The word kill hung in the air like a blade, and for a moment, the garden forgot to breathe. The bamboo stilled and the fountain's trickle sounded too loud. Even the chimes seemed to pause mid-swing as if the whole world was waiting to see what Asol would say.
But he couldn't say anything.
His throat closed around the response that tried to claw its way out. His fingers flexed around the cold metal of his Adamantium arm as the sigils along its surface pulsed faintly under his skin like a second heartbeat.
Aoi…
He'd imagined her laughing in this very garden, dragging Kazuma to see the flowers, and complaining about rehearsal schedules back on Earth. He'd seen her lift the entire room's mood with one smile. And now she was… leverage.
"Kazuma," Asol said finally, voice low, "say that again."
Kazuma stared at the stones, jaw locked, eyes shadowed under his fringe.
"You heard me."
"Say it anyway."
Silence stretched between them. The fountain's surface rippled with pale moonlight. Kazuma's shoulders trembled once.
"If I disobey," he repeated with each word edged with bitterness, "if I even think about betraying Providence…"
He swallowed.
"…he'll kill Aoi."
The air tightened more as Asol's Aura stirred within him and a slow burn rising from the pit of his stomach. It wasn't the reckless flare from battle, but something colder and heavier. It was rage, coiled around the memory of a girl right now comatose in another world, and another girl smiling in this one.
"Did he tell you that himself?" Asol asked quietly.
Kazuma laughed. It wasn't pleasant.
"He didn't have to. He showed me."
Asol's eyes narrowed.
"How?"
Kazuma finally looked up. His eyes gleamed—ice-blue, but fractured. Tired.
"You ever wondered where he found me?" Kazuma said. "You think I just… walked up to Aegis Prime and asked nicely to join the hero system?"
Asol didn't answer. He didn't have to. The question was its own indictment.
"I was supposed to be a corpse on a table," Kazuma went on, voice flat. "I was a failed experiment. A weapon with two souls jammed into one body. I was too unstable, and too dangerous. They wanted to dismantle me. Dissect the mistake that was us and start over."
He snorted.
"But Providence disagreed. He said I was 'useful.'"
A bitter echo of the word hung in the garden.
"He killed the people who made me. He burned the lab down to the last wire. Pulled me out of a pile of bodies like a broken toy someone dropped in the trash."
Asol's fingers tightened.
"So he saved you," Asol said. "And then he put a collar on your neck."
Kazuma's lips twisted.
"He's the one who taught me to control my Fire and Ice. How to flip between mine and Their soul. How to use one to hold the other back so we didn't tear ourselves apart. You think we don't know we're alive because he decided we were worth the effort?"
He lifted his hand. Frost curled lazily across his knuckles, then melted into a thin steam as a faint, ember-red glow pulsed there instead.
"But that kindness came with a price. When he says 'sit,' I sit. When he says 'burn,' I burn. When he says 'leave it alone'…"
His gaze speared through Asol.
"…I leave it alone."
"And Aoi?" Asol asked. "Where does she fit into that leash?"
Kazuma's shoulders sank.
"She's the leash."
For a heartbeat Asol thought the garden floor might open under him. His thoughts flickered back to Aoi's too-bright smile in the dome, the way her eyes didn't quite match it.
Brother… do you believe this world is perfect?
Providence's smile in the hallway. The gentle hand on Asol's arm, the easy warmth that now felt like poison.
Asol exhaled slowly.
"So that's it," he said. "You're his dog. As long as you heel, she lives."
Kazuma flinched.
"You think I want that?" he snapped. "You think I enjoy watching him turn this world into his theater while I clap from backstage?!"
His breath came out in a harsh cloud of visible frost. The temperature had dropped without Asol noticing.
"What I think," Asol replied, keeping his own voice even, "is that you've already decided losing her is worse than losing everything else."
Kazuma's eyes sharpened.
"You're damn right it is."
And there it was. The line. Asol felt something inside him snap and settle at the same time.
"So what?" he asked. "You're going to stand there and tell me you'll keep serving him. That you'll keep letting him loop people, enslave them, wipe them, as long as Aoi never sees it?"
