And so, the Herrscher of the Void's new nickname was decided in a rather muddled fashion.
Seeing Quan lost in thought, Fuli averted his gaze and took a look around the room she inhabited:
Half-eaten bags of chips and cookies were mixed with crumpled stockings of all kinds. Spilled, dried-up cola and orange juice on the rug, along with leg rings, emitted a foul odor.
Piles of creased manga and light novels were stacked in a corner. On the other side was a triple-monitor gaming setup; the middle screen had been pierced by a keyboard and then hastily patched with tape, a testament to the owner's hysteria and subsequent regret.
In a word—dirty! Messy! Awful!
"How do you live in this pigsty?"
Even if he wasn't a Virgo, Fuli's eyelids twitched at the sight.
He bent down, picked up a bag of chips, and found that both the production and expiration dates were blurred and illegible.
"Great, an unlicensed product, too. Does it just auto-refresh in the fridge when the time comes? Like food just grows on the shelves."
"If you were captured by a vile, despicable, ruthless, black-hearted, venomous woman and locked up for five hundred years, your den wouldn't be much better," the Herrscher of the Void grumbled, having snapped back to her senses.
Then she shouted, "Human, hurry up and please me! Start by cleaning up for this Queen! If you don't please me, I'll destroy the world!"
"Can you let go before you destroy the world?"
"Oh."
Miss Herrscher replied with puppy-dog eyes, seemingly agreeing but refusing to let go of her grip on Fuli.
A living person finally showed up! What if he disappears the moment I let go?!
Physical Cuddling, activate!
As Quan squeezed tighter, her soft northern hemispheres enveloped the boy's arm.
He silently cursed his luck. If he hadn't seen that pathetic, snot-and-tears-streaming mess earlier, he would have, without a second thought, thoroughly dealt with this white-haired temptress who had appeared in his dream!
But now... sigh!
Fuli complained, "How am I supposed to clean if you don't let go?"
"You can't work with just one hand? What a clumsy servant."
Quan huffed and, using both hands and feet, clambered onto Fuli's back. Her arms wrapped around his neck from behind, and her long, serpentine legs locked around his waist.
"There, now you can."
Miss Herrscher rubbed her chin against his cheek, her cascading hair brushing against his ear, like a white-haired kitten that was tsundere in words but honest with its body.
Her 49kg weight was practically nothing to Fuli. He quickly cleaned the room with her on his back.
Two things hindered him during this process:
The first was Quan's incessant chattering. The girl, who hadn't had anyone to talk to for five hundred years, had turned into a blabbering little trumpet, even critiquing Fuli's garbage disposal technique.
The second was the subtle sensation he felt through his back as he worked—yep, she was the Herrscher of Vacuum.
It was quite reasonable. You don't need to be as formal at home as you do when going out, especially after being a shut-in for centuries.
In fact, the only reason Quan was even wearing a white T-shirt and hot pants was because the higher-level narrator feared the wrath of the censorship gods. Otherwise, Fuli would have walked in on a naked woman crawling around.
To say that Miss Herrscher of Vacuum was completely unaware of this would be a lie. Was she willing to let him take advantage of her just so she wouldn't let go of her only lifeline? Hachi-Quan, you clingy thing...
Seeing the once-chaotic Herrscher's den now spick and span, Quan was nine-tenths, if not entirely, satisfied. "As expected of this Queen's servant! When it comes to serving your master, you've graduated to the big leagues!"
"As a reward, wait a sec."
She hopped off Fuli's back and pulled him by the hand to the refrigerator.
Taking out a hoard of snacks, drinks, and instant meals, she placed them before the two of them, puffed out her chest, and tilted her delicate nose up proudly. "This is all a reward from this Queen. Feel free to eat your fill and wipe it all clean!"
No matter how you looked at it, she was trying to curry favor.
The only question was whether "wiping it all clean" included her as well.
"Quan, you said just now that you were sealed here by a great demon lord for five hundred years, right?"
Staring at the table full of junk food, Fuli was puzzled. "In those five hundred years, you never learned to cook?"
"Cook? That's a servant's job!" Quan declared righteously while slurping her instant noodles.
In reality, she couldn't.
It was a classic Kaslana-brand moment of culinary charm. She had tried to make herself something nice, but after blowing up the kitchen a few dozen times, she learned her lesson.
Even though you couldn't die in this mental space, it still hurt!
Unlike Fuli, who was an accidental intruder, Mei's setup had reduced Quan's physical abilities in this little black room to that of an ordinary girl her age. The justification was, "What kind of prisoner gets to keep their weapons?"
