Honkai Impact 3rd: My Days as a Captain in Schicksal

Keng Huo sat on the bed with a smug look on his face.

Sure enough, a few seconds later, Elisa came running back in her slippers, puffing out her cheeks and shoving her arm around Keng Huo's shoulder, ruffling his hair: "You lied to me again...you lied to me again...Brother, you're such a bad guy! I'm never talking to you again!"

Keng Huo enjoyed the massage from Elisa's small hands, saying comfortably, "Hey, a little more to the left, oh yes, that's it, a little more pressure... scratch it..."

Feeling unsatisfied, Elisa stopped what she was doing, crawled up to Keng Huo, sat down angrily, and turned her back to him to express her dissatisfaction.

Then he quickly turned around, hugged the game console box that was between himself and Keng Huo, and turned his back again.

"Alright, alright, you set a trap for me too, now we're even." Keng Huo smiled and ruffled Elisa's cabbage-like hair. "Hurry up and eat, it's getting cold..."

Elisa, her chubby cheeks puffed out, turned around, glanced at Keng Huo, then turned back, stroking the smooth surface of the box. Her words betrayed obvious hesitation: "Brother... so you really won it in a lottery...?"

"Of course! I'm the legendary human-shaped self-propelled box opener, I can open anything I want with my lucky hands..." Keng Huo answered while serving rice, "You don't know, when I was doing the lottery at the supermarket just now, it was earth-shattering, a beam of light shot straight into the sky from the lottery box..."

But Elisa ignored Keng Huo's words and turned around with a look of surprise: "Brother! Let's sell it!"

"what?"

"Yes! It's worth so much money!" Elisa said excitedly. "Didn't you say before that you were going to buy some New Year's goods for the upcoming Spring Festival? Now we have money!"

Keng Huo nearly choked on Elisa's words. He never expected her to pull this stunt. He glanced to the left and quickly gave his answer: "But such an expensive item, very few people would buy it..."

“Well…” Elisa hesitated, “How about we try selling it cheaper? How about we lower the price by… a hundred dollars?”

In her mind, one hundred yuan was already a lot.

Keng Huo felt like he had dug himself a huge hole, and his mind was racing, trying to come up with a reasonable solution.

"Hmm...okay! I'll go out and ask around sometime to see if anyone wants to buy it..." Keng Huo thought for a moment and decided to take a step back to move forward. "Until then, let's just keep this at home for now."

"Hmm!" Alyssa reluctantly placed the box next to her pillow on the bedside table, her eyes still lingering on the game console.

Seeing this, Keng Huo casually pulled out three game discs from his pocket and placed them on top of the packaging box: "In that case, these three game discs I specially bought are useless now..."

Elisa stared wide-eyed at the game, "Monster Maniac 3" displayed on the top shelf. Although she had never played this series before, she had seen a description of the game in a newsstand's gaming magazine, which took up the entire cover.

A game that makes it onto a magazine cover must be really amazing... Elisa swallowed hard, forcing herself not to look at the game discs.

Seeing this, Keng Huo quickly added fuel to the fire: "I don't know anything about games, but the clerk kept raving about them, saying that these three games are absolute masterpieces, with great reputations and incredibly fun, making them addictive..."

"Time to eat! Time to eat!" Elisa interrupted Keng Huo with her puffed-out cheeks, picked up the bowl of rice in front of her, but her eyes were still secretly glancing at the game console.

Keng Huo sighed softly to himself and continued, "So I thought... I thought..."

"I want to try it out..."

Elisa paused noticeably as she picked at her food with her chopsticks.

Keng Huo, realizing his words had worked, quickly added, "So I was thinking... if we carefully open the box so that no one notices it's been opened, and then secretly put it back after we're done, the other party shouldn't be able to tell when we sell it, right?"

Elisa's eyes widened, seemingly shocked by Keng Huo's wild idea: "But...but I just saw a thin film on the outside of that box..."

"Then we can carefully cut it open with a knife, and when we wrap the box back in the film, we can glue it on properly, right?" Keng Huo persuaded patiently.

Elisa bit her chopsticks, seemingly pondering the loopholes in Keng Huo's words, but after thinking it over, she couldn't come up with anything wrong.

"Hmm... but you can only play for a short while, it wouldn't be good if someone found out when you tried to sell it." Elisa glanced furtively at the game console's packaging, as if afraid it might suddenly fly away.

Keng Huo breathed a sigh of relief: Luckily, children are easy to fool...

