AE Invasion

**AE Invasion** is one major event outside the main story, told in the *AE Invasion* manga, which detailed the events of Anti-Entropy's brief exchange with St. Freya High in its attempted kidnapping of the 3rd Herrscher, Raiden Mei.

## Characters

* Raiden Mei
* Kiana Kaslana
* Bronya Zaychik
* Joyce Clone 1
* Welt Yang
* Fu Hua
* 3rd Herrscher
* Theresa Apocalypse
* Siegfried Kaslana (simulation)
* Murata Himeko
* Cocolia
* Frederica Nikola Tesla
* Lieserl Albert Einstein
* Sin Mal
* Yae Sakura (simulation)
* Cecilia Schariac (flashback)

## Summary

Taking place in 2014, in St. Freya High Medical Bay ICU, Kiana is worriedly waiting for Himeko's recovery as the latter had passed out during the Honkai mission due to a Honkai power spike given her low Honkai adaptability. While waiting, Kiana slips into a dream, where she approaches Himeko's bedside to check on her. Before she could touch her, however, an undead Himeko attacks her, causing Kiana to free herself and flee, running into her father, Siegfried. Seeing him, Kiana berates him for abandoning her four years ago, only to have him shoot her, accusing her of being affected by the Honkai. Waking from her nightmare, Kiana then runs into Welt Yang, in the disguise of one of St. Freya's history professors, who ask if she was alright. Without a response, Kiana flees and is then seen later in the dorms with Mei and Bronya at the dining table. The two dormmates noticed Kiana's lack of appetite before Mei assures Kiana that Himeko would make a recovery soon.

Theresa then enters the dorm, seemingly bearing bad news, before announcing cheerfully that Himeko was expected to make a full recovery and suggesting a celebration involving Homu-Homu adventures and bitter melon juice. As Bronya downs a bottle of bitter melon juice, much to Mei's horror, the principal then notices her niece's downcasted mood, which prompts her to apologize to Kiana for joking. Kiana brushes it aside and reveals her pent-up guilt that she was at fault for what happened to Himeko, desiring nothing more than to protect those she loved. At that, Theresa triumphantly declares that she could make it possible by giving Kiana some "hellish training." Meanwhile, in an unknown base, Anti-Entropy was holding a meeting to brief on their plan to kidnap the 3rd Herrscher, Raiden Mei, from the dorms. Tesla then brings up that their sovereign told them to not make any moves against any herrscher until he has returned, in which case, Cocolia introduces the "sovereign" who seemingly returned. Suspicious of him, Tesla doubts only subsided when the "sovereign" demonstrated the raw gravitational powers of the 1st herrscher before ordering the meeting to be continued.

Some time later at the dorms, Mei and Bronya were playing a fighting game where Mei was about to commit to her 23rd loss before Bronya presses a button on Mei's controller, that unleashed her character's ultimate move, defeating Bronya for the first time and causing Mei to rejoice. There is then knocking on the door, to which Mei answers and is greeted by the "sovereign" of AE, under the impression that he was the "new admin" and that Theresa requested Mei's audience. Noticing the man, Bronya insists on tagging along, in which the "admin" empathizes that Theresa only wanted to see Mei. Bronya then suggests calling the principal, which gets the "sovereign" to tsk to himself, discarding his mission's secrecy as he threatens to harm Mei if Bronya didn't behave and shocking his captive into unconsciousness to prove that point. Bronya refuses and summons Project Bunny which fires a shot at the invader.

Meanwhile, in St. Freya's training cabin, Kiana dons the White Comet Battlesuit, which Theresa explains is a 3rd Gen battlesuit given to B rankers that would often take A rankers up to 3 months to master. Kiana then complains that 3 months was too long, causing Theresa to cheekily explain the training program which would replicate the hardest enemies that Kiana had fought into a real-simulation. While Kiana calls the program lame, the system then replicates Yae Sakura from Kiana's memories, who then attacks her. Seeing Sakura, Theresa was baffled as to how Kiana knew about Sakura, who she recalled from Gratitude Arc. Dismissing this, Theresa then warns Kiana cheerfully that while the simulation wasn't real, it was still dangerous. Freeing herself from Sakura's chains, Kiana willingly accepts the challenge.

