Midnight.
The Wandering Sea lay in perfect silence, disturbed only by the low, steady hum of Chaldea's magic circulation system.
After a string of operations that had drawn every ounce of hatred in Chaldea onto himself and nearly severed the magical-energy supply from the worried Sion, Steve returned to his room as though nothing had happened.
Click.
He locked the door at once, cutting off the noise of the outside.
Steve sat on the edge of the bed. He showed no sign of resting. First, he reached into the symbolic white four-dimensional pocket on his abdomen and slowly drew out an ordinary leather bag.
——[Recovery Bag]
A useful tool. Anything he wished to retrieve, no matter the distance or location, could be pulled out as easily as reaching into his own pocket.
"That Priestess… she ran pretty fast."
Steve muttered to himself and closed his eyes. The silver-blue phantom that had hovered outside the window moments ago rose clearly in his mind.
She had already escaped, yet before this causal-level future artifact, escape was nothing more than a minor amusement.
"And now… the arrest begins."
Steve thrust his arm into the bag. His hand seemed to cross countless spatial dimensions, groping desperately between imagination and reality.
"Hm? This texture… feels wrong."
He had expected to grasp that light, refreshing soul, but his fingertips met something real—cold skin. And heavy.
"Well, whatever. Let's pull it out and see."
He yanked hard.
Pop—
With a muffled sound like a champagne cork, a silver-white head burst out of the bag.
Delicate features, eyes tightly shut, face twisted in agony. From the neck down she remained trapped deep inside the handbag, as though sealed in another dimension. Only her head had been dragged into the room—like a scene from a horror film.
"You've got to be kidding me?!"
Steve's hands shook so violently he nearly flung the head away like a ball.
This was not the Priestess's spiritual body.
This was Olga Marie Animusphere's original form—frozen as a crystal inside the Chaldea sphere, still rejecting fusion!
"Wrong! Wrong! Case of mistaken identity!"
Steve reacted instantly. If he extracted her now, Chaldea would lose not only its ultimate goal of Antarctica, but the Director's hundred-year struggle—resisting fusion, enduring eternal nightmares to slow the freezing of human order—would be rendered meaningless.
"Go back! Right now!"
Without another word, Steve pushed down on her head, forcing it back into the extradimensional depths of the bag as though stuffing a stubborn marmot into its burrow.
"Whew… That was close."
He wiped the cold sweat from his brow. "I almost triggered an early bad end."
Just as he exhaled in relief and began reconstructing the mental image to recapture the soul, the air in the room grew heavy and damp.
Silver-blue light gathered at the foot of the bed.
His reckless action had not only alerted the sphere's main body—it had nearly driven it into rampage. The culprit hiding in the shadows could no longer remain still.
The alien priestess.
No longer a distant figure behind glass, she now stood as a real presence in Steve's room. She floated in the air, her once-empty eyes now filled with complex, faintly reproachful emotion as she stared at him.
As if to say: Are you insane? You nearly destroyed my body!
"Ah, so you finally decided to show up?"
Steve displayed not the slightest remorse. He casually slipped the wallet back into his pocket.
Then, as though performing magic, he produced something gray and jelly-like.
——[Translation Konjac]
"Open your mouth."
He took a bite first, then offered the rest to the Priestess. "You're a projection of a soul from another world. This is a conceptual translation device. Eat it and we can talk without any trouble."
The Priestess hesitated for only a moment. Given the terrifying methods this man had used to expose her identity so easily, cooperation seemed the wiser choice.
She parted her lips slightly. The konjac slice transformed into a streak of light and merged with her spiritual body.
"…What exactly do you want?"
A clear, celestial voice—unmistakably Olga Marie's—resonated directly in Steve's heart. There was almost no hostility, only deep fatigue and helplessness.
"Don't be nervous. It really was just an accident."
Steve raised both hands in a gesture of innocence. "I only wanted to talk to you. There are things even that carefree Director U can't say, and even a tiny fragment of a nerve ganglion lying on an otherworldly operating table can't say them either. Only you—the one who has always been an observer—have the right to speak."
