AKIHIRO ATLAS
My brother's hands felt like they were digging into my shoulders. I couldn't even tell if it was a physical grip anymore, because everything I felt in my body was meaningless next to the storm that was breaking inside my mind. My breathing was irregular. My chest hurt every time I took a breath, as if it was being torn apart from the inside. The same image was still spinning in front of my eyes. The same scene. The same bridge. The same sword. The same decline. Shu's body was still falling down the bridge in my mind. Again and again. Again and again. Again and again. When the human mind cannot accept certain moments, it keeps reliving them over and over again. And I knew what that meant at that moment. Because every time I blinked my eyes, I could see him. Every time I breathed, I could hear him. Every time I tried to think, that last image was drowning out all my thoughts.
My master was dead.
I could form this sentence in my mind. I could juxtapose the words one by one, I knew their meaning, I could understand what they meant. My master had died. It was like one of the simplest sentences in the world, consisting of just two words. But my mind refused to accept the truth behind those two words. Because accepting it wasn't just about saying he wasn't alive anymore. Accepting it meant acknowledging that he wouldn't be coming back. It was to accept that one day he would not stand in front of me again and look at me as if nothing had happened, put his hand on my shoulder and correct a mistake I had made, and tell me again in that heavy but calm voice how stupid I had behaved. To accept meant crossing that terrible line where one truly leaves one's life behind. And I didn't dare look beyond that line. Because there was no possibility left there anymore. No conversation, no explanation, no chance to complete an unfinished sentence... There was only the past. That cold reality that cannot be undone, cannot be changed, and awaits me no matter how much I run away from it.
Maybe what truly shattered me wasn't Ryugu. It wasn't the murder. It wasn't even death itself. What truly devastated me was the final conversation death left behind. Because when a person dies, not only their memories remain; their last words spoken also remain. And sometimes, if there was anything heavier than a corpse in one's mind, it was words that could no longer be taken back. I too had my last remaining words. The last words I said to Shu Pryhi, the person I have cared the most about, trusted the most throughout my life, who is not only my master, but the person who changed the direction of my life. I now remembered the anger of that moment with all its clarity. My voice. Your face. That moment when he looked at me. And then that sentence that came out of my mouth.
"I hate you."
It echoed in my mind.
One time.
Then once more.
Then hundreds of times.
With each repetition, something inside my chest felt a little heavier. I was looking at how short that sentence was and couldn't believe that one of the heaviest burdens of my life consisted of just a few words. I hate you. It's that simple. This is so certain. This is so irreversible. Yet I didn't really hate it. I never did. I was angry. I was broken. I was confused. I was crushed under a disappointment I couldn't even admit to myself. But I didn't hate it. I knew this now with all my soul. But reality didn't care what one meant. Once a word was spoken, it no longer belonged solely to the person who said it. He was also leaving a mark on the mind of the person opposite him. And I had engraved my own anger on one of the last memories of my master's life. This wasn't the last thing I wanted to tell him. I didn't want to say goodbye to him. I wanted to apologize. Maybe I wanted to hug him, maybe just look into his face and tell him one by one all the things I've carried inside me for years. But now I couldn't do any of these things. Because death was the only thing that heard one's regrets but didn't respond to them.
A part of me kept coming back to the same thought: I wish.
I wish I had been a little more patient that day. I wish I'd taken a breath before I got angry. I wish I had tried to understand the reason behind what he said. I wish our last conversation hadn't been an argument. I wish there had been gratitude in my eyes instead of anger when I looked at him for the last time. I wish those words had never come out of my mouth. But that was the cruelest part of human life; sometimes all it took to change some things was just a second, and when that second passed, you had to spend your whole life with its consequences. Most of the time, a person did not make life-changing decisions in a big ceremony. He was not giving in the middle of a battle, over a square, when the sky was splitting. Sometimes he spoke only in anger for a moment, lost control for a second, uttered an irreversible sentence in a breath of space. Then life went on. The world was turning. People were talking. The sun was rising again. But you couldn't stay the same person. Because that single second was no longer a part of his past, but was becoming a part of his future. And now I was seeing my whole future in the shadow of those few words.
And then my other failures started flooding into my mind.
Overall, I was unsuccessful.
Accepting this idea was easier than anything else. Because the evidence was right before my eyes. I had failed to protect my team. I couldn't protect Kuren. I couldn't protect Kazami. I had failed to fulfill properly any of the responsibilities people entrusted to me. As a General, instead of solving the crisis in front of me, I succumbed to my own anger, could not collect my thoughts in the middle of the meeting, I could not even form a logical sentence as it should be. While people were waiting for guidance from me, I had lost my way within myself. Then something even worse happened. I had destroyed the defenses that my master had built over the years, the balance he had created to protect people, perhaps the things he had fought for all his life, in a single outburst of anger. And at the end of all this, as if it wasn't enough that I lost him, I also poisoned one of my last memories of his life.
I bowed my head.
