| Not Coke |
Coke |
I, having been so resurrected, am merely viewing the image made of her - the person named Ryougi Shiki's - life.
I can't think of the film's protagonist as myself.
"A ghost caught on film, rather."
I bite my lip.
I don't know myself.
It is wholly uncertain that I am, truly, Ryougi Shiki.
I feel myself to be something unfamiliar.
My vacant body is like a cave. Air gusts through it, like the wind.
It is as if, for reasons unknown, a great hollow has opened in my chest.
That elicits great unease - and loneliness, too.
A piece of this puzzle is lacking. The heart. The vacant space is too much for me to bear.
All too hollow. No reason for life.
"And yet --- what of it, Shiki?"
It's nothing to me. No great thing of interest.
The unease that I feel, the anxiety, to the point of clawing at the chest, that I feel in regard of this - miracle - produces in me neither distress nor sorrow.
There is unease. And there is pain.
But those are habits which were to the last entertained by that which Ryougi Shiki used to be.
I am unmoved. Two years' death, and now resurrection, and I simply do not care.
I am merely here. Insubstantially.
Wholly unable to feel alive. |
It’s like I’m watching a biopic. Main character: Shiki Ryōgi. Weird ghost image caught in some of the frames: me.
I bite my lips until I’m sure I’m still awake.
It’s all I have to make sure I’m still here.
I’m a puzzle with a missing piece close to my chest, and the hole makes my insides feel as hollow as a cave with wind howling through it.
I’m missing my reason for living.
“And so? What the fuck does it matter?”
I mutter to myself with as much conviction as I can muster.
And once I’ve said that, I feel less troubled by it.
Strangely, this feeling of disquiet and irritation that scratches and pulls at my chest is sort of refreshing, in its own way.
There’s anxiety. There’s pain.
But those are feelings that the sixteen-year old Shiki still held on to.
Me? I’m unimpressed. I don’t know why I’m still alive but I have no intention of looking a gift horse in the mouth.
Not like I feel alive in the first place anyway. I’m just here, now; nursing an existence of being adrift on the wind. |
| I think I'd like my end to be a death by falling from a place with an overlooking view. |
I think my last moment should be spent on a high place, a place where I can look down on a panorama of the world, and fall back to the embrace of the reality that has rejected me so. |
"The 'you' on the Fujou building was close to being a disembodied consciousness. And you used that to your advantage, didn't you? Those girls were able to fly from the beginning, couldn't they -- whether they were just imagining it in dreams or whether they truly possessed the power of flight.
"Sleep-fliers -- not to be confused with sleep-walkers -- are relatively common, but they don't pose much of a problem. Why? Well, they never show symptoms except when they're unconscious. And because they're unconscious, they don't hold any ill intentions while flying, and would never even think to try flying the rest of the time. Among those, those girls were particularly special. We're not exactly talking Peter Pan here, but children tend to be volatile. One or two of them may have actually flown, but in the majority of cases it was just the consciousness that was flying, and they only had the vague sense that they'd dreamed of such a thing happening. You made them conscious of it. You dragged their subconscious impression into reality.
"As a result, they wound up realizing that they could fly. Oh, they certainly could, all right. But only unconsciously. It's difficult for a person to fly unaided. Even I can't fly without a broomstick. Conscious flight only succeeds about thirty percent of the time. The girls tried to fly as though it came naturally, and naturally fell." |
"You used the image of you at the Fujō Tower as more of a channel for your will, didn't you? You reached out to them in sleep, in their dreams of flight. And in those dreamscapes, at least one or two of them were on the verge of awakening to magic, which is why you could notice them in the mess of other minds in this city, and why you can snare them so easily. But it was you who made them think about flying while they were outside of sleep, even as they weren't really 'awake'. They tried to fly, and they got the natural result of trying to do the impossible." |
Before I knew it, I was responding to the counselor's light teasing.
"There's nothing funny about having a dual personality."
