The storm had passed. But the real disaster had never ended

Mikado watched in silence, the Stake of Absence planted into the concrete between his legs as he sat atop a slab of crumbled rubble. His hands rested on his thighs, fingers slack, unmoving, while his thoughts drifted without direction.

        The ruin around him was still wet from the storm, puddles collecting in shattered grooves, rainwater dripping from twisted metal and broken walls. Dawn light filtered through the fractured factory, pale and indifferent, illuminating scorch marks where lightning had carved its fury into stone.

        His gaze settled on Isabella and the woman holding her, Anastasia.

        Then it shifted, slowly, toward the ruined wall and the horizon beyond it, where the sky had begun to clear.

        For the first time since the battle began, Mikado felt no urgency to move.

        Only the quiet weight of how unhinged the situation truly was.

        How easily people could be manipulated when emotion collided with flawed judgment, how even strength, conviction, and sacrifice could become tools of self-destruction.

        Last night, when the storm began to break. Thunder raged not with command, but with loss, violent and directionless, howling through the ruins as if mourning the disappearance of its master. Lightning lashed blindly at the factory, tearing through walls and steel, before finally fading into fractured echoes.

        Amid the wreckage, Isabella lay motionless on the concrete, breath shallow, blood slipping from the corner of her mouth. Rain soaked her hair, plastered her clothes to her skin, and drained the last warmth from her body.

        That was when a vehicle forced its way into the ruined factory grounds.

        Its headlights cut through the darkness, scattering shadows and dispelling the remnants of the storm. The moment the engine died, Anastasia stumbled out.

        She ran.

        Blind eyes staring into nothing, she moved without hesitation, hands outstretched, feet unsteady as she crossed broken ground. She called Isabella's name again and again, voice hoarse, cracking with desperation.

        She fell.

        Rose.

        Fell again.

        Sharp metal beams grazed her legs, slicing skin open. Blood streaked down her knees, mixing with rainwater on the concrete. Splinters of debris cut into her palms. Pain should have stopped her.

        It didn't.

        She searched blindly, desperately, uncaring of herself, driven by something stronger than fear, stronger than pain… Love.

        Mikado watched.

        He didn't move.

        At the sight of a woman blindly tearing herself apart to find the person she loved most, his body refused to obey him. Not because he was restrained, but because he didn't deserve to act.

        This was his fault.

        The bitter truth settled heavily in his chest.

        This was the result of his incompetence. Of clouded judgment. Of letting hatred guide his hand instead of reason. Of being manipulated so easily, so predictably.

        He had seen the signs and ignored them.

        He had smelled his sister's presence on Isabella and labeled her an enemy without hesitation, because hatred came easier than thought. Because it was simpler to believe the worst.

        His gaze dropped to Isabella's still form.

        She lay on the cold concrete, rain tracing paths across her face, blood trembling at her lips with every shallow breath. There was no malice in her expression. No fanatic resolve.

        Only exhaustion.

        Only devotion twisted into desperation.

        She didn’t look like an enemy.

        She looked like someone who had been cruelly used.

        Played.

        And far away, somewhere unseen, she was smiling, having succeeded once again.

        "I'm sorry…" Isabella's voice pulled Mikado back from the dyed horizon. He turned his head slightly.

        She was still seated on the cold concrete, Anastasia beside her, one arm wrapped protectively around her shoulders. Isabella was soaked through, hair clinging to her face, clothes heavy with rain, yet she didn't seem to shiver.

        Strangely enough, she didn't look cold at all. What was cold, anyway, in the face of love and compassion?

        Mikado said nothing.

        "I'm sorry," Isabella repeated, her voice steadier now, though it trembled beneath the surface. "For attacking you. For treating you like a monster. For… playing with you."

        She swallowed.

        "Now that I think about it, it was ridiculous. Naive. Cruel, even, to believe everything would be fine once I took the Stake of Absence from you." Her fingers curled against the damp floor. "I never once considered how you might feel. What it would cost you. What about you."

        She let out a hollow breath.

        "I convinced myself you were evil. An enemy." Her eyes lowered. "But in truth… it was me."

        Silence stretched between them, heavy but unbroken.

        "All those days I spent watching you. Spying on you." A faint, bitter smile touched her lips. "I learned something I didn't want to accept."

        Her gaze lifted to him again.

