Looking again at the young ladies seated before the blackboard, everyone except Miss Maze had opened their eyes. The cat seemed perfectly fine, though it was currently sprawled on his shoulder with a very unhappy expression.
Emilia wore a frightened expression.
"Shade, are you all right? You turned into a Crystal Statue just now and scared us all. Little Mia looked like she was about to use her paws to scratch the crystal apart, but you changed back very quickly."
"I turned into crystal. I'm fine."
Shade shook his head in disappointment, stroked the brave and loyal cat, then lowered his head to look at his hands. Just now, amid those crystals, he had clearly felt that he had truly touched the Moon. Now that he had returned to reality and realized how that story had ended, realized the choice he had made, he did not regret being unable to let go at the end. He was merely disappointed that it had not been real.
"It seems that if I want to reach her, I still have to find the real Primordial Moon Remnant."
As for the brand-new Mystic Lock, he knew that the deity had wanted him to understand the principle of "Temperance," but clearly, he had failed the test of this final lesson. He had been telling a story, yet the god had also been teaching them a lesson. And the young ladies sitting before him who had already awakened—Iluna, Emilia, Miss Bister, and Miss Wilde—had clearly all passed the deity's "final lesson."
They should all have gained something through understanding themselves and letting go of their obsessions. From that perspective, Shade had undoubtedly failed. He was actually grateful that the god had still given him an opportunity—the normal state effect attached to the Mystic Lock. But even