"No, no. You know, you two don't have anything as pleasing to look at as dissociative identity disorder. Existing simultaneously, each having their own unique will, and on top of that your actions are coordinated. That sort of complex personality shouldn't be called a "dissociated identity," but rather a "united independent personality"."
"United... independent personality?" |
“There’s nothing amusing about having a dual personality,” I impulsively interject.
She clicks her teeth in disappointment. “A cute label, but not accurate, I’d say. Both of you exist simultaneously, each of you having your own will: a recipe for dissociation. And yet, you both perform the same actions. It’s complicated, and the label ‘dual personality’ doesn’t do it justice. Something like ‘composite independent personality’ seems more fitting.”
“Hey, tack on a ‘republic’ in the end there and it’ll sound like some new Balkan country.” |
"Wait, at least stay and get some breakfast."
The girl obediently follows what I say. The only things left are pasta and olive oil so naturally, our breakfast becomes spaghetti. I quickly make it for the two of us and carry it to the table to eat. Since it's so quiet, I turn on the TV and see a terrible news broadcast.
"... Wow, this is the kind of story Touko-san would like."
I murmur something aloud, so that if she were here, she would be throwing something at me. ... But that's how weird the contents of the news are. I listen to the newscaster who talks about what happened last night.
Last night, in the basement of a bar that has been abandoned for half a year, four dead bodies were found. It seems all four victims had their limbs torn off and the scene of the crime was soaked in a pool of blood. The place is pretty close to here, maybe around four stations away from last night's place. It's strange that they said the limbs were torn off rather than cut off, but the news does not elaborate much on it, and rather goes into the information on the victims.
All four of the victims were high-schoolers, and they were just kids that played around near that place. It seems they did some drugs too, and a person who the newscaster is interviewing is talking about the victims' personal lives.
......I think they deserved to die, those kids.
Those words flow from the TV and I get annoyed by this speaking ill of the dead, so I turn off the television. Looking at the girl, she is placing her hand painfully on her stomach. Seeing that she hasn't taken a bite of food, she might be really hurt. I can't see her expression as she is looking down |
“Wait up, wait up.” I call after her while rubbing my eyes awake. I can’t have her leave just like that when she waited for me to get up. “I can at least get you a breakfast.”
That stops her. Food must really get to her. As I thought, she’s just as hungry as anyone else would be after her ordeal last night. Now then, I’ve got some pasta and olive oil at the ready, which makes spaghetti the obvious choice for breakfast. I quickly whip up two portions of it and carry it to my dinner table, and we eat it together. Since it seems like she’s not in a talking mood, I turn on the TV to watch some morning news. It’s the usual diet of homicide in the city, but this one gave me a strange feeling.
“Ah, strange whodunits with a tinge of the weird. Just the kind of news that Miss Tōko would love.” If I had said that in the office, I’d probably already be smacked upside the head with a projectile shoe. But the news item is bizarre.
The reporter on the scene told the story. Seems four bodies were found in an underground bar that had been abandoned for a half a year. All four of them had had their limbs torn off, and the crime scene was filled with blood. The scene is pretty close by, maybe four stations or so away from where we were drinking last night.
I make a mental note of the fact that the news said that their limbs were “torn off” and not “cut off.” Regardless, the news has nothing more on that angle, and goes on to describe the details on the victims’ lives: all teenagers, and delinquents who frequently hung around the neighborhood. It seems they were slinging drugs too; corner boys. They have a citizen on the mike now, commenting on the victims.
“Those kids knew what they were getting into, and they got it. I think they deserved to die.”
