Kallen put on a mask on the rooftop and covered her clothes with a linen cloth.
"Stop!!"
Kallen shouted, drawing everyone's attention, then leaped down and landed beside Shakespeare.
"Who the hell are you!"
"I am Ka—... I'm not telling you." Kallen almost answered but stopped herself in time. She then kicked the person who asked the question away, picked up Shakespeare from the ground, and started to run.
While knocking aside Schicksal's missionaries, Kallen yelled apologies, asking them to forgive her.
"Well done!" "Ooooh!!"
The crowd cheered for Kallen's righteous act, even spontaneously forming a circle to prevent the missionaries from rushing forward.
They didn't dare to stand up and stop the people from Schicksal, but they wouldn't hinder someone who did.
Kallen took Shakespeare to an alley and put her down. The tsundere Shakespeare, blushing, gifted the mask to Kallen before hurrying away. Kallen happily waved goodbye to Shakespeare.
Watching the joyous Kallen, Otto remembered his first meeting with her. Kallen had smiled just as happily back then. He remembered the invitation she had extended to him.
"Come and help me save the world!"
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That night, Kallen kept contemplating the mask in her hand. Finally, she excitedly told Otto that she wanted to become a phantom thief, to steal the despicable Victor's gold coins and let him know that justice still existed in the world.
Otto did not refuse Kallen, as he had long known she would make such a decision.
He opened a hidden wardrobe, inside which were countless different outfits Otto had stored. Otto had Kallen try them on one by one, and after much deliberation, the two chose a purple formal dress—Sixth Night's Rhapsody.
After finally choosing her clothes, Kallen collapsed onto the floor, exhausted.
"By the way, why do you have so many clothes... and they all fit so well..."
"That's a secret~ Come see the little gadgets I've prepared for you!"
Otto took out a necklace, a bracelet, and a pile of miscellaneous items.
"Otto's Little Lecture is now in session! This bracelet can shoot a grappling line, this necklace is a smoke bomb that can confuse the enemy's vision... this is... and this..."
While explaining their functions, Otto equipped Kallen with the various gadgets he had invented.
"Next is the calling card!"
"Is it really necessary to send a letter to announce it?"
"Of course... Only by sending a calling card and then stealing the item with precision can one be called a phantom thief..."
While writing the letter, Otto didn't dare to look at Kallen, nor did he dare to tell her its contents, because this letter contained his own selfish intentions. In the letter, Otto subtly hinted that Victor must hide the things in the basement well.
Because Otto didn't want Kallen to find out what Schicksal was really doing. If Kallen found out, he and she would never be able to go back to how things were...
The next day, Victor, upon receiving the letter, thought the phantom thief was coming to steal the experimental data in the basement and, in a panic, deployed all his guards there.
That night, Otto wore a green dress and a green hat, disguising himself as a lady with a sprained ankle passing by, to draw away the remaining guards for Kallen.
Kallen took the opportunity to slip into Victor's mansion.
Because all the guards had been moved by Victor to defend the basement, Kallen moved as if through an unguarded land, turning the mansion upside down until she finally found where Victor hid his money.
"...I remember Otto taught me which gold coins were the most valuable, but I've forgotten everything... Oh well, it's not heavy anyway, I'll take it all!" So Kallen packed up all the gold coins, ready to leave.
But as she was leaving, Victor arrived with his men.
"Hmph, just as I expected. You wrote such an arrogant calling card, yet you still fell into my trap. Where are my gold coins?! Where are all my gold coins?!" Victor laughed wildly at the doorway, but when he saw his room, once piled high with gold, now empty, he was dumbfounded.
Victor looked at the white-haired, purple-clad girl shouldering a large sack, and it seemed he understood everything.
"How could you just stuff it all into a sack? That's something ten strong men couldn't lift! This hair color, plus this monstrous strength... you must be that idiot daughter from the Kaslana family!" Victor said, pointing at Kallen with a triumphant look.
*Think, Kallen, think of something quick, or my identity will be exposed...* Just then, Shakespeare's speech popped into Kallen's mind.
"Poor soul, have you fallen into the net of love?"
*Ahhh, what are you saying, Kallen?! Those are lines from that stage play!!* Oh well, as long as I'm not recognized.
Kallen was so embarrassed she could have dug a hole in the floor, but to avoid being recognized, she continued speaking.
"Must you make me say her name in my anguish?!"
Seeing the crowd stunned into silence by her words, Kallen seized the opportunity to throw down the smoke bomb Otto had given her and disappeared before their eyes.
After escaping, Kallen distributed the gold coins to the beggars and suffering people on the streets.
Finally, Kallen stopped at the home of the flower shop owner from before. Gently pushing open their window, Kallen looked at the sleeping Sasha, placed the gold coins by their bed, and quietly left.
But not long after Kallen departed, Sasha turned over in her sleep, and on the back of her hand, a Stigmata quietly appeared.
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In 1470, the Honkai spread in the form of the Black Death. Schicksal tried many methods to no avail, and even exacerbated the zombification of many patients.
Otto sat in his laboratory, weeping helplessly. His experiment had failed again; the latest test subject had already turned into a Honkai Zombie and been eliminated.
*No matter how many times I try, it will fail that many times... But if I can't become a great inventor, I will surely be abandoned again...*
*These patients are all going to die anyway. I will keep trying until I succeed.*
Driven to madness, Otto began to frantically conduct human experiments, but they all failed. Until the last one, an individual with a Stigmata named Eleanor, was brought before Otto...
Having tried every method without success, the desperate Otto began to draw his own blood, continuously purifying the Schariac part of it.
After injecting his blood into the dying Eleanor, she miraculously recovered. Eleanor's Stigmata and the Holy Blood had reached a bizarre equilibrium of symmetrical breaking...
When the cure succeeded on Eleanor, Otto, overjoyed that he could live up to Kallen's expectations and be looked up to as a great inventor, cried with happiness.
The Schariac family's first true "Saintess" was born. Otto bestowed the name Schariac upon Eleanor. And Eleanor Schariac became Otto's most loyal supporter.