Stella remained motionless inside the synthesizer chamber for several long seconds after the doors slid open.
The group stood around her proudly admiring their work while she appeared to be undergoing some kind of internal recalibration. Her eyes blinked once.
Then again, slower this time, as though she was manually reminding herself how blinking worked. One hand rose slightly toward the denim beret resting atop her head before stopping midway, her expression shifting through several emotions too quickly to fully identify.
Then, very quietly, she inhaled.
The movement alone made the room straighten instinctively. Even Mimi stopped grinning long enough to watch her carefully.
Stella stepped out of the chamber with all the poise of someone attempting to reclaim control over a situation that had spiraled violently out of her hands. The cardigan softened the entire effect immediately. It was difficult to maintain the aura of an untouchable cosmic entity while dressed like someone who gave suspiciously good life advice at an arts café. She tried anyway.
Her posture straightened. Her expression smoothed back into something calm and distant. When she finally spoke, her voice carried that same soft ethereal weight as before, though now accompanied by bell-bottom jeans with decorative chains.
"…Follow me."
The silence lasted exactly one second.
Then Midori whispered, "She still sounds majestic."
Mimi clasped both hands dramatically against her chest. "Cozy divinity."
Stella closed her eyes briefly.
Ragna immediately looked away, shoulders shaking faintly. And beside them, Rai tilted her head slightly while studying Stella with open fascination.
"…No, wait," she said quietly. "This is actually incredible."
Everyone looked at her.
Rai gestured vaguely toward Stella.
"You still feel like some ancient celestial being beyond mortal comprehension," she explained. "But now it's mixed with the energy of someone who would remind me to eat properly."
"…Psychic damage," Mimi whispered.
Rai nodded once, fully serious.
"The cardigan changed the entire aura."
"I heard that," Stella said without turning around.
"…I know," Rai replied pleasantly.
Stella began walking before anyone else could make the situation worse.
The others hurried after her through the pale Repository corridors, their footsteps echoing softly against the smooth floors while the embedded lights glowed steadily overhead. The deeper sections of the facility felt quieter than the areas they had explored earlier, cleaner somehow. Preserved. Occasionally they passed sealed doors labelled in symbols none of them recognized, entire sections hidden behind polished metallic walls and softly illuminated interfaces.
Mimi kept trying to peek into every side corridor they passed. Ragna kept dragging her back before she could wander off.
Midori got distracted by approximately every reflective surface in existence.
Gumi walked quietly beside Stella the entire time, occasionally glancing upward at the denim beret with visible satisfaction, as though proud of her contribution to the cosmic being makeover project.
Near the front of the group, Neera's attention remained fixed on the structure around them. Her eyes moved constantly across the architecture, tracking seams in the walls, changes in spacing, the subtle shifts in design as they descended deeper into the Repository.
"The internal layout still doesn't make sense," she murmured quietly. "There's no way this structure fits beneath the gazebo."
Rai glanced toward her.
"Oh, the Repository stopped obeying normal spatial logic ages ago," she said casually. "At some point it just decided geometry was optional."
Neera blinked.
"…That sentence should not be physically possible."
"I know," Rai replied sympathetically. "It bothered me for a while too."
Eventually Stella slowed.
The corridor widened ahead of them before ending at a large polished door embedded seamlessly into the wall. Unlike most of the Repository, this section looked almost untouched. The metallic surfaces gleamed softly beneath the pale lights overhead, clean enough to reflect distorted fragments of the group standing before it.
Above the entrance, illuminated letters glowed quietly against the metal.
ARMAMENTS ARCHIVE
The group collectively stopped.
Silence settled over them.
Then Mimi slowly pointed toward the sign.
"…Okay."
Midori nodded beside her.
"…That sounds concerning."
The doors to the Armaments Archive slid open with a low mechanical hum.
Then the group stopped dead.
The room beyond stretched far larger than it should have, rows upon rows of weapon racks disappearing into the distance beneath pale overhead lights. At first glance it looked like an armory. At second glance it looked like several thousand years of warfare had been thrown into a blender and organized by someone experiencing a breakdown.
