The world she knows is cold and dark. Outside, all there is to see is falling snow, steep, treacherous mountains, and more snow on those mountains. Encasing her is a magnificent castle on the inside, but on the inside, not a soul she cares for walks within its great halls. The only person in the throne room in which she sits is her, a symbol of her emptiness in the greater world.

This is her curse, her burden, and ironically, her abyss. She's the Queen of Loneliness, Eydis.

How long has it been since she's been alone? Days? Months? Centuries? She can't remember. What she does remember is the last time she did not feel alone, and that was the day she waved farewell to the woman she loved like a sister.

"Eydis… Will Jaymes be there?"

"He promised."

"Did you find him?"

"No, I did not. But… I know in my heart he'll be there." Eydis clutches her breastplate, looking up to the blue sky. "Maybe that's the thing called love, huh? Makes you believe in miracles and whatnot."

"...Maybe so." Alice smiles and turns to Eydis, nodding to her. "We should head out, right?"

"Right." Eydis pets Kirimai on the side of the gray dragon's neck and pick up the reins. "Let's get this war over with quickly, Alice. Once we're done, I'll demand we get a couple of weeks away. Just be sure to live, okay?"

Alice chuckles. "I would like that. Maybe I'll force Jaymes to take care of Kirito and we can do that. But until then, farewell, Eydis Synthesis Ten."

"Farewell, Alice Synthesis Thirty."

Those were the last words spoken to Alice before the war began, and at its end, she was whisked away to another world. That's when the cold emptiness began, and slowly, her castle began to lose life. The happiness in its halls became a frigid sadness. Everyone left her behind alone in this palace to suffer and die. The Order of Integrity Knights, the Unification Council, the people of the Human Empire...Medina and Jaymes too.

She last saw them in the woods after they beat the Reaper, and wanted to call out to them. Yet something about seeing them together prevented that, and that's when her soul felt completely empty and cold. But for a moment, she saw Medina again and tried speaking to her before the lonely world reclaimed her. How long has it been since she saw Medina's anger in the forest? It's gotten colder and darker since then.

As she heaves a sigh, she hears the metal doors at the throne room's entrance roar open. Someone is here in the castle? How did they get here? When? She doesn't have the answers to those, but she does have an answer as to who is here being escorted by knights in silver armor. She can never forget the short, burgundy hair, the angelic-white tunic, and the red boots that click against the floor as the womanly figure approaches. She scans the chamber in awe before her blue eyes settle on the lone throne, then their eyes meet.

For the first time in what feels like an eternity, Eydis' mouth moves and her vocal cords resonate. "Me...dina?"

"Eydis. So this is where the real you has been."

Eydis' jaw slackens in surprise. "You're... No way... Really? It's really you?"

"Of course. It is I, Medina Orthinanos."

"Me... Meddie!" Eydis drops her head and starts to sob.

"D-don't cry, Eydis. It hasn't been that long."

"What do you mean? It's been... Stacia knows how long. I've been trapped here for so many years I've stopped counting."

Medina stares back, flabbergasted. "What are you saying, Eydis? That can't be right... You've only been gone for a month."

"A month, you say? I'm serious, Medina. For uncountable years, I've been a prisoner here. Are you telling me that, to you, our meeting in the forest was recent? I see... Then time must have moved differently... So that's how it is. Is that so?" Eydis looks at the metal gauntlet covering her right hand and starts to chuckle at the hilarity of her situation. "Hahaha... Hahahaha! Right... Of course... What a fool I am... Of course... This would happen to me, wouldn't it?"

"Eydis," Medina confusedly calls out. "You're acting strange. Are... Are you okay?"

"How sympathetic you sound, Medina. But you can't even begin to understand. But then...you haven't aged a day, have you? So your Life was frozen, huh? Of course... Of course, it would be... How could it not be done? I've been alone for so long, searching and waiting and praying for you to return. I've waited and waited and waited, but then I eventually realized that I was left behind for some reason. Why was I sent to this place alone? Once I had the answer, I wept, moaned, and wished to die. But no matter what, I couldn't end it. I don't know for how long I tried to end it all. I've been forced to live through this torture."

