A soft sigh escaped Kazuki as he mulled over the thought.
He pulled up the chat group interface and tagged a specific member.
[Cliffhanger King: @Titania II, it’s all taken care of.
You can come back now.]
The message sent without a hitch.
A flicker of anticipation warmed him as he leaned against the cool stone wall at the alley’s entrance, content to wait.
The morning mist of Aurum Alley had yet to burn away, clinging to his eyelashes with a damp, refreshing touch.
A quarter of an hour bled into the quiet morning.
The group remained silent.
A cold weight settled in Kazuki’s stomach, and a nameless panic began to creep up his spine.
Had something happened?
He frantically opened the group notifications, his eyes scanning the rescue warning section.
It was quiet, with no new alerts.
The last time Firefly had been in danger, the entire group had been blasted with an emergency warning.
This time, there was nothing.
He refused to let his mind spiral.
Without a second thought, he initiated a travel request to Titania II’s world.
The familiar permission verification prompt had barely materialized before a stark red ‘Denied’ icon was stamped over it.
The sight, however, brought Kazuki a wave of relief.
A denial meant she was conscious.
It meant she was probably okay.
Before he could ponder it further, his private chat interface lit up.
A message from Titania II.
[Titania II: Sorry, I might have to break our promise.
I can’t come to your world anymore.]
Kazuki’s heart plummeted.
His fingers hovered over the screen for a long, frozen moment before he managed to type out a reply.
[Cliffhanger King: Why?…
I mean, can you give me a reason?]
He stared at the screen, his breath held tight in his chest.
The morning breeze swirled into the alley, kicking up a small vortex of fallen leaves that seemed to dance with his own anxious energy.
[Titania II: Because…
I’m afraid if I stay in your world for too long, I won’t want to leave.]
The words struck him, and Kazuki felt his own heart give a painful tremble.
[Titania II: Because, Group Owner Kazuki, you are very kind.
The time I spent with you, with Miss Firefly, with Miss Castorice…
with all of you…
has been the happiest of my entire life.]
[Titania II: I’m afraid that if I stay by your side, I’ll lose the will to shoulder the responsibilities I carry…]
For a moment, Kazuki was utterly at a loss for words. Find the original chapter at g.com.
[Titania II: Thank you.
I think I will remember everything that happened today for the rest of my life.
When I am finally worthy to stand before you, I will appear by your side again.]
What more could he possibly say?
[Cliffhanger King: Then I wish you all the best.
If you ever need help, don’t keep it to yourself.
I’ll be there.]
[Titania II: Okay.]
Just a simple ‘Okay.’ It was a word devoid of any affectation, delivered with the same decisiveness she showed when swinging a sword, the same earnestness he’d felt when she took his hand.
The moment the chat interface went dark, the young woman known as Titania II sat alone in the deep shadows of a cavern.
The screen’s pale light illuminated her face, her silver-white eyelashes lowered, hiding the storm of emotions swirling in her eyes.
The bitterness she had so carefully suppressed while talking to Kazuki finally broke free.
A single tear escaped, tracing a path down her cheek before dripping onto the turquoise fabric of her skirt, leaving a small, dark stain.
She drew a deep, shuddering breath and raised a hand to wipe the tear track away.
Her fingertips came away from her cheek with a scorching warmth.
After smoothing the wrinkles from her skirt, she slowly rose to her feet.
A draft from the cavern’s depths billowed the hem of her clothes, revealing a figure that was slender yet stood tall and unbent.
With a flick of her palm, a chrysalis-like device materialized in the air before her, its metallic surface gleaming coldly in the dim light.
‘Before, I was born for battle,’her voice was soft, yet it echoed with exceptional clarity, a vow made only to herself.’But…
from now on, I will become Firefly, fighting to live!’
The instant her words fell, blazing flames erupted from within her.
The orange-red light flared, illuminating the entire cavern as if it were day.
Fragments of the SAM armor coalesced and assembled within the inferno, encasing her limbs and torso.
The cold, hard lines of metal intertwined with the scorching heat, outlining a sharp, combat-ready silhouette.
But this was not the end.
Just as the armor finished forming, a cluster of fluorescent green flame surged from her chest.
It coiled upwards like a living entity, dyeing the orange-red armor with a layer of translucent, ethereal luster.
Several heat dissipation beams, glowing with the same green light, extended from her back.
They fluttered gently like the wings of a butterfly, scattering fine particles of light into the air.