Kazuma's answer came, raw and immediate.
"Yes."
The chimes overhead clicked once, like a quiet verdict.
"You know what's happening underground," Asol said. "You've seen it."
Kazuma's silence was confirmation.
"You knew," Asol pressed, anger threading into his words now, "about the miners. The Adamantium. The heroes beating children under this city while the crowds scream for more fireworks on the surface. You knew and you still—"
"What do you want me to say?!" Kazuma exploded.
Ice jumped along the stones at his feet, frosting the roots of the bamboo.
"If I stand against Providence, if I even talk about it, Aoi dies. They won't just kill her, Asol. They'll erase her. Do you understand that? I've seen what they do to people who don't fit his script."
A flicker of an image passed behind his eyes. A glass cylinder. Tubes. A girl floating in liquid. Asol saw it.
"So your solution," Asol said, each word steady, "is to keep dancing exactly how he wants."
Kazuma's teeth bared.
"My solution is to keep Aoi breathing."
"And what about everyone who isn't Aoi?"
"Don't," Kazuma warned.
"They don't matter?" Asol pushed. "Is that it? If it's between one girl and an entire world full of people getting crushed under Providence's heel, you'll choose the one girl?"
"Yes."
No hesitation. No apology.
"Because without her," Kazuma said hoarsely, "there is no world worth saving—for me."
The words struck Asol harder than a physical blow. He knew that feeling. He'd had it once. Back when his world still had a sky he could name. Back when Bell's laughter still lived in his ears instead of his dreams.
If I had a chance to save her… what would I trade?
The answer came too quickly, and he hated it. He closed his eyes briefly.
"…I get it," he said. "I do. But Kazuma—"
His eyes opened again, sharper than before.
"I've already watched one world burn while people told themselves a little cruelty now would prevent something worse later. I'm not going to sit by and let a second one rot while you call it mercy."
Kazuma's breath hitched.
"So what?" he asked. "You're going to play hero? You and that metal arm are going to topple Providence on your own? You think you're the first person to try to stand against him? The first to talk about 'justice' and 'truth'?"
His laugh was empty.
"They're all gone. Every last one. Wiped, looped, re-scripted. And now you're on his radar too. You really think throwing yourself against him is going to do anything except get her killed faster?"
Asol's Aura stirred again, hotter this time, like something inside him had finally decided which way it would fall.
"Kazuma," he said quietly, "move."
Kazuma blinked.
"What?"
"Get out of my way."
He nodded toward the garden's gate.
"You want to keep playing along? Fine. But I'm done pretending this place is a stage show. I'm done letting Providence choose who lives and who gets buried under his 'vision.'"
He took a slow step forward.
"I'm going after him. With or without you."
Kazuma stared as the frost at his feet thickened.
"…You really don't get it," he whispered.
Asol then waited. Kazuma lifted his head. His eyes were no longer just ice. There was something burning under it now—red, angry, and desperate.
"If you move against him now," Kazuma said, "if you drag his secrets into the light, he won't just come after you. He'll tighten the leash on everyone. On Aoi. On those miners. On the whole damn world."
"You think he isn't going to do that anyway?" Asol shot back. "You think sitting still is going to make him kinder?"
Kazuma's lips thinned.
"I'm not asking you to like it," he said. "I'm asking you to survive it. Go back to Earth."
Asol's expression cooled.
"That's not going to happen."
Kazuma nodded, as if he'd expected that answer and hated it.
"Then I don't have a choice."
He lifted his hand causing the air to snap.
"Stand down, Asol."
Asol's gaze dropped briefly to the frost blooming along the stones. Then back to Kazuma's eyes.
"No."
For a moment neither moved. Then the garden fell in temperature. Ice crawled up the fountain's lip in a sudden, jagged wave. The water churned once before freezing solid in mid-ripple. The bamboo leaves sagged under crystalline weight as frost raced up their stalks, turning the green to pale glass.
Kazuma exhaled. The breath left his mouth in a thick plume of white mist.
"All right then," he said quietly. "I'll knock you out and drag your ass back to Earth if I have to."
Asol's prosthetic fingers curled into a fist as the Adamantium creaked.