I still had my spear in my hand, but I didn't feel it like a weapon anymore. It was like I was carrying a heavy piece of iron. The grip between my fingers loosened Decently. My shoulders collapsed. All that remained of that power that had just filled the sky with lightning was fatigue. Maybe my body was still ready to fight, but my mind had already stopped fighting. Ryugu was in front of me. Radon was rising behind me. Around me were collapsed buildings, rising smoke, and people running away. A few minutes ago, I was too angry to see all this. And now, everywhere I looked, I could see the trace of my own mistake. The cracks opened by my lightning bolts. Shattered stones. The fear on people's faces. And in the midst of all this, when I looked back at myself, the person I saw was no longer the Akihiro Atlas I knew.
I had betrayed myself.
I had betrayed my master.
I felt like I had betrayed my team.
And worst of all, I had betrayed what I had been taught all my life: that power was entrusted to you not because you were strong enough to use it, but because you were human enough not to lose yourself in using it.
But I had lost my mind.
And now, even my master's body was nowhere to be found.
The place where I saw him for the last time was empty. The abyss on which he was said to have fallen was silent. There was neither a grave, nor a farewell, nor a piece of land where I could kneel before and speak to him one last time. Even death had an end; but for me, this death was incomplete. Because I didn't even have a grave. I only had my memory. There was his last look. There were my last words.
And among those words, a single sentence crushed all my other memories.
"I hate you."
I closed my eyes.
I wish...
If only we could talk just one more time.
Just once.
This time I would remain silent.
This time I would listen to him.
And maybe then, I could have said the main thing I wanted to say to him:
I don't hate you, master.
I just wasn't ready to lose you.
I could feel my brother holding me while all this was happening.
But I could only feel it.
I wasn't listening.
Because I couldn't listen.
Suddenly I tried to get away again.
I strained all my Novices.
I pulled my shoulders.
I threw my elbows.
The lightning bolts started shaking around my body again.
"LET ME GO!"
My voice was cracked.
My throat was burning.
But I kept shouting.
"LET ME GO, BROTHER!"
I tried to save my arms again.
I failed.
Mizu's understanding didn't even change.
This drove me even more crazy.
Because no matter how strong I become...
No matter how much of a general I become...
There was still a wall in front of me that I had been unable to overcome since my childhood.
"HE'S THE KILLER!"
This time my voice almost turned into a scream.
"HAVEN'T YOU SEEN IT?!"
The veins in my neck were tense.
"WHY IS EVERYONE BEHAVING SO CALM?!"
My eyes turned in the direction where Ryugu had been taken.
"HE KILLED HIM!"
I felt like my chest was being torn apart.
"HE KILLED MY MASTER!"
For a moment, I realized I was actually considering attacking my brother. This thought even scared me, but at that moment, the line between fear and logic had already been erased Decently. All I wanted to do was get out. All I wanted was to reach Ryugu. All I wanted was to erase that smile from his face forever.
Right at that moment...
Mizu turned me towards him forcefully.
And for the first time, he looked at me with an expression as if he were about to hit me.
The hardness in his eyes stopped me involuntarily.
I had seen that look a few times since my childhood.
And each time it meant he was really serious.
"ENOUGH!"
His voice was like thunder.
For a moment, he suppressed all the sounds in the vicinity.
The crackle of burning buildings.
People's screams.
The sound of the ruins.
All.
"Akihiro Atlas!"
He said my name completely.
That in itself was a bad sign.
"I understand your hatred."
His voice was still harsh.
"But what you're doing now is only making it worse."
I tried to talk again.
But he wouldn't let me.
"Shut up and listen to me."
I could see he was clenching his jaw.
"If you saw what Ryugu did and these are real, the evidence will be found. The area will be searched by teams."
With this sentence, the anger in my eyes flared up again.
"Then let me—"
"I WON'T QUIT!"
This time he really screamed.
And I fell silent.
Because for the first time I realized that my brother was angry too.
He was really angry.
But he wasn't losing control like me.
"If you want him to get his punishment, there is a way."
He was talking through gritted teeth.
"There are laws."
"Laws?"
My voice was broken.
"WHERE WERE THOSE LAWS WHEN MY MASTER WAS DYING?!"
Mizu wasn't even a little scared, even though I shouted with all my voice and breath. Only his eyes shortened and he answered calmly.
But this time he didn't scream.
"If you make the same mistake, you will be guilty too."
These words involuntarily sat inside me.
Because he was right.
And it hurt me more that he was right.
Right at that time...
I heard heavy footsteps coming from behind.
I looked up.
And I saw him.
Bel.
Lieutenant of Team 1. Grand General Yayati's right-hand man. One of Cistern's living disasters. I had heard his name since my childhood. The stories told about him were told differently from the stories of other strong soldiers; rather than telling about the strength of a man, they told about how the world changed when he entered a battlefield. It was said that he single-handedly changed the direction of the front in a battle. It was said that he accomplished what hundreds of soldiers had failed to achieve for weeks simply by stepping onto the battlefield. They said that some commanders changed their battle plans when they heard Bel's name, while some enemies retreated the moment they saw him. When I was a child, I thought all these were exaggerated stories told by warriors to glorify each other. When people saw someone powerful, they liked to portray them as greater than they actually were. After a while, I used to believe that these stories were disconnected from reality. Then I had the opportunity to train with Bel for a short time. And then I realized something terrible: None of what had been told about him was an exaggeration. The stories alone were not enough to tell the whole truth.
