“N-no... it’s not like that...”

Panic spidered like frost across the System’s face as memory cleared, fog lifting, under Nana Shi’s limp, shielding body.

She remembered it all: at the last heartbeat before the Ice Emperor’s snow-burial, a second amplifier flared like a spark in a blizzard.

But why? The question dropped like a stone into a frozen lake, vanishing without a ripple.

That girl always saved herself first, a lone wolf in a whiteout, then weighed others’ lives; why turn back for someone who ditched her and Seven five years ago?

It didn’t match her core creed, a compass gone wild, its needle spinning under storm-light.

Her head must’ve cracked like thin ice.

“Amazing, isn’t it, Xiao Yi.”

A familiar electronic tone slid into her mind like frost through a window seam.

“M-master?” Snow pressed down like a stone lid; Ningyi’s vision swam like heat over ice, then grabbed the voice like a drowning hand finds driftwood. “Please, save my host!”

“...”

Silence pooled like black water before the voice returned, flat as steel.

“Xiao Yi, sending you into Nana’s past was me placing every hope like lamps along a dark road. If even you can’t, the me in the future can’t.”

The words were calm, but in Ningyi’s ear they stung like sleet under a hood.

She was still useless; even in a human shell, her heart reached for that woman who once flipped fate with bare hands, like a moth to a lantern.

“If you’re not here to help... why contact me now?” The thought skittered like a startled bird; five years of silence snapped like brittle twigs.

“You’ve lingered in Nana’s mental plane long enough. It’s time to come back.” The emotionless blend of tones was colder than metal left on snow.

“What!”

Maybe the voice was too calm; disbelief spread like thawing cracks. “Y-you’re joking, right? You told me to find the key to wake the future host. I can’t leave now!”

“Give me time. If I can pull her through this storm, I’ll find the key we need.”

“Do you have any way to save Nana now?” The synthetic voice echoed like a blade on ice, each syllable a cut. “She can’t be saved. You know it. I know it. You, Ningyi, are a high-tech data construct, dressed in a borrowed soul, feelings mimicked like painted fire. Don’t burn them in the wrong place.”

“W-what? The wrong place?” Her head snapped up like a sapling in wind, eyes wide with incredulity.

“Nana’s body is failing, pushed past its limit by two amplifiers in quick succession, a bowstring frayed to one thread. And the cold around the Northland bites like a pack of wolves. Even if you revive her, how will you cross back to the continent?”

Her cold-suit was torn in the Ice Emperor’s snow-burial, seams split like old scars; only their shared warmth in this narrow pocket kept the night from gnawing her through.

Even so, Nana’s breath was a guttering candle, each flicker thinner than the last.

“Our optimal path is to abandon her, and find the next guardian to keep the test subject’s spirit safe. That’s the order from above, a seal pressed into wax.”

“But then what about the future host’s body?” Panic surged like a black tide. “Will she lie there forever, a sleeping tree that never buds?”

“I’ll handle it. Don’t worry, Xiao Yi.”

“...”

The world fell quiet, and the voice felt colder than the Northland’s wind, a night river that never thaws.

She was my host, my north star; we’ve walked through years like sand, and now I’m told to cut the cord. Bittersweet flooded her chest like steeped tea, sharp and dark.

“There’s still a chance,” she rasped, voice rough like wind over drift. “I’m not badly damaged. I’ve got power left. I can analyze the snowpack like reading code, dig us out like an ant through sugar.”

“Nana’s odds are bleak. Face it.” The master’s tone hardened, ice on stone. “Even if the ceiling holds, how many breaths can she buy at this ebb?”

“Stop letting your personified feelings drive the sled, Xiao Yi. You’re my System, built for study, not a true human. That persona is a tool, a glove over instruments. Do you understand?”

“Xiao Yi... doesn’t understand.”

“What?” The voice jolted, surprise cracking like a branch. He hadn’t expected his own creation to buck the reins.

“You’re wasting effort, do you hear me!”

“Even so,” she said, voice trembling like a string in wind, “I can’t abandon my host because you find it easy.”

She looked back. Unconscious, Nana still raised Heavens Sunder, bracing the pressing snow like Atlas under a mountain. Ningyi’s words shook like sleet.

“You gave me shape and a face. That’s my luck. Meeting her, stumbling and glowing through so many days, that’s my luck too.”

She’d been dead weight for years, a snag on the trail; to bail now would shame every step they took as partners.

Nana had fought through the second amplifier’s backlash to shield her. How could the one always dragging behind abandon the one who bled to cover her?

“I promised that girl I’d wake her up.”

“Ningyi, what are you doing!”

In an isolated chamber, a figure in black stood by a test bench; on a screen, the System pulled a faintly glowing piece from her pocket, a firefly cupped in snow. His voice went sharp as a snapped wire.

“Are you insane! You’re handing your power core to someone dying. What if it doesn’t take!”

That was her simulated heart. Lose it, and the humanoid body would crash like a puppet with cut strings. The price was ruin.

“I order you to stop! Do you know the cost of handing your core away!”

“I’m sorry, Master. Please forgive this one act of willfulness,” she said softly, snow over a grave. “I know the cost. If it wakes her, I won’t regret it. If I can’t come back, then pretend you never built a System named Ningyi.”

“Don’t talk nonsense—”

The voice cut off mid-snap, severed like a wire. Pinned beneath Nana Shi, the System killed the link without a tremor.

Silence fell, thick as falling snow. Cradling her power core, she set it gently on the chest of the woman who, even at the edge of night, held up a sky for her. “I miss the gentle Nana, and the host who called me a trash System,” she murmured, words drifting like flakes.

“Even if it’s a lie, I want to hear that lazy voice once more.”

“I grabbed handmade candy in the slums and never ate even one. I wonder if there’s another chance to taste sweetness again.”

The core pulsed and poured energy like a small sun thawing frost. Ningyi felt strength siphon away, threads pulling from a loom; her sight blurred like glass fogging.

“Your cold-suit is in tatters. At least, when you return in triumph, go back to the continent as a hero, with a cloak against the wind.”

Her small hand shook like a leaf; with the last pulse from her core, she swapped her intact cold-suit onto Nana Shi, warmth wrapping her like a second skin.

“I want to cling to you like before, a shadow at your heel... but that’s a path barred by snow. At least, in another world, don’t let me meet you again.”

Because she’d entered the past through tech, her being and every trace would be erased upon her end, scrubbed by the world’s law like waves wiping footprints.

She watched the suit settle, covering Nana Shi whole like a sheltering tent. Contentment loosened her, and as blur and cold closed in like dusk, she let her eyes fall.

The flashlight slipped into the snow and spent its last mote of light with a soft sigh; the cramped pocket returned to darkness and cold, a buried night without stars.