Near the entrance sat sharpened stones and crude tools tied to wooden sticks with dried cord, primitive weapons so old they looked more like archaeological discoveries than functioning equipment. Beside them rested early bronze swords and rough daggers, their blades darkened with age.
Further down the rows, history accelerated.
Recurve bows. Longbows taller than Midori. Crossbows lined with intricate mechanisms.
Curved blades and katanas polished bright enough to catch the light like water.
Massive medieval swords that looked less designed for combat and more designed to emotionally devastate whoever had to carry them. Shields rested beside them, heavy and scarred, straight out of something that belonged in a brutally difficult fantasy game. Naginatas stood upright in organized rows. Spears. Axes. War hammers.
Then the room abruptly lost interest in reality.
Weapons began glowing.
One section held sleek metallic devices humming faintly with blue energy. Another contained blades made entirely of light, suspended motionless inside transparent display cases. Strange firearms rested along the walls, their surfaces too smooth and seamless to understand mechanically.
A nearby shelf held glass vials filled with liquids in impossible colors that shifted slowly when viewed from different angles.
In the center of one platform floated a black cube several inches above its surface, rotating soundlessly in place.
And beside it, for reasons known only to the universe itself, sat a perfectly ordinary rubber duck.
Silence spread through the room.
Midori pointed immediately.
"…What is the duck for?"
"No," Ragna said instantly. "We are not starting with the duck."
"I need answers."
"You are not getting duck answers before weapon answers."
Neera had already wandered several steps forward, eyes darting rapidly from one section to another. The sheer density of technological contradiction packed into the room looked seconds away from causing her physical pain.
"This place makes absolutely no chronological sense," she murmured. "Primitive stone tools beside plasma weaponry implies either impossible archival methodology or—"
Mimi had reached the glowing swords.
"Oh my god."
The red light reflected brightly in her eyes as she leaned toward one of the suspended blades.
"Do not touch anything," Ragna warned immediately.
Midori was already standing beside a rack of polearms.
"Too late."
Nozomi moved more carefully through the archive, her gaze lingering over the older weapons. Something about the handcrafted blades and worn wooden shafts seemed to ground the room slightly amidst all the impossible technology surrounding them.
Meanwhile Stella remained near the entrance with her arms folded, watching the group quietly. Just standing there with the calm expression of someone who believed the situation should already make sense.
The girls gradually noticed. Then awkward silence settled over the room.
Mimi looked at Stella. Stella looked back.
Midori looked between them.
"So...?"
Nothing.
Ragna crossed her arms.
"…Are we supposed to guess?"
Stella remained perfectly composed.
Which somehow made it worse.
Finally Rai sighed softly and stepped forward before the silence could become physically painful.
"She wants you to choose weapons," she explained.
Immediately everyone looked toward Stella again who gave one small nod.
As if that had been obvious from the beginning.
Mimi stared at her.
"…You know, normal people usually say things."
"I did," Stella replied calmly.
"You said 'follow me.'"
"Yes."
"That was not enough information."
Stella tilted her head slightly.
"…You followed."
Ragna covered her face with one hand.
"…I'm starting to understand why the world ended."
Ragna looked one second away from turning around and walking directly back out of the Armaments Archive.
"The duck was already bad enough," she muttered, rubbing her temple. "Now we're apparently expected to choose mystery weapons in the apocalypse with zero explanation."
Mimi was still staring longingly at the glowing swords.
"I still think the duck is important."
"The duck is not important."
"We don't know that."
Before the argument could spiral further, Rai stepped forward with the air of someone reluctantly accepting the position of unofficial tour guide because nobody else in the room was capable of explaining things normally.
"The weapons won't remain exactly like this," she said.
That got everyone's attention immediately. Neera looked up from a display of impossibly thin metallic daggers. "What do you mean?"
Rai gestured lightly toward the archive around them.
