Chapter Text
Ever since little Su always felt he was different from others. He felt someone or something put a ‘curtain’ that split him from the ‘world’. Though, he didn't think much about it. He was never an active and talkative person to begin with. Always preferred reading books to physical activity. He will not deny that ‘curtain’ did give him an isolated feeling from the ‘world’, but never to the point of insanity. A certain someone was always by his side since childhood and that person became his anchor, giving him strength to keep suggesting to himself that he was also the same as others, that he too was a human. Su was certain as long as he kept self-suggesting like that, as long as he always stayed close to that person, he could survive living with the ‘curtain’. That peace was sad to say disturbed by a dream that he didn’t even remember when it started.
A glimpse of a horrible sight from a burning city crumbled to the ground. Someone always stood in the middle of that destruction. White haired male and deep icy blue eyes capable of freezing everything. A face that he knew better.
“Earth to Su. Hello…”
Su' wandering mind back to reality, staring at the face he always saw in his dream but much vibrant along with a smile that never disappeared from the lips. His best friend from childhood. His anchor.
Kevin Kaslana.
“Let me guess, copying my works?” replied Su, sighing. Kevin only smiled innocently. “When will you start to do your work by yourself,” he grumbled but his hand already picked up the book he needed.
“Copying yours faster. Thanks, Su.”
Su just shook his head while watching Kevin copying his answers. A face that was permanently filled by positive expression and blue eyes that reflected sky on the brightest day. This was Kevin’s face Su familiar with, but Kevin in his dream was the total opposite. In his dream, Kevin felt like carrying the weight of the entire world on his shoulder and eyes that saw many lost. Su clenched his hand tightly. He didn’t want Kevin in front of him becoming like that.
Kill him before that happens. He will unleash destruction in this world. You must kill him, for this world, for his sake. So he won’t need to suffer.
Su quickly observed his surroundings. No female students close enough to whisper at him. Furthermore, that voice while it felt so close but at the same time didn’t feel like a whisper in the ears, it was more like it suddenly appeared inside his head.
“Su?” Kevin asked, puzzled.
That gray haired teen shook his head. “You wouldn’t do anything that will destroy the world, right.” He cringed after asking that. What an idiot question.
Kevin fell silent with mouth open, blinking his eyes several times, until he laughed out loud. Su whined in shame.
“Destroying a famous basketball team when I become a professional player in the future? Sure. World? That is exaggerating,” Kevin answered in the middle of his laugh. “What weird dream did you have last night?” That strong arm patted Su’ head.
A gesture that usually Su replied by brushing off Kevin’s hand but something stopped him when their skin touched each other. Cold. Kevin’s skin felt so cold in the middle of early summer warm weather. Usually he didn’t think much about it but now it brought him a flashback to Kevin in his dream who was also frigid, literally, to the point of freezing body of water just by standing at it.
“Your hand…cold.” Fear and worry mixed together inside Su’ voice.
“Cold? Isn’t my body always like this?” Kevin replied with a confused look.
“Right,” was what Su said but full of self-doubt.
Since their days in childhood, Su always said he preferred staying close to Kevin during summer than winter because for unknown reason Kevin’s body temperature was slightly lower than normal human. Not abnormal to be considered an ice block but similar to skin that just touched cold water. It was just today Kevin’s hand felt colder than usual.
No one talked after that. Kevin went back to his notebook, copying homework answers before the bell rang, while Su tried to focus on the book he was currently reading. Tried. Because he couldn’t ignore what just happened. What he saw inside his dream kept playing inside his mind and so did what the voice said. Will his dream become reality? Did he have to kill the person that became his anchor for his entire life? Person that he secretly longed for more than just a best friend? He did not want to and will not.
Seeing Su sit on the spectator bench when the basketball team was doing their practice was a common thing. Seeing Su with face as pale as paper was not a common thing. Those in the same class with Su already realize the teenager's condition since morning. Su didn’t talk much but today he was much quieter. The stellar student who usually raised his hand first every time teachers asked a question didn't do that today. As his best friend, obviously Kevin realized Su’ condition but he only said it was just lack of sleep. Kevin also told him since the science club didn’t have activity today he should go straight home as soon as school ended but Su rejected, insisted on waiting until the basketball club finished their practice as usual.
