Warning: Contains graphic descriptions.
"Do you... know... me...?"
The figure shrouded in black cloth stirred slightly.
"Who... are you? No, wait... I recognize that voice... Could it be... Reiko-san?"
"Yes, Elena-san. Whatever has happened to you?"
"W-Wait, you know the Supreme Advisor?"
Liira and Arietta, witnessing the exchange between Reiko and the shrouded figure, stared in disbelief.
"Yes, she is an old acquaintance," Reiko replied matter-of-factly, causing the women's eyes to bulge even further.
"Reiko-san... and Lordtoss-san, too. Ah... what a... wonderful day... this is. Liira, Arietta... you did... well."
"W-We are honored, ma'am."
Liira and Arietta bowed deeply.
"Please... repair... me..." the person presumed to be Elena pleaded.
"What on earth happened? No, before that, I need to perform a diagnosis. May I remove the cloth?"
"Cloth?...Is there a... cloth over me?...Yes, please. Take it... away."
"Understood. Hope, if you would."
"Yes, Master."
The table was a bit high for Reiko, so Jin asked Hope to handle it instead. Hope gently pulled the cloth away.
"Ah..."
"This is..."
"Elena-san..."
Jin, Lordtoss, and Reiko each let out a gasp of shock.
Elena’s head was grotesquely deformed, the upper half of her face crushed beyond recognition. Her right arm ended at the elbow, while her left was missing from the wrist down. Both legs were mangled from the knee down, clearly beyond use.
Her torso was scorched in various places, with patches where the internal metal skeleton had actually melted. Only her ears and mouth seemed relatively spared, but the overall state was worse than being merely broken—she was a total wreck.
"This is horrific."
Not a trace of Elena’s former beauty remained. It was no wonder she had wanted to hide her appearance.
"What in the world happened?" Jin asked Liira.
"Could you leave that for later?" Liira replied sharply. "Lordtoss-sama, please, repair Elena-sama."
"Me?"
"Yes. Elena-sama is a high-performance automata created with ancient technology. An ordinary... no, even a first-rate engineer couldn't hope to fix her."
"...That is why... I searched for... someone I believed... was an Avalon graduate... and ordered them... to bring you here."
"So that was the reason."
"But I don't see how we can fix her without the proper materials," Jin pointed out.
Arietta nodded quickly, as if she had expected the question. "We have not been idle in that regard. In the next room, we have materials prepared exactly as Elena-sama instructed."
"I see."
"Yes... after all, we had... plenty... of time."
"Plenty?"
"Ye...s. It has been... twelve years... since I... arrived here."
"That long...?"
"Please, the talk can wait, Lordtoss-sama," Liira pressed, her desperation clear. Though she was technically addressing Lordtoss, her eyes were pleading with the whole group to start the repairs.
"All right. Lordtoss, let's get to work."
"I’m not sure I can do this..."
Jin gave the younger man a firm pat on the back. "Don't worry. I'll act as your assistant."
The table Elena lay upon was equipped with casters, so they rolled her directly into the adjacent room.
"Oh, they’ve really gathered quite a stash."
It was clear they hadn't wasted those twelve years; the room was stocked with first-rate and top-tier materials.
"With this, a full repair should be possible."
"R-Really?" Lordtoss still lacked Jin's confidence.
"Let's begin. Elena, I'm going to deactivate you for a moment, all right?"
"Yes... please. The password... is..."
"‘Stand Still.’"
Elena went limp.
"What? You stopped her with just the keyword?" Lordtoss cried out in surprise.
"Yeah. Because I’m ‘me’," Jin replied.
Because Jin was the one who had fundamentally rebuilt the former Golden Destruction Princess into her current self, he could bypass the security protocols with just the keyword. Anyone else with a different mana waveform would have required the full password.
Setting that aside, the four of them—Jin, Lordtoss, Reiko, and Hope—began the process of dismantling Elena. At this point, "dismantling" was the only appropriate word for it.
Liira and Arietta watched the process with faces that looked ready to burst into tears. Ordinarily, they would have screamed for them to stop tearing their Supreme Advisor apart, but they were paralyzed by the internal conflict of not wanting to interfere with the very people Elena had chosen to trust.
Before their eyes, Elena was meticulously taken to pieces. The black-haired man acting as the "assistant" worked with incredible efficiency, occasionally muttering terms that left Liira and Arietta completely baffled.
"The skeleton is the same light silver as back then. Looks like no one has touched it since. Let's upgrade this to 64 light silver."
Jin sorted through the provided materials and found light silver and aluminum, but as expected, vanadium was nowhere to be found. He contacted Laojun through Reiko and requested a small amount to be transferred.
Two minutes later, a one-kilogram ingot of vanadium materialized in Reiko’s hands.
(Father, we have identified the location. We are currently underground on Toryu Island, east of Io Island in the southern Kingdom of Elias.)
Precise position identification was essential for a transfer. In the process of getting his tools, Jin had unexpectedly learned the exact location of the headquarters.
"All right, let's mix this in."
Six percent aluminum, four percent vanadium, and the remainder light silver—which was actually titanium. This was the recipe for 64 light silver.
After forging nearly thirty kilograms of the alloy, Jin began constructing the frame alongside Lordtoss. To be more accurate, Jin fabricated the bones, and Lordtoss assembled them with help from Reiko and Hope.
"All right, the frame is finished."
In roughly fifteen minutes, a pristine internal skeleton sat before them.
"It’s beautiful. Your skill is incredible, Jin-san," Lordtoss whispered in awe. "This structure is so different from what’s common nowadays."
"I agree," Jin said. It was a shame that such an efficient design hadn't become the standard simply because it was too complex for most to replicate.