Yuusuke walked the corridor with quiet steps, hands in his pockets, a stiffness in his shoulders that hadn't left since the Akechi incident. Two guards opened the secured chamber doors without a word, and he stepped inside.
Hanzo sat on the floor, shackled at the wrists and ankles with black restraints. The aura around him was nearly gone, as if he had simply let himself hollow out.
He didn't look up when Yuusuke entered.
"You know," Yuusuke said, his voice level, "you never seemed like the kind of guy to follow anyone."
Hanzo's eyes opened slowly, focused, but not hostile. "You came to understand, or accuse?"
Yuusuke didn't answer.
Hanzo stretched out his legs, iron clinking lightly against the floor. "Then sit. You won't get either standing like that."
Yuusuke stayed where he was, but his gaze sharpened. "You sided with a man who nearly toppled the Association. Why?"
Hanzo tilted his head slightly. "I sided with a man who chose to stand where no one else would."
"By making demi-humans. By experimenting. By killing."
"Did he kill?" Hanzo asked, and for a second, the room felt colder.
Yuusuke frowned. "You really believe that."
"I believe in conviction," Hanzo said simply. "Akechi never once raised his hand to kill someone directly."
That caught Yuusuke off guard. "Then what about Yorihito?"
Hanzo looked at him evenly with silence.
"So... he used people."
"Yes," Hanzo said without hesitation. "And they knew it. Some even welcomed it."
Yuusuke clenched a fist, trying to wrap his head around it. "He lied to us. Lied to the Association."
"He challenged it," Hanzo corrected. "He forced the Association to face the hypocrisy buried beneath regulations. Devils exist. Nightmares spread."
Silence stretched.
Yuusuke finally stepped forward. "You knew what he was doing. You helped him. Even if you didn't kill anyone — you made it possible."
Hanzo nodded. "I did."
"Why?" Yuusuke asked again, softer this time.
Hanzo leaned his head back against the wall. "Because he didn't need me to believe in him. He needed someone who believed in the world he was trying to create. And I did."
Yuusuke's brow furrowed.
"You will too, eventually," Hanzo added. "Not because you're weak."
Because this world will eventually show you something so ugly… you'll have to ask yourself: is this worth protecting?"
Yuusuke didn't reply.
He turned and headed for the exit, but paused at the door.
"Even if he meant well," Yuusuke said, "he still lost."
Hanzo smiled faintly, not with arrogance, but something closer to sadness.
"No," he said. "He let himself lose."
"Because if he wanted to win, he had to cross a border, he didn't want to"
The door shut behind Yuusuke, sealing the silence once more.