Now, as I walked past him, I understood this once again. The power Bel possessed was not merely a flashy display of Spirit Power radiating outwards. There was something different, something heavier, about his presence. His long black cloak was dragging along as he passed through the ruins, as if leaving a dark trail behind. The edges of the cloak billowed gently in the wind, and despite the dust on it, not a single wrinkle could mar the perfection of its shape. The red and dark Spirit Power that was circulating around it had still not completely dissipated; sometimes it was concentrated around his shoulders, sometimes it curled up like shadows under his feet, and then it was drawn back into his body. Although the distance between me and him was a few meters, I could feel that his presence made the air heavy. Dec. It was as if what was walking in front of me was not a human being, but a catastrophe in human form. Even the debris around him seemed insignificant next to his presence as he made his way through the Decaying buildings, shattered stones and still-rising smoke. There was no hurry in Bel's walk. Because he didn't need to hurry. Strong people sometimes didn't have to show their strength. It was enough that they were just there.
And Ryugu was walking next to him.
They had sealed handcuffs on their hands. Heavy handcuffs made to suppress the Spirit Power, with complex seals on their surfaces, tightly gripped his wrists. The man who had just fought me against the sky, revealed his Avatar and made an entire region tremble, was now walking chained up. But that damn smile was still there on his face. He didn't look like he had lost or had any regrets. He was walking as if all that had just happened was just a small part of a long game for him. That smile again poured gasoline on the anger that had just begun to fade inside me. My fingers tightened involuntarily. I grasped my spear again. The remaining Soul Power in my body began to move. I wanted to take a step, run after him and wipe that smile off his face. But even Bel's presence was preventing me from moving. Because my mind, unlike my anger, was seeing the truth in front of me. If I attacked Ryugu, I would face not only him, but also Bel. And I knew that with the way I was now, it wouldn't be a war.
Bel stopped after taking a few more steps.
The movement of her cloak slowly ceased.
He turned his head very little.
He looked at Mizu first.
Then his eyes shifted to me.
At that moment, a strange feeling occurred to me. Bel's gaze was not the gaze of an ordinary person. He wasn't watching someone, it was as if he was evaluating them. When his eyes lingered on my face for a few seconds, I felt like all the things I was trying to hide inside me were seen by him. My anger. My fear. My regret. My mind shattered by my master's death. My loss of control. The ruins of Team 5. And perhaps the worst part... beneath all this, there's still that part of me that wants to kill Ryugu. There was no surprise on Bel's face. Nor was there any pity. He wasn't looking at me like he would look at a General. To be more precise, he wasn't looking at the General I was supposed to be. It was as if before him was not a soldier bearing one of Cistern's ranks, but a child lost in his anger.
And perhaps he was right.
Bel's voice rose above the silence.
"I'm turning him over to the Detective Agency."
His voice was neither angry nor loud. On the contrary, he was very calm. But this calmness did not lessen the weight of his command. A decision had been made, and it was clearly felt in Bel's tone that this decision was not open to discussion. He barely looked at Ryugu as he walked past him. It was as if he were not one of Cistern's most dangerous warriors, but an ordinary prisoner who had to be handed over. Even this created a separate uneasiness in me. Because I just fought with that guy. I've seen your strength. I felt in my body how dangerous he was. But even Ryugu seemed to shrink as he walked next to Bel.
Then Bel's gaze turned to my brother.
"Mizu."
My brother immediately became erect. The expression on his face changed; the worried brotherly expression that had just disappeared was replaced by the composure of a Lieutenant on duty.
"Sir."
Bel studied the destroyed area for a few seconds. He looked at the buildings with smoke rising, the shattered streets, the areas where people had been evacuated. His eyes weren't missing anything. Then he spoke in a calm voice.
"Take control of the wreckage here."
There was a brief silence.
Then Bel's eyes turned to me again.
"And calm your brother down."
Something inside me broke.
Calm my brother down.
It was as if I wasn't a General anymore. It was as if, in the midst of all this destruction, I had become a soldier who had lost control, a child overcome by anger, and a problem that needed to be dealt with. But there wasn't even the slightest hint of disdain on Bel's face regarding this. That was what was truly frightening. He wasn't insulting me. He wasn't trying to humiliate me. He was just saying what he saw.
Then he fixed his eyes directly on mine.
"Learn to act like a General."
That sentence exploded inside me like a lightning bolt.
For a moment, everything around me fell silent again. The voices of people, the noises coming from among the rubble, the wind, the distant clashes... They all seemed to drift away from me. I could only hear that sentence. Learn to act like a General.
I looked up at Bel but couldn't answer. Because there was nothing I could say to him. I could have gotten angry at him. I could have gotten angry at how he was looking at me. I could have tried to stop him from taking Ryugu. But what excuse would I offer? Am I unable to control my power? Am I losing myself because I lost my master? Am I failing to protect my team? Do you think all this is too much for me?