Su wasn’t lying when he said it was lack of sleep, what he purposely omitted was that it had been a week he was barely able to have long sleep because the dream that kept haunting him every time he closed his eyes got stronger. The figure of Kevin standing in the middle of destruction felt so real. The voice that kept telling him to kill Kevin getting more and more impatience that brought him to the brink of insanity. What kept him sane only by seeing Kevin, making sure his best friend was still himself. That smile never disappeared from the face of young Kaslana. Because of that, even though his headache was unbearable he must see the basketball team practice.
“Su~”
A teasing voice was heard right beside him. Su jolted from his seat. He started to develop ‘trauma’ with female voices who suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Blame it on the voice that kept telling him to kill Kevin having a female voice. His stiffened body started to relax when he realized that it was just his friend's voice.
“Su?” Short pink haired girl blinked her eyes in confusion. Su never reacted like that when get surprised. “Something wrong? I’m sorry if I disturb you.”
He shook his head. “I’m the one who should say sorry, Elysia.” He returned to his seat next to Elysia. “Need something?”
“Nothing. Theater club needs basketball club help for the next film project. I just finished talking with the supervisor when I saw you. Here.” Elysia gave him an energy drink. “Your face needs a lot of blush-on to cover that paleness. Actually, rather than this, you need more sleep. Something bugging you?”
“Just lack of sleep,” Su repeated his answer for the nth time today.
“Want to sleep in my lap?” offered Elysia, patted her lap.
If he was one of Elysia fans, that offer could make someone screaming in joy and massive nosebleed. What kind of fans will refuse an offer sleeping in the lap of the theater club's main actress. It was just that he wasn't a fan.
“No, thank you. I don’t want to be killed by your fans,” Su rejected quickly.
“Hmm…but you’re not rejecting Kevin’s thigh,” Elysia said with a teasing smirk.
A completely wrong timing to drink. “Wh…what do you mean?” he asked while still coughing.
“Two days ago I saw you sleeping in Kevin’s lap. Pretty comfortable I should add,” Elysia giggled.
Su just fell silent with head lowered trying to hide his red face. Two days ago he felt so tired until he completely unaware fell asleep on one of the benches in the school backyard while reading. By the time he woke up, he already found himself sleeping in Kevin’s lap. He definitely didn’t ask to sleep in that position. His best friend who casually made them in a compromising pose that basically asked to become ‘hot talk among girls’.
“I’m not requesting him to do that,” Su replied timidly.
Kill him quick! Don’t get lulled with his charm! He is trying to trick you!
That voice again. Su held his head. Every time that voice appeared, it hurt his head now.
“Watch out!!”
Before he could react, a ball flew toward his direction. Something that the gray haired teenager can usually dodge or use his hands to protect his face, but this time it hit his head straight. Adding his pain, the back of his head hit the upper row spectator bench when he staggered. With his lack of sleep, soon he could feel his consciousness fading. He could hear Elysia’s panic scream and the murmur of people surrounding them. Before everything turned black he saw a white haired teenager silhouette rushing to him and picking him up.
When his consciousness started to come back, his ears caught someone talking near him though weirdly only one voice was heard. That person talking to himself? Su tried to open his eyes but it felt so heavy.
“I won't kill him!”
Kill? Who?
“I don’t care about that! If the world must be destroyed then so be it!”
This voice…Kevin? Whom he talked to? World destroyed?
“Shut up! Get out of my head!”
No doubt it was Kevin’s voice. With whom he talked? Get out of his head? Was Kevin having the same thing with him? Hearing a mysterious voice?
He tried to call Kevin but only a faint groan out of his lips. Fortunately that voice was enough to give an alarm to his visitor.
“Su? Are you okay? Anything hurt?”
Su blinking slowly a few times. His heavy eyelids started to open and his blurry sight began to focus. A worried Kevin greeted him.
"Sorry, I threw the ball too hard." Those blue eyes filled with regret.
Su just laughed softly. "No wonder your opponent always feared your pass." His eyes took a quick glance. School infirmary and only two of them in there. Kevin did talk to himself or like Su, voices in head. What should he ask now?
