The Ballroom of the Opera House of Garnier had become a meat grinder at this moment, with that Steam-Powered Doll spinning at its center.
She spun so fast that her white Floor-Length Dress, under the force of centrifugal acceleration, had fanned out into a horizontal disc. Countless gleaming blades shot out, like the teeth of a shark.
“Bravo! Wonderful!”
A Count standing in the front row let out a heartfelt exclamation. In the next instant, his Crown of Hair, along with the scalp slicked with excessive hair gel, spun off like a flying saucer—landing squarely in the Noblewoman’s Champagne Bottle beside him.
The Noblewoman didn’t scream. Instead, she raised her glass and toasted the tuft of hair inside. “Here’s to discarding the decaying flesh of the Old Era! How avant-garde! How moving!”
Moving, my foot. Vivian felt her sanity flying away together with that wig.
“Run! Don’t stand there gawking!”
Cicero’s hand clamped her wrist like an iron vise, dragging her toward the floor-to-ceiling windows to the side.
“Why aren’t they running?!” Vivian stumbled as she lifted her skirts, glancing back at the frenziedly applauding nobles.
“Do they have foie gras in their heads instead of brains?”
“Because they’ve already been ‘devoured’.” Cicero didn’t look back, but swung his cane backward with force.
Clang!
A crisp sound rang out. An unknown severed arm that had flown toward them was swatted away by him as if playing baseball.
“Count Saint-Germain’s Ritual has already completed the Closed Logical Loop. In their perception, death is part of the performance. As long as the music continues, they’ll keep clapping.”
Even before he finished speaking, a grating metallic screech closed in.
The spinning Steam-Powered Doll seemed to tire of harvesting those motionless “crops.” She paused for just a split second; her glass eyes clicked and swiveled, locking precisely onto the two who were trying to escape.
Click—hiss—
Twin jets of white, high-pressure Grievance Steam burst from beneath the Doll’s skirt, and she shot forward like a white torpedo, straight at them.
“Does she have a personal grudge against me?!” Vivian shrieked.
“Remove ‘does’,” Cicero said, and suddenly shoved Vivian behind a Marble Column.
The Doll grazed the column as she shot past, slicing clean through the solid, one-meter-thick Marble Column as if it were tofu.
If Vivian had been a second slower, she’d be sliced like a loaf of bread.
“I can’t… I can’t run anymore…”
Vivian leaned against the column, gasping for air. The damned Bone-Whale Corset was crushing her last rib.
At the far end of the Ballroom, the Doll executed a perfect drift; the jets screamed sharply as she adjusted direction again.
This time, there was nowhere to dodge.
“Cicero! How do we stop this thing?!”
“Her power source is Grievance Steam. In theory, as long as there’s someone in Paris who remembers the Bourbon Dynasty, she’s a Perpetual Motion Machine.” Cicero raised his cane; the tip snapped out, revealing a silvery blade, shielding Vivian.
“Hide behind me—at least you’ll die with some dignity.”
Staring at the accelerating Doll, Vivian suddenly bent down, both hands clutching her layers upon layers of lace skirt.
RIP—!!!
The sound of fabric tearing thundered over the chorus of screams.
Expressionless, Vivian summoned all her strength. Like someone tearing open a stubborn bag of chips, she ripped her priceless Floor-Length Dress straight up the thighs, splitting it in two.
A shower of Lace Fragments drifted down like snowflakes.
Beneath the ruins of luxury, she revealed a pair of coarse gray Men’s Trousers.
Cicero’s gaze lingered on those loose-fitting trousers for a full two seconds.
“…What’s that?”
“It’s called a Tactical Underlayer!” Vivian flung the shredded skirt to the floor, feeling ten pounds lighter.
Finally able to breathe, she kicked off her heels, pressing her bare feet against the floor, rolling her ankles.
“Come on, you knock-off hunk of junk!”
Vivian raised a middle finger at the charging Doll.
The Doll’s movements faltered for a beat, but inertia carried her forward like a cannonball.
Ten meters.
Vivian drew in a deep breath, adrenaline boiling in her veins.
Five meters.
Cicero prepared to shove her aside, but Vivian moved first.