"When you choose one, it'll resonate with your element and change accordingly."
Silence.
Then six girls spoke at once.
"Our what?"
"Element?"
"We have elements?"
"Since when?"
"Excuse me?"
"What does that even mean?"
Rai blinked.
Then blinked again.
"…You didn't know?"
"No," Ragna replied flatly. "Shockingly, the cosmic mystery staircase neglected to provide us with an onboarding manual."
Mimi gasped softly.
"Wait wait wait."
She pointed dramatically around the room.
"So we're magical girls now."
Rai tilted her head slightly.
"…You are significantly closer to magical girls than normal humans at this point."
Mimi slowly turned toward Ragna with the most unbearable expression imaginable.
Ragna closed her eyes briefly.
"…I hate this place."
Sensing the incoming disaster before it fully arrived, Rai quietly stepped toward one of the nearby weapon racks. She reached out and lifted two identical chakrams from their display.
The reaction was immediate.
Golden light cracked violently across the metal rings the moment her fingers closed around them. Electricity burst outward in sharp branching arcs before settling into a steady glow that danced across the weapon edges like living lightning.
The room lit gold.
Mimi pointed instantly.
"LIGHTNING."
"Well," Midori said, impressed, "that one's subtle."
Rai stared at the chakrams herself for a moment, visibly fascinated by the energy crackling between them.
"…Oh," she said quietly. A small spark jumped between her fingers.
"…That explains several things, actually."
Neera leaned closer immediately, eyes reflecting the gold light.
"The energy output is responding directly to biological contact," she murmured. "Or neurological patterns. Or both."
Ragna looked at the electricity dancing across the weapons. Then at Rai. Then at the electricity again.
"…You know what," she decided. "Sure. Why not."
Beside them, Nozomi had already drifted toward another section of the archive.
Unlike the others, she moved through the room with quiet familiarity, her attention naturally gravitating toward older weapons rather than the futuristic ones. Eventually she stopped in front of a polished naginata resting against a stand.
Her fingers brushed lightly against the shaft.
"…I used to practice with these at the shrine," she said softly.
The others looked over. Nozomi lifted the weapon carefully. Purple light pulsed once through the room.
The reaction was quieter than Rai's, but no less striking. Thin etchings along the handle suddenly illuminated one by one, glowing with soft violet runes that spread across the weapon like veins of light.
The blade hummed faintly. Everyone stared.
Mimi pointed immediately.
"PURPLE."
"Yes," Ragna replied. "Excellent observation."
"No but what does purple mean?"
Nobody knew. Nozomi herself only stared quietly at the glowing runes winding along the handle, her reflection shifting faintly within the polished blade.
The weapon suited her so naturally it almost felt unsettling.
Ragna folded her arms.
"…Great," she muttered. "One of us has lightning and the other one has ominous ancient prophecy energy."
The room fell into a strange rhythm after that.
One by one, the weapons stopped feeling like objects resting on shelves and started feeling expectant somehow, as though the archive itself had been waiting for someone to finally touch them again. The lights overhead reflected softly across metal and polished wood while faint energy still crackled around Rai's chakrams and violet runes glowed steadily along Nozomi's naginata.
Midori, meanwhile, had wandered off completely. Which was never a reassuring development.
Neera noticed first.
"…Where did Midori go?"
"Probably toward something dangerous," Mimi answered immediately.
"That narrows down literally nothing in this room."
A few seconds later, Midori emerged from deeper within the archive holding a katana rather dramatically.
She slid into the center of the room and struck a pose like an anime protagonist moments away from announcing her tragic backstory. One hand rested against the sheath while the other pushed imaginary wind-blown hair away from her face.
The room stared.
Midori narrowed her eyes toward some invisible enemy in the distance.
"…At last," she whispered dramatically. "We meet again."
Ragna looked physically tired.
"Who are you talking to."
"The narrative."
"There is no narrative."
"There absolutely is."
Then Midori drew the sword. The reaction came instantly.
