Seeing Maya Ibuki looking embarrassed and indignant, the two mischievous culprits, Shinji Ikari and Ritsuko Akagi, stopped teasing the innocent new Chief Technician.
"So, what have you learned about this pharaoh's body?" Shinji Ikari asked.
"Your body is no longer constantly changing the way it was three years ago. Your reconstructed body is unexpectedly stable," Ritsuko Akagi said.
"Pseudo-deification... that's the term Kaworu Nagisa gave us. In other words, the changes you underwent after triggering the Impact three years ago had already fused you with the EVA."
"At the time, you two were the closest things to gods. That meant your reconstructed body had already achieved deification-the state we used to call your 'complete form.'"
"Complete form... meaning becoming an EVA, or an Angel. So you're saying I'm a humanoid Angel now, just like Kaworu Nagisa?" Shinji Ikari smiled faintly.
"No need to be so modest. I can tell you with certainty that your form of life has already surpassed the Angels." Ritsuko Akagi looked as though she were admiring a work of art.
Even if Shinji Ikari stripped naked right then, Ritsuko Akagi believed she would not have a single impure thought. At that moment, all she felt was a scientist's thirst for knowledge.
"Wouldn't surpassing the Angels make me Adam?" Shinji Ikari chuckled.
"I didn't find a seed of life in your body. Unit-01 is the little Adam. You should be the little Lilith," Ritsuko Akagi reminded him.
As she spoke, she pointed at the halo that had been glowing above Shinji Ikari's head all this time.
He could dismiss the halo himself, but these days, Shinji Ikari liked wearing it whenever he had nothing else to do. Ritsuko Akagi called this behavior "showing off."
"Take that halo of yours, for example. It should be a manifestation of