Chapter 436: Never use this.

Pandora staggered backward as if she had been punched in the stomach. She put her hand to her forehead, trembling.

“She created this not for survival. Not for self-defense. Not for magical instinct…” she murmured, her eyes wide. “She created it… for love.”

The silence that followed was as thick as the clear sky above them. Even the wind seemed to hesitate for a moment.

Vergil pulled Alice a little closer to his chest. She looked at him innocently, as if waiting for approval, her large eyes full of life. He smiled slightly, half bitter, half proud.

“So, you built all this… just so you could see me more?” he asked softly.

“Uh-huh!” Alice nodded, with the greatest pride in the world. “Here, no one bothers us. No one fights. And there’s honey ice cream!”

“There’s what?” Pandora almost shouted.

Alice raised her finger and, out of nowhere, made an ice cream cone appear floating in front of her — golden, shiny, with tiny sparkles dancing on the surface.

“It tastes like sunshine with honey!” she said, offering it to her father, who took it carefully.

He tasted it… and stopped.

“… This is really good.”

Pandora sat down on the floor, dropping everything. She stared at the horizon, trying to mentally rework everything she believed about mental realities, inner planes, cycles of reincarnation, magical logic… and throwing it all away, one idea at a time.

“Seris, please tell me this is a collective dream induced by astral hallucination,” Pandora asked, her voice low.

“No,” Seris said seriously. “This is real. And if it’s as stable as it seems… then we’re no longer just dealing with an anomaly.”

She approached Alice cautiously, like someone approaching a living relic.

“We are facing a potential dimensional core. A being capable of generating complete realities based on feelings.”

Morgana snorted. “In other words: a creator.”

“Yes,” said Pandora, still seated. “But not in the traditional sense. Creators build from emptiness, or magical matter. This little girl… is born with entire worlds inside her.”

Vergil looked at Seris. “That doesn’t exactly sound safe to me.”

Seris shook her head. “It’s not. Not at all. If she gets scared, sad, or worse—if she gets emotionally broken… this world could collapse. Or expand. Or… consume the material plane.”

Alice, hearing this, frowned.

“I wouldn’t do that!” she said, puffing out her cheeks. “I just want to be with you guys! I would never hurt anyone!”

“I know, dear,” said Seris, trying to ease the tension. “But… your soul carries memories you don’t know yet. Emotions that aren’t yours yet. They can wake up… at any moment.”

Vergil looked at her, narrowing his eyes slightly. “Are you saying she might not be… herself?”

Seris hesitated. “I’m saying that… maybe she’s more than herself. And that ‘more’ could eventually take control.”

Pandora took a deep breath, finally standing up.

“She is a seed, yes. But no one knows of what.” She looked directly at Vergil. “The problem isn’t her. The problem will be the day someone realizes this… and tries to plant her.”

Vergil stared at Pandora with sharp eyes. “What if someone already knows?”

Silence.

Pandora looked away, then gave a half smile.

“So, we’re all standing with one foot in hell and the other on the edge of a field of flowers.”

Alice suddenly raised her hand, excited.

“I want to plant a tree here!”

Everyone stared at her.

“A really big tree that touches the sky! So you can find me, even when I’m asleep!”

Vergil smiled, bending down to her eye level.

“And you’ll wait for me in this place?”

Alice nodded vigorously. “Always.”

He ran his hand through her hair affectionately.

“Then… I’ll protect this world.”

Pandora crossed her arms, staring at the horizon.

“You’ll have to do more than that, Vergil. You’ll have to stop the real world from destroying it.”

Seris sighed, his expression tired but serene. “Let’s go home… Many of these answers will only come with time. When she grows up. For now… she’s still just a child. We don’t even know her exact age.”

Alice raised her hand enthusiastically. “I’m twelve! Almost thirteen!”

Pandora raised an eyebrow, intrigued. “And how do you know that, if you lost your memories?”

Alice crossed her arms, as if it were obvious. “I just know! It’s right here!” She pointed to her chest with conviction. “I feel it. Twelve years old. And a little bit more!”

Pandora stared at her for a second… and then let out a soft laugh. “Wonderful. An interdimensional anomaly guided by… childish intuition. The universe is really having fun at our expense.”

Vergil just shrugged, holding Alice with a protective hand on her shoulder. “If she says she’s almost thirteen… then she’s almost thirteen.”

Alice smiled victoriously, while Morgana laughed softly in the background.

Seris waved her hand, conjuring a new portal. “All right, almost-thirteen. Let’s go home.”

And with one last look at that peaceful field of materialized dreams, they all crossed the veil of light together.

Back in reality, the light from the portal dissipated as if it had never existed. The group emerged in the runic room with the same heavy silence as before, but now carrying something new: an invisible weight, as if what they had witnessed was imprinted on their souls.

Seris was the first to compose herself. She knelt in front of Alice, serious, her eyes fixed on hers.

“Alice,” she said firmly, “you cannot show that place to anyone else. And never, under any circumstances, use that magic you called the ‘Gate of Babylon’. Never.”

Alice swallowed hard, surprised by the tone. “But… I only used it because everyone wanted to see it.”

“I know,” Seris replied more gently, but still firmly. “But it’s too dangerous. Not just for you, but for everyone. It’s a kind of power that the world isn’t ready to understand.”

Vergil, standing beside her, crossed his arms. His voice cut through the air like a blade:

“You only use it if I authorize it. Understood?”

Alice lowered her eyes for a moment… then lifted her chin, determined.

“I understand. I promise. I know it’s dangerous. But I also know that I’m strong. And I want to get even stronger… not to fight, but to protect. I want to grow up without being a problem.”

Vergil nodded slightly. There was nothing more to say there—she was already on the right track.

Pandora, who had been watching silently until then, let out a long sigh. One of those that come not from the lungs, but from the soul.

Her gaze wandered for a moment, fixed on something no one else could see.

The image came too quickly: her, small, surrounded by gears, fire, and iron — and the imposing shadow of Hephaestus, the god-craftsman, always distant, always dissatisfied.

“You are a creation, Pandora,” he had once said, without even turning his face. “Not a miracle.”

The bitter taste returned to her throat.

She now saw that little girl, a living anomaly with impossible power… being loved, cared for. Being taught with affection. Being listened to.

And for the first time in centuries, Pandora felt something that even time had not healed: envy.

But also… hope.

“You’re lucky, little girl,” she murmured, almost inaudibly. “Second chances are rare in this universe.”

Vergil glanced sideways, noticing the goddess’s tone, but said nothing. He just approached Alice and placed one hand firmly on top of her head, as if anchoring something that floats too much.

“Everything will be fine,” he said.

Alice smiled, her cheeks still red from the tension of the moment.

“I know.”