And with those words, I turn the TV off. I hate it when people say those things, and I hate it even more when the media goes out of its way to give people like that the time of day. I turn back to look at my guest only to find her with a hand on her stomach just like last night. She hasn’t even touched her food. There really must be something wrong with her stomach. She looks down, such that I can’t see her face. |
| "In this Spiral that is the source of everything, a directional impulse can be born like lighting. A directive with the meaning of "To do..." begins to flow, and particles compatible with this flow start to form objects. Sometimes, the objects formed are humans." |
An overriding direction, an entropic tendency to chaos that drives all of reality. Such shards of creation obtain a purpose,
a task, placing themselves into things part of the Pattern of reality that matches its symbology. An animal perhaps. Or a plant. Sometimes, or eventually, it may be a man, finding his soul. |
| If you want to see murder on a scale that the human mind cannot comprehend, go to a battlefield. If you wish to see humans dying on a scale you could never believe, just go to any starving nation. Something like this isn't hell. It's merely purgatory, this. |
And if you want to see the slaughter and wailing and gnashing of teeth that you love so much, I suggest you make a quick stop in Kosovo or the Congo. Your pitiful operation is nothing compared to that. |
"Is that so? So that's how you concluded that you had to destroy Ryougi Shiki."She narrows her two eyes.
Ryougi Shiki. The Ryougi clan was a family who had toiled over the ages to give birth to one with an empty body who could act as a vessel, all in order to create a human with maximum uses. To be empty was 「 」. Without realising what a dangerous thing they were doing, they had given birth to a body called Shiki who was connected to 「 」.
"--- Is that why you used Fujoh Kirie and Asagami Fujino?
If you moved yourself you would get found out by the Counter Force. So you had to always be at arms length while you destroy Shiki without allowing it to notice your existence. Right? By making Shiki confront murderers who held concepts totally opposite to her own, you made Shiki realise her own nature. If you are trying to make someone realise an idea I guess it is faster to let them experience it than to teach them.
So, what was it that you wanted, Araya? For Shiki and SHIKI to tear each other apart and leave behind an empty shell? Or did you just want to meet Ryougi Shiki?"
"Two years ago was to draw 'her' out. But it's different now. I told you the conclusion was already out. Shiki does not require that body. That body which is connected to the origin, I shall be taking it and making it my own." |
“But you found her. And her name is Shiki Ryōgi.” Tōko wonders briefly if the Ryōgi dynasty even knew what the dangerous progeny of their lineage implied and was truly capable of becoming. “Then you used Kirie Fujō and Asagami Fujino as bait to lure Shiki in without attracting the Deterrent to your scent. You hold two broken mirrors up to her to make her realize what she is. Got a hand it to you, there’s no better teacher than experience. Your gameplan for Shiki still isn’t clear, though. What’s it going to be? Bringing Shiki back from the dead? Or did you just kidnap her for a social call?”
“What I did two years ago only set the destiny that had been forged for Ryōgi into motion. A solution has presented itself. She has no need of that body, and I will take it for my own purposes.” |
"Araya. Why do you try to kill me?"The man doesn't respond.
Instead, he says something strange.
"Neither Fujoh Kirie nor Asagami Fujino were effective."
"--- What?"
Shiki swallows her words upon hearing those unexpected names.
Piercing that opening --- the man steps goes forward one more step.
"Unable to live without being close to death, Fujoh Kirie was someone similar yet different to you."
... Fujoh Kirie who had been confined to a bed with a disease that meant she could die at any moment. A woman who had only been able to feel that she was alive through death. A human who had only been able to feel that they were alive through death. ... An ability possessor with one mind and two bodies.
And.
Ryougi Shiki, who could only realise the fact she was alive by approaching death and defying it. ... An ability possessor with two minds and one body.
"Then there was Asagami Fujino who could only find joy by coming into contact with death, again someone similar yet different to you."
... Asagami Fujino, she who had no sense of pain and so could not accept feelings from the outside world. A girl who could only find pleasure in the extreme act of killing a person. A human who could only feel that they were alive by observing the pain her victims went through as she killed them, and the sense of superiority that brought. ... The scion of an old bloodline that sealed off the abilities they were born with through physical means.
And.
Ryougi Shiki who could only feel herself and others by coming into contact with death and trying to kill each other. ... The scion of an old bloodline that artificially developed their abilities.
