When Shido opened his eyes, he found himself lying in his bedroom.
Looking at the alarm clock by his bed, the hour and minute hands were stopped around five.
The setting sun spilled in, its orange red glow seeping into every corner of the room, silently reminding him that it was not morning, but already dusk.
"Am I… still dreaming?"
Shido looked sowhat dazed.
Judging by the layout and habits of the room alone, there was not much difference between Shido thirty years later and Shinji. Ordinary and simple. On top of that, his last mory before falling asleep was still in the lounge aboard the airship, so suddenly returning to his bedroom left him without the confidence to say he had truly returned to reality.
Should he pinch his cheek? Shido thought about it, but quickly abandoned the self abusive idea.
It was not because he feared pain, but because Shinji's dreams had been far too realistic. Forget the pain of pinching his cheek—the feel of objects, the taste of food, the warmth of sunlight, even the cold of blood draining away as he neared death and the agony of his chest being carved open had all been so real it was as if he had experienced them firsthand. They remained fresh in his mory.
In the dream, he had lived as Takamiya Shinji for nearly two or three months. But unlike returning to reality from the virtual world, which was more like the unfamiliarity caused by a mismatch in ti, this carried an ambiguity that made it difficult to distinguish truth from illusion.
Like the protagonist of a sci-fi film needing a totem to tell dream from reality, perhaps he now needed sothing to confirm whether this was reality. (TL:Inception~)
Using his elbow against the bed as a support, he raised his slightly sluggish body. Suddenly, a force pulled back on his wrist. It seed that sothing was pressing down on it—no, sothing was holding his hand.
"Hoo… nnh… hoo… hoo…"
A faint, regular breathing that did not belong to Shido entered his ears.
"Mm?"
Shido looked down and saw a raised shape beneath the blanket that clearly did not belong to him. Outside the blanket, he could see the lower half of a person from the slender waist down, sitting on a small stool by the bed.
He lifted the blanket. What appeared before him was not the silver haired girl from the dream, but Ryougi Yutsuki, lying face down by the bedside. Her left hand supported her forehead in place of a pillow, while her right hand rested in Shido's palm. A few drops of drool slipped from the corner of her mouth, staining a small dark patch into the blanket.
"Pfft—"
Seeing Yutsuki's defenseless, slack sleeping face, Shido could not help laughing.
"Looks like I really did co back…"
After murmuring that in relief, Shido began shaking Yutsuki's shoulder.
"Yutsuki, wake up. Don't sleep face down like that. It's bad for your body."
"—Hah! What happened?! Enemy attack?!"
In an instant, the startled Yutsuki jumped up like a frightened bird, looking left and right with her hair in complete disarray.
"Good afternoon, Yutsuki."
"What, so you're awake, Shido."
After realizing what was going on, Yutsuki let out a breath of relief and sat back down in the chair.
"Sorry. I was supposed to be on watch, but I ended up dozing off."
Holding her forehead and shaking her head, Yutsuki looked ashad and a little frightened. If DEM had launched an attack while both she and Shido were asleep, the consequences would have been unthinkable.
"It's okay. You've built up a lot of fatigue these past few days too, right?"
Shido shook his head to show he did not mind. He understood that ever since Kurumi had appeared, Yutsuki had been running around for all sorts of things. Stopping DEM's assassinations, training the Spirits, and watching over him—all of that had forced Yutsuki to cut down on her rest.
Although a Spirit's physical ability far exceeded an ordinary person's, Yutsuki's mind was still human. It was only natural that she would have monts of weakness.
"Also, Yutsuki."
"What is it, Shido? Why are you smiling so weirdly?"
"Drool. And your hair."
Shido pointed beside his own mouth to remind her.
Hearing Shido's words, Yutsuki realized how ssy she looked. A faint blush appeared on her face, lit by the sunset. She hurriedly wiped away the drool with her sleeve, then took out a hair tie and tied her disheveled long hair into a ponytail.
"You're wearing the hair tie I gave you."
"After receiving sothing, there's no reason to leave it in my room and let it gather mold."
"Mm, true."
Looking at the star and moon hair tie on Yutsuki's ponytail, Shido could not help smiling.
"What ti is it now?"
"February 18th, five in the afternoon."
"I slept that long?"
Hearing that he had slept for almost twenty hours, Shido was a little surprised.
"It's not that bad. When you told this ti that you'd be sleeping for a while, I honestly prepared myself for the possibility that you might still be asleep when DEM launched their attack."
"No matter what, I wouldn't sleep that long."
Hearing Yutsuki's words, Shido smiled wryly.
"Thank you."
"Enough with the formalities. Compared to that, I'd rather hope the extra sleep you got these past few days wasn't wasted."
Resting her chin on her hand, Yutsuki asked curiously.
"Did you rember?"
"Mm. I rembered everything."
Shido nodded softly. Recalling everything that had happened in the dream, he felt both frustrated and sowhat relieved.
"I think I understand now… why you wanted to go on a date with Reine."
"Is that so?"
Yutsuki answered calmly.
"Yutsuki, did you know from the start?"
Seeing that Yutsuki was not surprised at all, Shido could not help asking.
