"Abandon... the present..."
Standing beside Xu Xi, Kiana murmured the question, her eyes unfocused.
The sun seemed to shift its position in the sky in mere minutes. The shaft of sunlight pouring through the window moved, finding a new spot to illuminate and driving Kiana back into the shadows.
The present...
What is the present?
Did it mean the life she and Shu were living right now?
No, that wasn't what Kiana had to "abandon."
If she was going to travel to the future, to wait and greet Shu there, then the thing she had to abandon was—
Her civilization.
Abandon her world. Become a homeless, wandering avenger. Awaken in the next era as a leader and a pioneer, launching a futile crusade of vengeance against the Honkai.
Project STIGMA. The Fire Moth.
Kiana understood Xu Xi's meaning almost instantly.
She needed to become this era's Kevin Kaslana. She needed to leave all her hopes for the next era.
Truthfully, Kiana wasn't entirely opposed to that ending.
She firmly believed that humanity would ultimately conquer the Honkai, and she didn't need to be the one standing at the finish line... If she couldn't reach the end, she would gladly spend her life paving the way for those who came after, even if she only advanced it by a single step.
In the original timeline, the Previous Era had been exactly that: the path-builders.
Faced with the ever-escalating threat of the Honkai, humanity's defensive lines had inevitably, uncontrollably crumbled. Confronting an invincible enemy, they had ultimately distilled the pride of their entire civilization into a lethal poison that the Honkai was forced to swallow.
Everyone was destined to die. Everyone could see their inevitable end, and so everyone had been able to make that brutal decision...
But...
But they were different...
Kiana thought of the survivors who were slowly rekindling their hope for life under the protection of the Fire Moth.
She thought of the people of Sapphire City, whom Yun Mengxi had risked her life to save, people who still harbored the hope of returning to a functional society.
The Fire Moth was getting on the right track. The future seemed to be getting brighter. Everyone was holding onto hope.
And now, she was supposed to abandon those hopes? Issue a death sentence to all those people, just so she could travel to the next era?
She couldn't do it!
Even though she knew the current Fire Moth was still hopelessly fragile against the Honkai, even though she knew that no matter how hard this civilization struggled, it was just a moth flying into the flame, seeking its own doom...
She still couldn't bring herself to surrender that infinitesimally small "what if," even if it didn't truly exist.
Kiana knew exactly who she was.
She would undoubtedly fight for her civilization's last dying breath until the bitter end. And above her... there was no Dr. MEI who would forcibly put her into cryosleep.
Mei certainly wouldn't use her own death to force Kiana into a hateful crusade against the Honkai.
So... Kiana was almost certain that if her civilization truly had no future, she would burn to ashes alongside it.
Anyone could travel to the future—Otto, the Class Monitor, Cecilia, Bronya, or even Mei... The only person it couldn't be was her.
So in that future where Shu finally opens his eyes...
She would not be there.
"You can't do it, can you?" Xu Xi stood before the window, the sunlight washing away every shadow from her face.
She gently voiced Kiana's ultimate conclusion for her. Then, she withdrew her gaze, returning to her aloof posture as if she had never turned to look at Kiana in the first place.
"Then prepare yourself to say goodbye." After delivering that single sentence, Xu Xi said nothing more.
The future seemed entirely crystallized within those few words. The optimal path had been laid out before Kiana. All she had to do was reach out, and the future would unfold exactly as Xu Xi described.
"..."
Kiana lowered her head, slowly clenching her fists in the darkness.
"But... I don't want to run away."
The tireless breeze suddenly ceased, holding its breath like Xu Xi.
Kiana softly rejected the answer.
"I refuse to let another person flee from Shu's life."
...
The aloof, otherworldly girl slowly turned her head, looking at the young woman whose path was destined to diverge from her own.
"Flee...?"
—
Have you ever been a genius?
The kind of genius that leaves people in the dust the moment they lay eyes on you, so overwhelmingly brilliant that they don't even dare to chase after you?
Ah... that question is probably a bit unfair.
But it seems I truly am that kind of genius.
From the moment I opened my eyes and recognized that the woman in front of me was my 'mother,' and the man who occasionally returned home was my 'father,' I pretty much understood.
I am not like anyone else.
The distance implied by that 'not like anyone else' is incredibly vast. It's like a long, straight road leading directly to the finish line, devoid of any novelty or surprise.
I didn't need to 'learn' knowledge. It didn't even need to be poured into my head.
It was always there. The knowledge simply came to claim me.
Just like you don't need to study what 'pain' is. The moment your hand touches something hot, you know.
I knew everything, and it always felt exactly like that. The world would give me a single reminder, and from then on, I would never forget.
It sounds amazing, doesn't it? Something to be envied.
Ah...
Perhaps I only fail to cherish it because it belongs to me.
This world is so profoundly boring.
I am not sick.
I am simply, truly, bored.
Bored to my very bones. Bored to the point where every single cell in my body is yawning. Bored to the point where the first thing I do when I open my eyes every morning is calculate exactly how many hours I need to kill today.
Human beings need 'the unknown' in order to survive.
Because 'the unknown' means tomorrow might hold a surprise. The next page might hold an answer. The next person you meet might bring a light you have never seen before.
But my world has no surprises, no suspense, no 'maybes.'
It is a map laid out entirely bare, from the starting line to the ultimate destination. And I stand perfectly in the center, having been everywhere, yet wishing to go nowhere.
Unless... someone walks right up to me of their own volition.
I have an older brother. His name is Shu.
He is different.
The looks other people give me are nothing more than curiosity, amazement, jealousy, alienation, sycophancy, fear... Every single gaze is like a perfectly straight tunnel; I can see the exit with a single glance.
First they are drawn in, then they are stung, and then they retreat to a safe distance, studying me through the glass like a museum exhibit.
It operates like a mathematical formula, an absolute truth that everyone instinctively follows.
But my brother... he is like a river. He flows, and then he suddenly bends. He bends, and then he diverges. He diverges, and then he converges again.
I stand on this side of the river, watching those branching tributaries, completely unsure of where they will ultimately lead.
Sometimes, I look closely, absolutely certain I've seen the end.
But when I get closer, I realize it's only a blind curve. Behind that curve, the river stretches on even longer, leading to places even further away.
Ah...
I failed.
How wonderful.