Chapter 640: Just Woke Up

Ilya raised a ruby in midair, a pink magic projectile poured down from the tip of her staff, striking the pile of paper figures, exploding into clusters of pink light.

The paper figures hit by the magic projectile were blown into fragments; the fragments floated in the air for a moment, then began to reassemble, reassembling faster than before and in even more absurd shapes—one paper figure, after being shattered, reformed into a gigantic fist, with five fingers protruding from different directions like a flattened octopus, rolling wildly on the ground.

Weiba Daye finally pulled himself out of the ground at this moment.

The Mecha's two mechanical arms braced against the ground, lifting its whole body out of the rubble; its boot soles pressed on broken tiles, leaving two deep pits.

It stood there, the Lapis Flame on its body burning brighter than before; the expression on its small head shifted from anger to an indescribable mix of seriousness and petulance. It raised a hand, and one Lapis Flame wave after another shot out from its palm, detonating within the pile of paper figures, shattering the reassembling fragments into pieces too broken to rejoin.

Saber, Weiba Daye, and Ilya fought among the paper fragments for a while, slashing a batch, then another, blasting a heap, then another; the fragments seemed endless, emerging from every corner of the ruins.

Suddenly they began to grow!

All the paper fragments surged toward the same direction, like metal shavings drawn by something, converging from all sides to the center of the clearing, forming an ever‑higher paper pile.

The fragments writhed and fused on the surface of the pile until Ilya, looking up from midair, could see its face: a round face, two eyes as curved arcs, a mouth as a deeper curve, its corners turned upward.

Ah?

Ilya widened her eyes.

At that moment, Ilya noticed something falling from the sky.

Perspective shift.

When Robin opened her eyes, her first thought was: why is the sky gray?

The second thought: why am I falling down?

Her mind hadn't fully awakened from the hazy state; everything before her seemed veiled by frosted glass, gray and blurry, even her own hands were hard to see clearly.

Wind rushed in by her ears and out through her open mouth.

She remembered walking into that mansion.

Then… she knew nothing else.

The middle segment of memory was as if erased with a rubber, completely clean, leaving no trace.

She didn't recall how she fainted, how long she was unconscious, what happened in between, or even whether she had dreamed.

That blank stretched across her memory like a wall with nothing behind it.

Then she woke up.

Realizing this, Robin snapped to full awareness; the shift from daze to clarity was as swift as a splash of cold water, her pupils instantly constricted, limbs flailing randomly in midair—left hand scooping air, right hand doing the same, legs kicking a few times, only meeting air; she felt like a fish tossed out of water, tumbling in the sky, unable to find any posture to steady herself.

"Wait—wait—wait—"

Her voice was scattered by the wind, even she could barely hear what she was shouting.

The ground drew nearer, the grayish ruins before her shifting from blur to clarity, from clear to gigantic, from gigantic to—

A hand reached out from the side, clasping her waist.

The force was slight but precise, landing exactly at the most suitable spot on her side waist.

Robin's falling momentum was abruptly halted by that hand; her body paused midair, then the hand swept her sideways, drawing an arc as she shifted from a vertical descent to a forward slant.

The wind still blew, but no longer with a shredding force.

Robin gasped, turned her head, and saw a face.

The owner of that face had long purple hair reaching her waist, gently swaying in the wind; the ends were slightly curled, as if unkempt for a long time, but that messy look made her seem—how to put it—somewhat more genuine.

Her eyes were deep crimson, like two polished rubies set in her sockets, yet they emitted no light.

Robin recognized that face.

"I... Ilya?"

Her voice was still breathy; although the fall had been caught, the terror of plunging from height remained lodged in her throat, not fully swallowed.

Ilya said nothing, merely pulling her into her arms again, tighter, as if confirming the person in her embrace was not a fake, not made of paper.

Her fingers hooked onto Robin's side waist; the grip was light, yet she could feel those few fingers trembling slightly.

"Robin sister!"

The voice held an unstoppable joy, like a person who has walked in a desert for ages and finally sees water; that joy wasn't feigned nor forced, it seeped from the cracks in her bones, impossible to block.

Robin froze for a moment.

She hadn't yet figured out the situation.

"Are you okay? Any injuries? Where does it hurt? Are you dizzy? Nauseous?"

Ilya asked a string of five or six questions, and before Robin could answer, she continued on her own: "I just saw you fall from the sky, it scared me to death—"

Robin stared at her, opened her mouth, wanting to say something, but not a single word came out.

It wasn't that she didn't want to speak, she just didn't know where to start.

Her mind was now filled with question marks, each larger than her head, crowding together, squeezing the scant bits of lucidity in her mind until there was no room left.

"This... where is this?"

Her voice was still hoarse, as if her throat had been dried by wind, "How... am I... wasn't I inside that mansion? How am I in the sky? Why are you also here? What are those sounds below?"

Ilya looked around, her red eyes scanning the crooked broken pillars in the dim light.

"To be honest, I'm not quite sure."

Robin: "..."

"But I think this is inside the belly of that green‑haired little girl."

Robin froze again.

"Belly... inside?"

"It's that Giant Fox,"

Ilya gestured with her hand, "It swallowed both me and Saber."

Robin opened her mouth, then closed it again.

Swallowed by a Giant Fox, and inside its belly was a space that large, containing sky, ruins, broken pillars, shattered tiles, and wind—how could there be wind inside a belly?

She won't ask.