        "You were never a villain. Just a human being, living your life."

        The words hung in the air, soft, sincere, and far heavier than any accusation.

        Mikado remained still.       

        "The fact that you didn't even harm my lady…" Isabella said quietly, her fingers trembling as they brushed Anastasia’s cheeks, "…is proof enough that everything I believed was born from my own naiveness."

        "Despite what I did. Despite how easily I convinced myself that killing you was justified."

        The words hurt to say, but she forced them out.

        "Please—hear me out." She swallowed, throat dry, knowing how much this sounded like excuses, yet unable to stop herself. "This selfishness of mine… it began the moment my lady lost her sight."

        Her voice faltered.

        "When the backlash of her healing magic struck her, when darkness took her eyes, I—" Isabella clenched her jaw. "I poured everything I had into trying to give back what she had lost. I searched desperately. For a cure. For anything."

        Her saliva felt thick as she swallowed again, chest tightening. These weren't just words. They were the truth, stripped bare.

        "And then…" she continued, eyes unfocused as memory dragged her backward, "…then it happened."

        "In the middle of that desperate search, a woman approached me."

        Isabella's fingers curled slightly.

        "She told me there was a way to cure my lady." A bitter laugh escaped her lips. "That was all it took. Just that one promise, to snap me out of myself. To cloud my judgment completely."

        At the time, she had thought the woman an angel.

        A miracle sent from heaven.

        But now, looking back…

        Her shoulders trembled.

        "Now that I think about it… it was like speaking to a devil. As if madness itself had taken a human shape and whispered exactly what I wanted to hear."

        Her nails dug into her palm.

        "She told me you were evil. That you were part of an anti-magic organization. That you enjoyed killing healers."

        Her gaze lifted to Mikado at last.

        "That lie ignited everything."

        The storm. The hatred. The storm aimed at his life.

        "And I believed it," Isabella whispered.

        Silence answered her.

        But this time, it was no longer empty.

        "You don't have to apologize," Mikado said at last. "If anything… I should be the one asking for forgiveness."

        His voice was calm, almost weary. He rolled his neck back, stretching it slightly, and let out a slow, silent sigh.

        Isabella blinked, confusion flickering across her face. She tilted her head faintly. She didn't understand, why would he be sorry?

        "I'm sorry you were dragged into this," Mikado continued. He straightened, then reached down and pulled the Stake of Absence from the earth with ease, dust and grit falling from its length.

        "And in return," he said, stepping toward Isabella and Anastasia, stopping just in front of them, "I'll answer what you couldn't."

        His gaze settled on Isabella.

        "You said you did your research," Mikado went on, voice even. "But I'm willing to bet it wasn't complete." He lifted the wooden nail slightly. "You planned to use the Stake of Absence to erase your master's magic, to cure her blindness. But tell me… how were you going to do that?"

        The question struck harder than any blow.

        Isabella's lips parted, but no words came. Her breath caught in her throat.

        She hadn't thought that far. Was she going to drive the wooden nail to her masters heart.

        Desperation had narrowed her thinking to a single solution. All she had known, all she had clung to, was that she needed the Stake. That it was the answer. The rest had ceased to matter.

        Mikado inhaled deeply, frustration threading through his expression, not at her, but at the situation itself.

        Then he knelt slightly.

        At the corner of Anastasia's lips, a thin line of dried blood remained, left from when she had stumbled blindly through the ruins, searching for Isabella. Mikado reached out without hesitation, gently wiping it away with his thumb.

        Isabella stiffened, watching.

        "Fuzai no Kui," Mikado said quietly, straightening again. "Despite its simplicity… it's still a weapon worthy of reverence."

        He lowered his hand, wiping the blood from his fingers onto the concrete floor.

        "It doesn't merely erase magic," he continued. "Its effect can be adjusted. Refined. Directed."

        Then he brought the wooden nail down.

        The tip struck the bloodstain.

        A faint sound rang out.

        Crk.

        Like glass under pressure. Small, almost imperceptible, but unmistakable.

        Isabella froze. Her mind struggled to catch up, but her ears had heard it clearly.

        Something… had changed.

        "...Isabella."

        Anastasia's voice called her name.

        Isabella turned toward her at once. Before she could speak, a warm hand rose and cupped her cheek, fingers trembling as they traced the curve of her face with careful uncertainty, no longer searching blindly, but testing.

