“Um… Hei?”

“Yeah, Tianlan?”

“This is the spot, right?”

“Yeah, Tianlan.”

“We’ve been here for almost an hour, right?”

“… Yeah, Tianlan.”

“And nothing has happened.”

“Sigh. Yeah, Tianlan…”

“Um… Hei?”

“… Yeah, Tianlan?”

“You were wrong.”

Hei’s jaw quivered.

They had been sitting atop the trees in this forest for the better part of an hour, right at the location Tianlan had pointed out on the map, but contrary to Hei’s expectations, there was nothing out of the ordinary there.

He sat there in silence, hugging his knees as he tried to figure out what was going on. He even checked the map a few times to make sure this was the right place.

“You…”

“Hm? What was that?”

“You’ve got to be…”

“Sorry. I couldn’t quite hear you? Try speaking up a little.”

“Argh! You’ve got to be kidding me! How the heck is there nothing here?! It makes no sense!”

“No. Quite the contrary, actually. Isn’t this the expected result? Weren’t you the one who wasn’t making any sense when you insisted something would happen here?”

“That’s the thing, Tianlan. You’re not understanding.”

“What am I not understanding?”

“We’re main characters, Tianlan! Main characters! We don’t waste our time going to places like this! It’s just not a thing!”

“Face it, Hei. You were wrong this time. It turns out your Reality-Warping theory holds about as much water as a fishing net.”

“No! I refuse to accept this!”

“You have no other choice.”

“…”

Hei clenched his fists.

“I was sure something was going to happen… What went wrong?”

Tianlan watched as Hei’s eyes grew hazy and his attention drifted elsewhere.

“Are you actually trying to calculate this?”

“Of course. There’s obviously some kind of problem here. Maybe I should ask the Heavens.”

“… Seriously? Why can’t you just admit that you made a mistake?”

Hei shook his head.

“When an experienced warrior senses a problem, people should pay attention, right?”

“I guess?”

“And if an oracle tells you of your future, do you simply ignore it?”

“I mean… It depends. There are a lot of swindlers out there.”

“That’s beside the point! What I’m getting at is that one should listen to those who know more. And when it comes to situations like these, I know more.”

“If you say so. But there’s got to be a point at which you decide that you were wrong, right? When will that be? In an hour? Two? For all you know, we could have already missed this encounter of yours.”

“Already missed it? Hm…”

Hei’s eyes shot wide open.

“On guard, Tianlan!”

As he said that, chains erupted from his arms, wrapping his body in multiple layers, forming a suit of armour. Two masses of chains gathered at his back and grew until they formed two pairs of wings, and in his right hand, the chains formed into a lance.

Beside him, Tianlan’s eyes narrowed and his breathing changed, causing the sword at his waist to rise up and hover beside him.

“What’s going on, Hei?”

“This encounter is one that will come and go in an instant. It didn’t appear before because we weren’t ready for it.”

“Oh, come on. Isn’t this getting out of-”

Tianlan’s eyelids twitched and he instinctively looked up to the sky.

“What’s this pressure?”

“Isn’t it obvious?”

“You can’t be seri-”

“Be on the look-out, Tianlan. See if you can find anything out of place in the surrounding area.”

Tianlan opened his mouth to say something, but when he saw Hei’s focused gaze as he looked up to the sky, he closed it again and decided to play along.

“There doesn’t seem to be anything around h- Wait. I see a person over there. A boy. He moving strangely, staggering along his way as if he has no energy. No. It’s more like he… has no direction?”

“Tianlan.”

Tianlan gave Hei a glance and noticed that his attention was still directed toward the sky.

“What is it?”

“How fast are you?”

“Really fast.”

“Mm. When I give the signal, go and push that boy out of the way.”

“And what are you going to do?”

“Me?”

Hei pointed to the shooting star that was rapidly descending from the sky.

“I’m going to catch that thing.”

Tianlan shrugged his shoulders and jumped from the tree. He closed his eyes and adjusted his breathing once more as he entered a crouching stance with both hands placed on the floor and one foot in front of the other.

Hei stayed where he was, and soon, his fingers began to twitch and ripples began to form in the air around him, making it looks as if he was emitting a great deal of heat.

“You ready, Tianlan?”

“Mm.”

“Then…”

The ripples surrounding Hei’s body grew more exaggerated as he rose up a few metres above the treetops. He watched as the shooting star fell, and once it reached a certain point, his eyes narrowed.

“We move!”

He stopped sending pulses to his front and focused all of his energy on creating forward momentum, resulting in an explosive launch. This, combined with the effect of his lance and wings, allowed him to achieve extreme horizontal velocity without losing much altitude over a substantial distance.

As the trees blurred past him and he got closer to intercepting the shooting star’s path, Hei turned back to see how far behind Tianlan was.

“Tianlan!”

He was still in the same place!

Hei had timed this operation with extremely tight tolerances. Any mistake could result in serious harm befalling the innocent bystander.

As he looked forward and saw the boy for himself, Hei clenched his teeth.

He turned back to Tianlan.

“Mission failed! We’re stopping here, Tian-”

At the same time as he spoke those words, Tianlan’s closed eyes shot open and he exhaled a breath that sounded like rumbling thunder.

In the next moment, he disappeared.

“What the-”

Hei’s words were muffled by a booming thunderclap and the picture in front of him seemed to have been viciously torn by a streak of lightning.

Looking forward once more, Hei could see the blue scar left through the air in Tianlan’s wake.

“…”

Hei’s lapse in focus only lasted for an instant before he proceeded as planned.

With Tianlan having performed his role, it was now Hei’s turn.

He went full speed ahead in the direction of Tianlan’s lightning trail, knowing that the star was heading for the boy. At first, it took all of his power to slightly exceed the star’s horizontal velocity, but after a moment, he noticed that it began to slow down.

