Prologue
Amelia Watson and her companions picked themselves up from the cracked marble floors of the Infinite Library. Around them, a hundred dead men and women with corrupted souls rose up like mannequins on invisible strings, wielding short-swords and rifles. All the while, the menacing, shimmering figure of Knowledge loomed over them all and cast her long, serpentine shadow.
Knowledge ran a hand through her wavy locks of red hair and repeated her question to the frightened yet defiant detective with a clear voice that rang throughout the Library realm.
"Wouldn't you like to know why you were chosen to stand among the Myths, Amelia Watson?"
Ame furrowed her brow and pointed her Webley revolver at Knowledge. She lashed back dismissively.
"Just give us the damn book and let us go. That's all I want!"
Ame shouted at the top of her lungs and strained her voice, but her hand and her gun were both trembling involuntarily. Chills ran up her spine while her eyes wandered to the parade of dead men and women approaching them. Knowledge's question gnawed at her too.
Why was she chosen by Cover Corporation? Why was she one of the Myths that Jenma and Enma risked their lives to recruit?
The detective shook her head and steadied her aim.
"Just shut your mouth!" Ame hissed.
" Ara, but I haven't said anything, detective." Knowledge snickered condescendingly, "It's not healthy to talk to yourself…or to repress your deepest desires with such vulgar words." Her eyes then locked with Ame's again and she added, "You might end up hurting those you love."
Damn it, she's messing with my head!
Amused, Knowledge continued.
"Accept the Ancient Ones into your soul, detective. Let us take root there, and forbidden knowledge will be yours! Look at how happy these men and women are! You could become just like them~!"
While Ame struggled with her own mind, the parade of dead cultists drew closer.
The man that died before Ame's eyes lumbered towards her and limped on his one leg. He brandished his bayonet and swung it through the air menacingly, but his face was smiling from ear to ear - in a state of absolute bliss. The bullet hole on his forehead and the black grime trickling down his face did not faze the dead man in the slightest.
Ame nearly stumbled backward but caught herself before she fell. Her eyes were drawn to the dead man's labored limping and then to the fledgling tendril that had burst out from the tip of his spine.
It gave her an idea.
When the dead man drew close, she steadied her stance and kicked his leg with every ounce of strength she could muster. Her kick swept him off his foot and he came tumbling down face-first onto the war-scarred marble floor. The tendril sprouting from his spine flayed wildly as if it were trying to grab a hold of something that Ame couldn't see.
Without hesitation, Ame pointed her revolver at the tendril and shot it once - twice and then thrice. The muzzle flashes reflected off of the sky blue irises of her eyes, highlighting the mingling of fear and resolve gripping her heart. After the third shot, the tendril stopped moving and withered away.
Ame turned around towards her friends and barked urgently.
"Knock em' down and kill those tendril thingies!"
The ladies of HoloMyth nodded and started picking off the parade of dead mannequins one by one. They broke off legs and methodically slew nascent tendril after tendril. True enough, once the tendril was slain, the mannequins finally stopped moving for good.
"It's working!" Gura cheered with a toothy grin. She pulled off her trident from the back of a twice-dead cultist and whirled her weapon through the air, casting off the black grime from the prongs, "I think we might have a chance here, you guys…!?" Suddenly, Gura stopped mid-sentence and cried, "WATSON, LOOK OUT!"
Ame whipped her head to the side and saw Knowledge charging towards her with her naginata in tow. The cosmic being pulled her naginata back gracefully while she sailed through the air towards the detective at breakneck speed. Ame's face went pale and she fumbled for her rifle fitted with her bayonet to protect herself.
However, Knowledge beat Ame to the punch.
The cosmic custodian swung her naginata and knocked the rifle - and its bayonet - out of the detective's hands. Ame's heart sank when she watched the Krag rifle that had pulled her through so many battles go flying over the edge of the checkerboard floors and then fall into the cosmic void.