Keng Huo ladled a large spoonful of the potato and beef stew broth over his rice, mixed it with chopsticks, picked up a piece of potato, and carefully took a bite.

Instantly, a strong spiciness, a heavy saltiness, and a strong soy sauce flavor assaulted his brain from his taste buds.

"Hmm, not bad! You've improved!" Keng Huo praised Elisa, "Elisa will become a master chef in the future!"

"That's right!" Elisa proudly raised her head, quickly devouring the potatoes in the bowl, and handed the beef to Keng Huo. "This time, Elisa measured the amount of ingredients very carefully!"

Watching Elisa eat her meal with a calm expression, a bead of sweat the size of a soybean fell from Keng Huo's heart.

My sister must have something wrong with her sense of taste! How can she eat this kind of food without feeling anything? She seems to enjoy it immensely, not at all disliking it! Doesn't she get sick of eating this kind of food all the time?!

but……

Sitting together like this, eating what others would consider a very ordinary, even somewhat meager, meal in a cheap rented room...

Very happy.

I'm really... happy.

After a hearty meal, Elisa eagerly climbed into bed, grabbed the game console box, and held it up to Keng Huo with both hands: "Brother, open it!"

Keng Huo smiled slightly, seemingly just casually raising his hand, and a barely visible blade of light flashed, causing the thin film on the top side of the packaging box to fall off.

Watching Elisa carefully unpack the box, Keng Huo nonchalantly stuffed the plastic film into his pocket: then all he had to do was say that the film was accidentally lost and couldn't be found, and the buyer didn't want it anymore, and the silly girl probably wouldn't mention selling it again...

……

Elisa was just a child of about ten years old. Even with her initial excitement, she became extremely sleepy after only an hour or two of playing.

Keng Huo glanced at his watch; it was exactly eight o'clock. Elisa had always been a good girl who went to bed on time.

Alyssa, still half asleep, placed the game console next to her pillow. She curled up in Keng Huo's arms, shifting slightly as if finding a comfortable position, and pulled the blanket up over her head. "Brother... I'm sleepy..."

"Okay, go to sleep." Keng Huo quietly saved the game console's save file and turned off the power. Although the games he bought were all in Japanese, Keng Huo could incredibly understand most of the text on them. Only some of the newer words, or words related to modern machinery or equipment, were unfamiliar to him. Even so, he could still help Elisa understand most of the plot.

“But… I still can’t sleep…” Elisa peeked out from under the covers again, her two hair buns, which looked like cabbages in the dim light, sticking out as if adjusting her pillow. “Brother, tell me a story…”

Keng Huo gently untied her hair and spread it out so she wouldn't press it down while she slept: "Hmm... then I'll tell you the story of 'Jingwei Filling the Sea' today..."

"Hmm...okay..."

"Long, long ago, a catastrophe struck the continent of Shenzhou. Countless monsters attacked human villages. At this time, a hero named Ji Xuanyuan stepped forward. She carried an indestructible divine sword and was accompanied by a beautiful divine bird named 'Jingwei'..."

"To stay with her... just like my brother and Elisa did?"

"Well... In the end, the hero named Ji Xuanyuan fought a great battle with the demon leader 'Chi You' in the deep sea, and then disappeared without a trace. But 'Chi You' never appeared on the Shenzhou continent again."

"Wow...that's amazing...but...where's Jingwei?"

"Jingwei knew that the person she had always been with might never return, but before Ji Xuanyuan left, he earnestly entrusted her with protecting the Divine Continent, and so she always kept her promise... But one day, Jingwei suddenly remembered the unparalleled regenerative abilities of the demon race, fearing that the demon god Chiyou would be resurrected and wreak havoc on the Divine Continent again. So Jingwei decided to fill in the sea and bury Chiyou deep underground forever, so that Chiyou could no longer harm the Divine Continent. So day after day, Jingwei carried branches and stones from the Western Mountains and threw them into the sea, trying to fill in the sea. To this day, Jingwei is still doing this... This is the story of 'Jingwei Filling the Sea'."

"...So, will Ji Xuanyuan and Jingwei never see each other again?"

"Maybe..."

Keng Huo felt his clothes being gripped tightly. He looked down and met Elisa's dazed eyes.

Will my brother always stay by Elisa's side?

"Will do."

"Just like Jingwei and Ji Xuanyuan?"

"Ah."

"But they still separated in the end..."

