"Do you want to know what's truly happening to you, Kairi?" Selene said, her tone flat.
"Do you want to know why you returned to this point, why Arthur is missing, and why everyone in this room is looking at you as if you are some kind of center of everything?"
I didn't answer. But my body tensed.
"It's because you didn't return." She placed Mytheia in her palm, letting it float gently. "You... were released."
Azalea furrowed her brow. "Released? What do you mean...?"
Selene looked at us one by one, then directly into my eyes. "Mytheia is not just a time trigger. It's not a portal, not a dimension-traveling device. It is... a rejecter of continuity."
Helena tensed. "Selene—"
"What you experienced, Kairi, was not a 'return'. Return-By-Memory is merely a side effect."
I gripped the blanket. My heart shook my ribs. "What do you mean... side effect?"