In the blink of an eye, Knowledge followed through her swipe and slammed the blunt end of her naginata into the back of Ame's head. Ame fell down to the floor and sharp pain robbed her of her strength. Her arms instinctively shielded her from the fall, but she was already staggered. Falling so easily to a single blow made her feel incredibly weak - and the question that Knowledge asked echoed in her aching head.
Why was I chosen to stand among the Myths!?
Ame's vision was blurred, but she could see her blood splattering onto the checkerboard marble tiles. Then, barely a pace ahead of her, she could see the shadow of Knowledge looming over her with her naginata in hand. The cosmic being was just about to pierce the back of Ame's head when Gura's warcry reached the detective's ears.
"WATSON!"
All of the sudden, Gura leapt through the air and clashed with Knowledge. Ame found the strength to raise up her head. She saw Gura's aquamarine trident locked with the blade of Knowledge's naginata.
"I'm not gonna let you hurt Ame any more, stinky!"
"... Gura!?" Ame snapped back to the present.
"It appears we are at an impasse." Knowledge bore down on Gura and tested her strength, "Stubborn girls need to be put in their place… and we are happy to enlighten you of your folly!"
"Try me, book lady!" Gura hissed back.
With that, Gura and Knowledge pushed each other away and put ten paces of distance between them. Ina rushed over to Ame's side and eased her down to sit on the floor and help her with her injuries. Calli, Kiara and Jenma, on the other hand, joined Gura at the frontline.
Knowledge slammed the butt of her naginata onto the marble floor and shook the ground of the Infinite Library in her wake once again. However, the ladies of HoloMyth held their ground.
A malicious smirk then formed on the librarian's lips.
"Very well, warriors of the Myth. We shall teach you lessons that you shall never forget!
AlterMyth
String Theocracy
Sixty-Eighth Scene - Spectrophobia
Gawr Gura held her aquamarine trident firmly and stood together with Calli, Kiara and Jenma. Side by side with her friends, she stood defiant against Knowledge and the remainder of the reanimated cultists with black tendrils sprouting from their spines. The Atlantean stole one last glance over her shoulder and watched Ina carefully administering the last dose of the curative Watson Concoction to the detective.
Keep Ame safe, Ina . I'm counting on you.
She turned towards Knowledge again and charged at her with her trident to duel with her. Her companions, on the other hand, fanned out and kept the mannequin parade at bay.
Gura was quick on her feet and she dashed forward with fleet footsteps and speed that rivaled Knowledge herself. Once she got close to her foe, she shifted her weight with a whip of her shark's tail, planted her feet firmly on the ground and then thrust her trident at Knowledge.
The cosmic librarian tried to hop away from Gura's strike, but the Atlantean twisted her trident and caught Knowledge by the cheek with the right-most prong of her weapon. Black grime, just like the goop that flowed from the twice-dead puppets' guts spilled out and stained Knowledge's Napoleonic military uniform.
Were they made of the same stuff?
Gura didn't have time to ponder.
Knowledge clicked her tongue and whirled her naginata, drawing a lilac circle of death around her. Gura ducked under the swipe and put some distance between her and the librarian once again.
"Looks like you bleed too, stinky!" Gura taunted and raised her grime-stained trident up once again, "Pissed off yet?"
"Why would we be pissed off when we are having the time of our lives?" Knowledge shrugged off the taunt. She brought her free hand to the wound Gura gave her, wiped off a spot of grime with her pinky finger and then licked it off with sickening gusto, "Combat is a dance that, deep inside, the beings of this world crave. It is held with such high regard in some societies that martial strength becomes a virtue - and lack thereof is a sin." The librarian grinned at Gura with her grime-tainted teeth, "Isn't that why you haven't had the heart to return to Atlantis, Lokhagos Gura ?"
Gura gritted her teeth.
The way that Knowledge spoke her old military rank so casually struck a chord deep within her. It reminded her of the way her superior officers in the Atlantean Army spoke. Looking into Knowledge's eyes, Gura saw the indifferent frowns of those decorated men and women looking down upon her from their tall aquamarine thrones while they sent children to fight their wars for them.
