"This... this is New Zealand?"
Looking at the barren world before her, Kiana felt an out-of-place sense of disappointment.
It was early spring in New Zealand, but the blue sky, white clouds, and green fields she had imagined were nowhere to be found.
The white clouds in the sky were stretched into thin wisps, mingling with the cyan currents, flowing slowly like matcha milk that hadn't been fully stirred.
Not a single blade of grass could be seen on the ground, only dark brown earth that had been ravaged over and over, now layered like waves in a tide.
As for where the grass had gone... Kiana took a deep breath and sneezed twice. The flowing air was filled with grass fibers torn to shreds by the wind.
It even made one wonder if the cyan color that had replaced the usual azure blue in the sky was stained by the pulverized grass.
Bronya checked the map on her terminal and looked around.
After a great deal of effort, using the shape of the coastline as a reference, she managed to roughly determine their current position.
She then looked at another crooked red line on the map—the previous route of the Snow Lotus squad.
By comparison, the squad had gone missing near Queenstown, the location of the Oceania Branch. Their mission was simply to find the squad and, if necessary, conduct a rescue operation. This made things conveniently straightforward.
Bronya quickly planned a route and stood up.
"Don't just stand there, Kiana. Keep up!"
Michael and Rita weren't with them. To reduce the risk of the Herrscher escaping, they had headed straight for the location of the last Honkai energy eruption from the start, hoping to contain the Herrscher as soon as possible.
But it wasn't the first time the four girls had operated alone, and none of them felt there was a problem. With just a knowing glance, they set off on their search.
They first headed south to the point where the Snow Lotus squad had made landfall, then followed their previous route to search.
The four of them spread out, nearly a hundred meters apart. Mei and Kiana were on the flanks, occasionally taking high ground to scan for any sign of the squad. Bronya was in the center, walking along a barely discernible path, responsible for leading the team along the planned route.
In truth, they could have spread out even further. Schicksal's A-Rank Valkyries could control a frontline of over a thousand meters per person when setting up a defensive line. The reason they didn't, aside from their lack of experience and ability as B-Rank Valkyries, was mainly because communications were affected. Even short-range comms were intermittent and unclear. It was obviously safer to keep each other within sight.
As they advanced, all they saw was scorched black earth.
The "civilization" that humanity prided itself on was reduced to scattered wood chips, steel bars, broken concrete, and metal fragments.
Even the bodies of humans themselves were either torn into shreds before being blown away by the wind, or buried layer by layer under the black soil thrown into the air by the cyan gales.
Some of the shallowly buried ones occasionally revealed a hand or half a leg sticking out of the ground. The sight was so gruesome that even Bronya found it hard to look.
In such a devastated world, even if the Snow Lotus squad had left any markers, it was unlikely they would have survived...
No, wait!
"Stop!"
Bronya suddenly shouted at the top of her lungs.
Although the wind tore at her voice, it was fortunate they were close. Even if they couldn't hear her exact words, the sound was enough of an alert.
When they turned and saw her standing still, it wasn't hard to understand her meaning.
"What did you find, Bronya?"
Kiana's voice, carried by the wind, was surprisingly clear.
She saw Bronya crouch down, seemingly fiddling with something on the ground. A moment later, Bronya stood up and waved them over. The gesture was unambiguous. Kiana, Seele, and Mei quickly gathered around her.
"Have you guys noticed? There's something wrong with the wind here."
Bronya didn't immediately tell the others what she'd found, instead asking a rather strange question.
"What's wrong with it?"
Bronya shot Kiana a look, then glanced up at the sky, and scooped up a handful of earth, letting it trickle from her palm.
Watching the fine soil drift away in the direction of the wind, Kiana blinked, not seeing any problem.
Mei's gaze followed the dust, but then, like Bronya had, she suddenly looked up at the sky, then closed her eyes as if trying to recall something.
A moment later, she agreed.
"You're right. Something's off."
Kiana looked at Mei, then at Bronya. She couldn't understand how they could all see the same thing, yet she understood nothing at all. She didn't even know what there was to understand.
