She sighed; were all preindustrial humans this suspicious?

"The image that you see of me now, that's the illusion." Suddenly, she disappeared, leaving only empty air where her form once floated. After a second or two, it appeared again, in roughly the same place. "It's not really connected to me in any way; it's just a way of interacting with people who need a face to talk to."

Zouichi held up the projection sphere in his hand.

"That's where I live in reality. I exist as a pattern of electricity in a sphere of intricately constructed metal. There's no magic involved."