Shinji Ikari, returned from Warhammer

Fate is something that can be rewritten by human beings.

“But SEELE still refused to speak,” said Fuyutsuki Yukizo.

"The Human Instrumentality Project is our common goal. Since they haven't spoken up, it means they still won't interfere with our plans," Gendo Ikari said.

The seven blood-red stone tablets before him represented the remaining six members of the Human Completion Committee, excluding himself. All the tablets glowed with a blood-red light, proving that they were not dead after fourteen years. They simply refused to speak with him.

"Ikari, are you going to use Unit-03 this time?" Fuyutsuki Yukizo stood behind him.

However, Gendo Ikari continued to gaze at the floating stone monument above his head. Fuyutsuki Yukizo felt no sense of being ignored, for he knew that Gendo Ikari had now lost all human emotions.

"It doesn't matter, I'll just go with your plan." Fuyutsuki Yukizo looked out the window, a little sentimental... It was also for Yui's sake.

In the Central Dogma District, on the platform where the lights were off, Shinji Ikari had not left.

Gendo Ikari's attitude did not make Shinji Ikari uncomfortable. A lion will not care about the barking of wild dogs; if it is just unwarranted violence, it is no different from depravity.

Gendo Ikari even thought that it wasn't so bad that he still looked the same as he did fourteen years ago, and Shinji Ikari wanted to see what kind of surprise he could bring him.

Because the domain of Unit-00 reversed and unfolded, it successfully created ripples on the Dirac Sea. Or rather, it successfully opened a door for Shinji Ikari's physical body to pass through, thus extending the time to arrive in the parallel world to two days. If the domain were to be forcibly used to reject the repulsive force of the world, the time could even be delayed by two to four times.

Shinji Ikari wasn't in a hurry at this point; he had plenty of time.

He pulled a pure black metal card from his pocket. It was a piece of pure metal, with no exposed chip or magnetic stripe. Shinji Ikari ran his fingers across the surface of the card, feeling the subtle texture.

This is Shinji Ikari's identity card. Essentially, this parallel world and his own world are connected in some ways. Before coming here, he specifically went to the MAGI server room in the Central Dogma District to have it make him a special, enhanced version of his identity card.

Once you arrive at this world's NERV with this enhanced version of the identity card, the terrifying corrosive power of your former self, the Terror Angel, will be unleashed. As a new MAGI, the Terror Angel can easily paralyze the MAGI computer system of this parallel world.

This allows Shinji Ikari to reach the deepest console without hindrance, manually modify the core command library, and regain control of MAGI.

Rather than trying every means to get an explanation from an enemy or old friend, it's better to just let the question bank that stores the test papers tell you the answers.

Shinji Ikari, who was located in the Central Dogmatic District, did not have to go far to reach the server room where MAGI was stored.

But just as Shinji Ikari was about to arrive, he saw a small room, barely a few square meters in size, built from discarded building materials at the crossroads. Next to the room was a much larger bookshelf.

The outline of a girl's body was vaguely visible behind the yellow curtains. Shinji Ikari was certain of her identity without any hesitation.

Rei. Rei Ayanami.

Shinji Ikari's eyes narrowed slightly. He didn't go around or go straight in. He watched the figure behind the curtain change his clothes before approaching the narrow room.

"Is it convenient for me to come in?" Shinji Ikari asked, gently tapping the steel pipe supporting the room with his left hand.

“You’re already in,” Rei Ayanami said softly.

Inside the dimly lit room, Rei Ayanami, dressed in a black combat suit, silently watched the figure standing in the doorway, showing no particular surprise. She sensed someone approaching, but the other person didn't bother to make their footsteps quiet. He gave her the feeling of a robber, only politely knocking before entering, but regardless of her response, he would come in.

160: It's too late, organism

Upon entering the room, Shinji Ikari finally took a serious look at his surroundings.

Clothes carelessly discarded outside the door, sticky notes stuck on the door, and underwear piled high on the bed with changes of clothes and stained with yellowish-brown stains—the entire room's environment made Shinji Ikari feel as if he had returned to the situation when he first visited Rei Ayanami.

And in the very center of the room was Rei Ayanami.

She stood ramrod straight by the bed, dressed in a black combat suit, as rigid as a wooden stake. Her beautiful face, devoid of any emotion, evoked a slight sense of nostalgia in Shinji. But because of her indifferent crimson eyes, when Shinji met her gaze, he felt as if he were looking at a puppet possessed by a ghost—peaceful, serene, seemingly posed no threat whatsoever, yet carrying a certain indescribable sharpness.

Shinji Ikari observed Rei Ayanami, who was still wearing her combat uniform even in everyday circumstances. Judging from her wet hair, she had just taken a shower.

"Is the black combat suit a new generation product or the same style as my BM03? But compared to black, the previous blue and white combat suit suited you better," Shinji Ikari said.

