Three in the morning.
Su Yu, Kiana, Siegfried, and Bronie returned to this conference room in Anti-Entropy's underground lab.
The room was already packed, and what awaited Su Yu was a solid ten-plus minutes of the "elbow drop" treatment — even Bronie couldn't resist landing a punch square on his chest.
Still, it was only everyone's way of venting the fright they'd been through — after all, Su Yu had come back in one piece, and nothing mattered more than that.
"All right, all right — let me lay out exactly what happened yesterday."
Su Yu didn't bother beating around the bush.
He started from the moment he entered the Rift, moved on to his encounter with Raiden Mei, their joint battle against the Ice and Lava Honkai Emperors, and then Kevin's sudden appearance — how Might of An-Utu had nearly cleaved him in two, mistaking him for "Su."
He described how he'd steeled himself to play the role of that former civilization's friend's lingering obsession made flesh, how he'd used every trick he had to hold his own against Kevin, and how, after securing a three-day truce to present a new plan, he'd destroyed the Honkai core with the Neutron Star hand cannon and escaped via a Tarot-powered spatial fold-jump.
The room fell so silent that only the low hum of the exhaust fan remained.
Welt took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger. The muscles of his usually composed face tightened faintly.
"Kevin... Might of An-Utu." He put his glasses back on, looking at Su Yu with a complicated expression. "You walked away from him in one piece, protected Mei, and even managed to seal the Rift—"
Welt paused.
"'Not easy' doesn't even begin to cover it."
He raised his head, and in his eyes was a rare, complicated look mixing relief with lingering dread.
"Su Yu, this time you genuinely, honest-to-god saved the world."
Tesla opened her mouth, ready to fire off something sharp, but swallowed the words in the end.
She turned her face away, her red hair falling to hide half of it.
"Hmph. Pull a stunt like this again and I'll strap you to my lab table and let you test out my new electromagnetic restraint device!"
Einstein said nothing, only gave a small nod.
Watching their conflicted expressions, Su Yu understood exactly what was going on.
On one hand, they understood.
Without Su Yu's reckless gamble, Raiden Mei could never have escaped the Rift unscathed, and the stability of the World Barrier would have been lost for certain.
That was a genuine achievement, plain and simple.
But on the other hand—
the sheer panic of nearly losing a key combatant and ally still sent a chill crawling up the back of their necks whenever they thought back on it.
If Su Yu had come back one second later.
If Kevin hadn't held back.
If the spatial fold-jump had gone even slightly wrong.
The mood turned heavy.
Su Yu stood up and clapped his hands.
"All right, enough of those faces," he said, tossing a crumpled paper cup into the nearby trash bin. "I promise — next time I go save the world, I'll file a report with you all first."
The others in the room looked up at him.
Su Yu grinned and looked at the three of them — Welt, Tesla, and Einstein. "Though if the report doesn't get approved, I'll just drag the three of you along to get a taste of Kevin's Might of An-Utu yourselves. Dr. Tesla can handle fire suppression, Dr. Einstein can run data analysis, Old Yang can tank the front line, and I'll cover the rear — perfect."
The room went quiet for two full seconds.
Tesla let out a snort of laughter, then quickly straightened her face — though the corners of her mouth refused to stay down.
"You reckless idiot," she muttered, and turned to walk out.
Einstein pushed up his glasses, the faintest, barely noticeable smile tugging at his lips, and followed Tesla out of the room.
Welt rose to his feet, pushed his slipping glasses back up the bridge of his nose, and his expression eased.
"Today's Wotan's activation day. We still have a lot of preparation to finish."
He walked to the door and glanced back at Su Yu.
"...Do remember to file that report next time."
With that, he too left the room.
Su Yu finally let out a breath of relief. His gaze met Eden's not far off; she only smiled without a word, but that look in her eyes said plainly — you're in for it.
The memory of last time in the underground parking garage came flooding back, and Su Yu forced out an awkward laugh.
"I'm a little tired — I'm going to go rest up. Everyone, carry on!"
Then he bolted at light speed, looking for all the world like a lamb that had just spotted the big bad wolf.
