Yekase felt it took some art to sell “atonement through deeds” so light and airy, like hanging laundry in a clear breeze.

Lu Yao bought it at once, nodding with conviction like a temple bell answering dawn.

“I’ve seen people run from blame, shove it on society, and crooks who say ‘I’m evil anyway’ like it’s a warm cloak,” she said, voice like cold rain on slate. “But… you’re different.”

“…Wait, what was that last one…” Yekase blinked, a smile like a paper fan half-open.

“I like that type too,” Lu Yao said, eyes like still water holding a dark moon. “If you can name your evil, that’s good. That was my smoothest execution.”

“‘Execution’ sounds a bit much, doesn’t it?” Yekase winced, like touching a blade edge in the dark.

“It does. A bit much,” Lu Yao admitted, the words falling like ash.

She lifted her glass and sipped again, like a bird pecking dew from a leaf.

…What’s this, Yekase thought, a hush like snowfall folding the room. She’s suddenly chatty, and easy to talk to, like a locked gate left ajar.

Hold up. Is she… drunk? The thought rose like steam.

Her cheeks weren’t flushed, but her eyes carried a soft mist, like morning fog over a lake.

Yekase’s gaze flicked, quick as a fish turning. She dug a bottle of whiskey out of the teleport crate, a Valhalla special, the cap cracking open like a twig.

She poured her half a glass, then matched it for herself, two amber ponds under low light.

The staff never came. They sat cross-legged in the basement’s center, two islands in a concrete sea, and drank slow.

“…My sister, Luzhixing,” Lu Yao said suddenly, voice like a string plucked once in the dark.

It worked. The thought flared like a signal fire.

Alcohol, my caped hero, she cheered inside, like a child spotting a kite catch wind.

Yekase smothered a grin and settled into listening, still as a stone lantern.

“We used to be close,” Lu Yao said, words dropping like pebbles into a well. “Nine years ago, I came back to the base with groceries… and found her standing in a pool of blood with a longsword.”

Classic scapegoat scene, Yekase thought, dry as old parchment, a sigh like dust off shelves.

“Red, Green, and Blue were all down,” Lu Yao said, naming them like wilted flags. “No breath left in any of them.”

“She explained nothing,” she went on, the memory like frost on glass. “She just walked out of my life… and took every good day with her.”

“Did you chase the truth?” Yekase asked, voice like a soft tap on a locked door.

“No leads at all,” Lu Yao said, brows lowering like a storm front. “Every camera had been smashed ahead of time. I have to ask her myself. I have to hear what happened with my own ears.”

Textbook protagonist template, Yekase sighed inwardly, like flipping a familiar script under a lamp. Everyone’s a main character here: Ling Yi’s the shonen firebrand, this one’s the brooding avenger, even Shen Shanshan could headline a city-noir. And me? I’m the guilty wreck, dragging chains, needing to almost die just to see an old flame.

“—If it’s only about seeing her,” Yekase said, letting the words glide like a skater over thin ice, “I might have a way.”

“What way?” Lu Yao asked, gaze sharpening like a chisel on stone.

“I crossed paths with a pro fighter named Xiaoyuan,” Yekase said, voice low like a secret passed over tea. “Did her a small favor. She could repay it by ushering me into the elite circle. Then I might reach Luzhixing.”

“Truly?” The question hung like a lantern on a night road.

“The variable is whether that favor’s big enough,” Yekase said, weighing it like a coin in the palm.

Lu Yao’s from a super sentai team, Yekase thought, mind knitting threads like a spider in dusk. She plays lone wolf now, but her bones know squad work. Ling Yi needs a partner who can cover from range, lay down a veil, and strike from afar…

…Why not bring her up the mountain?

Gently, though. Not with a hook, but with a bridge. Like… giving her a chance to face her sister, ask the question, maybe cut a knot tied for years.

Lu Yao thought a while, eyes adrift like leaves on a slow river. Then she looked up.

“What’s the price?” The words were a measured blade.

“I hope you join us,” Yekase said, simple as a pebble dropped in a stream.

“…”

Her brows pinched, a shadow like two wings folding.

So she really doesn’t want it… Sister’s betrayal, teammates lost—those scars run deep like roots gripping rock.