"Is there something you need?" Rei Ayanami asked coldly.

Perhaps "indifferent" wouldn't be the right word; she showed no expression towards Shinji Ikari, simply looking at him with a rather detached expression.

Shinji Ikari didn't seem to care. Instead, he picked up an open book and asked, "This doesn't feel like a room. Don't you feel uncomfortable living in a place like this? What do you usually do?"

“Wait for orders,” Rei Ayanami replied.

“That’s very much your style. Since you’re free, come with me.” He smiled at Rei Ayanami, his tone like that of someone coaxing a child. “After it’s over, I’ll treat you to the fireworks.”

"Is this an order?" Rei Ayanami asked.

“It could be an order. But for you and me, it’s more like an invitation.” Shinji Ikari smiled and approached Rei Ayanami, naturally picking up a towel to dry her wet hair.

Rei Ayanami ignored Shinji Ikari's superfluous words and nodded slightly to him expressionlessly, like a weapon girl receiving an order.

"Since it's an order, I will obey."

At that moment, Shinji Ikari's gaze was fixed on the white shirt behind Rei Ayanami, which had the tag "402 Rei" written on it.

When was this clothing, with this tag, made?

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WILLE, the ship of hope. In the pilot's room.

"No way, is he sick?! Did he develop dementia after fourteen years in the sky?"

Asuka, unusually, displayed a lively and energetic side characteristic of humanity. She stayed close to Mari, tirelessly explaining to her that Shinji, the idiot, was no longer an idiot, but a problem child with cerebral palsy, a jerk, and dementia.

They only met twice, and both times she knocked him unconscious with a single blow. Doesn't Miss Asuka have any pride?

He even recalled their first meeting on Itoman Island fourteen years later, when he chose to deploy his domain to protect the silver-haired NERV pilot behind him, ignoring him completely and not saying a word.

Oh, I think I mentioned it. Asuka felt a stinging pain in her head, not because she couldn't recall it, but because her subconscious was refusing to remember that embarrassing aspect.

"I'm sorry, I really didn't expect you to be so weak." In her unconscious state, the voice she vaguely heard echoed in Asuka's mind once again.

“Alzheimer’s, who knows?” Mari pointed her index finger at her chin. Asuka’s casual remark had actually made her think seriously. “After all, think about it. Wang-chan wasn’t actually in the cockpit of Unit-01 in the sky. Essentially, he’s been in the negative universe, the imaginary space, for the past fourteen years.”

"What do you mean?" Asuka crossed her arms; she had only said it casually.

"As long as humanity exists in the imaginary space, it will not age with the passage of time. The accumulation of time is chaotic and disordered. It is possible that not even a second has passed, or it is possible that hundreds of years have passed. Just like Urashima Taro in the fairy tale, so perhaps he really will become an old monster."

"So the one who hit me wasn't the young, idiotic Shinji, but the old, steel-fisted Shinji?" Asuka raised an eyebrow.

Mari's expression turned somber. "Yes, that's why I say, beneath that youthful appearance lies a composed old man. Despite the calm that 'restrains his ferocity' and 'wasn't understood in his youth,' anyone who gets to fight him will discover that his sharp edge is still being honed, and he can easily slaughter his enemies!"

"What the hell?! You think I've never played with Fate/stay night?!" Asuka rolled the book into a tube and smacked Mari on the head with a blank expression. "An old man? A jade box? Sharpness and ferocity? Why don't you say he's a savior from a parallel world, blessed by God?"

Asuka grew increasingly vehement with her words, relentlessly pounding on Mari's neck.

"Princess? Don't hit my head! I'm serious!" Mari covered her head and ran away. "Look at the moves that knocked you out twice, it was the Divine Fist that never strikes twice, they didn't even use a second punch!"

"I'm serious!"

Asuka chased after him outside, but stopped the moment she opened the door.

Ritsuko Akagi, with her blond buzz cut, stood in front of her. She smiled slightly as she watched the two bickering. "You're quite energetic. That's good. It seems that Shinji Ikari's return has brought back some of your human side."

Ritsuko Akagi's teasing was unintentional, but Asuka looked disgusted as if she had been insulted. "Dr. Akagi, you think this is Shinji's ability? Don't be ridiculous, I just want to punch him in the face!"

"It doesn't matter what it is. Since you're all here, I don't need to go over and inform you. Let's gather at the battle bridge. I have something to announce," said Ritsuko Akagi.

"Battle bridge? Enemies have appeared again?" Asuka's gaze sharpened.

“No, it’s a good thing,” Ritsuko Akagi said.

When she arrived at the battle bridge, she saw Misato Katsuragi standing on the high platform, as well as all the core members of WILLE present. At this moment, she finally realized that something big was about to happen.

This is indeed a good thing, and a major event; it is a rare technological breakthrough in fourteen years.