"When death came near she chose death, and you chose life."
Throwing your lives before yourselves she enjoyed killing, and you enjoyed trying to kill each other.
You would have felt it. That those girls were comrades, yet murderers whose natures conflicted with Ryougi Shiki."
Shocked to the core, Shiki --- was watching the approaching darkness as it talked to her.
Watching, was all she could do.
"I failed 2 years ago. That person was too different. What was needed were those who had diverged from the same 'origin'.
That's right. Be happy, Ryougi Shiki. Those two were sacrifices that I prepared for you." |
“Why do you want to kill me, Alaya?” At first he seems to have no intent to answer. But in a moment, he mouths an entirely unexpected sentence.
“Kirie Fujō and Fujino Asagami performed quite poorly.”
“What did you say?” Taken aback by names she did not expect, Shiki is at a momentary loss for words. In that moment of hesitation that Shiki let slip, Alaya closes the distance with another hostile step.
“I hold the cracked mirror up to you, and you see Kirie Fujō, a woman who thrived on death only to cling to life.” He says the name of the woman who was once consumed by debilitating disease, not knowing when she would die. An individual who lived through a longing for death. She held the trait of having one soul, yet two bodies, inseparably twinned.
And then, there is Shiki Ryōgi, the name of the girl who can feel alive only through facing death, holding it close to her like a beloved trinket, but never letting it consume her. She held the trait of having two souls, yet one body, their link now definitively broken.
“The image in the mirror shifts, and you see Fujino Asagami, the woman that pleasures herself through the medium of death.” He says the name of the girl who felt nothing, and because of it, was stunted in her understanding of the emanations of the world beyond her. Only through the extremes of murder could she hope to gain the pleasure of dominion and the joy of life. Her dangerous abilities were sealed by the same dynasty through which she inherited it.
And then, there is Shiki Ryōgi, the name of the girl could only empathize with others through the act of mutual murder, risking death, and fighting it. Her honed skills are granted to her by the same dynasty through which she inherited it.
“On the precipice of death, Kirie Fujō chose the end, while you chose life. In the taking of lives, Fujino Asagami took pleasure, while you gave it weight and meaning. Surely your similarities and your differences as murderers have not escaped your attention.” Shocked into inaction, Shiki can only look as the darkness of the man approaches her. “Two years ago, I failed. I did not realize that what I needed were different individuals with the same origin. Rejoice, Shiki Ryōgi, for both of Kirie and Fujino were sacrifices made for you.” |
Touko shook her head, an act of pity rather than denial.
"I can't deny it. At this stage the Counter Force isn't going to move. You might actually succeed this time.
Further, I have no idea what will happen if someone such as yourself, who hates mankind so deeply, touches the Root. If it were a normal magus, he'd move on to that other world and forget all about ours, without a doubt. But you, you're different. Even if you touch the Root, some shade of yourself will almost certainly remain on this side. This entire country might even be annihilated as a result. Because, if somebody like you that hates humans seriously intends to save humans, the only possible result is the ultimate end of all suffering: death.
But, Araya. You don't really hate humans. You're merely infatuated with the ideal image of humanity you harbor within your heart. That's why you cannot tolerate the humans of this ugly, shameful world. You'll save humanity? Ha! Don't make me laugh. You don't want to save humanity. You just want to save your own delusions of a humanity that never even existed." |
Tōko shakes her head, in pity more so than repudiation. “Maybe so. Maybe you’ve actually won this time. I don’t know what you’ll do when you reach the spiral of origin. They told us that the mages who reached the realms above remained, never to return to the material world below, sloughing off their memory of it like dry skin. But you fancy yourself different, don’t you? You’d reshape reality, cast your shadow here on this side. As above, so below. You think you hate humanity so much that you want to save them. If that were true, you’d will yourself from existence after your ascension. But you don’t really hate humanity, Alaya. You only love the notion of the Platonic human you think you harbor within you. It’s why you can’t forgive the world of suffering you see. It’s hilarious, too, how you think you want to save them. But you only want to save your delusional self.” |
| On a night at the beginning of August, Mikiya came by without any notice. |
It is a night somewhere in the beginning of August, and Mikiya comes by to visit without any prior notice, as per his MO. |
The magus stood motionless in the hallway after destroying that thing called Enjou Tomoe.