"No. Just as I told you at the beginning, I only knew who Reine was. I didn't know what happened in her past."
Yutsuki shook her head lightly in denial.
"But since we decided to save Kurumi, that would inevitably involve her interests. And to find the correct thod of changing history, the information she possesses is also necessary. No matter how you look at it, we have to bring Reine—Takamiya Mio—over to our side."
"And just like when you captured and the other Spirits, if you approached her knowing nothing, Shido, you would definitely fail."
"…I see."
Shido exhaled in acceptance.
"Then, Yutsuki, would you be willing to listen? To a story about a girl and a boy—from eting to parting. An ordinary, yet sorrowful past."
"…Mm. Please."
_______________
"Ike! Ike!"
Woken by the noise ringing beside his ear, Westcott slowly opened his eyes. What entered his sight was Ellen's unpleasant, sour expression.
"Haah… Is sothing the matter, my dear Ellen?"
"This is the list of troops and combat resources Mulian received from headquarters. The inventory and authorization docunts are all prepared. All that's missing is your review and signature."
"Hah? Can't you just sign it for ?"
Hearing Westcott's careless answer, a vein popped on Ellen's forehead.
"Please don't joke. If sothing like this isn't personally signed for by a director, problems may arise. Or do you want to press the tablet against your face to do the authorization?!"
"All right, all right~ How frightening."
Westcott shrugged in feigned fear. He had noticed that after hiring Ai Mulian as a subordinate, he did not know what she had been teaching Ellen, but Ellen was becoming less and less polite with him.
Taking the docunts from Ellen's hand, Westcott flipped through them as if speed-reading. Half a minute later, he nodded in satisfaction.
"Very good. Both the types and numbers are correct. Having excellent subordinates really does make things easy."
"That does not an the superior is allowed to slack off."
Ellen retorted irritably.
"Speaking of which, Ike, haven't you been a little too relaxed lately? Sleeping lazily in a place like this—aren't you afraid Nightmare will assassinate you?"
—That won't happen.
—We've been guarding Father the whole ti.
—No need for you to worry blindly, bean sprout gorrila.
"—!?"
"Relax~ Relax, Ellen."
Looking at Ellen as she began emitting killing intent toward the Nibelcole, Westcott answered leisurely.
"The decisive battle is almost here. The closer it gets, the more one must relax. If you keep your nerves tense before it even begins, you're more likely to lose composure when the war actually starts."
"But…"
"Don't worry. Our wish will definitely co true."
Slowly standing up, Westcott looked around. Rare nostalgia appeared in his eyes.
"…How many years has it been already?"
Counting it out, nearly forty or fifty years had passed since his holand was destroyed.
At first, they had been penniless and could only conceal their identities while living in an orphanage. But soon, a couple took a liking to the handso and intelligent Ike, and adopted him as their son.
After hiding his true nature for several years, the elderly couple who had adopted Ike unfortunately passed away in an accident. Having inherited a large fortune, Ike finally had room to act. He gathered Elliot and the others together and founded DEM, freely researching thods of applying magecraft and mystery.
Theosophy, occultism, alchemy, the Kabbalah system. While they packaged magecraft as the false thing called "technology" to develop the company, they also wrote the "magic" that could change the world.
Finally, they developed the Spirit formula and summoned the First Spirit who caused the Eurasian Great Spacequake.
And that had already been thirty years ago.
Creating a world belonging only to magicians—Ellen might still genuinely believe Westcott's words. But Elliot and Karen had clearly seen through his true nature long ago, betrayed him, and established their own path.
Of course, in a certain sense, that was not a bad thing. Precisely because they opposed him, Westcott had been able to find amusent during these thirty years.
"I'm truly looking forward to it."
The corners of Westcott's mouth rose.
He had always been waiting, preparing to witness the descent of that hell once more.
_______________
Soon, Shido arrived aboard the airship Fraxinus.
There were many things he had to do now. Oppose DEM, fulfill his promise and confess to everyone what he had been hiding, and so on. But before that, he had to go find soone.
Walking forward with steady steps, he passed through the long corridor and found the person he was looking for.
It was an adult woman with gray hair. Her long hair was neatly tied up behind her head. Beneath her eyes were heavy bags, and against her chest hung the little bear plush she always carried with her, sewn and nded countless tis.
She was the analyst of this airship—Murasa Reine.
She was also the First Spirit they had been searching for all along—Takamiya Mio.
"Mm? You're here… Shin."
Noticing Shido's presence, Reine spoke slowly.
Her drowsy tone was the sa as ever. Yet after experiencing that dream, Shido's feelings were completely different.
Thinking carefully, ever since they had t, Reine had never once called him "Shido." She had always called him "Shin."
Not only that. The dark circles under her eyes, supposedly caused by not having slept for thirty years, and the plush she always kept at her chest—these traits, which had seed like re character quirks, were all telling of the sorrow in Reine's heart.
Even after thirty years, her love for Takamiya Shinji had not faded in the slightest.
"…Mm. I'm here."
However, now was not the ti to sink into lancholy. Shido took a deep breath, looked into Reine's eyes, and said,
"Reine-san."
"Mm?"
"Tomorrow, would you go on a date with ?"
Mio Past—End.
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