"Feliciana—Michelle's condition doesn't seem normal. It's best if we capture her and question her properly!"
With victory already in hand, even Elara could tell something was off. From a distance, she shouted for me to hold back.
Of course I would've done that even without her saying so—but just as I was about to cut down Michelle's wings, four robots faintly glowing with pale white light suddenly rushed out from the side. They clustered above her head and forcibly blocked the path of my descending scatter-beams.
"Huh?"
This time, Lost Paradise Scatter Wave didn't pierce through the robots' bodies. Several pillars of light only managed to disable the top two frames. Looking more closely, I saw why: each robot was wrapped in an extremely thick, high-level Light-element barrier. The barrier's source was the array-like rune patterns etched across their chassis.
It looked like these four white-glowing robots had a special function. Among so many robots, only they carried dedicated Light-element defensive formations—no wonder they had survived the earlier Lost Paradise Scatter Wave.
In the end, my Lost Paradise Scatter Wave was still a type of special-energy attack. Being blocked by multiple layers of Light-element shielding was, frankly, reasonable.
"Stop meddling. I don't need protection from worthless trash like you—this kind of attack means nothing to me!"
Even if Michelle's memory seemed to have issues, her inborn arrogance clearly hadn't changed. She actually stepped out of the protection zone. With a sweep of her left hand, she instantly summoned countless fireball missiles and hurled them toward me.
Naturally, her rapid-fire fireballs weren't just several grades weaker than before—they were no threat to me at all. But the remaining two robots clearly weren't obeying her orders completely. They cautiously shifted again, positioning themselves directly above her head—ready to intercept my next Lost Paradise Scatter Wave.
I wasn't afraid of the fireballs, but there were simply too many. Once scattered, they inevitably struck our rear—Norvale's royal castle—and even the residential districts farther away.
Each fireball carried power comparable to high-tier human magic. No matter how strong I and the others were, we couldn't intercept every single one simultaneously. Norvale—no matter how large—couldn't withstand Michelle's indiscriminate bombardment. Cyrae kept urging me from behind.
"Feliciana, think of something! You can't let her keep attacking like this—the city's about to collapse, civilians are already getting hurt!"
"Then I'll try another move!"
With those two special robots shielding her, Lost Paradise Scatter Wave wouldn't solve it in one strike anymore. And I wasn't going to be stupid enough to fall for the same trick twice. In truth, the Scatter Wave was just Lost Paradise Annihilation Wave divided into many thinner strikes to hit multiple targets at once. If I weren't worried about wiping Michelle out along with everything else, I would've used the lethal version long ago.
But the situation had become urgent. Innocent casualties were continuing to rise. After a brief hesitation, I had no choice but to abandon the plan to capture her alive.
I could only eliminate the culprit first.
"No! I can't allow you to hurt Michelle again!"
At the instant an enormous annihilation pillar began dropping from the sky, a voice suddenly sounded inside my mind. At first it resembled Cyrae's voice—but the next second my head felt like it was splitting apart.
A familiar figure abruptly split out from my own body, materializing out of nowhere right in front of me.
"It's you?!"
I recognized her at once—No. 18, Jasperly, the one who had been elusive and whom I suspected had controlled me for an entire day.
And the moment she appeared, the long-absent backlash from overusing authority surged back through me. My whole body went limp, and my mind became unbearably hazy.
Don't forget: since the fight began, I had already cast Lost Paradise Scatter Wave at least three or four times. If it were the old me, I would've collapsed long ago and never stood back up. The fact that I was still hovering in midair, still able to flap my wings, already meant I was forcing myself to the limit.
There was no way I could complete a full Lost Paradise Annihilation Wave now.
The annihilation pillar—only halfway formed—dissipated midair before it could hit its target.
In just a few seconds, Michelle had walked right up to the edge of death—and returned.
Before she could even react to what had happened, the two robots vanished together with her, disappearing from where they stood. I couldn't tell whether they had escaped via some standard instant-movement method, or whether No. 18 Jasperly had forcibly rewritten reality—transferring their location somewhere else entirely.
As for the remaining robots—few in number now—they seemed to receive a retreat order. One after another, they turned and flew out of the city.
"Why… why did you stop me?"
With everything ruined at the last moment, I finally understood why my control had suddenly improved so dramatically, why I had been able to use the Water Angel's power almost without limits—
Because No. 18 Jasperly had been secretly attached to me this entire time. She hadn't left at all.
But even more questions rushed in immediately: Why? How could she grant me that kind of capability? And why, at the critical moment, would she leave my body to save Michelle?
"What happened just now? Were you hurt?"
With the enemy withdrawn, Cyrae and Elara didn't understand why "another Cyrae" had appeared here—but from afar, they saw my condition collapse and my flight become unstable. They hurried toward me to check on me.
"I'll give you an answer," No. 18 Jasperly said softly, as if relieved now that Michelle had escaped. "But not now."
She clearly didn't want to get involved with anyone besides me. She glanced lightly toward the others, and as soon as her words fell—
She vanished again, exactly the same way she always did.
"She… seems a bit smarter now?"
That was the last thought I had before losing consciousness. My falling body felt like it was caught hard by someone. Countless worried voices rang in my ears, but I couldn't make out a single word.
…
When I came back to myself, it was already deep into the night. The moment I opened my eyes, I realized I was in a spacious room—judging by the furnishings, somewhere inside the royal castle.
Adrian was asleep at my bedside, his head resting against the bed. A warm feeling rose in my chest without warning.
"You're awake?" Adrian noticed immediately and hurried to explain while urging me not to move. "Lady Elara said this is a classic case of magical exhaustion. You need a long rest—maybe even several days…"
"No. 18 Jasperly appeared again!" I blurted out. "I actually had a chance to kill Michelle this time, but she stopped me. And Michelle got away!"
I told him everything that had happened, from start to finish. Even though I'd regained consciousness in only a few hours, I could still feel a dull, lingering ache deep in my soul.
Once No. 18 Jasperly left my body, my strength clearly returned to the level I had before she possessed and controlled me in the imperial capital Kyndrill. Not only was my authority use heavily restricted again, but because I had overused the Water Angel's power without preparation, I likely wouldn't be able to call on it freely for quite some time.
"I already heard about that," Adrian said. "Elara and Cyrae saw No. 18 Jasperly too. But she vanished quickly, so they don't know who she really is. The only thing we can say for sure is… she probably doesn't mean us any harm."
According to Adrian, not long after I fainted, he and Alfred had rushed back to Norvale on foot. But by then the battle was basically over. They didn't help much—mostly just assisted with cleanup and aftermath. Then he summarized what happened afterward for me.
"The Sage Alliance sent someone here too?"
Apparently, after the battle in the capital ended, the astrologer Meredith—someone we'd dealt with several times—suddenly appeared inside the royal castle. Adrian said she had used the Adventurers' Guild's teleportation formation to come directly from Crescent City.
At first, Adrian assumed she came because Michelle had launched a major attack on Norvale. But since Elara personally received her, and Galahad the king wasn't directly involved, that seemed unlikely. It looked more like a scheduled meeting Elara and Meredith had arranged in advance.
"The Sage Alliance and the angel race have always been friendly," Adrian guessed. "Maybe she came to catch up while the angels were down here?"
Hearing him say that, I didn't dwell on it. The thing I cared about most was still the message No. 18 Jasperly left behind:
She had clearly said she would give me an answer.
From past experience, the reason she still hadn't appeared was probably because Adrian had been by my side the whole time. She likely needed me alone.
So after making my intentions clear, I kept urging Adrian to go back to his own room and rest—so I could have the chance to meet her one-on-one.