"You're saying she could be me?"
Inori immediately understood what Mana was really trying to say.
"It's possible."
Mana nodded.
—No possible.
Inori's eyes dropped slightly.
She knew her own heart clearly, absolutely certain of what an unremarkable, ordinary human her past life had been. When she first awakened as Inori, she still remembered clearly that she had crossed over out of sheer boredom while revisiting Guilty Crown. Those memories remained vivid to this day. For now she assumed that this girl called JOJO, suspected to be a genderbent Diavolo, might share some connection with her—perhaps King Crimson had become her Stand precisely because of this memory.
Mana organized her thoughts and continued.
"Her father seems to have been an English noble, but because she was born out of wedlock, the main family never acknowledged her. So from a young age she lived a fairly poor but comfortable life with her mother."
—An English noble?
It might just be a baseless guess, but Inori instantly thought of the starting point of the JOJO story—Jonathan Joestar. His story also began around the late 19th century, and he too was born into an English noble family.
"Wait, wait a second."
Inori suddenly noticed a blind spot and cut Mana off.
"This girl you're talking about—what does she have to do with the Nameless Monster power I asked about?"
Mana's expression froze on her face, her faint pink eyebrows curving slightly—Inori's key question had touched on the part hardest for her to say aloud.
"JOJO has an unusual hobby. She likes to draw."
"...? What does that have to do with anything?"
Inori asked, confused.
"Your Nameless Monster—whether it was that red goldfish outfit before, or this feather outfit now—both were born from images she imagined in her youth. She drew them out with her own hand."
Mana slowly spoke this unbelievable truth.
"Eh?"
Inori's heart sank, her eyes fixed on Mana for a long time, unable to say a single word.
—Does this mean that I... am actually born from someone else's imagination, a person who doesn't truly exist? A paper person?
No—although the character Inori herself had always been fictional to begin with, this was different! Now that I've become her, she's no longer simply a paper person! She's a living, breathing person with flesh and blood, a soul, thoughts—but now you're telling me all of this is fake, that all the misfortunes I've suffered, all the power I've gained, are actually just something someone else scribbled down on paper?
...You've got to be joking.
Inori bit down hard on her lower lip, her hands resting on her pale thighs clenching into fists.
—I am the sovereign incarnate as Inori! I am the Stand User of King Crimson! I am not some paper person—everything I have, I earned through effort. It is absolutely not something some bratty kid casually doodled!
She hadn't felt an emotion like this in a very long time—being provoked to the point of fury, her bottom line violated. The last time she'd been angry enough to desperately want to deny something was back when Mana first spoke to her—she'd worried that her carefully laid plans would be derailed by Mana's resistance. But in the end, they became friends and overcame fate together.
"Don't get worked up, little Inori... this doesn't prove anything. You are you. You're a real, existing person—don't be so quick to deny yourself."
What Mana feared was that Inori would lose her rationality after learning this.
"Think about it—all the people we've met along the way. Me, Shu, Menjou Hare, everyone in Morioh... little Yasuho who said goodbye to you that night, even Kocho Kanae who's willing to draw her blade against her own comrades and break the rules for your sake right now—to all of them, you are an existence that shines without equal."
"If you belittle yourself, then what does that make us, the ones who've entrusted everything to you?"
The deep red of her eyes regained their luster, and her clenched fists slowly relaxed.
Inori slowly raised her head to look at Mana, only to see the white-dressed girl gazing at her with a smiling gaze—but this smile was different from her usual one. There was no teasing in it, no playfulness, only a gentleness like that of a mother or an older sister... Inori's nose stung unexpectedly, and she suddenly felt the urge to hug her and cry. Right now, she didn't dare listen further, didn't even dare to keep investigating what the Nameless Monster truly was—she was afraid the truth would be too cruel.
Nothing had ever made Inori feel this kind of panic, except herself.
"Do you remember what I told you? No matter what happens in the future, I'll face it together with you."
Before she knew it, Mana had drawn close and taken her small hand.
There are no coincidences in this world, only inevitabilities. That she had transformed into Inori yet possessed the power of King Crimson was absolutely not without reason. No matter how absurd the truth of the past might be, she shouldn't give up on herself, because who she is now is real, and everything now is not something imagined.
"Nothing's been decided yet, so don't go jumping to conclusions. Maybe you traveled to the 19th-century world before, and formed a deep friendship with that chuunibyou girl JOJO, and that's why she drew you on paper."
Mana stroked Inori's warm, soft hand, casually spinning a joke that sounded utterly implausible.
"Even if we truly can't stop traveling between worlds, it's fine... even if we can never return to the original world, it's fine. Little Inori, no matter how the worlds change, we will never be separated."
Inori's eyes grew a little moist.
—Yes, this warmth she felt on her hand wasn't fake. She was Inori—no matter what had happened in the past, it wasn't reason enough to shake who she was now... She really didn't need to be so tense. That outcome is fixed in the established "past," while what she has to face is the unknown "future."
"I'm glad you're here."
Counting this latest battle against Muzan, Mana had now saved her life for the second time. Inori never once thought bringing her along on these journeys across worlds was a bad thing—if anything, it was an irreplaceable stroke of luck.
Looking back on Inori's very first goal after she awoke—to devour Mana's soul in order to awaken "Epitaph"—it seemed so unbelievable in hindsight now, almost like someone else's memory.
She was no longer the person she once was. She was no longer alone. No matter when, no matter what difficulty she found herself in, there would always be someone reaching out a hand behind her, or shouldering the burden alongside her.
"Hmph~? It's rare to see little Inori so well-behaved."
Actually it wasn't that rare—it was just that the cute, docile act she put on for everyone else was a performance, meant to lower their guard. But in front of Mana, Inori's emotions and words carried no falseness at all.
"Look how hard I've worked to help you—won't you give me a little reward?"
Mana seized the moment to stir things up, smugly closing her eyes and deliberately leaning her face close to Inori's, then tapping her own smooth, egg-white cheek, hinting that she wanted a soft little kiss placed there.
~Hehe, little Inori will surely turn her face away in embarrassment, and make some excuse about "important matters" to brush this off—but that's fine, just seeing her cute reaction is satisfaction enough~
But Inori took a long moment to say nothing, and Mana sensed something was off.
Something soft and wet pressed tightly against her lips. A bold little snake pried open the city gate and surged into the interior, wantonly conquering and plundering within her territory, seizing every spoil it could find in her beautiful domain.
"Mm?!"
Mana's eyes flew wide open in astonishment. What she saw reflected in them were those bright red, emotion-filled eyes—transparent and glistening as if brimming with tears.
Her waist was tightly encircled by Inori's arms, their bodies pressing ever closer, growing hotter and hotter.
Mana's gaze gradually grew hazy, sinking into this dreamlike reality. An unprecedented restlessness flooded her entire body. She was no longer merely on the defensive; she too dispatched her own elite forces to counterattack the invader. The two generals became inseparably entangled at the city gate, launching into the next round of fierce, passionate combat...
Sinking deeper and deeper, sinking deeper and deeper.
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