Guilty Gear Transmigration: Light of Madness

Some time had passed since Christmas, with the year being 2016 on October 10th and the Ecosystem Evolution Project being renamed the Gear Project. 

On this day, Daubeny called Maria, asking for her help in a personal matter. She was sitting on a metal chair, enjoying a scoop of strawberry ice cream on a sunny day at an ice cream shop. Suddenly, she saw Daubeny running towards her, sweat dripping from his forehead and labored breathing.

"You're late. Did you run a marathon here rather than a car?" Maria asked curiously.

Daubeny took a deep breath and replied, "Not very far, just... wanted to test my endurance."

Maria raised her eyebrows in surprise, wondering what could possibly make him run in such a hurry. After a few seconds of his breathing returning to normal, he sat on a chair opposite her and said, "I asked for your help today because my friend and soon-to-be brother Frederick is going to be proposing to my sister today. And he asked for my help."

"So let me see if this is right. Your friend called you to help him, and you called me to help you to help him?" She asked.

"Yep."

Jumping up from her seat excitedly, Maria devoured her ice cream and pulled up her hood. "Alright, let's do this!"

Excited to help, Maria quickly finished her ice cream and followed Daubeny to the park. They spotted Frederick sitting on a bench as Aria appeared a few meters away wearing her large blond hat, protecting her head from the sun's glare. 

Daubeny motioned for Maria to follow him stealthily as they tried to capture the perfect shot. As they followed Aria and Frederick, Daubeny explained his plan to Maria. He wanted to capture the proposal and their live reactions without them knowing. Maria nodded in agreement, and they waited while watching Frederick interact with a floating screen with lines of code traveling across. Daubeny and Maria hid behind a tree, watching intently and preparing to capture the moment on their magical cameras. 

Aria stood a meter away from Frederick, saying, "So, it's my birthday... You asked me to spend some time with you..." Sitting down next to Frederick, she sighed. "aaand... it's for work."

"Sorry. Work's all I'm any good for." He said, not taking his eyes off the screen.

Taking a peek at it, Aria examined the screen, chuckling. "Is that machine code? What year is it?"

"Hey, magic-machine hybrids are plenty modern. This is ROSE. It was a popular programming language a long, long time ago. Here, I'm gonna call an undeclared variable."

"Won't that result in an error?" She asked.

"That's normally how it works..."

"Oh, is there something hidden in the error message?"

"Could you stop being so perceptive?"

"Could YOU stop being so mysterious? Fine, fine. I'll wait until you're ready to pull the curtain back."

Frederick started typing something into the screen, with Aria smiling while watching him. An annoying beeping sound echoed from the screen, scaring off nearby pigeons. 

"That's what I get for trying to be clever, I guess," Frederick said. The screen turned into code, and an image was now encircling in the center of a large ornate ring.

"A digital ring?" Aria asked, a little flustered.

"Yeah, sorry. The real one wasn't quite ready in time." She was silent for a few more moments before speaking again. However, this time, Daubeny could not hear anything Aria was saying as he clutched his chest with his free hand before raising it into a fist over his mouth, the hand holding the camera lowering as well. 

"Cough. Cough."

He was wheezing violently and would have gained more attention had he not forced himself to be silent. He began walking away silently, saying. "I'm heading back to that ice cream shop we met at. Please keep recording."

Looking worryingly at her friend, she said. "Okay, just don't die on your there."

-

After forty more minutes of recording that proposal, Maria returned to the ice cream shop and found Daubeny sitting outside, enjoying a sundae. And sat next to Daubeny, asking. "Are you okay?"

Stopping himself from eating another spoonful of ice cream, he reassured.

"I'm doing better now. I know it probably looked dire last time, right? Sorry if I scared you."

Shaking her head, Maria crouched slightly, leaning in to listen more as she responded. "There's nothing to be sorry about, but why are you so sick today?"

"Well, I'd been reading a book before we met today." Letting out a sigh of exasperation, he continued. "I guess I got so absorbed in it that I didn't realize how cold the wind was..." Snapping his fingers as if something clicked in his mind, he asked. "Do you enjoy reading books?"

Nodding her head in agreement, Maria answered, "I'd say so, but it depends on the book itself."

"I see. I guess that's another thing we have in common," Daubeny remarked, putting his hands behind his head and continuing with a sigh. 

"Nowadays, reading books, working, and hanging out with my friends is all I do."

Maria raised an eyebrow and leaned back into the chair during the process. "Huh, so everything we've done together was like that?" She insinuated with a disappointed voice.

"No, I'm happy with both of them. I could do without work, but it does keep me busy." He continued. "I find that books give me a way to escape everything else. I can just get lost in the book's private world."

Maria gave Daubeny a thumbs-up and said, "I know what you mean; it's a wonderful experience, though do ever read books all the way through?"

"Sometimes, but I stop if I get bored or annoyed with it."

"Oh, you do? I don't usually reach the end either." Maria kept jabbering on while imaginary stars were inside her eyes. "The more engaging a story is, the more I want to get lost, but... I'm always afraid to finish it. Because once I finish the story, I'll have to return to reality." She said the last part, almost brooding, resting her head into her hands. 

"When I feel the world draining me of my happiness, books are one of the few things that give me some solace when I have to come back to the real world." Daubeny smiled weakly.

They sat silently for some time, pondering each other's words, while Maria said, forcefully making her head look up, "Yes... I don't want this to end, but the mission comes first."

"Mission?"

"That's just the wording I use for my job. Oh well, it looks like the sun is already setting. I'll send you my pictures and recording, but this will probably be the last time we see each other." She hesitated, standing up to turn away from Daubeny.

"Oh, you're actually heading back home this time?" He asked.

"Thankfully, my parents will be proud of me for this; it's just one more task." She nodded resolutely and turned back around to face him.

Shaking each other's hands, Daubeny said,

"It's been fun knowing you. Take care of yourself." They parted ways, with each of their outlines reaching further apart.