The sky and earth collapsed into a wash of shattered white — every familiar shape ground beyond recognition.
A dark silhouette parted the curtain of snow and stepped through.
The girl stood there, mask cold and still, eyes tracing the pillars that had once stretched dozens of meters skyward — now crumbled into ruins like the remnants of a forgotten empire. The ground beneath her had been hurled open, split wide into a chasm of deep ice stretching for kilometers beneath her heels.
The crystal had shattered. Only fragments remained — thoughtless, inert.
Her gaze moved over all of it. Unfocused. Unanchored.
She had thought, perhaps, that everything would return to how it was before...
And then —
Her body jolted —
Violently —!
In pain — !!
Everything gave way at once. The pauldrons dissolved from her shoulders, falling like sand. Her body grew heavy and dropped, white hair cold as frost spilling across her shoulders. Her hands trembled beyond control, her body alight as though a billion needles were threading through her skin in an endless relay, one after another.
Her breath came in broken fragments —
"C — Cold... so cold..."
The whisper tore itself from her chest, carrying with it the weight of her own disbelief.
Into the silence, an unfamiliar sound suddenly cleaved through the dark.
*Clk... clk... clk...*
Dry, hollow footsteps — familiar enough to raise the hairs on her skin — echoed from the dark. A tall shadow moved through it, unhurried and quiet.
Uzuki was still standing. His body swayed from the deep wound in his shoulder, but he held. Both hands trembled faintly in rhythm with the girl's breathing. The sword was gone entirely from his grip.
But his eyes were fixed — boring straight into the face that had never once been seen.
One heavy foot lifted. His torn trousers dragged. He moved forward, toward the girl prostrate among the ruins of frost and snow.
He stopped a few paces away. His center of gravity dropped slightly. His lips parted, barely.
"Is this enough?"
The girl hung her head low. The being that had been the *Spirit Sovereign* shuddered under pressure against the ground, both hands clutched tight around a body still churning in disorder.
"I — I don't know anymore —"
"This feeling... it's s — strange..."
"Not — like anything before..."
Uzuki was quiet for a moment.
"Is it what losing feels like?"
The air thickened — suspended on a single drop of water, waiting.
The girl went still. Her expression settled.
"Perhaps... yes.."
"...It's over —!"
No resistance. No extension. Only acceptance.
Uzuki stared at her. The cold returned to his face like a door closing.
"Then you've proven your honor?"
---
"Not yet!"
The answer came sudden and sharp — voice catching, hardening, before the faint surprise even finished crossing Uzuki's face.
She asked him in return.
"Do you remember 'it'?"
He was silent a moment, then asked back.
"What is 'it' like?"
The girl eased slightly. Her shoulder dropped to the side. The trembling had stopped.
She drew a slow breath, then began.
"A space called The Celestial Tower."
"No light. No sound. No color. Everything undefined — nothing clear —"
"...Hff..."
"Inside is something called a 'wish' — obtainable only by destroying the Sin-spirit."
"I don't know either..."
"I can't understand — where they heard it from, but all of them... like starving animals —!"
"Bloodthirsty and frenzied in their hunt for 'it'..."
"Foolish and blind beyond imagination — !!!"
"But..."
She paused. Drew in more air.
"You are different — Uzuki!"
"You were entirely an outsider."
"Wandered in by chance..."
"And made me think all over again."
"Reminded me of something I once wanted."
She fell quiet again, then looked up — directly into Uzuki's eyes.
"I've been talking too much this whole time, haven't I?"
Uzuki gave a faint nod.
"Yes."
"And you still haven't answered my earlier question."
She kept her gaze on him. Her shoulders lifted slightly.
"Fuuuu..."
"Sorry.."
"I really wasted your time."
"But —"
"I think your being here was truly accidental —"
"Even so — there is something that will no longer be accidental."
She raised her arm suddenly. From her open palm, white smoke materialized at once — gathering, connecting, forming into a white sword.
She swung her arm hard —
But...
Uzuki did not move.
