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ArabicHonkai Star Rail: My Death Feeds Their Madness — Chapter 41
Chapter 41: It Is Not Him
Seeing Ruan Mei’s soul-shattered appearance, Yu Qingtu knew the woman was teetering on the very brink of collapse. She had already dangled one foot over the precipice of utter madness.
Years ago, Yu Qingtu had reached a quiet conclusion regarding this tangled web. If Ruan Mei harbored no true feelings for Kagashi, then his departure would simply be the end of it. But if she did love him… then everything Kagashi left behind for her would serve as the most terrifying revenge imaginable. No, revenge was the wrong word. To be precise, it was the cruel punishment of fate for Ruan Mei’s past callousness.
Watching the hollow despair warp Ruan Mei’s features, the heavy breath Yu Qingtu had held in her chest for centuries finally eased a fraction. Yet, she felt absolutely no joy. There was no satisfaction to be found here. In the wake of Kagashi letting go of the mortal world and departing with a peaceful heart, all three women standing in this frozen forest were nothing but losers.
Concepts of right and wrong had long since lost their meaning. Even if Ruan Mei knew the depths of her mistakes, even if the acid of regret burned straight through her heart, could she bring Kagashi back?
She could not.
For hundreds of years, Yu Qingtu had also tricked herself into believing she could rely on the slow erosion of time to smooth over her own regrets. But in the end, that gentle young man’s face remained as vivid as yesterday. Living in this vast universe, some people and some memories were simply destined to be unforgettable, impossible to release.
Ruan Mei slowly pushed herself up from the cold earth. She brushed past the two of them, her steps heavy as she moved toward the winding path down the mountain.
“What do you think you are doing?”
The moment Yu Qingtu caught the twisted shadow falling over Ruan Mei’s face, her expression hardened.
“…I said I would take responsibility for A’Mu. But I failed that promise…” Ruan Mei murmured, her voice hollow and distant. “…I am going to find him. I will bring him back…”
The corners of Ruan Mei’s lips curled upward in a highly unnatural, eerie smile. It carried a disturbing, obsessive weight. She was willing to pay any price.
The other two women immediately grasped her dark intention without needing a second thought. Black Swan merely deepened her frown, her reaction restrained by her nature as a Memokeeper. Yu Qingtu, however, possessed no such restraint. Her face darkened like a storm front.
“Are you going to continue this absolute madness!”
“What you chose to do in the past was your own family matter. As an outsider, I had no right to interfere.” Yu Qingtu’s voice cracked like a whip in the frigid air. “But that little guy called me Senior. I will absolutely not stand by and watch this, nor can I tolerate you defiling his rest. You had better abandon this sick idea right now.”
“…” Ruan Mei’s footsteps dragged to a halt.
She did not look back. She offered no argument. Her slumped shoulders and lonely silhouette exuded an aura of total desolation against the snow.
Yu Qingtu’s tone remained cold and unforgiving as iron. “When a person dies, they are dead. That is the reality of this universe.”
“I do not know what twisted logic is running through your head, but do you truly not understand what he thought about this?”
“A life compiled from numbers, synthetic data, and genetic sequences… even if it possesses every single memory of the deceased, even if it is a flawless replica down to the atomic level—”
“It is still nothing but an empty shell without a soul. Why do you refuse to understand this?”
“Why do you think the creation he left behind is identical to him in appearance, yet refers to itself as a separate entity and calls its own creator by name?”
Yu Qingtu raised her hand, pointing a trembling finger toward the distant, blooming plum tree.
Beneath its branches stood the mechanical puppet, still methodically picking plum blossoms in the biting cold.
“He left that there entirely for you to see. He wanted to tell you that no matter how identical the face is, it will never be the original him.”
“You want to use the biological methods you are currently studying to find your parents, to find Kagashi. It is a path destined for absolute failure.”
“Even if you truly reach the apex of your research in the future, whatever you pull from the vats will forever be a fake. In essence, it is nothing more than a pathetic, organic pet!”
“A dead soul will never return unless the Aeon of Finality reverses the flow of time itself, or unless Kagashi somehow enters a next life.”
Every single word was a poisoned thorn, mercilessly driving deep into the softest, most vulnerable depths of Ruan Mei’s heart.
She stood in absolute silence for a long time. Finally, she tilted her head upward, looking into the pale winter sky. The sunlight filtering through the clouds was rare and clear, yet it offered not a single trace of warmth to her freezing skin.
Her A’Mu back then… he must have felt this exact same freezing isolation…
Ruan Mei slowly turned back around.
“What?” Yu Qingtu stared at her deadened eyes, trying to read the broken genius.
