Lightning Empress

As Kouro and the others went to the evacuation site, at the same time somewhere else.

Mei was standing still staring coldly ahead towards a horde of Honkai Beasts heading towards her.

The horde numbered in the hundreds with various types of Honkai Beasts.

Seeing the horde of monsters approaching, Mei's body was covered in purple lightning flashes, with the katana in her hand also covered in purple lightning.

Her black eyes slowly turned bright purple with the lightning flashes.

She was then seen setting up an attack stance before moving as fast as lightning, she headed towards the Honkai Beast horde without any fear.

*Swoosh!*

In just the blink of an eye, she had arrived behind the Honkai Beast horde and the Honkai Beasts' movements suddenly seemed to stop before Mei who was behind them slowly sheathed her katana without looking back.

*Slash!*

All of the Honkai Beasts were suddenly stung by a purple lightning bolt before being chopped into pieces until they finally became dust.

Coincidentally, a strong wind came blowing the dust along with Mei's long hair up.

"Two thousand three hundred..." She muttered.

The number was the total number of all the monsters she had eliminated.

She then closed her eyes for a moment with her head tilted upwards before opening her eyes again slowly.

Her eyes which were originally purple now turned back to black.

Mei wore a pensive expression.

She recalled the past when she was still just an ordinary girl who pretended to be tough about everything.

She remembered when she needed Kiana's help just to fight a Seraph-type Honkai Beast which was the weakest Honkai Beast.

She remembered how weak she used to be and how helpless she was in the past.

Thinking of this, Mei smiled, but actually, she wanted to laugh, when she was still weak like that time, she was thinking of helping carry the burden that Kouro carried alone.

She really realized how naive she was back then.

Mei looked at her palms which were full of scars that had dried up. In the past when she practiced swordsmanship with someone wearing a HOMU costume, her palms were also like this.

But then the scars slowly disappeared because she didn't have enough time to practice swordsmanship.

And now the scars were back because she was practicing hard to control her Herrscher powers.

And her hard work did pay off, in the past Seraph-type Honkai Beasts were very difficult for her to defeat, but now, let alone a Seraph, even an Emperor-type Honkai Beasts were defeated by her easily.

Staring at her palm for a long time, she clenched her hand into a fist with her eyes looking forward with a determined expression.

She had now become strong! Mei felt confident that with her current strength, she deserved to stand beside Kouro.

Hmm... Could this be the time?

Mei thought of the promise she made to herself long ago when she felt strong enough to stand beside Kouro.

That promise was to declare her love for Kouro.

Thinking of that promise, Mei then felt her cheeks burn as she felt very shy and worried.

'What if Kouro rejects me?'

'What if after I confessed to him, Kouro then leaves me?'

'What if Kouro already has someone he likes?'

All these questions flashed through her mind, and slowly they became absurd, and finally, Mei stopped and smacked both her cheeks to wake herself up.

*Slap!*

'Remember Mei! You're determined to confess to him after all this is over! So stop those meaningless thoughts!'

After thinking like this, Mei let out a sigh of relief.

The Kouro she knew was not that kind of person, he was a reliable person, calm and kind, liked to joke around even though he was a bit... 'Dense', no, maybe very 'Dense'?

Yes. Kouro's flaw was only one, he was just too 'Dense'.

Hmm... If only Kouro wasn't this 'Dense'...

Mei then imagined a Kouro that was not 'Dense'.

In her mind was an image of Kouro hugging many girls into his arms with a smile like a pervert.

The Kouro imagined by Mei looks like a certain Harem protagonist.

(E/D: ... Issei... Soldiers! Bring out the flamer! The HEAVY FLAMER!)

Blue veins appeared on her forehead while being covered in purple lightning when imagining this.

Although it was all imagined, still when she thought of Kouro having such traits...

She felt very annoyed, upset, and angry.

To be able to make the gentle and kind Mei so angry... Kouro's not 'Dense' nature was indeed very annoying.

Fortunately, Kouro had a 'Dense' nature otherwise...

Mei remembered the kitchen knife she always carried just in case.

(I can imagine Mei and Grail-kun becoming the best of friends as their motto goes: Got a problem, here take a knife, no problem.)

Hmm... Maybe the suggestion of cutting off Kouro's 'PP' wasn't so bad either...

...

On the other hand, at the same time, Kouro who was running with the others suddenly got goosebumps.

"Wh-what?!" Kouro stopped and turned his head right and left with cold sweat running down.

He had for a moment suddenly felt a premonition of death.

"What's wrong Kouro? Why did you stop?" asked Himeko.

Kouro who turned his head right and left did not feel the premonition of death anymore, so he let out a sigh of relief.

"No, it's okay, let's continue." he said and quickly ran, not realizing that his face was already covered in sweat.

Himeko and the others looked at each other before shrugging and following behind.

...

Mei who was still thinking whether or not cutting off Kouro's 'PP' was necessary, suddenly heard someone's voice from behind her.

"Is it done?"  

Mei who heard this then turned around and looked at the person who spoke.

That person turned out to be Durandal, looking from her slightly dirty clothes it seemed like she had just helped some survivors who were crushed by the ruins of fallen buildings.

"Durandal-san? Yes. I'm done, this place has been cleared of Honkai Beasts." Mei replied softly.