Back at the dorms, the "sovereign" survives the Project Bunny cannon shot, revealing himself to be a clone of Welt Joyce. After dismantling Project Bunny, Bronya is then thrown against the wall. In a last ditch effort, Bronya tries to call Theresa, only for the clone to stop her and warn that had it not been for Cocolia begging him to spare Bronya's life, she would be dead. It is then that Fu Hua appears, attacking from behind. Hearing the commotion, Hua had originally believed it was Kiana and Bronya fighting again, only to discover it was an unwanted visitor.

At the same time, in the cabin, Kiana has successfully defeated her 7th opponent, causing Theresa to compare Kiana to her mother, Cecilia. Seeing the exhausted Kaslana, Theresa asks if Kiana wants a break, only for the other to refuse as she was determined to finish her training. Thus, the final boss appeared, originally taking the form of Mei before it switched to Siegfried, causing Theresa to question why the most feared enemy in Kiana's memory was him. She then tries to stop the test to no avail. Down below, Siegfried and Kiana have a heart to heart with Kiana accusing the other for abandoning her. The sim then brushes it off by making a perverted comment which earns him a right hook as Kiana declares she would beat him up so she could do the same to the real Siegfried later, in which the sim accepts.

As for the kidnapping incident, the dorms explode as the battle is taken outside, with the clone applauding Fu Hua's survivability as he boasts about his gravity manipulation powers. Fu Hua, though, just calls them lame, prompting him to retort with his other powers, before realizing he didn't know what other powers he had aside from gravity manipulation. In this brief hesitation, Fu Hua strikes, forcing the clone to block her attacks. However, attacking the clone was never Hua's intent as she managed to snatch Mei from him while he was distracted by her attacking illusion, further enraging him. Before they could get away, the clone then multiplied the gravity on Hua by 100, immobilizing her. As he prepares a barrage of rubble, he declares that he would resolve to rip the herrscher core out of Mei now that both Bronya and Fu Hua had dared to impede him. However, he is surprised to see Fu Hua still intact after the barrage's impact and realized the attack had been deflected by the 3rd Herrscher, who woke. Commenting that Hua had shed enough blood to defend her cowardly host, the 3rd Herrscher decides to take matters into her own hands. Unfortunately, the heart bomb placed as a safety measure is then activated, giving her only five minutes before it detonates. Scoffing at this, the herrscher remarks that five minutes was more than enough to trash the clone as lightning rains from the skies.

All the while, Kiana and Siegfried are sparring as Theresa gets a notification that the heat bomb was activated and that Mei was being kidnapped. Being alerted by this, Kiana then tells the sim she has to go and save Mei, which gets the sim to probe about Mei's importance to her. However, while the sim applauds their relationship, he also says he knew that Mei was a herrscher, therefore he wouldn't allow her to go save the other due to the Kaslana Oath to exterminate all Honkai and unleashing Shamash at max power over Kiana's shoulder to prove his point. Theresa immediately berates the sim for the reckless gesture while the familiarity of the action drags Kiana into a flashback. Meanwhile, Cocolia and Einstein managed to infiltrate St. Freya's underground church.

In Kiana's flashback, it is revealed that Siegfried had told her she had a freak head accident which was the reason why she couldn't remember anything before she was nine and that her mother died before she turned two. Kiana also mentions how Siegfried would often give her what she wants but never smiled nor celebrated her birthday with her, and for the longest, all she knew was her last name. She also mentions how occasionally, when drunk, Siegfried would mutter two names that were unfamiliar to her at the time: Kiana and Cecilia. Kiana also recalls how she knew that Siegfried was a former agent of Schicksal, who had gone rogue but continued to fight the Honkai, often coming home with scars and wounds that she would help patch up. One such incident, had the young Kiana ask her Siegfried why he fights the Honkai and for the first time, he smiled at her and told her it was in his Kaslana blood that he would rise up to protect those in the way of danger. This conversation affected Kiana deeply as she sought to also become a defender of the people, getting her father to teach her the Kaslana's Gun Kata fighting style but always being warned to stay home. However, two years later during her birthday, Siegfried returns and passes out from his wounds while Honkai are detected near their home. Determined to protect her father, Kiana takes the Judgement of Shamash and goes out to confront the beasts. Unfortunately, she was overpowered before Siegfried came and saved her. After the beasts were defeated, Kiana explains how she didn't want to see Siegfried hurt, which touched Siegfried, causing him to smile once more and hug her, apologizing for not celebrating her birthday and then giving her her full name: Kiana Kaslana. That day, the two swore an oath together to do their best to protect all that is beautiful in the world. After that, Siegfried's treatment of Kiana changed drastically, cooking for her (albeit still terrible at it) and attempting to teach her how to flirt and drink. The two were able to fight side by side, until a year later, when things changed once again. Waking in a burning forest, Kiana was disoriented and didn't know how she ended up in the situation, with the bandages over her right eye gone and revealing a golden eye. Out of the flames, Siegfried emerges with a bloodied and missing left arm. Kneeling by his daughter's side, Siegfried then tells Kiana that everything was alright and as a Kaslana, he would do anything he could to protect those he loved, before leaving her.

