The Speedrun Manual of Miss Witch - Chapter 277

Buzz——

The lingering impact of the shocking scene before her, and the vibration of the sandbox, quickly brought Imogen back to her senses.

She quickly took out the mini sandbox and glanced at it, her heart sinking slightly.

Imogen looked up at the young girl who was still bowing and taking her final curtain call before the mountain of corpses and sea of blood. In the end, she held back and didn’t interrupt.

Only after the young girl finished her curtain call did Imogen step forward and say, “Your Excellency Ciel… that commotion just now… someone has ‘woken up’…”

“Oh.” Ciel slowly lowered her hands, turned to look at Imogen, and said, “Who?”

Ciel’s voice was calm, as if it didn’t matter who “woke up”—it would have no effect on her at all.

Perhaps due to digesting the “Melody Master” potion, Ciel’s voice sounded even more ethereal and moving, as if just her normal speaking voice had several layers of audio tracks.

“Erigma, the Pope of the Church of the God of Order.” Imogen’s gaze swept over Ciel’s lowered hands. She quickly said, “Should we leave…?”

She noticed Ciel’s hands. The knuckles of those hands seemed to have elongated, and her fingers had become so slender that they looked uncanny at first glance.

In addition, Imogen could also see extra fingers growing on those hands… A very harmonious new finger had grown on each hand…

As expected… it hadn’t been fully digested. The potion’s erosion had already appeared, though the degree of erosion didn’t seem very deep.

“Why leave?” Ciel smiled faintly and said, “Didn’t you want to know how ‘Uniqueness’ is integrated?”

“The answer is with Erigma.”

Imogen: “!”

“With Erigma?” Imogen realized that the young lady before her seemed to truly be about to give her some information.

“You’ve already seen Mond’s memories. You should know what the Church of the God of Order is doing.” Ciel said.

“‘Artificial Divinity’?” Imogen murmured, “Is that… the answer?”

“No,” Ciel shook her head and said with a smile, “The Other Side node beneath the Church of the God of Order, the creature behind that Other Side node, is the key.”

“My ‘Uniqueness’ was integrated with the help of Them.”

The Other Side…

Imogen’s thoughts raced. She looked at Ciel for a long time in silence, then slowly said, “Thank you for informing me, Your Excellency… We will forever remember this kindness.”

“Please forgive me for not being able to stay here with you. I must inform that esteemed individual of this news immediately…”

“Please accept this small thank-you gift. It is a symbol of the Society of Merriment’s friendship.”

“As for the subsequent reconstitution rituals and potions, I will also have someone send them to you as promised, as soon as possible.”

Imogen reached out and took a bright pink, gold-edged invitation from her robe. She handed the invitation to Ciel with both hands.

Ciel reached out and took the invitation. The moment she held the invitation, Imogen’s figure began to dissipate. As the dissipation reached her face, the disguise on her face also vanished.

As expected, there was a disguise.

With just a final glance, Ciel had already memorized Imogen’s original appearance—Imogen seemed to have no intention of hiding it from Ciel at the last moment anyway.

For people of the Society of Merriment, the moment they revealed their true appearance, the threat was significantly reduced.

A face is a symbol of identity. No one can live in this world without leaving any trace. If one wants to investigate, in the transcendent world, anything is possible.

Friendship of the Society of Merriment?

Ciel looked at the brightly colored, exceedingly flashy invitation in her hand. The wax seal on it, in red, looked exactly like a smiling face.

Ciel tucked the invitation into her pocket and turned to walk backstage.

The moment Imogen said she didn’t want to make a big commotion and wake up the Tier 4s, Ciel had already decided to make a big fuss to embarrass Imogen.

She just hadn’t expected that with only about three thousand people dead, Imogen would lose control of the situation… This was indeed quite unexpected for Ciel.

Although she hadn’t seen other “Nightmares” who had advanced step by step, Imogen’s ability gave Ciel a very strong sense of déjà vu.

Imogen very likely transitioned from Tier 3 “Subverter” to Tier 4 “Nightmare.”

Otherwise, a mere “Nightmare” would probably find it very difficult to achieve such a large-scale subconscious modification. The “Listener” path’s greatest strength is its one-on-one influence.

Including the “animal town” incident Imogen mentioned before, Imogen had been merely an observer from beginning to end. After giving everyone a “setting” through “subconscious modification,” she simply observed their performance.

With this incident added, Ciel could almost confirm that Imogen’s ability to modify subconsciousness on a large scale had a significant flaw.

That is, it cannot withstand external interference.

Once external interference occurs, even a slight disturbance by a hand on a marionette’s string could cause the marionette to become aware.

Creating detailed and perfect “settings” and having the “actors” follow those settings step by step towards their demise—that was the true horror of Imogen.

The potion given by the “esteemed individual” Imogen mentioned was merely to prevent higher-tier transcendents, who were more easily awakened, from waking up prematurely.

If she didn’t have 【Calm Mind】 and the system panel, she might have suffered the same fate.

Ciel left the Royal Opera House backstage. Only after getting into the carriage did she slowly breathe a sigh of relief.

At least, she knew how to break Imogen’s ability.

Create a commotion, the bigger the better, to wake up more transcendents.

When it came to creating commotion, Ciel had some experience.

Ciel did not go straight home. Instead, she first went to the Prime Minister’s residence, picked up Avena and Tara, and brought them back to her own house. Incidentally, she also had the maids invite Adele and Amy over.

There was still some time left in the simulation. It was foreseeable that there would be considerable unrest in the city, and Ciel did not want this unrest to affect them.

After Erigma was awakened, she quickly awakened the other transcendents. The first to be awakened was Charles.

Being tricked by the Society of Merriment in Ansu City enraged Charles—he had originally intended to fully implement his ambitions in Ansu after Forte’s death, but after waking from his grand dream, he was left with a mess.

There was no “Nightmare” in Ansu City strong enough to simultaneously correct everyone’s memories. They could only violently dismantle the hallucinogen emitters in the city one by one, and then prepare to deal with the troublesome aftermath.

Explaining to the people of Ansu City why they were wearing women’s clothing… that was indeed a troublesome matter.