"Shut up!" Gura growled, "Stop talking like you know me!"
The Atlantean shook her head and charged at Knowledge again. The blade of Knowledge's naginata and the prongs of Gura's trident met between them and cast sparks of lilac and aquamarine into the cosmic void above them.
"Oh, but we do know you - and all of the names that you have gone by in these past thirty years." Knowledge mused confidently, "The Sawtoothed Slayer. The Cornfield Crusher. The Gravemaker. A different State, a different name. As your infamy on the land grew, you feared that word of your cowardice would reach Atlantis and that you would be punished for desertion and failure." The librarian laughed menacingly and pressed down on Gura with her naginata, "But the trails of blood that you've left in your wake all point the finger at you - a cold-hearted desperado who will never know peace and will never truly have a home!"
The more that Knowledge spoke, the more vivid the images in the eyes of Gura's mind grew. Even though she fought back against the formidable strength of Knowledge in the Infinite Library, an entirely new world seemed to be forming around her. It was almost as if Knowledge's words were weaving that world around her like a macabre tapestry.
She started to hear the voices of her superior officers in the Atlantean Army and all of the outlaws that she had betrayed all ringing in her ears. Wanted posters displaying her face throughout the American Midwest and the Eastern Seaboard floated around the scene too. In each poster, the bounties for her head grew larger and larger until she was deemed public enemy number one.
Suddenly, Ina's voice cried out over the horrifying din.
"Gura! Don't listen to her - and don't look into her eyes!"
However, it was already too late.
The ash green eyes of Knowledge were shining bright gold - just like the mass of tendrils that swarmed them in the River Styx. Gura had been looking straight into those shimmering eyes all this time. Before she knew it, she had lost all the strength in her legs and she fell down to her knees. Her trident soon followed and fell with a metallic crash that was muffled in Gura's ears - even though it fell right next to her.
"Gura!" Calliope Mori screamed, but the Atlantean wouldn't respond.
Without taking a single blow to her body, the powerful, tenacious shark-girl fell down to her knees. And yet, the tapestry world that Knowledge weaved around her was clear for Calli and for everyone else to see.
The rogue reaper snorted and kicked the mannequin she had been fighting onto the cracked marble floor. As soon as the mannequin was downed, she slammed the base of her scythe into the tendril and crushed it with staggering force. She then cried out to her companion fighting alongside her.
" Kusotori , Gura needs our help!"
Kiara incinerated a mannequin, along with its black tendril, with a smoldering pillar of Phoenix fire. She nodded to Calli and gestured to Jenma to cover their assault. When the management trainee gave a thumbs up, Calli and Kiara rushed to Gura's aid.
The Phoenix drew her broadsword and tried to cut through the tapestry world that was threatening to imprison the Atlantean.
Calli, on the other hand, crossed the gap towards Knowledge. The reaper swung her scythe with tremendous strength that made its blade sing as it sailed through the air. Knowledge, however, dissolved her naginata with a flash of lilac light and brought out her two-handed greatsword instead.
The cosmic librarian parried Calli's swing with the flat of her greatsword and promptly locked eyes with the rogue reaper.
"Is this the strength of three hundred years you wield?" Knowledge scoffed and pushed back against Calli now, "You have always been one of the greatest students of the Lord of Death, following his orders to the letter - repeating the cycles that mankind and the Grim Reapers have gone through over and over." She brought her face closer to Calli and taunted, "You are nothing more than a machine that does as she is told and complies - an old dog that can't learn new tricks! Can someone like you truly protect the Myths?"
Calli furrowed her brow and redoubled her efforts against Knowledge. Far in the distance, she could hear the voice of Ina desperately calling out to her, the librarian swung her large greatsword with such skill that Calli had to stay on her toes. The reaper hopped back and traded blows with Knowledge, overpowering the librarian with sheer strength and whittling away at her defense.