“We’ll never betray you,” Yekase said, voice like a hand held out in rain. “We won’t let you down. We won’t leave you behind. We won’t hurt you…”

“Why are you singing?” Lu Yao asked, deadpan as a drum.

“It’s fine if you’re not ready,” Yekase said, easing off like tide receding. “But you won’t miss what’s coming at Emerald Pool HQ, right? Flashblade Red and I will be there.”

“…Mm.” The assent was a stone dropping into a pond.

“Then I’ll put the drink on your tab,” Yekase said, light as wind through beads. “I’ll look forward to your next request.”

She swept up the half bottle and her own glass, then stood, goodbye soft as curtain rain.

The meaning was a bright ribbon—return the cup next time we meet.

Lu Yao only held the flat-bottomed glass in her palms like a small brazier, and looked up with those deep, ringed, fish-dead eyes, dull as old slate.

“…Hard sell?” she asked, voice like a dry leaf.

“Uh, look,” Yekase said, rubbing her neck like a guilty cat. “Your aircraft almost flattened me. Charging a little medical fee feels fair, right?”

“You’re hurt?” The question was clean as a bell.

“Yeah. The blocker shot’s about done,” Yekase said, words wobbling like heat-haze. “I overestimated my healing. Call me an ambulance, please.”

She smiled as she said it, a brittle crescent like thin ice.

Her eyes rolled. She went down stiff as a felled pine.

…

…

When Yekase came to, Liu RuoYuan and Ling Yi sat on either side of her bed, like bookends of black and blue.

She was home, her own mattress under her like a quiet shore, the sky outside gone ink-dark.

“…Morning, you two,” she said, humor thin as smoke.

“A lady in a black dress brought you back to Valhalla,” Ling Yi said, voice like a small bell.

“Where did you run off to fight who this time?” Liu RuoYuan pressed, her tone a ruler on knuckles.

Yekase’s eyes slid away, like a fish dodging a net. “Listen to you. You make me sound like a battle junkie…”

“Aren’t you?” The reply was a needle, quick and neat.

“No! I talk my way out whenever I can, okay?” Yekase protested, puffing up like a cat. “I have the dignity of a desk job!”

“Pfft.” The laugh popped like a soap bubble.

“Ling Yi, what are you laughing at!”

“N-nothing,” Ling Yi said, eyes crescenting like new moons. “Just glad the doctor’s hurt and still so lively.”

Yekase checked her body like a traveler patting pockets. Limbs intact, signals all green, movement steady like a well-oiled hinge.

The Flash Energy’s entry had hit hard, like lightning finding a vein. The aftertaste still bit, small glitches buzzing like mosquitoes. The road to improvement was long as winter.

“I’ll go heat dinner,” Liu RuoYuan said, seeing Yekase was mostly fine, her steps smooth as a metronome.

She vanished into the kitchen, light pooling behind like warm tea.

Yekase met Ling Yi’s eyes. Ling Yi said, “Fang Tang told me PeaceWarrior came to fight you?”

“Mm,” Yekase said, the sound like a pin tapped. “She doesn’t trust me much… but it’s better now.” She smiled, thin sunlight through cloud. “We set a meet in a few days. We’ll strike Emerald Pool HQ together.”

…

“...Huh?!” Ling Yi jolted, like a bird startled from a branch. “Weren’t we going to prep for ages? How is it already…”

“Chance like this is rare,” Yekase said, a hunter’s calm in her eyes like frost. “But ‘few days’ isn’t a fixed date. We’ll slip in while Twin Towers hits Emerald Pool. We’ll use the chaos to hit both.”

“I get it,” Ling Yi said, face saying the opposite like a mask on crooked. The confusion fluttered like moths.

“I’ll just follow the doctor,” she added, faith simple as a red thread. “Where you strike, I strike.”

“No. You and PeaceWarrior will work as a pair,” Yekase said, drawing the line like a brushstroke. “By the way, her real name’s Lu Yao—Yao like a ballad.”

“Ah—?!” Ling Yi made a noise somewhere between a wail and a squeak, like a kettle on edge.

Yekase sat up, rolling her neck like joints cracking ice. “Weren’t you longing for a teammate and a base? Base is pending, but the teammate’s here.”

“Eh, but PeaceWarrior… she looks so serious,” Ling Yi fretted, shoulders up like a hunched sparrow. “Will she scold me?”