"Kiana's intelligence is probably on par with a paramecium," Bronya lamented, hand on her forehead.
"Paramecium? What does that mean?"
Mei looked at Kiana, hesitating. So that's what she meant. She was just calling her dumb, why use words people don't understand... Wait a minute! How was she dumb?
"Seele didn't notice either, did she?"
Kiana pointed an accusing finger at Seele, only to see her, contrary to her usual gentle demeanor, cross her arms and state calmly:
"It's the wind force, isn't it?"
"Huh?"
Seeing Bronya and Mei nod in succession, Kiana finally gave up the struggle, but she still didn't understand.
"The wind force? What do you mean?"
"It's simple. The wind we're feeling right now is about a level six or seven, not even reaching level eight. But look at the level of destruction around us. Even a level eleven or twelve storm probably couldn't have destroyed a town so completely, not leaving a single house standing, not a single intact corpse. And the wind that caused the Hyperion to lurch and even blew away a railgun—a level seven wind can't do that. Plus, seeing as the Hyperion is still circling offshore, the wind force in the sky probably hasn't decreased. And I found something else."
Bronya bent down and pulled a dagger from the ground where no one had noticed it before, along with a sheath that had been secured to the ground by a ring passed through the blade.
Mei took the dagger and sheath and examined them. Both had Schicksal's insignia. The dagger also had an artificially engraved rose emblem on its hilt.
"That pattern is the Schariac family crest. Class President told us before, the captain of the Snow Lotus squad's surname is Schariac. It's clear this captain is experienced. She knew they might face communication interference, so she left this marker. I'm sure there will be more of these along the way. Although this might not have been her original intention, this marker gives us crucial information—it hasn't been damaged or affected by the strong winds, which means that since this marker was left, there hasn't been any strong airflow at low altitudes."
Perhaps sensing the gravity of the situation, Bronya spoke extremely quickly, and some of her wording wasn't perfectly structured, but it didn't hinder Kiana's understanding.
Because even if it were explained to her slowly and methodically, she wouldn't have understood it right away anyway.
As expected, she pressed down on the cowlick swaying in the wind, her face a blank slate.
"So... Ugh, Bronya, stop being so mysterious and just tell us the conclusion!"
"I think there are two possibilities."
Bronya held up her right index finger and waved it in front of them.
"First possibility: the land was destroyed by the storm before the Snow Lotus squad landed. Sometime after they landed, the Herrscher erupted for a second time for some reason, but this time, the airflow it affected was mainly concentrated at high altitudes. That's why the Hyperion was blocked offshore by the strong currents."
"And the second possibility?"
"Second possibility: the land was destroyed by the storm before the Snow Lotus squad landed..."
"Bronya, did you just repeat yourself?"
Facing Kiana's interruption once again, Bronya rolled her eyes, tossed the dagger in her hand, and answered irritably:
"Didn't I say before? In either case, the destruction of the towns and buildings must have happened before the Snow Lotus squad landed..."
"Did you say that?"
Bronya's fist clenched, then loosened powerlessly a moment later.
She decided to take the simplest approach with the foolish Kiana—ignore her.
"The second possibility is that the strong airflow at high altitudes has always been there. I mean, it was a product of the Herrscher's first eruption. The Southeast Asia Branch's battleship hadn't arrived yet, so the Snow Lotus squad came to New Zealand in a Valkyrie skiff after resupplying at a military base in northern Australia. To meet the demands of fighting Honkai Beasts, the skiff flies at a lower altitude, so it wasn't affected by the strong airflow."
"In fact, I think this possibility is higher, but there are two things I can't explain. First, why didn't we see their skiff at the landing site? Second, if the strong airflow at high altitudes has always existed, what about the Herrscher-level Honkai energy reaction the Hyperion detected when it was being tossed about? Why was the timing so perfect? This instantaneous eruption doesn't seem to have affected anything."
"The first question can be explained," Mei said, leaning on her sword, her eyes silently observing their surroundings.
"The Snow Lotus squad might have used a multi-pronged approach. The main force advanced on the ground, while the skiff was responsible for reconnaissance and fire support from the air."