He narrowed his eyes but continued on regardless.

But then the situation changed yet again.

The star had stopped following the path of the boy, and instead, fell vertically downward.

“What’s the meaning of-”

As Hei reached out his hand to catch the star, it suddenly stopped. With it now being stationary, Hei was able to make out its form. It was a dark blue orb with several dimples on its surface.

Hei observed the thing as it rotated in sporadic ways.

“Okay then… If you don’t mind…”

He reached his hand out to grab it, but that was when it rotated once more, this time revealing the other side of it, which made it look eerily similar to an eyeball.

It made minute movements, seemingly examining the person in front of it, and once it stopped, Hei felt a terrible sense of foreboding.

“Don’t tell me…”

He immediately released a number of chains, hoping to lock the eyeball in place, but it moved too swiftly. What’s more, it didn’t trigger his danger detection ability, so he was caught off-guard when he had to react in real-time.

Before he knew it, Hei felt an excruciating burning sensation in his left eye.

“Agh!”

He lost his concentration and thus began to plummet toward the earth, his chain armour unravelling. But he couldn’t spare any attention for that.

With every passing moment, the pain within his left eye grew more and more unbearable.

As he was about to hit the ground, Tianlan caught him and helped him to his feet.

He saw that Hei was clutching his left eye, his blood dripping through the gaps in his fingers.

“Hei?! What happened?!”

“Aargh! This hurts! This hurts!”

Tianlan grasped Hei shoulders and forcefully turned him to face him.

“Hei! What happened?!”

“This thing! Aargh! It swallowed my- AHHHHHHH!”

Hei fell to the ground and curled into a ball and he pressed his palm against his eye socket.

“It swallowed my eye, Tianlan!”

Tianlan’s own eyes opened wide as they shone with a brilliant blue light. His vision penetrated past Hei’s hand and locked on to the object behind it which was rapidly planting strange roots in his skull.

“Move your hand, Hei.”

“Aargh! This is the worst!”

“Hei! Move your hand!”

It was as if Hei could no longer hear Tianlan’s words. It seemed as if his attention was placed entirely on an internal struggle.

That left Tianlan with no other option.

He wrestled Hei into a position such that he was lying face-up, then straddled him and pried his hand away from his eye.

Hei remained in his delirious state as he continuously complained of the tremendous pain.

Tianlan enveloped his right hand in a layer of Sonic Qi and narrowed his eyes as he focused all of his attention on the foreign eyeball which was rapidly making random minute movements.

“This will probably hurt a lot, Hei.”

Tianlan thrust his hand toward the eyeball, fully intending to tear it away from his brother, but his hand was caught before he could.

“Let go, Hei. We need to get this thing out of you right now. It’s trying to integrate itself with your body.”

“No, Tianlan. There’s no need. It’s not dangerous.”

“On what basis?”

“Trust me. If it were dangerous, I would be the first to know. Besides…”

Hei signalled Tianlan to get off of him then sat up, placing his hand above his left eye.

“How’s the pain?”

“Ugh. It’s fading. Honestly, I haven’t felt this violated since the inheritance ceremonies.”

“Are you sure this isn’t a problem?”

Hei waved his hand dismissively.

“Yeah. As I was saying, I’ve encountered something like this before.”

Hei willed his storage space open and out came a thin black shield.

“Tianlan, Onyx. Onyx, my brother Tianlan.”

Tianlan raised a brow in confusion.

“Am I supposed to talk to this sword?”

“Sword? Do not lump me in with those crude instruments of murder. I am clearly a shield meant for defending.”

“…”

“Observe my rounded edges.”

“Ah… So you’re a defective sword then?”

“You people are all the same.”

Tianlan directed a blank stare toward Hei.

“What’s going on here?”

“Well, that’s what I would like to know. Onyx, do you know what this is?”

Hei pointed to his left eye which now looked like an ordinary eye, except it was grey in colour instead of brown like his right eye.

“It’s your eye, isn’t it?”

“Look closer.”

Onyx moved closer to Hei and used his spiritual perception to probe the eye deeper.

“I-Impossible…”

“Onyx?”

“It’s impossible…”

“Real useful information, Onyx.”

“Valor, is it truly you?”

“Tambourine.”

“Say something, Valor. It’s me, Avalon!”

“…”

“Valor!”

“…”

“Valor…”

Onyx retreated, his countenance resembling that of someone in mourning.

Hei exchanged awkward glances with Tianlan before turning back to Onyx.

“Are you ready to talk now, Onyx?”

“Sigh. The aura of the one who dwells within your left eye bears a striking resemblance to that of Valor Illantis, my closest friend and ally. I had thought he perished one thousand years ago, but it seems he chose to become an armament, as did I. However, unlike in my case, it seems his consciousness was lost during the process.”

“Oh… My condolences.”

“Thank you.”

“You said his consciousness was lost?

“Mm.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.”

“Hm?”

“Can an armament without consciousness choose a target of its own volition?”

“No. They would be like any ordinary soulless object.”

“Well, your friend seems to have specifically selected someone to fuse with. When I appeared, he switched targets to me.”

“Then in that case! Ah… Never mind…”

“Say it.”

“We have already discussed this.”

“Discussed what?”

“Heavenly Bestowal.”

“You’re saying that Heavenly Bestowal could help your friend?”

“Mm. I don’t know how much of an effect it would have, but it’s definitely non-zero.”

“Heavenly Bestowal, huh?”

“I already know that you have people higher on your priority list. I won’t ask you for this favour.”

“Hm…”

Hei tilted his head and thought for a moment.

Shortly after, he closed his eyes and focused on his left side.

He smiled, then opened his mouth and spoke.

“Valor Illantis. You are worthy.”