A General wouldn't have an excuse.
A General had people behind him.
As for me, instead of standing up for people, I hid behind my own anger.
Bel didn't say anything more.
He turned his head and kept walking.
His cloak rippled in the wind again. The Dark Spirit Power began to Decelerate away from the ruins as it moved silently around his feet. Ryugu was also moving along with him. The metal sound of his sealed handcuffs could be heard faintly with every step, but the smile on Ryugu's face still did not disappear. I stared at him for a few seconds. There was still an impulse in me that wanted to follow him. My legs wanted to move. My Soul Power wanted to rise again. I wanted to raise my spear and get in front of them.
But I couldn't.
Because for the first time, I was realizing not that using my anger wouldn't be enough to kill him, but that using my anger wouldn't fix anything.
Ryugu took a few more steps.
Then a little more.
And finally, it began to disappear from sight amidst the ruins, smoke, and darkness.
While watching him, a helplessness I had never felt before arose within me. A few minutes ago, I had filled the sky with thousands of lightning bolts, concentrating all the power of a General into a single attack. I had used a power so great that it could shake the world. But now I felt like all that power didn't mean anything. Because Ryugu was in front of me and I couldn't reach him.Not for the first time did I lack the strength...
I felt like even my anger wasn't enough.And perhaps that was what truly frightened me.
Because every time I felt helpless until today, I thought about becoming stronger.
But now, for the first time, I was beginning to understand:
Perhaps what I needed wasn't more power.
Maybe I needed to be myself again first.
And for the first time...
The thought that my master would never truly return was beginning to weigh heavily on my shoulders.
My eyes were still following him as the dark trail that Bel had left behind his cloak slowly moved away. Actually, I wasn't looking at Bel. I wasn't looking at Ryugu either. Maybe I wasn't looking at anything. Sometimes when a person is too tired to make sense of what he has experienced, he really stops seeing, even if his eyes are open. That's exactly how I was feeling. The person walking in front of me was one of Cistern's strongest men. He is a living legend about whom countless stories have been told, who was once the most feared enemy of these lands and then turned into one of their greatest protectors... Bel. The stories I heard about him when I was a child were still fresh in my mind. It was said he was a demon. A real demon. A creature known for its horns, red eyes, a Spirit Power that flows differently from humans, and the mountains of corpses it leaves behind on battlefields. The elderly lowered their voices when saying his name. Instructors spoke carefully when giving examples. Because Bel wasn't just a strong person. The waist was an asset that went beyond the measurements that people use to describe strength.
Then years passed.
And one day this demon...
He became Cistern's right-hand man.
No one knew exactly how this happened.
There were very few people who knew what was going on between him and Yayati.Dec.
But the result was obvious.
The man who once wanted Cistern destroyed had now become one of the pillars that kept it afloat.
Maybe that's why the more I looked at him, the more my insides got stuck.
Because Shu also once spoke out against the system.
Shu was also seeing things that people didn't see.
Shu was also going against what everyone considered to be true.
But Bel had lived.
And Shu was dead.
The moment this thought passed through my mind, I felt as if an invisible knife had been turned inside my chest. My breath is half gone. For a moment, the image on the bridge came back to my eyes. Sword. Blood. Falling. Then my own voice. That damn sentence. That last speech. That last look. That's the last word of hate. It was as if my mind was dragging me back to the same torture chamber every few seconds. No matter which way I turned, I was finally reaching Shu again. No matter what I tried to think, in the end it was connected to his death again. I didn't know how long this would take. Maybe days. Maybe years. Maybe for the rest of my life.
Just then, the hands holding my shoulders became a little firmer.
Mizu.
I almost forgot about him.
When I looked up, I saw my brother's face.
Normally, I wouldn't have any trouble reading the expressions on his face. We had grown up in the same house since childhood. I used to know how you looked when you were angry. I used to know how you shut up when you were sad. I knew how your eyes changed when you were happy. But what I saw on your face now wasn't any of those things. It was as if he had abandoned being my brother and transformed into his duty. He had become a lieutenant. He had become a soldier. He had become a manager. And this was frightening me for no reason.
"You're coming with me."
His voice was not loud.
But it had a weight that admitted of no objection.
My eyebrows furrowed involuntarily.
"Where to?"
"To the Detective Bureau."
At first I didn't understand what I was hearing.
Maybe I didn't want to understand.
Then the words gradually fell into place.
And the anger in me was stirred up again.
My eyes have grown big.
"What did you just say?"
Mizu's face hasn't changed.
That was even more frustrating.
"We're going to the Detective Bureau."
"Ryugu killed Shu."
''I know."
"I have seen it."
''I know."
"Then why am I being questioned?!"
When my voice went up, people around us started turning around and looking. Some had fear on their faces. Some people are curious. For some, it was the shock of the devastated area. But I didn't care. Because at that moment, I was feeling only one thing. I felt betrayed. Shu was dead. Ryugu was alive. And now they were taking me in for questioning.
"Don't you trust me?"
