Collapse, but Stand users

Ling's breathing was as even as ripples on a lake, and her pink hair was scattered on the pillow like crushed morning glow.

Sakura sat on the edge of the bed, counting the length of her sister's eyelashes by the moonlight—a habit she had developed since the day she was controlled by the poisonous pupa, as if this would confirm that Ling was still alive and well.

The old wall clock ticked away, shattering the silence of the guest room.

Sakura's gaze fell on the photo frame on the bedside table. Inside was a yellowed photograph: a retired assassin holding young Sakura and Ling in his arms, with a small courtyard full of fallen leaves in the background. The assassin had a scar on his face that ran from his brow bone to his jaw, but when he smiled, he looked like an old cat basking in the sun.

"A hitman should be like a fallen leaf, rotting in the soil, forgotten by everyone."

The old assassin always said this, but one snowy morning, he shoved a gleaming dagger into her hand.

“But you are different. You have to be like pine needles, able to sprout even when they are planted in the soil.”

At that time, Sakura didn't understand. She only knew that the old assassin's knife was very fast, and that when he cut vegetables, he could make carrot cubes as even as dice. When he taught her how to disassemble a gun, his fingers were more nimble than butterflies.

Until that stormy night, the man in the black trench coat kicked open the courtyard door, gunshots shattered the windowpanes, the old assassin pushed her and Ling into the cellar, and rushed out with a hunting rifle.

"Remember, stay hidden and don't make a sound."

These were the last words he said.

Blood droplets seeped into the cracks of the cellar, like blooming red plum blossoms.

Sakura covered Ling's mouth, listening to the screams and gunshots outside, and only dared to crawl out at dawn.

The old assassin lay dead by the threshold, still clutching the dagger in his hand. The word "Freedom" engraved on the hilt was soaked in blood, a glaring red.

The men in black trench coats didn't kill them, seemingly because they knew the old assassin had passed on his skills to Sakura, and they used Ling as leverage to force Sakura to work for them.

The poisonous pupa seems to know that Honkai energy has special functions and is secretly conducting human experiments.

Ling became one of the test subjects, but she also had to blackmail Sakura, so the poisonous pupae were not made too much of a mess.

Sakura then learned that the old assassin was once the ace of the "Poison Chrysalis" organization, and retired because he refused to carry out missions of human experimentation.

From then on, Sakura became the shadow of the poisonous pupa. By day, she was an ordinary girl taking her younger sister to the park; by night, she was an assassin who snapped the necks of her targets.

She learned to use smiles to conceal the glint of a blade and gentleness to wrap up murderous intent, but after each mission, she would lock herself in the bathroom, scrubbing the bloodstains under her fingernails until her skin turned red and painful.

This trip to the Oasis was indeed a vacation "approved" by the poisonous pupae.

Ling kept talking about the luminous manta ray in the textbook, saying she wanted to touch the glowing fish herself. Ying saved up her three months' worth of bonuses, booked the cheapest guesthouse, and even bought a new dress, trying to make Ling think they were really just on vacation.

Until three days ago, the communicator of the Poison Chrysalis lit up in the middle of the night: "Target: Möbius, Mirror Lake Hotel, bounty of 30 million, to be found alive or dead."

The accompanying photo shows a green-haired woman in a white lab coat, smiling, with a laboratory full of test tubes in the background—the very same Moth of Fire chief researcher infamous for human experimentation.

Sakura gripped the communicator tightly, her knuckles turning white.

She knew Mebius; the database of the Poison Chrysalis stated that this man had dissected thirty-seven Honkai Energy Adaptors, and his fingers were colder than a scalpel.

Killing her wasn't difficult; the challenge was how to do it right under Ling's nose, and how to ensure that after the mission was completed, Poison Chrysalis would keep its promise and inject Ling with the antidote that "inhibits Honkai energy erosion."

"Sister?" Ling turned over, her little hand groping around on the pillow. "Why aren't you asleep?"

Sakura snapped out of her daze, suppressing the coldness in her eyes, and reached out to pull her younger sister into her arms: "I was afraid you'd kick off the covers."