She neither ran nor dodged.
She dropped low, like a soccer player going for a slide tackle, or a bargain hunter diving under the store doors at the last minute. She pressed down, feet forward, and on the polished Marble Floor, performed a textbook-perfect slide.
Whoosh—
The figure in coarse gray trousers glided close to the ground, heading straight for the Doll’s skirt hem like a gray eel.
The blades at the Doll’s waist whistled past just two centimeters above Vivian’s head, slicing a lock of her hair.
“She made it through?!” Cicero’s eyes widened.
Sliding beneath the Doll, Vivian glimpsed the Doll’s internal structure in that moment of slow motion.
Among the tangle of gears and linkages, a red-hot metal port was spewing white steam.
“So it’s as simple as blocking a car’s exhaust pipe, right?”
During her slide, Vivian’s left hand snatched up a bottle of Champagne Louis Roederer Cristal 1876. Extra brut, thick glass, perfect grip.
“Since you’re so fond of banquets…”
Vivian twisted her waist. In that split-second of passing, she rammed the bottle into the Doll’s steaming exhaust port as if loading a cannon.
“…then drink your fill!”
Splat!
It was the sound of a giant rubber stopper plugging a leaky faucet.
Using the momentum of her slide, Vivian shot out from behind the Doll, rolled twice to disperse the force, and came up in a squat.
The very next second—
The spinning Doll suddenly trembled, as if drunk.
Blocked Grievance Steam, with nowhere to escape, built up pressure inside the Champagne Bottle.
The glass began to heat; the pressure mounted.
“Down!” Vivian shouted at Cicero.
BOOM—!!!
With a deafening blast, the Champagne exploded inside the Doll.
A deluge of foam and steam spewed from every seam of the Doll’s skirt, hissing and sputtering like a deflating balloon.
How to describe such a sight?
It was like a well-dressed Noblewoman, in front of everyone, soiling herself with a pantsful of carbonated soda.
The deadly, oppressive atmosphere was instantly… well, not quite the same.
Even the still-applauding nobles froze, hands suspended in the air, unsure whether to keep clapping for this “aromatic” scene.
The Doll’s spinning ground to a halt.
She stood there stiffly, expensive wine still dripping from beneath her skirt, making clicking noises of mechanical failure.
“…Vulgar.”
Cicero stepped out from behind the column, glancing from the Doll to Vivian—now squatting on the floor, barefoot, hair in a mess, dressed in men’s trousers.
His gaze was complex. There was shock, disdain, and… a hint of amusement.
“Enough talk! While she’s still sobering up!”
Vivian leaped up, grabbed Cicero, and dashed for the window. Together, they reached the floor-to-ceiling glass.
This was the second floor. Outside was the Terrace of the Opera House, and below, the bustling Opera House Square.
“Jump!” Vivian didn’t hesitate—she seized a chair, smashed the glass.
But the moment before she leapt out of the window—
In the hall behind her, the Doll, still bubbling with Champagne foam, suddenly raised her head.
Her neck twisted 180 degrees, face turned backward, eyes locked on Vivian’s back.
On that stiff, painted face, a vivid human smile suddenly appeared.
It was an expression only a real human could make.
“Don’t look.” Cicero pressed down the back of her head, and together they tumbled out the window.
The weightlessness swallowed them.
Thud! They landed heavily on a Hay Cart below.
Vivian felt her organs shift and her mouth fill with the earthy taste of straw.
Struggling upright, she looked back at the shattered window on the second floor.
It was empty, the night breeze stirring the curtains.
That “Vivian’s Self” stood in the shadow, watching her.
“Let’s go.” Cicero sat up from the hay, plucked a stalk from his bowtie, regaining his usual infuriating calm.
He glanced at Vivian’s men’s trousers, now covered in hay.
“While your sense of fashion is a terror attack on Paris’s style scene,” he paused, the corners of his lips quirking up, “this fabric’s quite nice. Next time, buy me a pair too—in case I ever need to dive under someone’s skirt.”
Vivian rolled her eyes and chucked a bundle of hay at his face.
“Shut up. Docking your pay.”
“But I’m the boss.”
“Don’t care!”