Meanwhile, as Lumina led March 7th and the others to Apricot Grove, time in the real world was also passing swiftly. In the blink of an eye, five days had already passed since the Special Preview Program.
During these five days, Lumina's popularity remained sky-high, with countless players flooding the official accounts with urgent requests.
They eagerly urged for the PV and animated short to be released as soon as possible, and some even dared to demand that Mihoyo drop Version 1.7 that very day.
However, the official accounts remained utterly silent, behaving like aloof and ethereal immortals.
[Hurry, hurry, hurry! Old man, drop the PV already!]
[Are you dead? Why haven't you made a single move? Should I call 911?]
[Please, please release just one! I'm dying! (Kneeling and sobbing uncontrollably)]
[What's the point of crying here? Do you think the official account even cares? You'd be better off spending this time enjoying some high-quality Lumina doujinshi... By the way, Lumina doujinshi are only 20 yuan each, top-tier quality (prepare for nosebleeds)!]
[Oh, you've scammed so much money that even your bots have evolved into real people?]
[Speaking of which, I remember they used to cost over 200 yuan each... Who's the god who managed to drive down the price of Lumina doujinshi?]
As midnight approached, players, as usual, flooded the official account's Comment Section with demands. Surprisingly, the official account responded.
Precisely as the clock struck midnight, the official account released a video simultaneously across all its platforms:
[Honkai: Star Rail - Myriad Celestia PV: "A World Forged by You"]
[Hiss... This PV title reminds me of someone from the past...]
[Lumina won't stray! Playing until the servers shut down!]
[To the previous commenter: Lumina never strays to begin with!]
As soon as the promotional video was released, a massive wave of viewers flooded into it. Upon seeing the initial 12+ age rating and Mihoyo logo, they immediately filled the comment section with the usual classic remarks that accompany every video.
["Conflict and disaster... gradually lead beautiful worlds toward destruction."]
["But a world on the brink of destruction isn't necessarily a planet's annihilation. It's..."]
As the images faded, a distinctive, gentle female voice resonated in the ears of every viewer.
["La♪ La-la♪ La-la-la♪"]
The voice fell silent, and a melancholic, sorrowful melody filled the air. The screen revealed a world teetering on the edge of annihilation.
Everything was withering; the sky shattered and crumbled. Despair and hopelessness poured from the video, flooding the hearts of every viewer.
The video continued to play, revealing the only surviving race in the World: humans.
Clad in tattered rags and looking disheveled, each person was as thin as wood, their faces gaunt with malnutrition and unbearable hunger.
Faced with the impending apocalypse, not a single one of them showed any sign of resistance. Perhaps, in their eyes, the world had already begun its final countdown, and resistance was nothing more than a futile struggle...
"O Great God... Will you deign to cast your gaze upon these mere ants?"
In the next moment, they all knelt on the ground with legs as thin as chopsticks, offering silent prayers to the desolate world. They prayed for a merciful God to grant humanity hope.
As the world's final countdown ticked down, humanity abandoned resistance, choosing instead to pray for divine intervention.
At the forefront of the kneeling crowd lay the world's dwindling food supply. Though the provisions were already rotting, food remained food, its rancid "fragrance" lingering in the air before their noses.
They knelt on the ground in orderly rows, each person silently praying with unwavering sincerity etched on their faces.
Though their stomachs were long since flattened by hunger, they felt no greed for the food offered to the gods.
How could such an emotion arise in people already consumed by despair?
How could those already consumed by despair believe in the descent of a divine being?
Everything they did was merely a desperate grasp at an illusory straw.
Even they themselves didn't believe in the existence of this straw.
Time trickled by, but the promised Divine Miracle failed to materialize. Yet, no emotion flickered across the faces of the kneeling people. They remained on their knees, continuing their silent prayers.
Time continued to flow, the countdown whispering in their ears. The background music shifted, the sorrow instantly vanishing, replaced by vast, suffocating Nihility—a Nihility that crushed hope into despair...
Perhaps, among the myriad gods, only Nihility had answered their prayers...
This was the thought in every player's mind as they watched the video... Perhaps because the video's emotional intensity was so overwhelming, most viewers had already forgotten that this was Lumina's Myriad Celestia Promotional Video.
Well... it wasn't really their fault. After all, the video was already past the halfway point, and Lumina still hadn't appeared yet...
What kind of decent person makes a Myriad Celestia PV where the protagonist doesn't show up until the progress bar is more than halfway full...? some clear-headed players silently grumbled.
But the next moment, as green light enveloped each viewer, the music shifted again, filling hearts with warmth and a sense of wonder.
Instantly, the players snapped out of their stupor, realizing that the protagonist of this PV was about to appear!
Just as they'd anticipated, a stunningly beautiful woman in a white dress, her bare feet treading the void, materialized before them, accompanied by her own dramatic background music.
"G... God... Oh, God..."
As the figure materialized before them, even the eyes of everyone in the video—once veiled by Nihility—now flickered with a hint of color.
A verdant hue—the color of life's resurgence.
"G... Great God, please deliver your judgment upon us..."
All knelt, burying their faces in the dirt at a mere glance of the Holy and Immaculate figure.
They dared not defile the Sacred God with their despairing, nihilistic gazes...
"Then, you who are about to dissolve into Nihility, please join me in silent prayer."
The woman showed no concern for these people who had mistaken her for a deity. A gentle smile graced her lips as she extended her palm toward the kneeling crowd.
"The calamity departs because of me."
"The calamity departs because of me."
Heeding the Great God's decree, each person earnestly repeated the words in their hearts.
"Life is reborn through me."
"Life is reborn through me."
"The future shines because of me."
"The future shines because of me."
As these words echoed, the images began to shift ceaselessly.
Yet no matter how the scenes transformed—whether the landscapes shifted, the worlds altered, or the people praying varied—the holy woman who brought miracles to life remained radiant, bestowing boundless hope upon all.
Even though the people of that era didn't fully grasp the meaning of her words, knowing only to cling to this final lifeline before slipping into nihility, the miracles she wrought and the hope she ignited were indelibly etched into the hearts of every witness.
"The world exists because of me."
"The world exists because of me."
With the final utterance, every world that had appeared in the images—every world teetering on the brink of collapse, about to dissolve into nothingness—their proof of existence, once again, began to glow with renewed brilliance...
Worlds that should have vanished into the long river of history, forgotten by all, began their second voyage.
Perhaps at the time, no one truly understood what I represented. But with each voyage's discoveries, with each voyage's calamities, people finally came to realize the truth.
I represented not that Holy God, but humanity, life itself.
Just as HER final words had declared:
The world exists because of humanity...
The world exists because of life...
But... this ultimate Answer held no importance for anyone.
For in the hearts of all people, all living beings, there was a unified Answer, the truest and most deeply acknowledged truth:
This is a world that exists because of you.
Honkai: Star Rail
As the Honkai: Star Rail's signature icon swept across the screen, the video concluded.