The ground had given way. The fall had been brief but brutal.
Mayu reopened her eyes in a white corridor, without a shadow in sight. An infinite, smooth space, with no clear sense of gravity. There was no sign of her team.
"Zéro?" she asked.
Silence.
Then… footsteps. Her own footsteps.
She turned around. No one was there.
Now, reflective walls rose all around her, emerging from the void. They did not mirror her image, but rather, showed different versions of herself. One smiled, covered in blood. Another wept, shackled. A third had its back turned, disappearing into the mist.
A voice spoke—The Ninth.
"The labyrinth responds to your mind. To what you are, what you hide, what you refuse to become."
Mayu moved forward, taking deep breaths. Her hand touched one of the walls—it pulsed.
FLASH.
A vision assaulted her.
She saw herself, younger, enclosed in a stasis tube. The Professor leaned over her.
"That one... is special. Too steady. Too human."
Back to the present, a shiver ran down her spine.
"You want to break me?!" she screamed. "You think I'm going to crack?!"
A door swung open before her. She stepped through.
Inside, she found a replica of her old room—before the escapes, before the war. The same scent lingered. The same notebook lay on the bed.
She moved closer… and opened it.
Scrawled across the pages were these words:
> I want to be free. But what does that mean when you've never been chained by choice?
A tear rolled down her cheek. Yet she clenched her fist—she was no longer that girl.
Behind her came an explosion. A wall tumbled down. The scout burst forth, injured.
"Mayu! I've found a partial exit. But there's… a heart at the center of the labyrinth. It beats. It controls them all."
"The Ninth?"
"No. Something above him. It calls it 'The Source.'"
Mayu gritted her teeth.
"Then let's go."
One last image followed them as they fled: a mirror reflecting Mayu… merged with an interface, smiling like a god of war.