Truly terrifying, that Raiden Mei.
One wonders if, on some future day when she learns that her boyfriend can use his Stigmata of the Void to sneak into this black room for a private (illicit) rendezvous (affair) with Quan, she'll grind her molars to dust from anger.
"Yeah, yeah, cooking is a servant's job. Too bad I'm not a servant."
Quan kept calling him a servant. At first, he let it slide out of pity, but now she was pushing her luck!
Fuli's face hardened. "I'm not hungry. You can have all this yourself."
With that, he tried to pry her bare feet from around his leg.
Seeing the boy get angry, Hachi-Quan panicked.
She put down her half-eaten noodles, gave them a reluctant glance, and quickly tried to appease him. "Then what do you want to eat, human? This Queen will think of something! It's awful to be hungry!"
Quan possessed Sirin's memories of starvation. The scientists at Schicksal's Babylon Labs, under the pretext of "observing human resistance to Honkai energy in a state of starvation," had thrown the girls, who had been starved for a day and a night, into an experimental container overflowing with Honkai energy.
That horrific experiment resulted in thirty-two deaths, including Bella, Sirin's friend with whom she had huddled for warmth.
It was because of this that she later nicknamed her companion Honkai Beast, Benares, "Bella."
Fuli knew none of this.
But he could detect the trace of panic and nervousness in Quan's tone.
"I'll teach you how to cook."
His attitude softened. "If it's like you said, and the time ratio here to reality is 3000:1, then before I leave, I think you can at least learn how to make scrambled eggs with tomato and steamed egg custard."
These two dishes were time-tested classics, even their international friends across the pond loved them.
"Leave?"
Quan froze at the word. "You... you can leave after coming in?"
"Of course."
Fuli pulled down his collar, pointing to the silver-glowing Stigmata of the Void on his chest. "I'm not locked in here like you are. The feedback this thing is giving me is that after a certain amount of time, it's my choice whether to stay or go."
"Then! I! Sob..."
The most terrifying thing is never simple despair, but seeing hope arrive, only to have it slip through your fingers the moment you're about to grasp it.
Seeing the girl's eyes well up with tears again, Fuli reached out and wiped them away with his finger. "Come on, you're the famous Herrscher of the Void. You're not going to make such a pathetic face just because you heard I'm leaving, are you?"
"No, wait, huh? You?"
Quan sniffled at the strange words.
"You really think I'm that stupid?"
The boy flicked her forehead. "The Stigmata of the Void is flashing, I'm in a mental space with a 3000:1 time flow where a 'demon lord' sealed you for a real-world month, and on top of that, I happened to learn two days ago while replicating the stigmata that Kiana has the Core of the Void implanted in her. The clues are all laid out. If I still couldn't figure it out, I'd be a complete moron."
The key was that Quan and Kiana looked, if not identical, then basically the same.
The only difference was the subtle change in their features due to their different temperaments and personalities, giving Quan a sharper, colder look befitting a Herrscher.
Though that was being rapidly worn away (lol).
"You know I'm a Herrscher."
Quan stared at Fuli blankly. "Then why aren't you trying to kill me?"
Wasn't that how humans always treated Herrschers?
They'd shout "danger!" and then, without a second thought, grab their weapons and charge in for a life-or-death battle. The Valkyries in Sirin's memories were like that, the Ragna squad four years ago was like that, Theresa Apocalypse earlier was like that, and Raiden Mei who sealed her was like that.
"We don't have a grudge against each other."
Fuli shrugged. "One, you're not trying to kill me. Two, you haven't been disrespectful—okay, you have, but it's still within an understandable range."
In the previous loop, the Herrscher of the Void had awakened at Schicksal HQ and immediately triggered a global catastrophe, with countless casualties from various secondary disasters.
But in this loop, the dummy Quan was effortlessly suppressed single-handedly by Emperor Mei right after waking up and had been locked in this little black room crying for her mommy and daddy for five hundred years.
To go after her now would be purely malicious.
Besides—
Glancing at Quan's exquisite face, which looked identical to Kiana's when she was dazed, Fuli cleared his throat. "I'll come visit you more often when I have time. You should give up those ideas about destroying civilization. Wouldn't it be great for us to live peacefully on this planet? If humanity is destroyed, you'll never get to eat such delicious food again."
He asked hesitantly, "By the way, you know about Kiana's memory loss, right? Is there any way for you to help her remember things from before the Void Core was implanted?"