Bronya shook her head. She wasn't refuting Mei's words; in fact, how could she not have thought of that?
Mei quickly realized it too. Although Bronya mentioned two unexplainable problems, it was clear that the only truly unexplainable one was the latter.
The Honkai energy reaction itself didn't prove much. Who's to say that the appearance of Honkai energy must result in destruction? And who's to say it was the Herrscher that emitted it? The real problem was why that reaction occurred at the exact moment the Hyperion was being battered.
It couldn't be a coincidence, right?
Countless inexplicable things in the world can be attributed to coincidence, but coincidence is just an excuse, a way to evade. As long as one's mind is clear, explaining everything with coincidence doesn't bring comfort, but rather a sense of unease.
There was a simpler solution: rule out the second possibility. But that's just how things are. The more you can't have something, the more you want it. The more you can't figure something out, the more you want to. The atmosphere among the four of them suddenly became silent.
"Let's keep moving. Just standing here won't solve anything."
They continued forward and, sure enough, found many more traces left by the Snow Lotus squad along the way: a Valkyrie insignia held down by a rock, a Valkyrie sash from a uniform, and even a bullet stuck upside down in the dirt.
The markers were spaced roughly two kilometers apart. This regular interval clearly confirmed Bronya's earlier speculation—after the Snow Lotus squad landed, there had been no strong airflow on the ground. At least that much was certain.
Not long after, as they neared Queenstown on the outskirts of the Oceania Branch, they surprisingly received a communication from the Hyperion.
"Bronya, you... you're already at Queenstown?"
Himeko seemed surprised by their speed, but before they could explain, she seemed to understand.
"I see. Looks like the wind on the ground isn't that strong."
Bronya shook her head. It was unclear if she meant "not strong" or "let's not talk about that for now."
"Why did the comms suddenly come back?"
"The electromagnetic field in the southern half of New Zealand has returned to normal, so we can maintain contact with you now. But there are two things. The airflow at high altitudes is still just as fierce, so don't expect much help from the Hyperion. Second... Michael and Rita's target is across the strait, which means we don't know their situation. Not only that, but most importantly, we still haven't reestablished contact with the Snow Lotus squad."
"I see. That means the Snow Lotus squad is definitely in trouble. We've made some discoveries here as well."
Bronya briefly explained about the markers they found and her deductions. She was met with a full five minutes of silence from the other end.
Five minutes later, Himeko gave a new order:
"Continue forward. The Oceania Branch is less than five kilometers east of your position. The Snow Lotus squad lost contact somewhere around there."
It was a new order, but it was no different from before.
The four of them no longer advanced with a set distance between them. With a clear objective, they made a beeline for the Oceania Branch.
Five kilometers wasn't a long distance for Valkyries equipped with artificial stigmata and battlesuits. By the time they saw the half-collapsed main gate of the Oceania Branch, only three minutes had passed.
The condition of the branch was much better than expected. Most of the houses, buildings, and walls remained, albeit in a terribly ruined state.
It was strange.
Logically, no matter how sturdy military buildings were, they should still be no match for a storm capable of leveling the entire landscape.
But here, it was as if someone had deliberately protected it...
They soon found a survivor.
In the garden behind the Oceania Branch base entrance, in front of a fountain that no longer spouted water.
"You..."
Upon seeing them, a girl with cyan hair spoke first.
But before she could finish her sentence, everything seemed to freeze in that moment.
The girl's lips were slightly parted, and the four Valkyries opposite her had various expressions. They remained in this comical pose, as if the world would never move on to the next second.
But time had not stopped.
Over the comms, Himeko's breathing had suddenly become rapid, yet this rapid breathing sounded slower than before. Above, the "matcha milk" clouds continued their slow but steady movement, only a fraction slower.
There was nothing wrong with the world. The problem was with the minds of those involved.
What a pity, sighed the man standing amidst the rubble.
No one could see him, and he would not look at anyone, for his eyes were always tightly shut.
But now, he had a few complaints to voice:
"I hope things on their end can move a little faster."
The image of his comrade flashed through his mind. He believed in her, and he believed in them.
But their opponent, after all, was him...