"We have achieved a breakthrough in vacuum zero-point energy technology, with the successful ignition of the N2 reactor. Twenty-nine years have passed since we proposed the super-spiral management theory, and we have finally mastered the technology for artificial S2 perpetual power machines," Misato Katsuragi officially announced.

A thunderous applause erupted instantly.

Wille, who inherited most of NERV's human resources, protected a large number of top scientific experts from the pre-modern era. Before the Third Probability Strike, positron weapons were already in mass production, and antimatter and vacuum zero-point energy technologies were being used skillfully. Humanity in this parallel world had a level of energy mastery far beyond that of this era.

However, mastering the technology of the artificial S2 mechanism is different for Wille.

They were just one step away from mastering this technology until recently, after defeating four 4C naval-type artificial apostles and obtaining the artificial cores created by SEELE from their corpses. Although they were only artificial cores, they were more valuable to them than the apostle cores, because this artificial, infinite energy source pointed them in the right direction.

Asuka clapped along with everyone else, expressionless. What else could she do but clap? She should be happy, because mastering the artificial S2 mechanism meant that Wille was no longer in a position to be beaten. From today onwards, they would have the ability to fight back.

But for some reason, Asuka wasn't happy, nor was she sad.

She touched the collar around her neck; it was probably because of it. Its existence also signified that the Lilins (humans) didn't trust her. From beginning to end, she wasn't on their side. They united to resist NERV's attacks, but it was just like porcupines huddling together for warmth.

But if they really defeat NERV, or if they show any signs of resistance, they'll probably erase themselves too. They might not even know that they're trying to master the technology of an artificial S2 machine.

She was the only outsider; everyone else had made the plan, and she was the only one left behind. Just like fourteen years ago when she tried to pilot Unit 3… the people she thought would come to her rescue were instead devouring her body, and now she had become one of “them”.

The apostles and Li Lin are two incompatible species.

The immense pressure of the crowd forced him to retreat step by step. She silently retreated to the wall, to a corner, like an adult crushed against the wall by life. Drunk and disheveled, she lay unnoticed and uncared for in the subway station; no one noticed her, everyone was celebrating. Only one person's gaze swept across the crowd, silently watching Asuka, but Asuka remained oblivious.

That was Mari Makinami; she, who had been all smiles, suddenly looked up. Holding up colorful balloons, she rushed to Asuka's side.

"Hey, Princess! How about we take this opportunity to steal some ham? They're celebrating, and if we go now, we definitely won't get caught!" Mari said excitedly.

"Now?" Asuka looked up in surprise. Actually, she didn't need to eat; she was just surprised by Mari's sudden suggestion.

"Of course, we're just killing time anyway!" Mari laughed and grabbed Asuka's wrist, releasing a colorful balloon that temporarily blocked Asuka's view.

For a moment she felt a little dazed, as if she were somewhere being held by the hand and running aimlessly forward, leaving all her troubles behind.

It seems like the past, or perhaps it comes from a parallel world.

Just then, the gate to the battleship bridge was suddenly pulled open, and young men from the Inspection Department, dressed in dark blue uniforms, rushed in.

"BM03 signal detected again, target location: Third New Tokyo City!"

The previously jubilant crowd fell silent. NERV held the advantage, and with Shinji Ikari returning from the Negative Universe, what could possibly stop them? Their joy at launching a counterattack was shattered once more, and the entire arena fell into dead silence.

Misato Katsuragi remained motionless for a long time before slumping back into her chair. She rubbed her temples repeatedly with the base of her thumbs and index fingers—a sign of anxiety. She simply couldn't think of any way to break the deadlock.

“Let’s do it!”

Suddenly, a loud voice drew everyone's attention back to her, and there stood Mari Makinami at the door. The usually jovial Mari Makinami was unusually serious, her gaze meeting everyone's eyes without flinching.

"How did you get here? Do you think Wille's current strength is enough to counterattack NERV? Or do you think the two of you alone can bring back Shinji Ikari, who destroyed the fleet and wreaked havoc on Itoman Island?" Ritsuko Akagi sat next to Misato Katsuragi. As a researcher, she was the most rational. Based on the current comparative data, there was absolutely no possibility of victory.

“I could sense that he didn’t trust Wille, but he didn’t trust NERV either. In this situation, it was just the two of us. Asuka, as his former partner, had carried out countless missions with him in Hakone, and they had long since developed feelings for each other.”

"Who would fall in love with such an idiot? Glasses Cat Girl, don't talk nonsense!" Asuka said, embarrassed and angry.

But Mari ignored her, or rather, no one present paid any attention to her; all eyes were on Mari.

“Let Asuka and I pilot the EVA together to bring her back. We don’t need to defeat him. We will prove to him that it is more appropriate to choose Wille, who is humanity’s hope, than NERV, which is trying to destroy all of humanity!” Mari clenched her right fist and slammed it heavily into her chest.