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I woke up to a disaster.

“Are you alright, Lady Jill?!” Eren, her big eyes filled with worry, peered down at me.

I responded, “I’m fine,” and sat up, sighing as I looked around at the devastation buried in the rubble. “How long was I unconscious?”

“Uh, um, I think maybe one or two minutes?”

It seemed that I hadn’t been out for long.

Despite that, I felt like I had a long, vivid dream, with voices that seemed oddly familiar—particularly the fate of the boy who had been crucified and set on fire at the end. I couldn’t help but be curious about what happened next, but assessing the current situation was my priority.

At first glance, a significant portion of the ceiling had collapsed, and it seemed like we had barely avoided being buried alive. Fortunately, the passageway proved to be sturdier than it seemed, allowing us to narrowly avoid a total collapse and retain its original structure.

Thanks to our escape, I only had a few minor cuts and bruises, but no major injuries like broken bones.

“Are you and Vier hurt anywhere?”
“We’re fine. Vier protected me again.”
“Woof!”

Seeing that both of them were unharmed was a relief. But the problem was… As I scanned the ruined chamber, now in a pitiable state, my eyes landed on the center of the room, half-buried under the rubble.

There, in the middle of the once fountain-filled pool, crouched the cause of this whole disaster—Bartholomew, the Death Knight, clad in a massive, black, iron-like suit of heavy armor.

He was still there, but…

“Why isn’t he moving?”
“Uh, I-I don’t know? He was already like that when I noticed.”

Vier and I both tilted our heads, puzzled by Bartholomew’s statue-like stillness.

On an unrelated note, the statues of the Four Seasonal Gods that used to adorn the edges of the fountain had been shattered to pieces. The statue of the Saintess in the center was barely intact, though it seemed Bartholomew must have knocked into it when he fell.

Beside the blade of his halberd, the Saintess’ severed head lay cleanly sliced off.

Bartholomew crouched there, facing the now headless statue.

Upon closer inspection, his skull’s jaw was wide open, and the eerie glow that usually burned in his eyes had completely vanished. It was as if he had just realized some catastrophic failure and—

“～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～～”

—frozen in a pose of shock, like a breaker had tripped in his mind. But surely, there’s no way someone like him could have such a sense of regret.

“Could it be that he failed to defeat the Nue? Maybe he’s sulking from losing confidence?” I voiced the possibility that came to mind.

“No, Vier and I both saw the Nue get defeated and turn into particles of light.”
“Woof! (I saw it!)”
“…Then what could it be?”

“Who knows? Maybe he just hit his head the wrong way.” Eren answered nonchalantly. Considering we’d just narrowly avoided getting buried alive for the second time today, it was understandable.

“Well, we can figure this out later. There’s still someone else—”

As I scanned the rubble, I spotted a familiar-looking pair of legs in a mini-skirt not far away. No one had helped, so I thought she was completely buried alive(?), but it seemed her upper body had only been partially buried.

I gave a light tug, and out from the debris emerged Coppelia, completely passed out.

For someone to go through all of that and come out without a scratch, she was certainly built tough.

“Hello? Are you alive? Or rather, not broken?”

Since my Healing couldn’t possibly work on her, I gave Coppelia a shake.

“…Error… error, a critical failure has occurred in the processing unit… This error appears when… cannot be connected, or when… is unstable. Currently rebooting… Reboot failed… Please initiate a physical reboot.”

She was muttering something, but there were no signs of her waking up. Also, how exactly am I supposed to perform a “physical reboot”? I didn’t see any kind of switch on her.

“She’s saying something, but what does it mean?”
“It sounds like she’s broken and can’t wake up on her own, so she’s asking for external help to restart.”

Eren peeked over and asked, so I gave a brief explanation.

“Hmph!” Suddenly, Eren’s hand chopped down on Coppelia’s head with a solid thud, making a loud BANG and stopping Coppelia’s muttering.

“Ah…” I was stunned by this reckless action, unable to stop her in time. Eren, however, puffed out her chest with confidence.

“When the magic tools in the mansion are acting up, the trick is to hit the top left at about a sixty-degree angle to fix them.”

Is that really something to be proud of? Honestly, if something’s broken, wouldn’t it be better to send it for proper repairs? Or did she just finish her off completely?

But—

Just as I feared the worst, the shock of being hit seemed to have stopped Coppelia’s rambling. After about thirty seconds of silence, she suddenly started blinking repeatedly, then looked around with a strangely refreshed and alert expression, as if she had just woken up.

“Is this… the sealed chamber built in my laboratory? Ohhhh! Has my seal been shattered!?”

Coppelia, taking a pose of delight, exclaimed: The clearly abnormal behavior and speech prompted Eren and I to act.

“Eren.”
“On it.”

Eren, understanding my intent, immediately launched a chop aimed at a sixty-degree angle to the left.