“As Member 55 of the Genius Society, can you answer a question for me?” Ruan Mei asked, her throat raw and hoarse.
“Speak.”
“What is the original essence of life, and what is the true essence of birth?”
“There are countless theories, but none are universally recognized as absolute truth. If I knew the answer to that, I would not be a mere genius. Perhaps only Nous can answer that question.”
“…I see.”
Ruan Mei nodded silently. She offered no further argument and began walking toward the working puppet.
Black Swan narrowed her eyes, maintaining her quiet observation. Yu Qingtu’s harsh lecture had struck a deep chord within her own chest. As a Memokeeper of the Garden of Recollection, someone who had accumulated power and insight over hundreds of years, she could easily ‘resurrect’ him using the vast ocean of Kagashi’s memories if she truly desired to do so.
But would the Mr. Kagashi resurrected through the Remembrance still be her Mr. Kagashi?
The answer anchored in her heart had always been firm.
No matter what, he would not be.
It would be nothing more than a selfish, foolish delusion. A horrific desecration of the gentle man she respected.
Numerous possibilities flashed through Yu Qingtu’s mind, but she did not step forward to stop Ruan Mei. She merely followed a few paces behind, her boots crunching softly against the frost.
The puppet registered the approaching footsteps and turned its head. That familiar, beloved face remained entirely devoid of emotion.
“Ms. Ruan Mei, what are your orders?”
Ruan Mei stared into those artificial eyes, finally understanding that Yu Qingtu’s cruel words were absolute truth.
No matter how perfectly the features matched, it was just a hollow fake.
It would never smile at her. It would never call her Teacher.
Even if she reprogrammed it to do so, the artificial affection would only rot her heart further. She finally, personally experienced the exact revulsion Yu Qingtu must have felt when she first laid eyes on the fake clone Ruan Mei had created all those years ago.
“In your core meta-instructions, how much authority do my commands hold?” Ruan Mei asked, her voice barely a whisper.
“Highest level,” the puppet replied instantly.
Two simple words. Yet they sent entirely different ripples of emotion through the three women present.
Black Swan carried the memories of Kagashi’s entire life within her mind. She was already well aware of his absolute devotion, so she maintained her composure.
Yu Qingtu let out a long, heavy sigh, the vapor pluming in the freezing air.
And for Ruan Mei… it was no different from a physical blade twisting directly into her chest.
“Abort the execution of the final instructions left by Kagashi. Shut down immediately.”
“Understood. Protocol modification command passed. Beginning execution.”
The puppet slowly lowered its arms, dropping the freshly picked plum blossoms into the snow. The artificial light behind its eyes rapidly dimmed into dead glass. It locked into a standard resting posture, completely motionless.
Watching the machine power down, Yu Qingtu breathed a slight sigh of relief.
“Do you finally understand?”
“It is not him,” Ruan Mei said softly, her voice trembling like a fragile leaf.
“It is good that you understand. Put it away and take it with you, although I loathe the idea of giving it to you.”
Yu Qingtu had to admit the bitter truth: Kagashi had constructed this puppet primarily for Ruan Mei’s sake. The fact that she held the highest-level authority over its systems explained everything about his lingering attachments.
But Yu Qingtu no longer felt the urge to be angry about it.
The sheer depth of Kagashi’s past devotion—treating Ruan Mei as the sole light of his life, respecting her through every silent action—was exactly proportional to the crushing weight of regret Ruan Mei suffered now.
This bitter fruit she was forced to swallow today was both her punishment and her inescapable retribution.
Ruan Mei carefully stored the dormant puppet away. She stood in the center of the plum forest, her gaze slowly sweeping across the snow-dusted branches. She looked as though she wanted to violently carve every single trace Kagashi had left in this place over the past century directly into her retinas.
This lingering emotion could have blossomed into a beautiful memory. But now, it was nothing more than a permanent, bleeding wound of loss.
Her A’Mu was no longer here… and he never would be again.
Before turning to leave the mountain forever, Ruan Mei’s deadened gaze fell upon Black Swan and Yu Qingtu.
“I will not use that biological method to find him. But I will never give up.”
Black Swan remained noncommittal, her elegant features veiled in sorrow. She only offered a single, quiet question in return.
“If Mr. Kagashi has already forgotten you by the time you find him, what will you do then?”
“That will be my business.”
A single tear of thick, crimson blood slipped from the corner of Ruan Mei’s eye, tracking slowly down her pale cheek. She smiled slightly. This time, the expression was no longer eerie or disturbing.
It was only an endless, hollow desolation.