In the present, Kiana is shocked to the core, on the ground, snapping out of her flashback as those memories slip out of her mind again. Standing in front of her was her father's sim, with Shamash aimed at her head, ordering her to take up the oath and give up on Mei. When Kiana refused again, the sim unseals Shamash's Zweihänder form, which Theresa recalls had once been recorded to devastate an entire city before killing its wielder. Demanding that the sim stop his madness, Theresa then realizes the only way the sim could use the form was because Kiana has seen it before in her memories, stunning the principal. Faced by the sim's unyielding resolve, Kiana despairs and is then visited by a memory of her father, who reminds her of their promise and how Kaslanas would always fight to defend those they loved. Realizing this, Kiana denounces the sim as a fake as she fires at the sigil of PE's Herrscher of Flame behind him, shattering Shamash's form. It is then that the sim smiles and reveals it never intended to kill Kiana, much to Theresa's relief, as it hugs her and says he is proud that Kiana had grown over the years but never forgot their promise to follow their heart. Noticing Theresa, the sim then comments how the other hadn't changed from Siegfried's memories and wishes that there was a window to see the moon as he had met everyone he loved under it, before leaving. As the sim disappears out of existence, Theresa checks up on Kiana, only to hear the other saddened that she couldn't recall the reason why her father had left her despite promptly remembering it a few minutes ago. Dismissing the numerous questions on her mind, Theresa then focuses on the crisis that Mei was currently facing before getting a notification that someone had breached the underground church. Meanwhile, the 3rd Herrscher had subdued the Joyce clone.

At the underground church, Theresa confronts Einstein and Cocolia, demanding the two to surrender themselves. Cocolia then remarks that the underground church must have been of high importance to the Overseer if he had prioritized it over the 3rd Herrscher. Theresa then brushes off Cocolia's stalling tactics, declaring that it wouldn't work as the archives' code would take 7 hours to decrypt. However, Einstein corrects her by saying 7 hours, 32 minutes, and 46 seconds, right as she cracked the code, much to Theresa's bewilderment. Einstein then explains that she brute forced the code with her special access key due to Anti Entropy being a former branch of Schicksal 60 years ago. Realizing who Einstein was, Theresa then exclaims that she was told the other had died in a freak accident before choosing to postpone her questions as she prepares to attack them. It is then that Cocolia reveals the three mechas that had been transported through the quantum realm, surrounding the Apocalypse. Realizing this would take longer than she had anticipated, Theresa then wishes Kiana well under her breath as she willingly accepts AE's challenge. On Mei's end, the herrscher was preparing to kill the Joyce clone before the heart bomb unleased secondary defenses as the timer hit the 10 second countdown mark, causing her to stop and keel in pain.

As the mechs prepared to attack Theresa, Cocolia remarks that the Oath of Judah would be rendered useless because the mechs weren't biologic organisms - only to have Theresa slam the 152 kg cross into the mechs like a toy, surprising the former. With the spear of Judah pointed at her throat, Cocolia then reveals her escape plan as Einstein interferes, uncovering the pods used in the Sirin Project by Schicksal to research the 2nd Herrscher's powers. Theresa dismisses this as something she already knew before Einstein prompts her to take a closer look. Upon closer examination, Theresa enters shock as she realizes each of the pods contained a clone of Kiana. Einstein then whispers in Theresa's ear that she had disabled the surveillance cameras briefly and proposes that they work together to protect those they loved.