Eydis turns her head down from the ceiling back to Medina, looking at her with an empty, cold glare. "So after many cold, lonely years, someone enters my palace, and it's who I partially wished it to be... You, Medina. You found me...alone." Closing her eyes, Eydis crosses her arms and ponders that last statement of hers. Yes, there is something wrong with this picture. "...Where is Jaymes?"

Medina bows her head and looks away with a pained expression. "You don't remember?"

"Remember? What is there to remember? Where is he?"

Medina's fists ball up. "You... You nearly killed him. Left him in the state he's in. He won't wake up, no matter how much I call to him, or Kirito or Asuna or Mia. He's locked in a perpetual nightmare, and I don't know what to do. But you put him there."

Eydis frowns and shakes her head. "No... That's impossible. And even if that is true, there must be a reason for it. Yet I... I don't see why I would do such a thing. Why would you lie to me, Medina? Maybe it was you who hurt him."

Medina silently regains her composure, a sharp glare fixated on Eydis. She approaches the steps leading to the throne but remains one level below it, but at the same height as the seated Eydis. "Eydis... No matter what you think, there's only one fact; we need you to come back to us. I need you, he needs you, all of us need you if we're to beat the First Children."

Eydis snorts. "Why should I care about them? They...told me why this world is wrong. Why my very existence as a knight is wrong. The Human Empire, the Dark Territory, our world is wrong, Medina. You saw how contemptible the Pontifex was, and the war and the rebellion, it all proves we've strayed from the path the goddesses intended."

"So you've truly fallen for their words...and yet, they made you attack me and Jaymes. They made you cut down Renly, Tiese, Mia, and Ilia! They made you bring disease to Rulid, Alice's hometown! They made you put Selka, Alice's sister, in harm's way! Are you listening to me, Eydis? You... You betrayed Alice, and they made you do it. You betrayed the one you love all because of them."

"Betrayal and love," Eydis spits with venom as she stands above Medina. "You speak of betrayal? You, of all people, can not scold me for such a thing. You let Hersyrian sweet talk you into betraying us! And love? You know much about that! So much that you cannot accept that he chose me! You hate it so much that you'd do whatever to get him to turn his eyes away from me and to you! You may have made amends with the rest of us, but ever since I've known you, you've betrayed me as a friend!"

"...Is that what you want to believe, Eydis?" Medina struggles to maintain her eyes on Eydis as tears well up in her eyelids, her voice mixing rage with sadness. "You want me to admit it, I will. Yes, I hate that he looks at you despite the fact I've spent more time with him. Yes, I hate that no matter what I do or how kind he is to me, I know it'll never amount to anything more. I hate that, if I do something, it confuses him on how to proceed because he isn't someone who is disloyal. I admit that I denied becoming a knight and I denied his offer to freeze my Life because I love him, but I also denied those things because I wanted to never compete with you. You'll live 200 years with him. I'm going to die once my natural life is over, and that's if I make it to that moment. I'll have to find someone else, but you have him. And he returns back to his world, he'll never remember what we would have done together, but you'll be here to remind him what you and he have done. So if anyone should be angry right now, it is not you. You'll see Jaymes again. You'll see Alice again. I'll never see Alice again."

"Alice... Alice..."

Medina takes the red sheath off her waist and tosses it aside, the Mirage Blade still inside, then drops to her knees. "I, too, hate that Alice left without saying a word and that Jaymes, Kirito, and Asuna took her away from us as they did. But they did nothing wrong. Alice left to protect this world to protect us. I do wish we could have said goodbye properly, though. I loved her like a sister, as annoyingly noble and perfect as she was. I miss our days arguing over whether the wayfarers are tools to be used or people who can make choices. I miss fighting the beasts the Clamps produced side by side. I miss her mind-raking lectures on how to act and her tiresome attitude towards using her authority as a knight. But I wouldn't trade any of those days. And surely we had good ones, too. I look up to you the most. Hell, I'm sure you're the reason Ilia is my apprentice despite me not being a knight... You're my sister too, Eydis. I do love Jaymes with all of my soul, but I love you just the same. I need you as equally as I need him. He needs you more than you know. But...more importantly, Alice needs you, for she trusts you to watch over the world she loved so much."

