Kitty Killer Isn't Very Cold

[So... how much longer are you going to hesitate?]

[Sin is still spreading...]

[Justice... will not stand up for itself...]

Dense black fog slowly flickered with intermittent light, and the Angel's crown settled back into a Halo.

Williams watched as the girl whose pupils had inexplicably scattered just moments ago suddenly returned to normal. Still pressing down on the wound in his leg, he continued staring at the progress display on the laboratory panel behind him...

Twenty percent remained until the final experiment was complete.

"...Twenty percent... meaning the 'modification phase' is already over... Next comes the 'finishing phase'... the personality modification, right...?"

Though she phrased it as a question, Nana, who had gone through the data center archives and thoroughly memorized the experimental stages, raised her gun.

The killer did not know whether this had been Matilda's own choice, or a choice Matilda's family had made for her.

But... she was the one who had allowed things to reach this point.

Being unable to stop Loken's long-planned conspiracy was no excuse. Since she had accepted the contract, she had to bear the responsibility.

A killer could not change a conspiracy...

But she could at least cut away the filthiest part of it.

She pulled the trigger... and the entire laboratory abruptly lost power, plunging into darkness.

Then, by the faint glow of the Fallen Angel's Halo—like storm clouds wrapped in dense mist—Williams saw it. The killer's silver pistol was aimed at him once more.

"Now, tell me what happens next."

PS:

The plot's getting a little heavy, so here's something lighter...

PS2: Well, while I'm at it, please vote... I'll add another update and get this part over with.

Rosemary's Embrace: Illusion and Reality of Rosemary

"Next? Ah... next... The experiment was forcibly interrupted at eighty percent... You even waited until that child's stitching was finished... Mm... very good. So... we have indeed reached an agreement?"

Williams's answer was three consecutive shots into his other thigh. Meanwhile, the mercenary team outside was gradually using Witchcraft to dispel Nana's interference... the range of the mist was shrinking, and time was running out.

"Now, tell me what could happen..."

"...Ugh... ngh... what... Oh... what happens..."

Clutching his legs in pain, Williams's face was deathly pale, yet he was unexpectedly cooperative... Just as he had said, it seemed that what he wanted had already been completed.

"The remaining twenty percent... uses... mature memory manipulation to erase Sample Five's memories... This isn't meant to harm her... Though... it easily brings to mind the claim that the military only wants a tool that obeys orders... But that isn't the truth...

"Erasing her memories is meant to reduce the chance that conflicting memories will interfere with her and cause her to lose control... And to reduce that chance to its lowest point... the brainwashing rate must reach one hundred percent... Otherwise, painful memories will stimulate her instinctive, unrestricted spellcasting, and as her Originium-corrupted organs transmit the consciousnesses of the previous transplant recipients in multiple directions, Sample Five will rapidly deteriorate from being forced to cast multiple spells..."

Listening to Williams, Nana suddenly thought of her own past, clean as a blank sheet of paper... But compared to herself, Matilda was obviously more important right now.

"...Don't expect me to restart the brainwashing process, but you don't want your 'success' to 'deteriorate' for some strange reason and turn into a laughingstock, do you... Tell me, there should be a way to handle this properly..."

"Ah... handle it properly... Mm... yes... Others might not be able to do it, but you... That's right... you should have a way."

Williams looked at Nana, and an eerie light shone in his eyes. He had lost his earlier calmness and indifference. His split grin curled into a mad smile, and Nana had no idea what he had seen to make him laugh so wildly.

"First, since you won't destroy Sample Five's own consciousness, then destroy the consciousnesses of the previous hosts... You should be able to do that. Sarkaz Sorcery can even allow its user to devour death itself... Though the life-support system has already lost power, the gradual dying process is what causes those flowing memories to slowly descend into madness... Go on, kill them. Use your ability to free them from their mortal flesh and embrace death... If it's you, if it's the 'Demon King,' you can definitely do it..."

"I don't understand what you're talking about... But I don't like that method. Think of another one..."