After being freed from the 3rd Herrscher, the Joyce clone had bound Mei up again, promising to make her pay for insulting him prior. However, the herrscher continues to call him pathetic before lamenting on her situation, remarking that she no longer had to cook for the others anymore. In her contemplation, she talks about how she had been born in Mei's mind when the other had been ostracized and lonely, overwhelmed with memories and emotions that were not her own. Instead, only the destructive powers and the mission to eradicate humanity were the only things she had to her identity. However, meeting Kiana changed both of them, with the herrscher questioning why she hadn't killed the Kaslana despite having every opportunity to. It is here that she realizes that Kiana had been the only one she felt she could talk to and had believed the other's nonstop talk of saving her. Even when she planned to kill herself and Mei, Kiana had reached out to both of them. After that, she had sealed herself in Mei's mind, watching Kiana from afar and feeling warm. After contemplating, the 3rd Herrscher remarks how ironic it was that there would be someone she would miss if she were to die. Thus she awakens once more and declares she would strike the clone down regardless of the cost, as long as Kiana would be saved from him. Before she could do that, however, Kiana appears and dropkicks the clone in the face, allowing the herrscher to retreat and pause the bomb countdown again.

Hearing Kiana declare that Mei's "Young Knight" was here, the 3rd Herrscher is amused before deadpanning that this wasn't a fairytale and noticing the tear streaks on Kiana's face, which Kiana denies. Irritated that so many valkyries were obstructing his mission, the Joyce clone challenges Kiana, who accepts after setting Mei down. The 3rd Herrscher then warns Kiana that she is no match for the clone, but Kiana reassures her that she would win as long as Mei was there for her. As the Joyce clone strikes, Kiana evades before dumping a barrage of bullets onto him, which were all blocked by a barrier. Noticing this, Kiana then summons a larger gun, Gunghir, and fires it at the clone. The clone counters by summoning a black hole, which devours the shot entirely. Watching the ailing fight, the 3rd Herrscher contemplates Kiana's rashness before cursing her host for being cowardly and still unconscious, unable to help. Meanwhile, Kiana's White Comet battlesuit runs out of power, making her a sitting duck for the clone's next attacks.

An hour prior to the situation, it was revealed that Otto had contacted Theresa and told her to go to the underground church while Kiana went to save Mei. In the present time, Theresa is alone in the underground church and is pleading with Otto to help Kiana after seeing the other's battlesuit drop out of power. The Overseer assures that Kiana would be fine because of the White Comet battlesuit before mentioning that he noticed the brief interference on the cameras, saying that he planned on increasing funding for the surveillance division. Back at the fight, the 3rd Herrscher initiated a global time fracture, allowing her to charge up Kiana's battlesuit with the rest of her strength. This prompts White Comet to transform into 4th Gen, Godsbane, Moon Empress. As the time fracture ends, Kiana unleashes a fully charged Gunghir again which sends the Joyce clone packing. With him gone, the 3rd Herrscher person slips into slumber as Kiana kneels by her side, looking skyward as she tells her father that she had succeeded in uploading their promises to protect those dearest to her.

Later that night, east of St. Freya, the Joyce clone is fleeing through the forest with a missing arm, swearing vengeance on the valkyries before running into Welt Yang, still in his teacher disguise. Upon being demanded who he was, Welt replied that he was a professor at St. Freya, in which the clone apologizes as he prepares an attack to wipe him out. However, Einstein then appears asking if "Mr. Welt" needed help. Seeing that Einstein was here, the clone tells her to send him back to HQ once he kills Welt, only to have Welt appear by his side and use the true Herrscher of Reason's power on him, creating a black hole of 10000 G that consumes the clone's entire existence. This takes a toll on Welt as he coughs briefly, remarking how well Cocolia had gotten in making the clones of his former hero. Welt then warns Einstein to not trust Cocolia fully as he has suspicions the other might be plotting. Einstein then reassures him by telling him she had made a deal with Theresa. As Einstein departs, she comments on how similar him and the real Joyce were, and how she missed the former sovereign. With that, Welt then looks skyward, looking forward to the completion of the Selene.