Lín did not believe he had much experience or qualification to be a guide for another person.
Huá's personality and experience dictated that she needed a clear goal. This statement might be somewhat vague. It would be more straightforward to say that Huá needed "a person" to give her "a mission that must be accomplished."
She couldn't find it herself, so she needed someone else to set it for her.
Lín's initial consideration was to have Huá regard him as her goal, and then slowly comprehend her life on her own. But at that time, he felt uncertain; he only had five years left.
Five years was truly too short.
Now that Huá was close to Himeko, Lín felt somewhat relieved. Lín knew Himeko's character well. Letting Himeko replace Lín might not be a bad thing.
He didn't want anyone to place hope on him, a dead man. He never wanted to see anyone sacrifice themselves for him, a short-lived person with only two years left to live.
The best outcome was for everything to return to normal.
"Captain… are you trying to send me to the Fifth Squad?" Huá sensed the meaning of Lín's words—the desire to push her away. Most of her drunkenness had subsided, but now she felt a chill deep in her heart.
"To apply for a transfer, you only need the agreement of both Captains and approval after review." Lín said calmly. "Currently, both the Seventh Squad and the Fifth Squad are under-staffed. Your transfer to the Fifth Squad can maximally supplement their combat power."
"What about the Seventh Squad?"
"The Seventh Squad will prioritize recruiting new soldiers. Don't worry."
The facts proved Huá's intuition was right. Lín intended to push her to the Fifth Squad.
"Captain… why?"
Perhaps he hadn't had deep interactions with Huá this past year, but Huá still remembered Lín's words to her. Why would Lín, who saved her and gave her a new goal back then, now take back what he said?
"…"
Lín's silence made Huá realize she shouldn't ask him why.
"I… refuse."
"…Why?"
"…" Huá also adopted Lín's approach, closing her mouth and remaining silent, looking at him with an unusual gaze.
Seeing this, Immer stepped in to mediate: "Captain…"
"I have three years left."
Lín's faint sentence froze the expressions of both Immer and Huá simultaneously.
Three years left?
What did that mean?
"Splash."
The sea waves crashed against the deck outside. The spray dampened his clothes. Lín, facing the two of them, reached out and pulled at his collar.
He revealed the skin just below his neck to them.
Ugly, pinkish-purple lines crawled up his neck like squirming worms, disgusting and evil.
When Huá saw the marks of the Honkai energy corrosion, she suddenly felt a whiff of alcohol in her nasal cavity. She held her head; the world before her spun, as if she had gotten drunk again and fallen into a hallucination.
She desperately wanted to vomit.
She wanted to kneel on the ground right now and throw up everything.
She must have drunk too much.
Huá quickly suppressed the strange feeling of nausea. She didn't feel much sadness, but more of an indefinable emotion. This feeling had appeared when her friends died in the Honkai, and when she heard her father died from being affected by the Honkai.
"Captain, what is going on?" Immer was equally incredulous. That Lín, that Captain, that Lín who had defeated two Herrschers and three High-Class Honkai Beasts, was going to die?
It was like a joke.
Furthermore, this level of corrosion was definitely not a matter of a day or two. It had been at least a year or more.
No wonder Lín always wore high-collared clothes and rarely exposed his skin.
"My Honkai energy adaptability is the lowest in the Moth of the Flame."
"But… but you're not…" Immer wanted to say that Lín always took good protective measures, then suddenly remembered Lín's severe injuries during the Third Honkai Eruption. "The Third Honkai Eruption… before we joined the squad…"
"I'm not special, so it's normal for me to die." Lín's tone was as if he were talking about someone else unrelated to him. "I have three years left. Continuing to execute missions might shorten that time, so I want you both to be prepared in advance."
Huá shivered.
Prepared…
Prepared for his death?
"If you still want to stay in the Seventh Squad, that's fine, but I'm telling you this so that once you're prepared, you can accept it quickly and strengthen our cohesion."
"From now on, whatever you choose to do is up to you."
As Lín said this, his gaze shifted towards the entrance of the deck. It seemed as though he had felt a gaze looking over just now.
"…"
But the spot was empty. It must have been Lín's illusion.
…
Die…?
Her fingers trembled, rummaging through a pile of documents. A dizzying array of files was scattered on the floor. Those were various documents summarized by Lín, but she didn't need those.
Where was the one she was looking for?
Soon, a familiar file envelope came into view. It was the envelope for the physical examination report. Every soldier in the Moth of the Flame underwent regular physical examinations to check for Honkai energy corrosion.
A date was written on it—three months ago, before the Fourth Honkai Eruption had even happened.
She must have misheard.
Lín never spoke of this matter. It must have been a mistake because she drank a little too much today, or perhaps it wasn't Lín; she must have seen wrong.
Something was definitely wrong.
She opened the envelope, her fingers clutching the thin sheets of paper, yet hesitating to pull them out.
If she thought carefully, did that voice really sound like Lín's?
She kept deceiving herself. Even though all she needed to do was pull out the file and look at it to know the truth, she continued to deceive herself.
Lín had already endured so much pain; the world wouldn't be so cruel, would it?
This world must have good karma for good people, right!
No!
No!
No!
Don't take anyone else away from me!
She yanked hard, and the document was pulled out of the envelope. Her sea-blue eyes stared intently at every word on it, then found the section for Honkai energy assessment.
What was written there…?
"…"
"…"
"…"
"Heh…"
"Heh heh heh heh…" She laughed softly, her mouth stretching to an exaggerated degree, like a gash had opened across her face.
All the gentleness faded from those once pure, sea-blue eyes.
"Heh heh heh heh heh heh…"
She laughed nonsensically.
It was the same laugh she made when she killed those Honkai Beasts and zombies on the battlefield, venting her frustrations by mincing them into unrecognizable blobs of flesh.
In those clear eyes, some pitch-black "impurities" gradually emerged, staining them muddy.
…
From a distance, Lín saw the girl standing in front of his room door.
Upon seeing Lín return, the girl smiled gently at him: "Team member Lín, where were you just now? I couldn't find you after I sent the Captain back to her room."
"…Nothing. I went to take care of a small matter."
"Is that so? Be careful not to overwork yourself. It's bad for your health, and you just came back."
Lín nodded calmly.
"Then I'll be going now. See you tomorrow, Team member Lín." The girl smiled, waved, and walked past Lín.
"…"
Lín watched her disappear around the corner, opened the door, and walked inside.
"Snap." The door closed.
"…"
"…"
A silhouette stood at the corner, grinning and laughing eerily with wide-open eyes.