“But brother is not Jingwei, and Elisa is not Ji Xuanyuan,” Keng Huo gently closed Elisa’s eyes with his palm, “so brother will always be with Elisa, always will be.”

"Hmm..." Elisa seemed quite satisfied with the answer, rubbing her little head against Keng Huo's arm. "By the way... Brother... what... do you want... for the New Year..."

Before she could finish speaking, Elisa fell asleep.

Keng Huo affectionately tapped Elisa's nose, then looked up and gazed at the boundless moonlight through the small, drafty window.

"A New Year's gift... I've already received it."

"Having dinner with my family...this is the best gift I've ever received."

Parasitism (I)

There is a type of creature in this world whose lifespan can be very short or very long. If it can find a good host, it can often live until that host dies; if, unfortunately, it takes root in a less robust host, it is common for it to live only a day and die at dusk.

This kind of creature is usually called a parasite.

The colorless glowing fire liked this creature very much because if it became a parasite, it could spend its whole life without struggling or making any effort, simply resigning itself to its fate and hiding under the host's skin, eating raw meat and drinking blood.

————————————————————————————————————

If she hadn't run out of sweets stored in her room, Wuse Huihuo would never have stepped out of her room. But since her food supplies were all gone, she had no choice but to go out and brave the inconveniently high temperature on the floating island to buy snacks.

If possible, she would rather buy more and have the shop deliver it, but the dessert shop on the Sky Island doesn't offer that service, and since it's neither profitable nor has any competitors, it naturally doesn't consider customer satisfaction—even if the dessert shops outside had delivery services, they couldn't deliver to the Sky Island where Schicksal headquarters is located, which was a real mistake.

If she could, she would prefer to move to a place outside the Sky Island and live on the ground. Ever since the Schicksal headquarters moved to the skies above the Mediterranean, she has always felt that the air is excessively humid, and she doesn't know if it's just her imagination or if there's any truth to it.

Wu Se Hui Huo's residence was far away from everyone else's, but she didn't care because no one would come to her residence. The only trouble was that she had to walk a long way every time she went to buy snacks.

Let's go then. I've traveled this road hundreds or thousands of times already, so one more trip won't make a difference.

However, the flowers lining the path made her feel very uncomfortable. These flowers, under the Sky Island's environmental control system, had lost their natural blooming season, blooming only according to human preferences, as if injected with hormones. Their entire lives were predetermined—when to take root, when to propagate, when to bloom—all were fixed.

Here, their existence is solely for the purpose of blooming, because the people who plant them only want to see them bloom.

Colorless Flame didn't care much about these things, but Otto arranged this living environment for her, saying it would make her feel more at home.

But she didn't really like the feeling of home.

……

Carrying the sweets on her way back to her place, Wuse Huihuo once again passed the path lined with yellow flowers. This time, she just wanted to get home quickly, because the two large bags of sweets she was carrying were very heavy.

Colorless Radiant Flame was not a Valkyrie known for her physical strength. The two bags of sweets made her steps a little heavy, and the yellow flowers seemed to be hooking her insteps, slowing her pace slightly.

The colorless firefly didn't know the name of these flowers, but their color reminded her of the mountain hibiscus, her mother's favorite flower.

She vaguely remembered running around the yard as a child, holding a handball her mother had given her. She didn't know why she was running around, but at that time, she truly felt that life was clear and real. Her mother would sit beside her, smiling as she watched her, and reciting poetry to her.

At the time, she didn't quite understand the meaning of that gaze, but now, thinking back, her mother's eyes were filled with a cold melancholy.

……

"...That day, Ota Kando was on his way back home when it suddenly started to rain. He had no choice but to run to the door of a house by the roadside to borrow a raincoat. However, a girl came out of the house but did not give him the help he wanted. She just handed him a Yamabuki flower."

"Does that girl like Ota Kando?" she asked, still quite naive at the time.

"No, it's not like that. 'The mountain blooms bloom seven or eight times, but pitifully there isn't a single seed.' The word 'seed' sounds the same as 'raincoat.' The girl was subtly telling Ota Kando that his family was so poor that they couldn't even afford a raincoat."

Colorless Radiant felt she couldn't understand, but she longed to hear the rest of the story, because in stories with such beginnings, the male and female protagonists often had a happy and romantic ending: "Oh... and then what happened?"

"Later? The book only says that after Ota Kando returned home, he mentioned the matter to others, and only after being reminded by others did he realize the girl's implied meaning. Ashamed, he began to study hard from that moment on."