"It’s the Queen."
Alyssa wiped the blood from her fingertips with the towel, lifting her head. Her innocent eyes sparkled with joy as she gazed at the heavens—no, more precisely, at the echo that resounded across thousands of worlds, transcending past, future, and present, reverberating across ti itself.
"Waa—!"
Letting out a startled cry, Susannah—an orange-haired B-rank Valkyrie under Alyssa’s command, sporting a dumb hair strand, bear hairpin, and an Immortal Blade uniform—shrunk her neck and nervously glanced around while holding a kettle in her elbow and a basin in both hands. Her youthful lips moved slightly.
The wilted ahoge on her head, paired with her frightened and clueless deanor, gave her an unmistakable air of cuteness, moe, and mascot appeal.
And indeed, that was the case. Susannah, a B-rank Valkyrie of Schicksal, had once served with the elite squad Phosphor of the West Asia branch. Though not notably powerful, she had been stationed with the Immortal Blades unit at Schicksal HQ before the organization was restructured into a division of the Holy Selene Empire.
As the Valkyrie forces shifted away from their prior role as Honkai-response units to more extensive warfare, decapitation operations, and diplomatic roles, Susannah had the fortune of being chosen by Alyssa herself.
Why was she selected? Ahem... Though Alyssa never said outright, unlike Selene who ignored trivial matters, Sebas—who had looked into the matter—could probably guess the girl’s thoughts and intentions at the ti:
"Whoa, she’s so dumb-cute—totally mascot material. Hmph, the Queen always calls the mascot? Fine, I’ll raise a bunch more! Then I won’t be the mascot anymore!"
Well, it may not be exact, but close enough.
Sebas didn’t oppose it—in fact, he seed inclined to support it.
A cold-hearted ruler, a shrewd politician, an unrelenting pursuer of ambition... these were traits Sebas truly hoped Alyssa wouldn’t absorb too much.
If Selene truly intended to mold Alyssa into such a person, Sebas, while regretful, wouldn’t have stopped her—he couldn’t. But reality aligned with his hope: Selene, like him, seed unwilling to burden Alyssa with the cruel, dark laws of the world.
The presence of companions like White Star (Shirahoshi from One Piece)—beings radiating noble vitality—around Alyssa was proof enough.
It might seem naive, even hypocritical, given Alyssa’s status as Selene’s closest confidante and ever-present attendant. It was unrealistic to expect her to remain unstained... but chalk it up to the selfish hope of a common old man for the child he cherishes.
As for the matter of the Empire’s succession... Sebas hoped that day would never co.
"Don’t be scared, little Susannah—that’s the Queen’s attack. Besides, I’m here, what’s there to fear?"
Mimicking Selene’s tone, Alyssa subtly stood on tiptoe, one hand ruffling Susannah’s ahoge, the other pounding her chest. With a spark of realization in her eyes, she half-squinted and declared:
Crack~
"Your Highness, that’s Her Majesty’s aura."
A sound of crushed gravel ca from behind. A towering shadow lood before Alyssa.
A commander of the Imperial Guard dragged the corpse of a colossal ancient dragon, thousands of ters long. Its severed head lay several ters apart behind Alyssa. He lifted his head, breath heavy, then raised his right hand high and shouted with fervent conviction:
"Long live the Empress!"
"Long live the Empress!"
The Imperial Guard, silent nuns, and Astartes followed suit, striking their chests with raised hands.
"Long live—!"
"Long live—!!"
More and more Imperial soldiers joined in the chorus.
In that mont—accompanied by the shockwave from the primordial universe that echoed across countless worlds—the cheers of the Imperial Army on the Antarctic battlefield thundered on endlessly.
...
Elsewhere, on yet another boundless battlefield—
What was once a dreamlike natural sanctuary had been reduced to dust. The Inner Sea cried out in grief. From the gaping tear in the world’s barrier, mountain-sized war machines surged forth, unleashing barrages of fire like torrential rain.
BOOM BOOM RUMBLE—!!
Deafening explosions roared into the heavens. Saturation bombardnts and dinsional-reducing strikes pierced this ravaged world. Heavy lasers, disintegration plasma, and macro cannons fired relentlessly. The skies lit up with plasma flashes and cannon bursts, forming a deadly cloud of charged particles.
