Honkai: Star Rail — Kamen Rider! [24]

"It all sounds so noble," the woman murmured, her voice soft through the lavender veil that hung from her head. "The War Foundry destroyed. The planet revived. Life slowly returning to a world on the edge of death…"

She sat across from Sora, her delicate fingers gliding over a spread of tarot cards.

"A classic tale of justice and passion. Evil repelled, righteousness restored."

From the deck, she selected a card and held it out to him.

"But, sir, these memories… we already know."

"What we seek to understand," she said, eyes gleaming with a strange intensity, "is what happened in the days when Planet Camille vanished from the records of the universe."

Vanished—meaning that during a certain period, nothing that occurred on Camille could be found in any known records. No witnesses. No traces.

Only the people who lived it would remember.

And as a Remembrancer of the Garden of Recollection, her task—her joy—was to piece together those missing fragments of galactic memory.

That's why, once the dust had settled, she'd come to find one of the key eyewitnesses.

"So, tell me—what happened next?"

"Why was Camille excluded from all cosmic records? Why was there no trace left of what transpired?"

"Would you be so kind," she asked, "as to help me fill in the blanks?"

"…So even you don't know what really happened."

Sora rolled the silver-white bullet between his fingers, his voice laced with a wistful bitterness.

"That time... what really happened was…"

---

When Anna appeared on the battlefield, the momentum shifted in an instant.

The arrows she conjured—illusions of the Hunt Aeon's divine rain—pierced through the three Doomsday Beasts surrounding Sora.

Armor shattered. Wings tore. Bodies crumbled.

Without a unifying controller, the beasts lacked cohesion. They each fought in isolation, unable to mount any coordinated defense.

And Anna's infinite barrage needed no opening—it created them.

Each arrow tore through their reinforced shells, punching through their bodies like divine judgment.

Her face flushed red from the strain—she was burning every ounce of power she had to protect the heroes of this ravaged world.

Sora and Ouja were now out of danger.

They could only stand back and watch as Anna took the stage.

The Doomsday Beasts roared, their cries thundering across the ruins.

The Antimatter Legion may not have known pain, but the Doomsday Beasts could feel rage—rage at their failure to destroy.

They sensed something terrifying: Camille was beginning to live again.

And they could not allow that.

It was a disgrace to the Legion. An insult to Destruction.

So even with gaping wounds riddling their bodies, they charged once more toward the girl in the sky.

But they never reached her.

The rain of arrows swallowed their last hope.

Even when two of the beasts tried to shield the third—hoping it could close the distance, claws outstretched toward Anna—

They were too late.

One final claw soared upward, aiming for her heart.

If they could just kill this one… maybe they could still—

"[Rider Kick]!"

"Don't you dare underestimate me!"

The violet figure dropped from the sky.

Sora's kick slammed into the reaching claw—and shattered the beast's final strike.

ROOOAAR!

The beast bellowed in disbelief.

But it couldn't reverse the tide.

Its torn body, weakened from arrows and fury, couldn't hold together any longer. Sora's attack drove it back, reeling.

BOOM.

With one final, thunderous crash, the last Doomsday Beast fell.

A cloud of dust rolled outward—gentle, like the dawn following a storm.

"Haaah... haaah..."

Anna hovered in the air, gasping for breath. The effort had pushed her childlike frame far beyond its limits.

But in the end, they'd done it.

The disease that had infected this dying world... was gone.

"Hah…"

Sora finally exhaled.

He pulled out the Memory. His armor shattered into fragments and dissolved into the wind.

A wave of exhaustion crashed over him—like someone who'd pulled an all-nighter for three days straight.

The truth was, his body had long since reached its limit. It was only the JOKER Memory keeping him on his feet.

Now that the power was gone, so was his strength.

And just as he began to collapse—someone caught him.

Robin.

She looked into his pale face, emerald-green eyes bright with relief.

"You okay?" she asked gently.

He gave a faint smile. "Barely."

The last Doomsday Beast's death cry was the final wail of the Antimatter Legion on Camille.

And with that, the planet welcomed its first true breath of hope.

Supported by Robin, Sora limped toward the waiting crowd.

But before he could even sit, he found himself surrounded.

They didn't cheer. They stared.

Eyes filled with awe. With gratitude. With fire.

Because Sora wasn't just another fighter.

He was the reason they had won.

And then she came.

Anna, the last royal of Camille, stood before him.

Her body wavered from exhaustion—but her voice was steady, ceremonial.

For one who had nearly saved the world, she owed him the highest honors her people could offer.

Camille's greatest gesture of respect: to place one's hands over the other's heart.

Anna pressed both hands gently to Sora's chest.

"Sora," she said solemnly, "we owe our victory to you."

"You are our hero. Our savior. On behalf of Camille, I—Anna Bergalo—thank you with all my heart."

She withdrew her hands and gave him a deep bow.

When she straightened, she continued, "Please take time to rest. Once we've restored contact with the outside, we'll arrange your return."

"And when you go, Camille will present you with a reward worthy of our debt."

"You saved us. No matter how modest it seems, we ask that you accept it."

At that, Sora simply nodded. There was nothing else to say.

A reward, huh?

...Yeah, he'd accept that.

"First Seat, we've found a fragment," someone called from the distance, drawing Anna away.

And with that, calm returned.

The Antimatter Legion had been purged. Camille was wounded, but alive.

"Looks like we can finally go home," Robin murmured, sitting beside him.

"Can you believe it? All this in just a few days."

"No... I really can't," Sora said.

Not long ago, he'd been just another tired office worker.

And now, somehow, he was a planetary hero.

...Not bad, honestly.

"Let's just hope nothing else happens," he sighed.

And then—

Something stirred.

A ripple in the air. A strange pulse, crawling across the sky.

And then—

A flood of black smoke rolled over the horizon, swallowing the sky whole.

Sora fell silent.

Then muttered a single word:

"...Fuck."

If I say I want to go out for barbecue, is a boss-level snake demon gonna show up next?