To the present Ciel, his mind felt active, it was churning as it rushed to examine itself. He was thinking, analyzing, pondering, as a result he reached dead ends, felt perplexed, or experienced sudden epiphanies. Ciel could now also perceive the warmth of his flesh and acknowledge the comfort that brought.

In many ways, nothing was wrong. He still had his motivations, his desires, his regrets, and yet there the sudden problem could be found. Those feelings only existed as preexisting facts, ones placed by his previous self, the him who had yet to regress to the past.

The current him remained willing to pursue those set desires, however he felt no joy at discovering that his regression succeeded, no passion in pursuing his desires, no lump of anguish at the reminiscing of his regrets.

He felt nothing…

Intellectually he understood the emotions he wanted to feel, or even those he felt he needed to. That stumped not from his present self desiring to feel those emotions but rather from the knowledge of who his old self is.

That was how the issue was first discovered. Ciel realized that he had yet to smile, yet to feel afraid, yet to rejoice. He just felt calm, unfazed, and simply ready to commence his work.

In this moment it was as though he was himself yet not at the same time. He felt whole yet infinitely broken. Perhaps that would have surged panic in him before, but now he lacked such an ability. Instead he merely began to brainstorm.

Why has this happened? How can I fix it?

Those were the only two questions which mattered. Ciel may have lacked the passion he should have felt towards the accomplishment of his goals, however his sense of responsibility remained firmly drilled into his being.

For even if he was an empty husk, so long as he could take action then he would. If he failed to do even that, then he should have remained buried beneath the dirt. He would move towards his goals, like a machine merely following its built in programming.

For that reason he needed this to be solved, however, only if it would hinder his ability to move forward. His mind churned, attempting sheepishly to recall the journey he endured when traversing the river of time.

The experience was one of grandeur, however the moment it dissipated it was as if he had never experienced it. His mind remembered no sensation of it, beyond some vague understandings of what his soul wished to convey as it swam against a furious current.

After some time, a single recollection came to him. That being the shattering he experienced just before the end. The cold of it all and the indescribable sensation which assaulted him as his soul was torn.

Only then did a hint of enlightenment gleam within him.

Could it be…

Ciel watched the distant city which modeled itself ahead, only to then turn the way which he came and raise a hand forth.

“Come Chariot.”

He commanded. But nothing happened.

His expression failed to change, however his hand fell and as it did it attempted to grasp at the air… No, not the air but the light which occupied its space.

Again nothing happened.

Hmm.

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

His premonition seemed even more certain now.

Did my Concept Accommodation shatter along with my soul? Is that why I feel so hollow?

He questioned, but his conclusion was all but verified when he was unable to summon any of the twenty one powers of the arcana cards at his disposal. His power had disappeared it seemed, running away with pieces of his broken soul.

Now most certainly, Ciel could not ignore this.

*****

Realizing the gravity of his situation, Ciel judged it best to return to his gravesite. There he sat cross legged, facing the lights of the distant metropolis. He wanted to evaluate every inch of his soul and confirm just how grave the situation was.

Furthermore, should it be the case that he has lost all of his Concept Accommodation abilities then his entire strategy moving forward would have to shift dramatically. He would no longer be a lion entering a den of kittens, but a very kitten himself, one perhaps in a more sorry state than most.

Such a conclusion did not anger him, neither did it agitate him. He merely accepted it as it was and immediately disregarded it as an inescapable state of reality.

No great feat will come without cost. It never has before, why did I believe I would be any different?

He thought self-deprecatingly before his eyes opened once more. His hour-long meditation had come to an end.

With it came troubling news.

Upon inspection his soul appeared rigged, with its edges pointy and uneven, as if literally torn apart. Of course this conclusion came from an instinctual understanding which he gained when he willed to ‘witness’ his very core. Souls had no tangible state which the naked human eye could hope to glance upon after all.

My soul is shattered, and my abilities are gone. Now the question is, have they turned into aberrations and become lost in the history of time? Or have they fallen into the timeline I aimed for, just detached and capable of being claimed by any wandering fool?

Neither seemed pleasant, yet both were plausible.

Hmm, at least there is one outlier.

He had lost all of his twenty one abilities of the arcana cards, however, the first of them, and the very power which he used to accomplish this miraculous feat, ‘The Fool’ was still present within his soul. It was this which allowed him to disregard the possibility that he had merely lost his Concept Accommodation as a natural result of traveling to the past before he had ever acquired it.

That came with its own boon as well, it meant he was not entirely powerless.

Yet even that was a poor excuse of a blessing.

Once he made a connection with ‘The Fool’ ability, he had willed its activation and through such an attempt, he made another realization. The Fool’s ability had yet to deactivate, it appeared that even now, it continued to fool time.

Is that because I don’t belong here? Does that mean the world would reject me should its ability be disrupted?

Through what he felt like a joke from mother luck herself, he had kept a single ability, and yet that ability was almost useless.

Almost…

Ciel still had one of its traits which it could still use, that being the ‘The Fool’ card’s reversal application. All major arcana cards abilities stemmed from the card’s: Name, Symbols, and Meanings. For that reason, each one came with a Name Ability and a Meaning Ability.

With one Ciel would take its literal name and use it to manifest an ability corresponding to it. With the second he would take its meanings to manifest abilities corresponding within those domains. That applied to both the card’s upright and reversed meanings.

Such was the nature of a Concept rooted in a fortune game.

For the current Ciel, his only ability which he could actively use was one which served as a mental-hex. It would invade the mind of a single target and slowly, with growing intensity, it would cause them to lose proper reasoning in their actions and become foolishly reckless.

The ability could only be used once every twenty four hours, limited to a single target. That knowledge came instinctively within Ciel’s mind the moment he willed it to.

A lot weaker than it was before, hmm. That makes sense, I am not an esper anymore, perhaps my soul lacks the spirituality to go any further than this.

It appeared that even his single ability had received more limitations. Ciel found it quite pitiful, but quickly disregarded it as well.

Alright, I have gotten everything I needed. It will be more arduous, but I will manage. All I can do is keep my eyes wide for any signs of my concept and proceed forward.

He would march forward, even if his legs were to break and his flesh be mangled, so long as he could move then he would aim towards reaching his purpose.

There was too great of a price if he failed even now, for that reason Ciel soon stood and resumed towards the direction he had been headed before. Before anything else could be done, he needed to properly arm himself.

For now, a gun will have to do.

He took one step after the other with nothing stopping his march this time around. Before long, he arrived at the entrance of the gravesite, and at the edge of the slums.

With cold indifferent eyes, he moved his tattered self forth, taking his first steps inside.