        "This is what you look like… right?" Anastasia asked softly.

        Isabella's breath caught. She tried to answer, but no sound came out.

        Anastasia frowned slightly, her brow knitting as if something pained her. Then she squeezed her eyes shut.

        "…It's bright," she whispered.

        Slowly, hesitantly, she opened them again.

        Her pupils constricted.

        She flinched, turning her head away a fraction, a hand lifting instinctively to shield her eyes from the pale dawn light filtering through the broken factory wall. Tears welled immediately, spilling over, reacting to light they had been denied for so long.

        "I can—" Her voice wavered. She blinked rapidly, breath shallow. "I can see…"

        Her gaze wavered, unfocused at first, sliding past Isabella's shoulder, catching on the fractured concrete, the wet floor reflecting the morning light, the jagged outline of the ruined wall.

        Then her eyes found Isabella again.

        This time, they stopped.

        They focused.

        Her breath hitched as recognition set in, not by memory alone, but by sight. The shape of her face. The color of her eyes. The way her lips trembled.

        "…You're crying," Anastasia said quietly, almost in awe.

        That was all it took.

        Isabella broke.

        A sob tore free from her chest as she collapsed forward, pressing her forehead against Anastasia's shoulder, hands clutching at her clothes as if afraid this vision, this miracle, might vanish if she let go.

        Anastasia wrapped her arms around her, holding her close despite her own shaking hands.

        "I see you," she whispered again, as if saying it once wasn't enough. "I can now see."

        Nearby, the rain-soaked ruins remained silent.

        Mikado had not erased Anastasia's magic. Instead, Mikado had aimed the Stake of Absence at something far more precise.

        The cost.

        With the tip of Fuzai no Kui driven into blood itself, its radius narrowed beyond space and into function. The Stake did not touch Anastasia's healing magic. It reached past it, past the will, past the mana, and erased the consequence bound to it.

        The backlash.

        The toll.

        The invisible sentence written into every act of healing.

        Where her magic once demanded her life force in payment, there was now nothing to collect.

        The burden that had accumulated with every cure, every kindness, every miracle she had given others, was gone. Purged, not from her body, but from the logic of her power itself.

        That was why the blindness lifted.

        Not because her magic had vanished, but because the wound it had carved into her over time no longer existed.

        The curse of healing magic had been severed.

        And Anastasia remained what she had always been, a healer. Just no longer one destined to destroy herself to save others.

        The corner of Mikado's lips curved upward, a faint, gentle smile forming as he watched the scene before him.

        Isabella clutched Anastasia as if afraid she might disappear if released, while Anastasia held her just as tightly, her newly opened eyes wet with tears yet shining with life. Years of suffering, of quiet endurance and unspoken pain, had finally loosened their grip.

        For a brief moment, it was warm.

        Then the smile faded.

        It vanished as quickly as it had come, as though Mikado himself had torn it away.

        He did not have the luxury of relief. Not now. Not while she was still alive.

        Mikado carried a secret he had never spoken aloud... Not even to Eto.

        According to school records, and the official registry of Second Shibuya, Mikado was an orphan. A boy with no surviving relatives. A life written cleanly, conveniently empty.

        That record was a lie.

        He had an older sister.

        Bound by blood. By flesh. By a bond Mikado refused to acknowledge, no matter how deeply it was carved into him. Calling her family would have been an insult to the word.

        She did not love him, not in any way a sane person would understand. Her love was ruinous, obsessive, absolute. To her, destroying Mikado, inside and out, was love. She erased everything that tethered him to the world. Friends. Allies. Anyone who drew close.

        Even their parents...

        One by one, they fell.

        Until, at last, Mikado's hands found their way to her heart.

        And yet, even that had not been enough to end her.

        The warmth before him now was fragile. Borrowed time.

        Mikado looked away from Isabella and Anastasia, toward the pale horizon beyond the shattered wall, his expression settling back into something cold and unreadable.

        The storm had passed.

        But the real disaster had never ended.

        Mikado clenched his fist, so tightly that his fingernails bit into his palm, carving crescents into flesh. Pain bloomed, sharp, grounding, but he welcomed it.

        He would not lose anyone again.

        Not to her.

        Not to fate.

        Not to his own hesitation.

        He would not lose Eto.