Suzu did not give them time to understand what they had just seen. The moment Shunjiro’s body struck the floodwater, blood surged from beneath her feet and swept toward the remaining fighters in a low crimson wave. Yoshinori reacted on instinct, raising his lightning blade and cutting downward through the attack before it could reach Aiko and Daichi. Electricity tore across the water, flashing blue-white against the red glow of the barrier as the blood split apart and scattered around his legs.

“Get them back!” Yoshinori shouted.

Daichi did not need to be told twice. His body had already reached its limit, and the sight of Shunjiro lying motionless in the water had drained what little fight remained in him. He grabbed Aiko by the arm and pulled her away from the center of the battlefield before she could try to force herself back into the fight.

“No,” Aiko said, her voice shaking as she stared at Shunjiro. “Let go of me.”

“You can barely stand.”

“I can still swap people.”

“You can barely lift your hand.”

Aiko tried to pull away, but her injured leg buckled beneath her. Daichi caught her before she fell face-first into the floodwater and dragged her farther back toward Itsuki. Her eyes remained fixed on Shunjiro’s body the entire time, and she looked as though she might shatter if she allowed herself to blink.

“I’m not leaving him,” she whispered.

“You’re not leaving him,” Daichi said, his own voice rough with exhaustion. “If you go back out there like this, you’ll just end up beside him.”

A few yards away, Itsuki remained beside him on her knees. Her hands were still pressed against his body as though refusing to accept that there was nothing left for her to give. No spiritual energy gathered around her palms. No healing light appeared. She stared down at him with the same blank, fractured expression she had worn since Suzu rose again, but now there was something else behind it.

Fear.

Not the sharp panic of someone watching a battle unfold. Not even grief.

It was the slow, terrible fear of realizing that the person lying in front of her might truly be gone.

Suzu took one step toward them.

Sora moved before anyone else could.

He placed himself directly between Suzu and the wounded, his body still covered in cuts from Blood Sickles. Blood ran down his arms and chest, slipping from the wounds across his shoulders, ribs, and legs before disappearing into the water around his boots. He looked exhausted. His breathing was uneven, and his hands shook whenever he let them hang at his sides for too long.

But he was still standing.

Yoshinori stepped beside him, lightning gathered into a jagged blade that extended from his hand. The weapon trembled slightly from the strain of maintaining it, but the light reflected in his narrowed eyes as he stared at Suzu.

For a few seconds, neither of them spoke.

They both understood what was left.

Two fifteen-year-olds standing in front of something that had destroyed almost everyone.

Sora rolled his shoulders and looked at Yoshinori from the corner of his eye. “You still have enough lightning for this?”

Yoshinori tightened his grip around the blade. “Do you still have enough body for it?”

Sora gave a tired, humorless smile. “Guess we’ll find out.”

Suzu’s blood rose from the floodwater and wrapped around her right arm.

This time, it did not split into spikes. It did not spread through the ground. It did not form another storm of sickles.

Instead, it stretched outward in one long, dark crimson line.

A blade formed in her hand.

It was narrower than the oversized blood weapons she had used earlier in the fight, but somehow more dangerous because of it. The weapon resembled a sword, though its edge shifted constantly, hardening and thinning as blood slid along the length of it. It was not clean or elegant. It looked alive. The surface rippled with every movement, as though the blade was still trying to return to the blood beneath her feet.

Suzu lowered her stance.

Yoshinori’s expression changed immediately.

“She’s conserving energy,” he said.

Sora glanced toward him. “What?”

“She’s too damaged to keep throwing everything at us.” Yoshinori’s eyes remained locked on Suzu. “So she’s changing how she fights.”

Suzu vanished forward.

The water exploded beneath her feet as she crossed the distance with terrifying speed. Yoshinori raised his lightning blade and met her strike head-on. Blood collided with lightning, and the impact sent a burst of steam and red mist into the air. Yoshinori’s arm shook under the force of the clash, but he held his ground long enough for Sora to move.

Sora stepped around Suzu’s flank and threw a punch toward her ribs.

She twisted away from him, her blood blade cutting backward in a short, brutal arc. The edge struck Sora across the side, but the attack shattered against the invisible barrier around his body before it could reach him. Crimson fragments burst outward and vanished into the floodwater.

