Amidst the blossoming red light, it wasn't just the authority of [Evolution] that was provoked.
The repelled mist suddenly turned violent. [He] circled aggressively around the resolutely advancing Kiana several times. After multiple attempts were deflected by the blood-red light, the mist turned and charged towards the young man.
Then, the flawless white sky cracked...
A colossal fissure, stretching beyond sight, nearly split this world in two.
Outside lay that floating space. Kiana looked up and could even see some familiar objects... the giant bathtub... the carriage...
[He] was enraged too, resorting to methods Kiana had never witnessed before.
Destruction...
He effortlessly destroyed this space.
And as the fissure opened, the young man's expression suddenly went vacant for an instant.
He felt a heavy hammer slam directly onto his brain... crushing it into pulp.
From the black world outside, seemingly endless mist poured in.
This mist rapidly gathered within the memory space, joining the initial wisp to surround both Kiana and the young man.
The madly spinning mist whipped up a storm, tearing chunks of the solid ground, pulling them into the storm wall formed by the mist, and then digesting them...
Kiana understood. This world was collapsing... this memory fragment was being discarded by [Him]...
Did [He] always have the ability to delete memories like this?
Kiana focused, the blood-red glow emanating from her intensifying.
The crimson crack on her face rapidly spread, branching out like a spiderweb to every corner.
Similar blood-red cracks appeared on Kiana's palms and legs. Her entire being seemed like an exquisite sculpture carved from crimson gemstone, and now, this exquisite sculpture was shattering.
—[Operating Power: 75%]
The blank look on the young man's face finally vanished. Kiana, bathed in blood-red light, had already taken steady step after steady step, closing the distance to just a few paces away.
With each step she took, specks of bloody light fell from her body; pieces of armor from the Spirit Awakening Key detached and clattered onto the ground with crisp metallic sounds.
The storm was tearing this world apart – the white wall behind the young man, the distant sky and land where the horizon blurred.
Amidst this gray-white storm, the young man's eyes saw only that figure radiating blood-red light, unyieldingly anchored here.
Anchored in his memory.
In a daze, the young man looked back.
The drawing on the wall was fragmented, yet somehow its entirety could still be glimpsed amidst the storm.
This drawing... and this person...
They...
The young man suddenly realized something. He turned back, looking at the figure now less than ten steps away.
Looking at her trembling arms, at the blood-red motes constantly flaking off her body...
Finally—
The young man spoke.
"You damn..." He stared intently at the girl before him, his eyes shot with blood, filled with expectation, fear, and a helpless plea.
The sudden voice made Kiana instinctively halt. She lifted her somewhat clouded head, looking towards the young man who had spoken.
After rushing for so long, she could finally stop quietly for a moment and listen to his voice.
The young man clenched his fists, letting out his roar with all his might.
"—Who the hell are you!!!"
Kiana's azure eyes reflected the young man's hysterical state, heard the anguished cry that followed close behind.
"In your eyes—who the hell am I—!!!"
[Operating Power: 95%]
Who am I?
In my eyes... who is he?
Kiana's eyes, previously clouded, suddenly cleared, becoming as limpid as a mirror, as the sky, as a pure lake, "recording" the image of the young man.
Her perpetually tense body suddenly relaxed. Kiana broke into a relieved smile.
The movement was a bit too wide, causing a piece of skin to flake off from the corner of her mouth, revealing the blood-red gem-like interior beneath.
"I don't know..."
She lowered her head, looking at her own hand.
At this moment, her palm was covered in blood-red cracks. Yet neither the deathly pale skin nor the eerie crimson fissures could conceal the words she herself had written.
The young man stood frozen, waiting for Kiana's answer.
Kiana looked up, meeting his gaze, and repeated.
"I don't know...
"I don't know your name... when we met... don't know what you like, what you hate... don't know what our relationship was like... don't know what your cooking tastes like...
"All these things about you... I don't know any of them..."
Kiana's voice was gentle, standing out distinctly against the backdrop of the shrinking, raging hurricane around them.
"But... I know... I seem to have lost someone important... someone very, very important...
"I don't know where I lost him... or why he was lost there... I don't understand... why I absolutely have to find him...
"But... BUT—!"
Kiana's voice suddenly intensified. Her previously gentle tone shifted, becoming incredibly resolute.
She stared intently at the young man, at the person she had lost, at the person she had missed time and time again.
Kiana clenched the hand bearing the inscription, leaned forward, and planted her foot heavily on the ground before her.
Then, she too shouted, answering the young man's bewildered cry.
"Because you are—
"Someone who—if we just cry and scream—will definitely—
"Risk everything to save us, you big—ID—IOT—!!"
She stumbled forward, staggering through the final ten steps, rushing towards the stunned young man, raising her fist towards him.
"So I will definitely find you!! I will definitely take you back!"
"Even if my limbs break, even if I lose my life!!"
"I will definitely take you—"
"Home!!"
More impactful than the incoming fist were those two words. In truth, if the young man hadn't already been leaning against the wall, Kiana's words alone would have been enough to make him stumble back several steps in a daze.
Home?
Home!!
But where is home?
Where is home?!
He watched the fist approaching ever closer in his vision. He understood.
She was home...
The place she wanted to take him back to was...
Thump—
The storm... stopped abruptly. Only the blood-red light remained, dim and lusterless.
The fist landed softly on the young man's face, along with a body collapsing powerlessly into his arms, fragile and pitiable.
[Operating Power: 100% —— 0%]
[Checking—User Status]
[Confirmed—Deceased]