The moment Ren died, a window began floating up before my eyes.
The kind of window that appears when you defeat a boss and obtain that boss's soul had appeared.
"Why is this..."
Why had this appeared?
I had not even sealed Ren's spirit power, so I had no idea why her soul had come out.
"Wait a second."
No, maybe there was one possibility.
Ren had absorbed my Dark Souls and become a being similar to Gael.
And the one who had killed that Ren was none other than me.
If that was the case, and if the barrier Samael had cast was some kind of Fog Wall, with Ren serving as the boss of that Fog Wall?
Then that would explain why Ren's soul had appeared.
So then, what should I do with this soul?
If I used it right away, I would probably obtain a weapon related to Ren's angel.
But rather than that kind of personal increase in strength, there had to be another use for this soul.
"There may still be a chance."
"...What?"
Yes, there might still be a chance.
Even though Ren was dead, if I used the spirit power contained in this soul, reviving her would not be impossible.
And just in time, the Fire Keeper had come here too, so all the conditions were at least met.
Whether this soul could truly bring Ren back was uncertain, but it was still worth trying.
"Sachi."
"...Yes, noble one."
"From now on, I'm going to try reviving Ren. Will you help me?"
I approached the Fire Keeper and asked for her help.
This wasn't something I could do alone; it required the Fire Keeper too.
"If that is the noble one's wish."
Fortunately, the Fire Keeper also agreed to revive Ren.
Without delay, I obtained Ren's soul and held it in my hand.
Wuuung-!
Unlike the other spirits' souls, Ren's soul resonated with a dark violet glow.
That faint vibration spread outward and drew everyone's attention.
"Hieta, that is..."
"Ren's soul."
"...What? Ren's soul?"
"Yes."
Itsuka-kun stared at me with an expression of disbelief.
Rinne and Mayuri were the same, but soon anticipation began to appear on their faces.
"From here on, I'm going to use this to revive Ren."
"Can you really do that?"
At the commander’s question, asked as if warning me not to give false hope, I shook my head.
"Whether it can be done or not, we'll find out now."
It was my first time trying to revive a dead spirit with a spirit soul, so I didn't know whether it would work.
Even if a spirit was created, like with Rio, another child might be born between Ren and Itsuka-kun.
But even that would be proof that Ren had remained in this world.
"I'll begin."
With that, I closed my eyes and concentrated, drawing my focus to its limit.
I moved the soul within my body and covered the crystal made of spirit power that I held in my hand.
It was called a soul, but what was inside it was not soul but spirit power, so the two repelled each other and resisted.
"Noble one, I'll hold your hand."
The Fire Keeper gently placed her hand over mine and activated her power, and the resistance slowly began to subside.
Once that resistance disappeared, it was my turn again.
At a pace neither too fast nor too slow, I covered the soul and formed a body.
I had already seen Ren's body before, and if I formed it similarly, it would take on Ren's appearance, so I built it without the slightest hesitation.
With only the sound of sweat dripping from my forehead to the floor, my and the Fire Keeper's concentration rose to its peak.
Shaaa-!
At last, the formation of the body was complete, and Ren's shape began to gradually reveal itself.
"Noble one, now."
At the Fire Keeper's signal from beside me, I shattered Ren's soul.
Kwaa-ching-!
With a sound like glass breaking, spirit power tried to flow into my body.
I pushed it back by making it repel against the soul and sealed it into Ren's body.
"Noble one, take your hand away now!"
Following the Fire Keeper's words, I pulled my hand out of Ren's body, and the space my hand had occupied began to fill in, until Ren's body was completed.
"...Is it, over?"
"Not yet. Not yet."
Itsuka-kun seemed to want it to be over, but it wasn't finished yet.
Only when the spirit power inside that body properly adapted and Ren opened her eyes could it be called complete.
"Phew..."
"It will work out, noble one."
"...I hope so."
The Fire Keeper and I had both done our best, but there was no guarantee the result wouldn't be failure.
So the tension we felt didn't easily go away.
“…….”
In the silence, everyone stared at Ren's body with tense eyes, but Ren herself did not move at all.
'Could it have failed?'
Just as the thought that it might have failed began to occupy my mind and the tension was about to grow even stronger—
Sssss-!
Ren's body began to change.
"...Huh?"
I had clearly formed the body to match Ren's original appearance, so why was it suddenly changing?
My head couldn't keep up with the sudden change, and I was flustered when—
Ren's body changed into that of a small child, about Yoshino's age.
"W-where..."
Then she opened her eyes and looked around, confused about where she was.
"Ren...?"
"...Looks like I accidentally gave her something to worry about."
"Ren!!!"
Though it was clumsy, Itsuka-kun hugged her tightly and cried at the fact that Ren had come back to life.
*****
After everyone took a moment to calm down, everyone except the young lady gathered in the [Fraxinus] lounge and talked.
"Wow, I really didn't expect myself to get younger like this."
Ren looked around with curiosity, her gaze fixed on objects that seemed larger because she had become smaller.
As she looked around, she soon noticed me and bowed her head.
"Hmm?"
