Chapter 192: Just Like Countless Days Before
Elysia nodded. "That's right — this book will teach you from scratch how to get along with Kalpas. Simple, straightforward, anyone can pick it up fast."
"You should know, back in the old Fire Moth, this was required reading — right up there with the survival guide."
"Is... is that really okay?" Sirin's mouth twitched. What on earth had Mr. Kalpas done during the Previous Era that a whole friendship manual had to be written for him — one that ended up being mandatory reading, no less? Even specifically listed alongside the survival guide.
"That part is actually true." Irene looked at Sirin with a smile. "Pardo practically has this book memorized cover to cover — after all, cats are terrified of fire.
"As for whether it works, well — Elysia wrote it, and she reads people very well. It's at least somewhat useful."
"Pardo? The catgirl Miss Irene transformed into before?" All three of them latched onto the name the moment it left Irene's lips. They'd heard Irene mention it before, but it hadn't occurred to them that she might also be one of the Flame-Chasers.
"Little Pardo is such a sweet kid." Elysia winked at them. "Especially when you pat her head — she nuzzles those two ears of hers against you, it's really quite lovely."
"...Huh?" × 3
The three of them blinked, then thought back to whenever Irene transformed into Pardo — the cat ears swaying behind her, the ones on top of her head twitching and bobbing.
It felt a little wrong to think about a Flame-Chaser that way, but all three of them found themselves nodding slowly, as if suddenly understanding something.
"Right then — I'm sure you've all picked up those little coins while fighting, yes?" Irene glanced at Elysia with a mildly exasperated look, then felt around in her pockets and pulled out a silver cat-paw coin.
Anything that had passed through the Realm tended to turn up on enemies sooner or later.
She herself hadn't fought any enemies last time she was in here, but she and Pardo were close — Pardo had slipped her a few coins as a little souvenir. Thanks to Little Corruption, even items made of data could be carried out, so the coins had stayed with Irene.
The three of them looked at the coin in Irene's hand and nodded — they had indeed picked up coins like that while fighting. Though most of them had ended up with Sirin.
Sirin's theory was that they were some kind of collectible reward, and that they'd probably run into a shop eventually. They just happened to get intercepted by Kalpas before they ever found one.
Irene nodded and continued. "And I'm sure you've also come across an unmanned stall here and there?"
After a brief silence, the three of them all turned to look at Kalpas. Irene followed their gaze, thought it over, and silently nodded. Right — Kalpas had been a little too enthusiastic, it seemed. These three had been waylaid before they ever made it to Pardo's shop.
"Anyway — those coins and those unmanned little stalls? That's Pardofelis's shop, right here in the Realm." Irene pocketed the coin.
"Simply put, Little Pardo is a merchant in here — she loves running her little business. I'll introduce you to her later."
Her Pardo had come in and immediately gone scampering off, delighted, to go play with the other version of herself. Well — cats will be cats.
"I never imagined the Flame-Chasers of the Previous Era included someone like that." Mei's gaze lingered on the coin Irene had just tucked away. Having now met Kevin and Kalpas, her impression of the Previous Era had settled into something like: cold, immensely powerful, and — in Elysia's case — mysterious.
They all knew Pardo, but Irene had genuinely never mentioned that Pardo was also one of the Flame-Chasers. And Pardo's appearance had given them an instinctive first impression of someone soft and gentle.
"Every era has people like that." Irene smiled at them. "Even at the end of the world, there are always some who just want to live quietly.
"They don't want to be heroes — but when there's nowhere left to retreat, when they're the only one left, they'll still walk that road without a second thought.
"Pardofelis is different from the others. She didn't have any exceptional gift, her physical condition wasn't outstanding either — she was, by any measure, an ordinary person who simply happened to be there at the right moment."
Everyone stared at Irene, a little dazed. Irene just smiled and continued: "There's nothing to be surprised about. Before they became Valkyries, weren't most Valkyries ordinary people?
"And once they became Valkyries — did that mean nothing of who they were before remained?
