After what felt like an eternity of waiting—or rather, being forced to wait, because time in this place always seemed to move backward—my ears were finally graced with the sound of hurried footsteps. Rushing, as if chased by a debt collector, or perhaps, yes, a real monster. Who else could it be but them? It didn’t take a genius to figure it out.

A moment later, the door hissed open, revealing the figures I had already anticipated. How ’surprised’ I was. Without preamble or unnecessary theatrics, I immediately averted my gaze—attempting to feign indifference, though a slight, strange flutter stirred in my mind.

Seriously, is this for real?

There, standing in the faintly smoking doorway, was Selene. Selene, the scrawny one, who somehow always managed to possess the curves and bust of a supermodel. And she... she was carrying Azalea. Azalea, who, from a quick glance at her physical build, was clearly heavier than Selene herself. Gods, and the way she was carrying her, too—in that ’princess’ style, a bridal carry? It was painfully obvious Selene was struggling, trembling with every joint, like an old tree caught in a hurricane, though she stubbornly tried to hide it. What a drama queen.

What in the world was this supposed to mean?

My eyes scanned the entire ’performance’ before me, pausing for a moment on a more interesting detail. And how ’impressed’ I was when my gaze landed on a dark red stain seeping from the side of Azalea’s waistline.

A stab wound.... oh no.

"Don’t, d-don’t be shocked yet. Th-this... the important thing is, get Azalea safe first," Selene’s voice rasped, barely audible, cutting off my internal monologue before I could even voice it. She stammered, her breath ragged, as if Azalea’s weight was truly so immense that she couldn’t even speak normally. A ridiculous sight.

Selene then began to walk, stumbling like a sack of potatoes trying to escape, heading towards the rehabilitation cot that had already been prepared. For a moment, I wondered if she’d collapse halfway and drop her ’burden.’

She dragged her feet closer, finally depositing Azalea onto the empty cot. That cot, no less, was precisely to my left. As if it had been specifically set up for this dramatic show.

My precious necklace.

I glanced at it, then at Selene. She looked at me, her eyes, usually sharp, now blurry and filled with extreme exhaustion. "

You... you already know, don’t you?" she whispered, her voice almost fading.

No explanation. No details.

Just a rhetorical question hanging in the air, as if I were some psychic who knew everything that transpired while they were gone. Or maybe she was just too tired for pleasantries.

Idiot. Of course, I knew. Who else could leave behind a trail of chaos this obvious?

I didn’t care about her dying condition or her idiotic question. I just stared at the necklace for a moment, then looked up at Azalea. The girl, who should have been the victim, actually looked... confused.

Her eyes, usually bright, were now vacant, darting around as if she had just woken up in a strange place.

This was odd.

I still remembered how, just a while ago, she herself had detected Selene’s soul partially imprinting on hers—a crazy energy transfer that only a desperate, high-level mage could attempt. How could she now look as if she had just fallen from the sky?

Is she perhaps suffering from amnesia?

I thought, a hypothesis too troublesome to entertain. If that were the case, this would be more complicated than I’d imagined. Why did there always have to be additional drama like this?

I let out an irritated scoff.

Alright. Enough with the drama.

Selene, still sitting like a wax figure, didn’t respond.

Good.

At least she knew when to shut up after ranting like a maniac as*hole.

I ignored Selene completely.

My priority right now wasn’t queenly drama or feigned surprise. There was a problem I needed to resolve.

"You," I called out coldly to Azalea. "Come closer."

Azalea blinked slowly, like a robot running out of battery.

"Yes."

She tried to lift her hand, then let it fall limply again. It was clear she didn’t even have the energy to move on her own. So utterly useless.

I sighed, again. Truly, this was adding to my workload. With efficient strides, I approached the cot, ignoring Selene still slumped on the floor.

My hand extended, not to help, but to begin the diagnostic process.

I held my palm over Azalea’s forehead, allowing a slight flow of my energy to probe into her core. Not for healing. Only for reading.

Data flooded in. Fragmentation. Chaos.

Most of her short-term memories were gone. Key information regarding the battle, Selene’s previous whereabouts, even Arthur’s identity—all vanished. Empty.

Amnesia.

I pulled my hand back roughly. The diagnosis was clear: she was suffering from amnesia. Not surprising. Such a massive energy surge, a forced soul transfer, coupled with her dying physical state—it was the perfect recipe for scrambling someone’s memory.

Again, unnecessary drama.

"Excellent," I muttered sarcastically, perhaps directed at Selene, or perhaps at the entire universe that seemed to enjoy complicating my life.

"Now we have an amnesiac brat on our hands. So helpful."

Selene merely let out a soft groan, as if my sarcastic comment added to her immense burden.

"You are the worst, as usual."

