Touko's response to Aoko's request was a dramatic eye roll—she knew her younger sister far too well. Aoko was always acting on impulse, never thinking things through.
Still, after giving Aoko a verbal lashing, Touko agreed to her request. She set aside her studies with Preceptor Miriam and prepared to accompany Aoko to the Inverted Tower.
The Inverted Tower, as the name suggests, is accessed by inverting the space of the Carian Study Hall using the Carian Inverted Statue, entering the reflection of the study hall. This reflection conceals the true entrance to the Divine Tower of Liurnia.
Preceptor Miriam was stationed in the study hall partly because of her love for books and research—she wished for a quiet place to study—and partly because she bore the responsibility of defending against intruders.
Mirian had enough power to invent new spells under her name, which had become widespread among royal scholars. Her strength and skill were undeniable. Spatial teleportation in glintstone sorcery was extremely rare; aside from teleportation gates, Mirian's vanishing spell was the only readily usable teleportation magic. Teleportation traps were merely a derivative application of the gates.
The intruders Mirian defended against generally fell into two categories. The first included typical enemies of Caria—greedy adventurers and Tarnished seeking Carian secrets.
The second group was more interesting: enemies sent by the Two Fingers, who opposed Princess Ranni.
When Aoko and Touko entered the Inverted Tower, they encountered numerous Fingercreepers and even a few Twinfinger Assassins. These creatures were the minions of the Two Fingers once stationed at the top of the Divine Tower. Upon discovering Ranni's intent, the Two Fingers immediately dispatched these servants to try and seize control of the Carian Study Hall, aiming to expel Ranni's followers from the Divine Tower. Unfortunately for them, they failed.
With Mirian guarding the Carian Study Hall, the connection between the Divine Tower and the outside world was severed. The minions of the Two Fingers could only penetrate the tower itself, but not the true Carian royal archives within the study hall.
Realizing this, Ranni's Two Fingers relocated itself without hesitation. Knowing the Divine Tower of Liurnia was lost, it moved through the roots of the Erdtree and hid deep beneath the inaccessible Cathedral of Manus Celes.
After Ranni personally eliminated her destined enemy—her own Two Fingers—all the Fingercreepers in the Inverted Tower lost their coordination and became mindless, beast-like monsters that wandered.
Preceptor Miriam was undoubtedly Ranni's most loyal follower. Unlike Seluvis, who was scheming and untrustworthy, Mirian was wholly faithful and vastly more powerful. When Queen Rennala had lost her mind, Mirian had been the pillar holding Caria together.
When she heard Aoko's plan to resurrect Princess Ranni's physical body, Preceptor Miriam wholeheartedly approved. She had been the first to oppose Ranni's decision to abandon her body, unaware then that it had been cursed by the Two Fingers.
The three of them activated the Carian lunar globe using the Inverted Statue and entered the Inverted Tower, which had a completely mirrored structure compared to the original study hall. While clearing out the many Fingercreepers inside, Preceptor Miriam also sorrowfully recovered various damaged texts from the tower's archives. Many were too far gone to be restored, which greatly upset her.
Not wanting to sit idly by, Aoko and Touko joined Mirian in her efforts to eliminate the pests and salvage the books. They worked together all afternoon, and by evening, they had finally managed to tidy up the chaotic tower.
By the time Aoko reached the top of the Divine Tower, the stars and moon were visible—it was night.
"That's Princess Ranni's corpse, right?" Touko asked. "It's been badly damaged… Was it burned by some kind of flame?"
"This was caused by the Godslaying Flame, triggered by a fragment of the Death Rune," Aoko replied, pointing to the centipede-shaped curse mark on the corpse's back. "That curse still holds residual power, constantly burning Ranni's body. Otherwise, her divine flesh wouldn't be so easily destroyed."
"So what do you want me to do?" Touko lit a cigarette, took a deep drag, and exhaled a curl of smoke. "Do you want to remove the Death Rune and try to reconstruct the body? Or extract its genetic traits and create a new one?"
"You! I told you to cut back on smoking!" Aoko snapped, rolling her eyes. "Neither of those options. For Ranni now, her original body doesn't matter much. Cloning it would be no better than repairing it."
"You mean…" Touko paused, catching on to Aoko's implication.
"Exactly. We'll use the remaining genetic material in this body to create a primordial embryo. Then, using the power of the Great Rune of the Unborn held by Queen Rennala, we can allow Ranni's body to undergo rebirth, purged of the Golden Order's shackles," Aoko explained.
Mirian had been both shocked and hopeful while listening to their discussion. She was devastated by Ranni's corpse but inspired by the proposed resurrection. Aoko's final plan—having Queen Rennala give birth to the princess again—aligned perfectly with Mirian's ideals. She also had relevant knowledge of the re-birthing ritual.
"Hahaha, surely Ranni will be pleased to experience a mother's love once more?" Touko laughed, finding the idea amusing.
With their plan decided, the Aozaki sisters began their work. Aoko carefully removed the fragment of the Death Rune. Touko then methodically dismembered Ranni's burned body, using thaumaturgic techniques to extract the lingering informational fragments from the charred remains.
These fragments alone weren't enough to restore the original body, as most of it had been destroyed by the Death Rune. But they were essential to ensure soul compatibility for the new body.
For the remaining genetic material, Aoko intended to replicate what Ranni had once done with Rena. By combining Rennala's and Ranni's genetic traits and eliminating defects caused by inbreeding, they would create a new, pure-blooded Rennala family body.
Strictly speaking, the resurrected Ranni wouldn't be the demigod born of Rennala and Radagon, but rather a new Ranni-blooded witch, inheriting only the bloodline of the Rennala.