"You can try."
The first step was Kazuma's. He moved faster than Asol remembered. There was no wasted motion, no flare of dramatics. Just a clean, silent slide over the stones, ice forming under his boots to propel him forward like a blade.
Asol barely got his arm up in time as Kazuma's fist crashed against the Adamantium with a crack like shattering glass. The impact blew a ring of frost outward, spiderwebbing through the stone tiles around them. The fountain's frozen surface fractured at the edge as thin fissures raced across it.
Asol's feet slid half a step back as his bones shook under the transferred force. Kazuma thought to himself.
He's heavier than before me and Aoi had trained him.
Kazuma's eyes flickered.
"Move," he repeated.
"Make me," Asol grunted.
He twisted his arm, redirecting the force. Kazuma pivoted off it. Ice shattered under his heel as he flipped backward, landing lightly near the bamboo. Before Asol could close the distance, the air in front of him glittered and spears of ice erupted from the ground.
"—Tch!"
He jerked sideways, but one shard grazed his shoulder, slicing through his jacket and nicking his skin. Another glanced off his prosthetic arm with a shriek of ice against metal. A third shot past his head, embedding in the stone behind him like a crystal dagger.
Asol felt the razor-cold kiss of air where it had missed his cheek by an inch.
Kazuma's expression was tight.
"This isn't like the time when me and Aoi trained you," he warned.
"I can tell," Asol shot back, ducking under a fourth spike and smashing it with his metal fist. It exploded into a spray of glittering shards that stung his face.
He winced, raising his arm to block the flurry of smaller projectiles that followed. Kazuma swept his hand, and the broken shards whipped around mid-air, forming a spiraling ring that hurtled toward Asol like a bladed halo.
It's too dense to just power through…
Asol slammed his prosthetic into the ground as his Aura flared. The Adamantium sang under his skin, the sigils flashing briefly as he poured power into it. It wasn't enough to unleash [Shattered Legacy] fully, but enough to thicken the air around him.
The shards hit the invisible pressure like bullets striking water. Some deflected while others shattered. A few still punched through, slicing his forearm, his cheek, and his legs. Each cut stung with a sharp, numbing cold that bit deeper than it should have.
He gritted his teeth.
"Since when," he muttered, "were you this annoying with ice?"
Kazuma's mouth twitched.
"Since I realized I'd have to keep idiots like you alive."
Asol snorted—and then Kazuma disappeared.
No, not disappeared. Blurred.
His instincts screamed as his body twisted, barely catching the movement as Kazuma slid along a path of conjured ice, body low, fist drawn back. The world narrowed to the arc of that punch. Asol raised his arm in a cross-guard, and the collision rattled his teeth. The stone under his feet cracked and the impact forced his heels back, gouging two lines in the tiles.
However, Kazuma didn't let up.
He drove forward, combination flowing—jab, cross, low kick, elbow. Each movement had ice behind it, bursts of frost marking every place his limbs passed like the air itself was freezing in reaction.
Asol blocked what he could with his arm, took some blows on his ribs, but twisted away from others. Each impact reverberated through his bones.
He's measured. He's not trying to kill me. Just break enough things that I stay down.
The realization stung almost worse than the punches.
"Kazuma—" Asol grunted between impacts. "You really—think this is—going to stop anything?"
"It'll stop you," Kazuma snapped, pivoting into a spinning back kick.
Asol ducked under it. His fist shot up, Adamantium connecting with Kazuma's side. The impact sent a jolt up Asol's own arm.
Kazuma flew sideways, crashing shoulder-first into a bamboo stalk. The stalk snapped, ice shattering around him. He rolled, catching himself with a palm against the ground, sliding backward until his heels hit the fountain's base.
He coughed once, hand briefly pressed to his ribs.
"Still heavy," he muttered. "Like getting hit by a car."
"Good," Asol said, straightening. His Aura hummed in his chest.
"Maybe you'll remember that when you're thinking about hitting me again."
Kazuma's expression darkened.
"Don't make me switch," he warned.
Asol hesitated.
"Switch to—"
He stopped.
