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ArabicHonkai Impact: My Power Grows When Valkyries Fall For Me — Chapter 33
Chapter 33: Mei’s Nightmare
The afternoon’s final classes drifted by in a haze, and soon, the evening sun cast a warm, orange glow across the classroom, painting long shadows over the empty desks.
Not long after the last bell echoed through the halls, the room had emptied out, leaving only a few scattered students behind.
Lucian packed his bag with a calm, unhurried rhythm. Beside him, Kiana was the picture of restless energy, slumped over her desk and drumming her fingertips against the polished wood in a bored tattoo.
“Hey, Lucian…” Her voice was a low, drawn-out whine. “Come with me to find Mei today, okay?”
Lucian paused, his hands still inside his bag, and turned to look at her. “Didn’t you just wait outside her classroom door yesterday?”
“That’s different!” Kiana shot upright, her expression suddenly serious. “She didn’t even come out the front door yesterday. She must have slipped out the back. Today, I’m going to corner her right in her classroom!”
Seeing the stubborn glint in her eyes, Lucian could only offer a helpless smile. He stuffed the last textbook into his bag and zipped it shut.
‘This feels a bit like a scene from a drama,’he thought with a private, wry amusement,’the school bully demanding the transfer student not leave after class.’
“Alright, let’s go,” he conceded. “Let’s go find Mei.”
The two of them left the classroom and made their way down the corridor, heading toward the second-year wing of the school.
“Do you think Mei will talk to us today?” Kiana asked in a hushed voice, a rare note of nervousness coloring her tone.
Lucian considered it for a moment before shrugging. “I don’t know.”
The second-year floor was exceptionally quiet, a stark contrast to the usual after-school clamor. At this hour, most students were either at club activities or had already left campus, leaving the corridor feeling hollow and deserted.
They found Mei’s classroom, its door half-ajar. From within, they could hear the faint, solitary sound of someone packing up their things.
Kiana took a deep, steadying breath, her hand poised to push the door open. But before she could, it was pulled open from the inside.
A cascade of long, deep purple hair came into view. Mei stood in the doorway, her schoolbag already slung over her shoulder, a look of genuine surprise on her face.
“Kiana? Lucian?” She looked from one to the other, instinctively taking half a step back. “You two… is something the matter?”
“Mei!” Kiana’s eyes lit up, and she closed the distance in an instant, grabbing her arm. “Let’s go home together! And we can stop by the dessert shop to buy some cake!”
Mei froze, her gaze fixed on Kiana’s bright, expectant face. Then, her eyes flickered toward Lucian, who stood quietly nearby. In that single moment, the memory of the scene she’d witnessed on the rooftop yesterday—Kiana pinning Lucian against the wall, stealing a kiss—collided with the nightmare that had plagued her for nights on end.
The images flashed in her mind: a shadowy, purple figure, its hands tight around her throat, its voice a venomous whisper questioning why she hadn’t saved him.
The dream was baffling, nonsensical, yet it returned with terrifying consistency each night, chipping away at her composure and leaving her perpetually exhausted. Now, looking at Lucian, Mei couldn’t escape the feeling that he was the epicenter of all the recent strangeness in her life.
First, that otherworldly version of herself had warned her that Lucian was an important person. Then, the figure in her dream began insisting she had to protect him.
She… she couldn’t bring herself to believe any of it.
Yet, faced with Kiana’s overwhelming enthusiasm, Mei found herself unable to refuse, even though a part of her desperately wanted to. She gave a small, hesitant nod.
“…Okay.”
“Really? That’s great!” Kiana cheered, tightening her grip on Mei’s arm and pulling her toward the stairwell. “Quick, quick, quick! If we’re late, the line will be huge!”
After being dragged a few steps, Mei seemed to remember something. She glanced back over her shoulder at Lucian. “Is Lucian coming too?”
“Of course!” Kiana declared without missing a beat. “It’s his treat!”
Lucian followed them with another resigned smile. “Yes, yes, my treat.”
——————
The twilight deepened, and one by one, the shops lining the street began to flicker to life, their warm, yellow lights cutting through the growing dusk.
A small queue had already formed outside the dessert shop Lucian and Kiana frequented. The air hung heavy with the intoxicating, almost cloying, scent of sugar and cream.
“Wow, there are so many people today…” Kiana stood on her tiptoes, trying to peer toward the front of the line.
