Chapter 88: An Unwelcome Intervention

The name, my true name, hung in the air of the small cottage like a shattered crystal. “Akane?” Natsuki whispered again, and the single word was a bridge across time, across death, across the very fabric of reality I had so carefully woven. He remembered. The divine amnesia I had installed, the single most powerful memory-altering magic in existence, had been shattered by the simple, clumsy act of me tripping over a floorboard. It was a beautiful, catastrophic, impossible miracle.

My mind, for the second time since becoming mortal, went completely blank. I was no longer Aki the magical girl or Akane the goddess. I was just Akane Suzuki, a seventeen-year-old girl, staring at the boy she loved who had just come back from the dead, only to find that she had, too. I was on the floor amidst the broken pottery, completely exposed, my entire ridiculously complicated lie in ruins.

“Natsuki, what are you talking about?” Lirael’s voice was sharp, cutting through the haze of my shock. She and Kaelen moved to his side, their expressions a mixture of alarm and confusion. “Who is Akane?”

“Her,” Natsuki breathed, never taking his eyes off me. He took a stumbling step forward, his hand outstretched. “It’s you. It’s really you. But… how?”

Before he could take another step, before I could utter a single word of denial or confirmation, the atmosphere in the cottage changed. The warm, crackling fire in the hearth sputtered and died, its light instantly devoured by a sudden, oppressive cold. The shadows in the corners of the room seemed to deepen, to stretch and writhe as if they had a life of their own. A profound, soul-deep chill washed over us, a cold that had nothing to do with the temperature and everything to do with the absolute absence of life.

The girls immediately drew their weapons, their adventuring instincts screaming at the sudden, unnatural threat. Lirael nocked an arrow, Kaelen’s daggers were in her hands, and a sphere of protective magic shimmered around Elara. Natsuki, despite his confusion, positioned himself in front of me, his spirit blade flaring back to life, a lonely point of light in the encroaching darkness.

In the center of the room, the shadows coalesced. They swirled together, not into the familiar, hazy wisp of smoke I knew, but into a solid, terrifyingly real form. A tall, elegant figure emerged from the darkness, clad in robes the color of a starless midnight sky. His hair was the silver of a dying moon, and his eyes, which held a cold, ancient fury, glowed with the same light. He was no longer a playful observer. He was here in his full, terrifying authority as a god.

“Isao,” I breathed, the name a horrified whisper.

He ignored me. His gaze, heavy with the weight of eons and the power of entropy itself, fell upon Natsuki. “Mortal,” Isao’s voice was no longer a purr; it was the sound of a tombstone cracking in the winter frost. “You have overstayed your welcome in a memory that does not belong to you.”

The girls were frozen, not by magic, but by a primal, instinctual terror. They were in the presence of something their mortal senses could barely comprehend, a being whose very existence was a violation of the natural order.

“Who… what are you?” Natsuki demanded, his voice trembling but his stance firm, his blade held steady between me and the God of Death.

Isao’s lip curled in a sneer of pure, divine arrogance. “I am the end of all things. And I am here to collect something that has been misplaced.” His silver eyes finally shifted, locking onto me with a possessive, furious glare. “Akane. Your little holiday is over. It is time to go.”

The truth, in all its cosmic, unbelievable absurdity, was laid bare. Lirael’s bow wavered. Kaelen’s daggers seemed to tremble in her hands. Elara’s mouth was slightly agape, her analytical mind finally encountering a variable that was not just significant, but impossibly, terrifyingly divine.

“Go where?” Natsuki challenged, his grip tightening on his sword. “She’s not going anywhere with you.”

Isao let out a soft, cruel chuckle. “Brave little ghost. Do you truly think you have a say in this matter? You are an echo, a memory that has been allowed to persist out of a goddess’s foolish sentimentality.” He took a gliding step forward, the floorboards groaning under a weight that was not of this world. “This game is over. She is coming with me, back to a place where she belongs, away from the contamination of mortal attachments.”

“I won’t let you take her!” Natsuki roared, and he charged.

It was a beautiful, heroic, and utterly suicidal gesture. He swung his spirit blade, a weapon of pure, soul-forged energy, directly at the God of Death. Isao didn’t even move. He simply raised a hand, his fingers outstretched.

The blade stopped an inch from his palm, its brilliant light flickering and dying as if smothered by an invisible force. The raw, life-affirming energy of the hero’s sword was utterly negated by the sheer, overwhelming presence of its antithesis. The blade dissolved into motes of light, leaving Natsuki with nothing but a useless hilt.

“Insignificant,” Isao hissed. He flicked his wrist, and Natsuki was thrown backwards as if hit by a battering ram, crashing into the far wall and slumping to the ground, stunned and breathless.

“Natsuki!” The girls screamed in unison, but they were frozen in place, their courage failing them in the face of a power beyond their comprehension.

“Stop it!” I finally found my voice, scrambling to my feet. I stood between Natsuki’s fallen form and the imposing figure of Isao. “This is between you and me! Leave him out of it!”

“He is the point, Akane!” Isao’s voice was a roar of raw, jealous fury. “This is the infection I am here to cure! You broke the most sacred laws, abandoned your very nature, for him! A fleeting, insignificant memory of a boy who died because of a piece of fruit!” He gestured dismissively at Natsuki. “I am doing what I should have done from the beginning. I am taking you home. To the Underworld, if I have to. You will remember what you are.”

He reached for me, his hand a claw of darkness, intent on dragging me away. Natsuki groaned, pushing himself up, his eyes blazing with a desperate, helpless fire. He was going to get up. He was going to try and fight again. He was going to get himself killed.

And in that moment, I knew I had lost. I had broken the world to be with him, but his very presence, his very memory of me, had summoned a force that would destroy him. The only way to save him was to leave him.

“Stop,” I said, my voice quiet but firm. I held up a hand, not to Isao, but to Natsuki. “Don’t. Please.”

Natsuki froze, his pained gaze locking on mine. He saw the desperation, the plea in my eyes.

I turned to face Isao, my shoulders slumping in defeat. The fight was gone from me. The dream was over. “Alright,” I said, my voice hollow. “You win. I’ll go. Just… don’t hurt him.”

Isao’s furious expression softened for a fraction of a second, a flicker of triumph and something that might have been relief crossing his features. He lowered his hand.

“Akane, no!” Natsuki cried, stumbling to his feet. “Don’t go with him! We can fight him! Together!”

I turned to look at him one last time, my heart breaking into a million pieces. I gave him a sad, watery smile. “You can’t fight a god, Natsuki. Some things… some things just aren’t possible.”

I took a step towards Isao, the act of surrender feeling like a physical death. My quest was over. My ridiculously reckless, universe-breaking plan had ended in failure. I had found him, and now I had to lose him all over again.