He knew that tone. He'd heard it once before, when Kazuma had gone from calm ice to something else entirely. A burning presence that made the air feel too tight.
"…Fire Mode?" Asol asked.
Kazuma's eye twitched.
"Stay in Ice," Asol said. "We can talk this out without—"
Flames flickered, faint, at the tips of Kazuma's fingers.
The temperature lurched. The frost on the stones hissed, not melting but steaming.
"You're not listening," Kazuma said, voice dropping lower, rougher. Another timbre surfaced beneath it—one Asol had only ever heard reflected in bells of panic and combat.
Let me out…
Asol felt the hairs on his arms stand.
"Don't," he warned. "You're barely holding yourself together as it is. You throw Fire on top of that Ice while you're this pissed off, and you're going to rip something."
Kazuma laughed. It wasn't Kazuma's laugh.
"And if I do?" the second voice asked through his mouth, heat curling around the words. "Maybe that's what it takes to get through your skull, Asol."
Fire Mode.
His eyes smoldered—not fully red, not fully blue, but a turbulent mix between the two, like embers under ice.
"I didn't come here to fight you," Asol said, forcing his tone steady.
Kazuma's (Fire Mode) twisted his head, curious.
"You came here to drag my host into your little crusade," he said. "You want him to spit in Providence's face. It's adorable."
Asol's jaw tightened.
"I want him to stop letting Aoi be a hostage."
Fire Mode's smile vanished.
"The girl," he said, tone flattening. "Always about the girl."
He stepped forward. Steam rose from his boots where fire and frost met and argued.
"You think you're the only one who cares if she lives?" Fire Mode asked. "I was born in the same lab. I heard the same screams. I watched the same cages. I know exactly what happens to people when men like Providence get bored of them."
He spread his hands.
"And you want to poke that on purpose."
Asol swallowed, throat dry.
"I want to make sure no one else has to live like—"
"—like Kurogane?" Fire Mode cut in.
The name landed like a dropped stone.
Asol's eyes widened.
"…So, you do know her?"
Fire Mode's gaze sharpened.
"Of course I do," he said. "Kazuma never shut up about her when we were alone. The girl in the tank. The one who watched him burn the facility down. The one he couldn't save properly."
Asol's chest tightened.
"I met her," he said quietly.
Fire Mode stilled.
"Liar."
"She's alive," Asol pressed. "She's been hiding underground for ten years. She broke the temporal loop. She cut me out of Providence's script."
He took a step forward.
"She remembers you. You pulled her out of that hell. She wants to thank you."
For the first time since Fire Mode surfaced, something fragile cracked through the heat.
"…She's alive?" the voice asked, softer now. "She survived?"
"Yes."
Silence.
Kazuma's shoulders trembled. For a second, Asol wasn't sure who was in control. The air around them flickered between chill and heat.
"Where is she?" Fire Mode demanded.
"Not here," Asol answered. "I didn't bring her cause I'm not stupid. But she's safe. For now, at least."
He jabbed a finger at Kazuma's chest.
"Because I decided to move. Because she decided to fight back. If she'd stayed in that room waiting for Providence to get bored, she'd be dead."
Fire Mode's lips curled.
"So what, you want to use her as your moral?"
Asol's patience thinned.
"I want you to see there are ways out of cages you think are permanent."
Fire Mode's eyes narrowed as he interrupted Asol.
"Let me educate you," he said. "There are cages made of bars, and there are cages made of people. Providence doesn't need to lay a finger on Aoi. All he has to do is let her stand in a place you're trying to blow up, and you've already lost."
He stepped in close, heat rolling off his skin.
"You say you met the girl we saved. Good for you. But if Providence decides to scrunch this world in his fist, the first thing that breaks is not a random miner. It's her. The idol. The symbol. The sister."
His grin went razor-thin.
"You going to punch through her too, Liberator?"
The title, spoken like a slur, scraped down Asol's spine. Now he suddenly wanted to hit something.
"How about," Asol said slowly, "instead of building a thousand excuses for why it's impossible, you help me make sure Providence never gets to make that choice in the first place?"
Fire Mode's smile faded completely.
"I told you," he said. "You are not ready for what he is."
