Deep within the manor, in a room that had never been open to outsiders, the doll passed down through the generations came to life.
She was a petite female doll with hair as white as snow.
She should have been an eternally motionless work of art, but a miracle had granted her life.
Now, a murky gray light appeared in her hollow eyes.
"...Ah?"
A faint voice emerged from the doll's throat. The voice mechanism, which should have been merely decorative, now let out a pained moan that should never have existed.
Sellen had conducted 78 experiments in the underground laboratory, resulting in an unexpected leakage of magic.
Those "soul fragments" that had been forcibly split apart and forcibly glued back together with Runes, those remnants of consciousness that had scattered during failed experiments, those rejected, unfinished creations carried pain and resentment.
They flowed silently along the pathways, finally gathering in this exhibition hall.
Gathering within this ancient vessel that had already been all but abandoned.
The doll's body began to tremble.
The gray light in her eyes grew brighter and brighter, and fragmented images were reflected within that murky glow:
78 failures.
78 unfinished creations.
78 incomplete consciousnesses, 78 "Sellens" who had never had the chance to be born.
They had no complete souls, only fragments forcibly cut apart and forcibly glued together; they had no real lives, only lingering ripples of power left after failed experiments; they did not even have clear selves, only cold numbers in experiment records and a pile of erroneous data.
But they had "sensations."
The longing to be created, the instant of activation, the despair of being declared failures, the emptiness of being discarded.
And... contradictory feelings toward that creator, a mixture of dependence and resentment.
Oh, doll, how pitiful you are.
*You,