In other words, finding the Third Herrscher was the most likely way to cross paths with Elysia.
Only then could she attempt to awaken that slumbering consciousness.
While Durandal was busy closing in on the areas with the highest Honkai energy readings—violently tearing through any Honkai Beast that dared block her path—a floating Fire Moth warship finally arrived at the outskirts of Nagazora City.
Truth be told, arriving only after the Honkai eruption had already peaked could hardly be called "timely."
By the time they reached this stage, perhaps only a tenth of the civilians on the city's periphery could still be saved.
As for those in the inner districts? They had likely already succumbed to the lethal concentrations of Honkai energy, turned into Zombies, or been torn apart by the beasts nesting in the city's core.
Urban centers are notoriously dense; the outskirts usually account for only a small fraction of the total population.
This meant that in a city of ten million, the final survival rate would likely struggle to reach even one percent—roughly a hundred thousand souls.
Aboard the warship, Elysia, serving as the commander for this operation, had uncharacteristically tucked away her usual sweet smile. Her expression was grave.
She had just finished a session in the ship's training room, sharpening her edge for the bitter struggle ahead. However, the session had been anything but smooth.
For a fleeting moment, Elysia's mind had gone hazy. A simulated Honkai Beast had seized that split second of distraction to strike a lethal blow, forcing the simulation to terminate early due to her "death."
It was a rookie mistake, the kind that had never happened to her before.
Usually, her sessions ended only when every simulated monster lay dead at her feet. As for why it happened, Elysia couldn't quite put it into words.
All she knew was that in the heartbeat before the beast "killed" her, her spirit had jolted.
It felt as though something new had manifested within her, yet it was accompanied by a crushing sense of loss—as if she had forgotten someone, or something, of vital importance.
Elysia furrowed her brows in deep thought. She scanned through her memories, but everything from her earliest childhood seemed intact.
She even pulled out her private notebook—the one she never showed a soul—and flipped through it from page one.
Every name recorded there matched a face she could still see clearly in her mind. Her memory, it seemed, was perfectly fine.
Was it just a trick of the mind? A symptom of pre-battle nerves?
Elysia couldn't even convince herself of that. This wasn't her first brush with the Honkai.
If she hadn't disguised herself as a common Fire Moth soldier to intervene during the Second Honkai Eruption, the losses humanity suffered might have been ten times worse.
The Third Eruption, so far, didn't seem significantly more powerful than the second. Since the interval between them wasn't that long, there was no reason for her to be this tense.
She didn't have the answers.
Yet, as she gazed through the warship's reinforced glass at the once-thriving metropolis of Nagazora City—now a sprawling graveyard of half-collapsed ruins—a strange clarity took hold of her heart.
It felt as though every answer she sought was buried deep within the heart of that city.
Driven by an inexplicable sense of urgency, Elysia threw her original plan out the window.
She was supposed to lead a steady, methodical push from the outskirts toward the center.
That had been the strategy dictated by the Fire Moth Council's Combat Command, and as the field commander, Elysia was expected to follow those orders to the letter.
But Elysia had never been one for rules. If she were a rule-follower, she never would have snuck into the organization under a false identity in the first place.
The moment the warship touched down, Elysia sought out her second-in-command, Ato.
"Ato, I'm leaving the execution of the Council's orders to you!" she told the veteran warrior, a man she considered an old friend.
Ato, naturally, caught the hidden meaning behind her words immediately. He frowned. "You want me to handle the orders? Then what about you?"
Elysia clearly had her script ready. "Me? As the commander and the strongest fighter here, my job is to clear the smoothest path for the rest of you and scout out the Third Herrscher's location~♪"
She tried to keep her tone as light and airy as usual, and it worked; Ato's heavy brow relaxed slightly.
Still, he shook his head. "No. Nagazora is too dangerous right now. The city is crawling with more Honkai Beasts than we can count. I don't doubt you could hold your own against the Third Herrscher, but if you run into her after exhausting yourself against a localized swarm, we're in trouble. You're our strongest asset; I can't let you take that risk."
Ato wasn't wrong. Elysia was powerful, but her stamina wasn't infinite.
The Combat Department's plan—the slow crawl inward—was designed so that the other units would clear the rank-and-file monsters, allowing Elysia to preserve her full strength for the final confrontation with the Herrscher.
Elysia's suggestion was a total reversal of that logic, and Ato wasn't about to sign off on it.
"Ato..."
Elysia sighed. Suddenly, she tilted her head, looking past him with a look of genuine shock. "Blanca? Griseo? What are you two doing on the battlefield?"
The moment he heard the names of his wife and daughter, Ato spun around instinctively.
When he realized there was no one behind him and turned back, Elysia was already a vanishing silhouette on the horizon.
Ato could only manage a helpless, bitter smile. It was such a clumsy trick, yet because it involved the two women he loved most, it had worked perfectly.
Watching her receding back, Ato knew it was too late to give chase. Even if she hadn't gotten the jump on him, he was no match for her speed.
However, he didn't report this sudden deviation to Combat Command or the Council.
He simply gathered the troops and repeated the excuse Elysia had given him, accounting for the "disappearance" of their commander the moment they hit the dirt.
Having successfully slipped away, Elysia didn't let herself get overconfident. As she engaged a wandering Honkai Beast, she realized her movements weren't as fluid as they used to be.
It was a bizarre sensation—as if she were suddenly unaccustomed to the weight of her own gear and the feel of the weapon in her hand.
--+--
T/N: If you want advance chapters, you can find it at [email protected]/AspenTL