As this question was coming out of my mouth, I noticed how broken my voice was.
Because what I actually asked wasn't about trust.
What I actually asked was this.
Am I still on your side?
Mizu remained silent for a few seconds as if he understood this. Then he gave a deep sigh. He turned his face to the side for a moment. He looked at the destroyed buildings. He looked at the smoke. Then he turned to me again.
"Trust..."
he murmured slowly.
"It is one of the most dangerous concepts that people confuse with justice."
His eyes locked on mine.
"If justice is applied only to people we trust, its name is not justice, Aki."
I clenched my teeth.
"That's nonsense."
"no."
His voice hardened.
"The ridiculous thing is that people believe that the people they love can't make mistakes."
He held my shoulders tighter.
"You are my brother."
As he said this sentence, I saw pain in his eyes for the first time.
"That's why I have to question you more, not less."
I couldn't answer for a moment.
Because of the expression on your face...
He was truly suffering.
But he didn't stop.
"Today you waged a full-scale war in a team area. You used an avatar. You turned the area into ruins. You damaged civilian areas. You stopped controlling your Soul Power. If Ryugu had done the same things, would we question him?"
"..."
"Yes."
"What if Sao had done it?"
Silence.
"Yes."
"What if I had done it?"
This question hung in the air.
Then Mizu replied.
"Yes."
At that moment, I couldn't find anything to talk about.
Because absolutely...
I knew you were right.
And that's why it hurt more to be silent.
Hours later, as I walked through the gray corridors of the Detective Agency, all these thoughts were still swirling around in my mind. The building looked ordinary from the outside, but when you entered it, it created a strange pressure on a person. The corridors were too quiet. The walls were too clean. The white lights on the ceiling were too bright. It was as if this building was designed to make people talk. It was as if confessions were hidden in every stone.
Finally, we stopped in front of one of the heavy steel doors.
Mizu looked at the guard.
The officer nodded.
Then he turned to me.
"Necklace."
My fingers moved involuntarily to my neck.
And my heart tightened again.
Because that necklace wasn't just an object.
It was Ares's seal.
It was a trust given to me by my master.
It was one of the last things his hands touched.
I noticed that my hands were shaking as I took off the necklace chain. As soon as I handed it to the attendant, I felt as if I had torn a piece out of my body and given it to him. My strength hadn't left me. But I felt drained.
The door opened.
It was small inside.
It was suffocating.
A single lamp was burning on the table in the middle.
The light of the lamp hit the surface of the table, but could not reach the corners of the room.
Shadows had accumulated on the walls.
The sound of metal when the door closed behind me echoed through the room.
I stayed up for a while.
Mizu sat in the opposite chair.
But this time when I looked at him, I couldn't see my brother.
The person sitting opposite me was not the man who shared my childhood.
The person sitting opposite me was not the person who taught me to walk.
The person sitting opposite me was not the person who taught me how to hold a gun.
The person sitting opposite me was an interrogator.
And for the first time...
When I left this room, I felt like my life would never be the same again.
There was a strange heaviness in the air of the interrogation room. This weight was not only due to the thickness of the walls or the fact that the room was deliberately designed without windows. Sometimes a person could feel the emotions that penetrated into some places, and this room was like a tomb where fears, lies, confessions and destruction had been accumulating for years. The pale white light from the ceiling fell on the table, leaving the rest of the room in semi-darkness. The walls were gray. The table was gray. The chairs were grey. It's like this room was designed to steal all the colors from people. As for me, I was sitting on one side of the table. My hands were clasped in front of me, but my fists were so clenched that my knuckles had turned white. Mizu, who was sitting in the chair opposite me, looked perfect as usual. Not a single point of his uniform was wrinkled. The files in front of him were neatly arranged. His gaze was calm. But I knew him well enough. I could see what was going on beneath that calmness. He was angry too. He was sad too. He was affected by Shu's death too. But that was exactly the difference between Mizu and Dec. I was falling apart. He, on the other hand, was managing to chain the pieces together.
Mizu slowly opened the file in front of him. The sound of pages being turned echoed unnecessarily in the silence in the room. Then he raised his eyes. He didn't say anything for a few seconds. He just looked at me. Those looks had always bothered me since my childhood. Because when Mizu looked into someone's eyes, I felt like he was listening not to what they said, but to what they didn't say.
"Let's get started."
His voice was calm.
But beneath that calm, there was order.
An order too severe to be resisted.
"What was the first thing you saw when Team 5 arrived at the area?"
My throat is knotted.
Shu's body came before my eyes again.
Bridge.
Blood.
Ryugu.
Sword.
Falling.
I started to explain.
Every detail.
Every second.
Every image.
As I talked, my breathing became irregular. I had to close my eyes in some places. Because I was reliving things I didn't want to remember. But Mizu continued to listen without saying a word. He didn't Decamp. It was no consolation. He didn't slow it down. He listened like a detective.
When I fell silent, there was only the sound of the clock on the wall in the room for a few seconds.
Then Mizu placed his pen on the table.
"And then you attacked Ryugu."
This wasn't a question.
It was a discovery.
I looked up.
