Trizha: 2
Fate: 0
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.
.
Trizha: 5
Fate: 0
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.
.
Trizha: 28
Fate: 0
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.
.
Trizha: 42
Fate: 0
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.
.
Trizha: 77
Fate: 0
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.
Trizha: 102
Fate: 0
With each and every thrust Zackier performed, there was no longer any room for doubt: she was truly surviving the impossible.
It should have been a mathematical certainty; her death through a unique, lethal puncture in this very moment was fated to be a flawless reality.
The laws of the world demanded her blood.
And yet, she lived.
She survived.
She managed to win against the concept of destiny itself, not once, but a hundred times over.
She achieved it by doing the one thing the universe deemed impossible: she fought against her own fate.
Fighting against fate.
This unique, burgeoning ability allowed her to dodge and evade every single propelled thrust from Zackier's "Hundred Propelled Thrust" without even a hint of struggle.
She moved through the storm of steel like a ghost through a graveyard, while Zackier himself began to drown in his own desperation.
With an enraged scream that tore through the rooftop air, Zackier unleashed his final, desperate thrust, ignoring the physical consequences of the strain on his muscles.
"DAMN YOU!!!" Zackier shrieked, his face contorted into a mask of pure, primal hatred.
Within that final thrust lay the absolute sum of his remaining strength—the pinnacle of the momentum provided by his technique.
He had lost all hope the more absurd Trizha's actions became.
Ever since she had stepped back into the world of the living, her movements had defied every logical parameter he had spent three hundred years studying.
From a state of utter vulnerability and fragility, she had transitioned into an efficiently powerful being wielding unknown, reality-bending abilities.
Zackier's existence as an Alter Being might have been incomprehensible to the average human, but Trizha had become something more: she was now her own inevitable fate.
Zackier sought to prove the supremacy of his strength in this dying moment.
He wanted to showcase the prime of his abilities and the true extent of what it meant to be an Alter Being—creatures born free from the suffocating laws of benevolence.
He knew deep in his marrow that what Trizha had become would soon herald his demise, his first true downfall in three centuries.
Even without a unique ability like hers, he attempted to prove himself capable of fighting against Fate as well.
He thrust his knife forward with everything he had left.
But it was a futile gesture.
His eyes bore witness as the knife—the very weapon he had used as his final straw—was instantly shattered into a thousand glittering shards.
Trizha had demolished the blade with a single, contemptuous swing of her iron pipe.
She was no longer a victim; she was the end of his story.
For a heartbeat, Zackier stood bewildered, staring at the empty hilt in his hand.
Then, in the next moment, the crushing weight of reality settled in.
He finally realized his place.
In three hundred years of killing Trizha Frantzes across unendings , this was the only time she had managed to rebel against the interruption he had caused.
He was going to suffer the consequences.
But the horror didn't stop there.
As he looked into Trizha's face through the cloud of shattered steel, he noticed her expression had shifted.
It was a look that was hauntingly familiar—an expression the Trizha he knew would never, ever wear.
It was as if a different soul had taken the pilot's seat.
Then, she spoke.
The voice was hers, yet the tone and the weight behind the words belonged to someone else entirely.
"You've been keeping me locked in here for far too long," She said, her voice carrying a cold, ancient resonance that vibrated in Zackier's chest. "Don't you think it's tiring and exhausting to repeat this play over and over again? For twenty-two times... for three hundred years... It's ironic, really, considering what you are."
She adjusted her grip on the iron pipe, her gaze boring a hole through his soul.
"If I were you, I'd buckle up and finally rebel against 'him'. After all, 'I am Free.' Isn't that the mantra you Alter Beings love to recite? The 'complete liberation over the rules of benevolence'—it's a very convincing concept for beings like you to hold onto. And yet, here you stand, obeying every petty command that bastard gives you like a loyal dog."
She stepped closer, her aura flaring with a dark, focused light.
