"Mm, I know." Dr. MEI nodded, then seemed to remember something and looked over at Irene. "Right, Irene, the Cosmic Juggernaut should be with you, correct?"
"It is." Irene nodded, then took out the green leaf of light Otto had given her earlier, the one representing control authority over the Cosmic Juggernaut. "Is there something you need it for?"
"It's not exactly that I need it for anything—call it preparing for the future ahead of time." MEI shook her head and looked toward Vill-V. "Vill-V, I'll have to trouble you to refit the Cosmic Juggernaut."
"In what direction, then?" Vill-V nodded. "Are you thinking of using the Cosmic Juggernaut to assist Project Stigma and send Irene over? That does seem doable, actually."
"Not just that." Dr. MEI shook her head. "I also want her to be able to travel freely through the Sea of Quanta, and with guaranteed safety. We long for the sky, but we mustn't give up on the resources in the sea beside us either."
"We still know nothing of the vast sky, but as for the things in the sea, we can come to understand a little. Whether it's to help in saving lives or simply for development, neither would be a loss for us."
"Mm, I roughly understand what you're getting at." After thinking it over, Vill-V nodded earnestly, though her words still carried a touch of the pride befitting a genius.
"Leave it to me, don't worry. I'll finish the refit as fast as I can. Oh, right—Irene, I seem to recall you all captured a batch of Soulium. Could you give me a portion of it?"
"No problem." Irene nodded, then remembered the matter of how she'd planned to drag that child Sirin out and give her something to keep busy with. So she looked at Vill-V and spoke up.
"While I'm at it, I'll pull Sirin out in a bit. See if you can tutor her a little on matters relating to space. She's got the imagination now, but she's still lacking on the knowledge side."
"Hm?" Hearing Irene's request, Vill-V looked troubled for a moment, then nodded toward her. "Matters of space, is it? Understood."
"I'm not sure whether I can teach the Herrscher of the Void, but it's fine. I'll just study it for a few days and I guarantee I'll teach that child well."
"Ah."
Off to the side, Mobius watched Irene and explained, "This one isn't lying. With her abilities, studying for just a short while is enough to make her count as an expert."
"That little girl can absolutely just learn alongside her—she'll teach while learning herself. In any case, I reckon that Sirin of yours probably won't learn as fast as she does."
"And since she says she can teach after three days of study, she should measure up to the average doctor you'd come across." Dr. MEI nodded too. "And her basic knowledge alone should be enough for that child to study for a good while."
Although Dr. MEI had never much cared for Vill-V's habit of adding utterly unnecessary features into her designs—those space-wasting, completely pointless additions made purely for the sake of looking good—she had always disliked that sort of thing.
But when it came to learning and being a jack-of-all-trades, she truly couldn't help but admire Vill-V. Even in the twilight of their civilization, Vill-V, relying on her versatility, had still single-handedly propped up a good many of their research projects.
"Ah, so this is what an all-rounder is?" Irene scratched her head, looking as though sweat were about to drip from her face. She'd known Vill-V was an exceedingly powerful genius.
To self-teach eight different fields by her own efforts, and yet still come out on top in every single one of them—how could she not be called a genius?
But she really hadn't been quite clear on just how strong Vill-V's learning ability actually was. Seeing it today, she truly lived up to being an all-rounder.
"Then I'll have to trouble you, Miss Vill-V."
"Mm, just leave it to me." Vill-V nodded. "Is there anything else you need me to do?"
"Nope."
"Nothing."
"I'm going to find Kevin."
"Got time to come to the cocktail party?"
The last one was, unsurprisingly, Elysia—but the moment Elysia finished speaking, Irene gave her a light tap on the head, and said somewhat helplessly,
"Dr. Vill-V is still busy. Don't go causing trouble at a time like this."
"I-I wasn't causing trouble." Elysia immediately shook her head, but a moment later her collar was seized by Irene, who dragged her off toward the exit.
As she walked, Irene kept looking back at Vill-V, as if she'd suddenly remembered something, and addressed the three doctors: "Oh, right, Dr. Vill-V, about the matter of the Void Archives..."