"Yes."
"You attacked directly."
"Yes."
"You didn't try to talk."
"No."
"You didn't try to arrest him."
"No."
"You didn't call for reinforcements."
I was clenching my jaw.
"No."
Mizu continued to look at me without squinting his eyes.
"So you declared war directly on the Team 8 General."
At that moment, my nerves were on edge.
Because he was deliberately choosing his words.
You declared war.
You committed a crime.
You broke the rules.
As if that were the whole story.
"I started a war because he had killed my master."
Mizu's face hasn't changed.
"That's an explanation."
He closed the file.
"But it's not a defense."
Something inside me broke at that moment.
I leaned over the table.
"Defense?"
My voice was shaking.
"Do you want a defense?"
Mizu's question hung in the room for a while. His voice wasn't loud. In fact, he was as calm as ever; measured, controlled, and so composed that it was difficult to understand what he was thinking. But now I knew what that calmness in his voice meant. Mizu wouldn't get angry when he spoke like that. It would have been worse. He would have held on with all his strength not to give himself up to his anger. Because for him, anger meant a weakness that could cause one to make the wrong decision even when one is right. And I was thinking at that moment that all those measurements, all those rules, all those damn job descriptions that I've learned all my life don't make any sense. The death of my master was still before my eyes. The more I tried to push that memory out of my mind, the deeper it sank; every time I closed my eyes, the same image reappeared before me. Sometimes the more one tries to forget a pain, the more unforgettable it becomes. That's exactly what I was experiencing.
Mizu fell silent.
I continued.
"The most precious person in your life is being killed in front of a person's eyes." My voice was still controlled in the first words, but towards the end of the sentence it was starting to break down under its own weight. "And then you come and ask me for a defense?"
Mizu's gaze changed.
It was a very small thing.
Anyone else wouldn't have noticed. Maybe even I wouldn't have noticed it at another time. But Mizu was my big brother. Since my childhood, I had grown up reading every tiny change on his face. That vague tension between his eyebrows, the contraction of his jaw for a moment, that tiny movement he held on his chest before Decanting his breath... all of this told me one thing.
He was hurt.
Because when I said "the most precious person in your life" in that sentence, I knew Mizu couldn't think of anyone else.
I was here.
Maybe he hadn't said that out loud in his whole life. Maybe he never needed to say it either. Mizu was not someone who showed his love with words. He would show that he was worried about me by saying "be careful", that he missed me by touching me on the shoulder, and that he was afraid by not saying anything and staying with me for longer. Once when we met in the hallway, after my conversion, the first thing he did, even though he recognized me, was attack me. He had pointed his spear at me. I still couldn't forget what I saw in his eyes at that moment. It wasn't anger. Nor was there any doubt.
It was fear.
He was afraid of losing me.
And then, after all his harshness, he held me in his arms.
The man standing before me now was the same man.
But at that moment, for the first time, I realized that the sentence I said to him was aimed directly at not only my pain, but also hisworst fear.
Mizu bowed his head very slightly.
He didn't take his eyes off me.
But he didn't respond for a few seconds.
That few seconds of silence was heavier than all the words in the room.
"Yes."
One word.
But it came out so harshly that it stopped me.
Mizu bent forward for the first time.
He joined his hands on the table. His fingers were interlocked. That flawless expression on his face was still intact, but now even carrying it seemed difficult.
"Because you were a general."
There was no tremor in his voice as he said the sentence.
"Because you weren't an ordinary citizen."
He paused for a moment.
"Because the responsibility for your own life wasn't the only thing on your shoulders."
His gaze locked onto my eyes.
"And because your task was not to prove that you were not suffering. It was to do what was right even though you were suffering."
Something inside me broke again.
"Is it the right thing to do?"
The words came out of my mouth involuntarily. "My master was killed, brother."
''I know."
"They killed him in front of my eyes."
''I know."
"And you are still telling me about the mission."
Mizu's face broke down for the first time.
It's very light.
But it broke down.
"Because someone needs to talk about the mission from now on."
His voice was lower this time.
"You can't talk about it."
This sentence silenced me.
Mizu kept his eyes on me for a few seconds. Then his gaze slowly went down. It was as if he was talking not to the general opposite him, but to the brother he had been trying to protect since childhood.
"And I..." he said.
The word was interrupted.
Mizu fell silent.
Even this was too obvious for someone like him.
Because Mizu hated what he was about to say. Not because he had to say it; but because what he wanted to say and what he had to say were completely different.
He lifted his head again.
"I don't want to lose you either, Aki."
For the first time, the harshness in his voice completely disappeared.
"You don't understand that."
His brows furrowed.
"When I saw you turning the entire region into a battlefield, the first thing that came to my mind wasn't your rank." I didn't even think about how many people died. The first thing I thought about was whether you would die somewhere in that war.
He took a breath.
"Because for me, you..."
He fell silent again.
It was as if it touched his pride to say the word.
"You are my brother. You're my only brother. You are the most precious thing I have in this life."
He closed his eyes.
"You've been one of the things I've had to protect all my life."
Then he opened his eyes.
