Regarding the question of whether one thousand lives are enough to beat Honkai Impact 3rd.

The girl always gives herself the exact same answer.

The answer has never changed, never wavered.

Because my mother died in battle.

That tall, gentle, plain-looking, muscular mother who would embrace all her hobbies died in battle.

That mother who was strict with herself but lenient with others, that mother who looked so out of place in her apron yet would cook for me so earnestly, that mother I was somewhat afraid of but also deeply loved, and who I planned to repay in my own way…

They died under the trampling of the collapsing city.

[Colonel Lewis encountered the Emperor-class Honkai Beast codenamed Ashura at 2:23 PM on February 21st.]

[Faced with certain defeat in the battle, she ultimately sacrificed her life to destroy Ashura's arms and cause him to be rendered inoperable for thirty-seven minutes.]

The remaining seventy-eight survivors in the city, who were under her protection, were all saved as a result.

On the day she arrived at the Australian branch, reality played a cruel joke on Carol Pepper, crushing her last remaining hopes into dust.

Himeko stopped reading the rest of the text. She looked into those suddenly empty eyes but didn't know how to comfort them.

She had seen too many of these things, to the point of being numb.

Although it is cruel, in such a world, those who cannot quickly recover from their grief and the past and choose to carry on with heavy burdens will find it difficult to survive.

The woman chose to leave, leaving only one sentence behind.

After that day, Carol was completely distraught and remained silent and dazed for three days.

When Fu Hua finally met her... it was already at the recruit camp.

How stupid of me to choose this path.

The recruit camp was full of high-intensity training that used to make her complain endlessly. Compared to the girl who would carefully relax her calf muscles after jogging a few steps, the person now seemed to have shed the remains of the past, and was etched by the world and time into an unrecognizable state.

Carol had become accustomed to responding to everything with silence. Only in front of her few remaining friends would she pretend that nothing had happened, maintaining this facade with an empty, familiar smile and the same tone of voice as before.

When she was alone, she lost the ability to speak.

Why bother about appearance anymore? But even before such a question could arise, the lingering feeling of caring about such things had vanished.

My mother had dark skin, strong muscles, and a sharp, angular face. She always stood out from women with fair skin and slender figures.

Carol used to hate her mother's appearance; she might have been a bad child.

But as she grew up, she eventually accepted it.

She loved her mother like that.

She loved her mother, who was so upright, straightforward, and unique.

But she died.

Therefore, Carol Pepper had to join the Firemoth. She had to undergo arduous training, endure pain and torment, overcome fear and sorrow, and then step onto the battlefield filled with smoke and death.

The reason is simple: without joining the Moth of Fire, one cannot know the truth about Honkai.

This is the result of the stubborn continuation of previous policies, and also a comforting thought that gives rise to hopeful expectations among the uninformed public.

Himeko cannot deny that such practices have a definite effect, and she also believes that it is better for people who do not have the corresponding awareness not to face such a reality.

But such a choice was too difficult for Carol.

The mother's death was caused by that so-called Emperor-class Honkai Beast, but what is Emperor-class? What is a Honkai Beast? What is Honkai? Why does Honkai occur? Who is the real culprit?

I can't let go of what I don't know, I can't forgive myself if I don't know, I can't do anything for that person if I don't move forward, and if I don't know... I have no reason to continue living.

Carol didn't want any of those dreams, futures, or life and death.

So empty, so sad, so hopeless.

It was as if my heart had already broken down at that time. Even if I died on the virtual battlefield and was pierced by the Honkai Beast's lance, it seemed to have little effect.

Carol simply realized that this was her limit. After seeing Xiao Hua wield a thin sword and slay one Honkai Beast after another that she thought she couldn't defeat, she understood even more that this was reality.

So-called enlightenment and effort cannot overcome those things that are innate.

A weak person is weak; even if they become stronger, they can only stay at a certain limit.

The fact that even someone as powerful as my mother died at the hands of the Honkai Beasts proves that neither short-term efforts nor long-term suffering can bring the desired results.

Will my actions upset that person?

Not important anymore.

Anyway, she won't be able to see it.

90. Meeting an old friend in a foreign land, at St. Peter's Basilica.

During the four months that Su Qing'an was in slumber, both humanity and the Honkai were advancing at their own pace.

In such a world, roughly half a year is enough to completely crush a person, or enough for a person to be reborn from the ashes.

Fu Hua, Shigure Kira, and Carol successfully graduated from the recruit camp and stepped into the battlefield.

In the past, recruit training in military camps lasted up to three months, followed by various procedures and screenings. Only after this process could the survival rate of soldiers entering the battlefield be considered normal.

