Is it wrong to try to meet someone in a dungeon?

Liu said timidly, her head hanging low.

You're lying.

but……

Alexandra only replied with this brief sentence.

"────"

Liu opened her large, sky-blue eyes, looked up, and saw her familiar face.

Seeing the resolute look in the girl's eyes, who seemed to have seen through everything Liu was thinking.

Your "justice" is crying out that you refuse to lose your way.

Alexandra didn't preach, didn't advise her to change her ways, and didn't offer any guidance.

He simply moved Ryu with sincere words.

Use words that can shake Liu's heart, stir ripples in her soul, and move her with sincerity.

Your sense of "justice" still lives in your heart!

What is "justice"? What is "principle"?

Liu never understood and could never provide an answer.

The only truth is that the goddess (Asteria) asked her to "abandon justice," making her believe that she had lost the right to uphold "justice."

However, the boy (Bell) denied this.

He insisted that Ryu still had a sense of justice in his heart.

Now, the girl (Arisel) also affirms Ryu's "justice".

The boy (Bell) and the girl (Arischel) connect in their words, trying to make Ryu realize the true meaning behind them.

Your "justice"—"hope"—is not extinguished yet!

That's right.

Since the day she lost Alexie and the others, the "justice" that Ryu pursued was "hope".

When Seele rescued her, Ryu decided to live in order to witness the results of Alyssa and the others' efforts to uphold "justice".

Try to believe that the legacy of the Astrea Familia can bring hope.

It is believed that it will bring order and peace to Orario, and bring smiles to people's faces.

From that day on, Liu has been pursuing these things.

The boy's words also contained this true meaning.

Ryu helped and saved them, bringing them "hope".

Ryu's actions created "hope" for some people.

The boy had been asking her for this all along.

Presumably, no single concept of "justice" can be universally applied.

Therefore, this is Ryu's "justice".

It is not the "past," but the "hope" used to illuminate the "future."

Ryu has finally... truly, finally realized what the "justice" she lives in her heart means.

At that moment, as if resonating with her change of heart, the members of the Astrea Familia standing on either side of Aristie also turned around.

"Go quickly."

Beside Alisha, Kaguya waved impatiently to shoo people away.

"Don't run away!"

Leila crossed her arms behind her head and smiled mischievously.

"come on."

"We can't give up!"

Irreplaceable friends, each offering different words of encouragement to her.

These words and those tender gazes were too much for Liu to bear, and she shook her head violently, crying out:

"I...I've always wanted to apologize! I've always wanted to apologize to you all!"

She vented her inner feelings.

It's an outlet for the true, willful desires (wishes) that have been hidden in my heart since the moment I lost everything.

"I desperately hope you will convict me, because I was powerless to help you in your time of need! I desperately hope you will blame me, scold me, and punish me!"

Kaguya and the others, who remained on the other side of the light, refused to answer any questions.

As expected, they simply looked back at Ryu with gentle eyes—as if to say: You know perfectly well.

Yes, that's right, Ryu knows very well.

They knew they couldn't possibly blame Ryu.

Ryu is simply unable to forgive her sins, unable to accept the past.

It's just that they treat it as a sin, punish themselves, and try to get rid of it.

Liu's clenched fist loosened and drooped limply.

"Rion!"

The voice of the girl Ryu liked rang out in a high-pitched tone.

What kind of justice do you now?!

Ryu's throat trembled.

Before she knew it, tears streamed down her face.

Liu desperately suppressed the sobs welling up in her chest and slowly uttered her "true wish".

"I want to...save him..."

Instead of staying on the gentle shore of light, we return to the dark depths where harsh reality awaits us.

Instead of returning to Alexie and the others, she went to the side of the boy who was living in the present.

"I want to go back to that tavern with him... back to Seele and the others!"

It's not about chasing after the past like Alyssa and her friends, but about moving towards the future.

Alexandra smiled.

As if saying "Well done," he beamed with a radiant smile.