"And I hate to say it."
What I saw on Mizu's face at that moment was not anger.
It was a broken pride.
Under that hardness that always kept him standing, there was a man who cracked because of me. But still, he wasn't backing down. Because Mizu's honor lay in being able to stand up to even the people he loved when necessary. He thought that if he ignored that I had done something wrong because he loved me, he wouldn't be protecting me. On the contrary, he would have led me to an even greater disaster with his own hands.
"But I cannot abandon justice just because I love you."
The sentence fell like a heavy stone into the room.
"Just because you're my brother, I can't call you right where you're not right."
Mizu's voice became harsh again.
"And I can't let other people get hurt just because it hurts you."
He struck his hand on the table.
It wasn't too harsh.
But he was tough enough.
"You are General Akihiro Atlas!"
This time his voice hit the walls of the room.
"People don't expect your anger from you, they expect your decision! They're not waiting for you to take revenge, they're waiting for you to make sure they're still alive tomorrow morning!"
He stopped for a moment.
Then he went on in a lower voice.
"I'm not asking you to kill your feelings, Aki. I want you to direct them."
I looked up.
My eyes were burning.
"What about Shu?"
Mizu's face froze.
"Who will give him his due?"
There was no answer.
"Who will remember him?"
Silence.
"Who wouldn't just view his murder as an 'incident'?"
Mizu's hands clenched again.
This time I saw your fingers were trembling.
"Me."
He said only one word.
"I will remember. Even though I never truly loved that man until today."
Yes, my brother didn't really like my master. There were many reasons for this, but I don't have time to think about them right now.
He didn't take his eyes off me.
"You'll remember too."
I'll remember… huh?
Then he took a deep breath.
"But if you say that you want justice on his behalf and start punishing other people, you will make Shu's death an excuse for your own anger."
That word hurt me.
Because it was true.
And the fact that it was true didn't make it any less painful.
I shook my head from side to side.
"To hell with it!"
My voice rose not in anger this time, but in desperation.
"To hell with your generalship! To hell with your rules! I'm tired of you watching people die and then deciding which decision is the right one at the head of the tables!"
Mizu didn't say anything.
He just looked at me.
Long time.
Then he stood up.
Instead of walking towards me, he stood on the other side of the table.
"I'm fed up too."
This time his voice was almost a whisper.
"I'm tired of losing someone every day."
He closed his eyes for a moment.
"But if I give up justice, what we have lost will have no meaning."
He opened his eyes again.
"You are one of the most precious people in the world to me, Aki."
All the hardness on his face was gone as he said this sentence.
"Maybe that's why I'm opposing you."
He took a step back.
"Because I'm afraid of losing you."
Then his gaze hardened again.
"And the way to protect you is not to forgive everything you've done."
Silence.
"Stopping you sometimes."
He looked me straight in the eye.
"Don't forget about Shu."
His voice was no longer as harsh as it used to be.
"You can cry for him. You can get angry at him. You might even hate him for it."
There was a brief silence.
"But when making a decision on his behalf, also think about what Shu will want from you."
He reached for the handle of the door.
"Because the person you lost was only your master."
He turned his head slightly.
"The person I was afraid of losing is still here."
I waited a few seconds. Thinking about the things I could say. By asking to be respectful to my brother.
But I couldn't.
I heard my voice go up, but it didn't sound like it belonged to me. It was as if all the anger, all the fear, all the helplessness that had been accumulating in my chest for years could no longer fit into my body and had come out on its own. The narrow walls of the interrogation room reflected my voice back. Even the echoes that bounced off the stone surfaces and came back to my ears sounded angry. The yellow light of the lamp on the table seemed to flicker in my eyes. Maybe he was really shaking. Perhaps it was I who was trembling.
"To hell with your rules!" I continued, my voice had now gone beyond shouting. My throat was burning. My chest was struggling to breathe. But I couldn't stop. Because I was going to think if I stopped. If I thought about it, I would think of Shu's face.
And I was afraid to remember his face right now.
"All my life you have been telling me about justice. You mentioned equality. You mentioned order. You mentioned that people need to be protected. You said that power requires responsibility. You said that the law should cover everyone. But what are you telling me now, Mizu? What are you really telling me? Are you going to open law books and read articles in front of me when a person I love has been killed in front of my eyes? Are you going to tell me about the procedures? Are you going to talk about the rights of a murderer? Are you going to tell me that I should calm down?"
I didn't even realize I was standing up when the words were coming out of my mouth. The chair had slid back, rubbing behind me. My hands were resting on the table. My fingers were clenched so hard that I could see that my joints were whitening.
I looked at Mizu's face.
He was looking at me.
Quietly.
Stagnant.
But I knew his eyes.
I knew the hardness in those eyes.
I had known him since my childhood.
Those unchanging looks when he makes a decision.
That's why I got even more angry.
Because while I was falling apart, he could still stand.
"A philosopher had a saying about the king... Where did I hear it?! From the man you don't even know the truth about, my master, about justice!"" I shouted in my muffled voice. "The purpose of justice is to protect people. People don't live for justice. Justice lives for people. Said that philosopher. If a system can't protect a person I love, if it still gives rights to the man who killed him, what's the point of that system? Tell me, Mizu. What's the point?"
