Chapter 9: Then She Departed

Lud, Sven and Meitzer headed for the Verne 1 launch facility to stop the Saint. Those remaining behind collected Daian and Marissa, took the surviving noncombatants, and headed for the submarine moored in the port.

“This elevator is connected to the underground launch facility.” Sven led the other two using a map of the facility. “It should take about five minutes to reach the bottom.”

The gondola sank deeper underground, clunking and rattling.

“Oh, Meitzer, are you hungry?” Lud removed a bundle from his breast pocket. “Have a bite to eat.”

It was a baked sweet... No, it was like bread baked into a biscuit shape.

“This bread keeps a long time.”

“You’re a baker through and through.”

When taking the field during war, Lud hadn’t prepared guns or knives, but bread.

“Is this hostia—like the sacramental host?”

It was a type of bread that existed in Europea for generations.

“No... Well, not exactly. I wanted to make a hard bread without yeast, so maybe it turned out like altar bread.”

It was called flatbread, or non-leavened bread. Tockerbrot had once become home to a stray kitten. They had named it Eris, and since cats can’t eat bread containing yeast, Lud had gone through a process of trial and error to make unleavened bread.

“It has raisins on top. It’s also highly nutritious, so it’s perfect for a packed meal.”

Because they are so nutritious, the military used raisins for many years.

“Yeah, I’ll have some. I see... Raisins? Those used to be called rezan.”

Holding the hostia, Meitzer wore a nostalgic look.

“In ancient Europea, rezan supposedly meant the ‘blessings of God.’”

The rezanium reactors using the ore with that name were the key to progress.

“Meitzer, there’s still something I want to ask you.”

“Can’t it wait?” Meitzer tried to put off Sven’s question, but she shook her head.

“At least let me ask before we get there.”

“Well, if it’s important... What’s your question?”

“You said you’re my father, but you also said you’re God’s avatar. So what exactly are you?”

Sven found it hard to believe Meitzer was deceiving her. Her heart rather than her reason told her so.

“You... Both of you witnessed the Saint’s memory of the destruction of the European Empire, didn’t you?”

God was incensed at the people of the empire for killing the woman he loved, so he annihilated everything, even destroying and then scattering himself.

“The people of the imperial capital numbered ten million. With the surrounding Shepherds, maybe a billion human beings disappeared in an instant.”

“Who were the Shepherds?” Lud asked.

“Shepherd was slang in the imperial capital. As the people outside continued to wait for an opening to reside in the imperial capital, the residents of the capital likened them to shepherds watching sheep all day, so it was derogatory.” Meitzer explained and then continued.

“The Saint fell in love with a young man who was a Shepherd, fled the imperial capital, and was killed. In exchange for his own destruction, God resurrected the two.”

“Yes, I’ve understood that much. But in that story, you don’t appear as the Devil.”

There was something mysterious about Meitzer that Sven couldn’t understand.

“The people of Europea use ‘Devil’ as a metaphor for the Shepherd, because he tried to steal the girl who was an offering to God.”

“Wait a second. Then...”

Meitzer was the Shepherd?

“No, Sven. I’m not the Shepherd. I was just made in his image.”

“Huh? Um...”

Sven couldn’t respond, because she didn’t understand what he meant by “made.”

“God regretted his action. He had destroyed the world in a fit of anger and needed to help the survivors recover. He duplicated his ego, placed it inside a synthetic human he had created in the likeness of the Shepherd, and sent it into the ravaged world as his representative.”

That was the truth behind the fable of the Saint and Devil that remained today. They were not human but were beings created to restore the world God destroyed.

“I was allowed to wield the power of rezanium, the power of God, to repair the devastation, but...”

Then Meitzer stopped. The gondola had reached the underground launch facility. The space was so vast that it could have contained the entire facility above ground. The launch pad was in the center, with Verne 1 standing like a steeple.

“This is our stop. Shall we go?”