Ling Yi’s face was all worry and wind, and you could imagine how long Liu RuoYuan had sat her down at school today and talked, like rain drumming steady on eaves.

“She won’t scold you,” Yekase said, the promise warm as a hand-warmer. “At worst, she’ll ignore you.”

“That’s awkward too!” Ling Yi scratched her cheek, a cat caught between doors.

She’d always dreamed of a squad, backs together like shields. She’d grown into a solo blade, but yearning stays like incense smoke—thin, persistent, sweet.

But PeaceWarrior… she hadn’t even met her.

Fighting shoulder to shoulder with a stranger… that’s beyond being a social butterfly. It’s crossing a rope bridge in fog.

“It’s fine. She’ll treat you well,” Yekase said, the certainty laid like a stepping stone.

“…Huh.” Ling Yi blinked, a small owl in dusk.

In truth, this was step two of Yekase’s bring-her-up-the-mountain plan, threads weaving like silk.

Yesterday she’d stressed how Lu Yao owed Ling Yi a life, planting a small stone of guilt in Lu Yao’s chest, cold and round.

But she didn’t know Ling Yi yet, so the guilt sat on the surface like frost.

Let them act together. Let them trade cover fire, trade breath, trade trust. The rhythm would braid like river reeds, and friendship would stack on guilt, weight on weight, until it became a burden she chose to carry—staying to protect Ling Yi.

The premise was simple as a compass: Lu Yao’s conscience.

…Using someone’s conscience feels a bit cruel, Yekase thought, a thorn under the thumb. But she did shoot Ling Yi first.

Ling Yi didn’t know what Yekase was weaving, only saw how firm her eyes were, like winter stars, and stopped refusing.

They fell quiet and looked out at the city night, neon running like rain down glass.

—Two months ago, same spot, same two people, staring into the dark like sailors reading tides.

After that, did we really step forward? Did we make the world better in any way, like a lantern lit on a long road? Did we… surpass ourselves, like a sprout breaking the crust?

“…Oh,” Yekase said, thoughts bending like reeds toward a new current. “After Emerald Pool’s settled, Mi— a friend invited me to travel to Ningxia. Her intel says a Gobi city called Changyun’s about to host a week-long rally. Someone plans to use the race for something. She asked me to find what that is, and stop it if needed.”

Truth is, Mira’s tone in the chat was less an invite and more a command, like a stamp on a letter. But after opening the red envelope she sent, Yekase slid it onto the schedule like a knife into a sheath.

“Ningxia! Travel! Can I go?” Ling Yi asked, eyes sparkling like stars in a basin.

“I can’t take you… just kidding,” Yekase said, grin like a fox’s tail. “The rally runs a week. Flights and hotel covered. I’ll help you make up classes. Convincing your parents is on you.”

“Awesome!” Ling Yi whooped, bouncing like a spring, right as Liu RuoYuan came out with dinner, steam curling like banners.

She glanced at delighted Ling Yi, then at Yekase’s mysterious smile, and looked like she understood something and nothing, like fog parting and closing again.

“Food’s ready,” she said, voice warm as soup. “Sit. Eat.”

“Thank you, teacher!” Ling Yi ran to the table, bright as a sparrow to crumbs.

“…Spill it,” Liu RuoYuan murmured to Yekase, arms crossed like folded wings. Only the two of them could hear the edge. “What are you dragging her into now?”

“Nothing. Really nothing,” Yekase said, innocence painted on like watercolor. “Just taking her on a trip…”

“You’re taking a senior on a trip?!” Liu RuoYuan’s eyebrow rose like a drawn bow.

“Before the college entrance exam, I took a month off to play at home,” Yekase said, shrugging like a kite in a light wind. “Remember?”

“That was you,” Liu RuoYuan snapped, a chopstick on table. “Don’t compare normal people to you.”

“I’ll supervise her homework,” Yekase said, palms up like empty plates.

She dodged Liu RuoYuan’s stare and looked to the dining table, where a girl sat without touching chopsticks, waiting for them, lips smacking like a kitten, eyes fixed on the braised eel shining like lacquered dusk.

Maybe it was the light, maybe a trick of angle.

In those clear, onyx eyes—so beautiful you’d think of night pools—there flickered neon red and blue, like twin blades crossing in rain.