Manual-Gear Breath

Beatrice opened her eyes numbly.

Her eyes shifted, and the cold, hard sensation beneath her body told her where she was.

She was still inside the furnace.

Pain came crashing over her like waves, one after another, without end, as though her entire body had been thrown into a millstone and ground to pieces, over and over again. She could barely distinguish reality from illusion anymore.

Yes, hallucinations came often. One moment, she was still a little girl, chasing butterflies in the garden; the next, she had returned to that rainy night in Rhine, where Hela approached with the Triple Crown held in both hands.

Sometimes she saw Uncle Jules crouching down with a smile to greet her. Sometimes she was back in Gear Sage's classroom, drowsily listening to a lesson.

Time, place, past, present—they had all blended together. Her memories seemed to have been tossed into a great pot and boiled into a sticky lump of porridge.

At times, she even wondered whether this was the instant before death, nothing more than a final montage before everything ended.

A tearing sensation rose from her abdomen, carrying scorching heat into her chest. It was like a bag of sharp blades forcing its way through flesh and blood before bursting uncontrollably from her mouth.

Beatrice's eyes were numb, then gradually turned vacant.

Her steadfast will had saved her, yet it had also pushed her into the abyss: she had to endure this ceaseless torment.

But why?

Why did she have to struggle through such pain? Why not simply sink into it?

She seemed to have endured until now because of certain obsessions, yet the things supporting her also seemed to be gradually wearing away.

Confusion slowly welled up within her. The hallucinations suddenly overlapped and repeated, leaving her unable to distinguish