Suzu’s head turned toward him.

Something behind her crimson eyes sharpened as she realized the attack had failed again.

Sora did not let her think about it.

He drove his fist into her shoulder.

The punch landed hard enough to force her backward, sending her sliding across the water. Yoshinori followed immediately, lightning blade flashing toward her chest. Suzu raised her sword to block, and the two weapons clashed again. Her blood blade bent beneath the force of the lightning before snapping back into shape, cutting toward Yoshinori’s wrist.

He pulled his arm away just in time.

The edge sliced through the sleeve of his clothes and grazed his forearm, but Yoshinori did not retreat. He shifted his grip and swung from the opposite side, forcing Suzu to move backward again.

Sora closed in from behind.

For the next several seconds, the fight became a blur of close-range movement.

Suzu no longer stood in one place and overwhelmed them with large attacks. She moved with the blood blade in her hand, cutting from angles that forced Yoshinori to defend while trying to keep Sora from getting close. Her movements were faster than both of theirs, even in her weakened state. Every time Yoshinori tried to press forward, she met him with a slash that made him recoil. Every time Sora attempted to strike her from behind, she shifted just enough to bring the blade between them.

Yet Sora’s adaptation changed everything.

He stopped fearing the attacks he had already survived.

When Suzu swung low at his legs, the blood blade never reached him. The edge slowed abruptly, stopping short of contact as though the space between them had stretched into an endless distance. When she sliced across his torso, the same thing happened. The blade advanced, slowed, and halted before it could touch him, cutting through nothing but air. Each time an attack failed, Sora moved closer. He no longer flinched from strikes that could not reach him, stepping through attacks that would have forced anyone else backward.

Suzu adjusted.

She stopped aiming for the same places.

She used the blade to drive Yoshinori away, then shifted her focus entirely to Sora. Rather than trying to cut him, she moved around him, forcing him to react to her positioning while searching for some way around the distance separating her attacks from his body. Sora tracked her movements carefully, but the momentary distraction was enough. Suzu slipped past his guard and sent a surge of blood upward from beneath the floodwater, aiming to catch him off balance. The attack struck the invisible barrier around him and burst apart harmlessly, but the force of the impact still shoved him several feet backward. He hit the ground hard, skidded across broken stone, and barely managed to roll away before Suzu followed with a downward slash.

The blade struck the ground where his neck had been.

Yoshinori intercepted her.

Lightning crashed against the blood blade, and for a moment the two of them were locked together. Yoshinori’s face twisted from the effort as Suzu pressed against him. His lightning blade hissed and crackled, but the blood weapon did not yield.

“You’re slowing down,” Suzu said.

They were the first words she had spoken since her battle with Itsuki.

Yoshinori’s jaw tightened. “You’re talking now?”

Suzu did not answer.

She shoved forward.

The force of it sent Yoshinori sliding backward through the water. His injured shoulder screamed beneath the strain, and lightning flickered unevenly around the blade in his hand. Suzu moved to follow, but Sora appeared at her side and wrapped both arms around her from behind.

He locked his hands together across her chest and tightened his grip.

Suzu’s blade twisted backward toward his arm.

It struck the invisible barrier.

Sora gritted his teeth. “Yoshinori!”

Yoshinori understood immediately.

He raised one hand toward the sky.

The dark clouds above the barrier churned faintly, disturbed by the spiritual energy building beneath them. Yoshinori’s arm trembled as lightning began gathering overhead. He had already used too much. Every bolt he called down now demanded more from a body that had been bleeding and fighting for far too long.

But he did not lower his hand.

“Move!” he shouted.

Sora released Suzu and threw himself backward.

The lightning came down and struck Suzu directly.

The entire battlefield flashed blue-white as electricity ripped through her body. Her cloak snapped violently in the blast, and blood burst outward from the wounds along her arms and shoulders. The force drove her into the ground, splitting the stone beneath the floodwater and sending debris into the air.

Yoshinori stood with his hand still raised, breathing hard as electricity crawled weakly around his fingers.

Sora landed beside him, chest rising and falling rapidly. “That was good.”

Yoshinori’s eyes stayed on Suzu. “Don’t say that like we’re winning.”