Durandal gave her a long look before finally sighing, "...No matter how many times I see it, your way of fighting is so impressive, I think I understand why people call you the 'Lightning Empress'."

She saw the way Mei exterminated those Honkai Beasts, fast, powerful, without unnecessary movements, and precise, that was how Durandal described Mei's fighting technique.

Durandal also recalled a few months ago when she had a collaboration mission with Mei's team.

She still remembered her first encounter with Mei.

The purple lightning that danced on her body and followed her commands, the purple eyes that were cold but at the same time captivating, those were all sights she saw when she fought the Honkai Beast together with her.

And it was also at that moment that Mei earned the nickname 'Lightning Empress'.

Mei smiled embarrassedly when she heard Durandal's praise, "Mou... Durandal-san, compared to you I'm nothing."

Mei wasn't lying, with the power of her Herrscher, she could feel the immense power from within Durandal's body.

"Then what about you, have you eradicated all the remaining Honkai Beasts?" Mei asked.

Durandal nodded "I have eradicated many Honkai Beasts from various places."

The suddenly decreased Honkai Beast aura felt by Higokumaru was caused by Durandal.

She had apparently eradicated all the remaining Honkai Beasts throughout the city of Manila.

As expected for an S-ranks Valkyrie.

"By the way, Mei-san, with your powers, are you able to sense the location of hidden survivors?" asked Durandal with a serious expression.

Durandal had been told by Otto a few months ago that Mei was a Herrscher who possessed electromagnetic abilities.

Hearing her question, Mei nodded her head and then closed her eyes for a few moments before finally opening her eyes again and wearing a serious expression.

She then turned to look at Durandal, "I can sense thousands of survivors who are trapped in various locations, being crushed by the ruins, trapped inside a place, and so on."

"We will save them, take me to the nearest survivor first." said Durandal with a serious expression.

"Understood!"

After saying that, Mei then informed her about the nearest places that had trapped survivors.

These places turned out to be close to the location of Rita and her teammates, she then informed Rita using Virtual communication.

A brilliant idea then came to Durandal's mind, she then asked Mei about all the locations of the survivors.

Mei roughly understood her plan and supported it so she answered her with as much detail as possible.

After memorizing all the locations mentioned by Mei, Durandal then sent the information to all the Valkyries on duty in the city of Manila.

Durandal knew that she couldn't save everyone alone, so she asked the other Valkyries for help.

__

At the same time, on the other side.

Nakuru, who was walking around aimlessly, suddenly received a one-way message from Durandal.

"Hm? What is this? The location of the remaining survivors?"

He stared at the virtual map screen in front of him and he saw that there were several red dots very close to his location.

He quickly searched around his neighborhood before finding several survivors who were crushed under the rubble and trapped indoors.

Nakuru gave first aid to the injured survivors and eventually took the survivors he rescued to the nearest safe place.

"It's very distressing to help someone..." Nakuru muttered.

__

Moments later, Kouro along with the others had arrived at the Evacuation site.

Kouro raised his head to look at the white-colored building.

It was very strange that this building had not been reduced to rubble like the other buildings.

Kouro approached and touched the wall of the building.

"This texture... This hardness... Don't tell me that this wall was made using Honkai Beast shells?" muttered Kouro with a surprised expression.

It was extremely rare for a country to use Honkai Beast shells as building materials for evacuation buildings alone.

The Honkai Beast shell was stronger and lighter than any other metal, of course, the Honkai Beast shell could not be compared to Soulium.

Soulium was after all very rare and even if told to look for it, that mineral only existed on the moon.

Kouro and the others then went inside.

They saw several Valkyries standing guard and carrying some seriously injured survivors on stretchers to a certain place.

"Quickly take this patient to that place!" said a Valkyrie to her friend who was carrying a patient on a stretcher.

Kouro who saw that then said goodbye to Higokumaru and the others before quickly following the two Valkyries.

"You guys wait here, I suddenly have some rather important business, see you later."

"Kouro-kun?!" Ayame and the others called out in confusion.

Unfortunately, Kouro did not hear their words, on the way he also did not forget to heal some patients or even injured Valkyries using the authority of [Death and life] unobtrusively.

Walking after the two Valkyries, he then found a special room for patients who were really badly injured with a very high percentage of death.

Kouro unceremoniously entered the room before furrowing his brow at the smell of blood, sweat, and whatnot that smelled so pungent.

Because he could not stand the smell, Kouro took out a filter mask from his inventory.

After being able to breathe freely, Kouro then looked at all the patients in the room who were arguably in a terrible state.

There were those who had both hands cut off, stomachs pierced with sharp iron pipes, legs amputated, and so on.

He didn't see Tianwu and the others in this room, he only saw a few doctors who were closing the wound of a patient whose hip had been cut deeply.

Staring at them, Kouro then changed his clothes into doctor's clothes and then put on his 'See-through' glasses.

Of course, he wore them not for anything else, but to see which parts of the body were the most severely injured.

Walking with calm steps and observing the patients who were lying on the mattress and often hissing in pain.

A young doctor then noticed Kouro's arrival, "Who are you? This place is forbidden to be entered by unauthorized persons!"

"Who am I? I am a doctor sent directly by Overseer Otto!" said Kouro firmly.

For now, Kouro is not a warrior who fights on the front lines but a Doctor who saves someone's life on the back end!