“Whoa!?”

Coppelia barely avoided the attack.

“Tch, missed it.”
“What are you doing, you little brat!?”

Coppelia, now visibly enraged, confronted Eren with a fierce look.

“Obviously, since you’re malfunctioning, we need to hit you again to fix you.”
“What nerve! I am not broken at all!”

As Coppelia, still shouting, was cornered, I also tried to explain.

“No, your tone and personality are completely different from before. Something is off.”

Whether or not her previous self was the normal one is debatable, but it’s not typical for a girl to be possessed by an old dude like this.

“There’s a reason for that… Oh, is that you, Adelheid… no, Clara, is it not? What’s going on? It was you who confined my virtual persona, and yet you have released me again? What is your purpose?”
“Clara again… Let me clarify, I am not Clara. I am currently called Julia… or Jill.”
“Hmm? My… no, this automaton Coppelia’s observation device indicates a 98.76% match, making it impossible for you to not be the same person, but very well. You are ‘Jill’ now. I accept that as a temporary name. So ‘Jill’, why have you released me?”

Coppelia, or rather Victor Francis, asked with a tone of skepticism that didn’t seem convinced.

“Well, I don’t fully understand the situation myself, but aren’t you supposed to be Coppelia?”

It felt as though the person inside was someone else entirely, so I decided to clarify this first.

“I am ‘Coppelia,’ but not the usual basic persona. The higher-ranking persona, which was supposed to be my ‘Victor Francis’ reserve personality, has surfaced.”
“Victor Francis!?”

We were both taken aback by the unexpected name, while the self-proclaimed Victor Francis observed us with satisfaction.

“…But, isn’t he the one who conducted forbidden research on immortality, committed heinous acts, and earned the Saintess’ wrath, resulting in his confinement?”
“That is not true!!”

Victor Francis, or rather Coppelia, turned bright red with indignation at my words.

“Indeed, I did research immortality, but I did not perform actions that would inconvenience others! All the blame for such infamy should be placed upon that person!”
“That person? Who is it?”
“Who else?! It was that scoundrel who stole the fruits of my research, and even worse, repeatedly did cruel human experiments in secret. He noticed that I was about to discard my research and he killed my original body to cover up his crimes. In the end, he perfected immortality for himself and became the dreadful ‘No-Life King,’ that person—”

Victor Francis’ gaze, through Coppelia’s body, turned toward the crucifix held by the half-destroyed statue of the Saint.

“Is Igor, that evil magician and my former patron—Igoronak!!”

In response to this exclamation, a voice filled with anguish and resentment echoed from the bottom of the fountain.

Author’s note:

The relationships between the characters are a little hard to understand, so I’ll add some details.

・Prof. Victor Francis: An alchemist researching immortality. He’s basically a dumb scholar, brilliant but naive. He created Coppelia as his research assistant and equips her with a copy of his personality. He is later killed by Igor.

・Igor (Igoronak): Patron of Professor Victor. He is actually a magician with an extraordinary interest in immortality and steals all of the doctor’s research results and uses them to conduct repeated human experiments, eventually becoming the King of the Undead and being sealed away by the Saint.

・Coppelia: An android. After the death of her real body, Professor Victor, she is ashamed of her own ignorance and remains at the research lab to monitor Igor’s seal and to conduct proper research. She comes into contact with Clara and cooperates with her in developing healing techniques, but then Clara seals the Professor’s personality. After that, she goes a little crazy due to the negative effects of the seal.

In conclusion, Igor and Clara are at fault.

Translator’s Note:

It is hard to translate it to English properly, but the way Victor speaks is old-fashioned. She (he?) uses Washi, which is a form of Watashi typically used by old characters, and ends her (his?) sentences in Noja.

Which is why Jill and Eren could tell right away that Coppelia’s personality has swapped with Victor’s. Coppelia speaks a bit like an airhead and acts cutesy, while Victor speaks like a grandpa.¹

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Anyway, no matter how you look at it, this seal is entirely legitimate, and trying to break it by sacrificing human lives is nothing but a heinous act.

It would be better to consult either the public authorities of this country or the higher-ups of the academy, such as Principal Mei.

We must ensure that no one carelessly attempts to break the seal any further.

And it might be best to restrain Coppelia and deal with her appropriately. This is outside my area of expertise, so I can’t say for sure, but it would be nice if we could make her brainwashed “Master-worshiping” thought process a bit more flexible…

“—For now, it’s not something that can be dealt with today or tomorrow, so we’ll have to leave it as it is. More importantly, we need to inform everyone that we’re safe, and I’m also curious about how the attack was repelled.”

“Agreed.”

Eren and I exchanged serious looks, while Coppelia gave us a puzzled look.

“Attack? What attack?”
“Before coming here, our lodging was attacked by a massive horde of undead… Wait, don’t tell me, that was your doing too?!”
“???”