She smelled the coconut scent in Ling's hair—when they went to the night market that afternoon, Aili bought Ling a bottle of coconut milk shampoo, saying, "A young girl should smell nice."

Ling snuggled against her and mumbled, "Tomorrow... can I go boating with the pink-haired sister? Her crystal is so pretty..."

"Yes." Sakura's voice was a little tight as she gently patted her younger sister's back. "I'll take you there after I finish my 'work'."

She didn't say that this "job" might mean she could never come back.

There is no turning back in the mission of the Poison Chrysalis; failed assassins and their families become specimens on the experimental table.

......

The open-air café at the Mirror Lake Hotel is filled with the aroma of Blue Mountain coffee.

Ellie was holding colored pencils, drawing a manta ray on the back of the menu. Her pink tail swept across the paper, splashing out tiny specks of fluorescence—a new ability she had mastered that allowed her drawings to glow briefly.

"Sister Mebius, look at this!" She ran over, menu in hand, crystal shards in her hair shimmering with her movements. "Doesn't it look like the glowing bacteria in your lab?"

Mebius had just ended a communication with the Firemoth headquarters, and the words "Internal security level upgraded" were still on the screen.

She took the menu, her fingertips tracing the fluorescent lines, a hint of surprise flashing in her eyes: "The energy fluctuations are very stable, much more condensed than when we were in the ruins last time."

She took out a small testing device from her bag and scanned the pattern. "92% purity, almost as good as a purified gemstone."

"Really?" Ellie's eyes lit up. "Can I shoot down the helicopter with my crystal arrow? I saw heroes doing that in the picture book last time!"

Toulong walked over carrying three iced lattes, and paused upon hearing this: "Dangerous actions are prohibited from being imitated."

He placed the coffee in front of Ellie, and water droplets from the cup dripped onto the table, spreading into a small dark patch.

Qianjie leaned against the pillar of the parasol, his gaze sweeping over the suspicious vehicles at the hotel entrance—since the restaurant attack, there had been a significant increase in these cars with out-of-town license plates, their plates covered in mud and their windows tinted with dark film, resembling lurking beetles.

“Time to prepare for camping.” His voice was low, and the bone blade trembled slightly inside his sleeve.

When Ellie suggested camping by the lake, Toulong agreed almost without hesitation. The reed beds on the west bank of Mirror Lake are the best spot to observe the manta rays, away from the hustle and bustle of the hotel and away from those subtle, prying eyes.

Mebius had intended to go with them, but was called away by an urgent communication from headquarters. Before leaving, he gave Ellie a small bottle of fluorescent dye: "Sprinkle it on the tent, and it will look like stars at night."

“She doesn’t seem… so bad.” Ellie stirred the sugar cubes in her coffee, watching Möbius walk into the elevator. “She said she would teach me how to make glowing soap bubbles.”

Toulong didn't reply, but just drew circles on the surface of his coffee with the straw.

Mebius was indeed quite good to his experimental subjects, at least that was the case in the simulation with Kaz. It's likely that after they were captured in the ruins and sent to Mebius, he wouldn't have harmed them.

But at this moment, he disliked Mebius's green eyes, which seemed to see through everything, and he disliked even more the way she looked at Ellie, as if she were observing an experimental sample.

Qianjie suddenly nudged his arm and gestured towards the northwest with his lips.

Looking through the tunnel, one could see Sakura holding Ling's hand, walking out of the hotel's side door. Ling was holding a windmill, its pink blades spinning rapidly.

Sakura's eyes met his, and she instantly tensed up, pulling Ling along as they hurried toward the dock, as if trying to avoid something.

"She's about to make her move." Qianjie's voice was as cold as ice. "Her killing intent is stronger than yesterday."

Tou Ryu watched Sakura's figure disappear into the crowd at the dock, the coffee stain on his fingertips spreading into a dark circle: "It's none of our business."

He picked up his camping bag. "Let's go to the reed marshes."

When Möbius pushed open the door to the presidential suite, he smelled a very faint scent of blood—not fresh, but as if diluted by some kind of solvent and hidden in expensive fragrance.

She calmly pressed the emergency button by the door, her movements as elegant as if she were attending a dinner party as she took off her trench coat: "My friend hiding behind the curtains, would you like me to pour you a glass of whiskey?"