It was almost time. Half a day had passed since he switched from the body he was using up until yesterday to the spare he was using now, and his consciousness finally permeated every cell of it. Of course, Araya Souren had not prepared identical bodies in advance in case he died, like some kind of puppet master. In fact, he has never experienced death at all.
Though his body has rotted and crumbled to dust from age several times, his consciousness alone survived unbroken. Araya Souren has remained a solitary existence through to the bitter end. Therefore, there was no refuge to flee to should his current body be ruined. He would have to act carefully.
However, there was no longer any reason to wait. The will of the soul called Araya Souren had much experience bringing physical bodies under its control. Already the magic circuits, the wiring that moves his physical form, reached as far as his fingers and toes. The process was complete. The magus' temporary body had been completely sublimated into the real thing.
And so, in order to accomplish his original goal, the magus began to move.
But, before that, he sensed something amiss within the apartment building. |
After the destruction Tomoe Enjō, the mage Sōren Alaya stands stock still in the tenth floor hallway. He knows the time is close at hand. He has prepared the body he will use, and his soul is ready to be relocated, and he will finally leave this inferior flesh. Unlike the puppet master he once knew, his soul will not move to something similar to his previous form. He has no need of one, for he has never known death. He has known rot and decay, but his soul presses him forward to some grand goal, and so he survives. And in the end, he stands alone. This body will either be his medium for ascension, or death; for there is no other. Due to this, his extreme attention to caution can perhaps be forgiven.
Not much longer now until he leaves this false material world, his soul sublimated to the vessel of the girl connected to the spiral of origin, from where he can command reality itself. As above, so below. The process has already started. But before this happens, there is one matter left to settle. |
| It's similar to the collective subconsciousness some psychologist proposed. He probably thought that if he felt his way along that chain, he would eventually reach the heart. |
It almost resembles that ‘collective unconscious’ bullshit by that psychiatrist a long time ago. He thought he could reach the origin if he just followed the breadcrumbs, the little clues left for us here. |
"...Indeed. Shiki is incapable of causing anything but destruction. And as far as you're concerned, I'm Shiki after all."
"---Shiki?"
"...My origin is nothingness. As a result, Shiki, who is possessed of that body, can perceive death. Two years ago--- when she fell into a coma, the outside world was shut off to her. Her vision turned inward toward the nothingness called Ryougi Shiki, and she felt the touch of death.
Shiki floated on the sea known as the spiral of origin for a long, long time. A solitary form in the void of 「 」."
...With an origin like "nothingness" the girl would certainly feel compelled to return everything to nothing.
Therefore, she was able to kill all things without exception. Even if the personality of Shiki tried to deny it, her soul itself was oriented toward the death of everything.
"That is Shiki's ability. Just like Asagami Fujino, she has a unique channel that can see things normal humans can't. Eyes that can glimpse the spiral of origin, itself a microcosm of the greater world.
But, I can dive even deeper than she. Or rather... I suppose you could say that I myself am that spiral." |
“An understandable observation. Shiki is very much a creature of destruction. I suppose you still cannot see me as anything else but her, in the end. My origin is emptiness, and because of this, Shiki can see the death of everything. When Shiki slept for two years, her senses shattered and dead, she gazed into the emptiness inside her for so long that she came to know the welcoming embrace of death. Shiki floated on the vast abyss of the spiral of origin, alone inside the void, where she awoke. And no matter how much she denied it, her soul called out to that base drive, that voice inside her that told her that she could kill. Her power stemmed from that. Much like Fujino Asagami, her Arcane Eyes made her play an entirely different game than common men. Her Eyes expressed their connection to the spiral of origin through death, calling forth the destined entropy of all things and manifesting it. But my connection to it is far more profound. And it allows me to see everything so…differently.” |
--- You may be right.