When I pressed her, Coppelia looked utterly confused. At the very least, it didn’t seem like she was involved intentionally, but there was way too much evidence to say she was completely uninvolved.

“Just to be sure, you haven’t been out in town recently, have you?”
“Hmm… I go out about once every six months to stock up on alchemy materials, taking two or three skeleton soldiers as bodyguards. But I haven’t gone out in the last three months.”
“Then it’s probably not you. Also, bringing skeleton soldiers and wearing a miniskirt maid outfit is more than just suspicious, so you should stop that. If you walk around town like that, the guards will point their weapons at you.”
“Huh? Aren’t guards supposed to approach with weapons drawn?”

At that moment, Eren timidly raised her hand and made a suggestion.

“Um, I don’t really want to stay here any longer, so can we at least leave?”

Upon closer inspection, this place… no, all over the place, there were warning messages carved into the walls, disguised as intricate patterns.

‘Idiot, idiot.’
‘Look at the idiot!’
‘Arrest this guy, policeman!’
‘You’re such a sad adult.’
‘A flat chest is a status symbol!!’
‘You’re trash, and that’s me being nice.’

As we moved further from the entrance, the insults became more and more childish, regressing to the level of kids’ taunts. Also, why is there an odd one out?

“Sigh… In that case, I’ll brew some fresh tea. How about a fragrant tea that’s popular with women, nicknamed ‘Lady Killer’?”
“That’s another name for wolfsbane!!”

By the way, its dried roots can be used as a poison, and its extract is used for applying poison on arrow tips.

And so, while discussing such things, we eventually left after merely observing the Saintess’ seal. Whether this experience held any meaning or not was unclear, but at the very least, we had uncovered truths that impacted the core of the teachings of the Saintess’ Church. We decided to leave the scene, with this knowledge lingering in our minds.

…Upon reflection, it feels like we’ve learned things we were better off not knowing. If we carelessly blab about this, we might be labeled heretics by the Church and face a witch trial (though, well, I am a witch), so I should probably tell Eren to keep quiet about it too.

Just as I made that solemn vow, some dust suddenly fell onto my shoulder from above.

“Huh?” I instinctively brushed it off and looked up at the ceiling.

(Master, something’s coming from above. Be careful!)

Vier’s urgent mental warning echoed in my head, and immediately after, a crack appeared in the ceiling.

This… it feels like I’ve seen this recently…

“It’s kind of a familiar sight, isn’t it…” Eren, also sensing the déjà vu, muttered blankly.

“…don’t tell me, he—”

Before my words could even finish, Vier grabbed both Eren and me in her mouth and leaped toward the exit. Almost at the same moment, something enormous crashed down, breaking through the magnificent ceiling of the sealed chamber.

“GUAHAHAHAHAHA!! Weak, weak, weak, weak, weak, weak, weak, weak! Pathetic! This is the end. Meet your fate!!”

Through the dust and debris, I thought I heard a familiar booming voice, but with Vier’s rapid acceleration and the shock from the falling object, my consciousness faded to black in the next instant.

♦♢♦

Screams shook the darkness.

In a bleak room, likely a dimly lit underground chamber enclosed by stone walls, two men wearing black triangular masks with only holes for their eyes, covering their heads completely—both obese, bare-chested, and wearing black tights on their lower halves—were relentlessly torturing a young boy with whips and spiked iron rods.

Watching them with satisfaction was a middle-aged man dressed in clothes that suggested a noble status—his body and movements indicated as much—but his identity was obscured by a bondage-style mask that hid his eyes.

The boy, who was continually tormented by these two hulking torturers, appeared to be in his early to mid-teens.

In the dark room, he was bound with shackles in a position resembling a raised-arm salute. His hair, soaked and half-burned, had discolored, and since his face was covered by a blindfold, his features were unclear. His still-developing body, stripped to the waist, was marked with stab wounds from blades and needles, and horrific burns, likely from chemicals or fire, covered him without exception. His condition was nothing short of pitiful.

Fire torture, waterboarding, the torture chair, limb stretching, branding irons, nail removal, salted herring² …

As the boy screamed with each successive form of torture, the middle-aged man, who had been chuckling darkly, said, “Still not giving up? Why don’t you reflect on your actions and apologize already?”

Pressing the tip of his drawn sword under the boy’s chin, he licked his lips as he interrogated him.

“…Who would—who would give up on Jill?! Don’t think for a second I’ll break from something like this!” Even then, the boy defiantly shouted, refusing to let his spirit be broken.

Unfazed, the middle-aged man coolly instructed the torturers to prepare more gruesome devices. Without a word, the two torturers continued their work as directed.

“Guahhhhhhhhhh!! Jill—!!”

The boy’s screams echoed endlessly through the cramped underground chamber.