"And I told you," Asol replied, "I don't care."
They stared at each other. Then Kazuma moved. Flames exploded across his right arm. His Aura flared so violently the garden lights flickered. The frozen fountain cracked further as a jagged line split the center.
Asol had one instant to think oh, that's bad before Kazuma vanished again. This time, it was like watching a storm compacted into a human frame.
Kazuma (Fire Mode) was on Asol in a heartbeat, fire-wreathed fist swinging. Asol threw up his prosthetic to block. The impact detonated a shockwave of steam as fire met Adamantium.
The metal overheated instantly, the sigils along it flaring with a searing light.
"Asol—!" his own mind screamed.
His bones vibrated. The limb screamed with phantom pain, his nerves convinced his missing flesh was burning.
Kazuma didn't stop.
Fire slammed into Asol's side a split-second later from Kazuma's other hand— flames so absolute it stole the breath from his lungs. Heat crashed over him in alternating waves as his Aura scrambled to compensate.
He blocked, parried, and redirected it all. But Kazuma was a relentless rhythm. Fire to crack his defenses, Fire to burn his responses, Fire to punish openings, Fire to render him immobile.
He's not trying to out-power me!
Asol realized, teeth gritted as he deflected another blazing hook.
He's trying to break my sense of my own body. To make my Aura misfire. To make me hesitate.
It was working. For a moment, his internal flow stuttered, confused by conflicting signals, his vision blurred.
Kazuma drove a knee toward his gut. Asol twisted, catching it on his hip instead, pain lancing up his side. He grabbed Kazuma's shoulder with his metal hand and squeezed.
Adamantium dug into muscle.
Kazuma hissed.
"I don't want to hurt you," Asol ground out.
"Then fall," Kazuma snarled.
Flames roared up from his back, engulfing both of them in an inferno.
Asol's Aura reacted on instinct, flaring outward in a desperate shield. The world became noise and light and choking heat as the space around them distorted. Bamboo combusted at the edges as leaves disintegrated into ash mid-air.
They were in an Aura Clash. He felt his lungs try to seize.
Too much—
He forced his Aura downward, into the Adamantium. The arm screamed, but it held, becoming an anchor. He slammed his feet into the half-frozen, half-melting stones and pushed. The shield expanded, blowing the worst of the flames outward in a dome. Fire rolled off the invisible barrier in waves, licking the garden walls.
Kazuma's eyes widened.
Asol swung.
It wasn't [Shattered Legacy], not fully. He didn't have the luxury of the windup, and he didn't want to risk collapsing the entire Dome. But he poured enough condensed Aura into his punch that the very air warped in front of it.
His fist connected with Kazuma's chest. Sound died for a second. Then came back as a thunderclap, sending Kazuma flying. He crashed through what remained of the bamboo cluster, slammed into the garden wall, and slid down, leaving a spiderweb of cracked plaster behind. The ground shook under Asol's feet.
Asol staggered himself, knees buckling for a moment.
"Ha… ha…"
His breathing was ragged, sweat mixed with steam dripping down his face. His prosthetic arm throbbed with a dead, heavy ache—the sigils now dim and cracked further along the forearm.
He flexed his fingers.
They moved.
Barely.
"Kazuma," he gasped, "stop this. I don't want to keep hurting you."
From the pile of collapsed bamboo, fire flickered.
Kazuma (Fire Mode) dragged himself up, one hand pressed to his chest, breathing hard. His lips were split; blood smeared his chin. His coat hung in scorched tatters.
"…You…" He coughed once, then laughed weakly. "…still… hit like a damn truck."
Asol managed a humorless snort.
"Then stay down."
Kazuma shook his head.
"I can't."
He lifted his eyes.
They were clearer now. Less fire, more human—but full of something worse than anger.
Resignation.
"If I don't stop you here," he said, "he'll make me do something worse later."
Asol's stomach dropped.
"Kazuma—"
"You think this is bad?" Kazuma continued, voice shaking. "You think me punching you in a garden is the worst case?"
He raised his hand. Ice and fire both flickered around it in uneven pulses.
