Honkai Impact 3rd experience, starting with a thousand Herrschers

Kiana raised her head, facing Selene who was staring at her.

"I don't want to run away anymore."

"That's why humans are so interesting!"

Selene chuckled softly, once again marveling at how contradictory and fascinating humans were.

Chapter 105: Facing Oneself

Looking at the two people talking behind the glass door, Cheng Xing withdrew his gaze and then looked at the curious gazes of the people at the dining table.

Perhaps because of the departure of the Honkai, the atmosphere at the dining table gradually warmed up, as if nothing was pressing down on them anymore, and everyone started to find topics to chat about.

But now everyone's curiosity is focused on this guy.

"It seems you all want to get some information from me, so who wants to ask first?"

Cheng Xing was also somewhat familiar with these former Valkyries, and was willing to satisfy their curiosity. As long as the questions weren't too difficult to answer, he would try his best to do so.

"I want to know who that person is! Why does he look exactly like Kiana? And why is the Herrscher of the Void, who should have been dead, here?!"

Theresa was the first to step forward; she had so much to ask.

"How rude of you! As the host, is this how you treat your guests, asking such impolite questions?"

Celine sat in her seat, looking at Theresa with a questioning tone in her voice.

"Theresa Apocalypse, you are a member of one of the three great noble families of Destiny. How can you ask your guests such an impolite question as whether they are dead or not? Is this all the level of your upbringing and manners? Didn't your elders teach you proper etiquette?"

"Goo!"

Theresa was speechless at Celine's question. She swallowed hard, finding the other woman quite reasonable, and realized how impolite she had been. After all, Celine hadn't done anything harmful and had been very polite in visiting her.

However, he had asked such a rude question, which was truly disrespectful to both the Heavenly Mandate and St. Freya Academy.

"Feel sorry."

Upon hearing the apology, Xilin raised her head higher, then seemed to remember something, coughed slightly, and lowered her head again, saying to Cheng Xing, "Ahem, I'm fine now."

“Alright, then let me give you a brief introduction. Selene… I know her true identity, but for some reasons, I can’t tell you. I can only say that she has no connection with Bishop Otto whatsoever… right?”

In the end, Cheng Xing was a little uncertain. He vaguely remembered that during the Second Honkai Impact, Otto had a conversation with the Honkai in Sirin's consciousness space, so was there a connection?

"This ambiguous answer feels like nothing was said at all."

Himeko could immediately tell that there was no useful information in this conversation. She shook her head helplessly and asked, "I want to know what exactly happened between Kiana and you? I'm sorry, this might be a bit direct, but as that child's teacher, I still want to know what's going on."

"This matter is a bit complicated. Back in Changkong City, Kiana saved my life."

At this point, Cheng Xing suddenly remembered the female assassin he had in the first two servers. If he hadn't met Kiana back then, would he still be on the path of constantly collecting Pokémon and getting stronger?

"Then, in exchange, I took Kiana, who was lost at the time, to Chiba Academy... The story after that involves some personal privacy issues. It's just that I became a bit too arrogant and had some mental problems, which led to some misunderstandings between us."

Cheng Xing naturally noticed Raiden Mei, who had been looking at him anxiously from the beginning. He understood that what he had done before had left a shadow in the girl's heart, so he said, "Miss Raiden Mei, I know that you must still be a little afraid and hate me because of that incident. I don't think that we were both wrong at the time; we just made choices that we had no other choice to make. Just say what you want to say."

After hearing this, Raiden Mei hesitated for a moment before standing up, looking somewhat lost, and said, "Um, can we go to the room and talk alone?"

Everyone present looked uneasy, and Xilin felt a sense of horror. Why was even this cook joining the fray? When did something happen between them that I didn't know about?

Bronya frowned as well. None of the things Cheng Xing had told her could be connected to Raiden Mei!

Fu Hua pushed up her glasses, completely oblivious to what had happened. From her perspective, the two were simply discussing some private matters from the past. What was so strange about that?

Himeko looked at the two of them with complicated emotions, then shook her head helplessly, feeling a strange pang of sadness in her heart.

"Are all the girls so much younger than me already caught up in these messy romantic relationships? And I don't even have a sweetheart yet!"

Himeko channeled her grief and anger into alcohol, gulping down a can of beer in one go.

Theresa looked out at her niece on the balcony. What should she do now? Should she call her grandfather and ask?

The two of them walked into a small room to the side, and everyone present was no ordinary person; they could all hear the sound of the door being locked. Instantly, everyone's expression became even more strange.

If Bronya hadn't stopped her, Sirin would have already opened the spatial tunnel to peek inside.

"Why are you stopping me? Aren't you curious?"

"Are you an idiot? Don't forget that the fluctuations of a space tunnel can't be hidden."

"Then what do you suggest we do?"

"Of course, the two of us went straight to ask after we came out. Do you think Cheng Xing would lie to the two of us?"

"...Tsk!"

At this moment, Xilin actually felt like she had already lost.

Looking at the somewhat hesitant Raiden Mei in front of him, Cheng Lixing, who was in the locked room, said directly, "You probably want me to help you deal with the problem of your other consciousness, right?"

"Well, I feel like she's been getting more and more active lately. I don't know if I'll turn back into that kind of person if this continues, the kind of person who only hurts others. So I'd like to ask you to help me get rid of this problem completely."

Raiden Mei bent down and bowed deeply with utmost sincerity.

"...Actually, the Herrscher consciousness is also a part of your consciousness. I think the two of you should try to have a proper conversation before making a final decision. I will help the two of you communicate face-to-face first, and then I will see how things go. If there is really no other way, I will help you to directly erase the other consciousness."

"Wouldn't that be too cruel?"

