegfried thought of Welt, a Herrscher that fought for humanity, so unlike Sirin in every way.
Someone he aspired to be like.
Was Mei more like Welt? Or had Kiana and the others, Lee, managed to find a way to turn Mei back to normal.
Einstein had the answer when he had told her about Lee's use of her power on the zombie.
Einstein theorised that if Lee had used her ability on Mei, it could reverse the Herrscher transformation.
They had attempted to contact Welt to try and ask for his opinion on what would happen if a Herrscher transformation was reversed, however, he had not responded to direct communication for quite some time, only leaving and responding to messages periodically.
So Siegfried now knew the whole story of the Herrscher. But from his limited observation, Mei seemed fully human, and in his opinion, had the potential to become the next Welt.
Einstein had confirmed that Mei had not caused the eruption intentionally, and that the Honkai energy had come from a single point source within ME Corp Tower, before being absorbed and emitted again by Mei.
He thought for a moment before deciding that he shouldn't inform Himeko that Mei was the Herrscher. While he thought he knew Himeko's personality and thought that she would perhaps do the right thing, he knew that others in Schicksal would revel at the chance to do research on a live Herrscher.
He knew exactly how that had ended last time, in 2000.
He needed to protect Mei from the prying hands of Schicksal, at least long enough to get her to Anti Entropy. Hopefully, once there, and once Welt was back, she could be trained to become a Herrscher fighting alongside humanity. Just like Welt did.
"I don't know what happened to the Herrscher. It seems to have died somehow."
As soon as he said this, he realised that he probably should have claimed that he had killed the Herrscher. He wasn't very good at this whole deception thing. He preferred direct action to verbal sparing.
Murata Himeko raised a eyebrow, "It seems to have died somehow?"
In response to this, several of the Valkyries with her raised their weapons slightly, pointed towards Siegfried.
Siegfried thought for a whole .2 seconds, before replying "Well, yeah, I mean, I didn't kill it, and it's not around anymore." This was a rather good lie, given that it was true.
Murata Himeko simply said nothing in response, the conversation was being live recorded and sent to the Hyperion, and to the Far East branch. She simply waited for orders.
Suddenly, Himeko stiffened, and several of the Valkyries surrounding him suddenly looked even more nervous then they did before.
Due to his enhanced hearing, he clearly heard a familiar voice from the comm's of the Valkyries.
Otto.
Suddenly, several Valkyries opened fire at once, forcing Siegfried back.
Gunfire erupted like a storm. Violet Honkai energy based rounds carved streaks through the air as Siegfried twisted aside, Cleaver of Shamash's molten blade igniting to full power in his hand. The ground cracked beneath his boots as he swung once, not to kill, but to disarm several Valkyries with one swing, unfortunately, Judgement of Shamash's output was far from controllable, it was not really designed for human opponents. A burst of radiant heat melted and burned the Valkyries closest to him.
Two Valkyries lunged from the smoke, swords drawn, moving with Schicksal's trademark precision. Siegfried met their blades, parrying both in a single sweep, leaving the swords in their hands partially melted and deformed. Fire flared as he pivoted, his momentum forcing them back a step. He could have ended them there, one movement, but he restrained himself.
"I don't want to fight you," he said, "My enemy is Otto, not Schicksal's Valkyries."
No one listened.
A beam of concentrated Honkai energy seared across his shoulder, forcing him back. He winced, not from pain, it hadn't really done much damage, but from frustration. His body still thrummed with power, the ICHOR factor burning within him, every bestial instinct screaming at him to eliminate those in front of him. However, it was much better than before, he could resist it.
Then Himeko moved.
The air split with the sound of her blade, a massive greatsword also wreathed in flame connected. She charged through the haze, each swing a blaze of red light. Siegfried blocked, the impact sending shockwaves across the ruined street. Her strength surprised him, that armor she was wearing looked like a modified version of one of the older Valkyrie battlesuits.
"Stand down, Kaslana!" Himeko shouted, slamming her sword down again. "You're surrounded!"
And what, let you murder me? Siegfried thought to himself.
With a single thrust of Shamash, Siegfried released a burst of fire, melting even the road beneath their feet. The ground erupted between them, a wall of scorched debris and molten asphalt forcing the Valkyries to retreat momentarily. In that instant, he leapt, using a collapsing wall as a springboard, landing atop the remnants of a collapsed building, a remnant of his earlier fight with all those Honkai beasts.
From below, Himeko shouted his name.
"I am not your enemy," he said, his voice echoing across the ruins. "Otto's pulling your strings, I will defend myself if attacked again."
Then he swung Judgement of Shamash again, creating a wall of flames between Himeko and himself, before running off at a speed much faster than Himeko could achieve even with the Valkyrie armor, designed to be deployed against Herrschers. After all, she only had the limited power generation of the armor itself, which was designed with an external power source in mind.