Mountains were leveled. Oceans, forests, and cities were rcilessly vaporized and incinerated.
Destruction. Despair.
Wave after wave of assault craft scread from the clouds, flying in formation like flocks of geese, charging straight into the inferno of frontline fire.
Huff... huff... huff...
Colossal energy spears rained down endlessly. Amid the wreckage of the world, the Queen of the Land of Shadows stood firm, using her crimson spear of death to steady herself. No longer did she bear her past grace and allure.
Gasping for breath, her exposed skin revealed raw, torn muscles soaked in blood. Sweat, blood, dust, and gunpowder had congealed into hideous scabs across her body. Her once-glorious hair now looked like scorched straw—dried, blackened, and sparking.
"Cú Chulainn..."
Scáthach cast a sorrowful gaze toward her prized disciple, lying over a kiloter away—his body mostly lted. Crimson eyes—still shedding blood—flickered with grief.
This high-dinsional world, born from the Root’s main current, was a critical node—and had naturally beco one of the primary battlegrounds where both sides committed their full might.
At this mont, its outer space had completely fallen. The surface counterattack from Earth—the core of the high-dinsional realm—had failed. Piles of corpses from dragons, fairies, and magical beasts towered high. Those who had retreated to the Inner Sea of Stars were now only one step from total annihilation.
Were they weak?
Not at all. Many natural gods, dragons, fairies, and Heroic Spirits far surpassed even Astartes in power. But this was war, not a one-on-one gladiator duel. The more modernized a war becos, the more it’s decided by logistics and firepower.
And what logistics did they have? After the Swirl of the Root exhausted all it could summon, its attention had turned fully to the tug-of-war with Selene.
It was as if these frontline soldiers received one full supply drop at the start—and then the base vanished. The buffs they received were negligible at best.
Now look at the enemy: wave after wave of reinforcents followed the vanguard. Each offensive more intense than the last. Any sign of weakness was imdiately buried under devastating artillery support.
Their Noble Phantasms—no matter how legendary—were all promptly targeted by orbital battleships above. Neutralized. Countered. Obliterated.
Yes, so Noble Phantasms could claim to shatter stars, pierce celestial bodies, or rend the world. They were EX-ranked.
But above low orbit, the capital ship-class cannons of those void battleships—though different in nature—were all EX-rank in destructive capability. Planet-killing level.
Thanks to Honkai energy—a pure, non-polluting, universally adaptable high-energy source—the Imperial Navy never had to compromise on energy storage or engine size in their ship designs.
Honestly, even the most basic Imperial frigates were equipped with various models of radiation bombs, viral warheads, and light lance projectors—more than enough to raze entire landscapes.
The firepower was overwhelming.
Take Scáthach—once a taker of countless lives, whether human, spirit, or divine. She had faced and slaughtered innurable foes. The Queen of the Land of Shadows, who ruled the Land of Shadows, had long since been cast outside the world itself. Her very existence had beco nearly indistinguishable from that of a god.
Her power was unquestionably among the top planetary tiers.
And yet, no matter how strong she was—planet-level or not—it ant little against the concentrated void lance barrage from an Imperial Navy battleship fleet.
"So this is the death I once yearned for... to fall on the battlefield."
The fragnt of Cú Chulainn who fought in the Fifth Fuyuki Holy Grail War had long perished. His true self, just descended from the Throne of Heroes, had also just been slain. Without Gaia—or rather, without the nurturing of the Swirl of the Root—a destroyed Heroic Spirit could no longer be summoned.
Scáthach’s own fragnt had already been crushed by Selene. What remained now was the original body kept in the Land of Shadows—awakened by the Root’s revelation to serve as a principal force in this war zone, tasked with buying ti.
Step—
She stood again. Her exquisitely crafted dark purple tight battle dress had long been torn apart by the fallout of fortress-grade cannons. Only a few shreds of fabric remained, clinging to her battered, yet heartbreakingly beautiful and seductive body.
But alas, their enemies showed no rcy.
"For Selene—!"
After the standard artillery sweep ended, the grinding of transmission shafts and heavy hydraulic rods filled the air with a chanical rhythm. Rows of massive war machines lit up their fortress-class void arrays. With gears roaring, they let out battle cries like a collapsing mountain range. Scáthach, newly risen, remained silent.
