Just as Kosma's heart sank because he failed to dodge the move unleashed by Persona Arsene, he was then astonished by the evasion speed he displayed due to inertia.
Kosma had suffered severe injuries in the previous battle with Ren Amamiya. Even as a MANTIS, he shouldn't have been able to display speed nearly comparable to his peak condition while heavily injured.
It wasn't until Kosma stopped moving and stood still to carefully examine himself that he widened his eyes in astonishment, discovering that the severe injuries he had sustained in battle had almost completely healed due to the move Ren Amamiya had executed with Persona Arsene!
"This move is called Diarahan. It can greatly recover sustained injuries. It's a new skill I mastered from Griseo's scroll!"
Gazing at Kosma, whose battle wounds had completely healed and who was now looking at him with an expression of surprise, Ren Amamiya nodded in satisfaction.
While explaining to Kosma, Persona Arsene, floating in mid-air behind Ren Amamiya, very appropriately raised its wrist, and a soft, warm white light once again overflowed from its sharp black claws.
Healing-type skills were originally Ren Amamiya's weakest area.
Even with Hare, a partner skilled in healing and recovery skills, tutoring him, Ren Amamiya had only learned the most basic Dia skill.
However, through the skill scroll created by Griseo, Ren Amamiya had directly skipped learning Diarama, which moderately recovered the target's HP, and mastered Diarahan, a skill that could completely recover the target's HP.
Although in the real world, Diarahan certainly couldn't fully restore damaged HP in one go as it did in the game, it could still significantly recover the target's injuries.
After receiving the healing from the [Diarahan] skill used by Ren Amamiya's Persona Arsene, Kosma's injuries healed completely at a visible rate. Ren Amamiya himself knew best how terrifying the full power he had just used was.
To be able to instantly restore Kosma's state to its peak, his healing output was already on par with Hare's.
"But the Persona copied by Griseo's skill scroll... seems to be Veliona? I remember, didn't you say you don't know healing skills?"
When the skill scroll transformed into light and merged into his heart, Ren Amamiya could somewhat sense which Persona's skill in his heart it had copied.
The source Persona for the [Diarahan] skill scroll was clearly Veliona, who had once claimed she didn't know healing skills.
Therefore, after using Kosma as a target to test the power of the Diarahan skill, Ren Amamiya couldn't help but ask Veliona within his heart with some confusion.
[...I indeed don't know healing skills, I haven't even used them once. But that doesn't mean I can't learn to use healing abilities. I just never practiced those healing moves.]
After a long silence, Veliona responded to Ren Amamiya with some irritation in her voice.
What Veliona used was the power of the Stigmata of Death.
Reversing the darkness of death yields the light of creation.
Veliona theoretically could heal others, but she had never done so, nor was there anyone worthy of Veliona doing so—before Ren Amamiya infiltrated Seele's Palace, Veliona had always protected Seele very well, never letting her get injured even in the world of the Sea of Quanta.
It was only recently, after Veliona was subdued by Ren Amamiya as a Persona, that she idly explored the method of reversing the power of death into the power of creation. As a result, the method of using the power of creation was inexplicably copied by the skill scroll Griseo created.
Of course, as for why Veliona started practicing the method of reversing the power of death into the power of creation, the stubborn her naturally refused to reveal even a shred of it.
"I see. Griseo's scrolls can not only copy skills that Personas have already mastered but can even copy skills that haven't been fully learned yet... It seems I have one more reason to subdue Personas."
After deeply realizing what Griseo meant to him, Ren Amamiya's gaze towards the petite figure of the blue-haired little painter before him couldn't help but become even more fervent.
By subduing different Personas and using Griseo's skill scrolls to copy each Persona's most outstanding skills and paste them onto Persona Arsene.
Ren Amamiya could very well cultivate Arsene into the strongest Persona, creating an omnipotent, flawless Arsene deity with all-attribute reflection!
But for now, Ren Amamiya temporarily couldn't accommodate any more Personas.
He had to return to the Kaslana Palace and ask Kaslana to upgrade the capacity of his inner Persona slots.
"I should leave. I'll visit again next time with interesting gifts... Higokumaru, let's go."
He had stayed in the Elysian Realm long enough, and his gains were very substantial.
It was time to leave Mementos and return to the real world.
After bidding farewell to Griseo and Kosma, Ren Amamiya called out to Higokumaru beside him and turned to return in the direction he came from.
A gate of light, glowing with a blue luminescence, opened before Ren Amamiya.
When Ren Amamiya stepped into the blue light, his vision suddenly plunged into familiar darkness, returning once again to that dark prison of the Velvet Room.
"Lord God, please send me back to the real world."
Ren Amamiya looked up and requested Philemon, the god of unconsciousness who was silently watching him in the darkness.
This time, no golden butterflies danced around Ren Amamiya.
Ren Amamiya merely blinked, and he felt a force pull him out of his original space.
When he opened his eyes again and looked around intently, Ren Amamiya found himself in a magnificent lounge, with a luxurious and expensive-looking red sofa occupying the most prominent position.
Not far from the lounge, in the hall, a mechanical device full of sci-fi style floated in the very center of the hall, emitting a faint blue eerie glow, and a low hum, like precision instruments operating, could be vaguely heard.
"Is that the device sealing the Velvet Room..."
At first glance, Ren Amamiya recognized the true function of that blue mechanical device.
If you asked why, Ren Amamiya could clearly, through the obstruction of that blue mechanical device, vaguely sense the aura of Persona Kosma in that space called the Elysian Realm, located in the deepest part of Mementos.
"If I destroy this device, would I be able to liberate the Velvet Room from the evil god's seal..."