The shadow behind the curtains shifted, and Sakura tightened her grip on the dagger.

She was supposed to make her move after Toulong and the others left, but she was annoyed by the communications from the Poison Chrysalis—they said that a "colleague" was also eyeing Mebius, and she had to finish the job quickly, otherwise Ling's antidote would be "delayed in supply."

"The poisonous pupa's knife, still so unoriginal." Möbius walked to the liquor cabinet, poured himself a glass of amber liquid, and said, "Is your boss still the same as always? Likes to use children as bargaining chips?"

Sakura's pupils suddenly contracted, and her short sword flashed from its sheath, reflecting the cold light of the crystal chandelier: "How did you know?"

I know more than you think.

Möbius swirled his wine glass, the liquid leaving long, thin streaks on the rim. "For example, Ling's Honkai energy adaptability was obtained through a bone marrow transplant from the old assassin, for example..."

Her words were interrupted by a deafening roar.

Several dark shadows suddenly flashed past the window, and the searchlight of the helicopter pierced the night, the beams of light like cold spears stabbing into the room.

"Mebius! Die!" A hoarse roar came from the loudspeaker, followed by the rattling sound of machine gun fire. Bullets pierced the glass and punched countless bullet holes in the wall.

Sakura instinctively lunged forward and pinned Mebius to the floor.

The bullet grazed her hair and struck the liquor cabinet, shattering an expensive whiskey bottle and splashing her with liquor and glass shards.

“The Anti-Honkai Alliance are lunatics.” Mebius sneered beneath her, but a hint of seriousness flashed in his eyes. “They actually managed to get their hands on an armed helicopter.”

Sakura's face was whiter than shards of glass.

She wasn't protecting Mebius; she simply knew perfectly well that if Mebius were killed by the Anti-Honkai Alliance, the Poison Chrysalis wouldn't be able to obtain a complete body, her mission would fail, and Ling's antidote would be wasted.

"Hide in the bathroom!" Sakura dragged Mebius to the bathroom door, her short sword drawing a silver line in the darkness, precisely piercing the wrist of a black-clad man who had broken in through the window.

The bathroom door had just closed when the sound of a grenade exploding came from outside, causing the tiles to crumble and fall.

Mebius pulled a modified pistol from the inner pocket of his briefcase, the magazine engraved with a serpentine pattern: "Looks like we'll have to let these 'righteous men' know today that the Moth Chasers aren't so easy to kill."

Sakura leaned against the door, panting. Her wrist was cut by shrapnel, and drops of blood dripped onto the floor, mixing with the wine.

She watched as Mebius expertly inspected the magazines and suddenly felt a sense of absurdity—the person she had wanted to kill just minutes before was now her only ally.

"Why are you helping me?" Möbius suddenly asked, pointing the gun at the crack in the bathroom door.

“I will only kill you.” Sakura’s voice was dry, as if it had been sanded. “Your bounty can only belong to the poisonous pupa.”

Mebius chuckled softly, his laughter interrupted by another round of gunfire: "Interesting. Then let's 'cooperate' for now and see if the Anti-Honkai Alliance's bullets are faster, or the Poison Chrysalis's blade."

They maneuvered through a hail of bullets, using the cramped space of the bathroom to dodge them.

Sakura's short sword is designed to strike vital points, and each strike can incapacitate an enemy; Mebius's marksmanship is cunning, and his bullets always hit the enemy's joints with pinpoint accuracy.

But there were too many enemies, pouring in like a tide through the broken windows and doors. The helicopter's searchlights were always locked on the direction of the bathroom, as if guiding the ground troops to their target.

"Where are your reinforcements?" Sakura's arm was grazed by a stray bullet, and blood dripped from her fingertips onto her pistol. "The Moth Chaser shouldn't be this slow."

Mebius's expression darkened.

The emergency button had been pressed for almost ten minutes. Normally, the Moth Chaser branch stationed in Oasis City should have surrounded the hotel by now, but apart from the roars of the Anti-Honkai Alliance, there was no sound of their own people outside.