Medina extends her hand to Eydis, pleading "So...Eydis...I beg you, please come back. Not for me. Not for Jaymes, Not for anyone in our world. Come back for Alice."

Eydis hears Medina's long speech, and for some unexplainable reason, it lifts the frigidity in Eydis' veins and fills her heart with warmth. So badly she wants to reach out to Medina and take her hand...but retracts it. She turns her head away and bites her lip. "But even so... I know their power. And if what you say is true, that means... Falchion is in their hands. So what can we do against that power?"

"You'll figure it out as you always have, Big Sister."

Eydis looks toward Medina again, but this time, her eyes are not on Medina. Instead, her irises transfix on a young girl standing behind Medina. She looks just like Medina in every way. She wears a long white dress with a red scarf over her shoulders and a black bow in her hair. She, like Medina, reaches her little hand out to Eydis. "Come back, Big Sister Eydis."

"M...Mary?"

"Come back, Eydis." Another hand appears, and it is the golden gauntlet of Eydis' beloved junior knight, Alice Synthesis Thirty. She smiles warming under her light blonde hair. "It is time to return to your true self. The one that pestered me whenever she could, the one I was hurt to leave behind the most."

"You have so much work to be done, little one," says another hand, this one belonging to Bercouli Synthesis One, the former commander of the knights. "He swore an oath to me to finish the work, and you promised to be there with him. We're waiting on you." On those words, the room is suddenly filled with numerous people, all of that Eydis recognize. Integrity Knights, people she's met in both the Human Empire and the Dark Territory, all of them reach out for her to take their hand and come home.

"Eydis." A voice turns her head away from the crowd. There, seated to her right on a similar, slightly larger throne sits Jaymes, a dark crown on his head like hers but larger. He looks like a king-well, he is one-and turns to Eydis. "It's time. Your place to rule is not here in the deep loneliness of your soul, but in the world beyond...and with me."

"You see and hear them all, Eydis," Medina says, now standing on her feet. "I'm not the only one who wants you to come back. We all do. You, I, Jaymes, and everyone will find a way to defeat the First Children and protect our world. We need you to do that. You just have to come back from the abyss of your soul by taking my hand."

"Lady Medina... Lady Medina, wake up..."

"...Hey, Ilia... L-Lady Eydis is waking up..."

Eydis' feels an intense headache, his vision unfocused, and her body feels weighty. She can tell she's under the cloak of darkness, with the moon being the only source of light. She lifts herself up to her knees, groaning as she tries searching around her. Sand...cold...she's in a desert? Her memories are hazy, yet there must be some purpose to her presence here.

Let's see...she was chasing someone...a few someones. They were all women...one was certainly Medina. Where are they now... Oh. Looking behind her, she sees Medina lying on the sand, two girls seated around her. She recognizes both of them as Ilia, Medina's apprentice and the future thirty-fourth knight, and Mia, Jaymes' apprentice. They look at her with fear and caution, with good reason if Eydis' memory serves her right. Thinking of those memories brings up others, ones that are more pressing and urgent.

She faces the Integrity Knight trainee. "Ilia, do the First Children have Falchion?"

Ilia looks shocked, but shakes that off and replies, "Yes, they do."

"And Jaymes...he's... I see. Then there's no time. I don't remember much right now, but what I do remember, I'm going to tell you now. Falchion and Jaymes are just the first steps. The Ancient Apostles are nothing more than distractions. And I was just a test... The first phase of their plans is to rid of Kirito, Asuna, and Jaymes, but not with their own hands."

Mia frowns. "What do you mean then?"

"I think Medina's Perfect Weapon Control is the key to saving Jaymes, but you have to hurry. You have to save Jaymes before he wakes up...or one, or all of the otherworlders, is going to die... And there's more..."