“It’s over, isn’t it?”
Shiki sighed and flopped down, laughing weakly and looking up at me. “I’m kind of tired,” she added.
“After being targeted by such a formidable opponent, it’s no wonder.”
“That’s part of it, yeah. But thinking that I’ve avenged my family… It feels like a weight’s been lifted off my shoulders.”
I nodded in agreement. Her emotions were something only she could fully understand. If Shiki felt even a little bit relieved, that was a joy for me as well.
She looked up at the ceiling. It was completely all white.
“Now, I guess there’s nothing left for me to regret in this world. The only thing I wanted was to level up a little more. At this level, facing the Demon Lord would be…”
“Impossible, right? The Demon Lord must be on a much higher level than even the Four Heavenly Kings. I mean, it sounds like he operates on a similar system to the monsters and us.”
Of course, it’s unlikely the Demon Lord would come at us wielding a weapon.
That aspect of the system still baffled me.
“The system might not be exactly the same. After all, it’s too optimized for us.”
“That’s true. The system fits us so perfectly, it’s like it was made specifically for us. Honestly, if someone told me it was made by a future version of myself…”
Suddenly, I realized something that had been nagging at the back of my mind.
No, that’s it. Took me long enough, but I think I’ve got it now.
I sat down in front of a PC alone and began typing.
“Are you Mia?”
After a pause, the response came back: NO.
“Are you an entity created by Mia?”
The answer: YES.
I guess they thought I was acting odd, because everyone behind was holding their breath, wondering what was happening.
✦ ✦ ✦
“Kayla, did you know about this? I mean, that your mom created the master of the White Room?”
My beloved daughter energetically raised her hand high in affirmation.
So, she knew—huh, I see. I wonder if she would have told me if I’d asked the right questions… because the PC isn’t telling us anything more about this.
“Do you know how it came to be?”
“Mama spread across the past and the future.”
“I don’t totally understand what you mean, but I get that something incredible happened.”
To summarize what I learned from Kayla: Mia prioritized communication with the beings that govern that space and altered herself in the process. As a result, she became an existence slightly different from us. It seems she became a continuum that broadly unfolds across time and space equally. Thus, she was able to travel back in time and design the core of this White Room system.
Whether it was always meant to be this way, or if she’d chosen for us to be able to come to the White Room… I still had no idea. Actually, it seemed like Kayla didn’t fully grasp what she was saying either; she was more parroting the words Mia had told her.
“Is Mia watching over this room… over us right now?”
“Who knows?”
“Gotcha… I want to see Mia.”
The words slipped out unbidden, followed by a sigh. Kayla reached up and gave my head a gentle pat. “Papa, good boy, good boy.”
“Kayla is an angel.”
“No. Kayla is a daughter!”
Kayla puffed out her chest with pride. My daughter truly is an angel, I marveled.
✦ ✦ ✦
Now that we’ve covered everything we knew about that situation, let’s shift our focus.
This time, everyone leveled up. Notably, Shiki jumped three levels, reaching Level 25.
I enhanced my Summoning to Level 7 and improved both my Familiar Enhancement and Familiar Sustain Magic Reduction.
Arisu, Tamaki, Rushia, and Kayla each upgraded their respective derivative skills. In Kayla’s case, since Free Bullet was capped at Level 3, she acquired Destructive Bullet at Level 1. Shiki decided to save her points.
We’d dealt with Diasnexus and done what needed to be done. Now, the only thing left was to confront the Demon Lord.