—
Morning sunlight filtered through the broken skyline of Tokyo, warming the steel and stone of a city slowly piecing itself back together. Workers cleared debris. Children laughed again in the streets. And overhead, drones captured images of something people thought they'd never see.
The hero with no mask.
News feeds exploded with his face—young, determined, scarred but human. Hoshiro. No code name. No alias. Just the boy who stood between the world and the void.
In the crowd, people whispered.
"That's him…"
"He looks so young…"
"Did he really beat a god?"
But none of it mattered to Hoshiro as he walked through the crowd—unarmored, unguarded. He didn't need to hide anymore.
At a corner stall, he saw a little boy holding a handmade wooden sword, swinging it awkwardly.
"You're holding it wrong," Hoshiro said gently.
The kid blinked up at him. "You're him. The real one."
Hoshiro smiled and knelt. "Not the only one. But yeah… I'm me."
He adjusted the kid's grip. "If you want to protect something, you hold it like this. With your whole heart."
The boy nodded, eyes wide.
Ayame stood nearby, watching silently. "You know this doesn't mean it's over," she said.
"I know," Hoshiro replied, rising. "But maybe it means we finally get to live while we fight."
Kazuki pulled up in a beat-up hoverbike. "You love dramatic walk-offs, don't you?"
"Only the cool ones," Hoshiro smirked.
He turned back once—just once—to look at the city.
"I'm not the Masked Hero anymore," he said. "I'm Hoshiro. And I'm still not done."
—