"Welcome everyone to my kingdom, the famous Honorary Knights!"
Furina deliberately raised her voice, adopting a dramatic tone. To appear more imposing, she had specifically asked someone to bring a wooden crate for her to stand on. She was currently standing on it, looking down at the quartet, Lumine, and Paimon below.
Sunlight shone upon her, attempting to create an aura of divine descent—if one ignored her slightly trembling legs, which were almost moving in sync.
Neuvillette stood slightly behind her, watching his Hydro Archon put on this brave front, and shook his head helplessly. He tightened his grip on his staff, ready to respond to any potential... accidents.
"Hmm?" Furina scanned the area below, then tilted her head, showing a perfectly timed look of confusion.
"That's not right, is it? I recall the report mentioning that you have another very important companion, that... uh... magnificent Mr. Wolf King? Why is he absent?"
"The Wolf King went to prepare a 'grand gift'," Jesse replied lazily, picking his ear.
"I estimate he should be back around now."
Before his words had finished—"Ah ah ah ah ah—!!!" A sharp, inhuman shriek came from the other end of the street, instantly drawing everyone's attention.
They saw the silver-white Wolf King walking steadily, step by step.
And in one of its mechanical claws, it was dragging a... or rather, a "thing."
It was a "human stick," its limbs severed at the root, leaving only a torso and head! Blood continuously gushed from the gruesome wounds like a burst waterskin, dragging a long, shocking trail of blood across the ground.
The person seemed to have lost even the strength to scream, only letting out intermittent, bellows-like wails, their body convulsing uncontrollably from the extreme pain.
This bloody and terrifying scene instantly silenced the entire welcome area.
"Hmm?! W-What are you trying to do?!" Neuvillette's expression changed. He immediately stepped forward, shielding the clearly terrified, pale-faced Furina behind him, and demanded sharply. The power of the Hydro element began to gather faintly around him.
"I already told you."
Jesse's tone remained terrifyingly calm, as if the Wolf King had merely dragged over a bag of trash.
"This is the 'grand gift' we prepared."
"Pfft—!" Not far away, Navia, who was drinking coffee to calm her nerves on a temporarily erected viewing platform, spat out a mouthful of coffee. She stared intently at the bloody figure, her eyes wide, and cried out in shock, "Ma—Marcel?! Impossible!"
"Allow me to formally introduce this gift to everyone!" Elliot leaped onto a nearby flower bed, snatched the megaphone from a band member who had frozen in shock, and shouted at the top of his lungs:
"He! Is the culprit behind Fontaine's most heinous and unforgivable decades-long Series of Damselette Disappearances—Vacher! This beast wearing human skin!"
"???" "!!!" "What did you say?!" "Impossible!" "Oh my god! This..." Elliot's words were like a giant rock thrown into a calm lake, stirring up monstrous waves among all the Fontaine citizens and officials present.
The Series of Damselette Disappearances! This was a nightmare and shadow that had weighed on the heart of every person in Fontaine for years!
"Chief Justice Neuvillette, sir." Matt, relying on his massive seven-meter height, carefully (for him) held a thick stack of papers, some even stained with blood, and handed them to the extremely solemn Neuvillette.
"These are all the criminal records of that beast Vacher, including experimental data, transaction records, and victim lists. They are very... complete."
Neuvillette took the heavy evidence and quickly flipped through it.
His brow furrowed tighter and tighter, and the surrounding air seemed to grow damp and heavy due to his emotions.
After a long time, he put down the papers, took a deep breath, and spoke in a low, authoritative voice: "I am now aware of the situation. Next, the Opera Epiclese and the Marechaussee Phantom will..."
"No!" Zane stepped forward, his resonant voice interrupting the Chief Justice.
"The matter of his judgment."
Zane's gaze swept over every shocked face present.
"You cannot do it!"
"Nor can we! Not even the gods can do it!"
Before he finished speaking, Zane abruptly stretched out his arm. His thick fingers began to glow faintly with a spectral light and plunged directly into Vacher's ruined torso!