Seeing the girl before him purse her lips, Williams groaned again and sank into thought... As Nana anxiously looked toward the laboratory, Matilda, just as he had analyzed, began twisting in agony atop the unpowered operating table.

The hallucinations that had disappeared earlier suddenly returned. Nana could see them beside the girl... her family, worriedly trying to approach.

But once they came close, they too cried out in the same pain.

It hurts!

Oripathy hurts, life hurts too. Why can't we die?!

[Why does it still hurt so much even after dying?!]

The man screamed wildly as he gradually merged with Matilda. The restraints binding her seemed to be torn apart by immense force, and the shockwave instantly destroyed the entire testing table. Like an explosion, the whole laboratory burst apart.

Nana had been preparing to protect Williams, who was still somewhat useful, but surprisingly, the girl did not feel any impact at all.

Turning around, Nana saw the twins shielding her with outstretched arms, their bodies having become partly transparent. Farther away... Kate nodded at her, though Nana did not know what she meant. Cole had already embraced her youngest daughter, and then she too vanished...

"Even if you suddenly demand that, it's different from a plan prepared over years. Research and surgery aren't things that can be completed just because you make a request! If we can't calm Sample Five down here, then let her vent... Let her destroy as much as she wants, but memories that painful will drive her mad!"

"...Her name isn't 'Sample Five'... Her name is 'Matilda'..."

Nana grabbed Williams by the collar and threw him out through the door she had pried open. Judging from the sounds of the mercenaries outside, they should be arriving there soon... Nana decided to let this man keep his life for now. There might still be many questions about Matilda's physical condition that she would need to ask him later.

But she absolutely could not let Matilda keep destroying everything until she went mad. Nana had to find a way to calm her down...

But how?

This seemed to have brought Nana back to another blind spot in her understanding, much like before—her confusion over what it meant to be alive...

Having absorbed Cole, Matilda had even caused half of Kate to disappear. The girl cried as she clawed at her head... the invisible storm grew exponentially stronger.

The pretty silver hair she had inherited had all been shaved away during the surgery. Seeing the Little Cat crush her brothers' corpses and claw her own wounds until blood streamed down them, Nana did not know what she should do.

But... remembering Cole... and how Kate had hugged Matilda before, then held her hand, trying to stop her from hurting herself, Nana unconsciously took a step forward.

Yes, she could not keep hesitating this time.

Using the wrecked laboratory for cover, the killer dodged several sweeping gusts and forced herself forward... Even though neither Witchcraft nor the power of Judgment could help her now, even if Nana could only be an observer... even if she could only physically touch the other girl, even though she knew better than anyone that no matter how tight the embrace, it could not share even a fraction of the pain...

Even knowing that doing this would only get her hurt for no reason, Nana still hugged her... hugged this child who had suffered such calamity simply because Bruce family blood flowed through her veins.

Reason asked, what was the point?

Emotion answered: because even if she did not do this, the pain would still pierce her to the bone.

The embrace could not ease even the slightest bit of Matilda's pain, yet it gradually healed Nana's heart.

But... was there really no way to help her?

No, there was... perhaps there had always been a way... Nana simply had not wanted to think about it.

Looking at the laboratory, torn apart by invisible violence, Nana lifted Matilda, who stood as if within the eye of a storm. In the distance, on the second floor, the life-support systems bolted to the floor... were bathed in a streak of crimson beneath the ripped-open ceiling.

[If it's you, you should be able to do it.]

[If it's Nana, it'll be fine.]

[Me too.]

[Mia looks so pitiful... End all of this.]

That family appeared beside her again. For the first time, Nana realized how fragile she truly was. At first, she had only invested the slightest bit of emotion in the neighbors around her... so why was she crying over and over again?

[Because... you had never loved anything like a normal person before. Only now do you resemble a normal person.]

"Cole..."

The white-haired Feline woman watched Nana raise her gun, then smiled at her and said nothing more.

Under the sunlight, those jars were no longer merely 'samples'... Nana could clearly see that they were living people.