In that moment, Calli recalled all of the lessons she learned in her three hundred years. She unleashed every technique that she had been taught for combat one after another. Slowly but surely, the stalwart defense of Knowledge was whittled away. Calli even managed to cut the librarian's skin and draw even more black grime when she drew back her weapon.
In the span of a minute, Knowledge was covered in cuts and bruises and her Napoleonic uniform was tattered and torn by Calli's relentless assault. Then, Knowledge stumbled backwards as if strength was leaning her arms and her legs.
This was Calli's chance!
She drew back her scythe and prepared herself to cut Knowledge in two. However, it was at this time that she noticed the sounds of battle intensifying around her. Time seemed to slow down from the adrenaline and her heart sank when her pink eyes wandered towards her companions.
In the corner of her eye, Calli saw that Kiara was clashing against Knowledge too - but not the same one that she had been attacking all that time. That second Knowledge wielded a rapier and dueled fiercely with Kiara in a battle of speed and dexterity.
Kiara was unable to dismantle the tapestry world that was imprisoning Gura, but she looked like she was winning her battle against the second iteration of Knowledge handily. Her flaming broadsword was more than a match for the thin rapier of second Knowledge and she set the librarian ablaze with Phoenix fire!
Despite this, tears were forming at the sides of the mighty Phoenix's eyes. A look of anguish etched on her face. Her normally confident pink eyes trembled. Her buckler shield blocked the swift strikes of Knowledge's rapier, but Calli could tell that something else had pierced Kiara's heart.
Something that must have gripped at her very soul.
Kusotori!?
More sounds of struggle reached Calli's ears.
The reaper's eyes shifted to the management trainee who, just like Kiara, was fighting another iteration of Knowledge. That third Knowledge wielded the mace-like scepter and fended off Jenma's red-bladed katana with ease. The management trainee too was winning the battle before her, but she also looked like she was on the verge of tears.
Calli saw the third Knowledge saying something to Jenma, but she couldn't hear over the voices whispering in her head and the beating of her own heart. All of the sudden, Calli saw the katana slip from Jenma's hands.
The management trainee fell down to her knees on the marble floor and a tapestry world started manifesting around her - just like the one that manifested around Gura. Calli only caught a glimpse of that world, but she saw what she thought was an office-space from the parallel world. There were broad-paned windows emblazoned with the same blue triangle that she saw on the seal of her invitation envelope.
In that diorama of the parallel world, Jenma started bowing down to the scepter-wielding Knowledge. She was pleading with the third Knowledge for forgiveness and she begged for another chance.
"I'll recruit everyone this time! I won't lose anyone ever again! Please don't let me go! A-chan senpai , please! I beg of you!"
A-chan?
Who in the world was this 'A-chan'? Another superior, perhaps?
Likewise, Calli saw that another tapestry world was forming around Kiara too. In the span of a few heartbeats, Kiara's fiery resolve faltered and she became hysterical. Calli saw a mountainous scene forming on her world - the mountain ranges of Austria-Hungary - where Phoenixes were jumping off the cliffs and falling head first, never to fly again.
Kiara wailed like a child and grabbed a hold of the shoulders of the second Knowledge and wept, saying something in German that Calli couldn't quite understand.
The mighty Phoenix had foregone all her defenses and was completely vulnerable, but the second Knowledge didn't strike her down with her rapier. Instead, Knowledge just shook her head, pried Kiara's hands off of her shoulders and then leapt backwards over the edge of the false cliffs.
"NEIN!" Kiara screamed, absolutely crestfallen.
What in the world was Kiara seeing right now? What lies did Knowledge whisper into her ears to shatter her so thoroughly?
What lies did Knowledge have prepared for me?
That frightening thought sent a chill up Calli's spine and time started to flow back to normal. Her eyes dared to look at the staggered Knowledge before her and saw that she had taken on an entirely new form. Instead of the haughty cosmic librarian, her beloved mentor was standing in her place.
J-chad.