The three of them found their place at the end. Here, the sweet aroma of the shop mingled with the cool, crisp air of the evening breeze. Kiana, oblivious or simply uncaring, had looped one arm through Mei’s and the other through Lucian’s, pulling them into a tight, three-person huddle. The overly familiar formation earned them more than a few curious glances from the other students in line.
A faint blush touched Mei’s cheeks, and she tried to subtly pull her arm free, but Kiana’s grip only tightened in a playful warning.
Finally, Mei spoke, her voice soft and tinged with helplessness. “Kiana… you don’t have to hold on so tight. I won’t run away.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure!” Kiana muttered, though she did loosen her grip slightly. “You’ve been avoiding us lately.”
“I haven’t been avoiding you…” Mei denied in a low voice, but her words lacked conviction.
The line shuffled forward at a snail’s pace. Kiana, however, was perfectly content, her eyes excitedly scanning the new items in the display case. Every so often, she would pull Mei and Lucian into a hushed, enthusiastic discussion about what to order.
Mei mostly just nodded or offered soft, one-word responses, her mind clearly elsewhere. Her gaze kept drifting toward the window, her reflection staring back at a woman lost in thought.
Lucian followed her line of sight, but there was nothing to see but the ordinary street scenery outside.
“Senior Mei,” he asked gently, “what are you thinking about?”
Mei’s focus snapped back to the present, her violet eyes blinking as if she’d been pulled from a great distance. She turned to Lucian, a trace of confusion still lingering in her gaze.
“…It’s nothing,” she said, shaking her head slightly. “I’ve just been thinking about the future a bit more lately.”
Kiana overheard her. She flashed Mei a brilliant smile. “Don’t worry, Mei! No matter what happens, Lucian and I will be by your side!”
Her words were, as always, straightforward and brimming with a strength that felt unshakable.
Mei’s eyelashes fluttered. Staring at Kiana’s cloudless, radiant smile, she pressed her lips together. Kiana was like the sun, a brilliant light that was beginning to illuminate her own darkening life. But the warmer and brighter that sunlight became, the more she felt she was letting Kiana down.
She had been avoiding them. It was true. The nightly dream was the cause, forcing her to keep her distance from Lucian, and by extension, from Kiana, who was practically inseparable from him. She knew they were worried about her, which only made the guilt heavier.
“…Thank you, Kiana.”
The line finally moved, and it was their turn. Kiana enthusiastically ordered several new cakes. Lucian paid, and the three of them carried their trays to a small table by the window.
The warm, yellow light of the cafe spilled over their desserts, and the air was thick with the scent of fresh cream.
Kiana scooped up a large spoonful of mousse cake and popped it into her mouth, her eyes squeezing shut in bliss. “Mmm—delicious!” she praised, her voice muffled. She then deftly cut another piece with her fork and, in a gesture of pure, unthinking familiarity, held it to Mei’s lips. “Mei, you try some too! This strawberry flavor is amazing!”
Mei stared at the fork hovering in front of her, momentarily stunned. The gesture was so intimate it made her uncomfortable, but seeing the pure, guileless expectation in Kiana’s eyes, she leaned forward and accepted the bite of cake.
The delicate strawberry mousse melted on her tongue, its sweetness spreading in slow, pleasant threads.
“Is it good, Mei?”
“…Yes,” she managed. “It’s very sweet.”
“Right? Right!” Vindicated, Kiana happily scooped up another spoonful. “Lucian, you try this too!”
With a flick of her wrist, she aimed the fork, still smeared with a bit of cream, toward Lucian.
Lucian simply looked up from his own dessert, leaned forward naturally, and opened his mouth to accept the offering. “Yeah, it’s not bad.”
Watching this seamless, casual exchange, the hand Mei used to hold her own fork tightened, her knuckles turning white. A sharp, inexplicable pang seized her chest.
A voice—not her own—screamed in the back of her mind, a frantic, desperate protest against the scene unfolding before her. With a force of will, Mei ruthlessly suppressed it.
‘Are you kidding me? Why now…’
Mei frowned, rubbing her temples. Whenever that intrusive voice surfaced, it brought with it a wave of intense dizziness that left her feeling sick and disoriented.
The nightmare was trying to poison her, using emotions that felt alien to twist her perception and shatter the fragile, budding friendship between the three of them.
But the harder it pushed, the more fiercely Mei resolved to resist.