"Ordinary people have their own convictions too. They were never ones to stand at the back and watch, waiting to be saved by heroes. When the moment came — why couldn't they become heroes for someone else?
"Ordinary people have their own backbone. Back in the Previous Era, Pardofelis carried out a mission that was all but guaranteed to kill her — without a moment's hesitation."
"Well — not exactly without hesitation." Just as Irene finished speaking, the portal rippled, and two Pardos came bounding out of it. One of them scratched her cheek, looking a little sheepish.
"I was actually crying pretty hard when we set out, to be honest. But I was the only one who could do it, and everyone else had their own things to take care of — so there wasn't really anything left to hesitate over."
"Close enough, close enough — can we not get hung up on those little details?" Irene turned around and looked at Pardo with mild exasperation. She had been building up a nice moment for Pardo, and here Pardo was dismantling it herself.
"Whatever." Irene waved a hand, then looked around at the group — Kiana and the other two. "Speaking of which, where have Wendy and Bronya gotten to? It's been a while now — where did those two wander off to?"
Honestly, at this point, Kiana, Mei, and the third one had all been thoroughly beaten up by Kalpas in turn — those three should have had their own run-ins with the Flame-Chasers by now.
Was it possible that neither of them had caught a Flame-Chaser's eye yet? Unlikely. Wendy was one thing — there hadn't been many in the Previous Era with a connection to the Wind Herrscher's domain; the Herrscher of Wind Core had literally been turned into a satellite and launched into orbit.
But Bronya shouldn't be the case. The Authority of the Herrscher of Reason plus those two Doctors — there was no way Vill-V wouldn't come take a look.
"Hmm, hold on — let me check." Elysia casually pulled up her Realm permissions and queried the whereabouts of the challengers who had entered.
As the lovely, beautiful Miss Pink Elf of this beautiful fairy Realm, she did have certain special privileges — naturally.
"Let's see — the silver-haired little girl and the two Doctors are heading toward Vill-V's area. Oh wait, it looks like Vill-V already got to them?"
Elysia spotted Bronya immediately, then quickly pulled up Wendy's location. "Wendy seems to have been lured into the depths by Kosma."
"Wendy... Kosma? What does Kosma have to do with the Wind Herrscher..." Irene thought for a moment before it came back to her — if she remembered correctly, before Kosma had even joined the Fire Moth, he had once tried to hurl himself into the Herrscher of Wind's tornado with a bomb clutched to his chest.
Kosma had literally jumped into the Herrscher of Wind's vortex with a bomb... wait. Just for that?
"So Kosma had that kind of history." Elysia raised an eyebrow as though she'd just heard something delightfully unexpected. "I never knew."
Sirin looked up at Irene, puzzled. "But that seems incredibly reckless — just hurling himself into a storm with a bomb. What if it wasn't at all how he expected?"
"But there was no other choice, was there?" Irene met Sirin's gaze with a smile. "Like I said — it was just an ordinary person making a brave choice. Even if it failed, even if he guessed wrong, that's not stupidity."
Irene finished speaking and looked toward the portal. "As for why he wants to find Wendy now — perhaps he just wants to remember the younger version of himself from back then."
"Ooh, I feel like I should go stir things up." Although Irene had already moved on from the topic, Elysia — professional busybody — was immediately intrigued.
"Honestly, I'd think Mobius's side would be even more eventful." Irene smiled. "I'm genuinely curious — what's going to happen between Klein and Mobius? Will Mobius simply accept Klein reappearing like this, or will she hesitate?"
After thinking it over for so long, had Dr. Mobius finally worked some things out — or hadn't she?
———
Between Infinities
Klein led the two through the portal and arrived at Mobius's domain. Standing before the familiar doors of the research lab, a flicker of something passed through Klein's eyes — nostalgia, perhaps, or something else entirely.
"The Doctor still hasn't come out." Nuwa stared at the tightly shut laboratory doors, scratching her head. She had assumed that once they passed through the first portal, Mobius would appear to meet them.
Or at the very least, one of the Klein dolls should have come out to greet them. But even now that they'd walked all the way to the front door, Dr. Mobius had still not come to meet them.