Under the terrified gaze of the crowd, he violently pulled outward—a soul, translucent, constantly twisting and struggling, radiating an intense aura of sin and pain, was forcibly ripped out!
"Only they can!" As Zane spoke, a tiny blue light suddenly appeared in the clear skies above Fontaine. The light rapidly expanded, emitting pure and sorrowful Hydro element fluctuations.
Finally, the light slowly descended, condensing before Vacher's painfully howling soul, transforming into a hazy yet beautiful Oceanid.
"An Oceanid?" Neuvillette recognized the being, a hint of surprise flashing in his eyes.
The Oceanid's light flickered slightly, and a gentle voice, laced with endless sorrow, softly sounded: "Vacher...?"
Vacher, in his soul state, stiffened abruptly upon hearing the voice and let out an even more shrill and distorted shriek: "That voice! Vigneire! Is that you?! No—!!!"
"The matter that follows, resolve it yourselves," Zane said deeply, nodding to the Oceanid.
The Oceanid's light gently enveloped Vacher's sinful soul, as if countless tiny streams of water were wrapping around it and whispering.
She (or they) acknowledged Zane with a slight gesture, then, taking Vacher's soul, transformed into a streak of light and vanished into the sky.
In the air, only a faint whisper remained, seemingly composed of countless water droplets:
"Thank you..."
The subsequent judgment would be personally carried out by the girls whose futures he had stolen and who slept beneath the water!
Neuvillette fell silent. He looked in the direction Vacher had vanished, then looked at the empty shell still faintly twitching on the ground. For a long time, he seemed about to speak, the concepts of law and order circling in his mind.
But a hand wearing a white glove gently blocked him. It was Furina.
She had regained her composure at some point. Although her face was still pale, a complex fire burned in her blue eyes—there was fear, shock, but mostly determination and a heavy... realization.
She stepped forward, took a deep breath, and declared in a voice that was as loud as possible, slightly trembling due to her intense emotions:
"This... This is indeed an unprecedented 'grand gift'! Fontaine... thanks you!"
She paused, her gaze sweeping over the quartet, and her voice suddenly soared, imbued with a near-absolute trust:
"In view of your previous actions! As the Hydro Archon, I hereby grant you my trust and special permission! Do what you wish within the land of Fontaine!"
But she immediately forced herself to maintain her authority, adding: "O-Of course! Excluding evil deeds! Otherwise, I... I, Furina de Fontaine, will still judge you in the name of justice!"
"Hahahahahaha!" Having said that, she let out a string of her characteristic, slightly exaggerated laughs, spun around abruptly, and quickly left the scene with steps that looked composed but were actually somewhat frantic.
the quartet: "..." They exchanged a knowing glance—she was putting on a brave face again.
— — — — — —
"Hoo... Hoo... Hoo..." Around the corner of an empty corridor in the Opera Epiclese, Furina leaned against the cold wall, her legs giving out. She slid down the wall onto the floor, breathing heavily, her forehead covered in cold sweat.
"Hoo! Th-That was terrifying! That... that thing... the blood... the soul..." She muttered incoherently, constantly wiping the sweat with a handkerchief.
"Good thing... good thing I reacted quickly... and held the stage..."
While calming her frantically beating heart, she subconsciously grabbed the hand that had reached out beside her, intending to help her up.
"Eh?" Only after grabbing it did Furina suddenly realize a fatal problem—she had run here alone, and logically... shouldn't there be anyone nearby?!
Furina's body instantly froze. Her neck, like a rusted gear, slowly, inch by inch, twisted her head around.
Her gaze met the silent figure standing beside her, the "The Knave" Arlecchino, who had arrived who knows how long ago.
Those red eyes, like Burning roses, were watching her calmly, even with a hint of indescribable scrutiny.
Arlecchino's hand was still gripped by Furina, while her other hand elegantly held a delicate small cake box.
"Miss Furina."
Arlecchino's voice was low and calm, yet it made Furina feel as if she had fallen into an ice cave.
"Are you alright?"
Looking at Arlecchino's face, which was so close, Furina felt her vision swim.
Her hanging heart finally—died completely.