Sora looked toward the crater where Suzu had fallen.

He did not answer because Yoshinori was right.

They were not winning.

They were surviving.

Suzu pushed herself up again.

Her body looked worse now. Burns covered one side of her neck and shoulder. Blood seeped from the slash across her chest, from the wounds Yoshinori had opened, from the places where Sora’s punches had landed. The blood blade in her hand reformed more slowly than before, gathering in uneven streams around her fingers before stretching outward.

She had maybe a fraction of the strength she once possessed.

But it was still more than either of them had left.

Yoshinori could feel it in the weight of his lightning blade.

Sora could feel it in his legs.

They were reaching the point where every movement needed to matter.

Suzu moved again.

This time, she focused on Yoshinori.

She rushed him with the blood blade held low, forcing him to meet her directly. Yoshinori raised his lightning blade, and their weapons collided in a shower of sparks. Suzu pressed him backward, her strikes becoming faster, each slash flowing into the next without pause. Yoshinori blocked the first. Then the second. Then the third.

The fourth cut through his guard.

The blood blade sliced across his side.

Yoshinori staggered, one hand flying toward the wound as blood spread across his clothes.

Suzu raised her weapon again.

Sora hit her before she could bring it down.

His fist connected with the side of her face, snapping her head sideways. He followed with another punch to her ribs, then another to her stomach. Suzu tried to cut him, but the blade hit his barrier. He stepped closer and drove his knee into her body before grabbing her wrist.

For a second, Sora held her in place.

“You’re not getting past us,” he said.

Suzu’s eyes remained empty as the blood blade in her hand dissolved and flowed down between them. At first, Sora thought she was abandoning the weapon, but the blood immediately gathered around her other hand and reshaped itself into a new blade. The weapon that emerged looked denser than before, its edge darker and more defined, and he realized too late that she had shifted its output again.

The edge sliced across Sora’s shoulder before he could react, cutting through his clothes and into his skin. He hissed and stumbled away, one hand moving toward the wound.

Suzu had changed the output again.

Sora’s adaptation had only worked against attacks he had already endured. This blade carried a different output, a different level of force, and the barrier failed to stop it.

Yoshinori saw the opening and forced himself forward despite the pain in his side. His lightning blade swung toward Suzu’s neck. She caught the attack with her blood sword, but Yoshinori did not try to overpower her. Instead, he let the blades lock together and poured electricity down into the water around her feet.

Lightning spread through the floodwater.

Suzu’s body jerked as the current ran up through her legs.

Yoshinori’s eyes narrowed.

“Now!”

Sora ignored the pain in his shoulder and charged.

He ran directly through Suzu’s next swing. The blood blade struck the invisible barrier, weaker again now that Suzu had spent more energy on the previous attack. Sora closed the remaining distance and drove his fist upward into Suzu’s jaw.

The impact lifted her off her feet.

She crashed backward into a mound of broken stone, sending rubble rolling into the water around her.

For a moment, neither Sora nor Yoshinori moved.

They stood several yards apart, both breathing heavily, both bleeding, both barely keeping their footing. Behind them, Yuki remained near the wounded fighters with one hand raised, frost gathering around her fingers as she watched for any sign that Suzu might break past them. Aiko sat beside Tetsuo, her hand pressed against his shoulder as though she could hold him there by force alone. Daichi stood nearby, bent over with both hands on his knees, unable to do anything except stare at the fight in front of him.

Itsuki still knelt beside Shunjiro.

She did not look up.

Sora wiped blood from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand. “You think she’s done?”

Yoshinori looked toward the rubble.

“No.”

Suzu stood.

The blood blade in her hand had almost completely dissolved. She stared at the two boys in front of her, then lifted her eyes toward the crimson barrier overhead.

Something had changed.

At first, Yoshinori thought it was only another tremor from the battle. The barrier had been pulsing for so long that the movement had become part of the world around them. But this time the pulse did not travel smoothly across the dome.

The red light above them flickered.

Suzu’s head tilted upward.

For the first time since the fight began, she stopped attacking.

The blood around her feet began to shake.

Sora noticed it too. “What is she looking at?”

Yoshinori followed her gaze.

The barrier trembled.

