…
…
“Yulin-chan?
“Yulin-chan?!”
A familiar voice, very gentle.
The feeling of my body being shaken gradually woke my senses.
Sensing that I was lying on my side against something hard, I slowly rolled over, then opened my eyes.
“Alice…?”
In my blurred vision, a white robe, and strands of golden hair hanging in front of me.
[“Because you endured considerable mental pressure and shock over an extended period, you fell into an irresistible deep sleep. Sleep duration: 7 hours 23 minutes.”]
I see.
I had fallen asleep.
[“The time since your First Nervous System and Second Nervous System began to intermingle has not been long. To maintain a stable mental state, some archive fragments have been sealed.”]
[“Analysis indicates that the generation of the archive fragments may be related to a failed synchronization between the Halo and the Archive Bureau. The synchronization process was incomplete.”]
The AI’s prompt sounded in my mind as I woke.
In vision that was gradually clearing, Alice looked down at me, her expression full of worry.
It felt like collapsing onto a bed or a sofa after crying myself out, and falling asleep just like that.
After waking again, the heavy tightness in my chest made it almost impossible to breathe.
But as Alice’s face grew clear before my eyes, I reached out and touched her cheek, and felt much better. “Alice.”
“Thank goodness, Yulin-chan, you finally woke up. I thought something had happened to you!” She looked ready to cry at any moment, her eyes and nose all scrunched together.
Then she threw her arms around my head and buried my face deep in her chest. “You scared me to death. I called and called and you wouldn’t wake up. I thought you were never going to wake again… uu…”
Eh, had I been sleeping that hard…?
A faint fragrance.
This was the scent Alice ought to have had all along…
After the surgical repair, her skin had become much smoother and finer.
Even the dryness of long life in the desert and the roughness left by long labor had been restored.
This was how a girl her age was supposed to look.
“I—I’m going to suffocate…” I was almost unable to breathe again, and I gently pushed her away.
Alice still looked at me with a face full of worry. “I remember we were attacked by that monster fish. I, I thought I would never see you again… But it looks like we’re both all right. By the way, where is this?
“Eh?! Don’t tell me we both actually died, and this is hell?”
Ah, no…
And why did she assume that if we died we would necessarily go to hell?
Was heaven not any good?
This was the first time I had seen Alice a little panicked.
In the time I had known her, she had been a bit careless, but all in all she was someone I could rely on.
I crawled up from between her knees, knelt in front of her, reached out to pat her head, and smiled. “Calm down. Neither of us is dead.”
Although it is true we came close to never seeing each other again.
“Eh… we actually survived that?!”
I could not tell whether she meant to make me laugh or not, but Alice’s reaction pulled a pfft of laughter out of me.
Then I lifted my head and looked into those still-shining blue eyes of hers. “This is [Eden]. My hometown.”
“Eden?! Yulin’s hometown?!” Of course, that reaction was only to be expected.
The voice she raised in surprise set my ears buzzing, and then she seemed to notice the volume and lowered it again. “This is that paradise the gods created?”
“Eh?” Alice’s voice was still echoing through the enclosed medical room.
Hearing her say that, I glanced aside, thought for a moment, and said, “I suppose… it is.”
This world had the same legends as ours.
[Eden], the eternal paradise created by the gods.
And yet it had already become what it was now.
“So the angels all live in Eden? But isn’t Eden in the sky? Did we go up to heaven? Eh…”
Alice asked questions like a string of firecrackers.
But the questions she asked were ones I could not answer either.
After a brief silence, Alice suddenly let out an “ah,” then leaned forward and crawled toward me, lifting her eyes to look at me as I kept my head down. “I’m sorry, Yulin. I think I got a little too impatient.
“You were hurt too, weren’t you? That is why you collapsed on the floor.
“After all, we were both swallowed by a monster fish that size. There is no way we could have come out without a scratch. You must have saved me.”
“Well…” I cannot actually answer your questions, because I do not understand the answers myself.
I lifted my head and looked at Alice.
Somehow, only then did I come back to myself from the message Lingyin had left me.
Alice was still looking up at me, her hand resting lightly on the back of mine.
“What’s wrong, Yulin-chan? Did the questions I just asked give you a headache? Do you want to rest a little longer?”
“No. That’s not it.” Her hand. So it was this soft, this warm.
I shook my head.
I only felt that I had clearly already grown into an adult, and yet I was still this fragile. “Alice, there are no angels here anymore. Only me… only me.”
In 3,505,584 hours, I had been the only person to visit the factory, the only person to use it.
3,505,584 hours ago — no, perhaps even longer before that — no one had come here anymore.
“Alice…” Her eyes were so close to me, reflecting my image.
My vision suddenly blurred.
No matter how I wiped the tears from the corners of my eyes, it would not clear.
When I realized that in this world I truly was alone, when I had seen Lingyin so close I could almost touch her and still could not speak with her, the longing for her, the fear of being alone — I could not hold myself back.
“I only have you now, Alice…
“I only have you now…”
I had believed I was long used to being alone, long used to solitude.
I had believed that in this world I no longer needed anyone else, that I needed nothing at all.
But that was not true.
Alice…