“Wait. I still haven’t heard the important part!”

She still didn’t know how Meitzer was her father.

“I’m a copy of God and a copy of the Shepherd, so I’m a double replica. You’re a recreation of the Saint. Or rather, you’re a recreation of the child of the Saint and Shepherd.”

“What?!”

“The remains of the Saint that Daian recovered were from the moment she was giving birth. It consisted of the Saint’s blood as well as the blood of her daughter. There’s your answer.”

“So that’s what happened?”

Sven was flooded with an indescribable longing. She knew it was a yearning for her father engraved on her soul’s data.

But...

Sven wasn’t entirely convinced.

Is that really all?

She felt an inexplicable trepidation.

“Yes, you’re both imitations. You’re shams. Fakes!” The Saint’s voice rang out.

The three braced themselves, but she didn’t appear.

“Langart! Fall back!”

Meitzer noticed it a moment before the others. He sensed the invisible blades the Saint wielded. He shoved Lud aside, but...

“Agh?!”

Instead, the blades struck Meitzer. His body split in two and he collapsed.

“That’s one down!!”

The Saint had been hiding in the shadow of the launch pad, and she stepped forward.

“I knew you would come!! I’ll finish you off before you can rewrite the flight program!!”

She moved awkwardly for one whose body looked so delicate. She deployed her invisible blades. Her strength was impossible to withstand, but...

“I see... In that case...”

Sven gathered her breath and searched in her mind for the invisible blades.

“Show them!!”

As soon as she uttered the words, the blades—which looked like whips or scythes—appeared in space.

“What?!”

The Saint was surprised, but quickly grasped how this had happened. The power of the blades was derived from rezanium. Because of God’s blessing, Sven could control rezanium.

Even if Sven can’t completely take control, she took my stealth function! How dare she?!

Sensing Sven had moved one step closer, the Saint lost her smug smile.

“So you can see it! But can you defend against it?!”

Summoning her stubbornness and tenacity, the Saint offered a joyous grin and aimed her blades at Sven. It was a four-way attack from above, below, left and right, all at once. Sven’s only retreat would be backwards. The Saint could then launch a strike into Sven’s left breast and dig out her rezanium reactor. That would seal the Saint’s victory. However, that attack was blocked.

“Graaah!!”

Lud drove back the four blades. He wasn’t barehanded, of course. He held Toolman’s katana.

“That’s...”

“We haven’t come unprepared either!”

Lud held the magnificent sword that had severed even the metal arm of the humanoid Hunter Unit Rebecca. It was strong enough to stand against the Saint’s blades.

“Wow, Master! You’ve learned swordplay as well?!”

It was a measure of Lud’s skill that he could wield the katana, and Sven was surprised.

“Actually, I’m better with a knife.” Lud answered with a wry smile. As a soldier, he was accustomed to using a knife, but he had also learned swordsmanship. “Suzuka taught me how to use it but that was a long time ago.”

Suzuka was Yamato’s military attaché and Lud’s bujutsu instructor. Sven understood why Suzuka had found Lud so endearing. It was probably because he was a serious and hardworking student. They were only together a short time, but he had demonstrated the ability to handle the sword so she had taken a liking to him.

“Master... you’re very versatile!”

Sven remembered how Lud became a baker who took pride in his delicious products after a few years of practice. He had made some questionable life choices in the past, but he was capable of almost anything.

“So what?! Defending isn’t enough to beat me!”

Nonetheless, he possessed a human being’s sword skills. The Saint possessed a strength no human could match, while ignoring normal attack range. To fight against her, human opponents were forced to focus only on defense and could barely manage that.

“I’m aware of that!”

Creating this deadlock had been Lud’s goal.

“That’s right!”

From behind Lud, Sven glared at the Saint. Her red eyes looked directly into the Saint’s.

“What’d you say?!”

The Saint understood what Sven and Lud were hiding.