I was silent for a moment.
My throat is knotted.
My brother never liked that I called him Mizu. When I did this in an official area, he usually punched me, but now is not the time for control. At least for me.
Shu came to mind.
The top of the bridge has arrived.
The blood has spread to the stones.
His eyes, which were not directed at me, came.
And then...
Our last moment in the hallway.
My body hitting the wall.
The anger on your face.
And that sentence came out of my mouth.
"I hate you."
At that moment, my knees unraveled.
It's really solved.
It was as if someone had taken away all the power in my bones.
When my body hit the ground, I felt my knees hit the stone, but I didn't care about the pain.
Because something much bigger was breaking inside me.
My head was bowed.
My hair was covering my face.
My shoulders were shaking.
And finally...
I started to cry.
But this wasn't a normal cry.
It was the cry that comes when something inside a person dies.
"I couldn't protect him..."I said in a hoarse voice.
I was out of breath.
"I couldn't protect the man who taught me throughout my life..."
A single tear fell to the ground.
Then another one.
Then another one.
"I couldn't even apologize..."
My throat hurt while saying the words.
Because I didn't want to accept this sentence.
But it was true.
It was terrifyingly true.
"My last words..."I whispered."
"My last words were hatred.".."
That's when I really broke down.
Because there was something more terrible than death.
And that thing was regret.
Death would take a person away.
But regret would remain behind.
Everyday.
Every hour.
With every breath.
It would settle within a person.
And slowly it would corrupt them.
I could feel it.
Inside me.
Right in the middle of my chest.
It was as if someone had stabbed a rusty knife into my soul and kept turning it around.
Mizu didn't speak for a long time.
The only sounds in the room were my breathing and the occasional tear falling.
Then he stood up from his chair.
Slowly.
Decisively.
And he looked at me.
"Your general title has been suspended."
When I heard this sentence, I felt time slow down.
But I wasn't surprised.
Because I was already expecting this.
Maybe I've been waiting for a long time.
Maybe since that meeting.
Maybe since the moment I started fighting Ryugu.
Maybe even before.
Perhaps since the very first moment I couldn't look into Shu's eyes.
Because I knew the truth.
I had failed.
I couldn't protect my team.
I couldn't defend my members.
I could not defend Kuren.
I couldn't defend Kazami.
I couldn't protect my master.
I couldn't even protect myself.
The removal of my title of general was only one result.
The real destruction had happened much earlier.
But still...
That hurt.
Because that title was not just a rank.
It was one of the meanings of my life.
And now he was going too.
Another city in me was destroyed.
Quietly.
Noiselessly.
With a crash that no one has ever heard of.
Mizu fell silent for a few seconds.
And that's the moment...
For the first time I saw hesitation on his face.
This scared me.
Because Mizu was not someone who hesitated.
I had seen him a thousand times during my childhood.
But not like this.
It's never like this.
My heart got stuck again.
I looked up.
My eyes were blurred with tears.
"What is it?" I asked.
My voice was very small.
Mizu looked at me.
Then he looked away.
And that moment...
An inexplicable fear settled within me.
Because sometimes one feels bad news before hearing it.
Just as one can sense the approach of a storm by the change in weather.
I felt it too.
Something was wrong.
It was very wrong.
Mizu finally looked at me again.
And he spoke.
"There's one more thing."
My heart stopped.
"what?"
He remained silent for a few seconds before answering.
And those few seconds seemed like hours to me.
Then he said.
"We couldn't find Shu's body."
The world stopped.
It really stopped.
I forgot how to breathe.
I forgot to blink.
I forgot to think.
Because that sentence refused to enter my mind.
Didn't we find it?
What do you mean, we didn't find it?
He fell off a bridge.
I saw it.
Ryugu pushed.
I saw it.
There was blood.
I saw it.
I've seen everything.
In that case...
How?
My chair tipped backwards.
I stood up.
No.
I didn't stand up.
I jumped.
It was as if someone had shot lightning into my chest.
"What did you say?"
My voice didn't belong to me.
"What did you just say?"
Mizu was saying something.
But I wasn't hearing it anymore.
Because there were other things going on in my head.
Our last conversation in the hallway.
Shu's face.
His incomprehensible anger.
And...
That smile for a second.
That damn smile.
At that moment, for the first time, I felt something greater than fear.
Because death was terrible.
But it was a missing body...
This was something else.
This was a riddle.
This was a sign.
This was the last shadow Shu Pryhi left behind.
And I could feel a pair of eyes looking at me from within that shadow.
It was as if he was watching me from somewhere, even after his death.
The thought that crossed my mind at that moment was so terrible that I didn't even want to think about it.
But the thought still came.
And it froze my entire being.
If Shu had truly died...
His body should have been there.
And if the body is not there...
Then the real question was not death.
The main question was:
Is Shu Pryhi really dead?
Or did I not even notice that his last lesson had started yet?
END OF CHAPTER