"Thank you, Higakieta Hae. Thanks to you, I was able to come back out into the world from that despair."
"Ren, what are you talking about? Despair...?"
Itsuka-kun questioned Ren's words, and since I also didn't understand what she meant, I just listened quietly as she explained.
Because of the Dark Souls she had absorbed from me, her mind had nearly been swallowed by darkness, but she had been holding on thanks to the spirit power of the other spirits.
However, when Itsuka-kun sealed Ren's spirit power, he also took the other spirits' spirit power with it, and in an instant the tug-of-war that had been balanced tipped to one side, allowing the Dark Souls to consume Ren.
After that, whenever I fought the now-dead Ren, she had been feeling tremendous despair.
The helplessness of being unable to do anything, the self-hatred and guilt of seeing the people she loved get hurt because of her.
Those negative emotions began to gnaw at her even more, accelerating her despair, and that allowed the Dark Souls to consume her faster.
"In that situation, you killed me and freed me from that despair."
"You're not resenting me for killing you."
"I may call myself a villain, but I'm not shameless enough to blame someone else for what happened because of me. And thanks to you, I got younger, but I still came back to life, didn't I?"
She shrugged as she said that, and I let out a dry laugh.
She was saying all that in a child’s body, so it felt like a kid trying to imitate an adult.
"Now for the main point, Ren. Why did you try to kill Shido?"
Now that Ren had come back to life, the commander asked about her original purpose.
Because of that question, the atmosphere instantly grew cold, and everyone focused on Ren.
"Well, that's because..."
According to Ren's explanation, she was a spirit born from the hatred of the spirit of origin.
Fearing Ren, who had been born from her own hatred, the spirit of origin had immediately sealed her in darkness.
After spending thirty years in that state, she slipped out through the gap created when Itsuka-kun altered history to save Tobiichi, and in the process she tried to kill Itsuka-kun in order to interfere with the spirit of origin's objective.
"What's that person's objective?"
"I don't know the details either. I only know that she cherishes Itsuka Shido."
"Eh, me?"
Itsuka-kun pointed to himself in surprise at the completely unexpected remark, and Ren nodded as if it were obvious.
"Then why did she love Shido?"
"Because, in the first place, I was born from the same kind of spirit as Rinne, so it was my fate to end up loving Shido. I wanted to kill Shido, but I loved him even more than that."
Ren, looking relieved after pouring everything out, now gave off a lighter atmosphere than before.
"If that's the case, isn't something strange?"
"Question. Mayuri should be the same, but instead of Shido, she loves Hae."
The Yamai sisters asked that question to Ren.
"Well, I don't know everything either."
Ren seemed to have no real answer for that reason.
So everyone's gaze fell on Mayuri, and she said it as if it were nothing at all.
"Maybe it's because there are more girls who like Hae than Shido."
"Come to think of it, when Mayuri first appeared, there were more spirits who had been won over by Hiki than by Shido."
Thinking about it, that was true.
For some reason, even though Itsuka-kun was supposed to be the first one to try winning them over, I had more successful conquests.
I had just never paid much attention to that ironic situation, so I hadn't realized it until now.
"Well, leaving that aside. Reine. Do we have the results?"
After figuring out both Ren's reason for trying to kill Itsuka-kun and the reason she had loved him, the commander asked Murasame-san that question.
Before Ren came to the lounge, she had been given a physical examination just in case, so it was about time for the results.
"...They’re in. First, there’s nothing wrong with her body. Her spirit power is intact too, and the thing Hiki calls a soul is forming her body, so she won't disappear anymore."
"Then why did she get younger?"
"...Because she had too little spirit power. The god sealed her spirit power, and the remaining residue was absurdly small. She'll probably return to normal in a few days."
"That's a relief."
"What a shame~ I kind of like Ren in this form too~"
Ren was relieved that she wouldn't have to live like that forever, while Miku looked disappointed.
I was thinking that was pretty serious in its own way, but Ren's expression didn't look very good.
To put it another way, I could feel a bit of discomfort toward Murasame-san hidden behind her otherwise unconcerned expression.
I didn't really know why, but I figured it might be because she was a stranger.
Jiiing-!
"Mama!!!"
Rio ran into the lounge and threw herself into Rinne's arms.
"Rio?"
"Oh! It's Aunt Ren!"
"......"
The moment she saw Ren, Rio called her Aunt Ren.
That made Ren completely freeze.
Last time, she had startled the commander by calling him Uncle, too.
"Aunt Ren?"
"A-aunt..."
"Ahaha, Rio. Let's call her big sister instead of aunt."
"Okaaay!"
While Rinne patted Rio's head and called her cute for answering so energetically, Ren, who had gone blank, kept repeating the same words and radiating a gloomy atmosphere.
"Ren, Rio probably didn't mean it on purpose. Cheer up."
Itsuka-kun approached Ren and tried to comfort her.
That, I think, was not a very good choice.
"...I know that too, Shido. But human feelings don't always go the way you want, do they?"
"Ahaha, that's true. Anyway, I'm glad you're back."
"...Yeah, I guess it is."
Well, I guess it's one of those situations where if it's good, then it's good.
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