“Your power is superhuman... No... it isn’t human at all!”

The Saint had lived over one hundred years and acquired knowledge and power from the ancient empire, so she possessed physical abilities surpassing those of human beings. But, such a being could still be human.

“The source of that power... It’s the rezanium, like mine!”

Sven’s influence over the power of her invisible blades turned the Saint’s suspicion to certainty.

“In that case, I too have God’s blessing, so I can stop you with my power!!”

Sven’s red eyes shone even more brightly. The Saint’s eyes also spilled red light as if resonating with them.

“Urgh... Agh?!”

The Saint began to suppress Sven’s power.

“You’re like me? But I don’t know who gave birth to you!”

Sven had become certain.

“You’re a synthetic human, just like me! You’re a machine!”

She proved it by touching the Saint with her power.

“What...?”

The Saint’s smile completely disappeared when she heard those words. The Saint spoke with a voice lacking any trace of humanity—coldly... colder than a doll.

“I’m a synthetic human? Like you... I’m a mechanical doll, did you say?!”

An explosive sound rang out—bam!—as if something had broken loose. It was the sound of Sven’s power, which was interfering with the Saint.

“Ungh!” Sven flew back from her own power’s recoil.

“You’d better take me seriously, you fake! Don’t lump us together!”

Fierce and crazy with anger, the Saint kicked off the ground and sprung toward Sven. Then she hit Sven’s face mercilessly with a tight fist.

“—?!”

Unable to cry out, Sven was bashed into the floor.

“Me... a doll?! A fake?! An imitation?! I’m not like you!! Never think that!!!”

With a ghastly face, she punched Sven over and over as if to smash her out of this world and erase her very existence.

“Why you...!!”

“Stop!!”

The Saint threw more punches, but Lud raced over to stop her. Even though she wasn’t human, he couldn’t be violent toward a girl. However, when that girl acted like this, it was a different story. Brandishing the katana, he moved to stop her but not go so far as to kill her.

“Don’t interfere!!”

He couldn’t do it. The Saint gave in to her anger, like a wild beast, without elegance or any concern for appearances. She landed a backhand blow, sending both the katana and Lud flying.

“M... Master!”

Seeing that, Sven tried to stand. She wouldn’t let anyone harm her master. That would always be true.

“Shut up!!”

Even Sven’s determination, which yielded to no opponent, couldn’t stand against the Saint’s wrath. The Saint used one hand to force Sven’s head down, smashing her face into the floor.

“We’re not the same! I... I am the only human God is supposed to love!!”

Contrary to her words, she continued pressing Sven down with monstrous strength. Attacking wasn’t all. She was trying to crush Sven’s head.

“I will pulverize you, you doll!”

The Saint was beyond anger and began to laugh crazily.

“Umph!”

Lud stood up to help Sven. The single punch from the Saint’s small fist had broken a few of his ribs. There might also be damage to his internal organs. Intense pain coursed through him, but he was so panicked he didn’t have time to worry about it.

“Sven!”

He had to save her but there was nothing he could do now. Even if he had been equipped with heavy weaponry, he may not have been able to defeat the Saint. Nonetheless, he stood up and tried once more.

“Don’t you give up?!”

Sensing his approach, the Saint continued to hold Sven down with one hand as she swung her other hand in a tight fist toward Lud.

In that moment, everything in Lud’s field of vision slowed down. Due to the extreme tension, a brain secretion accelerated neural transmissions and caused an implosion of visual information. That state was called the zone. Lud heard a voice.

“What’s wrong, Langart? I showed you how to do it!”

It must have been an auditory hallucination. It was the voice of his former friend—and former enemy—a man no longer alive. It was Genitz’s voice.

At the last moment, he avoided the Saint’s flying fist. Even though the Saint wasn’t human, she had human form, therefore the principle was the same.

