Honkai Star Rail: My Death Feeds Their Madness — Chapter 97

Chapter 97: Master Will Come Back Alive to Cure You

Star Calendar Year 6328. Xianzhou Yaoqing, Alchemy Commission.

Ten years had drifted by since Jingliu slipped into her silent, frozen slumber.

Three armored figures stepped into the sterile quiet of the ward. The man at the forefront moved with practiced familiarity, swapping the withered blooms in the bedside vase for fresh ones. He sat on the edge of the mattress, his slender fingers brushing gently through the sleeping woman’s ice-colored hair.

“I do not know how many years this will take,” Kagashi murmured, his voice exceptionally gentle, carrying a softness Jingliu had never witnessed in her waking hours. “But Master will come back alive to cure you.”

He leaned closer, his breath a quiet promise against the cold air. “Master promises you. I will never break my word.”

Silence stretched, heavy and poignant, until Mianxue spoke up from the doorway, her voice kept low to respect the quiet of the room.

“Lord Kagashi, ninety million Cloud Knights have finished assembling. We are ready to set out.”

Kagashi drew in a slow, deep breath. He picked up his helmet, securing it over his head, and closed his eyes. When his eyelids parted once more, every trace of warmth had vanished, replaced by an absolute, freezing cold.

“Set out.”

“Understood!”

A short while later, the largest military port on the Yaoqing thrummed with overwhelming energy.

Countless Cloud Knights stood in perfect formation. High above the dark, dense array of soldiers, a tall figure hung suspended in mid-air, eyes closed in silent meditation.

Dozens of elite warriors swept in from all directions, converging before the vast army. They dropped to one knee behind the suspended figure, bowing their heads as they awaited their orders. These were the Cloud Knight Vanguards of the Yaoqing.

A solemn, majestic pressure weighed down on the entire port.

Kagashi arrived on a streak of sword-light, cutting through the atmosphere with Mianxue and Qinghan flanking him. He touched down at the very front of the Valiant Guard line.

At his arrival, the suspended General, Sha Feng, snapped his eyes open, sweeping a piercing gaze across the millions of soldiers below.

A murderous intent rolled through the port on the wind, snapping the millions of war banners into a deafening flutter.

Sha Feng did not need a broadcaster. His voice rang directly within the ears of the ninety million Cloud Knights, striking straight into the depths of their souls.

“The target of this expedition is the Yatedelan Ring Star Belt—a super-giant galaxy cluster spanning approximately 2,574 light-years in diameter.”

“There, the Abominations of Abundance are breeding and gathering frantically like a festering ulcer, attempting to form an allied army to launch the Third Abundance Plague War!”

“In this battle, I shall follow the Marshal’s decree. I will personally lead this army upon the path of The Hunt, and we shall execute the will of The Hunt!”

The roar of the army shattered the firmament, their battle intent soaring into the stratosphere.

“We Cloud Knights are like clouds obscuring the sky, guarding and shielding the Xianzhou!”

This marked one of the grandest military expeditions since the Yaoqing first took up arms to hunt the Abominations. With the General leaving the main ship, the Yaoqing itself would be exposed to high risk. To mitigate this, the ship would temporarily dock within a highly secure star sector under the jurisdiction of the Interstellar Peace Corporation until the expeditionary force returned.

Facing such a vast war zone and an endless tide of Abominations, the ninety million Cloud Knights were divided into multiple strike routes, each detachment commanded by two Valiant Guards.

“Depart!!!”

At Sha Feng’s thunderous command, the colossal marching warships roared to life. Their engines ignited, lifting the massive vessels into the void as they passed through the Yaoqing’s celestial gates and vanished into the vast sea of stars.

Kagashi stood on the deck of his assigned vessel, his gaze sweeping over the endless starlight. Deep within his pupils flickered a trace of unmatched madness—a nearly delirious obsession.

‘I must hunt enough Abominations… I must!’

Initially, the war proceeded with irresistible momentum. The Cloud Knights, relying on their superior armaments and ironclad discipline, crushed dozens of Abomination dens in rapid succession.

However, as the fleet pushed deeper into the star sector—a region heavily polluted by the blessing of Abundance—the situation took a sharp, brutal turn. The swift campaign devolved into a grueling war of attrition.

One year, two years, five years…

In the cold vacuum of space, warships were reduced to floating wreckage every single day. Cloud Knights sacrificed their lives with every passing moment. Sometimes, the Xianzhou forces would scour three entire planets clean of Abomination nests in a single rotation, only to be ambushed the very next day by a swarming horde emerging from the dark corners of the galaxy.

Victory and defeat bled into one another. Blood and severed limbs paved a gruesome road leading ever deeper into the cosmos.

Time flowed like water, and ten years vanished in the blink of an eye.

The war ground into its most brutal stalemate. The Cloud Knights were forced to fight a two-front war: battling the entrenched enemies within the Yatedelan Ring Star Belt while simultaneously intercepting fresh waves of Abominations rushing in from the wider universe.

