Something stirred in Elliot's mind.
Then he made a bold decision.
In the basement, Flora had been expressionless. Neither the sacrifice nor her loss of control had brought the slightest ripple to her face.
But now, her eyes widened in surprise.
She suddenly strode off and made a circuit of the basement.
"What-is going on?"
"Why is my body moving on its own?"
Flora stopped. Just as she was about to ask, her body moved again!
She charged toward a corner, then leaped, pushing off several times in midair with the agility of a leopard. Then she extended her fingers and braced them against tiny cracks in the wall, actually suspending her entire body from the ceiling.
The whole sequence flowed seamlessly, like a phantom.
Flora was too astonished to speak.
Controlling her body herself, she might barely have managed those movements, but she could never have performed them with such fluidity and effortless ease.
Who exactly was controlling her?
Why did it feel as though that person knew her body better than she did?
Flora blinked.
She felt that emotions such as "fear," "confusion," and "shock" should have been surfacing in her heart.
But-they weren't.
Her heart was empty. She felt neither pain nor fear.
And-
Flora felt that strange sensation of being controlled.
She couldn't say why, but the sensation felt somewhat familiar and put her somewhat at ease.
She thought for a long time without figuring out where that familiar presence came from, but it wasn't a bad feeling.
Her heart was empty, and she didn't know where she should go. But now someone had made the decision for her and taken control of this empty shell.
This, too, filled the void within her.
Without her even noticing, a little flesh and blood grew at an extremely