Budo was the ultimate defensive art developed by an island nation in the east. It was a god-like art for maneuvering an opponent’s strength. Suzuka was a distinguished expert, but Genitz had also been proficient in the skill. Lud now hit the Saint with Budo.

“What?!”

When her own strength was turned back on her, the Saint flew through the air. Her hands and feet didn’t touch the ground. She was airborne. The technique had been delivered so perfectly even the Saint didn’t understand what had happened and was slow to respond. Her left side was wide open.

“Graaahhh!”

This might be his only chance to deliver a blow. He struck with all the strength he had.

Ryuku was a technique from eastern bujutsu.

Its force could reach into the recipient’s internal organs and cause direct damage, no matter how thick her armor or how tough the protective muscles.

“Guh!”

The Saint’s face froze. She spit blood and collapsed on the spot.

“Blood...?”

Sven looked as if she couldn’t believe what she was seeing as the Saint coughed up red blood, which didn’t flow through mechanical dolls.

“What the...? Are you... a real human?”

The ryuku Lud had released would damage the human heart. It could not work against someone without a heart, much less a machine.

“I told you... you’re a fake.”

Despite the intense pain that felt like an unseen dragon’s claws raking through her insides, the Saint spoke with hate.

“I am... human. I’m different... from you!!”

Once upon a time, the people of Europea killed the Saint and invited God’s wrath. That was not the only sin they committed.

“If the Saint is dead, but we provide a replacement, God will be satisfied.”

They cultivated cells from the Saint’s body and made a copy. God abandoned them because of that act, which treated life without due respect. The empire was destroyed and all life turned to pillars of salt, but God overlooked one individual because she too was a victim. It was the copy of the Saint. The unfortunate copy was left all alone.

“God chose me! In that empire of fools, I alone was allowed to live! I am righteous! I am the chosen one! I’m different from the rest! I am God’s only beloved in this world!!”

Tearing out her hair, the Saint ranted and raved. Her beautiful hair was scattered across the floor. She looked down on human beings because God had abandoned them. She looked down on Sven as a fake because as the Saint, she was proud of herself.

“But you’re the replacement, aren’t you? No, maybe you aren’t even that?”

“Silence!”

Her face contorted by anger, the Saint kicked Sven in the face.

“Gagh!”

Sven rolled across the floor.

“Ngah!”

The Saint’s heart had been injured by Lud’s blow, and she was gravely wounded.

She clawed at her chest and moaned in pain.

“Aaagh!!”

The dress she wore was shredded.

“?!”

Sven and Lud were silent when they saw what was beneath her clothes. Countless mechanical parts were connected where she should have had breasts. All sorts of mechanisms—cogs, screws, bearings, bolts and cylinders—had been pieced together like a chimera to form a human doll.

“You... What is all that?!”

Sven was a mechanical doll, but she was at a loss for words when she saw the Saint was more mechanical than she was herself.

“Uaaagh!!”

The Saint did not answer. She plunged her hand into her own chest and pulled something out.

“I don’t need this anymore!!”

She then scornfully cast aside a lump of flesh enclosed in layers of auxiliary machinery. It was her heart.

“I shouldn’t have clung to it... It just gets in the way!!”

The Saint’s breathing calmed. Of course. Her heart, with all its despair, was now gone.

“In order to remain human, you changed your body into a machine.”

Without a doubt, the Saint was human. She was a human survivor of the world’s annihilation one thousand years ago. She had been sealed away, but she had been alive for a few hundred years. It was unusual for a human being to live such a long time.

“You replaced the failing parts of your body with machinery. That’s how you lived so long.”

How much that was left of her was human? Even after ripping out her heart, the Saint was moving without any difficulty, so it was certain that few of her human parts remained.

“Yes, that’s why I’m different from you. I’m human! Even if all that’s left is part of my brain... I’m not a mechanical doll and a copy like you!! I’m real!”