"You don't represent what it means to be an Alter Being, Zackier Morkator. You're hopeless. And something as hopeless as you should just get out of my sight. If you can't even manage that... then just keep your eyes on me and die already, you pathetic weakling."
The words shook him to his very core.
Every nerve in his spine screamed in recognition of that tone.
It was the same body, but he saw two distinct entities inhabiting it: the Trizha of today, and the 'Frantzes' of a forgotten era.
Paralyzed by the cold, intense death glare that seemed to freeze his blood, Zackier failed to notice a shadow looming over him.
Nomoro had leaped from the smoke, his massive demonic arm cocked back like a loaded spring.
"...Who... who the heck is that?"
Zackier muttered, his voice thick with confusion as he witnessed Trizha's transformation.
Even as he questioned the reality before him, Nomoro's strength took over.
He slammed his demonic fist into Zackier, driving the Alter Being into the concrete with the force of a falling meteor.
A massive shockwave erupted upon impact, a thunderous explosion that sent plumes of smoke and grit billowing across the rooftop.
It had only been ten seconds since Trizha had stood up to fight Zackier alone, and ten seconds since Nomoro had rejoined the fray.
The battle was only just reaching its true beginning—the beginning of the end.
***
The smoke remained heavy, refusing to clear as it blanketed half the tower's peak.
From the streets below, the scene was one of escalating chaos.
SWAT teams and the police department had finally established a perimeter around the La Luna Sangre Hotel, their sirens a mournful chorus in the night.
Troops pointed high-caliber rifles at the crumbling walls, ready for an outbreak of supernatural violence they weren't equipped to handle.
The crowd of civilians was reaching a breaking point.
Parents of the students trapped inside were screaming, pushing against the barricades in a desperate attempt to reach their children.
"My child is in there! Let us through, damn you!" a father screamed, his face red with fury.
"There are children inside!" a woman wailed nearby. "What are you doing just pointing guns at the walls? Go in and save them!"
"Everyone stay calm and back off until further updates!" a police officer bellowed through a megaphone, his voice cracking under the pressure. "This place is a restricted combat zone!"
"Like hell we care about that!" another parent shouted, shoving against a riot shield. "Our children are in danger! We're going in!"
"I repeat, this is a restricted area!" the officer yelled back, his hand hovering over his holster. "Any further disobedience will be met with force! Back off!"
The crowd glared at the men in uniform, the air thick with the threat of a riot.
Seeing the leveled weapons, they were forced to step back for the moment, but the hatred in their eyes was palpable.
They knew people were dead.
They could feel the tragedy in the air, and being forced to wait was a torture worse than the destruction itself.
High above, a news helicopter cut through the misty air, its spotlight sweeping over the hotel.
A news reporter leaned out of the open door, a headset pressed to her ear as the cameraman filmed the carnage below.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, this is Hagh Laveska reporting live," she said, her voice projecting a forced professional calm despite her trembling hands. "We are currently approaching the world-famous La Luna Sangre Hotel, which is currently in the grip of a catastrophic incident. The government has placed the area under immediate restriction as parents and civilians clash with local authorities. It is a scene of absolute desperation."
As the helicopter descended closer, the spotlight hit the shattered windows of the lower floors, revealing the horror within.
Hagh's voice faltered as she saw the dark stains on the marble.
"As... as you can see, the ground floor is a scene of utter carnage. The area is filled with the bodies of the hotel's security force. It's a massacre. What kind of person– no, what kind of monster could possibly cause such an outbreak? Hundreds of youths are trapped in this nightmare."
On the rooftop, the roar of the helicopter's blades was a constant drone.
Nomoro, his demonic arm's armor beginning to crack and flake away from the sheer output of his last strike, leaped out of the thick smoke.
He held Trizha protectively in his arms.
As he hung in the air for a brief second, he looked down at the surging crowds below.
A wave of dread and profound regret washed over him.
He knew that he was the one who had inadvertently caused the tower's near-collapse when his punch was redirected by Zackier.