"Oh, really? So who put me to this trouble in the first place then?"

I didn’t care about their suffering. I only had one task now: to clean up this mess. And Azalea, with her fragmented memories, was a crucial part of that mess.

Restoring memories wasn’t easy, especially memories lost due to high-level energy trauma. But I wasn’t just any ordinary mage who could only recite spells. I had my own methods. Methods that other mages wouldn’t understand or approve of.

I looked at Azalea, analyzing her energy profile. She was indeed amnesiac, but that didn’t mean her data was entirely lost. The memories were there, just... out of place. Scattered. Like a book with torn and disorganized pages.

"Azalea, please listen to me." I said flatly.

"I’m going to do something that might feel strange. Don’t fight it."

"I know you have no idea on who I am, but it doesn’t matter right now."

Of course, she wouldn’t fight. She could barely even blink.

Lobotomy Healing Diagnostics...

A name I’d personally coined, much to the discomfort of those who preferred their magic to sound less... invasive.

It was a technique only accessible to the most skilled Aetherflow users, allowing me to directly penetrate and manipulate the very fundamental energy patterns of a soul.

Essentially, I could ’rewrite’ damaged neurological pathways, or more precisely, ’re-attach’ lost memory fragments right back to where they belonged.

A precise, brutal art of reconstruction, using a scalpel of pure Aetherflow.

And how did I know what to do?

Simple. I had stored a portion of Azalea’s energy. During the battle earlier, when she was blindly expending her power, I had ’taken’ a small part of her energy core—just as a ’backup’ or ’sample,’ in case it proved useful later. It was an old habit. Always prepare backup data.

That energy, which I had kept in one of my most stable storage crystals, was the blueprint of her soul. It carried the imprints, the energy fingerprints, and even the resonance of Azalea’s memories before everything shattered.

With that blueprint, I could trace and retrieve the lost fragments, reassembling them into their original places, as if putting together shattered glass using its original pattern.

My hand rose again, this time not to her forehead, but to Azalea’s chest, directly over her heart, where her energy core pulsed weakly. I closed my eyes for a moment, activating the crystal in my hand, feeling the invisible resonance between the energy sample and Azalea’s body.

The process would be painful for Azalea, no doubt. Perhaps she would convulse, perhaps she would scream. But I didn’t care. This was the fastest way. And I didn’t have time for drama.

I began to manipulate. Azalea’s chaotic energy pathways felt like tangled threads beneath my touch. I didn’t care about the feelings of ’kindness’ or ’gentleness’ that other mages might possess. I only cared about efficiency. These memories needed to return. Azalea needed to function again. There was no place for memory-impaired individuals in this ’game.’

The energy flow began to work, coursing from the crystal in my hand into Azalea’s body, seeking out gaps, pulling fragments, reorienting the incorrect patterns. A rough, efficient, and utterly unempathetic process. This was pure science, not sentimental magic.

I felt a slight resistance from her fragile soul, a desperate flicker attempting to repel my intervention. But it wasn’t enough. I pushed harder, asserting my will, forcing the memories back into their rightful paths.

Let her feel the pain. That just meant it was working.

Sooner, the neural pathways began to reform.

his was tricky, but at least I could certainly say it’s easier than my previous life as a pulmonologist, low-key hiding knowledge I had attained as a lung specialist.

That Earthly life had been a tedious charade.

Every cough, every wheeze, every cryptic shadow on an X-ray film was a direct challenge to my self-imposed ignorance. I’d perfected diagnostics, capable of pinpointing obscure ailments with a glance, only to feign uncertainty.

Imagine consulting memorized textbooks, hesitating over symptoms I understood instinctively. It was exhausting, this constant mental filter, this self-imposed handicap. And infuriatingly boring. This, at least, engaged my full intellect.

No need to dumb down my abilities.

Here, my skills were directly applicable. I wasn’t hiding a thing; I was embracing my full capabilities. Manipulating Azalea’s energy pathways, untangling her fractured mind, felt like a complex, satisfying puzzle.

Far more intricate than a bronchial biopsy, more impactful than prescribing antibiotics. This wasn’t just physical repair; it was an architectural reconstruction of her very essence.

A slight shudder ran through Azalea.

A whimper, barely audible, escaped her lips.

Good.

That meant the pressure was building, the fragmented pieces resisting before snapping into place. Chaos fighting order, and order always won under my command.

No, this new existence, despite its constant threats, was infinitely preferable. No archaic ethics committees, no tedious peer reviews, no bureaucratic red tape. Just raw power, precise application, and tangible results.

For someone who valued efficiency and directness, this was the ultimate validation. Azalea’s twitching fingers, her shallow, quickening breaths – they were proof. Proof that chaos was being tamed, the broken made whole.

And I, Kairi, was the one wielding the hammer.