"Memory loss?"
The Queen was taken aback. "Kiana lost her—"
CRUNCH!
Realization dawned, and Miss Herrscher quickly bit down hard, swallowing the words "lost what memory?" back down her throat.
"Ow, that hurts!"
She had accidentally bitten her tongue.
As an individual with independent consciousness, the Herrscher of the Void hidden within K423 naturally knew that as an artificial human, she hadn't lost any memories at all.
It was Fuli who had unilaterally mistaken her for the real Kiana Kaslana and assumed K423 had forgotten her past because of the core implantation.
Little did he know, the real Kiana Kaslana had been hit in the head by plane debris, fell from thousands of meters in the sky, and disappeared into a vast snowy mountain, all of which the Queen had witnessed with her own eyes.
Before, the Queen couldn't have cared less whether Fuli knew the truth.
Helping K423 hide it was just a way to make the coming storm more violent, making it easier for her to take control of K423's body after her personality collapsed.
But now, she had changed her mind.
"Memories... This Queen doesn't know much about them."
Quan's eyes darted around. "You can try mentioning things you two experienced in the past in her ear and see if it helps her recall anything."
It'll also make it easier for K423 to pretend to be the real Kiana, Miss Herrscher muttered to herself.
I've been alone for five hundred years and finally have someone to talk to. If you have a mental breakdown, who's going to keep this Queen company?
Let's see, in another real-world month, this Queen can get out. Once I'm out, I'll have a good talk with that Kiana (K423).
The real Kiana already got a GG. We can't let Fuli spend the rest of his life single, clinging to a baseless hope!
"So there's still a chance for her to recover!"
Fuli, completely unaware of the Herrscher of the Void's malicious thoughts, smiled brightly and started muttering to himself, "It's not that I absolutely need her to recover her memories, but a person should be whole, right? And it's not that I need her to remember the past, because even if she forgets, everyone is still a part of the Hyperion, and I could never really kick her out. And finally, it's not that I need her to remember our promise. Finding that old geezer—I mean, uncle Siegfried has to be put on the agenda. We'll need an elder for the engagement. Or maybe Theresa and Sis Himeko can stand in? Oh, and I have to invite little grand-aunt and cousin Fu Hua..."
As he spoke, the boy couldn't sit still any longer. He turned and was about to charge back to the real world.
Quan grabbed him. "Stop, stop, stop! I'm warning you, servant! This Queen knows you're happy, but everything requires a gradual approach! Being too abrupt and eager will only arouse her aversion! Don't forget what happened when you were reunited with K-Kiana in Shenzhou!"
The moment she saw Fuli was about to leave, her sharp intellect took over again!
"You're absolutely right!"
The boy, held back, nodded vigorously. "Having a stranger suddenly pop up and call you their fiancée—cringe! So cringe! It's universally despised!"
"Exactly!"
Quan lifted her smooth chin, her condescending little gaze saying, This child can be taught. "What you need to do now, servant, is to calm down in this faster-flowing space, clear your thoughts, and while you're at it, suck up to this Queen some more. That way, when I get out, I can whisper good things about you in Kiana's ear all the time."
That's right! Servant! Grovel before me!
As long as you serve me well, it's not out of the question for me to reward you with the qualification of being my companion Honkai Beast when I get out!
What's that? Benares is still frozen in Siberia, and there's only one spot for a companion, so I can't just give it away?
Whatever! Just dangle the carrot for now!
Alas, imagination is beautiful, but reality is cruel.
As the eagerly waiting Quan perked up her ears, Fuli's suppressed voice suddenly reached her. "Everything you said seems to be correct. But did you forget that it was the implantation of the Void Core that caused Kiana's memory loss?"
He said grimly, "I've been searching for two lifetimes. Shouldn't we settle this score?"
"Huh?"
Miss Herrscher, who had been confident of victory just a moment ago, froze in a comical pose. The reason was that the boy had manifested crystal-blue threads and tied her hands and feet, leaving her dangling in mid-air like a lobster.
"The Shadow trailing Sword is the most versatile of arts. As long as the user's control is precise, it can become anything I want it to be."
The seemingly calm words echoed in Quan's ears.
Gazing at the various multi-functional tools gradually taking shape in the boy's hands, she forced a pained cry. "Mmph! Mmph! (Servant, you—)!"
The boy said nothing. A descending shadow slowly enveloped Her Majesty the Queen, whose mouth had been sealed with tape.
...