In her hands, two longswords as thin as a cicada’s wing silently materialized, their blades flowing with a firefly-like luminescence, as if they had been tempered with stardust.
This was her unique ‘Full Burn State’—the proof that she had shattered the shackles of lies, the medal earned in her fight for life.
‘Witness it!
My will!’
Her voice rang through the cavern, carrying the power of a rebirth, of a moth breaking free from its cocoon.
The next second, her figure shot out of the cavern like an arrow, leaping into the gray, overcast sky.
On the horizon, a living tsunami of chitin and wings writhed as it approached—a sky-obscuring swarm of insects, a dark, oppressive mass that threatened to devour all light.
Firefly hovered in the air before The Swarm.
The fluorescent green heat dissipation beams spread wide behind her.
She crossed her twin swords before her chest, tracing a dazzling arc of light.
‘For Glamoth, and for myself—Firefly!’
She whispered the name, and her figure transformed into a stream of light, an interwoven ribbon of green and red, charging into The Swarm without a shred of hesitation.
Sword light flashed, sharp and sudden, like the tearing of silk, like a volley of shooting stars. Visit g.com for the full chapter.
Firefly’s figure darted through the monstrous tide.
Luminous green trails sliced through the dark, oppressive swarm, leaving scorching trajectories in their wake.
The twin swords vibrated with a low hum, and each swing cleaved through a vast wave of insects, as if she were not battling a vicious alien horde, but harvesting a field of ripe wheat.
Crack!
Several Beetles in the front rank had just opened their massive pincers when the sword light sheared them in half.
Dark green ichor sprayed through the air, failing to even touch the hem of her armor.
Using her momentum, she spun, her twin swords sweeping upwards in a reverse slash.
Three flying insectoids attempting an ambush from behind were instantly split in two, their wing fragments fluttering down like withered leaves.
The fluorescent green beams on her back fluttered, allowing her to nimbly evade the Swarm’s lunges and bites.
Sometimes she would sidestep with a graceful slide, avoiding a thick, scythed leg; sometimes she would abruptly ascend, dodging a sudden spurt of acid.
More often than not, she charged straight into the insect tide.
Wherever her blades reached, The Swarm broke and fell in waves, like leaves scattered by a gale.
The hum of the armor and the crisp, cracking sounds of shattering insect limbs intertwined, forming the dense beat of a war drum.
Every twist of her body, every thrust of her sword, carried an almost artistic fluidity.
The Swarm that had once made the elite Glamoth Iron Cavalry pay such a heavy price now seemed fragile and weak before her—not because The Swarm had grown weaker, but because the one wielding the sword was finally fighting for herself.
She pressed forward, leaving swathes of insect corpses in her wake.
Suddenly, an eerie disturbance rippled through the tide of monsters ahead, as if they were parting to make way for something colossal.
Firefly abruptly sheathed her swords, hovering in the sky.
From within the parting gap, a shadow larger than a mountain slowly emerged.
It was the broodmother of this swarm.
Its body was covered in overlapping, gray-black carapace, with countless tiny tentacles writhing across its surface.
The ovipositor beneath its bulk was continuously spewing forth new insectoid horrors.
‘As long as I deal with the broodmother,’she thought, her resolve hardening,’these things will lose their ‘hive mind’ and perish… just like the Glamoth Iron Cavalry did…’Facing the enemy she once thought it was impossible to fight, Firefly felt not a single shred of fear.’I will ignite the starry sea!’
She declared it aloud, her voice piercing through the cacophony of screeches from The Swarm, as clear and bright as a newborn star.
The fluorescent green wings on her back suddenly unfurled.
They beat like a butterfly’s, yet carried the power to tear through the void itself.
Every feather of light was burning, scorching the surrounding darkness into scattered sparks.
The Swarm sensed the threat and lunged at her in a frenzy.
Pincers snapped, acid flew, weaving an impenetrable web of death.
But Firefly neither dodged nor evaded.
Crossing her twin swords before her chest, her light wings gave a single, powerful beat—
VMMMM—
A wave of intense light exploded outward from her.
The insects caught in the initial blast were instantly incinerated to ash.
Using this momentum, she became a meteor of green fire and burning steel, forcefully breaking through The Swarm’s barrier.
Her blade cleaved through layers of carapace and tentacles as she swung down fiercely toward the broodmother’s head, a grotesque canvas covered with countless, unblinking eyes.
[Elysian’s Note:
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