"What is it?" asked Kevin as if knowing something weighed his mind.
A faint mumble of 'nothing'. Su didn't dare to ask a question, even one that seemed innocent like 'I faintly heard you talk to someone before I woke up'. He just fainted. Both he and Kevin could shrug it off as his muddled mind played tricks. His feeling said if he asked about it, it would change their friendship. Something he always avoided.
"Really? Nothing? Your head isn’t in pain? Need I bring you to hospital?"
"I'm fine. I fainted just because of lack of sleep, nothing serious."
Kevin let out a long sigh. "Since when is this 'lack of sleep'? Is something troubling you? You can tell me everything." Seeing the constant worry in Kevin’s face made Su feel so bad. He didn’t want a worried Kevin, he wanted a cheerful Kevin.
“It's just a bad dream. Nothing to worry about,” he answered, trying to ease Kevin's feeling but his best friend still did not change his expression.
“More than a week?” Kevin asked full of doubt. “Same dream?”
Something weird from Kevin’s wording and tone when asking about his dream that made Su can’t help but wonder. Those words implied Kevin knew about his dream or at least part of it. He just said lack of sleep because of a nightmare, skipping ‘same nightmare over and over’ in the answer. ‘Same dream’, did Kevin just make an assumption or he really knew?
“Yes.” Su picked the safest answer he can pull now while his brain was trying to create a sentence on how to ask his suspicion without making the other feel the same.
“It's just a dream. Don’t think much about it.” With a smile Kevin stretched his hand, giving Su’ head a gentle caress.
A touch from a cold hand, a warm smile, things that usually make his heart beating faster. But he can’t feel it now. He just felt a swallowing despair pulling him to their bottomless abyss. Something will change and it was inevitable.
No longer able to hold it, a question slipped from his mouth, “Kevin, if someday you need to choose between me or the world, which one will you choose?”
Fuchsia eyes staring straight toward Kevin. He already knew he would see a surprised look on Kevin's face, an easy guess. What he didn’t want to see was a surprised look with fear inside it but reality slapped him hard when he saw that exact expression on Kevin. That expression was what Kevin gave when he was hiding something.
“Kevin, is Su awake? Coach calling you.” A basketball team member called Kevin in front of the infirmary door.
“Yes. I’ll return soon,” he replied to his teammate then at Su. “Rest here. I’ll bring you home after practice.”
Su chose silence and lay on his side, facing his back to Kevin. Didn’t see the sad look Kevin gave before leaving him alone in the infirmary.
Peace that only lasted for a moment for him. Not long after Kevin's footsteps couldn't be heard in the corridor, the same mysterious female voice echoed inside his head.
He starts to realize. You must kill him.
“He won’t be like in the dream. Stop talking in my head,” Su said in anger.
This was the first time he actively responded to that voice. All this time he picked silence and ignorance everytime that voice talked. He didn’t want to be judged as someone losing his mind for talking to himself, but he reached his breaking point beyond care. He needed to know what this voice wanted that made it persistently torment him and giving him a cruel order, murdering his best friend.
That voice laughed cynically.
You want to know the reason, Su? Listen and consider it after. This world is just one from many branches that grow in the Imaginary Tree. Same as other trees, bad branches will be pruned. There are many ways to prune the worlds that are considered ‘bad’ for Imaginary Tree, Honkai is one of them. Honkai is trying to destroy this world.
Su was stunned. This was beyond his wildest expectation.
“And how is that related to Kevin?”
Honkai tried to destroy this world but they couldn't. There is a force that locked this world from the Honkai attack. But it doesn’t deter them. Someone in this world is an avatar from the guardian that keeps defending the Honkai attack. Honkai use the same concept to make a counterattack. Slowly they slip into this world, a small amount of energy that after eons passes enough to create their own avatar.
Su can guess where this conversation ended. Honkai’s avatar, dream that he always saw, Kevin’s reaction…
Now you know why you must kill him?
“No,” Su said in denial but he realized can’t reject the fact.
What should he do.
What should he do.
What should he do.
Su kept repeating those words with turmoil inside his heart.