The crisis escalated to the point that even the Interstellar Peace Corporation grew uneasy. The Armed Archaeology School, a specialized branch of the Intelligentsia Guild, rushed across the sea of stars to provide tactical support, attempting to analyze and contain the frantically multiplying biological tide.

On the front lines of Planet Yatedelan-13571, amidst a range of jagged, steep mountains.

“Report! The Valiant Guard detachment led by Mianxue and Qinghan has lost contact! The final enemy intelligence transmission mentioned a Rhinocerhound hunting pack!”

Kagashi had just ripped his blade free from the chest of a dying Abomination. His pupils constricted into tight pinpricks.

Mianxue and Qinghan were far from weak, and they commanded the absolute elites of the Yaoqing. Being outnumbered would never result in a total communications blackout. They had to have encountered an entity far beyond their capacity to handle.

‘A Rhinocerhound hunting pack… Could a Great Nest Father be among them?’

“These are the last coordinates they transmitted before the signal died!” The intelligence officer frantically typed at the console, projecting a holographic map of the battlefield onto the light screen.

“The nearest backup detachment is currently pinned down by a Serpent Descendants army. It will take them at least three-quarters of an hour to break through and provide support…”

‘Three-quarters of an hour?’

Kagashi spoke without a fraction of hesitation.

“Pass the order. Command is temporarily transferred to Valiant Guard Mo Tingquan on the sub-ship.”

“My Lord! You plan to go al—”

Before the officer could finish his sentence, Kagashi had already vaulted from the command deck. He tore through the atmosphere, his figure blurring into a streak of blinding light as he crossed the treacherous mountain ranges at breakneck speed.

When Kagashi finally crashed down at the coordinates, the tragic scene waiting for him made his heart plummet into an icy abyss.

The once-proud elite Cloud Knight detachment had been utterly erased.

Shattered wrecks of combat skiffs littered the scorched earth, tangled with the mangled, torn bodies of both Abominations and Xianzhou soldiers.

A short distance away, a Borisin as massive as a mountain loomed over the carnage. It radiated a sickeningly familiar aura of rot and vitality, its massive jaws chewing on something with lingering, grotesque relish.

And there, lying in a spreading pool of their own blood at the beast’s feet, were Mianxue and Qinghan.

They were clinging to their final breaths. Everything below their abdomens had been completely obliterated, leaving only half of their torsos intact. Ruined internal organs spilled across the bloody soil.

Their life-fires flickered like dying candles in a storm, threatening to extinguish at any second.

Hearing the impact of Kagashi’s landing, the Rhinocerhound Great Nest Father slowly turned its massive head. A puff of foul, hot steam escaped from the gaps between its meat-stained fangs. Its eyes gleamed with raw brutality and mocking cruelty.

It could sense the energy rolling off this newly arrived human. This vermin smelled even more delicious than the rest.

With a spirit-shattering roar, the beast lunged. A giant, clawed hand enveloped in a foul, toxic wind materialized above Kagashi’s head, slamming down with the force of a falling meteor.

Kagashi did not even attempt to dodge.

He slowly raised his head. His eyes erupted with a terrifying, bloodthirsty light.

The exact moment the monster met that gaze, the newly ascended Rhinocerhound Great Nest Father froze. It felt as though it were staring into the maw of an ancient, cosmic behemoth—something infinitely more terrifying than even a Borisin war leader.

An unmatched, suffocating pressure exploded from Kagashi’s body. This was absolutely not a power that a mere Cloud Knight Valiant Guard could possess.

There were no flashy techniques. No wasted movements. Only a singular beam of light that moved faster than the concept of thought itself.

Time seemed to freeze.

Kagashi’s palm rested lightly against the center of the Rhinocerhound Great Nest Father’s skull.

Before the primal terror in the wolf-like eyes could even fully surface, the massive, mountain-sized body disintegrated. It rapidly turned into fine black ash, scattering across the blood-soaked ground with the wind.

If General Sha Feng were to witness such a display, he would likely hesitate over whether to execute Kagashi according to Xianzhou law for harboring such monstrous, hidden strength.

Kagashi did not spare a single glance for the ash drifting away on the breeze. He immediately dropped to his knees in front of the two sisters.

His hands trembled violently as he gently supported their necks, his eyes frantically scanning the catastrophic damage.

It couldn’t possibly be worse.

Their elixir organs were entirely destroyed, incapable of generating even a fraction of regenerative energy. The blood in their bodies had nearly drained out completely. If not for a sheer, stubborn sliver of obsession keeping them anchored to the waking world, they would have perished long before he arrived.

The cruel, irreversible reality of their condition forced Kagashi’s eyes to turn a deeper shade of crimson. He tore through his own mind, desperately searching his vast biological knowledge for any emergency method to reverse life and death.

But the medical sciences he possessed were utterly useless on the anatomy of a Xianzhou Long-Life Species.

“This is…”

Suddenly, he sensed it. A mysterious power, familiar to the very core of his soul, began to pulse nearby.

A dark shadow quickly crept over Kagashi’s face.