"Mm, hold on a second." After thinking it over, Vill-V turned around, took a box glittering with golden light from a nearby stand, and set it on the table.
"I've already dismantled the Void Archives. It just so happens we're short a helper—when we get Number 17 back later, it might just come in handy."
"The safety locks and the like have all been completely released, so that Herrscher of Reason should be able to use it at will. As for whether it can be fused, that's hard to say."
"Mm, that's fine." Irene nodded. It was merely a supplement to combat power. For the Herrscher of Reason, what they lacked had never been how to use their Authority, but rather a shortage of Honkai energy.
Their upper limit was determined by the upper limit of their civilization. Their Authority had no real development path to speak of—the only road was learning and replication.
However strong the civilization, that's how strong the things they could build would be. But there was one single restriction: their reserve of Honkai energy, whether or not it could support them in constructing what they envisioned. That was all.
So the only use this gem had for Joyce was to be stuffed into her hands as a sort of Honkai energy battery—after all, Joyce had carved the Herrscher's Authority right into her own DNA.
"Is there anything else?" Vill-V looked at Irene and at Elysia, who was pretending to struggle in Irene's grip, but who in truth looked more like she was acting spoiled.
"That's all. The rest I'll leave to you." Irene shook her head, then, tugging Elysia along, turned and left the workshop.
"Elysia's finally met someone who can handle her, hasn't she." Mobius watched Elysia being dragged off outright in Irene's grip.
"After all, she's met someone she likes—or rather, someone she can truly entrust her heart and self to." Dr. MEI lifted her head and glanced at Elysia, who was acting spoiled under Irene's tugging.
She too had once been in love with the Kevin of her own world, so she understood this feeling well. It was only with the one you loved that you could act spoiled without restraint, and be willing to go along with whatever they wanted.
Although the Elysia of before had seemed like someone who turned no one away, it looked as if Irene was truly to Elysia's liking—not only had she given away her own Herrscher's Authority, it seemed she wasn't even intending to keep her Herrscher identity.
And that, indeed, was something Elysia had never done before.
"Hah, someone who's been nourished by love really does experience things differently." Mobius raised an eyebrow slightly, looking at MEI, who had also fallen into a bit of thought, even with a trace of nostalgia in her eyes.
"..." Hearing Mobius's words, Dr. MEI fell silent. Indeed, that period had been very sweet, and very... something that made one want to look back on it, but...
Recalling those days, she could also recall that it was her plan that had gotten them all killed—and in the end, almost as if in mockery, it had left only her alone.
Sensing the dejection and pain coming from MEI, Mobius knew she'd misspoken too, but Mobius offered no words of comfort. She merely spoke up.
"Wipe that look off your face. The things you didn't manage to do, the things we failed to do before—those can't be solved by crying."
"I know. I don't need you to remind me." Dr. MEI took a deep breath and headed out of the workshop. She still had to sync up the things they'd discussed here with Kevin.
After all, Project Stigma had all along been Kevin's World Serpent that was responsible for pushing it forward. A lot of things had surely already been set up on the World Serpent side, so they could just make use of what was ready when the time came.
Meanwhile, Vill-V, having closed her eyes, opened them again. The aura about her had turned firm, no longer as gentle as before—clearly, the primary personality had returned.
"The Conductor, is it?"
"Hm-hmm?" Vill-V nodded. "My, it seems my true self has slipped out again. It's been so long since she last came out—quite the rare occasion."
"But the moment I wake up there's a whole pile of things arranged for me to do. How troublesome. Let the expert rack her brains over it."
The Conductor simply became a hands-off boss. In any case, all these matters would in the end fall onto the expert's head—and besides, an expert is never burdened by having too many skills, so letting her learn a bit more was perfectly fine.
After all, if they really could cross over Finality later on, there was no way they'd actually huddle on Earth—surely they'd spend their lives exploring outward, whether beyond the heavens or within the sea.
Since they had such conditions, grasping at both was perfectly reasonable. And if that was the case, then they'd just have to make things hard on the expert's free time.
"You'll separate me and Sirin?" Kiana looked at Irene. "Is that even something that can be done? I thought it'd be like you, Sister Irene, and [Irene]—no way to separate."