A deep sound rolled through the battlefield, low enough that it could be felt more than heard. The floodwater rippled around their legs. Broken stone trembled beneath the surface. For a moment, the entire crimson dome seemed to draw inward as though something outside it had placed a hand against its surface.

Then a crack appeared.

It ran across the barrier high above them.

Everyone on the battlefield froze.

The crack was thin at first, little more than a black line cutting through the red glow. But then another appeared beside it. Then another. They spread through the dome in every direction, branching outward like fractures racing across glass.

Suzu took one step backward as her blood blade dissolved completely. Above them, the crimson barrier shuddered, its surface rippling unevenly before fractures spread across it in every direction. The entire dome seemed to strain against an unseen force for a single breath, and then it broke.

The barrier shattered above the Coastal Kingdom.

The sound was deafening.

It was not like stone breaking. It was not like metal tearing apart. It was the sound of something vast and living being ripped open. Crimson fragments burst outward across the night sky before dissolving into liquid, and the blood that had formed the barrier came down all at once.

It rained.

Blood fell from the sky over the entire battlefield.

It poured across broken streets, shattered stone, ruined buildings, and the flooded ground beneath their feet. It struck Yoshinori’s face and clothes. It ran across Sora’s shoulders and arms. It splashed over Aiko, Daichi, Yuki, and the wounded fighters huddled behind them. It fell around Itsuki and Shunjiro, turning the water surrounding them darker still.

Suzu stood alone in the center of the flooded battlefield. Her crimson eyes remained fixed on the open sky where the barrier had once stood, but the fear that had entered them did not make her retreat. The corruption inside her had stripped away too much for that. Even battered to the edge of collapse, even with her body burned, cut open, and weakened beyond recognition, she still held herself upright with the same terrible purpose that had carried her through the entire night.

Kill anything alive.

Yoshinori tightened his grip around the lightning blade in his hand, though the weapon flickered so weakly now that it looked ready to disappear. Blood ran from the wound in his side and down his arm, mixing with the rain before slipping into the floodwater around his boots. Beside him, Sora stood with his shoulders raised and his fists clenched, his entire body covered in cuts.

Neither of them moved toward her.

Neither of them had enough strength left to make the first move.

Then someone stepped onto the battlefield.

At first, it was only the sound of boots pressing into the shallow water behind them. The sound was quiet, almost impossible to hear beneath the rain, yet it cut through the silence anyway. Yoshinori looked over his shoulder first.

His eyes widened.

A man walked through the broken remains of the city without hesitation. There was not a single building left standing beneath where the barrier had been. The streets that had once been filled with stores, taverns, homes, and crowded walkways had been reduced to shattered stone, splintered wood, and flooded ruin. Bodies lay scattered between the debris. Some were unconscious. Some were barely breathing. Others sat in the water beside friends they could not help.

Kaito saw all of it.

He saw Roki lying motionless near the wounded group. He saw Rei slumped against broken stone, too exhausted to lift her head. He saw Aira seated beside the others, surrounded by water she no longer had the energy to command. He saw Lars clutching his chest wound while Yuki remained beside him, one hand hovering near the injury as frost gathered weakly around her fingers. He saw Tetsuo lying still in the floodwater with Aiko sitting beside him, her face pale and streaked with blood as she stared down at him.

Then Kaito saw Shunjiro.

Itsuki remained beside him on her knees, her hands pressed against his body as though refusing to let go. The water around them had darkened with blood, and even from a distance, Kaito could see enough to understand what had happened.

His expression did not change.

But his eyes hardened.

“Kaito,” Yoshinori said quietly.

Sora turned toward him and some of the tension left his shoulders. He knew what it meant for the leader of the Gilded Blades to be standing here now.

Relief tried to rise in his chest.

Suzu moved before it could.

Her crimson eyes shifted away from Yoshinori and Sora and settled on Kaito. The blood around her feet stirred as she turned toward him, and the remains of her weapon began to gather around her hand again. Her body was barely holding together, but the corruption did not care. It only recognized another living presence.

Itsuki looked up.

She saw Kaito through the falling blood.

She saw the katana at his side.

And she understood what was about to happen.

“No!” she screamed.

The sound tore through the battlefield at the exact moment Kaito disappeared.

