Upon hearing her mother leave the house, young Gladiia gets up from her bed, calls her lamp alight, and pulls out her vanity handmirror from under her pillow. Not that she would with any regularity be fully awake when the clock rolls over to zero, but tonight, she needs to look at herself. She needs to choose. As other Ægir view her, she is Gladiia, daughter of key Academy of Sciences personnel, winner of all youth competitions, a family girl, a young success story. But in her mirror, Gladiia sees a carbon-based robot, an emotionless form. Her memory begins with her birth mother being infatuated with Ægir affairs and Academy policymaking, her home merely a secondary point of residence, after the Academy's lounge. She once believed her birth mother sought accomplishment from her, and so she compelled herself to relentlessly reach new heights, applying the standards of adults to her young self. But she never was able to pry any form of feedback from her birth mother—no acknowledgement, no criticism, nothing whatsoever. No, her birth mother gave all her time to Ægir, and left not one idle second of one spare minute for her daughter. Perhaps it was all an accident that she was raised, and this household had no reason to exist. This was the sort of conclusion Gladiia reached. So, what else but to look for somewhere she can truly call 'home,' Ægir she can truly call 'family.' She has decided. She will seek. She is set to do it. She wants to hear for herself just what kind of case her birth mother might make in a civil court of law. Gladiia stows away the handmirror, turns off her light, and sinks into rest. Her mind swims frantically with planning. She is restless all night. ...... Gladiia stands before the tremendous standing mirror of the Consul's residence, examining her negligible self in the looking glass. In just a few hours, she will depart the mansion, take to an operating table, and begin the Abyssal Hunter modification surgery. Perhaps, the moment the procedure is over, her dutiful vocation will be as a military commander and not a Technology Consul, and she will take to the battlefield, there becoming a monster with hands drenched in fresh blood. This has completely destroyed any notion of plotting her life's trajectory, and may even end her time then and there. Gladiia has never feared death, nor the giving of her life, but the sumptuous hall she sees in the mirror does make clear to her an aside—she is still teeming with regrets. Some are desires, some are responsibilities, some are promises, and becoming an Abyssal Hunter will render them all forever unfulfilled. If only the surgery could be postponed long enough, if only Ægir could publish the full scope of the plans to her as soon as possible... This is the first time she realizes that she had never had it all firmly in her grasp like she thought. She will lose, and she will never be able to regain. Gladiia looks around the hall one more time, then returns to her study. In a few hours, she will depart for the Abyssal Hunter experimentation site. Before she does, she has the mansion's smart housekeeping system store two documents. One, her speech to be given upon becoming an Abyssal Hunter. One, a will. ...... After Gladiia is marooned in a land not of Ægir, she has in the truest sense of the words lost it all. All she has left with her are a bloodridden lance, a still-passable outfit, and a desiccated and scorching eternity. And now, she stands before a pothole filled with fresh water, gazing upon her own reflection, washing the filth and bloodstains from her clothes. The silt comes off with the water easily enough, but the clots of blood on her garments refuse to be washed off. With no option but to brush them by hand, she watches as their hardened forms attain a pellucidity, turn the shade of liquid blood, and run through the seams, dripping to a rest upon the soil. Is it her blood? The Seaborn's blood? Or her fellows' blood? She cannot differentiate. All of a sudden, Gladiia notices something, and she leans close to the hole, carefully examining her neck. A tiny scale. Though why is a mystery, Gladiia's birth mother comes to her mind in that moment. If she could, she would rather suffer her neglect again. This scale would never have found the chance to rest upon her neck. But it has. Gladiia stands up, and throws her freshwater-soaked hair behind her in one gesture. She can indeed feel it. There is an embitterment, a discontent inside her. There is no need for these feelings to surface, and they do nothing to help in this present situation. She has indeed lost it all, but she finds she can still afford to uphold her basic honor and dignity, which in turn means she can still move onwards with her head held high. She needs no hope. She simply focuses on possibilities, feasibilities, and results. She can still return to Ægir. She is still alive to recover the Abyssal Hunters, scattered and lost. As long as the probability is not zero, she is still bound to try. So make good on it she shall. Gladiia wipes her lance's bloodstains dry, and vanishes from the side of the 'hole.' Seconds later, the sonic boom jolts the water from the pool, blanketing any and all trace she was ever there.