You see, that Opposing Power refers to the 'Restorer of Direction' which is at once our greatest ally, and our greatest enemy.
We don't want to kill humans. We want to live in peace.
This planet that we live on doesn't want to die either, it wants to live for a long time.
The Opposing Power is like that. The collective unconsciousness of all those who belong to the whole of the dominant species, their desire to see that the world continues to exist. It is the fundamental wish of the human species that has gathered and taken form, the Counter Guardian that we call the Opposing Power.
Okay, let's take an example and say an extraordinary person A has conquered the world. He is a just person, and his rule has been exemplary. Within the limits of human morals that is. But in the case that you don't look from one person's point of view, and person A's actions are taken as evil by the whole of the dominant species, in short a cause for extinction, the Opposing Power will be realised.
This is the collective body of the unconscious desire of all members of the dominant species including A to keep the world as it is in existence. To protect the race this existence that composes the species appears without anyone realising, and without anyone noticing, destroys the existence called A. The representative created by the maelstrom of humanity's unconscious mind is also a part of that unconsciousness and is not picked up.
Even so, it's not to say that a formless consciousness becomes a curse and kills A. The Opposing Power generally hides within a human who can become a link, then drives out A who is the enemy. The person who has become the link has enough power to topple A, but no more, in order that they cannot replace A.
Receivers who can accept the Opposing Power comprised of the whole of the dominant race's will, humans with special channels like that are few and far between. History calls them heroes and praises them.
But in modern times that title isn't being used. Civilisations progressed to the point where it has become quite simple for humanity to destroy itself. If some company's chairman invested all his money into expanding the amount of logging in the Amazon rainforest, the world could end in a year. See, the Earth is in danger wherever and whenever. There are countless numbers of people who are being incited by the Opposing Power that save the planet without anyone knowing it. There is one hero per age. Such a thing as saving the world is no longer enough to get you called a hero.
Also, in the case that A is too powerful to topple with a human's power, the Opposing Power becomes a natural force and destroys the area including A. Long, long ago, the sinking of that continent was due to this bastard too.
If you talk about it like this it seems like some guardian of humanity, but this thing has no human emotions. There are times when it blocks acts that would make everyone happier. The aggravating thing is that in the end this nuisance is the representation of humanity itself. Although we can't comprehend it the Opposing Power is the ultimate form of the dominant race. Time and time again in the past, this thing appeared in front of mages who attempted a particular experiment, and the mages were all massacred." |
“Perhaps. It’s only a theory, a metaphysical rule of the universe. It’s the ‘consensus’ I always talk about, humanity’s greatest ally, and a mage’s most constant enemy. We have no ill will towards people, and only want to live in peace. Unfortunately, reality feels the same way. The combined will of all the people form into a consensual paradigm which tends to restore reality to a stable state, to combat things that logically shouldn’t exist…like the Art and mages. Sometimes, when the consensus is so focused, it coalesces, and becomes a literal manifestation. It can cast its hands into fate to move otherwise normal people in positions that would topple great men. Humanity’s swirling consensus itself is its unseen protector, and the people it channels its will into were the ones we called heroes, though it’s not so easy to have the same result now in the plurality of our world and the ease with which we can fuck ourselves over without knowing it. The Deterrent influences people all the time, saving us without us knowing it. But don’t mistake it as having any empathy for humans. It’s only loyalty is to the consensus, and it doesn’t take into account something like human happiness, where there seems to be no consensus at all. We can only be sure about two things: it is humanity’s representative will, and it will eliminate the paradoxes of the world, the mages and their experiments with the illogical Art.” |
"...the Spiral of Origin. The place where all Causes mingle into a whirlpool. It is a place where everything and nothing exists. That, is my true self. Although I am connected to the Spiral of Origin, I am merely part of it. In other words, we are one and the same, aren't we?