There was no burst of spiritual energy. No flash of light. No warning.

One instant, he stood several yards away from Suzu.

The next, he was behind her.

Suzu’s eyes widened.

Kaito’s sword was already moving.

The blade passed across her back in one clean motion, cutting through the torn black cloak and opening a deep line across her body. The strike was fast enough that Suzu remained standing for a second after it landed, her sword hand still half-raised as though she had not understood what had happened.

Then her strength left her.

The blood blade dissolved from her hand.

Her knees buckled.

Suzu fell forward into the floodwater without another sound.

The impact sent a small wave outward from her body.

Kaito remained behind her, his katana lowered at his side.

He did not look toward Itsuki.

His attention stayed on Suzu until he was certain the Blood Witch would not rise again.

For a few seconds, the crimson rain continued falling.

It struck the water around Suzu’s unconscious body. It ran down Kaito’s cloak and blade. It washed over Yoshinori and Sora as they stood in stunned silence, too exhausted to understand that the fight had finally stopped.

Then the rain began to weaken.

The drops grew thinner.

The blood that had been pouring from the broken sky slowed to a light red drizzle before fading entirely. The ruined district fell quiet beneath the first pale light of morning. Far beyond the shattered buildings and flooded streets, the sun began to rise over the horizon.

Gold spread slowly across the sky.

The night was over.

Yoshinori let the lightning blade in his hand disappear. The energy faded from his fingers, and the moment it did, his legs nearly gave out beneath him. Sora reached out and caught his shoulder before he hit the water.

“Easy,” Sora said.

Yoshinori gave a tired breath that almost became a laugh. “You’re telling me to take it easy?”

“You look worse than I do.”

“I do not.”

“You definitely do.”

Yoshinori leaned against Sora for a moment, both of them staring across the battlefield at Suzu’s unconscious body. Neither of them looked relieved. They looked too tired to feel anything yet.

Behind them, Yuki remained beside Lars, keeping one hand near his reopened chest wound as a thin layer of frost held the bleeding back as best it could. Rei sat slumped against a broken wall with Akima beside her, both too exhausted to speak. Aira stayed close to Ryuji and Roki, her eyes moving between the injured bodies around her as though trying to decide who needed help first despite having nothing left to give. Aiko had not moved from Tetsuo’s side. She sat in the water beside him, one hand resting against his shoulder while she stared down at his motionless body with tears gathering in her eyes.

Daichi stood a short distance away, bent forward with both hands on his knees. His body trembled from exhaustion, and blood still ran down his side, but he remained on his feet through sheer stubbornness.

Kaito walked through the center of the ruined district.

His gaze moved over the fallen fighters as he crossed the battlefield. He saw Tetsuo lying motionless beside Aiko. He saw Lars barely conscious near Yuki. He saw Shunjiro in Itsuki’s arms.

For the briefest moment, Kaito slowed.

His eyes settled on Shunjiro’s body, then shifted to Itsuki. She did not look up at him. She did not look up at anyone. Her shoulders shook as she held Shunjiro close, silent grief pouring out of her more painfully than any scream could have.

Kaito’s expression remained unreadable, but the hand at his side tightened slightly.

Then he continued walking.

Daichi forced himself upright when Kaito stopped in front of him. The effort made his legs shake, but he did not look away.

“What happened here?” Kaito asked.

Daichi opened his mouth.

Before he could answer, the air near Suzu’s unconscious body changed.

A low hum spread through the battlefield.

It was not loud, but everyone felt it. The floodwater around Suzu began to ripple even though there was no wind, and the broken pieces of stone scattered near her body trembled against the ground. Kaito turned first, his hand moving immediately toward the hilt of his katana.

Purple light appeared in the air above Suzu.

At first it was no larger than a handprint, a faint violet glow twisting against the pale morning sky. Then it widened. The space in front of Suzu bent inward as though something on the other side was pulling at the world itself. Purple energy spiraled outward, forming a circular shape that continued expanding.

The portal opened in complete silence.

Its edges rotated slowly, pulling loose droplets of blood and water toward the violet light before releasing them again. The glow reflected across the flooded street, painting the broken stone, the unconscious Suzu, and the exhausted survivors in shades of purple.