Green light burst softly along the blade, spreading outward in glowing lines before vines curled across the metal in real time. Thin flowering branches wound themselves around the handle while tiny leaves unfurled from the guard, delicate white blossoms blooming one after another along the edge.
The entire katana looked alive. The flowers swayed gently despite the complete absence of wind. Silence settled over the room.
Then:
"…Okay," Mimi admitted quietly. "That's sick."
Midori blinked at the sword in her hands. Then grinned.
"Oh my god."
She swung it once through the air and flower petals scattered behind the movement in glowing fragments before fading away completely.
Neera stared openly now, all pretense of scientific restraint disappearing.
"The weapon altered its own structural composition."
"It grew flowers," Ragna corrected.
"It GREW THEM."
Midori pointed the blade upward victoriously.
"I knew the protagonist energy would pay off."
Ragna sighed.
"Unfortunately, yes."
Inspired instantly by Midori's theatrics, Mimi lunged toward another section of the archive before anyone could stop her.
"Mimi," Ragna warned immediately.
Too late.
She had already grabbed a bow.
The moment she lifted it, she spun dramatically in place and pointed it toward the ceiling.
"Behold," she declared. "The modern-day Cupid."
"Mimi," Neera said carefully, "that is a weapon."
"So was Cupid."
"That does not help your case."
Mimi grinned and pulled back the string slightly.
The bow ignited. Flames erupted along both curved ends in a violent burst of red-orange light while fire raced across the string itself without consuming it. Heat rolled outward through the room, warm enough to force several people backward instinctively.
Mimi froze.
The flames reflected brightly in her newly red eyes.
"…OH."
The fire settled quickly after the initial burst, now flickering steadily along the weapon like it belonged there.
Midori gasped.
"No wait that's insanely cool."
"FIRE," Gumi announced from somewhere nearby.
"Yes, Jelly," Ragna replied. "Good job."
Mimi stared at the burning bow for several seconds.
Then her grin returned slowly.
Dangerously.
"I'm literally magical girl Hawkeye."
"You are absolutely not."
"Fiery Cupid."
"No."
"Cupid but problematic."
"…Unfortunately closer."
Mimi spun the bow once experimentally, flames trailing through the air behind the motion in bright arcs before vanishing.
Meanwhile Neera continued staring at the weapon transformations with increasing scientific distress.
"No, because how is the energy determining symbolic compatibility," she muttered rapidly. "The elemental manifestation is reflecting subconscious identity patterns but also combat preference and psychological alignment and—"
Ragna pointed toward her immediately.
"She's next."
Neera blinked.
"…What."
"You're rambling," Midori informed her cheerfully. "That means the brain is cooking."
"No it isn't."
"It absolutely is."
While Mimi continued spinning her flaming bow around like she had just unlocked a legendary cosmetic set, Ragna quietly wandered deeper into the melee section of the archive.
Unlike the others, she didn't hesitate. Her gaze moved once across the weapon racks before settling immediately on a double axe resting near the back wall, and something about the way she approached it made it feel less like choosing and more like recognizing something that had already belonged to her.
The weapon looked brutal.
Twin heavy blades curved outward from either side of the handle, dark metal polished just enough to catch pale reflections from the archive lights. It looked dense. Built less for elegance and more for overwhelming force.
Ragna lifted it easily.
Grey light pulsed outward across the weapon instantly.
The glow spread through the axe in a low wave before settling along the sharpened edges, silver-grey energy tracing the blades like liquid metal.
Then it stopped.
No dramatic elemental explosion.
No obvious manifestation.
Just the lingering glow quietly resting along the weapon's edge.
Midori blinked.
"…Okay, what element even is grey."
"No clue," Mimi admitted.
Ragna rested the axe against her shoulder naturally, like she had carried it for years already.
"At least mine isn't actively on fire."
"Coward," Mimi replied immediately.
Nearby, Neera had become distracted by something significantly worse: The duck.
Silence settled over the group as they slowly realized where her attention had drifted.