Time rolled forward to seven-fifty in the morning.
After a quick wash-up, Su Yu made his way to the conference room and checked the time on his terminal.
Today also marked the end of leave for the two hundred fifty trainees at the Starfire training base.
He quickly typed up a message on the terminal and sent the rendezvous coordinates to every trainee's comm device.
"Deadline is eight tonight," Su Yu added. "Anyone who fails to reach the location by then will be treated as having automatically forfeited their qualification."
He hit send and shoved the terminal back into his pocket.
Su Yu turned around, his gaze landing on a corner at the far end of the room.
A coffee table sat there, flanked by two sofas.
Cecilia sat on the left-hand sofa, holding a small white porcelain plate.
On it sat a delicate slice of strawberry mousse cake.
She cut off a small piece with a little silver fork and carefully held it up to Kiana, who sat beside her.
"Here, Kiana, try this." Cecilia's tone was as gentle as if she were coaxing a five-year-old.
Kiana's cheeks flushed bright red.
A little stiffly, she opened her mouth and took the small bite of cake.
"It's... it's good..." Kiana mumbled, her cheeks bulging.
A contented smile bloomed across Cecilia's face.
She reached out with her other hand and gave Kiana's white hair a couple of gentle strokes.
That sticky-sweet warmth found only between a mother and daughter seemed almost thick enough to spill out of the corner as something solid.
Diagonally across from this heartwarming scene—
Siegfried sat on the other sofa.
Holding a cup of tea gone stone cold, he stared longingly at the mother and daughter across from him.
His mournful expression made him look exactly like a stray dog forgotten outside the door by its owner, left standing in the rain half the night.
Su Yu pulled out the chair next to Siegfried and sat down.
He grinned, not entirely kindly.
In truth, a certain head of House Kaslana had lived through quite the emotional rollercoaster the night before.
Last night, after finally shaking off Theresa's manhunt at the hospital and completing the whole tearful family reunion, Siegfried had assumed he could finally head back to their temporary lodgings and enjoy some long-overdue intimacy with his wife.
Instead—
Cecilia had announced, right there in the hospital hallway, that to make up for all the motherly love little Kiana had missed out on growing up—
starting today, she'd be sleeping with Kiana.
And so the poor S-rank agent found himself ruthlessly evicted by his own wife.
In the end, stranded in unfamiliar Arc City, Siegfried had shamelessly dragged Su Yu along, and the two of them had squeezed into a windowless lounge at the Anti-Entropy base for the night.
It had been a long night, the two grown men each claiming a cot.
Siegfried had spent the whole night grumbling that Cecilia had forgotten her husband the moment she got her daughter back.
His bitter tears over losing his wife's favor were so pitiful that Su Yu couldn't hold back his laughter, stifling it until his stomach cramped, and didn't fall asleep until nearly dawn.
Su Yu picked up an apple from the table, gave it a quick wipe on his clothes, and took a bite.
He turned to look at Kevin, who sat next to Siegfried, head bowed over a structural diagram of the Wotan mech.
"Hey, Kevin." Su Yu nudged his arm with an elbow.
Kevin didn't look up, his eyes still scanning the blueprint.
"What is it."
"Watching that loving mother-and-daughter scene over there, doesn't it make you jealous, as the actual son?" Su Yu lowered his voice, needling him a bit. "This is a classic 'secret heir' storyline. A long-lost illegitimate daughter suddenly turns up and gets welcomed back into the family, showered with all the doting love. Your position as the true heir apparent is looking pretty shaky."
Kevin finally lifted his eyes from the blueprint.
He turned and gave Su Yu a look like he was staring at an idiot, then rolled his eyes hard.
"The genders don't even match — what kind of 'secret heir' plot is that." Kevin rolled the blueprint into a tube and tapped it twice on the table. "Besides, have you got water in your head? If a long-lost sister really came back, why would her own brother go and get jealous over something as stupid as her taking a share of the inheritance?"
"Hard to say," Su Yu said, rubbing his chin as if in thought. "Plenty of family members on the news beat each other bloody over inheritance disputes."
But looking at Kevin's eternally unreadable ice-block of a face, he shook his head.
