Compared to that past business-like feeling of wearing a mask and having a sense of calculation no matter what she did, Haruno's expression at this moment looked as if it were becoming much more... relaxed? Unwound? In short, it was something like that.
After all, compared to an existence like Asakura who bore supernatural powers and acted as an ally of justice, she really did feel much more relaxed having only the burden of her family on her shoulders and needing to engage in social pleasantries and maneuvers with others.
So they say human happiness is born of comparison.
"That's not quite how it is." Asakura patted Gokou Ruri's head, soothing the girl whose eyes had become sharp, and only then said to Yukinoshita Haruno: "I am not a professional at manipulating memories after all. My handling of memories is actually quite simple and crude; I cannot guarantee that while deleting a segment of someone's memory, I won't cause any damage to other memories at all."
To put it mildly, even if Asakura's hand didn't shake, when using [Candle] to burn away someone's memories, some irrelevant things would be forgotten because of various tangled connections.
To put it more seriously, the formation of personality, besides innate factors, is largely shaped by the influence of postnatal memories. Tampering with someone else's memories already carries the risk of altering their personality to a certain extent.
To explain it in a simpler and more straightforward way, it is that a character whose memories have been deleted by him is more likely to experience OOC (Out Of Character) situations.
Therefore, in the past, if Asakura could avoid deleting people's memories, he would try his best not to do it, especially for those who possessed magic power and had the potential to become witches. This was because he couldn't guarantee that the previously unactivated magic inside them wouldn't resist his [Candle], leading to the deletion of some strange parts—it wasn't that he actually had any lecherous intentions toward those girls.
However, the number of people involved in this incident was simply too many. To prevent any accidents, Asakura could only delete and modify everyone's memories once.
Of course, there were still some differences. For example, for Shiina Mahiru, who had been following him from the start, Asakura was much gentler when he acted. Compared to those mass-produced modifications in the banquet hall, the part where her memories were deleted would be much more precise. It only deleted the parts related to Asakura, Gokou Ruri, Yukinoshita Haruno, and those bizarre bugs. Although there might be some omissions, it could prevent the collapse of the young girl's personality to the greatest extent, which could be considered a form of protection for her.
"Is your method of modifying others' memories really that crude..."
Yukinoshita Haruno looked at Shiina Mahiru lying on the ground, and the corner of her mouth couldn't stop twitching.
At this moment, she felt incredibly lucky that she was a "relative" of Yukino and didn't have to have her memories modified by such a simple and crude method.
It was decided! After this, she would go to Yukino's apartment and give her dear sister a big hug to show her gratitude!
"Alright, it's about done now."
Asakura activated [Candle] for the third time. After erasing some traces left by himself and Gokou Ruri, he said decisively: "Prepare to withdraw."
"Wait a minute, is it really okay to leave this here?"
Yukinoshita Haruno looked at a long table scattered in the hallway and asked with some disbelief: "Then don't you guys have that kind of ability to turn everything back to its original state after the matter is resolved?"
"What are you thinking? We are magicians, not PreCure. Where would we get that kind of 'convenient outcome for the plot'?"
Asakura shot her a glance and said.
Actually, it wasn't that there was no way to handle it, as long as he burned away the fact that Gokou Ruri and the others had crashed Chimera into the floor, then some derivative events related to this matter would also be corrected.
But that way, many unpredictable situations would occur. For example, Gokou Ruri and the others might be directly teleported back to the banquet hall, the scattered long tables and marble slabs might crush some people to death, and Yukinoshita Haruno might be infected by the bugs because she hadn't escaped the banquet hall... in short, it would be quite troublesome, and there was an eighty percent chance it would be worse than maintaining the status quo.
Secondly, acting upon 'Existence' itself was an extremely magic-consuming task.
Although the matter had now come to a close, just in case, Asakura still intended to reserve enough magic to deal with any possible emergencies.
"Then how are we going to leave here? Is it by broomstick? Or a flying carpet? It couldn't be the Anywhere Door..." Yukinoshita Haruno showed a rare girl-like innocence.
"No, by car." Asakura pulled out his car keys: "My car is still in the parking lot."
Yukinoshita Haruno: "..."
Suddenly, it didn't feel so romantic anymore.
Asakura kicked open the door of a nearby room and led the two of them inside.
"Didn't you say we had to leave here quickly? Why are we entering a room?"
Yukinoshita Haruno asked with difficulty.
"Is there any conflict between these two things?" Asakura said casually.
As he spoke, he turned his body so that Yukinoshita Haruno's vision could see a bit further—his old Ford car was currently floating leisurely outside the huge floor-to-ceiling window of the room's balcony.
"Am I dreaming? This is the eighth floor..." Yukinoshita Haruno murmured in disbelief.
Haruno was still doubting her life, while Gokou Ruri had already taken the lead and climbed into the car, occupying the co-pilot seat.
After Asakura sat in the driver's seat, seeing that she didn't seem to have much patience and was already about to drive away, Yukinoshita Haruno hurriedly climbed into the back seat.
Clearly, from the outside, it looked like quite a small car model, but the space inside was quite spacious.
"Where is your home? I'll send you directly over." Asakura pressed a button next to the steering wheel, causing the flying small car to enter stealth mode while he asked.
"I... don't really want to go home today."
Yukinoshita Haruno said softly: "Does Asakura have time..."
"No time." Before she could finish, Asakura refused with a beaming smile: "I still have to go listen to rock and roll."
"I can let Chimera take you to a hotel." Gokou Ruri said icily.
"Ah, just joking, just joking. Please send me to Yukino's place, please~"
Yukinoshita Haruno couldn't tell if the other party was joking or being serious, so she immediately folded her hands and said with a smile.
About ten minutes later, in Yukinoshita Yukino's apartment.
Yukino, who had just finished her bath and was sitting on the sofa reading a book in her pajamas, was interrupted by a burst of urgent knocking on the door.
Opening the door, she found that the person standing outside was actually her elder sister, Yukinoshita Haruno.
"Yukino! Sister's mood right now is really happy and excited and scared; in short, it's super complicated!" Yukinoshita Haruno lunged toward her sister.
"What strange things are you saying?" Yukino frowned, stretching out her hand to block the other's face, showing a somewhat displeased expression: "Did you drink some cheap alcohol?"
"Put those things aside for now, in short, let sister have a hug and a kiss first!"
Seeing her elder sister really looking like she wanted to come over and kiss her, Yukinoshita Yukino immediately leaned her whole body back in disgust, trying hard to pull some distance between them: "Don't come over here!"