"Imagine what happens when Providence tells me to point this at Aoi. Or at Fujiwara. Or at any of those kids underground."
His fingers curled into a fist.
"And imagine what happens when I can't disobey."
Asol stared.
He suddenly saw a different fight than the one they were having. One where the person across from him wasn't him, but a girl with cyan hair, or a mute girl with crimson eyes, or a field of children with pickaxes.
And Kazuma, stuck in the center, forced to choose which target to burn.
His grip on his arm eased slightly.
"Kazuma," Asol said, softer now, "then let me break the leash before he can tighten it."
Kazuma laughed weakly.
"You think a few punches is enough to snap something woven into my soul?"
He shook his head.
"You're trying to fix a bomb by hitting it. All you're going to do is make it go off sooner."
Asol took a step forward.
"Then tell me where the bomb is," he said. "How he controls you. What he did to you. Give me something I can use."
Kazuma's jaw clenched hard enough that Asol heard his teeth grind.
"I… can't."
"You won't."
"I CAN'T!" Kazuma shouted again, voice cracking.
Emotion spilled over at last.
"Because the moment I try—"
He dug his nails into his own temple, eyes screwing shut. Flame and frost sputtered wildly around him, his Aura spasming.
"—the commands kick in. You think he trusts me enough to leave failsafes off? You think I haven't tried? That I haven't stood in front of a mirror and tried to say it?!"
He gasped, breath hitching.
"I can't even speak certain words without my body shutting down. Without my heart trying to stop."
Asol froze.
He'd seen mental loops. The Saviours had used some on Dystopia. Orders that made rebels walk back into fire with a smile.
Providence was playing the same game. But with more pieces.
"You're telling me," Asol said slowly, "that if you try to tell me what he did to you, your own body will kill you."
Kazuma let out a thin, humorless breath.
"Welcome," he said, "to the Providence Contract. You now know Providence's real power."
The words felt heavy enough to dent the air. Asol's anger, so sharp a moment ago, folded under the weight. He looked at Kazuma—really looked—and saw not a willing accomplice but a boy walking a tightrope over an abyss with someone else's hand on the rope.
The rage didn't go away. It just… shifted direction.
"…Okay," Asol said quietly.
Kazuma blinked.
"What?"
"I said okay."
Asol straightened as much as his screaming muscles allowed.
"You can't tell me how he has you. You can't betray him directly. But you just told me something you weren't supposed to say, didn't you?"
Kazuma opened his mouth.
Closed it.
"…Maybe," he admitted. "Maybe I already said too much."
"Then I'll use that," Asol said. "I'll treat it as proof you want this to change. And I'll move based on what I know."
Kazuma's expression twisted.
"You're insane."
"Probably."
Asol took another step, closing the distance between them.
"Listen," he said. "You want me to run? I won't. You want me to pretend I didn't see this world's underside? I can't. You want me to leave Providence's leash on you and Aoi and hope he never gets bored of pulling it? No."
He met Kazuma's eyes, steady.
"But I can promise you this: I'm not going to make you choose between me and her."
Kazuma's eyes widened.
"Asol—"
"You're right," Asol went on. "If I push you into open rebellion right now, Providence uses Aoi as a punishment. So I won't push you."
He exhaled slowly.
"You stay where you are. You protect her the way you've been doing. Play the good dog a little longer."
Kazuma's face contorted.
"Don't say it like that."
"Fine. Play the double agent you can't admit you are," Asol amended. "Keep your head down. Keep her alive. And when the time comes—when we find a crack in his god-act big enough to hit without putting her in the crosshairs—you take whatever shot you can from the inside."
Kazuma stared at him like he'd grown another head.
"You're talking like you're going to live long enough to see that time."
Asol smiled faintly.
"I survived the Saviours," he said. "I survived Dystopia. I survived your punch. I think I can manage."
"That's not funny."
"Wasn't meant to be."
They stood there, surrounded by the wreckage of their not-quite fight—charred bamboo, cracked stone, a frozen, fractured fountain reflecting a lopsided moon. Kazuma looked down at his hands. Fire and ice both slowly died away, leaving only human skin.
"If he finds out I even talked to you like this…"
He trailed off.