"Though I don't think you've got much interest in inheriting the family fortune anyway. As far as you're concerned, having this sister show up to help take the heat probably sounds a lot better than just dropping everything and running."
Kevin's brow twitched, and on that perpetually blank face, the corner of his mouth curved upward before he could stop it.
"You little punk." Kevin pointed the rolled-up tube at him. "You actually hit the nail on the head."
He leaned back, hands folded behind his head.
"Inheriting the position of House Kaslana's head, dealing with all those impossible Schicksal politicians and endless tedious duties every day — none of that beats finding some deserted island with Mei and living the easy life, just the two of us." Kevin let out a laugh. "If there really was someone to take over, I'd buy a plane ticket and leave tomorrow."
Sitting beside him, Siegfried's teacup trembled at that, nearly spilling onto his pants.
He hurriedly grabbed a napkin to wipe his hands and turned to fix Su Yu with a hard stare.
"Listen here, kid — why do you keep egging Kevin on about running off?" Siegfried hissed through gritted teeth, keeping his voice low. "If he actually leaves, what happens to House Kaslana's future? Those stubborn old fossils will tear me apart alive."
He glanced over at Kiana, who was nibbling her cake.
"Since Kiana carries the Kaslana bloodline too..." Siegfried suddenly leaned in close to Su Yu, dropping his voice, a strange grin spreading across his face. "Worst case, why don't you and Kiana just go ahead and have a kid already."
Su Yu, mid-bite on his apple, nearly choked to death on the spot.
"Once there's a grandchild, even if it's not Kevin's own line, it'll still carry our family's genes. Then I won't have to worry about this whole no-one-to-inherit mess anymore."
Siegfried nodded, looking thoroughly pleased with himself, as if he'd just found the perfect solution.
"Uncle." Su Yu, finally catching his breath, pointed at himself, then at Kiana across the room. "Do you realize what you just said could get me a nice free stay courtesy of the state?"
What an absurd joke.
In this world's peaceful household registry system, Kiana was, in official black and white, a perfectly legitimate sixteen-year-old minor.
That's a minimum of three years! Maximum, the death penalty!
Siegfried blinked, then waved a careless hand and laughed.
"What's the big deal." Siegfried slapped his thigh. "If it's really an issue, just wait two more years. You're both so young anyway — two years will fly by in the blink of an eye, no rush at all!"
Astonishingly, Kevin, sitting on the other side, nodded right along with him.
"Fair enough." Kevin looked at Su Yu, as if this were the most reasonable thing in the world. "Worst case, wait two years. Still better than sticking me with that mess."
Su Yu pressed a hand to his forehead in despair.
"Kevin, don't tell me you're getting in on this too."
He glanced from Siegfried to Kevin.
This father and son had a startlingly perfect understanding when it came to dumping their problems on someone else.
"Besides." Su Yu straightened up, trying to defend himself. "Kiana and I aren't even that kind of thing. We're purely—"
"Enough of that, you little brat."
Siegfried didn't let him finish, cutting off his weak excuse with a slap on the shoulder.
"'Purely' my foot." Siegfried gave him the knowing look of a man who'd been there. "You two have been shacked up together in that little apartment for months now, and you're going to try and sell me on some pure, platonic friendship?"
Siegfried snorted.
"Tell that to someone who'll believe it."
Once again, Su Yu found himself thoroughly shut down.
Faced with House Kaslana's brand of unreasonable logic, he found that his usual gift for talking circles around people was utterly useless.
"Ahem." Su Yu cleared his throat awkwardly and stood up. "Actually, I just remembered there might be some kind of issue over at Dr. Tesla's weapons workshop. I'd better go check it out."
Without giving father and son another chance to keep pressuring him into marriage, he grabbed the lamest excuse he could think of and hurried toward the conference room door.
Just as he reached the door and was about to push it open, Su Yu stopped.
He looked back.
Siegfried had, at some point, made his way over to the sofa beside Cecilia.
Leaning down, he'd said something that earned him a glare from Cecilia — though she still cut off a piece of cake and popped it into his mouth.
Beside them, Kiana watched the two of them.