"That depends on whether you can accept her, after all, she is another version of you."

Cheng Xing opened his scarlet eyes, and in that instant, Raiden Mei felt the surrounding space instantly distort, the colors rapidly fading, and finally the entire space transformed into something else entirely.

A school that had become a pile of ruins at dusk.

Atop the ruins of the school sat a girl in a somewhat tattered school uniform, her face aloof, her long purple hair flowing in the wind like that of a queen…

Raiden Mei.

"You've come, you coward."

She glanced at Raiden Mei, who was standing a step behind Cheng Xing, looking somewhat hesitant.

"..."

For some reason, Raiden Mei felt somewhat lost and afraid at this moment.

Just then, someone patted her shoulder. Raiden Mei looked up and saw that Cheng Xing had come to her side. He looked at her with gentle eyes and said encouragingly, "It's okay, go ahead. Nothing will happen with me here."

In an instant, a strange sense of peace filled Raiden Mei's heart. She took a deep breath and mustered up the courage to walk up to her alone.

Chapter 106: The Lonely Queen

"Have you finally mustered the courage to face me?"

The Herrscher of Thunder glanced again at Cheng Xing, who was calmly watching from a distance, and sneered disdainfully. Then she mocked Raiden Mei, "So you're only willing to face me because you have someone backing you up? What, your little girlfriend isn't enough for you anymore?"

"I just felt that I couldn't run away anymore."

Although Raiden Mei still looked somewhat frightened, she did not leave or retreat. Instead, she gradually raised her head and looked directly into the eyes that were exactly the same as her own.

However, compared to the emotions in his eyes, there was an even stronger sense of violence and coercion.

"Really? Should I give you a compliment then?"

"The Herrscher of Thunder said sarcastically."

"Why do you think things turned out this way between us? Of course, it's not because I wanted to take over your body and do anything. It's just that you unilaterally dumped all those painful rejections from the past onto me."

The Herrscher of Thunder rose from the throne built from the ruins, looking down at Raiden Mei, who looked up and met her gaze. She said, “You will recall the loneliness of not having a mother and your father’s constant absence. You will recall the pressure you accumulated while maintaining your carefully constructed persona during your pampered past. You will recall the torment you suffered from bullying by classmates because of your father’s imprisonment… and the guilt you felt for killing an entire city, even unintentionally. You’ve thrown all of that into me.”

"You're just a coward who only knows how to run away. You're never willing to solve or face those things yourself. You just passively accept external pressure and passively accept all changes. Like now, all you need to do is passively accept help from others and kill me, this consciousness that contains all the pain from your past. Then you can pretend nothing happened and live happily ever after with your girlfriend."

"No...that's not how it is..."

"What? Do you intend to accept me? Accept me, this other self formed from all your fears, resentment, bitterness, and pain? Are you going to tell me that you no longer want to run away and want to truly face the future?"

"Stop making me laugh, Raiden Mei... I know you better than you know yourself. You're only here to try and make peace with others, you don't have any real intentions. And you're only here because you have a way out and a backup plan."

This time, the Herrscher of Thunder didn't even look at Raiden Mei. She sat back on her throne, closed her eyes, and said, "Now you either get out of here, or let that guy kill me."

Raiden Mei opened her mouth, but in the end she couldn't do anything and could only let Cheng Xing take her away from the consciousness space.

After Raiden Mei left, the Herrscher of Thunder sat alone on the throne, gazing at the surrounding ruins.

Under the glow of dusk, the light of the setting sun shone on the Herrscher of Thunder, but it did not cast any shadow... because she herself was the shadow.

"You don't seem to dislike her as much as you appear on the surface."

The Herrscher of Thunder glanced at the uninvited guest still standing there, snorted, and didn't even reply.

"It seems you also dislike being alone."

"...None of your business."

"How can it be unrelated? To be precise, we are colleagues, so it's perfectly reasonable to care about the mental health of a colleague. Do you need me to offer you some counseling?"

"Instead of trying to tutor me, you might as well tutor that coward outside. Haven't you always known that the real problem is with her, not me?"

Cheng Xing shook his head helplessly, looking at the Herrscher of Thunder and saying, "Aren't you two the same person? She has all the memories and emotions you possess. And vice versa. In the end, you're just hating yourselves, loathing your own incompetence and weakness..."

"enough!"

With a shout from the Herrscher of Thunder, the twilight sky suddenly became overcast, with terrifying bolts of lightning crackling within. Her purple eyes stared directly at Cheng Xing before her, and she said coldly, "If you have nothing else to say, then get lost! Even if there's a huge difference in our strength, I'm not someone you can provoke!"

"It seems that being a psychologist is indeed not an easy job. Sometimes you have to be careful not to get hurt by patients... Okay, I'll leave now."

Cheng Xing quickly dodged an arrow formed from lightning by sidestepping to the side, and then immediately flashed away.

The Herrscher of Thunder let out a soft breath, then sat back down in her seat. In this chemical place reported by twilight and ruins, she sat alone.

She appears as proud as a queen, yet as powerless as a prisoner.

So high and mighty, and so lonely...

"Oh, by the way, do you need me to mail you some toys or snacks? You seem pretty bored all by yourself!"

"roll!"

"Sigh! My colleagues are so hard to manage."

With the mindset of recruiting as many Herrschers as possible, Cheng Xing planned to bring all the Herrschers he could to the human camp as soon as possible.

For this reason, he also intends to cure Raiden Mei's dual personality, thus contributing to the power of this generation's civilization.

This time, the Herrscher of Thunder did not sit down immediately. Instead, she looked around for a long time, and after confirming that the guy had left, she sighed. She had completely lost her previous lonely and indifferent temperament, and instead looked somewhat exasperated.