Asol shrugged one shoulder.
"Then let him think I came here to rant and you beat me up," he said. "Which, to be fair, you almost did."
Kazuma snorted despite himself.
"Almost? You can barely stand."
"And you're pretending your ribs aren't broken."
They shared a brief, grim silence.
Asol took a breath.
"Kazuma," he said, "one more thing."
"What now?"
"The girl from the lab." Asol's gaze steadied. "Kurogane."
Kazuma's fingers twitched.
"Don't—"
"She is waiting for you," Asol continued. "I didn't lie about that. Underground. With the people Providence tried to erase. She's fought to stay alive for ten years. Not for heroes. Not for Providence."
His voice softened.
"She survived so she could see you again. To thank you. You may not realize it but to her, you are her hero."
Kazuma's face crumpled for half a heartbeat before he forced it back.
"Don't tell me that," he said. "Not now."
"Then I'll tell you later," Asol replied. "When you need one more reason not to let Providence turn you into his weapon."
Kazuma squeezed his eyes shut.
"You're really going to do this," he murmured. "You're really going to try to break him and his world."
"Yes."
"You're going to make everything worse."
"Probably."
"And you still expect me to help you when the time comes."
Asol shrugged.
"I expect you to do what you've always done," he said. "Protect the people you care about. Even if that means putting a knife in the back of the man who thinks he owns you."
Kazuma opened his eyes. For the first time since the conversation started, there was a hint of something like… reluctant faith there. Or maybe just exhaustion with hopelessness.
"If you get Aoi killed," he said quietly, "I'll have to kill you."
Asol nodded.
"Fair."
Kazuma sighed. The sound seemed to deflate something inside him.
"Fine," he muttered. "Do whatever suicidal thing you're planning. I'll… pretend I tried my best to stop you."
"You did try," Asol said, looking pointedly at the ruined garden.
"Shut up."
They both looked around at the damage.
"…Think Providence is going to notice this?" Asol asked.
Kazuma grimaced.
"Absolutely."
"Can you blame it on a training mishap?"
"Not if he reviews the heat signatures."
"Right. Then… this never happened?"
Kazuma snorted.
"Too late for that."
He turned away, shoulders heavy.
"Asol."
"Yeah?"
Kazuma didn't look back.
"Don't underestimate him," he said. "He's not just a man with power. He is this world. The systems, the heroes, the public. You're not fighting a person. You're fighting a belief."
Asol's gaze drifted up toward the distant dome, where cheers were probably still echoing for heroes who smiled and waved.
"Good," he said softly.
Kazuma frowned.
"How is that good?"
"Because belief is powerful," Asol replied, "but it can be idiotic."
Kazuma shook his head.
"Didn't you use that line for The Leader right before he kidnapped Fujiwara?"
Asol blinked. Then Kazuma started toward the exit, then paused.
"…Asol."
"Mm?"
"If you decide to talk to Aoi," Kazuma said slowly, "be careful. Providence did something to her, and now she's not acting like herself."
A small shadow cast upon Asol's eyes.
"Wasn't planning to."
Kazuma hesitated like he wanted to say more, then just lifted a hand in a half-hearted wave.
He disappeared into the corridor shadow.
Asol stood alone in the ruined garden for a long moment, letting the night wind cool the burns and stings he hadn't had time to register.
His prosthetic arm ached dully. The cracks along the sigils throbbed in sync with his heartbeat.
"…You still with me?" he muttered, flexing his fingers.
The metal creaked, but obeyed.
"Good," he said. "We're not done."
He glanced at the frozen fountain, the cracked wall, the scorched bamboo.
"Sorry about the mess," he told no one.
Then he turned and limped toward the exit, mind already stretching toward the next step.
Kurogane waiting in the city's noise. The miners waiting underground. Aoi, somewhere in this building, smiling with someone else's script in her head. Providence, in his chamber of marble and lies, feeling the first tremors of a story slipping out of his control.
You want to be God? Fine. Let's see what happens when the world stops believing in you.
He stepped back into the corridor's light, leaving the shattered garden behind.
The chimes swayed once more, counting the wind.