Sven had been made using machinery to replace a human being. The Saint had stayed alive using machinery to substitute all parts that had once been human. One was a machine that was very close to a human being and the other was a human being much closer to a machine. They were exact opposites; contrasting beings who were intermediaries between human and machine.

“God loves me. That’s why it was my mission to have God return to the world! Until that happens, I’ll do anything I have to not to die!”

The True System—the super crystallized calculation device that was God—had already fragmented and scattered across the continent in the form of rezan ore. She wanted that God to be whole again.

The task was tremendous, like finding grains of sand in the ocean in order to turn them back into a mountain. It would only be possible when human science and civilization had advanced to surpass the ancient great empire.

“That’s why I’m leading you... the ones God abandoned. Why don’t you understand that?! Because you’re stupid and you can’t help it!” she raged and sneered.

Ongoing stimulation through war would force humanity to evolve and develop. That was the Saint’s plan. It was like forced cultivation by providing excessive nutrients. Humankind couldn’t keep up with the rapid development of civilization and would be destroyed.

That didn’t matter to the Saint. If she could bring God back, she didn’t care if she destroyed human civilization and killed hundreds of thousands, millions, or hundreds of millions in the process.

“I’m sick of dealing with you! There is something I have to do!”

The Saint turned her back on them and walked toward Verne 1. Launch preparation was complete, so it was ready to lift off. But first she needed to rewrite the flight program.

“I won’t let you!!”

Lud leapt to stop the Saint.

“Shut up!”

She knocked him away with one blow.

“Master!!”

Sven wanted to run to him, but her legs wouldn’t cooperate. Her skeletal framework had been damaged in the fighting.

“Stay here and struggle. Either way, when Verne 1 takes off, this whole area will be wasted. Isn’t that good? It’ll be an easy death.”

Firing a giant object to an extremely high altitude required an explosion of chemical fuel. The large-scale combustion would release an explosive flame and a blast at the launch. Human beings and even humanoid Hunter Units would not escape without damage.

“W... wait!”

Lud had collapsed. He called out, coughing blood, but the Saint would not stop. She calmly walked toward the launch pad until she reached the tip of Verne 1, which housed the flight instrumentation.

“Umf!”

She opened a maintenance hatch and peered inside. A rezanium reactor glowed red. All she had to do now was rewrite the program and evacuate to a safe place via the same elevator Sven’s group had arrived in.

“This is the end.”

“Yes, for you and me both.”

“?!”

The Saint was cornered. She had lived a long time and this was the first time she had been up against such a wall.

“You...!!”

When she turned around, it was too late. She had cut Meitzer in half but he had repaired himself, picked up Toolman’s fallen katana, and now stood before her.

“You Devil!!”

“Grarrrgh!”

Meitzer charged, and the tip of the katana stabbed the Saint’s chest.

“It’s no use. There’s nothing in there.”

The Saint had already removed her own heart.

“I know!”

Meitzer didn’t stop. He pushed the blade further, impaling the Saint’s body, pushing her inside Verne 1’s maintenance hatch, and pinning her inside.

“What are you doing?!”

“You’ll take a trip to space yourself!”

“What’re you... NO!!”

It had been close. He had only been able to outfox the Saint because Lud and Sven had maneuvered her into such a tight spot.

“Don’t be ridiculous! Verne 1 is a missile! It isn’t made for human passengers! If it launches like this...”

Only a few minutes remained until ignition. The shock from the launch would sever her body into pieces or the missile would carry her into space, flinging her into a world without water or air and certain death.

“Yes, that’s right. That’s why I can’t let you go alone. I’ll go with you.”

“What? Give me a break!!”

Insane with rage, the Saint screamed and struggled, but no matter how much she was cut, he would not let go of the katana that held her in place.

“Sven!” He called to his daughter outside. “Hurry and run away with Langart!”

If they boarded the elevator now, they might still survive. It would at least improve their chances.

“What about you?!” Hearing his command, Sven shouted back.