"Rion, you can't run away! -- You can't miss this!"

Liu smiled.

She was also crying, letting tears slide down her cheeks.

There was no sorrow or gloom in it.

Liu turned her back to them and walked into the darkness.

Go, Leon.

The words of farewell from her companions quietly saw Ryu off as she walked away.

Goodbye.

My beloved, whom I once deeply loved.

○

“──!!”

Liu has regained consciousness.

First came the burning pain that scalded my body, followed by a weariness that crushed my will, and then the loneliness of being abandoned. The warmth of Ryu's body that had once held me tightly was now gone.

The boy was gone. In his place, a fierce battle song roared from the depths of the darkness ahead.

Bell never gave up hope.

He was thinking of Ryu and tried to offer her a glimmer of "hope".

We must not allow Ryukyu to lose its "justice".

"Bell...!"

Ryu mustered all her strength and clenched her fist.

She already knew what she had to do.

The phantom vanished, the phantom departed. Alexie and the others were gone. The scene seen beyond the light was perhaps all just Ryu's self-delusion.

However, Alicia and the others did offer some words of comfort to Ryu.

Let her know that "justice" still lives in her heart.

Knowing that one must pursue "hope" and not give up.

With trembling hands, Liu raised her arms and ripped her body off the ground.

"Ughhhhhh...!!"

Within the pool of blood, she roared out a cry of rebirth.

Say goodbye to the lingering shadows of Alise and the others that have long been dependent on them, and be trapped in the past, so that a completely new self can be born.

Ryū must face it.

Facing the "past" that has always been avoided.

Ryukyu must fight back.

To confront the "symbols of the past" that have always been feared and dreaded.

The monstrous "Zagnat" represents Ryu's past.

However, if Ryu wants to obtain the "future," he must transcend this "past."

If you don't want to lose anyone else and want to uphold your "justice" and "hope".

“Aa ...

She stood up.

Ryu grabbed the skeleton warrior's (earth-born) bone sword, a monster weapon that had been soaking in the blood pool spring, and stabbed it into the ground.

The first step taken to break free from pain leads to the next powerful step, awakening the strength to move forward.

Ignoring the cries emanating from her body, Ryu begins to walk down a dark path.

Walk toward the sound you hear.

Heading forward, we reached the place where the monster's cries clashed with the shouts of the humans.

Ryu throws herself into the phosphorescent light that illuminates the darkness, a light that awaits her amidst calamity and harsh reality.

"────────────────────────!!"

"Roar!!"

Upon passing through the passage, a life-or-death battle unfolded before their eyes.

Humans and monsters clashed in the center of the cave, each chipping away at the other's life in a desperate fight. It's unclear where that remaining strength came from—perhaps it was a true testament to how all the remaining power was channeled into it—but Bel and "Zagnat" fought to a standstill.

Bell is engaging in a head-on confrontation.

With the gleaming white dagger in his right hand, he repelled every "spiked spike" that "Zagnat" launched after its continuous three-dimensional jumps.

As if boasting: the enemy's "sharp stakes" are slower than the swift swallows (iguazú), so they can be intercepted. The boy, who has experienced the terrifying killing blizzard of swallows, used "White Illusion" to knock down every single one of the approaching white bone spears.

The "Zagnat," roaring with both resentment and joy, would swiftly equip itself with the "Hestia's Blade" if Bell wanted to engage in close combat, staging a sword fight—a high-speed exchange of dual blades. He skillfully wielded the blue-purple and bright white blades with his right hand, effectively countering the monster's hit-and-run tactics. Not only that, he also seized an opening and slashed at the enemy's tail, successfully cutting off the lizardman's scales.

Enemies with compromised mobility exhibit a "pattern" in their continuous jumps, such as the angle of landing and the time it takes to "charge up." Bell, with his adventurer's instincts, understood this information and survived the relentless onslaught.

He turned his first defeat into the foundation of victory, roaring as he launched a counterattack.