Gazing at the continuously operating blue mechanical device, Ren Amamiya couldn't help but murmur thoughtfully, beginning to consider it seriously.
If he destroyed this mechanical device that the evil god used to seal the Velvet Room in the real world, perhaps Ren Amamiya could freely enter and exit the Velvet Room from any corner of the real world according to his own will, without needing the evil god's permission.
[.....!!!]
Elysian Realm, within the Painter's Dream.
As Ren Amamiya left, the connection between Kosma and Ren Amamiya grew increasingly faint.
A data-simulated memory form was, after all, different from a true Stigmata Ideal Form. Kosma couldn't observe the situation Ren Amamiya faced all the time like Veliona could.
Only when Ren Amamiya was in a place like the lounge, which served as a liminal space between the Elysian Realm and the real world, could Kosma barely receive information from Ren Amamiya's side.
However, when Kosma observed Ren Amamiya looking at the Elysian Realm's teleportation device and contemplating whether to destroy it, he instantly froze.
Although he desperately wanted to stop Ren Amamiya's actions immediately, he momentarily even forgot what he should say, frantically trying to organize his words to stop Ren Amamiya in his mind.
[I...]
"...Forget it. Destroying the evil god's believer strongholds in the real world doesn't matter. But if I destroy the Velvet Room's seal, the evil god might immediately fall out with me. It's best to keep things as they are."
Just as Kosma opened his mouth, intending to speak out and stop Ren Amamiya from destroying the Elysian Realm device, Ren Amamiya himself gently shook his head, proactively abandoning the idea of destroying the sealing device.
"Hmm? Kosma, is something wrong?"
Hearing Kosma's voice echo in his heart, Ren Amamiya looked up with some confusion, asking Kosma, who had only uttered a single syllable.
[...No, it's nothing.]
Kosma started to speak but then stopped, ultimately saying nothing.
Anyway, Ren Amamiya had already given up on destroying the teleportation device, so there was no need for him to say anything more.
In the deepest part, Aponia, who had been silently observing Ren Amamiya's actions, also felt her heart pound violently at this sudden destructive idea from Ren Amamiya.
Although the destruction of the teleportation device in the Elysian Realm's main hall wouldn't have a major impact on the Elysian Realm's continued existence, it would inevitably cause some data anomalies in the Elysian Realm, requiring a certain Elysian Realm administrator to work overtime to maintain and repair the bugs.
"He seems to call the Elysian Realm... specifically, the deepest part, the Velvet Room."
Vill-V wasn't frightened by Ren Amamiya's wild ideas. Instead, she rubbed her chin and showed a joyful smile, like seeing a kindred spirit.
As the designer of the Elysian Realm, Vill-V knew its functions best, knowing that the impact of destroying the teleportation device on the Elysian Realm was very limited.
In fact, she had secretly kept more than one or two emergency teleportation device backdoor programs, ensuring that an accident with the teleportation device wouldn't affect the Elysian Realm's operation.
Besides, Vill-V had thought more than once back in the Previous Era about bombing the Fire Moth base into the sky or relocating it, to perform a shocking grand magic show that would astound the world.
Therefore, Vill-V believed she could very well understand Ren Amamiya's feelings and thoughts. She even began to analyze with keen interest the information contained in Ren Amamiya's words just now.
"I once read the name [Velvet Room] in a novel. The novel's name was 'The Masque of the Red Death.' The novel's setting consisted of seven rooms, metaphorically representing the different life stages of a human being, from childhood to youth, from youth to old age. And the meaning of [Velvet Room] is [approaching death]."
"[Approaching death], Aponia, don't you think this is very fitting for your current situation?"
A look of keen interest appeared in Vill-V's pink and white gradient pupils. She spoke to Aponia beside her in an impassioned tone.
"There is only one being sealed in the deepest part, and we both know who that person is. I once said that your current state is no different from death. But if we really have to find half a living person in the current Elysian Realm... undoubtedly, compared to Mobius, who is trying every means to regain life and leave the Elysian Realm, you, who have completely integrated your spirit and consciousness into the Elysian Realm, fit this definition better."
During the period when the Previous Era was coming to an end, Aponia ultimately chose to entrust Vill-V to integrate her consciousness into the space of the Elysian Realm.
Unlike the other twelve Flame-Chasers, although Aponia also existed in the Elysian Realm space in a manner similar to a memory form, she was not a replica created from Flame-Chaser memories, but her genuine self.
As a MANTIS specializing in spiritual perception, Aponia's spiritual strength was extremely resilient. Even after tens of thousands of years, her consciousness was still in a [half-dead, half-alive] state.
If Ren Amamiya truly destroyed the Elysian Realm and then used some method to extract Aponia's consciousness, and transferred Aponia's consciousness to a suitable vessel or medium, then Aponia could theoretically achieve the great feat of walking the earth again after fifty thousand years!
"Aponia, do you really not remember who he is? Unafraid of the deepest part, even calling you Lord God, trying every means, devotedly wanting to save you from this state no different from death, wanting to break the seal for you so you can revive, granting you a second life... Although he's wearing a mask, you wouldn't really not remember who this person so devout to you is, would you?"
Facing Vill-V's well-evidenced inquiry, Aponia remained silent with her eyes lowered. However, her fair hands, clasped in a prayer-like gesture before her chest, like her turbulent emotions, unconsciously tightened to the extreme.
Could it be, I really know this Phantom Thief, and we have a close relationship?
Is it just that due to some unknown reason, such as the impact of fusing with the Elysian Realm on my consciousness, I've lost a part of my memory???