Shinobu saw everything.
He saw Sakuya's arm vanish into Jūzō's left flank.
He saw the blood burst out—too dark, too much—running down Sakuya's forearm like something alive.
He saw Jūzō's body fold in on itself, sagging, held upright only by that impossible presence piercing straight through him.
At first, his mind refused to accept what he was seeing.
This wasn't a fight.
This wasn't a victory.
It was something deeply wrong.
Misplaced.
Final.
Shinobu opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
His throat tightened, his breath caught, as if his body understood before his mind that no words could exist to describe this. His hands trembled against the armrests of his chair. His vision blurred, overwhelmed by the metallic stench of blood and the raw horror of the scene.
Then his stomach turned.
He doubled forward and vomited violently, his body rejecting what his mind refused to process. The nausea was immediate, absolute. And before he could even catch his breath, his strength gave out.
Shinobu collapsed in on himself, unconscious.
This time, no one had touched him.
This time, it wasn't Jūzō.
Sakuya saw none of it.
The world had shrunk to a single point in front of him.
Jūzō.
On his knees. Agonizing. His breathing ragged. His gaze already sliding toward something irreversible. Sakuya felt the heat of the blood around his arm, the uneven pressure of flesh, the brutal reality of what he had done.
And yet—
His mind was still working.
Fast.
Cold.
Desperate.
Then an idea struck him.
As insane as it was precise.
As unnatural as it was terrifyingly logical.
"Use your Seimei."
Sakuya's voice cracked through the air—hard, steady, without a tremor.
"Focus it around my arm."
"Close your wound around me."
Jūzō slowly lifted his head, disbelief written across his face. His eyes widened, caught between pain and shock.
"What the hell… are you saying…?"
His voice was rough, drowned in blood.
"You're completely… insane…"
Sakuya clenched his teeth.
He could feel time slipping away.
So he raised his voice.
"It's your only way to survive!"
"Tighten the wound around my arm. Now."
"Stop the fucking bleeding!"
His words weren't gentle.
They weren't compassionate.
They were orders thrown at someone already halfway dead.
And yet, as absurd as the idea was, Jūzō understood.
He understood that Sakuya was right.
It was insane. Unnatural. Dangerous.
But it was also… his only chance.
Jūzō drew in a shallow breath, every movement of his chest igniting burning pain. His body trembled, drained of strength, but he gathered what little he had left—not out of bravery, but survival.
He closed his eyes.
And focused.
Not just his Seimei, but his entire intent. His will. His very being. He forced the energy to converge toward the gaping wound, where Sakuya's arm still pierced through him. The Seimei answered violently, like an animal reflex.
The flesh contracted.
The wound closed.
Not slowly.
Not cleanly.
It tightened with brutal, visceral force, clamping down on Sakuya's arm painfully, as if Jūzō's body was trying to consume it just to stay alive. Muscles seized. Tissue locked around the forearm.
Then—
The blood stopped.
Not a single drop fell to the ground.
The silence that followed was heavy. Unreal.
Sakuya felt the difference instantly. The pressure was intense, almost crushing, but stable. He looked down at his arm, saw that the bleeding had stopped, then slowly lifted his gaze back to Jūzō.
Relief slammed into him.
"You see…" he said, his voice lower now, steadier.
"It works."
He took a deep breath, forcing his body to calm.
"Now the medics need to get here. Immediately."
Jūzō, still on his knees, panting, lifted his head toward him. His eyes were hazy, but still conscious. Confusion mixed with irritation crossed his expression.
"What's wrong with you…?" he muttered.
"Why are you trying so hard to save me?"
He let out a short laugh, choked by blood.
"You won. That should be the end of it."
"This makes no fucking sense."
His breathing grew heavier.
"You've got no reason to go this far for me. It's… insane."
Sakuya didn't answer right away.
He was careful not to move his arm, knowing even the slightest tension could reopen the wound. Then he spoke, calm, almost cold.
"I already took you down."
"And I don't want to become someone like you."
He paused.
"And more than that—"
His voice cracked slightly.
"I didn't mean for this to happen."
He lowered his eyes briefly.
"I don't understand what happened to me."
Jūzō let out a weak chuckle, thick with irony and pain.
"Seriously…?"
"You don't understand?"
He coughed, blood splattering onto the concrete.
"What you did…"
"That was a fusion of soul and Seimei."
Sakuya stiffened.
"I have no idea what that is, Jūzō."
He cast a nervous glance at the wound, then around them.
"How do we call for help?"
Jūzō blinked slowly, one eye after the other, as if his consciousness was struggling to stay anchored.
"They should already be here…"
He spat more blood.
"When I went all out against you…"
He inhaled with difficulty.
"The Seimei sensors in my uniform activated."
---
Sakuya was barely listening anymore.
Jūzō's words reached him as if through a thick wall—distorted, distant. Part of him remained present, enough to understand he was being spoken to, but his mind had turned inward.
I don't understand anything anymore.
How did I do this?
How did my life become so chaotic…
Why me?