Yoshinori forced himself upright despite the pain tearing through his body. Sora stepped forward on instinct, placing himself between the portal and the wounded fighters even though his legs trembled beneath him. Yuki raised one hand as frost gathered weakly around her fingers. Aiko lifted her head from Tetsuo’s side, her eyes widening as she turned toward the light.

Every person left standing turned toward it.

A figure stepped out of the portal.

He was a young man in a long black cloak traced with deep purple along its edges. The fabric shifted around his boots as he entered the flooded street, untouched by the water beneath him. His hair was dark, falling just past his ears in uneven strands, with a distinct white patch near the front that contrasted sharply against the rest, but it was his eyes that held everyone’s attention.

One was purple.

The other was white.

He looked across the battlefield with an expression that was far too relaxed for the destruction around him. His gaze moved over the injured fighters, the collapsed bodies, the unconscious Blood Witch, and the city that had been reduced to rubble. Nothing about it seemed to disturb him. If anything, he looked entertained.

Then he saw Kaito.

A smile spread across his face.

“Kaito Ishiro,” the stranger said, his voice carrying easily through the quiet battlefield. “It has been far too long.”

Kaito did not move.

His hand remained close to the hilt of his katana, and the coldness in his eyes sharpened as he stared at the man standing beside Suzu.

“Tsubasa Astoria,” Kaito said. “The runaway prince of Altheron.”

Several of the surviving fighters exchanged uneasy looks. The name meant nothing to most of them, but the way Kaito spoke it made the danger clear enough.

Tsubasa gave a small laugh and spread his hands at his sides. “Still using that name? I left because I had better things to do than spend my life smiling at nobles who hated each other. You of all people should understand the value of leaving a cage.”

“You ran,” Kaito replied.

“I escaped.”

“You escaped because I let you.”

Tsubasa’s smile widened, though something more serious flashed behind his mismatched eyes. “Four years later, and you still tell that story as though you had me cornered.”

“I did.”

“You had a blade at my throat.”

“And you opened a portal before I could finish the job.”

Tsubasa tilted his head, considering that for a moment as though they were discussing an old game instead of a hunt that had nearly ended in bloodshed. “That is generally how escaping works, Kaito. You should try it sometime.”

The purple portal behind him remained open, twisting silently over Suzu’s motionless body. Kaito’s eyes flicked toward it once before returning to Tsubasa.

“What do you want?”

Tsubasa’s expression brightened as though he had been waiting for the question.

“I came for two things,” he said. “The Blood Witch and Shunjiro Tenzai.”

The name carried through the battlefield.

Itsuki’s head lifted sharply from beside Shunjiro’s body. Her hands were still pressed against his chest, trembling as she stared toward Tsubasa through wet hair and tear-streaked cheeks.

Kaito’s voice remained calm, but there was a warning beneath it. “You are taking neither.”

Tsubasa glanced toward Suzu as though she were nothing more than an object someone had placed in the wrong room. “The Blood Witch is useful. That much should be obvious. I have no interest in whatever tragedy turned her into this, and I care even less about the city she destroyed. But power like hers should not be wasted lying in floodwater.”

“She is not your weapon.”

“Everything is someone’s weapon,” Tsubasa said. “Some people are simply more honest about it.”

Kaito took one step forward.

The water shifted around his boots.

“You will not touch her.”

Tsubasa’s gaze moved from Kaito to Suzu, then back again. “Relax. I did not come here to drag an unconscious girl through a portal while you are standing in front of me. I can take her after we are finished.”

“We are not finishing anything.”

Tsubasa laughed softly. “You say that now, but I remember you. You do not walk away when someone takes something from you.”

Kaito’s expression did not change.

“Then you remember poorly.”

Tsubasa’s smile faded just enough to show that he understood the threat. He had always treated danger like a game, but not because he failed to recognize it. Kaito was not someone he underestimated. The prince’s posture remained casual, yet his attention never drifted from Kaito for long.

Then his gaze shifted toward Shunjiro.

“That one is different,” Tsubasa said.

Kaito’s eyes narrowed. “He is dead.”

Tsubasa looked almost disappointed by the answer, though the expression lasted only a moment.