"What'cha waiting for, kid?" Knowledge spoke, mimicking the senior reaper's tone perfectly. She even dropped the pretentious royal 'we'. The greatsword in her hands then took the form of J-chad's heavy scythe and she rested its pole on her shoulder, "You wanna earn your freedom, Calli? You're gonna have to go through me."
"Stop copying her." Calli hissed and gripped her scythe firmly, "Don't you have any shame, Knowledge!"
"Funny you say that, kid." The fake J-chad snickered, "All your techniques and fighting styles were things you learned from me - things that I learned from Death-sensei. Who's copying who?"
"I've had enough of this!" The veteran reaper roared.
She swung her scythe with tremendous strength, but the fake J-chad met her halfway. Calli shifted her weight and pressed on with her attack, but her opponent clashed with her every step of the way. It was almost like a mirror perfect performance of well-timed strikes and counters. Two powerful scythes flew through the air and carved into the cracked marble floor as the deadly performance continued.
Knowledge, masquerading as J-chad, wielded the fundamental techniques that had been passed down from generation to generation of Grim Reapers since time immemorial and kept Calli at bay. Orthodox strikes and orthodox counters. However, because of this, Calli knew that this J-chad was fake.
After all, J-chad developed new styles together with Calli - styles that the old school reapers shunned.
"Looks like you don't know everything after all!" Calli taunted.
Calli stopped her scythe swing halfway and shifted her footing in the blink of an eye. Rather than following through with her swipe, she struck the fake J-chad with a roundhouse kick to the jaw. She then spun around and thrust the sharp base of her scythe through the fake J-chad's heart.
"What…!?" Knowledge, for once, seemed confused. It was almost as if the script had been flipped on her.
"Get wrecked, punk!" Calli growled.
All the initiative that Knowledge had built up melted away in the blink of an eye. Her imitation of J-chad faded away and she reverted back to her lithe, red-headed form. Black grime trickled down from her broken jaw and her tattered Napoleonic military dress was stained black as night.
This time, Calli loomed over Knowledge. The veteran reaper raised up her scythe and tore through her horizontally, cutting the librarian cleanly in half.
Knowledge, and her greatsword exploded into a mass of black tendrils that skittered away before writhing lifelessly on the marble floor. Calli struggled to catch her breath, but the pool of black grime infested with dying tendrils was plain for her to see.
Did I do it…?
Calli's hopes went cold, however, when she saw that the tapestry worlds that were imprisoning Gura, Kiara and Jemna were still completely intact. Her allies were still trapped in the threadlike prisons. It wasn't over yet.
Were these the Sanity Checks that Ina was talking about?
How can we break these damn prisons!?
Calli tried to turn to Ina to ask for her help, but the Priestess was being swarmed by the remnants of the puppet parade - the foes that Calli and the others were unable to stop. She saw all twelve of Ina's tentacles striking down puppets while Ina herself shot sporadically with her futuristic pistol. The Priestess did everything in her power to protect the ailing detective who was still recovering from her injuries.
Moreover, Calli couldn't help but feel like Ina and Ame were incredibly far away - much farther than she first thought they were before.
Was this another one of Knowledge's tricks?
While Calli was thinking of what to do, a cold wind blew from out of nowhere. Goosebumps formed on Calli's skin and she shivered from the biting cold. Where was this wind coming from? Then, the familiar sensation of cold touched her cheeks.
Wait a second… don't tell me.
Snow? Here?
The moment that Calli entertained that thought, a blizzard swept in from out of the blue and surrounded her. The pool of black grime at her feet became thread-like and turned into the murky waters of the Potomac River. Calli saw her reflection in the murky waters - but it wasn't a reflection of the Grim Reaper who ferried souls in the Underworld for three hundred years.
It was the frail human girl with pale, frostbitten skin standing on death's doorstep that Calli knew too well. That girl in the river looked at Calli with longing eyes and spoke.
"Were you able to make your way home this time?"
Calli had no answer.