*Fwt!*
*Thud —!*
Two sounds followed each other in quick succession, marking the impact that had occurred.
Uzuki remained standing. He turned his eyes to the emerald set in the sword's hilt — now driven into the stone floor beside him. Not into him.
The girl slumped again, her body going dim and slow.
"— that is the one who must die —!"
Everything seemed to solidify in that instant. The world quieted before her words.
"The Celestial Tower permits only one to remain —"
"— or to leave!"
"I will never be able to leave this place..."
"But you can!"
Uzuki did not move. In that moment, he was like a statue — even his breath seemed to dissolve into the space around him.
The girl broke the silence with a voice meant to steady.
"Don't worry. Think of this as a ritual of honor."
Only then did Uzuki shift — barely. His gaze still nailed to some fixed, unseen point.
"No."
"I'm just... watching."
"What is the 'character' supposed to say?"
The strange answer made the girl go still. She lowered her head — and let out a quiet, self-mocking laugh.
"You truly make it impossible to predict you."
Her voice dropped.
"Nothing like what I've ever sensed from the other side..."
Uzuki gave a slight nod in place of a reply — as though he hadn't heard that last part.
He reached out and wrapped his hand around the sword's hilt. The movement was decisive. Cold.
*Shing!*
Metal against stone rang out clean and sharp.
In an instant the sword was across his shoulder, ready for the ritual.
"Either way..."
"You don't need encouragement."
His other hand joined the grip, leveling the blade straight out before the girl's face — as though it meant to divide the world at the center of her.
She did not pull away. She lowered herself to one knee on the cold ground, mask still raised, meeting her end with absolute composure.
Uzuki's cold gaze swept across her. His voice came out carrying full, merciless weight.
"I will never pardon those who have failed."
Every word struck like a decree hammered into iron.
"To die beneath one's own honor — that is the only fitting end!"
The blade rose slowly. Cold steel reflected in the still eyes watching it rise.
The world around them retreated — making way for an old, worn reel that began turning slowly in the deep of her mind. Images blurred at the edges. Sound flickered like a broken radio, stuttering, cutting out...
◇ ...
A wooden floor that could hardly be called something to lie on. Blurry shapes stumbling in and out of shadow.
"Your grandmother is dead —!"
"...It's all your fault!"
"You little comet — !!!"
◇ ...
Faces without clear features. Only the sounds of distorted cursing remained.
"...worthless trash..."
"...get out..."
Beatings. Cold neglect.
◇ ...
Another voice surfaced — thin as morning mist, warming the chest that had gone cold.
"...don't be sad... I'm here..."
"...I'll help you..."
A hand reached out — but just as she moved to take it, it dissolved into scattered sparks of light.
◇ ...
Space shook. A piercing scream crashed in from somewhere very deep.
"It... the Sin-spirit..."
"CATCH IT—!"
Everything spun. Old fear clung to the skin.
◇ ...Finally.
A blank whiteness settled over her mind.
"Cold... so cold..."
And then, a voice adrift in nothing.
"Who are you...?"
◇ returning...
Everything fell into a whirlpool — everything swept away — nothing left behind...
The blade descended gently toward the girl's head —
...Perhaps it was finally time to end...
*crack —?*
The sound of something breaking — and light, somehow, came through.
The porcelain mask — brittle, without resistance — let go.
The veil split in two, adrift in the open air.
Nothing left to conceal.
*crash!*
The porcelain mask shattered against the ground, carrying with it all attachments — and the black flowers went with them.
The corners of her eyes blazed to life before the sudden world around her, and alongside that light came tears of something like regret.
A beauty like a goddess slowly came into being — soft hair falling around her face, bringing with it a warmth that felt, strangely, like gentleness.
Her eyes flinched at the sudden light.
Slowly the lids lifted — revealing eyes of jade green, glittering before the brightness, separated from it only by the dark shape standing before her.
A hand extended — unguarded, unafraid — toward that shape.
Waiting to be held.
And a voice rose.
"But I will not allow a person to die in despair and the crushing weight of pain!"