“Don’t worry!”

“Well, I do worry!!”

Sven understood what Meitzer was trying to do. He had chosen to die and take the Saint with him.

“But you don’t need to. This is my wish. Oh, and as for how you can become human...” He finally could answer the question that she was desperate to know. “You just have to wish!”

“Wish?”

Sven was puzzled as Meitzer continued.

“Have you forgotten? With the blessing of God, you can control anything derived from rezanium. Your body is no exception!”

Even now, the power of the rezanium circulated through Sven’s body.

“Give yourself a command. Just say ‘Become human!’ That’s the answer. You’ve had it all along!”

The power of Europea’s God turned ten million people into pillars of salt overnight. A miraculous power capable of transforming substances just might change a mechanical body into a human body.

“Get going with Langart! So long!!” Shouting his last words, Meitzer closed the maintenance hatch.

“What are you—?!”

“Sven... let’s go.” Sven was stunned, so Lud pulled her to the elevator. He didn’t want her final memory of Meitzer to be his death.

A vibration seized the launch pad. Verne 1 shifted into launch mode. A lifeless electronic voice began a countdown. The two jumped into the gondola and pressed the button to take them up. It began moving, but the launch vibrations shook it violently. The engine ignited and the shaking worsened. The rumbling was so loud they couldn’t hear their own voices.

“How... could you do that, Dad?” Sven shouted through a deluge of tears. She knew he couldn’t hear her, but she shouted anyway.

Over the sea, three kilometers from Penmunde Test Site...

Sophia, Daian and the others watched Verne 1’s smoke trail extend into the sky from the deck of the surfaced submarine.

“Did they fail?”

Thinking they had been unable to prevent the launch, Sophia sounded disappointed.

“No, Major Rundstadt. Based on the launch angle, Verne 1 is on an exoatmospheric trajectory, not a ballistic trajectory.”

Rebecca had sophisticated observation sensors, so she had quickly calculated the missile’s trajectory.

“They were able to prevent the rewriting of the flight program. For now, that’s good, but...”

It was the first rocket launch in modern civilization. Its scale was far beyond what Sophia had imagined.

“We could feel the shock from the launch all the way out here, so the explosion directly underneath must have been overpowering.”

Evacuating the people at Penmunde Test Site had barely succeeded. If they had left even a little later, and if they had not reached a safe distance in the sea as Daian advised, who knows what would have happened?

“I hope Lud and Sven are all right!”

“There must be several evacuation areas inside the test site. Otherwise, the staff participating in the launch would all die. So they’re probably okay.”

Sophia looked worried as Daian spoke to her. If they were able to evacuate, there was a chance they survived.

“What do you mean probably? Why probably?!”

“Sophia, you’re scaring me!! Stop pulling me by the collar! I can’t breathe!”

Sophia was so upset she seemed ready to strangle him to death, shaking him by the collar back and forth and left and right.

“Even if they do come back alive, there may be even bigger trouble.”

As Blitzdonner spoke, he gazed at the rocket’s trail soaring high into the sky.

“Yes, that’s right.” Suzuka agreed with a sad look on her face.

“What do you mean?” Sophia was perplexed.

A few minutes later...

Verne 1 had surpassed first astronautical velocity, traveled one hundred kilometers over the earth, and reached the outer atmosphere. There was no air, water or gravity at that altitude. It was a lifeless world looking down upon a blue planet overflowing with life. The Saint and Meitzer were still alive.

“What a foolish thing you’ve done!” The Saint spoke from where she was still impaled to the wall by the katana.

Verne 1 was a ballistic missile. It was not designed for passengers, of course. The shock of the launch would have crushed a human body, but these two had survived. However, there was no water, no food, and no way to return to the earth. They were currently still getting light from the sun but they would soon enter the earth’s shadow. In the vacuum of space, the temperature would fall below -200 degrees Celsius. No life form could survive at that temperature. Before they died of starvation, thirst or suffocation, the Saint and Meitzer were certain to freeze to death.

