After an impact that seemed to freeze time for several seconds, Helos finally recovered her voice that had abandoned her.
“Y-you… you… you—are you Gavi?!”
Her voice had become shrill and piercing from extreme shock, even cracking.
“Yes, Master.”
The blonde girl standing in front of the bed—no, now she should be called “the girl Gavi”—answered calmly again.
Her voice was so clear and pleasant, but flat with no inflection at all, forming a strong dissonance with her vivid and delicate face.
Helos felt her worldview had completely collapsed in that moment.
Was she dreaming?
She pinched her thigh hard. The clear pain told her everything before her was real.
Her loyal and reliable golem—made of metal skeleton, precision parts, and a half-mask—had, after just one sleep, turned into a living blonde little girl?!
What the hell kind of alchemy was this?!
No! This isn’t even alchemy anymore, is it?!
Helos forced herself to calm down.
“N-no… that’s not…”
Her eyes frantically scanned Gavi’s body, trying to find a flaw.
“Yes.”
“You… turn around.”
“Yes.”
“Jump. Raise your hand.”
Gavi obeyed, tilting her head in confusion, but lightly jumped in place, her smooth deep-golden hair drawing a beautiful arc.
Helos was completely stumped.
Whether in appearance, touch, or movement, the Gavi before her was no different from a real human girl.
No, she had to figure this out.
Her mind was instantly consumed by that curiosity belonging to a “researcher.”
She absolutely could not imagine why Gavi had become like this.
To study Gavi’s current body structure, Helos’s expression changed in an instant.
She looked at Gavi’s dress—now somewhat mismatched on this “new” body—and then at Gavi’s face, still obedient to her every word.
An extremely bold—even “beastly”—idea shot straight into her head.
“Gavi.”
Helos’s voice trembled slightly with excitement.
“Take off all your clothes.”
“Eh?”
For the first time, an emotion called “confusion” flickered in Gavi’s gray eyes, as empty as the void.
“That’s an order!”
Helos said with a deliberately stern face, but her light purple eyes, gleaming with fanatical light, had long since betrayed her true intentions.
“…Yes, Master.”
After a brief hesitation, Gavi chose to obey.
Her pale, slender fingers trembled slightly as she began to undo the buttons of her damaged dress.
Soon, one piece of clothing after another slid to the floor.
When Gavi’s small body, carved like white jade, was completely exposed before Helos, even Helos—whose soul called itself a “real man”—couldn’t help but stare in awe.
But what shocked her even more was that Gavi’s cheeks had instantly turned bright red, even her ears tinged with a suspicious pink.
She instinctively raised her arms, trying to cover the budding curves of her chest, her gray eyes filled with shame and panic. She didn’t even dare lift her head to look at Helos.
“…What are you shy about?”
Looking at her blushing face, Helos’s strange, malicious thoughts were immediately suppressed by curiosity.
Like a beastly scientist with a new toy, she forced Gavi into various poses, meticulously examining every part of her body structure.
“Raise your arm.”
“Turn around.”
“Lift your leg.”
“M-Master… this pose is a bit…”
“Less talk! Hurry up!”
Under the girl’s bashful gaze, Helos carefully examined every joint of Gavi’s body.
When her fingers pressed against Gavi’s shoulders, elbows, and knees—the key points—she finally found the clue.
Beneath the seemingly smooth and fair skin, she could clearly feel cold, inhuman mechanical structures.
Especially the shoulders and joints—they were clearly extremely precise ball joints!
Helos suddenly understood.
“So that’s it…”
She could finally confirm that Gavi had not turned into a real human.
Her essence was still that golem made of metal skeleton and precision parts.
It was just that, for some reason, her cold metal shell had been replaced by a layer of highly realistic “bionic” tissue that resembled human skin and flesh.
This level of technology was outrageous!
“What about the weapons?”
Another key question came to Helos’s mind.
She grabbed Gavi’s arm and carefully turned it over.
“Gavi, activate the armor-piercing spike.”
“Yes.”
Gavi responded.
With a soft shing, the silver spike that had once been installed on her armor suddenly shot out from the back of her hand without warning!
Like Wolverine’s claws!
The gleaming spike formed an extremely eerie and strong contrast with her fair, tender hand.
“Wow!”
Helos’s eyes practically sparkled.
“That’s so cool!”
She had Gavi retract the weapon. The spike shinged back into her arm, and the skin on the back of her hand healed instantly, leaving not even a trace.
“Amazing! Totally amazing!”
After confirming everything she wanted to know, she ended the “academic research” with satisfaction.
Gavi quickly put the dress back on like a frightened deer.
Helos, watching the other’s still-red cheeks, couldn’t help but tease:
“I say, Gavi—you’re a golem. What’s with the blushing?”
Gavi suddenly lifted her head.
For the first time, the fire of anger burned in her gray eyes.
She puffed out her cheeks and retorted indignantly:
“My body might be a puppet, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have thoughts!!”
“Master—what you just did… that was just perverted!”
Gavi’s voice trembled with shame and anger.
Helos was momentarily stunned by her sudden rebuttal.
When she thought about it, Gavi did have a point.
She might be a golem, but ever since fusing with the soul fragment of that necklace, she had acquired an independent personality and emotions.
That “research” of hers had indeed been a bit beastly.
“Ahem.”
Helos rubbed her nose awkwardly.
“Sorry, sorry. I was just too curious.”
Gavi humpfed, turned her head away in a huff, and ignored her.
Having gotten the cold shoulder, Helos could only sigh helplessly and lie back down on her bed.
Staring at the ceiling, she couldn’t help but wonder why Gavi had become like this.
This bizarre “magical transformation” was almost certainly related to the change that happened before she passed out.
Could it be a problem with the Branch of Enlightenment Alchemy?
Just thinking about that terrifying mental impact, which had seemed to crush her soul, made Helos shudder.
What were those cold blue pupils?
Were they a backlash from the power of the Branch of Enlightenment itself? Or was that mysterious eye secretly causing trouble?
She felt her brain starting to ache again.
No.
After hesitating for a long time, Helos decided she had to see exactly what had happened.
She needed to find out what the Branch of Enlightenment Alchemy had given her, and what it had taken from her—or from Gavi.
So she closed her eyes again, suppressed the fear in her heart, and flipped open Ultimate Alchemy in her mind.
Carefully, she extended her consciousness toward the blue crest representing “Enlightenment.”
This time, when she looked at that deep, dim blue crest again, that world-shattering mental impact did not appear.
It was like a module that had already been tamed, floating quietly in her sea of consciousness, awaiting her inspection.
Helos finally breathed a sigh of relief.
So, with a mixture of excitement and trepidation, she relaxed, immersed her consciousness fully, and began to examine the new abilities granted to her by the Branch of Enlightenment Alchemy.
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