"Mm, I suppose..." Fuxi glanced at Klein beside her. "Maybe she's frightened."
"What?" Nuwa stared at her sister like she'd said something ridiculous. "How could that be? I've never seen Dr. Mobius scared of anything."
"And how could Dr. Mobius possibly be frightened of Senior Klein?"
"Dr. Mobius has never feared anything else, that much is true — but that doesn't mean she can't fear a reunion." Fuxi shook her head. As someone who had to go beg for funding on a regular basis, Fuxi was well-practiced at reading people's emotions.
You couldn't extract that much funding without knowing how to read a room and tailor your approach to the person in front of you. During Project Ember, she had been the one handling communications, precisely because Nuwa, despite her liveliness, was sometimes too lively — the things she said went clean over people's heads, so someone else had to be there to balance things out.
Besides, they'd been quietly watching from the sidelines when Dr. Mobius and Klein first met. They had heard every word between them.
Even then, Fuxi had noticed that Mobius was afraid. Yes — even at the time, she herself hadn't believed Mobius could be afraid of anything.
But turning it over afterward, Fuxi had come to understand something: Dr. Mobius was afraid of the reunion. Afraid of hearing a certain answer from Senior Klein.
Afraid that the answer would be the one she did not want to hear.
"Let's go." Klein stepped forward — just as she had done countless times before — walking at the front, leading Nuwa and Fuxi toward the research lab doors.
She stood at the card reader by the entrance and reached, with practiced ease, into that same pocket she never touched, pulling out her ID card and placing it on the reader.
[Beep——]
The reader chimed, and the door beside it swung slowly open — just as it had done countless times before — welcoming the researcher back inside. Klein led the two of them into the laboratory.
The outer area was empty. No Dr. Mobius, and none of the Klein dolls that Nuwa and Fuxi had mentioned earlier.
"Looks like Dr. Mobius is deeper in, still working." Nuwa peered toward the inner laboratory.
"Mm, understood." Klein nodded and turned to look at the two of them. "I think Dr. Mobius has probably already prepared the data that needs your verification — I expect it should be at..."
Klein trailed off as she walked, almost out of habit, toward a familiar workstation nearby and pulled up the system. Sure enough, it was stacked with pending review tasks.
The two of them took one look at that mountain of backlogged work and their expressions immediately said: we are not going to survive this. They had been almost done clearing it last time — how was there suddenly this much again?
Tearing their eyes away from that painful sight, Fuxi looked at Klein and asked: "So is Senior Klein going inside to find the Doctor?"
"Mm." Klein nodded and stepped forward toward the inner lab. The two left behind — Nuwa and Fuxi — exchanged a glance and, without a word spoken between them, quietly and wordlessly fell into step behind her.
The work could wait. Right now, both of them were far more interested in seeing the reunion between Dr. Mobius and Senior Klein.
And if they got caught? Well — it wasn't as if Dr. Mobius could kill them a second time. They were souls now, after all. Right?
Besides, they trusted that the bond between them and Mobius was deep enough that she wouldn't do anything that drastic.
So: gossip first, gossip second, and gossip thereafter.
As the Herrscher of the Legion, Klein naturally noticed the two sneaking along behind her — but she didn't mind. It wasn't as if this was anything new for them.
She pushed open the door.
And there was Mobius — standing at the lab bench, studying something on a screen. Beside her stood the Klein doll, looking, for some reason, a little at a loss.
"I'm back, Dr. Mobius."
"..." At the sound of Klein's voice, Mobius's body gave an involuntary shiver. She drew a slow, deep breath, then turned to look at her — and spoke in a perfectly level tone.
"Mm. Good that you're back. Where's that data I asked you to collect?"
"All here." Klein — as though she found nothing strange about Mobius's flatness — reached into herself and withdrew a data tablet, assembled from the Herrscher of the Legion's core, and held it out to Mobius.
Mobius took it and connected it to the computer. Then Klein stepped forward — and stood there, right beside her, waiting for Mobius's next instruction.
Just like countless days before... wasn't it?
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