“I’ve known you a long time. One thousand years ago, you and I were supposed to carry out God’s atonement.”

Before their certain death, the two were talking as if they had achieved enlightenment or perhaps were simply resigned to their fates.

“God ordered us to restore the world as atonement for destroying the empire.”

Later generations called them the Saint and the Devil.

“You were too hasty. You thought if you returned the world to its past, God would come back. I tried to stop you many times, didn’t I?”

“I would never stop. I was born so God could love me. So why wasn’t God there? Asking me to lead people abandoned by God was a bad joke.”

“Oh, I see.” Meitzer smiled.

He knew that. Nonetheless, she had led humanity and saved them in her own way. But, the Saint could not live forever, so she had gradually suffered mental collapse. She was afraid of dying without receiving God’s love.

“Why did you just seal me away? You should’ve killed me.”

950 years ago, Meitzer had—even at the cost of his own life—trapped the Saint inside a Door as madness gripped her further each day.

“I could never do that.” As if embarrassed, Meitzer scratched his head.

“Why? Tell me.”

“Well... I couldn’t kill the woman I like, could I?”

“What?” The Saint’s voice was surprised and she looked uncomfortable.

“You never noticed? I’m in love with you. I have been for one thousand years. That’s why I wanted you to stop. I wanted you to see me, not him—not God!”

“That’s stupid.” The Saint shook her head.

“You’re just a copy of God. I want the real God’s love!”

The Saint’s face hardened as she spat her words back at him. But the face belonged to the Saint’s substitute.

“Yeah, that’s right... It has to be the real thing, doesn’t it?”

A drop of water floated through the air. Her tear, unable to fall without gravity, slowly drifted by.

“In the end, I... Actually, we’re both fakes.”

The Saint’s substitute and a copy of God.

“That’s right, but what you and I felt wasn’t fake. Something real can inhabit a copy. That’s the way it is for her, for Sven.”

A doll, a copy of a human being, felt true love.

“Right, Angela?”

“Hearing that name brings back memories.”

That was the real name of the Saint’s substitute.

“Are you hungry? Have some of this.” As he spoke, Meitzer handed her some of Lud’s hostia bread.

“I’m surprised you have an appetite when we’re about to die.” The Saint—Angela—took it and tore it in half.

“Here, we’ll share.”

“Okay, thanks.”

Long ago, people offered hostia to God as thanks for the joys of living. It was said they would divide it evenly and eat it after the festival.

“Come to think of it, what did you say your name was?”

“How mean of you! You don’t remember?” Meitzer sounded disappointed.

“I can’t help it! You change your name all the time!”

Living as he had among humans, it was difficult to use the same name for very long. Douglas Meitzer was another fake name.

“I don’t have a real name. I was given the same name as him, the Shepherd my body was copied from.”

“Oh... so what was his name?”

The name had belonged to the youth who met the Saint, fell in love with her, and sparked the destruction of the world. They were a normal man and woman and were happy as they lived a normal, common life.

“Lud.”

He spoke a name laden with memories and rich with the whims of fate.

“That’s...”

Angela was surprised to hear the name. Then she understood everything. She understood why the real Saint’s emotions inhabited the girl with the mechanical body. It was a simple fact.

“They both fell in love with men with the same name. Ha ha... How ridiculous.” Despite her derisive tone, Angela laughed. “Ha ha... That’s how it was? Hmf! What a ridiculous world!” She laughed as if finding something funny and enjoying herself.

“I don’t care anymore. Surprisingly, someone like you might be a good match for me.”

It wasn’t the cruel, inhuman laugh of the imitation Saint. It was a natural human laugh.

“Um, did you say something?”

When he asked, Angela mischievously stuck her tongue out at Meitzer—or rather Lud—and laughed.

“Never mind, dummy!”

She had a very cute smile.