The blizzard intensified and blurred the lines between the Infinite Library and the desolate banks of the Potomac River. All of the strength and experience that she had built up in her three hundred years as a Grim Reaper melted away with the snow beneath her feet.
This was a tapestry world, Calli realized. Her tapestry world. The one that was being weaved especially for her. Knowing this now, she realized her grave mistake.
The eyes of the frostbitten girl in the murky river were glowing bright gold.
"I fucked up…" Calli lamented, "I'm… sorry…"
Her legs buckled and she fell face-first into the harsh, muddy snow. The tapestry world of the blizzard finally claimed its victim.
Sixty-Ninth Scene - Those Chosen
Ina'nis Ninomae was panting heavily and slouched forward as she fought to catch her breath. All around her, the remnants of the puppet parade were sprawled out in pools of black grime. The edges of her tentacles, the tip of her crowbar and even the slide of her pistol were stained with her enemies' filth, but she eventually managed to defeat them all.
She managed to protect the ailing Amelia Watson.
But at what cost?
The Priestess saw that the rest of their companions - Calli, Kiara, Jenma and Gura - had all succumbed to the relentless, evolving Sanity Checks unleashed by the cosmic librarian Knowledge. A unique tapestry world imprisoned each of the four warriors, reflecting the hells that they had repressed within their hearts.
Unlike those warriors, though, Ina could see the threads that were being woven into those tapestries. They descended down from the cosmic ceiling like a mannequin's strings and flowed into the tapestry worlds, adding detail after painstaking details of the ladies' repressed memories.
Moreover, Ina could also look straight into the golden eyes of Knowledge without repercussion. Unordained or not, Ina was still a Priestess of the Ancient Ones. Magic borne from forbidden knowledge didn't affect her as strongly as it did for the uninitiated - but she wasn't completely immune to their effects either.
Looking at Knowledge's golden eyes made Ina's stomach turn, but she had to see her friends and the sadistic librarian that was slowly imprisoning them in threads.
Knowledge was no longer as immaculate as she first appeared. All the scars and bruises she sustained from her battles remained clear for Ina to see. The deep cut on her cheek from Gura's trident, the burns from Kiara's flames, the slash mark on her uniform from Jenma's katana and the horizontal wound on her torso from Calli's scythe all remained.
And yet, Knowledge was victorious over them.
The weapons of Knowledge loomed over the tapestry worlds that she formed: her naginata lording over Gura, her greatsword casting shadows over Calli, her rapier towering over Kiara and her scepter dominating Jenma.
Was this the sort of power the Ancient Ones wield?
It made Ina feel sick.
The troubled Ina furrowed her brow and her grimoire AO-chan suddenly appeared and floated before Ina. It formed purple runes around herself, urging Ina to read them. Ina obliged and frowned.
The unordained Priestess followed AO-chan's directions and saw spools of multi-colored threads that flowed up to the cosmic sky. Knowledge noticed Ina's eyes fixed on her hands and she smiled her sickly sweet smile.
"It appears that your companions have been carrying incredible weights on their shoulders all this time, Ina'nis Ninomae." Knowledge explained herself in a playful, sing-song voice, "These threads we carry are weightless, but they have brought these brave warriors down to their knees. They are weightless, but they have been steeped in the depths of their subconsciousness." The librarian walked around the four tapestry worlds as if she were walking through a gallery, "Look at how much they struggle - in prisons of their own making."
"Are these the kinds of things Priestesses do?" Ina protested and spat with disdain, "What in the world do the Ancient Ones want with us?"
"Our powers only exist within our realms in the void, Unordained One." Knowledge replied. She fixed her broken jaw with a bone-crunching crack and continued, "Outside of the Infinite Library, we do not have tangible power. Other Ancient Ones too are bound to their realms just like we are. That's why we must manifest and gather strength in order to anchor into your world - albeit briefly." A wicked smile then formed on her grime-stained lips, "However, a Priestess wields the Ancient One's powers in the mortal realm. They are the keys to unlock the floodgates of 'reality' that hold us back. Their ascensions allow the will of the Ancient Ones to be fulfilled on earth as it is in the void!"