Kate made a face at her. The twins looked apologetic... And if there was anyone who remained annoying even in death, it was naturally Andy, who had caused all of this yet seemed relieved...

The gray-haired man merely met the killer's eyes, then spoke.

Shoot.

That punchable tone was truly irritating.

Thinking that, Nana, already covered in wounds from the surrounding storm and the debris within it, pulled the trigger.

Five gunshots rang out. The Angel revealed her Halo and wings... This was not Judgment. If she had to call it anything, it was Nana's own farewell... Five streams of light, mixed with particles of flesh and blood, merged into Nana herself.

But just as the storm around them calmed and Nana lowered her head to check on the girl in her arms... what met her eyes were emerald eyes filled first with terror, then with hatred.

"...You killed Mom, Dad, and everyone else?!"

Ah... she could see them too...

Before that thought could turn into consideration of how she should respond, the girl's sudden scream and eruption of power swept away half the buildings behind Nana.

Part of her vision vanished just like that, but almost at the same moment that power erupted, four phantoms appeared beside the Angel. They were the child's parents, sister, and brothers... the grief-stricken figures held down the Little Cat.

Facing Matilda, whose expression shifted from fury to blankness, then from blankness to helpless confusion, Nana somehow felt the weight in her heart finally ease... So, Williams, were you reliable or not? Letting the Little Cat destroy things had not calmed her down in the end—Nana herself was the one who felt relieved?

Or perhaps... was it merely that something not even serious enough to count as a fatal wound was enough to free her from her guilt? Either way, the expression on the killer's blood-covered half of a face turned into a timid smile that belonged only to Nana.

"...Mia, we can go home now..."

Matilda Bruce...

She was too young to understand many things.

But... if suffering was repayment for mistakes... then could this pain repay the deaths she had brought to the people in the church?

After the battle at the church ended, standing there blankly and surrendering without resistance may have been a child's simple response to please don't commit Outrage anymore... But children still worried. If she had stepped forward from the beginning, would things perhaps not have become like this?

A child so young had not yet fully understood the connection between cause and effect. Before true pain arrived... she had also thought that if her sacrifice could buy peace for others... then perhaps that would not be such a bad choice.

When Matilda Bruce thought that... she did not even know how to write the word "sacrifice."

A child was still just a child...

Even adults could not get what they wanted most of the time. How many children's wishes could truly come true?

[The killer arrived faster than expected... Then disregard all long-term plans. Directly begin the experimental procedure, using the final experiment of implanting Experimental Subject Five as the standard.]

And so, the painful things began.

Although the first brother placed on the operating table lost consciousness almost instantly, the pain seemed to flow into her body through her gaze.

That voice said it was because of some "Originium Arts," but children did not understand things like that... The only reaction she could manage was to cry and struggle, but that clearly did nothing.

After that... the glowing room that constantly made noises suddenly went dark...

Though the sounds were gone, the machines kept running.

Her brothers were processed like ingredients or monster materials in a game. Thinking that she too would be moved beneath that illuminated spot, the child had no response other than continuing to cry and struggle.

As for Matilda, she did not even have a concept like a "final montage of memories."

She did not even know what death was.

The child only perceived the world in her own way... Until the very end, she struggled and wailed... because she could feel it. Even without her family, that soul, blank as a sheet of paper, was still desperately trying to come closer.

She could still be saved!

The child cried out instinctively.

But... she was still moved beneath that terrifying light... No matter how she begged for help in a child's way toward where that person stood, the other person's emotions seemed to be hesitating.

Why...

Why won't Nana come save me?

You're right there, aren't you?!

The child did not understand. She could only keep crying...

In the darkness, more things inexplicably began to surface...

Her brothers' endless homework, her sister's endless work, her mother's exhaustion while working... and... that... which should have been the strongest... yet in the end could feel nothing but pain—the sensation of pain.

This was not the father who would stand in front of her! He would never curl up into a ball like in these memories!

If it was only pain, then she was in pain too!

Having things stuffed into her head hurt so much!