When tonight's rain ended, summer would end with it.
La Signora walked through the cold, somber forest.
Her half-open, crown-shaped mask had cracked slightly, revealing the edge of a scarlet burn pattern near her eye.
Icy rain poured beneath the leaden horizon. Dawn was slowly beginning at the farthest edge of sight, but even its glow had been stained gray by the downpour.
Daybreak was near, yet Chinju Forest remained shrouded in night. Raindrops fell through the narrow interval between darkness and light, faster and harder with every moment.
She was injured.
Blessed by the Tsaritsa, she had fought a mortal—and she had still been injured.
Electro lingered within the wound, hissing as it burned through her flesh with a needling pain. To La Signora, that wound was a humiliation.
The corrupted beast had escaped from directly beneath her eyes.
Just as the corrupted dragon Durin had wreaked havoc five hundred years ago and killed Rostam while she had been able to do nothing.
Allowing corruption to escape was another humiliation. She had sworn to burn away every calamity and every trace of filth left by the old world, then create the pure-white world Rostam had longed to see.
If they gathered every Gnosis—if they gathered every Gnosis—their dream would come true.
The living needed meaning to sustain them. Without it, they were walking corpses, nothing more than ashes. This was the final meaning left to La Signora's life.
And to ashes, it did not matter if that so-called meaning was empty, nothing more than a reason woven from their own delusions. If it could make the ashes burn again, that was reason enough to cast themselves into the flame.
La Signora continued onward.
Driving rain struck the forest floor and threw damp mist into the air. Fatui soldiers raised clusters of torches and searched the vast forest little by little.
The blazing light drew the birches into long shadows.
La Signora took out the heart once more.
It gleamed like a precious stone, reflecting the torches and casting ring after ring of warm light. Even amid the coldest rain, it radiated a gentle warmth.
She cradled the heart in both hands and pressed it against her cheek.
The heart was beating again.
She could feel it with perfect clarity: Rostam's heart was beating once more, trembling faintly with barely contained excitement.
Yes.
You are happy too, aren't you?
The Gnosis was ahead.
They had taken another step toward that dream—their dream.
Soon it would come true.
She could feel Rostam's emotions. She understood them. Never before had she been so close to Rostam's heart. She could see every feeling within the Wolf Pup with perfect clarity. At last, she understood what it all meant.
Their hearts were joined.
She understood now that this heart had always loved her. Otherwise, it would not have protected her. It would not have shielded her from Barbatos.
They had always belonged to one another. There had merely been a misunderstanding, and that misunderstanding had given rise to conflict.
But now the misunderstanding was gone, and so was the conflict.
Now their hearts were one.
Even at this moment, the heart was guiding her in the right direction. The closer she drew, the faster it beat, until its slow rhythm became a rumble like distant thunder.
That heart was beating for her.
In the entire year she had carried it, nothing like this had ever happened.
It was leading her to the boy who had dared defy divine authority and shelter a corrupted beast.
La Signora remembered that the heart had beaten when she first met that mortal too. Surely that had been Rostam's warning to her—his attempt to guide her.
And now, at last, that kindness had been proven real.
She finally reached the place toward which the heart had led her. Its thunderous beating erupted with unprecedented force, startling the birds from the mountains.
The sky was growing bright.
Washed clean by rain, it was now clear and translucent. Only a few yellow-tinged clouds stretched across the heavens, like the shadows of pine, cypress, and bamboo reflected upon still water. The clear sunlight of early autumn poured between the leaves and fell upon the back of a young man in the distance.
Light stirred faintly in La Signora's eyes.
Then, in the next instant, her expression froze.
The young man sensed the movement behind him and turned. Beneath a pale violet kasa was a handsome, delicate face, exquisite as a doll's yet utterly without expression. His light-blue eyes were still and deep as pooled water.
Those eyes reflected La Signora's faintly startled face.
The puppet named Kunikuzushi stared straight at her. Yet his gaze never truly rested upon La Signora.
It remained fixed upon the heart.
Kunikuzushi.
...What?
Why?
Why was Kunikuzushi waiting at the end of the heart's guidance?
An entire year had passed. Why did it still lead to Kunikuzushi?
It was not supposed to be like this.
No. This was wrong. This could not be right. It was not supposed to be like this!
