I had things I wanted to say.
Things I couldn’t say.
Things I wanted to do. Things I couldn’t do. Ways I couldn’t help.
Many, many things.
Now I’m just drowning in a sea of contradictions.
I can’t stay myself for very much longer.
I’d like to say just one thing before the end.
Hey, partner.
I really, really…
Beneath a perfectly clear blue sky, Rheinhardt Crossline took a deep breath.
“You know, as a child, we used to dream about this place.”
He stood within District Two, a street lined with mansions for the rich and powerful, deep in the heart of the Holy City.
“Of course, part of me just wanted to make Remy happy… But another part of me hated what I was and what I had become. After my parents were suddenly taken from us, we had nowhere to live. We were penniless kids living on the streets, and somewhere inside, I always hated that.”
His violet eyes, a fusion of the human and fiend within him, fixed on one of the houses.
“Even after my sister died, I never lost sight of that dream. So soon after becoming an adventurer, I bought this place. Maybe I just always wanted to see what it was like to live in luxury. Settle the score. Break free of my troubled past and move on… It was a rite of passage for me. At least, that’s how I thought of it at first.”
As Rheinhardt called to mind his memory of those happy days, a smile spread across his lips.
“…It was fun, you know, living here with you. Messing around with you, making Master angry. At some point along the line, I started to think of this place as my home.”
However, that memory, as valuable as gold, was not enough to erase the hatred polluting his heart. That was why Rheinhardt had come here. To see it all destroyed.
“…It’s funny. Everything that seemed so precious to me back then…now looks dull.”
Rheinhardt took a look around. It was like a scene straight out of hell. The citizens, transformed into ghouls, had lost themselves to violence, rape, and cannibalism.
Unending screams. Unending carnage. And yet up above, the sky had never looked so clear. Rheinhardt looked up at it, lost in memory.
“It’s always been there. On the day my parents died. The day my sister died. The first day I made Master proud. And also—”
A bang. A gunshot. Ripping apart his thoughts. Tearing away the past.
He was here.
“…Do you remember, partner, how clear the sky was on the day we first met?”
The world meant nothing to him anymore. He no longer cared about this city or the people living in it who ruined his life. As far as he was concerned, there was only one other person here: the ghoul.
Violet met crimson. Crimson met violet. And neither could pull away from the other.
Leon was the same. No thoughts but those of his sworn brother. Four years. Over a thousand days of constant torment. At the end of them all, he stood and he said,
“My old friend. I’ve come to make good on my promise.”
The wandering ghoul had stumbled at last to the finish line. To the place where all his sins would be counted. Leon’s eyes were dark as he neared the end, but there was no hesitation in them. His mind was set upon the path. The path to send his sworn brother’s soul to heaven. That was the only thing that kept him going all this time, through all the hardships and pain.
“Ha! Looks like you’re raring to go, partner. But first things first, wouldn’t you say? We can’t have our long-awaited rematch without a little prelude to get us all warmed up!”
Rheinhardt snapped his fingers, and as he did, hordes upon hordes of transfigured ghouls broke through the doors, walls, and windows. Rheinhardt had been busy.
Their numbers were in the many thousands at least. To fight them all would have been suicide for Leon…once upon a time. If he were still the scared, trembling puppy of his past, the wave would have engulfed and consumed him in an instant.
But he was not. And he was about to prove it.
As the crowd closed in, Leon extended both arms, as if unfurling a pair of wings.
“Arts of Steel, Deploy: Dual Expansion.”
The next moment, Leon’s arms both writhed and swelled, tearing away the sleeves of his coat.
Abominable Armament Number Three: Slasher Bite.
Usually, the technique created a serpent of blades that moved and acted autonomously. But this time, there were two of them: one forged from his right arm, and one from his left. Like a pair of deeply entwined familiars, the two coiled, each a mirror image of the other, and devoured the hordes of hungry ghouls.
Naught remained but a vast pool of rot and a trove of Testament Stones, weakly gleaming.
“Huh. I guess my words really got through to you, partner. More than I ever expected.”
Leon’s arms reverted to their original forms. As he watched them do so, Rheinhardt smiled.
“So, you even cut off your other limbs? That’s quite the show of determination, eh, partner?”
Leon’s unique strength came at the price of the limbs he lost four years ago. His loss was the source of his power. And so, to defeat Rheinhardt, he had to give up everything he had.
He no longer hated himself, for there was nothing left to hate.
He could no longer be distracted, for he had abandoned all he cared about.
In both body and mind, Leon was now the perfect being.
“Okay, okay. That does it for the opening act, I think,” said Rheinhardt. “I can’t just sit on my ass after seeing that.”
He tightly grasped the steel blades in his hands.
“It’s been a while since we last had a bout, hasn’t it? Oh, it’s getting me all emotional. Still…”
Rheinhardt chuckled and flashed a carefree smile.
“The record stands at 1,288 wins, zero losses… Let’s make it 1,289!”
He lunged. His monstrous leg strength left deep gouges in the earth, tossing debris in his wake. By the time that debris began to fall, Rheinhardt was already up close, delivering a fiendish slice. His blade was so fierce, so precise, that the old Leon would have had no chance in hell of dodging it.
Leon’s left leg used to be so heavy that it impeded his movement, and this was the reason he always had to drag it behind him instead of running at full speed. Because of that, he was often at a disadvantage in close-quarter combat.
However, now that he had cut off his other leg and replaced it with a similar prosthetic, all of that went out of the window. The burden once borne by a single leg was now split across two, and Leon had regained his old agility at last.