Thus, I am omnipotent. ....Yes, rewriting the laws that govern the microcosm of invisible particles, returning to the very beginning to reshape the System Tree of life on Earth... I am capable of all these. Even creating a new Order for this World is simple. It would not be recreating this World, but destroying it with a new World." |
“The spiral of origin is the primordial beginning of all things in this pattern of reality. All things pass through the great wheel, their natures and their histories—past, present, and future—are connected to it. It is thus a vast and empty place. It reflects what I am, in a way. I am connected to it, and I am a part of it as well. I am it. Which is why the greatest feats that mages can only dream of are allowed me. I can change the very structure of elementary particles. I can transmute evolution itself, changing everything into something wholly different. All creation dances to the tune of magic and the melody of the arcane Art. I can bend the rules of this lie of a reality, this prison that keeps so many minds in sleep. I can break it as easily as a twig. I can remake this world. I can unmake it. I can make a new one whole cloth.” |
Infinity is not “ “. In order to render infinity, one must define limits. Without limits, infinity does not exist. Infinity can be observed because objects possess limits. Ryougi Shiki was immersed in infinity, but found the non-existent limit and severed it.
Of course, limits do not exist within infinity, thus one cannot sever something that does not exist. As a result, escaping from this prison is impossible.
However -- - without limits, infinity does not exist. Regardless if a finite wall existed, an limitless world is meaningless before Ryougi Shiki.
If there is no limit, then it is not infinity, but “ “. If limits exist, then Rougi would find it and cut away everything.
…. What is supposed to be an absolute black hole, to an opponent such as Ryougi Shiki is merely a confined dark cell. The magus felt ashamed of himself. |
What is “ ” is antonymic to infinity. The concept of infinity is twinned with the concept of a finite existence. It is this finite existence, this end of all things that Shiki Ryōgi observes with her Arcane Eyes, and the same end that she cuts to make entropy act quickly, almost immediately. The prison she was contained in was made to be infinite, an inconceivable non-Euclidean space. But there is no true infinity. Only ends, driven by processes both mechanical and mystical. The only denial of the end that exists is the true nothingness of “ ”. To this girl, the space was nothing more than a room with its door unbarred and unguarded. It shames Alaya to admit it as such. |
"......You had me deceived. Then you were only pretending to be serious in your battle with Asagami Fujino?"
Ryougi Shiki answered no, shaking her head to the words of the magus.
Whatever the weapon, I am always serious, her cold eyes told him.
The magus saw her gaze and realized.
What did this woman say just now?
What is the vessel that is here?
When did she stop being Shiki?
"I see......We finally meet...!" |
“You have fooled me, Shiki Ryōgi. I had thought you had revealed all you could about your skill in combat when you danced with Fujino Asagami. But I see you have this one last trick.” Shiki shakes her head slowly in reply. Whether it is an affirmative or a disparaging negative, Alaya can’t say. “And so we meet properly at last,” he shouts as he pressed down on the gaping wound of his former right arm. |
| Bonus Mahoyo |
Coke's Mahoyo Demo |
The Laughing Man, as shown by his deformed appearance, had already exceeded what were considered strange and supernatural.
Glamour, Charm, Compulsion.
Freezing, Waxen, and the most powerful amongst the Mystic Eyes, Petrifaction.
The puppet who had experienced grueling punishments ranging from drugs to sorcery screamed.
This is different. This is something else altogether. |
This smiling man’s poor mimicry of a mind now ran through many different, foreign sensations, all of them new. Curiosity, fascination, and the sensation of submission. The sensation of cold grave wax from a corpse. And in the deep of this heady mix, he finally felt the familiar resonance of an arcane eye. The memory of being granted the magical Art from a rush of dosages, tinctures, and drugs, itself an act in violation of so many prohibitions, flooded in his head, screaming. And in his mind, he shouted back. |
Originally Posted by Namelesss
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