Predetermination

Only dust remained. Her beautiful face, her shining, blue hair, her cute little smile were no more.

I held on to what was left as tightly as I could, until it was carried off by the wind or slipped through the gaps between my fingers.

It hurt me to think what we were going to tell her sister if we succeeded in rescuing her. At least we could tell her about how valiant she was when fighting alongside us. We would make sure to let her sister know that she fought until the very end and was a hero.

I felt as though I now had a onus to rescue her sister. I couldn’t let both of them die. I had to save Izumi’s sister…it’s all she could have asked for.

As my weeping dragged on, my legs lacking the strength to stand up just yet, Ren interrupted my quiet grieving with a statement that reignited the burning flames that had coursed through my head after seeing Izumi surrounded for the first time.

“It hurts every time you have to watch it. I didn’t think I’d feel so awful this time….but seeing it for real is a whole lot worse,” Ren softly uttered behind me.

Ren’s words echoed through my head numerous times as I took a few seconds to properly analyse the implications behind his words.

My head slowly retracted. My eyes widened with shock. And my voice lowered into a cold demeanour.

“Ren…What did you just say?”

Ren clearly didn’t take note of my tone, and so he responded quickly.

“I said it hurts every time you have to watch it. I didn’t think I’d feel so awful this time…but seeing it for real…it’s—it’s a whole lot worse. A whole new experience at that.”

My body shot and sharply turned towards Ren, my right arm outstretched in front of me and my index finger rudely pointing directly at Ren. I could feel the painful rush of blood race across my head and the veins popping out of my temple.

Ren looked quite shocked, but still remained calm. It was likely he knew what I was going through.

“Are you being serious, you idiot! You knew this was going to happen…and you didn’t do anything about it?!”

“Taro, calm down, you’re not going to listen if you’re full of—”

“Answer me, Ren! You knew this was going to happen, didn’t you?!” My breathing intensified, and I became more impatient by the second, desperate for answers from Ren.

“Well…”

“Don’t hesitate…just tell me.”

Ren regained his confident demeanour and stopped stalling his explanation.

“Of course I did. I’ve played this game before. It’s just like everything else that has happened. This is all part of it. This is—”

I couldn’t hold in my anger any longer as I could feel my blistering impatience knocking against my skull. “Then answer my question! Why did you let Izumi die?! We could’ve saved her! I know we could have!”

“Taro! You have to relax. If you’re not going to let me explain, then what’s the point?” Ren spoke with a comforting yet firm tone. Clearly he was trying to reason with me and minimise escalating the tense situation that confronted us.

I remained still, breathing heavily as I awaited Ren to continue. Ren gave me a concerned look, finally speaking after being assured that I wasn’t going to interrupt him again.

“It’s a cut-scene. One that the players have to experience regardless. It’s an event that’s supposed to take place once the players go to sleep. In the game, it’s shown that Izumi wanders off by herself at night to catch some fresh air. And then—” Ren averted his gaze to the floor, his mouth trembling slightly. “And then—then that’s when all of this happens. You have to sit there and watch it, knowing there isn’t a thing you can do about it. If there was one thing I didn’t like about this game, it’s that she has to die when no one chooses to play as her.”

Ren’s response didn’t fully answer my question, so I barraged him with more of the same. “But that doesn’t explain why you left her to die alone.” Something suddenly clicked in my head so I changed the course of my words slightly. “That’s why you sent me away, isn’t it. There wasn’t really any blue wood…was there.”

“No.”

“I knew it! What a fool I was to believe that crap. I was trying to do you a favour, Ren. And this is how you repay me!?”

“Taro! How many times do I have to tell you — there’s nothing we could’ve done about it. Those men…they’re far too strong for us. If we tried to get involved now, we would’ve died within seconds.”

Ignoring the fact that Ren’s knowledge far exceeded mine here, I still chose to ignore his logic. “But how do you know that’s true? We’re both much stronger now. We could’ve fought them off…I know we could!”

“No!” Ren looked sorry for shouting so harshly. He adjusted his tone. “No, Taro. We can’t fight them at this level. But don’t worry. Near the end there’s a mission where we can get our revenge. You just have to wait until—”

I couldn’t listen to Ren any longer, despite him obviously speaking the truth. My rage had grown so much I felt like I had to hurt something. So I attacked Ren upon instinct, hoping to prove him wrong in that moment.

“Maybe you were just afraid because you’re so weak. I’ll show you I could’ve done something!”

My right fist swept through the air and connected cleanly with one of Ren’s cheeks, twisting his head in the process. His body remained still, and he didn’t let out even an ounce of a noise.

He turned back toward me, my arm being pushed back as he did. My face met a much worse fate than his.

He struck me sternly on the chin, lifting me in the air before I plummeted back to the ground with a great thump. The punch hurt more than anything I had felt before, but I could tell he held back. The look on his face as he hit me wasn’t filled with anger; it looked apologetic — as it had done for the last few minutes.

I couldn’t quite get up, so I held my upper-body off of the ground with my hands as the injury on my face pulsated.

Ren looked at me, speaking more gently than he had before.

“The only reason I haven’t beaten you up yet is because I understand your pain. The first time I played this game…I couldn’t believe it either. It takes time, but soon you’ll realise how silly you are being. You’ll remember it’s just a game. She isn’t real. She never was…and she never will be.”

Ren was right. I was being far too irrational. I was letting my anger consume me more than it had ever before. I wasn’t usually the kind to let my emotions conquer logic.

I slowly got up and held my throbbing face.

“You’re right, Ren. I’m sorry. I just wasn’t thinking straight. I shouldn't have attacked you. It’s just—”

“I know, Taro.”

A brief silence formed, before I broke it with one last weep. “I— I thought you said things weren’t exactly the same as the game anymore.”

“That was only in the cave level. When I said that, I said it was only something we should watch out for. There’s no way I could possibly know if that was going to be the case with anything else.”

I looked towards the sky as Ren’s rationality once again struck down my emotions.

Tears never quite stopped running down my face since I had realised Izumi’s death was inevitable.

Though I was distraught, I quickly accepted that what Ren did was the only option.

However, I couldn’t let what had happened go. I wasn’t going to rest until I got my revenge on those men.

I thought for a second, soon approaching a tree.

I began punching it. Harder, I thought to myself. My fists continued to bombard the tree with punches from both sides while I could tell Ren was glancing at me with bewilderment.

“Taro…What are you doing?”

“Levelling up,” I shouted back at Ren.

“Levelling up? What do you mean? You’re hitting a tree, that’s not going to—”

“Look. See. It’s going up.” I called upon the hologram that showed our level and, to even my surprise, my XP was going up.

Ren glanced over my shoulder and still seemed unconvinced. “It’s barely going up. You’ll have to do that for hours before levelling up even just once.”

“If it’s going up, then that’s better than nothing”.

I couldn’t lie around after what had just happened. I needed to make sure that, when we finally came across those men, I’d be able to make them suffer — like the made Izumi.

“I guess I’ll leave you to it, then. I’m going to sleep. And Taro, please, get some rest at some point.”

Ren went off to bed while I stayed attacking the tree, switching to others once I thought I had beaten one close to falling down.

I stayed up all night doing this. Though I had only grown by one level and a half, it was worth it.

Now I had even more objectives to fulfil.

Revive Junpei, save Izumi’s sister and, now, take cold-blooded revenge on the three men that murdered Izumi.