The Priestess fell silent. She drifted down and sat in the chair nearest to Steve. Her body remained a phantom, yet the isolating aura around her had softened.
What do you wish to ask?
"What I want to know is…" Steve's playful expression vanished; his gaze turned serious. "What do you truly think of Fujimaru Ritsuka and the people of Chaldea? Not just now—ever since Singularity F, from the moment you were cast into the sphere… until you watched them escape Antarctica and fight to survive in the Lostbelts. After a hundred years of suffering and observation… did you never hate them?"
The question struck like a blade, piercing the Priestess's softest, most festering wound.
Her body trembled violently. She lowered her head; silver hair veiled her face. Silence stretched so long the air itself seemed to freeze.
At last the clear, cold voice returned—trembling, choked with emotion.
"…I hated it. I hated it so much."
How could she not have hated?
She lifted her face. For the first time, genuine human emotion surfaced in those mysterious eyes.
"In that sea of flames, when Lev threw me into the bottomless abyss… I kept screaming. I begged Lev to stop, begged Mash to save me, begged that new Master who had only just arrived in Chaldea to save me. But no one came. I simply collapsed. And then… hell began."
Her voice rose sharply. "Do you know what it feels like? Your body carved apart again and again, your consciousness torn to shreds, your existence used as experimental material over and over. In that endless nightmare, the only thing I could cling to was that brief memory from Singularity F—watching them save the world, watching them hailed as heroes, watching them laugh and cry… while I rotted away in the dark like forgotten trash!"
"Why? Why did only I have to suffer? Why could they live without guilt? I hated them… that incompetent new Master, Mash who only follows orders, Dr. Roman who stole every bit of my glory… I even thought it might be better if humanity perished, so we would all be equal."
Steve listened in silence. He knew she had carried these words in her heart for a hundred years. Those quiet, distant gazes in the Lostbelts—the seemingly indifferent observers—were the product of hatred and love twisted into self-torture.
"But…"
She drew a deep breath. Her excited tone gradually calmed, replaced by profound relief.
"But everything changed after that day."
"Which day?" Steve asked, though he already knew the answer.
"The day the new director named Goredolf stood with them in Antarctica. The day we escaped through the blizzard."
Her eyes softened with memory.
"He was cowardly and useless… yet at that moment of life and death, he shouted through the loudspeaker: 'Help! Anyone—please help! Please, someone help!'"
She repeated the words quietly, a bittersweet smile on her lips.
"Those were the exact same words I screamed in Singularity F. For an instant I thought history was repeating itself. The Master must have thought she could only watch the director die, just like before. But she didn't. The girl named Fujimaru Ritsuka—standing at the edge of despair—clenched her fists and shouted toward the garage, the broadcast room, and the new director she had never met:
'We can't let that line fall again!'"
Two transparent tears traced down the Priestess's translucent cheeks.
"In that moment… all the hatred, resentment, and bitterness in my heart vanished. She had remembered. The helplessness I felt wasn't mine alone—it had been her nightmare too. Every battle she fought afterward, every desperate struggle, every moment of despair… was to ensure that scene would never repeat. At that instant I felt… it was enough."
"My hundred years of suffering, my desperate resistance to fusion in that desolate place—even if no one knew, even if no one came to save me—had meaning. My death gave birth to a savior who 'never abandons anyone.' Thanks to my sacrifice, the new director survived. So… I no longer hate."
She closed her eyes gently. The silver light enveloping her body grew soft and warm.
"From that day on, I decided. I would keep watching their journey—not as a vengeful spirit, but as a witness. I want to see them walk this path. I want to see them reclaim the world I ruined."
A long silence filled the room.
Gazing at the soul before him, Steve felt an indescribable reverence rise in his chest.
This was Olga Marie Animusphere—the proud, clumsy girl who had always spoken of glory. Deep in her heart she possessed a nobility and kindness greater than anyone else.
"Mary… you've worked hard."
Steve spoke the nickname for the first time, his voice quiet.
The Priestess froze for a moment, then offered a faint but genuine smile.
"…Thank you."
Two simple words—yet they bridged a century and crossed the boundary between life and death. A long-overdue reconciliation.
…
…
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