When Shiomi opened his eyes again, he didn't see the transparent glass of Chaldea's Rayshift coffin, but a pink-themed room.
It looked just like a live TV show set, with "BB Channel" written across the LED screen.
"Oh, I'm still dreaming…"
Shiomi shook his head, closed his eyes again, and lowered his head, hoping it was just a nightmare—that everything would be fine once he woke up.
"Wait! Why are you going back to sleep after waking up, Dad?!" BB snapped, grabbing his shoulders and shaking him awake.
Shiomi swayed like a giant pillow under her grip. "Alright, alright, I'm awake. Where is this? Your... channel?"
"Yes, of course!" BB replied smugly. "A celebration—for the defeat of Beast III/R!"
"Beast… So Kiara Sessyoin was defeated." Shiomi glanced around.
Morgan sat beside him on a row of two-seater benches, watching him with concern.
"But SE.RA.PH, as a Singularity, had already fused with Beast. Destroying Beast meant destroying the Singularity too," Morgan explained. "It was BB who forcibly transferred me here, saving me from being swallowed by the ocean trench."
"I see…"
Shiomi looked up, taking in the room that resembled a TV studio. People were scattered around the space.
Artoria was catching up with two of the Knights of the Round Table, Scáthach was chatting with Passionlip and Meltryllis, while Suzuka Gozen looked utterly exhausted, clutching a cake she'd somehow gotten and devouring it for a sugar boost.
Shiomi had no idea when his master had grown so close to the two Alteregos. Then again, it was Scáthach—dealing with two young girls wouldn't be a challenge for her.
"Thanks a lot. Speaking of which—BB, just what exactly is Beast III/R?" Shiomi pinched the bridge of his nose, about to ask something critical.
The two Alteregos noticed he was awake. Passionlip immediately gave Scáthach a slight apologetic bow, then hurried over.
"You're finally awake, Dad," Passionlip said cheerfully. "Heartbeat and pulse are stable—now I can relax."
"Wait, Lip, why are you calling this man 'Dad'?" Meltryllis asked, baffled.
Not that she could be blamed.
After all, she had been controlled by Sessyoin and used as the "Guardian" of the Observatory. Following a grueling battle, she had barely recovered before charging into the fray with the others to face Sessyoin.
Meltryllis had joined the fight to get revenge on Sessyoin.
Even so, she had fought hard, helping wipe out the empty Demon Pillars released by Sessyoin, and played a significant role in the battle against Beast.
"Um... I heard from BB that he's the 'Original's' father," Passionlip said with a cheerful smile.
Meltryllis felt her thoughts scrambling. "Huh? He's Sakura's father? A guy in his twenties?"
"That's rude—I'm nearly fifty, you know," Shiomi replied, deliberately putting on an old man's tone.
His physical time had long been fixed. Age had lost its meaning, and it was only natural that people mistook him for a guy in his twenties at first glance.
"Liar... Humans don't age?" Meltryllis took two steps back, her face full of disbelief.
"That's how Magi are," Shiomi said casually, then turned to BB. "They're both back to normal. Are you taking them back to Mooncell?"
BB nodded. "Yep. One of Mooncell's assignments for me was to retrieve them after they were dredged up from the Imaginary Numbers."
"Hah? Why do I have to go with you?" Meltryllis looked thoroughly annoyed.
"You don't have to. You could always sink alone to the Mariana Trench instead," BB replied indifferently.
Passionlip quickly stepped in to mediate. "We really don't have anywhere else to go. It's better to return to the Mooncell."
"You're okay with that, Lip?" Meltryllis was surprised.
"Yeah. I want to accept Mooncell's evaluation and rethink how an advanced AI like me should live in a way that honors my soul," Passionlip said.
Meltryllis gave her a long, meaningful look. "Wow... The crybaby Lip is actually saying stuff like 'a way to live that honors the soul.'"
"I just copied what Dad said," Passionlip declared, puffing out her chest—causing quite the ripple effect.
BB also puffed out her chest. "Whether it's me or you two, even though we're superior AIs, better than humans, we're still just kids in front of Dad! We have to learn to listen to him!"
"Tch..." Meltryllis clicked her tongue.
Whether it was BB's words or the passive-aggressive chest competition that got to her, it wasn't clear.
As the three of them seemed ready to start bickering, Morgan simply smiled and turned to Shiomi.
"More importantly, I didn't expect my husband to be able to wield Tiamat's power."
"You mean the 'Chaos Tide' and the Noble Phantasm?" Shiomi leaned back in his chair. "I mentioned it before—my mother and I are spiritually linked. If we reach out, we can always communicate."
At that moment, Scáthach grabbed Shiomi's shoulders from behind and gave them a firm squeeze. "So when Sessyoin swallowed you, you connected with Tiamat, and she sent the Chaos Tide from the Sea of Imaginary Numbers to counterattack from within."
"Yeah. That final Noble Phantasm is, in a sense, a limited materialization of my mother's Spirit Origin," Shiomi said with a wry smile. "She knew what kind of impact her return to the world would have, so she chose that method instead."
Thinking about it filled Shiomi with a bittersweet warmth.
If humanity were to one day leave Earth behind and set off for the stars and seas beyond, truly ending the species' childhood... would the goddess Tiamat then be able to return to the planet?
Even his mother didn't know the answer. That's why she made this choice.
"Once the Mother of Life who brought catastrophe to the Seventh Singularity—this time, she chose to appear in her own way to help her child," Artoria said.
"Even as an incomplete Beast, without a proper countermeasure, we wouldn't have been able to defeat it easily," Shiomi added with a self-deprecating smile. "Relying on my mother's power… maybe it just shows I'm still not mature enough as a living being."
Of course, no one actually believed Shiomi was immature.
Using a Beast's power to defeat another Beast—that was an idea only he could've come up with.
Then everyone around him laughed, and he joined in, laughing along with them.
...
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