Chapter 47: Reunion with Old Friends (Patreon)

In the America of Honkai Impact 3rd's Earth, there was also a kill line, or what you might call an Alice line.

The kill line looks like an efficient way to weed out people who are unnecessary or incapable.

In reality it's an inefficient culling. Most of the time it doesn't kill the incapable. It kills the unlucky. The truly incapable, meanwhile, survive through crooked means: joining the mob, looting stores for free, pulling all sorts of shady stunts.

The people who actually want to live honest lives and are willing to pay their bills are the ones who get culled in droves.

That is exactly what poor social management looks like.

Shenzhou, by contrast, is extremely efficient. Every child, from a young age, regardless of ability or intelligence, joins the rat race together, and their families get dragged into it as well.

The grind continues until they're nearly adults. Only then do the ones who come out the other end prove their intelligence is up to standard, and the state picks them for high-end work, scientific research and innovation, and so on.

Those who fail the grind are put to full use as well. Depending on their ability, even the bottom 15 percent are sent into flexible employment to provide society with one last bit of value.

That is what truly efficient social management looks like.

Of course, for the development of society, the kill line really is inefficient.

But from capital's point of view, once it sees signs that you're about to fall, the most efficient move is to wring out your last drop of blood before you die.

As for society, the individual, the family, the nation and all that, it's every man for himself. Better a fellow Daoist die than me.

And the kill line is precisely a concrete manifestation of capital alienating humanity.

It also shows that this society and its system have reached the stage where the relations of production are holding back the productive forces.

The Interastral Peace Corporation and New Eridu's Tops conglomerate are exactly that.

They earn profit for themselves in the most efficient way possible, yet they do nothing for the development of society. They even stand in its way.

After that, Gusttave took Huohuo traveling through this society as it entered a new era.

But Feixiao and Tingyun, who had never stopped watching over Huohuo, could hardly fail to notice that she had left Tushan.

Through the tracking methods they'd left on Huohuo, they soon tracked her down, and found the person following at her side as well.

The air around them suddenly turned cold.

The children who'd been chattering away a moment ago clamped their mouths shut by instinct, hunched their necks, and scurried back into their houses.

Gusttave paused, then looked up toward the end of the street.

Two people stood there.

The woman in front wore an ice-blue fox fur. Her white hair was loosely pinned up, a few stray strands falling against her cheeks, making her already pale face look as though it were coated in frost.

Her ice-blue eyes were locked on him, as sharp as if tempered in ice, yet they seemed to hide a fire that had burned for years. Her knuckles were white around her folding fan, and her fingertips made the ribs creak.

It was none other than the current ruler of Tushan, Feixiao.

Behind her, Tingyun swayed a peach-blossom fan, her eyes curved in a smile brimming with the delight of someone enjoying a good show. She tapped the tip of the fan lightly against Feixiao's back and muttered, pitched so only the two of them could hear:

"Sister Feixiao, everyone's watching. If you keep glaring at him you'll grind your teeth to dust. We've got plenty of time to settle accounts later."

Feixiao ignored her. Her gaze never left Gusttave once. She walked toward him step by step, her boots striking the bluestone slabs, each footfall landing as though on someone's heartstrings.

Huohuo shuddered in fright. The candy figurine in her hand nearly slipped from her fingers. She darted behind Gusttave in a flash, leaving only two fluffy fox ears showing, and whispered in a voice thin as a mosquito's: "S-Sister Feixiao..."

"So you still know to call me sister?" Feixiao's gaze finally shifted from Gusttave to those two trembling ears, and her voice was cold enough to shed ice chips. "How many times have I told you not to sneak out of Tushan? You treat my words as wind past your ears? And you even dare to run around with someone you don't know. I see your nerve is growing by the day!"

Huohuo was scolded until her head nearly sank into her chest. Her tail was clamped tight between her legs as she mumbled in her defense: "I... I just wanted to come and see... Big Brother isn't a bad person..."

"He's not a bad person? Of course he isn't." Feixiao gave a cold snort, and her gaze fell back on Gusttave's face, her ice-blue eyes churning with emotions that couldn't be named. "Gusttave, you have quite the talent."

"Dead all these years, not a word of news, and the moment you come back you abduct the Female Emperor of Nanguo and turn Nanguo upside down. And now, right after that, you're abducting a fox spirit of my Tushan. Truly impressive!"

[March 7th: The shura field has arrived!! The main event has shown up!! Let me grab a stool and sit down!!]

Hearing Feixiao's words, Gusttave rebutted at once: "I'm taking my first wife out for a stroll. How is that abducting?"

Huohuo, hiding behind him, had been watching the tense standoff with both fox ears flattened against her head in terror.

But when Gusttave said, "I'm taking my first wife out for a stroll, how is that abducting?" she froze on the spot.

Gusttave had just taken her out for a stroll, and now he said he was taking his first wife out for a stroll.

Wouldn't that mean she was the first wife he was talking about?!

The thought sent Huohuo into a panic. "No! I won't marry anyone!"

The moment she imagined that marrying would keep her from becoming a Red Thread Immortal, Huohuo grew frantic inside.

Feixiao, however, wasn't about to indulge her.

In a voice icy as could be, she said: "Your only mission is to marry him. Don't think about anything else!"

All Feixiao wanted was to help Huohuo and Gusttave complete the Pledge of Love, then retrieve every bit of the demonic power and memories Huohuo had spent on it.

She wanted the timid Huohuo of today to turn back into the older sister of her memories.

Gusttave, however, disagreed with this.

In his view, both Huohuos were Huohuo, two personalities of one and the same person. So he respected the little Huohuo's wishes and had no desire to force her into marrying him.

Gusttave watched the ice and fire churning in Feixiao's eyes. He didn't rush to argue. He simply reached out and gently pressed down on the trembling head behind him, then shielded the little fox, already shrunk into a ball with fright, a bit further behind his back.

"Feixiao, she isn't a tool for completing the Pledge of Love. She's Huohuo." His voice was level, yet carried an unshakable certainty. "Don't force her to accept a past that's completely foreign to her, or to marry someone she doesn't even know."

Feixiao froze.

She had imagined countless reactions from Gusttave. He might feel guilty, he might explain himself, he might grin and brush it off, he might even pick a fight with her. The one thing she hadn't expected was a refusal.

"What did you say?" Her voice dropped a few degrees colder, and incredulity churned in her ice-blue eyes. "Do you even know who she became like this for? She gave up all her memories and her demonic power in exchange for your Pledge of Love! And now you tell me you don't want it?"