“No,” he said quietly. “Fate has other things in store for the young Tenzai.”

Itsuki froze.

At first, she did not understand why he had said it. Then she looked down at Shunjiro again.

The blood around his body had begun to move.

It was subtle at first. So subtle that nobody else noticed. Thin currents of red water drifted across the flooded street, carrying tiny pale grains through the blood around him. The particles were too small to see clearly unless someone was already staring at them, but Itsuki was staring at him with every piece of herself that had not broken yet.

The strange substance gathered around the place where his body had been severed.

Itsuki’s breath caught.

Her fingers tightened against his chest as she watched the pale grains press into the blood around the wound. They moved with a purpose that terrified her. Not like ordinary spiritual energy. Not like a healing spell. They did not glow. They did not give off warmth. They simply shifted through the blood in countless tiny streams, pulling torn flesh toward torn flesh and drawing the separated parts of Shunjiro’s body closer together.

“What is that?” Itsuki whispered.

Tsubasa heard her.

His mismatched eyes moved toward Shunjiro, and something satisfied settled across his face.

Kaito noticed Itsuki’s reaction a second later. His attention shifted from Tsubasa to the body in the floodwater, and for the first time since the portal had opened, uncertainty crossed his expression.

The process continued slowly.

Blood drew inward around Shunjiro’s waist. The strange pale grains moved through it, stitching the wound shut in thin, steady lines. Muscle reconnected. Skin pulled closed. His torn clothes remained soaked and ruined, but the injury beneath them began to disappear piece by piece.

Itsuki could not move.

She could barely breathe.

She had spent the last several minutes believing that there was nothing left to save. She had pressed her hands against Shunjiro’s body and begged for healing that would not come. She had watched Suzu fall and felt hope return only because her sister had been left alive.

Now something impossible was happening in front of her.

Shunjiro’s fingers twitched.

Itsuki’s eyes widened.

His hand moved again, dragging weakly through the shallow water at his side. His breathing came first, slow and uneven. Then his chest rose more clearly beneath her trembling hands.

“Shunjiro?” she whispered.

His eyes opened.

For several seconds, he stared upward at the brightening sky as if he had no idea where he was. His breathing remained shallow, and his face was pale beneath the blood and dirt, but he was alive. Slowly, his gaze shifted toward Itsuki.

“Itsuki?” he said.

The sound of his voice broke her.

She leaned over him immediately, wrapping both arms around him as tears spilled down her face. Her forehead pressed against his chest, and her shoulders shook as the grief she had been holding back finally broke loose.

Shunjiro tried to sit up too quickly.

Pain ran through him, forcing a strained breath from his throat, but the injury that should have made movement impossible was gone. His body still felt weak and wrong, as though every muscle had been drained of strength, but he could move.

Itsuki helped him.

One arm went around his back while the other held his shoulder, and together they slowly pushed him upright. Shunjiro swayed once when he reached his feet, but he did not fall. His open cuts had closed. The wounds across his waist, wrists, and body were gone or nearly gone, though his clothes still told the story of what had happened.

He looked down at himself.

Then he looked at the blood around his feet.

Memory returned in broken pieces.

Tetsuo falling.

Suzu’s blade.

The pain.

Darkness.

Shunjiro’s eyes widened slightly as he looked back at Itsuki. “You healed me?”

Itsuki did not answer.

She only held onto him more tightly, tears continuing to fall as though she was afraid the moment would disappear if she spoke.

Shunjiro looked over her shoulder toward the battlefield, then toward Tsubasa standing beside Suzu. He had not heard every word of the conversation, but he had heard his own name. He could feel the stranger’s attention resting on him.

“Who are you?” Shunjiro asked.

Tsubasa’s smile returned.

“Someone with an invitation.”

Shunjiro frowned. “An invitation?”

“Yes.” Tsubasa took a slow step forward, though he remained near the place where he had first emerged from the portal. “I am offering you a place in my guild.”

Shunjiro stared at him.

For a moment, he thought he had misheard.

“I already have a guild.”

“I know.”

“Then why would you ask me to join yours?”

“Because yours has taught you how to survive,” Tsubasa said. “Mine can teach you why you survived that.”

The words made Shunjiro’s expression tighten.