La Signora tightened her grip around the heart without realizing it.
"I heard thunder." Kunikuzushi's eyes were unsettling. "I saw a bolt of lightning. It looked familiar."
"And?"
After that brief moment of surprise, La Signora's voice turned cold.
"He is merely a mortal who has overstepped his place. In the end, he will die by my hand."
"That thing in your hands..." Kunikuzushi asked. "What is it?"
"Kiyono Fugin's heart. My trophy." La Signora's voice sank. "I have already explained this."
"Then why...?" Kunikuzushi stared directly into her eyes. "Why would you carry a 'trophy' taken in Mondstadt while hunting an enemy through Inazuma?"
"Are you truly so unwilling to let that heart out of your hands?"
"Meaningless nonsense." La Signora's face was impassive.
"I went to see the Guuji—the fox."
Kunikuzushi spoke calmly.
"When I mentioned the heart, I felt her composure waver. It lasted only an instant, but the disturbance was unmistakable—and violent."
"There are very few people in this world who could shake Yae Miko so deeply. But whoever that person may be, he cannot possibly be some knight from Mondstadt."
"Yae Miko is here too?" La Signora's expression turned glacial. "Did you bring her?"
"No. I did not tell her where to find you."
Kunikuzushi's voice was equally cold.
"This is between us. An internal matter of the Fatui."
La Signora stared at him. After an unknowable length of time, something moved faintly in her eyes.
A report had just reached her.
One of the search parties had found Kiyo Seigan—the bearer of the Gnosis.
He was at the edge of Chinju Forest.
"Move." La Signora's voice was cold. "I have no time to waste on you."
"Answer me."
Kunikuzushi did not move.
This was the first morning of autumn. A desolate autumn light lay across Chinju Forest, and century-old birches rustled in the wind. Their swaying shadows spread between the two Harbingers as they faced one another in deathly silence.
"Rosalyne-Kruzchka Lohefalter!"
Kunikuzushi spoke her name in a low, threatening voice. The calm had vanished from his eyes.
"What are you hiding?"
Iaijutsu—the art of striking in the instant a blade was drawn.
This iaijutsu strike was wrought from blades of wind. Racing currents wrapped around a razor-sharp path and descended in a single instant. The slash grazed La Signora's cheek and scattered droplets of blood.
In the next instant, Kunikuzushi appeared directly before her. His dark-blue eyes bore into hers as he growled:
"That heart!"
"Where did it come from?"
"Why does seeing it..." Kunikuzushi's eyes trembled faintly. "Why does it hurt so much?"
Kunikuzushi had never admitted it, but Kiyono Raimei had indeed filled something resembling the role of a father in his life.
And so, when the heartless puppet looked upon that heart again, a phantom pain throbbed within his empty chest.
All this time, he had never known what to call the emotion that sprang to life there.
It should have meant nothing. Yet he stubbornly pursued its meaning and whatever truth it might reveal.
Crimson fire butterflies crashed against the wind blades. Fire and wind entwined, fighting and feeding one another until they erupted in an enormous explosion.
The Fatui Harbingers stood at the summit of mortal power.
When the Eighth and Sixth Harbingers fought, the elements around them were thrown into chaos.
Kunikuzushi staggered several steps back. His wind blades severed fire butterfly after fire butterfly, and their shattered remains fell as streams of flame.
"Answer me. Answer me!"
"I am going to reclaim the Gnosis. What I carry out is the pure-white will."
"The will and command of the Tsaritsa."
The fluttering fire butterflies swept outward into the hem of a magnificent crimson gown. La Signora's half-open, crown-shaped mask slowly shattered.
Her voice was cold.
"No one will stand in the path of that will."
"Kunikuzushi, there is no longer a place for you among the Fatui."
"You have betrayed us."
—
Kiyo Seigan felt Kamigiri stir.
Ever since he first set foot upon Inazuman soil, the weapon that had once been stained with a god's blood had been trying to tell him something.
Today—just moments ago, when Teppei cried out the oath of Fudoshin—that stirring reached its peak.
Kiyo saw that slash once more.
Heaven and earth turned white. The frost-laden air was swept clear. The snowfields trembled. Thunder descended from the sky. Every sound was swallowed by its roar, every shape bleached away within its light, until nothing remained in the world but pure white.
