“Yeah, I can! Why else would I have come all this way?!”
✦ ✦ ✦
It was as if time stopped for the two of them.
Takamasa’s breath caught in his throat, like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. But it was the truth. No one man knew more about the game than Takamasa, but Kaname wasn’t alone. He’d fought to collect all the Legacies and combine their glitches to reverse-engineer the code of Money (Game) Master. That was not a plan he had come up with himself.
His partner, Tselika.
The Dealers who fought alongside him. Even the very Mind who had started it all.
Humans, Magistelli, friends, enemies, all of them had come together to bring Kaname this far.
That was why now he could say it with confidence.
Unlike Takamasa, Kaname wasn’t fighting alone.
“I will save Midori. You can bet your life on it. I’m sorry, but this isn’t your job.”
“Hah.”
He chuckled. Then Takamasa Hekireki reached for his parachute.
“I’m a human,” he said. “I don’t plan on giving that up. I’ve been telling myself that this whole time, but looking at you, I really think…”
His hand fell not on the pull cord but on the clasp fastening it to his body.
✦ ✦ ✦
“…You win. Go on without me.”
✦ ✦ ✦
As soon as Takamasa removed his parachute, the straps were blown about by the wind, tangling around Kaname’s arms. The extra air resistance tugged him up and away, while Takamasa carried on falling into the darkness below, already far beyond his reach.
In his stead, something large came into view. Kaname snatched it out of the air before it flew by. It was Takamasa’s Legacy, the quad-barrel door kicker #meltdown.err. It seemed to defy gravity, coming up to meet him, but in reality, it was simply falling slower.
“Heh. After everything you said…”
For Kaname’s plan to succeed, he needed all the Legacies. He couldn’t allow one to be destroyed. It must have been Takamasa, falling ahead, who somehow altered the weapon’s air resistance to gift it to Kaname.
“…You’re a human, no mistake. And you’re my hero.”
Takamasa was human from head to toe. From the part of him that would do anything to save his sister, to the part of him that worried he’d been wrong when his sister was in danger.
Kaname bit the pull cord and activated the parachute while it was still wrapped around his arm.
“Whoa?!”
Something large and made of metal dropped down next to him. Bright green like mint ice cream, it was Kaname’s coupe. Thanks to the drag chute extending from its rear bumper, just like those used in the races of the same name, the car drifted slowly, nose down.
Tselika was inside with her arms and legs pressed against the walls, cognizant of the fact that she could fall through the broken windshield at any time. If only the demon girl wore her seatbelt, she wouldn’t have to worry about such things.
With tears in her eyes, she asked, “H-how did it go, then?”
“Perfectly.”
There was no room for error when Midori’s life was on the line.