The fact that Irene had a dual personality was no secret to Kiana, since Sirin had been beaten up by [Irene] more than once, so Kiana knew about it.
"In theory it should be feasible." Irene nodded. "The connection between you two isn't as tight as you imagine—at least not like me and [Irene]."
No dual personality could do what Kiana could, each controlling half of one body. Even she and [Irene] were the same—at the start, the most they could manage was one controlling the body and one controlling the Authority.
Because the Authority was something both of them could use, but as for the body, it was absolutely impossible for one of them to control just one side. The only one who could do that was her—she could do it back when she shared a body with other souls.
But Irene was more accustomed to simply handing all that control over entirely—after all, the feeling of being able to control only half a body was far too strange.
How to put it—it had a sort of half-paralyzed feeling.
So Kiana's and Sirin's souls, in theory, could absolutely be separated; it was just a tiny bit more complicated than with others.
"I don't really have any objection to this." Kiana nodded too. This sort of thing was all benefit and no harm, so why would she oppose it? At most she'd be down one Authority of the Void.
But to this day all she could do with that thing was open a portal and summon the Lance of the Void. The more advanced maneuvers she pretty much couldn't figure out at all—only Sirin understood how to play with them.
In that case, rather than that, she might as well split Sirin off now and focus herself on studying the Authority of Flame.
"So when do you start, Sister Irene?"
"Not so fast. I have to make some preparations." Irene waved her hand, then reached out toward Kiana. "Come, let me collect a bit of your DNA first."
Kiana obediently held out her hand. Irene's fingernails grew slightly longer and lightly grazed across the back of Kiana's hand, drawing a single bead of blood, which Irene pinched between her fingertips.
A blue glow flashed through Irene's eyes, and after a while, Irene nodded toward Kiana: "Does Sirin have anything she wants to say? Like, is there anything she'd want changed?"
Kiana's eyes turned golden. Sirin looked at Irene: "Just change my golden irises and my hair back for me—I don't have any other requests."
"Sure." Irene nodded. A request like that was easy—just adjust the expression a tiny bit when constructing the body. This much she'd already learned in Mobius's little classroom.
"But Irene, why'd you suddenly decide to separate me from Kiana?" Sirin looked at Irene. "Did something happen?"
"Nothing. I saw you were too idle, so I'm planning to find you a class to attend." A smile played on Irene's face. "Afterward you'll follow Vill-V and study up on knowledge relating to space and the like."
"You've got the imagination now, but your knowledge base still isn't enough. There's a lot of things you just can't bring into being, isn't there? Studying a little will do you good."
"What?!" Sirin immediately cried out in surprise. She'd never imagined that Irene actually thought she was too idle and was planning to find her a class to attend.
"I don't want to."
"That won't do—you've been slacking off for far too long." Irene immediately shook her head. "Stop holing up in Kiana's head playing games all the time. There are so many worlds out there—you really ought to go take a look."
"I never once taught you to be a shut-in, you know."
"Mm." Sirin turned her face away and said with a guilty conscience, "It's not like there's anything bad about it."
But on second thought, staying holed up obediently inside someone's consciousness really wasn't good—though certainly not for the reason Irene gave, about not being a shut-in. Rather, Sirin had thought of another matter.
Staying inside Kiana's head, she'd always be influenced by Kiana's knowledge. The games she played were actually all ones Kiana had played before.
Once she had her own body, she could go find the comics and games she herself was interested in—the sheer variety would be countless times better than staying inside someone's consciousness.
"Fine, I understand." After nodding, Sirin immediately shrank back into the consciousness. She had to make good use of this last stretch of relatively free time, when she could roam and play as she pleased, to have a proper good time.
White Kiana looked at Irene's fingernails, and for some reason a wire suddenly got crossed in her head, and she asked, "Come to think of it, Sister Irene, your nails are so long—you must not be able to, mm~"
Irene lifted her head and glanced at Kiana, whose face was full of a knowing expression, and let out a somewhat helpless sigh: "My nails can extend and retract at will, you know."
"Heh heh."
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