"So you're saying we're nothing more than tools of the Ancient Ones!?" Ina's eyes trembled with fear.
"Priestesses are more than mere tools, Unordained One." Knowledge spoke with a rare hint of genuine frustration, "The greatest of Priestesses, at the end of their ministries, become Ancient Ones themselves." She laid a hand over her grime-stained heart and declared, "Behold, for you are looking at the Great Priestess of the Last Age!"
Wait a minute. Knowledge was a Priestess of the Ancient Ones too!?
Ina lowered her head and felt her own heart beating against her chest. Her inner thoughts then escaped her lips in a whisper.
"Just how many crimes did you commit… how many things did you forsake to become such a horrible creature?"
Despite her soft tone, the cosmic librarian heard her words and went red with unbridled fury.
"CREATURE!? YOU DARE CALL US A MERE CREATURE, YOU HALF-BAKED FOOL!? YOU COULDN'T FATHOM THE THINGS WE'VE SACRIFICED TO ACHIEVE THIS STATE!"
Overcome with her rage, Knowledge summoned her fifth and last weapon - the revolver - and pointed it at Ina. Dark, otherworldly energy formed within the barrel of the weapon and swirled with menacing strength that seemed to tear through reality itself.
It was just like the powerful energy that Death-sensei wielded and unleashed in the Sous La Lune - energy that ripped through brimstone hills and shook the earth below!
Ina froze like a deer in the headlights in the midst of that looming storm of power. However, as soon as Knowledge pulled the trigger, Ina heard Ame's voice.
"Ina, get down!"
The injured detective grabbed a hold of Ina and tackled her down onto the cracked marble floors of the Infinite Library. The powerful blast of otherworldly energy shattered the sound barrier with a sonic boom, but it sailed over Ame and Ina. It only missed them by a few inches!
Knowledge clicked her tongue and beads of sweat started forming on her brow. All of the wounds that Gura, Calli, Kiara and Jenma dealt to the librarian spewed black grime. The magical blast reopened the librarian's wounds and made her lose her footing, but she defiantly pulled back the hammer of her revolver and prepared yet another otherworldly shot.
Before Knowledge could gather her strength to charge her magic, Ame rolled over to the side and drew her own revolver. The detective steadied her breath and shot the cosmic revolver from out of Knowledge's hand.
The revolver of Knowledge fell unceremoniously down to the floor beside its owner's feet with a hollow, metallic rattle.
Epilogue
Moments later, Knowledge herself dropped to her knees and lowered her head while the black grime from her many wounds pooled around her. She then held up her left hand and regarded her newest wound - a bullet hole from Ame's revolver. From behind the torn collars of her Napoleonic uniform, a simple golden pendant slipped out and dangled from the librarian's neck.
It was a golden symbol roughly in the shape of an 'R'.
Knowledge looked at that pendant and started laughing hysterically.
"What's so funny!?" Ame demanded. The detective and the priestess slowly picked themselves up from the floor while AO-chan floated between them.
"Of course it had to be you, detective. Another gunslinger, just like our previous identity. Even now, our past continues to haunt us." Knowledge tucked her pendant back into her tattered uniform and then held her wounded hand in agony, "We had our doubts when the Ancient Ones made their prescripts, but it's plain for us to see."
The wounded librarian then looked straight into Ame's eyes and her ash grey irises turned gold.
"Ame, don't look!" Ina warned.
However, Ame kept looking straight into Knowledge's eyes without flinching. No tapestry world formed around the detective. The powerful Sanity Check that brought their friends didn't affect her in the slightest.
Just like Ina.
"Don't tell me…" Ina gasped, "Ame, you're…"
Knowledge cut Ina off and made her bold declaration.
"This is the reason why the Cover Corporation chose you too, Detective Amelia Watson. You too have the potential to become our Priestess!"
To Be Continued