The thoughts looped endlessly, heavy, unanswered. Everything had collapsed in mere minutes. The fight. The blood. That thing he had triggered without understanding it—without even wanting it.
Then he felt it.
A deep, dull agitation. Something internal.
His Seimei.
It stirred inside him like a living mass, unstable, searching for a way out. Pressure rose in his chest, spread through his shoulders, his neck, down into his limbs. His body began to react on its own, exactly like during the fight.
The same state.
The same drift.
Sakuya inhaled sharply.
And suddenly, he understood.
His Seimei was moving toward his arm.
"Shit…"
The word escaped him in a panicked breath.
If he became intangible again now—
If he lost control, even for a second—
The wound would reopen.
Nothing would hold it shut.
And Jūzō would die. Right there. Instantly.
Sakuya felt the energy surge—massive, crushing—like all of his Seimei was trying to drag him back into that unreal state. His arm vibrated, on the verge of phasing out. The boundary between tangible and intangible blurred, dangerously unstable.
No.
Not now.
Not like this.
He clenched his teeth so hard his jaw ached. Every muscle in his body tensed. He forced his mind to anchor itself—to the pain, to the weight of blood, to the pressure of flesh locked around his arm.
I have to resist.
I can't lose control.
Not now.
Not yet.
His heart pounded violently against his chest. His breathing turned short and ragged. Every part of him screamed to let go, to give in to that power that came so easily.
But he refused.
He refused to disappear.
He refused to become intangible again.
Not like this.
Not now.
Then—
A sound tore through the sky.
A violent, mechanical roar split the air above them, almost destructive in force. The pressure of it seemed to crush the space itself, as if something had ripped through the atmosphere.
Sakuya and Jūzō understood immediately.
A Skyshift.
Someone was finally coming.
A silhouette appeared in the sky barely a second later, a dark shape plummeting downward at absurd speed. It fell like a projectile, then abruptly altered its trajectory, heading straight for them.
The impact never came.
It landed a few meters away with unreal precision. No crash. No imbalance. Just a perfectly controlled motion—fluid, almost elegant. Like a cat falling from an impossible height… far too graceful for the speed it had reached.
Jūzō no longer had the strength to turn his head.
His body shook too much. His consciousness wavered too violently.
But Sakuya saw her.
Natsumi Endō.
The one who had come to retrieve him for the Capsule Eight test. Jūzō's direct superior.
She advanced slowly, one step at a time, her boots tapping faintly against the cracked concrete. Her gaze swept over the scene without the slightest emotion.
Then her eyes settled on Sakuya.
Icy blue. Clear. Cold as a dead star.
"Sakuya."
Her voice was low, sharp, utterly devoid of warmth.
"Get out of the way."
He didn't have time to respond.
Natsumi leaned forward slightly.
And vanished.
A fraction of a second later, she was already there.
Beside him.
Her trajectory was perfect—explosive, calculated. Her body shot forward like a bullet, her left leg snapping out in a brutal, precise motion, aimed straight at Sakuya's abdomen.
The impact was instantaneous.
Crushing.
The strike lifted him off the ground, launching his body several meters away. The air was ripped violently from his lungs, his vision exploded into white fragments, and a spray of blood followed his trajectory as he was torn away from Jūzō.
The separation was clean.
Final.
Sakuya flew through the air before slamming hard into the concrete, his body bouncing once before crashing down with a brutal, hollow sound.
Jūzō's wound reopened.
All at once.
The pressure sealing the flesh around Sakuya's arm vanished, and blood burst out again, uncontrollable. Jūzō staggered, his body unable to fight anymore.
Before collapsing for good, he lifted his eyes.
They found Natsumi.
"It was me…" he whispered, his voice broken. "I attacked him… it wasn't—"
He never finished.
His breath cut off.
The light drained from his eyes, and his body fell heavily to the ground, lifeless, the sound echoing like a verdict.
The silence that followed was glacial.
Natsumi didn't move.
Not even slightly.
Then she straightened and assumed a combat stance, her gaze already fixed on Sakuya lying on the ground. There was no hesitation. No visible anger. Just a cold, irreversible decision.
"You won't feel anything."
She raised her right hand.
Her fingers aligned—straight, rigid, perfectly extended, like blades ready to pierce. The air around her compressed, trembling faintly under the rise of her Seimei.
Then she vanished.
She surged toward Sakuya at absurd speed, her body reduced to a streak of motion. Her trajectory was clear. Direct. Lethal. She was going to pass through him.
This time, not through his flank.
Through his head.
Just centimeters from Sakuya's face—
Her wrist was seized.
Clean.
Brutal.
The motion stopped instantly, as if time itself had been ripped from its course. An implacable force blocked her attack despite the insane speed she had committed to.
It was Mizunashi.
Standing. Calm. Impassive.
His gaze didn't waver.
His hand tightened around Natsumi's wrist. The pressure increased until a sharp crack rang out—sinister, revealing the strength contained within that absolute calm.
Mizunashi didn't shout.
He didn't raise his voice.
He spoke simply.
"You heard Jūzō."
His eyes hardened.
"Don't force me to eliminate you."