Maybe he's telling the truth, after all?

“Why is it so hard to believe, Leo?”

Why, she asked, as if truly thinking the kid in front of us wasn’t just some delusional cosplayer would do anyone any favors.

“We don’t have any proof, you know?”

I said, trying to keep this conversation as rational as possible.

“Actually, you’re the one that has no proof, right?”

…Okay, she stumped me with that one.

“Huh? What are you talking about?”

She smiled, waving her finger at me as if she was about to say the smartest thing in the world.

“He has a scythe, he tore a car in half, he survived a crash with an injury that’s almost fully healed now, and he knows all about NEMESIS. Meanwhile you don’t have a single piece of evidence to support your claim other than ‘common sense’, don’t you?”

“Hah!? I- I mean, that’s true, but common sense literally trumps all of those—”

“NEMESIS!?” Shin suddenly ran up to me and grabbed me by the collar of my shirt.

“Do you know where they are!? Talk now, human!”

I bonked him on the head.

“Shut up. The grown ups are talking.”

“Leo, don’t be so aggressive,” Claire sighed. “Shin, would you like to have something to eat? How about I cook you a nice, warm meal at my place? Would you like that?”

Shin growled as he rubbed his head, but then his stomach growled even louder, and he stopped in his tracks.

“...I suppose… sustenance isn’t such a bad idea.”

Claire laughed with a little chuckle stifled by her pretty manicure.

***

Somehow or another I was roped into this, too, and the three of us headed towards her place.

Since the hospital belonged to her family, she got herself a place so close by you could walk to it. According to her it was nothing special, but in my mind I knew it had to be a nice place worthy of the daughter of a president.

She gave Shin some clothes from the gift store on the first floor, and we were both surprised at his wound actually no joke being almost fully healed. All I could think of was that the doctor might’ve made some mistake and it wasn’t as deep as it looked, because otherwise there legit was no explanation for this.

On our way there, she asked Shin many questions, all of which he answered exactly as I would’ve made my character answer, which was… very freaky.

Of course, I had a lot of questions of my own, but I couldn’t think of any that didn’t circle back to ‘where the hell did you come from’, so I let Claire take the wheel for now.

“Do you remember what you were doing before you ended up over here?”

Claire’s question to Shin caught my attention as I walked a step behind them.

“Of course I do,” Shin huffed. “I was in the middle of a fierce battle against—”

“Oh, come on!” I interrupted.

I couldn’t take it anymore. I didn’t believe a word he said, and he kept spinning these tales, each one more convoluted than the rest, and I just had it. I had it!

“What is it now, human?”

“It’s Leo, you dork. And I can’t listen to you talk anymore. You give me so much cringe it’s insane.”

“What did you just say— argh!”

Shin made a phantom move to reach for his scythe, but Claire told us earlier she’ll have it brought to her address tonight because it’s too dangerous to walk around with it, so he came up empty-handed, clicking his tongue.

“I was about to say I was in the middle of a fierce battle against insomnia, you worthless mortal!”

Oh.

Okay, yeah, that’s a little more normal than what I had in mind. My bad.

Still, it made me realize something…

When I was a kid, I gave Sinful Shadow insomnia because I thought it was insanely cool. I don’t know why I thought that; nowadays I can’t think of anything worse than not being able to sleep, but back then it sounded exactly like the kind of thing an assassin would complain about.

But there was one small detail about that character trait being mentioned by him that stopped me in my tracks.

“...Leo?”

Claire looked back, realizing I had stopped walking behind them.

“...Shin,” I said, taking in a calm, deep breath.

“What?”

I looked at him for a long time.

The sun was beginning to set on the horizon, and his black hair was getting a burning tint of orange at the tips.

He was frowning intensely at me; the bangs covering his eyepatch were swaying gently with the wind.

I didn’t believe a word he said.

I swear I didn’t.

And maybe this is just a coincidence, maybe it doesn’t mean anything, but…

“Hah… haha…”

I found myself laughing incredulously as my two companions looked at me with confusion.

I took off my glasses to clean them with my sleeve.

“You know… Sinful Shadow indeed suffered from insomnia, but…”

I put my glasses back on, looking at them with a bitter smile on my face.

“...I never told anybody that.”

It’s true. I never did.

Sinful Shadow’s background was so rich and complicated that there were many details about his life that I simply couldn’t find the time to go into them no matter how many chapters I wrote.

His sleeping habits were never explored, as I hated drawing anything that wasn’t action and would rather die than explore common, everyday life for even a panel, so I never did.

But I remember that.

I remember thinking I should at least make him mention it in passing, but I never did.

It’s the one thing I vividly remember never exploring in canon, and I don’t think anyone ever asked about it, so I’m sure it’s something only I would know.

Well.

Only I… and Sinful Shadow himself.

“…Fuck.”

I was starting to believe it now, too.