The rubber duck sat innocently atop its display shelf, perfectly ordinary amidst the impossible weapons surrounding it.
Neera stared at it, then slowly walked closer.
Ragna noticed immediately.
"…No."
Neera crouched slightly in front of the shelf, eyes narrowed with complete fascination.
"No, because this is absurd," she said. "The cube makes sense."
"The floating cube makes sense to you?" Midori asked.
"Yes. Mysterious future technology is predictable in places like this. Every advanced archive has one ominous floating object."
"…That is not true."
"But the duck?" Neera continued, pointing at it. "That's irrational. That means someone consciously decided to place a rubber duck inside an interdimensional armory."
Midori gasped softly.
"She's right."
Mimi immediately appeared beside them.
"Oh my god."
"The duck is statistically the most interesting object in this room," Neera argued.
"That sentence should not exist."
Neera leaned slightly closer to the shelf.
"Why is it here? Is it symbolic? Is it a joke? Is it a weapon disguised as a joke? That's psychologically fascinating."
Midori folded her arms thoughtfully.
"Counterpoint."
Everyone looked at her.
"What if the duck is the strongest weapon here."
Mimi pointed immediately.
"Secret legendary item."
Neera looked genuinely tempted now.
Ragna physically started walking toward them.
"Absolutely not."
Nozomi stepped in too, expression calm but visibly concerned.
"Neera," she said gently, "please choose something that does not involve experimental duck combat."
"That's a very closed-minded sentence."
Rai looked toward the shelf thoughtfully.
"…To be fair," she admitted, "I also don't know why the duck is there."
The entire room turned toward her.
"You WHAT," Ragna asked.
Rai lifted both hands slightly.
"That somehow made it worse."
Neera reached toward the duck.
Immediately three people grabbed her at once.
"No."
"You are not bonding with the duck."
"Release the scientist," Neera protested.
After several more minutes of what could generously be called rational discussion and what more accurately resembled an intervention, Neera was finally steered away from the duck shelf entirely.
Reluctantly, she stopped in front of a spear rack.
She crossed her arms while studying one of the weapons thoughtfully.
"…This is probably the most practical option," she admitted at last. "Balanced range, defensive viability, adaptable movement, manageable learning curve…"
Mimi looked devastated.
"You chose practicality over duck."
"Yes."
"Character development."
Neera ignored her and lifted the spear from its stand.
Blue light spiraled instantly along the shaft. The glow wrapped upward in smooth curling patterns, luminous energy twisting around the handle like flowing currents. Unlike Nozomi's runes, Neera's weapon carried no symbols. Just endless spiraling blue light coiling around the spear in steady motion. The room quieted again.
Three weapons now glowed without revealing anything obvious about their elements: Nozomi's violet runes. Ragna's silver-edged axe. Neera's spiraling blue spear.
Midori pointed dramatically between them.
"You three got mystery flavors."
"That is not what elements are," Neera replied automatically.
Mimi tilted her head thoughtfully.
"…Actually wait. What are your elements."
Silence.
Neera looked down at the glowing spiral winding around her spear. Then toward Nozomi's naginata.
Then at the silver light resting along Ragna's axe.
Nobody had answers. Ragna sighed.
"…Fantastic. We unlocked a class system and half of us still don't know what our powers are."
The room remained suspended in noisy overlapping conversation while glowing weapons continued casting shifting colors across the archive walls. Firelight flickered from Mimi's bow. Green petals occasionally drifted from Midori's katana before dissolving into light halfway to the floor. Rai's chakrams crackled softly with electricity while the silver glow along Ragna's axe reflected dimly against the polished metal shelves nearby.
Meanwhile, Gumi had wandered off quietly.
Nobody noticed until the sharp sound cracked through the archive.
THWACK.
The room froze. Everyone turned at once.
Gumi stood several feet away holding a whip. She was simply holding it, like the decision had made complete sense to her from the beginning. Thick pink slime coated the length of the weapon, slowly shifting along the cord in glossy ripples before gathering near the tip in heavy translucent droplets.
