The mountain of piled-up Kayakos — thousands upon thousands of them — began to churn violently, collapsing inward on itself.
Pallid limbs crushed together and fused, black hair grew wild and knotted itself, corpse-white flesh and pitch-black malice twisting into each other until they gathered into a single, far vaster being. [Writing this far, I hope readers will remember our domain — for books, go to Tiantian Read Novels, ttks.tw, it's fantastic]-
It was the silhouette of a giant, magnified several times over, forcibly stitched together out of countless Kayakos.
It stood nearly ten meters tall, its body writhing without pause. Ashen faces surfaced across its skin only to be swallowed again beneath more hair and more limbs. Its head had no features at all — only a dense knot of darkness.
Ultraseven watched the vengeful spirit before him without a flicker of alarm. He raised his right hand and pressed it to his forehead.
The Eye Slugger tore free with a hum and hovered in front of him, silver-white light rippling along its edge. His right hand stabbed forward, and the Eye Slugger became a silver light-blade and flew, cutting cleanly into the very center of the twisted horror.
It sank in without resistance, burst out the other side, and spun back into Ultraseven's hand.
The spirit froze for one heartbeat.
Then a straight seam of light bloomed at the crown of its head and raced downward.
Kayako's enormous form split in two down the middle. There was no flesh in the cut, no blood — only rolling black mist and pale, thrashing limbs.
The two halves toppled apart, left and right.
And then the black mist erupted from the severed surfaces like a thousand grasping hands, dragging the halves back together. White limbs seized one another and sewed themselves shut; black hair lashed and coiled. In under three seconds the mountain of flesh was whole again — bigger than before.
Hatred, agony, fury: it all condensed into raw psychic pressure and burst outward like a tidal wave.
(Love? That is your love?)
Across the surface of that aggregate of malice, a hundred Kayako faces turned toward the Giant of Light at once. Every pair of eyes wept black blood. Every mouth gaped wide enough to tear the cheeks apart.
(Where were you when I was the one being hurt? Where were you when I was beaten to death? Where were you when I screamed for help? Where were you when I needed help most?)
Each question dragged a memory behind it that no one should have to look at twice. The swamp of the curse boiled over, becoming a visible darkness that surged and roiled in front of the Giant of Light.
(You told me you understood my hatred and my pain. You told me my suffering grieved you. You told me you wanted me to understand your love… and now you stand across from me, you shining light! Tell me — hatred alone isn't enough?)
Kayako's roar carried a mockery close to collapse, and beneath it something far heavier: grief turned to rage. The hysteria of her fury and loathing kept her shape from holding, and it changed the sky again.
Black rain hammered down like lead shot. The air thickened until it was nearly solid, and the curse, made physical, swelled outward.
Lightning split the night. Kayako — whose body was darkness and deformity given shape — grew and grew, a colossal ball of meat studded with faces of hatred and wrath, faces like demons.
The outer walls of the buildings still standing turned gray and flaked away in moments, as though decades of rot had passed in a breath. The swelling curse strained to spread in every direction, and Amamiya Rin's light held it back.
(Tell me! Why did you only come now? That love of yours, that pity, so high above everything — why would you never spare one scrap of it for me, down in my corner? Why did you wait until there was nothing in me but hate before you finally stood in front of me — as an enemy?)
Countless warped faces screamed the question together.
Kayako stared at the giant, stared at the light pouring off him, felt a warmth that could not be counterfeited — and inside her there was only pain.
She had been used to the dark for a long time.
In a corner no one ever looked at, on a cold floor, inside an endless death, she could have gone on that way forever.
Then he appeared.
Carrying a light she had never owned, had never even dared to want.
That light had torn open a heart that held nothing but hatred. It had shown her a longing she herself had forgotten. It had left her lost, hesitating — it had made her carry Amamiya Rin somewhere safe when the enemy struck at him.
One meeting. That was all.
And the dark became unbearable.
If I had never seen the light, I could have stayed in the dark forever!
Kayako had believed that the man who grieved for her from the bottom of his heart would wrap her in that light of his, and lead her out.
He hadn't.
That future never came. The light stood before her now as an enemy, planted so firmly on the opposite side that it seemed to erase, without effort, every scrap of meaning her suffering had built.
So the hatred burned hotter, the pain cut sharper, and the gathered malice raged harder still.
Against that accusation wept in blood, Amamiya Rin did not move. Those golden hexagonal eyes looked calmly upon the aggregate of anguish.
He offered no hurried defense. He only raised both arms — left palm turned upright, crossed at the right wrist, right arm bent, until the two formed an L.
(Yes. My love came late. I had no power to save the you of the past.)
The thought reached Kayako clear and quiet, and heavy with sorrow and resolve.
(So I am not standing here to deny your pain. I am standing here so that more people will never have to bear the pain you bore. That is my choice, Kayako.)
Blinding white light blazed along Ultraseven's right arm.
(You asked me where my love is —)
The glow gathered to its limit, as if his arm cradled a miniature sun.
(It is here.)
He declared it quietly, and the will behind it weighed a thousand tons.
(My love for humanity — and for a future worth protecting.)
Energy converged at his elbow with a high, singing hum.
Cluster Beam!
Thousands of lances of light burst from the edge of his right arm in a downpour and swallowed Kayako's massive body whole.
Every inch of white limb, every strand of crawling hair, every twisted face was pierced, scorched and vaporized in the same instant.
(Gaaaaahhh —!!!)
Kayako's final shriek drowned in the rain of light.
The immense sphere of flesh shuddered under the barrage. Limbs that reached out crumbled to ash the moment they touched the beams, and the churning malice was ripped apart by sheer brightness.
Her body shrank and broke down before their eyes, like a snowdrift under a blazing sun.
Three seconds later, the light stopped falling.
Ultraseven lowered his arm.
The black rain ended. Through the torn hole in the sky, real starlight shone down.
Where Kayako had stood there was nothing but rubble. The colossus built from endless hatred had vanished without a trace.
"He… he won! Ultraseven won! Ultraman won!"
One voice, shaking, held back far too long, broke the dead silence first.
Then, like a lit fuse, the cheering detonated — thunderous, sweeping through every corner of the ruins.
"Was there ever any doubt? Ultraseven is unbeatable!"
"Yes! We're alive! We're saved!"
"Ultraman! Ultraseven! Thank you!"
"With brave Ultra Warriors watching over us, no monster can ever hurt us!"
…
People slumped on the ground struggled up and threw their arms around each other. A father lifted his daughter high overhead and she waved her small hands, beaming. Two boys, friends since forever, slapped their palms together hard, faces bright with wild joy.
"I got it… I got all of it…"
Sato shouldered the camera, his hands still trembling, but the lens stayed locked on that towering red-and-silver giant. Awe and excitement warred on his face, with a trace of daze underneath.
All of this — it really wasn't a dream!
____
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