Things had not gone as planned, but well.
When did they ever?
Helping his enemies by accident had also revealed their weakness.
Allowing Strelok to go on a rampage cleared up all the interference.
Sure, the Paula Copy Nr 13 could have been more helpful and told him things in advance. But now Konrad had someone else to talk to, and he wouldn't have exchanged her for anything.
'Took you long enough, Konny Baby.' Lily's scolding voice was music in his mind.
'There have been issues,' he answered, and this time he even made the effort to use only his thoughts. 'In fact, I'm in the middle of one big issue right now. Could you hear me out?'
Meanwhile, in the control room, Dmitry was running around as if he'd lost his mind.
"Now he's unconscious, too. Damn you and your fist, Konrad."
He left for the corridor and came back empty-handed, unable to move the passed-out Lady Origin. For which Konrad couldn't blame him. She seemed so fragile and broken.
'What are you thinking about?' the demoness asked. 'Not another woman?!'
'Read my mind, please,' he offered for once. 'Faster that way, 'cause we ain't got no time.'
Then tried his best to organise his thoughts by their urgency, starting with the CNPP, and—
'Oh boy, that's ambitious,' Lily scoffed. 'But it's not like it couldn't be done.'
Yeah. That was never the question.
It was whether he could pull it off in the little time remaining.
'Not alone, no,' the little ginger thought. 'And I can't rush to your aid, either. In the middle of something, too, believe it or not. But with that girl's mana—Lady Origin—it might be possible?'
Phew. Konrad would have even cheered if her tone weren't so uncertain.
But that was not a no.
'As a plus, her mana is already permeating this place,' the Paula copy butted in. 'But if you need a specific magic circle, I can't help with that without a body. And hers, well—'
Konrad was aware. It was a miracle that she was still in one piece.
'Do what you can,' Lily messaged. 'But if you fail, make sure you at least save yourself and that Strelok guy. I'll pick you up from the heavens right away, but you have to make it there alone.'
Yeah, yeah. That was the original plan, anyway.
But in that, they had no third big nuclear explosion in sight, and—
None of the mess Strelok left for him to deal with, either.
And with the little time remaining—was there even a timer?!
'Up on that console,' Paula offered, and now he wished she didn't.
Three minutes?!
In a best-case scenario, he'd need five to draw the runes, and then start channeling his mana. But if it involved her original, adding her own essence, and ripping out the whole place—
"Wait. Hold on," Konrad yelled, realising something. "You said you'd need a body to help."
Strelok was out, and the scientists were dead, but—
"Did you talk to me?" Dmitry asked, panting on the edge of panic.
"I'd appreciate it if you didn't break him, though," Konrad muttered, pulling out his pen and ink.
"Break who? What?!" the Captain scowled, but then his body went rigid.
He'd have to give him a proper thanks and apology later. But Paula had taken over and begun by making enough space. All the while, she deciphered the spell from Konrad's mindspace.
'You sure this thing would work?' she asked, her voice mixing with Dmitry's.
"I used it to escape from Tokyo with an entire rock band, so it should do the job."
'Well, moving a million-ton building before it explodes might be a little more difficult, but—'
"What?!" The Captain wrestled back control for a second to shout. "We're moving what, where?"
"As I said," Konrad grunted, offering his spare pen. "I'm no bomb expert, and can't defuse this thing. But I can teleport everything away before it explodes, so that's the new plan."
Dmitry's eyes were still wide, even as his body started working.
And hell, Paula made him work faster than Konrad could draw his own spell.
"I still don't know how we'll fuse our mana with Lady Origin," he noted as he laid out the basic circle. "Or if she'll even wake up before it's too late. What did they inject her with anyway?"
"Working on it," the parallel brain said with Dmitry's mouth. "Need a second to break it down."
Okay, well, as long as she was dealing with it.
Damn. Back in Tokyo, he had Maou Midori and Lily-Maple-Kaede to help while Yuki bought them time. And here, all they had was an unmerciful countdown, but—
"Now that you mention it, I could try that time-dilation again," the Captain-Paula offered.
Right. She did that earlier. Not too long and not that well, but whatever.
He'd take all the help she could offer.
The change was immediate.
His arms felt heavy and slow, but he had to persevere. It wasn't his first time under this strain, where moving or even breathing in the time bubble was a challenge.
And poor Dmitry had the parallel brain to push him through, so—
They did, in fact, make decent progress.
By the time the rune was complete, they still had one whole minute on the countdown.
But that's when the tricky part would start.
He had to infuse it with his essence and extend it over the entire CNPP.
Well, no, not him per se, but he and the original Paula, which made it that much more difficult.
And right as he thought that, the tortured corpse of a woman stumbled into the control room.
She was not an easy sight to take in, and knowing that he could do nothing to help her made it all the worse. Instead, he had to take her hand and mana to escape this hell.
"It's my own choice," she rasped, almost making him jump. "For the first time in decades."
Yeah. Why couldn't she read his mind, after all?
'I'm doing it for her, idiot,' the copy-Paula noted as the real thing stumbled by the circle.
That did make more sense.
"They stole me from my family. From Pavel," the woman said, voice ghostly and hollow. "They made me make this place. Tortured and never let me die."
"With this, it'll be over," Konrad tried to comfort her, but—
What could he even say?
He felt it earlier. She was a necromancer, too.
And there was enough life force around to resurrect an ancient dragon and then some.
But she didn't touch it. She stopped before her instincts could take over.
She chose to remain like that and to help them, but—
"I do ask a favor of you, though," she breathed, less than a whisper. "My brother, Pavel. Once the magic circle's ready, lay me to rest next to him. You'll carry my memories and power, but he—"
She coughed blood before she'd finish.
But Konrad nodded, the runes finally lighting up.
The countdown had only ten seconds left. Nine.
But once the spell had activated, it'd suspend them in time.
Or if he miscalculated, they'd all go out with a bang.
Either way, it would have been over for Lady Origin and the Zone as a whole.
And he was hell-bent on delivering the last puzzle to fight the fallen angel responsible for it.