The shockwaves that had terrified those parents were his doing.
He bit his lip, his heart heavy with the weight of his own recklessness.
"Everyone... I'm so sorry," Nomoro thought, his resolve hardening into something cold and sharp. "Forgive me. I'll make this right. I'll take down the source of all this, no matter what it costs me."
He landed softly on the concrete, sighing with relief as he gently set Trizha down.
He turned to check on her, but his expression immediately shifted to one of pure confusion.
Trizha looked mesmerized, her eyes glazed over as she leaned forward and covered her mouth.
Suddenly, she began to vomit a shimmering, prismatic substance—a literal rainbow of ethereal fluids that splashed onto the roof.
Nomoro recoiled in shock.
"...This must be an aftereffect of that sudden transformation," he realized, watching the strange colors swirl.
It was an absurd sight, but given the night they'd had, it almost made sense.
He didn't have time to ponder where such a power had come from; he was just glad she was breathing.
The bulging veins and the void-white eyes had vanished.
Trizha was back to her normal self—the "Romance" Trizha he knew.
The relief Nomoro felt was so immense it made him smile, even as she wiped her mouth and panted for breath.
"Are you okay? Are you... well?" Nomoro asked softly, stepping closer to offer support.
Trizha looked up at him, her face pale and exhausted. "Y-yeah... it's just weird. I'm having a hard time registering what I'm feeling right now. It feels like my soul was stretched."
Nomoro chuckled softly, trying to lighten the crushing atmosphere. "Don't worry, I've been there. Getting a superpower for the first time is terrifying. At first, I thought I was becoming a monster, but now? Now I find it exhilarating."
Trizha shook her head, her expression darkening. "No, Nomoro, it's not just the power. It's really weird... like, hellish. One second I was dead, the next I was fighting Zackier as if I'd been a warrior my whole life. And then... I was in a white space. A void. There was a woman there, sitting on a throne. Well, not exactly; she's sitting right in front of the throne. She looked just like me, but her hair was shorter, her eyes were like cold, and she was wearing clothes similar to Wyne's."
She hugged herself, a visible shiver running through her.
Nomoro patted her head gently, his smile softening.
"I'm not sure I follow all of that, but it has to be connected to whatever power or ability you used against Zackier. Then again, you saved us, Trizha."
Trizha didn't look comforted.
She looked down at her right wrist, staring at the biological impossibility of the 'dent' left in her skin.
She traced the metal-like deformation with a finger.
"Maybe there are two of them," she whispered, so low Nomoro barely heard her.
High above, the news helicopter began to ascend again, circling the peak of the Prom Tower.
The crew leaned in, their eyes widening as the spotlight finally pierced through the thinning veil of smoke on the rooftop.
"There are people up there!" Hagh Laveska shouted, pointing her finger. "I see two survivors!"
The camera zoomed in, capturing the figures of Trizha and Nomoro.
But as the smoke continued to drift away, Hagh's voice rose to a scream.
"Wait, no... look! There's a third!"
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"Trizha Frantzes... no. Frantzes Trizha."
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Before anyone could move, the smoke at the center of the rooftop was violently blasted away.
A massive surge of air pressure erupted from the impact site, a continuous gale that sent a physical shockwave through the vicinity.
The news helicopter was caught in the wake, spinning wildly as the pilot struggled to maintain control.
Nomoro and Trizha were forced to drop low, shielding their faces as the wind threatened to tear them from the roof.
When the air finally stilled and the smoke vanished, the figure in the center was revealed.
Zackier Morkator was no longer on the ground.
He was hovering a few feet in the air, his formal attire shredded and hanging in rags.
Blood flowed freely from a jagged wound on his forehead, coating a part of his face in a crimson mask.
In his left hand, he held a pulsating, unreleased Emoplotion—a sphere of pure, concentrated emotion that glowed with a lethal intensity.
He looked down at them with a gaze of absolute, murderous intent.
The play was over; the execution was beginning.