"It seems there's a 'minor problem' inside." Her voice was as cold as a scalpel. "Someone is trying to use someone else to do their dirty work."

Sakura's heart sank. She could feel her strength draining away rapidly, and the pain from her wounds gnawed at her nerves like ants.

Toulong and the others should have already set up their tents in the reeds, right? Is Ling wondering why she hasn't gone back yet?

"I never thought I'd die here." Sakura leaned against the cold tiles, the tip of her short sword carving a desperate line across the ground. "That's right, killing so many people, this is my retribution. I just pity my sister; she's still waiting for me to take her to see the manta ray..."

Mebius's gun trembled slightly. She had seen too many killers confessing before their death, but this was the first time she had heard pure despair in such a voice, like the last cry for help from a drowning person.

Möbius hated death, and he hated her hopeless state.

"Shut up." She growled as she pulled the trigger, the bullet piercing an enemy's shoulder. "I haven't lost yet."

Before the words were even finished, the roar of the helicopter suddenly became extremely piercing, and it tilted as if it had gone out of control.

The spotlight beam swayed wildly in the room, finally settling on the bathroom doorway.

Sakura and Möbius looked up at the same time and saw a pink streak of light pierce the night sky, like a shooting star with a long tail, and shoot precisely at the helicopter's propeller.

"Buzz — Click!"

It was an arrow formed from crystal, its shaft gleaming with a soft pink light, yet its tip was as sharp as a knife.

The moment the propeller was hit, the blades shattered like fragile glass, the helicopter lost its balance, and plummeted toward the distant lake, billowing black smoke. It created huge waves on the water, and the fluorescent algae were scattered everywhere, like a handful of glowing stardust.

"Hmm, I'm still getting used to this new ability." Ellie's voice, tinged with a hint of embarrassed excitement, came from the ventilation duct. "Sorry I'm late, you two."

The ventilation duct grille was pried open from the outside, and Toulong's figure peeked in first. His gray eyes swept over the mess in the bathroom, and his stone right hand gleamed with a faint blue light in the darkness.

Qianjie followed closely behind, his bone blade still stained with fresh blood, clearly having just taken down the sniper on the roof.

"Why are you here?" Mebius put away his pistol, a hint of surprise flashing in his green eyes, but more so understanding—the only way to get here in such a short time was for the Dragon's perception to give him an early warning.

“Aili is worried about you.” Toulong’s voice was calm. Even though Mebius had previously sent people to hunt down the two of them, Alicia was still worried about her safety.

He stepped out of the bathroom and stood in the center of the room filled with corpses, exposing himself to the enemy's view.

Those members of the Anti-Honkai Alliance who were still putting up a stubborn resistance were suddenly controlled by an invisible hand. Some were hit by guns fired by their own people, while others slipped on broken glass and hit their necks on sharp table corners. The screams quickly subsided.

Sakura watched this miraculous scene and loosened her grip on the sword.

She finally understood why the document Möbius had placed on the table contained the words "Avoid making enemies of Toulong".

"Are you alright?" Ellie peeked out from behind Toulong and saw the wound on Sakura's arm. She immediately ran over, pink light swirling around her fingertips. "Let me take care of it for you."

The warm light seeped into the wound, and the pain instantly lessened considerably.

Sakura stared blankly at Ellie's serious profile, suddenly remembering the old assassin's words: "True light is not about burning away the darkness, but about enabling those struggling in the darkness to dare to look up at the moon."

The task of clearing the battlefield was handed over to the Fire Moth unit, which arrived late.

Mebius stood on the terrace, looking at the lingering glow of the lake in the distance, a miniature communicator clutched in her hand. She had just confirmed through the encrypted channel that the internal traitor was indeed the supervisor in charge of the Oasis branch, who had already been turned by the Anti-Honkai Alliance. This siege was nothing more than a trap set by collusion between insiders and outsiders.

"Thank you." She said to Toulong, who had walked up to her, her tone no longer playful but more sincere. "I owe you one."

Toulong gazed towards the reed marshes, where Ai Li and Qian Jie were demonstrating to Ling how to decorate a tent with fluorescent dye, their laughter as clear as silver bells.

"Ah."