Itsuki looked up at Tsubasa, still holding Shunjiro’s arm as though she could shield him from the conversation.

Tsubasa continued, his voice calm and almost conversational. “You have questions, Shunjiro Tenzai. Questions about yourself. Questions about what just brought you back from death. Questions that no one around you can answer.”

Kaito’s hand moved closer to his sword.

“You will not speak to him about that.”

Tsubasa glanced toward Kaito and gave a light shrug. “You always were terrible at letting people learn the truth for themselves.”

“You do not know the truth.”

“No,” Tsubasa said. “But I know enough to recognize potential when I see it.”

Shunjiro’s jaw tightened. “What do you want from me?”

“I told you. I want you in my guild.”

“You do not even know me.”

Tsubasa’s purple eye narrowed with amusement. “You would be surprised.”

Shunjiro looked toward Itsuki.

She was still crying, but there was something different in her face now. For the first time since Suzu had reformed, there was hope. Fragile and terrified, but there.

Shunjiro turned back toward Tsubasa. “I am not going anywhere.”

Tsubasa sighed, as though Shunjiro had answered a question incorrectly on purpose.

“That is unfortunate,” he said.

Kaito’s eyes hardened.

“Tsubasa.”

The prince did not move.

He did not lift a hand.

He did not turn toward Shunjiro.

A purple circle opened beneath Shunjiro’s feet.

Itsuki gasped.

The portal appeared so quickly that neither she nor Shunjiro had time to react. One moment he was standing beside her, weak but alive, his hand still gripping her arm. The next, the ground beneath him disappeared into swirling violet light.

Shunjiro reached for her.

Itsuki reached back.

Their fingers brushed.

For a fraction of a second, their hands caught at each other.

Then the portal swallowed him.

Shunjiro vanished into the purple light.

Itsuki stumbled forward, reaching for the place where he had been. The portal remained open for one terrible second, showing nothing but twisting darkness beneath the surface. Then it folded inward and disappeared.

Shunjiro was gone.

Itsuki stood frozen in the empty space he had left behind.

For one breath, she had been allowed to hope.

Her sister was alive.

Shunjiro was alive.

Then he was taken from her.

Aiko moved first.

She tore herself away from Tetsuo’s side, leaving him in the floodwater as she ran toward Tsubasa with her dagger clenched in one shaking hand. Sora followed from the opposite side, his exhaustion forgotten beneath anger. Yuki moved beside him, frost building around her fingers as she raised her hand toward the prince.

“Bring him back!” Aiko shouted.

Tsubasa looked at them with mild interest.

Three more children stepping into a fight they could not win.

Two portals opened instantly.

One appeared beneath Aiko as she ran.

The other opened beneath Sora and Yuki at the exact moment they reached one another.

Aiko’s eyes widened as the ground vanished beneath her. She tried to twist away, but the portal swallowed her before she could even complete the movement. Sora lunged toward Yuki, grabbing for her arm as violet light rose around both of them, but neither had time to pull free.

The portals closed a second later.

Aiko was gone.

Sora and Yuki were gone.

Kaito drew his katana.

The blade slid free with a quiet metallic sound, but the pressure behind it made the ruined district feel smaller.

“Where did you send them?” he asked.

Tsubasa’s expression brightened as though this was the part he had been waiting for. “Elsewhere in the kingdom. They will be fighting two friends of mine while I handle you.”

“You sent injured children into another fight.”

Tsubasa shrugged. “They ran toward me with weapons in their hands. I gave them an opportunity to prove they were serious.”

“They are not part of this.”

“They made themselves part of it.”

Kaito’s gaze did not leave him.

“Bring them back.”

Tsubasa smiled again, but there was less humor in it now. “After we are done. It has been four years, Kaito. You hunted me across the Cosmic and beyond it. You nearly killed me the last time we met. I think we have earned a proper reunion.”

Kaito lifted his katana slightly.

Tsubasa reached down and drew two kunai from his belt, spinning one of them between his fingers before settling it into a reverse grip. His cloak shifted around him as purple light gathered faintly at his feet.

“You should be grateful,” Tsubasa said. “I came all this way to give you something worth fighting for.”

Kaito Ishiro and Tsubasa Astoria faced each other once more.