The pure white left behind when all filth had been swept from the open fields.
Kiyo had severed the Fatui captain's head and ordered them to get out of Inazuma.
He was gravely wounded. His body had already reached its limit.
Yet, somehow, he had frightened the soldiers opposite him into fleeing in abject terror.
Kiyo knew it would not last. Their hiding place had been exposed. They had to leave immediately.
Now that his true face had been revealed, where could he go?
The Inazuman Commissions could not be trusted. He could not seek their protection. The nation's borders were sealed and its mail routes cut off. He could neither leave by ship nor summon outside aid.
If he returned to Kiyono's Tofu Shop, he would only drag the people of Konda Village into danger.
Besides, he could no longer return.
A Fatui Harbinger was probably waiting outside Konda Village at that very moment.
He had temporarily lost contact with Lumine. Torachiyo and Havria had yet to awaken.
His wounds had split open again, and icy cold was slowly seeping into his bones.
His gaze lowered to Teppei, who was staring at him with open worship.
"That was so cool." The young soldier's eyes seemed to shine. He was still reliving the magnificence of Kiyo's slash, utterly exhilarated. "That was incredible!"
This idiot.
"Looking cool comes at a price..." A strained smile tugged at Kiyo's lips. "Come hold me up. Hurry... I can't stay on my feet much longer."
They began fleeing once more.
The only fortunate thing was that no Harbinger came after them.
For reasons they could not know.
The soldiers with Delusions were troublesome enough.
Teppei had already been wounded. His old samurai garb was even more tattered than before, dusty and bedraggled. He supported Kiyo as they made their way through the cold forest, while Ioroi carried the unconscious Torachiyo upon his back.
Behind them came the pounding hooves of the Fatui cavalry, each beat shattering the solitude of autumn.
They were about to be caught.
Teppei drew his sword and exhaled. Resolved to die, he stared at the Fatui bearing down upon them.
In the next instant, bowstrings thrummed.
The warhorses screamed in terror as arrows struck them. One after another, they toppled mid-charge, sending up wave after wave of dirt. Fatui soldiers were thrown headlong from their saddles.
Before they could recover, a second rain of arrows arrived, heavy with killing intent. Shafts pierced arms, chests, and hearts. Blood and severed limbs flew through the air as the volley turned the charge into a meat grinder.
Something moved in Kiyo's eyes.
Kiyono Sara.
At the farthest edge of sight, the tall woman held a longbow at full draw. She wore a pale violet samurai kimono, its hem revealing her fair thighs. White tabi rested within wooden geta. Her expression was cold and solemn as she loosed one arrow after another into the Fatui ranks.
Each arrow pierced a soldier's chest and claimed a life like death itself.
Soon, the pursuing Fatui broke and fled. At Kiyono Sara's command, troops beneath banners bearing Lightning and Snake surged after them.
They cut the fleeing Fatui to pieces.
"That's General Kiyono Sara! I recognize her!"
Teppei's eyes shone with excitement.
"She's the adopted daughter of His Grace the Pillar General! And that banner... It belongs to the Pillar General's estate! Those soldiers are his household troops!"
Lightning and Snake had not belonged solely to the Pillar General's estate.
A century ago, it had been the banner of the entire Pillar Army.
When that army was dissolved, many of its veterans laid down their arms and returned to civilian life. Some, however, volunteered to enter the service of the Pillar General's household, and thus the legacy had endured.
The soldiers before them were descendants of the Pillar Army of a century ago.
No wonder Teppei was so excited.
"We meet again."
Kiyo Seigan's face was reflected in Kiyono Sara's eyes. For some reason, something trembled faintly in their depths.
She suppressed that strange emotion and spoke with her customary seriousness.
"Do not worry. The Pillar General's household will protect you."
That strange feeling was better described as familiarity.
It came from her father.
Her voice turned cold.
"The Fatui do not have free rein in Inazuma. One day, every debt they owe will be settled."
Kiyono Sara paused, then continued.
"The person you asked me to find... I found him."
"Or rather, he deliberately revealed his trail."
Found him...?
Kiyo stared at her.
"The tengu?"
"Yes." Kiyono Sara looked directly at him. "My ancestor—the Great Tengu, Sasayuri."
Apart from the Raiden sisters, the Great Tengu was the final name upon the list.