She still held the small silver fork, a trace of white cream at the corner of her mouth.
Her cheeks were flushed, and she ducked her head a little shyly.
But in those two mismatched eyes, the dull, stagnant-pond darkness that had lingered there so long had vanished completely.
In its place was a bright, warm kind of happiness.
The feeling of being surrounded by real, tangible family — of no longer being alone.
Su Yu stood at the door, watching the scene.
His face, usually set with a habitual edge of mockery or sarcasm, slowly relaxed.
He didn't speak up to break the warmth of the moment. He turned, gently pushed open the door, and walked out.
The hallway lights were dim.
Overhead, the exhaust fan hummed low.
As Su Yu headed toward Tesla's lab, he raised his right hand.
He made a downward swiping motion in the air.
A translucent screen, visible only to him, snapped into view across his retina.
Eye-catching data and red notification boxes flickered across it.
He opened the settlement report for last night's long, melodramatic ordeal of a quest.
He looked over the string of numbers.
This was the final reward the System had given, tallied from all the Emotion Points it had harvested from last night's intricate psychological standoff.
A hefty sum of points had been credited.
On top of that, there were two extremely important Bond-level-up notifications.
Su Yu opened the character skill panel.
The first was from Kiana. The [The Fool] Bond card between them shimmered with a soft golden glow.
Su Yu clenched his fist.
He could feel his bones and muscles adjusting to an entirely new way of generating force.
From now on, he could freely and flawlessly perform Kiana's own Kaslana Gun Kata.
No more scrambling to learn on the fly — the muscle memory for its evasions and shooting patterns was now etched deep into his mind.
Next, he looked at the other two portraits.
Welt and Rita.
As the strength of those Bonds grew in tandem—
the special skills these two heavyweights provided him — the Eye of Deconstruction that let him analyze an object's structure, and Rita's disguise technique — both saw their spiritual power cost drop significantly once again when used.
It meant he could sustain both of these borderline-cheat abilities through longer, more intense battles.
Su Yu nodded to himself in silence.
The absurd, exhausting night he'd spent at the hospital hadn't gone to waste after all.
In this ever-closer marathon toward death, he'd padded his odds of survival just a little more.
Next, his fingers swept across the screen, switching to the interface labeled the Valkyrie Cultivation System.
Listed here were various sets of data extracted from his Valkyries, along with special items available for redemption.
Su Yu didn't hesitate.
He found the item he'd had his eye on for a while, tucked among the expensive redemption list.
It was a set of Stigmata he'd been coveting for ages — [Atropos].
Atropos was a goddess of Greek mythology, ruler of death, tasked with cutting the thread of life.
This set of Stigmata would not only drastically boost Rita's physical capabilities, but also grant her a range of abilities suited to her combat style.
He tapped the redeem button.
The Emotion Points he'd only just earned, still warm in his pocket so to speak, evaporated by more than half in an instant.
The Stigmata set was silently stored away in his System space; Su Yu planned to give it to Rita once today's business was finished.
Finally, he glanced at another corner of the interface.
There sat an item that granted enchantment properties to melee weapons.
Su Yu redeemed that one too — it was for Kiana's well-worn baseball bat.
He watched the Emotion Point balance in the upper-right corner plunge, dropping at a visible rate as if a gaping hole had torn open in it.
Su Yu stopped walking and leaned against the cold metal wall of the corridor.
He felt his heart give a sharp spasm.
That gut-deep ache was more real than the sting of handing over rent right after payday, back in his old life.
"This damn System is a real bloodsucker."
Su Yu cursed silently.
But it also sharpened his focus.
Every one of these expenses was a price he had to pay.
Watching the ever-rising demands of survival and protection, he knew he absolutely couldn't afford to stop.
"Looks like—"
Su Yu closed the System panel, and the air before him turned empty once more.
"I need to pick up the pace. Gotta get that new, knife-filled story arc finished and served up as fast as possible."
"Ride the current buzz, milk a good round of tears out of those innocent players online, and earn back everything I just spent — with interest."
"Ah well. For the sake of the world, I guess the players' tear ducts will just have to suffer a little."
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