However, these rules and regulations had to be relaxed due to insufficient staff.

Currently, the only condition that cannot be relaxed is Honkai energy literacy. Without this key element, going to the battlefield is simply a waste of resources.

Without exception, all the personnel in the Fifth Squad's recruit camp who possess the necessary Honkai energy skills are women.

It is wishful thinking to expect most people who do not meet the physical requirements to reach the physical fitness level of a qualified soldier in just one month.

Therefore, the gap above this can only be filled with basic armor.

As the earliest proposer and inventor of the concept of armor for Honkai energy applications, Himeko's emphasis on armor is self-evident.

However, she simply didn't have the time to work part-time researching armor, so she applied to her superiors for a proposal on a general-purpose Honkai energy combat armor.

In fact, this was a request that had been made earlier, but it had not been put on the agenda for a long time.

Even though Himeko's own armor was gradually becoming less effective in supporting combat than the frequent appearances of the King-class Honkai Beasts, she had no choice but to apply for armor optimization.

Su Qing'an, who killed Ganesha with a single sword strike, may not have had any profound experience, but the reality is that the Emperor-level Honkai Beasts of the pre-civilization era and the Emperor-level Honkai Beasts of the post-civilization era are completely different levels of beings.

Even though they are all Ganesha, their strength cannot be generalized.

However, the limits he himself had crossed were far beyond those, which led to the seemingly indistinguishable situation.

Therefore, the current situation is that the Emperor-class Honkai Beasts are in a very troublesome position at this stage, given the current restrictions on large-scale weaponry.

Even though the top leadership's policy is to vigorously develop large-scale weapons such as Honkai Impact Explosion-type weapons.

However, to defend the remaining cities, these large armed forces can only play a decisive role at crucial moments.

However, given the constraint of not affecting the city itself, the individual combat effectiveness of the soldiers was inadvertently increased.

This also meant that even if it meant temporarily deviating from the core policy, the authorities had to pay attention to the casualty rate attached to Himeko's application.

Humans with Honkai energy literacy are not commonplace; rather, they are a rare resource that must be taken seriously from a long-term strategic perspective.

The fully autonomous robot soldiers meant that the casualty rate was not so high as to be unacceptable to the authorities, but the overall casualty trend in the battle presented in this report is an issue that needs attention.

Eliminating potential threats before they materialize is the most cost-effective approach.

Just as the authorities were preparing to continue allocating substantial funds and resources to the original armor project team, the progress report from the Quantum Sea Experiment Group drew the attention of the higher-ups to Mei's existence.

This girl, who had joined the Quantum Sea Experiment Group less than half a month ago, easily overcame a problem that should have taken ten years to begin to show results.

No one can doubt her talent in this area; in fact, many believe that Dr. Mei may have been born specifically for the Quantum Sea project.

But Mei herself was far from satisfied with this; she no longer had time to waste on getting people to slowly accept her uniqueness.

With Dr. Moon as his guarantor, Mei gained another identity.

That is, an advisor to the general-purpose collapse combat armor design team.

From the perspective of officials and academics, this is an arrogant act that treats the entire project team as if they don't exist.

Despite Mei's exceptional talent, she still received this insignificant, nominal position.

Therefore, in May, the general-purpose Honkai Energy combat armor was successfully optimized.

This is an unreasonable talent, a powerful disregard for logic.

This young girl, not even twenty years old, completely crushed the skills that her predecessors had accumulated over the years into dust, and in an absurdly short amount of time.

The answers to everything seemed to appear naturally in Mei's eyes; she would never be wrong or fail.

While others need hundreds or thousands of failed experiments to arrive at a theory, Mei proved the correctness of his theory with a single experiment while simultaneously constructing it.

However, what truly solidified Mei's position was not the optimization of the armor.

It was because of yet another deal between Seele and her.

……

……

Upon waking up and seeing the girl's serene profile, Seele was stunned for a moment.

If you are unharmed, it means the experiment has been successful.

The girl's lips curved into a joyful smile. She gazed into Mei's calm eyes and asked in a light tone:

"Am I still of any use to you, Dr. Mei?"

The unusual tone in which Seele said this, and the question itself, made Mei, who was still in her early teens, feel strange.

These are words that shouldn't be uttered in this situation, but they seem understandable when applied to the other person.

She adjusted her glasses and said quietly:

“…Miss Seele, please don’t use such a misleading way of speaking.”

"In short, I think I understand what you mean."

"There are still things you want me to do, right?"

The little girl recalled the girl's tear-filled blue eyes, and she nodded obediently, saying earnestly:

"I want Dr. Mei to research a reagent that can cure Honkai, and then help me use it to save someone."

"All we need to do is let him live a little longer."