Boom! Boom boom!
"Run, hide—go on, hide! Hahaha, no matter where you flee, no matter where you are, as long as you defy the Empire—clinging to life? No, no! All that awaits you is death! Death in so stinking gutter, rembered in infamy! Hahaha—!"
"Victory? Hahaha! Brave resistance? Those aren’t your words to speak!"
"Kneel! Or die!"
"We will destroy everything you care about! We will annihilate all you love! We will crush the foolish world you worship! Cry! Scream! Despair! You have only one choice: to watch this world burn in beautiful agony, and then vanish in pathetic ruin!!"
Beneath blood-red bat wings, under the hands of midnight specter soldiers, a barrage of bolters roared. Explosive shells pierced through sound barriers, shredding through Karna’s Heroic Spirit body from all directions.
On that brutal battlefield, the spear that once slew gods had already fallen. Without the protection of the golden armor of the sun, a focused volley of 1.25-inch Leviathan-class explosive armor-piercing rounds easily shattered Karna’s spirit core, tearing through his divine body. The son of the sun god fell, powerless.
Achilles’ Heroic Spirit body had lost his Akhilleus Kosmos—completely lted away. If the shield once projected the entire world he had known—every mountain, river, and realm of Greece—then the descending light lance had matched it with an output capable of incinerating half the Balkan Peninsula.
When the lance’s light faded, what remained in the Inner Sea of Stars was a crater vaster than the Aegean Sea.
Karna’s eternal rival, the heaven-gifted hero Arjuna, also perished—his body ravaged with dozens of wounds, dismbered under the screech of lightning talons.
Under Goddess Rhongomyniad, the sacred lance Rhongomyniad had dimd to nothing.
The Argo—annihilated.
The Red Branch Knights—annihilated.
The Knights of the Round Table—annihilated.
The Fianna—annihilated.
The Twelve Paladins of Charlemagne—annihilated.
....
BOOM BOOM BOOM RUMBLE RUMBLE—!!
At that mont, another resounding shockwave swept the battlefield. From the roiling near-Earth orbit—part of the dark side of the cosmos—
In the haze, nearly endless magic power, cosmic ether, and Honkai particles were drawn forth, coalescing into what seed like a tangible, torrential downpour, obscuring the heavens.
A crimson radiance bead from above—from that distant, unfathomable horizon—casting its glow across the boundless battlefield.
Where the sky had once been pitch black, filled only with the roar of cannon fire, a blood-red halo suddenly spread out. The heavens and earth trembled. Stars howled in the void, everything connected—forming a suffocating, impenetrable net.
As if this war-torn world would be drowned completely.
Yet this oppressive force did not belong to the Empire’s foes. For the Empire’s warriors, this radiance felt like returning ho. Their morale surged, their cheers shook the heavens, and they charged forward even more fiercely.
Scáthach felt her breath catch. The sudden, soul-piercing wail shook her to her very core. No taphor—it exploded like shattering glass in the soul of every being born of this world.
She stared blankly at the trembling star-sea. A sudden, inexplicable sorrow overwheld her. After so many years, her long-stilled emotions surged with anxiety and dread. Blood-tinged tears spilled from her eyes.
It was as if she had lost sothing irreplaceable... ’Mother’...
But before she could search further, the change unfolded—quietly, yet everywhere—all souls felt it.
An indescribable tearing sensation brought her to her knees.
"Ugh... Has it... already failed...?"
...
"You’ve failed."
The once-grand primordial universe had reached its end. Once, it should have had a glorious future—like all physical universes birthed from the Big Bang, destined to expand.
As the primordial goddess, Ashtart too should have grown with the Milky Way.
But Selene had forcibly cut its life short—and shattered the Swirl of the Root’s last hope.
In the void, silence reigned. Only a colossal gravitational force remained, forming a violent whirlpool. Parallel worlds born from the primordial universe collapsed one after another.
The pitch-black vortex resembled a bottomless, insatiable demon, endlessly devouring matter, crushing it all. Like a mysterious prison, it imprisoned the primordial goddess within.
Splurt!
A slender, pale hand suddenly pierced the dimd divine star-body—straight through the black hole.
"Caught you, Root."
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