Silence settled over the room. Then Gumi lifted the whip slightly, pointed toward it, and explained in her calm flat voice:
"…Slime."
Midori burst into laughter first.
"No wait, that's perfect."
Mimi nearly folded in half immediately after.
"Oh my god, it actually matches her."
Even Ragna looked momentarily caught off guard as she stared between Gumi and the weapon.
"…Okay," she admitted reluctantly. "That one actually makes sense."
The slime coating the whip shifted again as Gumi gave it a small experimental swing. The pink substance splattered lightly against the floor before slowly pulling itself back up the weapon like liquid reversing gravity.
Neera's eyes immediately lit up.
"The viscosity response is adapting dynamically to motion," she said, already stepping closer. "That means the slime itself is reacting to kinetic force and—"
"Do not lick the weapon," Ragna interrupted instantly.
Neera blinked.
"…I wasn't going to."
"You were thinking scientifically too loudly."
Nearby, Mimi had already decided this confirmed her earlier theory.
"Okay no, we literally are an RPG party now."
Midori pointed around the room excitedly.
"Wait wait, assign everyone classes."
Ragna visibly regretted existing. Mimi ignored her completely.
"Ragna's the dark knight build."
"I hate that you're not wrong."
"Nozomi's support class."
Nozomi sighed softly. "…That feels unfairly accurate."
"Midori's anime swordswoman."
"I was born for this role."
"Neera's spear scientist hybrid."
"That is not a class."
"It is now."
Then Mimi pointed dramatically toward Gumi.
"And Gumi's the slime tamer."
Gumi considered that for a moment. Then nodded once.
The room dissolved again after that, conversations colliding over one another in loud excited fragments while theories, jokes, and arguments spiraled out of control faster than anyone could keep track of.
At some point Stella stepped forward.
Not dramatically. Just enough to speak.
"There are things you should know before—"
Nobody heard her.
Midori had already started talking over Mimi about combat formations. Neera was questioning Rai about whether elemental resonance affected reflex adaptation. Ragna was trying unsuccessfully to stop Mimi from attempting trick shots with a flaming bow indoors.
The noise swallowed the room whole. Stella fell silent.
Her arms folded tighter across her chest as she watched them continue spiraling further into chaos without even realizing she had been speaking.
Annoyance settled sharp and immediate beneath her ribs. They were already moving recklessly again. Running headfirst into things they didn't understand with the same careless momentum that had brought them into the Repository in the first place.
And worse still, she was worried about them. The realization irritated her almost immediately.
After all this time, after everything she had deliberately buried and distanced herself from, she should not have been standing there feeling protective over a group of girls arguing about elemental class systems and rubber ducks.
Yet the feeling remained anyway. Warm and sickeningly bittersweet.
Mimi suddenly grabbed Neera's wrist.
"Last one out of the archive is weak."
"HEY—"
Instantly the room exploded into movement.
Mimi bolted first. Midori followed immediately after her while laughing loud enough to echo through the entire archive. Ragna swore under her breath and ran after them before either could accidentally kill themselves. Nozomi hurried after the group, her naginata clutched tight in her hand.
Gumi followed behind them at a steady pace, the slime-coated whip dragging softly along the floor at her side.
Within seconds, the archive doors slid shut behind the last of them.
Silence crashed down afterward so suddenly it almost felt unnatural.
Only Rai and Stella remained.
Rai watched the closed doors for a long moment before exhaling softly.
"…I genuinely don't know how to contain them."
Stella's expression tightened faintly.
"You aren't supposed to," she replied quietly.
But the irritation remained.
Not entirely directed at the girls.
Some of it lingered toward herself for reacting at all.
Without another word, Stella turned away from the archive entrance. The sharp sound of her new heels echoed softly against the polished floor as she disappeared deeper into the quiet sections of the Repository, retreating back toward her room while the distant noise of the others continued somewhere far ahead through the halls.