"Su, practice over. Let's go home," Kevin said while opening the infirmary door minutes later. He only saw an empty room. "Su?" he called but no answer. Bed where Su lay before felt cold, a sign whoever slept in there was already long gone.
Su wasn't a popular student in Senba High but news about his disappearance spread like a fire in the entire school. Of course it became hot news because along with his disappearance the friendly and outgoing 'Senba Prince' went one-eighty into what Elysia dubbed as 'block of ice'. Students who usually hang out around Kevin avoided him, too scared with freezing stares in that azure. Even Elysia who on a regular day dared to tease Kevin didn't do that now, only giving a small talk before Kevin asked her not to bother him.
Kevin knew the sudden change in his attitude tarnished his school reputation. He didn't care. He just wanted to find Su. Watching that fuchsia eyed teenager sit on the first row while reading a book again, not an empty chair. He knew Su was acting strange before disappeared. He should have convinced more, making Su willing to talk about what was bothering him and they could seek the answer. Now it was too late. He already searched for Su in every place he can think about but in every place no trace of his best friend. First time in his life he felt despair eating him.
Kevin's blue eyes took a glance toward the digital clock on top of his nightstand. The date in there told him today was Sunday noon. Even without rain pouring heavily since morning, Kevin only planned to do nothing, just lying on his bed. He only realized it after this incident, he always spent his Sunday with Su. Be it playing video games together, accompanying him playing one on one which definitely one-sided win, or just dragging Su to hang out along with other friends. Su was always there. That was why he couldn't do anything today. Today supposedly a special day he spent with Su, not alone, with Su nowhere to be seen.
His phone rang. An incoming message. Kevin picked his phone lazily, thinking it was just another message like what he often got this week. Either asking about if there was new information about Su or trying to lift his mood up. But after seeing the name on the screen he quickly got up.
A message from Su for a coordinate and short text 'meet me there'. Kevin quickly dialed his number but connected to voicemail. Su only wanted to talk to him directly. Wasting no time, Kevin quickly ran to place in the coordinate, didn't care he drenched head to toe under heavy rain. He kept running until arrived at the park on the city edge.
"This place…" Kevin said faintly in front of the park entrance, taking a slower step, no longer running. He knew where he should go.
He and Su visited this park several times in their childhood. He admitted it never crossed his mind to check here because Su always felt uncomfortable every time in here, or to be exact every time they came too close to a giant tree that grew deep inside the park. Truthfully, he also felt discomfort near that tree, it always gave him a strong feeling of sadness but for Su it was more than that. Su said that the tree felt like rejecting him, trying to attack him. When they were still a kid he thought that just Su wild imagination from reading fantasy books, but now Su' fear was probably a real thing. This giant tree reminded him of another place.
"Su, you here?" called Kevin, not far from the base of a huge tree that stood strongly, unwavering from raging rain.
No answer for a few moments, just voices from raging rain. Kevin thought Su already changed his mind and left. He turned his body but stopped when his ears caught the sound of footsteps behind rain drops. From behind the tree a familiar figure that he had been looking for showed up.
"Su!" Kevin rushed to him and hugged him tight. "Where have you been? Why do you suddenly disappear? Everyone is worried."
Su just stood still, didn't return his hug, but replied in a faint voice, "everyone, including you?"
"Of course I'm worried, silly! You disappear, your phone is inactive, there is no way I'm not worried!" Kevin loosened his hug to take a look at Su' face but that teenager casted down his head instead. "Su, what is it?" he asked in a much calmer voice, his finger caressing Su' cheek, coaxing his friend to look at him.
Kevin's cold hand. Su wanted to lean his head in that touch but he couldn't. There was something else that became his focus. He lifted his head. Fuchsia met with azure.
"Do you ever get haunted by nightmares until it makes you crazy, Kevin?" he asked weakly.
Without waiting for a reply from the stunned Kevin, Su continued his story. About how a mysterious voice kept disturbing him and making his head hurt. About how nightmares haunt him for a long time and get vivid every time. And about how Kevin inside his dream became someone that will destroy the world. Everything he told with desperation. Kevin stayed silent during the story but his best friend's face was enough for him to conclude Kevin knew more. If Kevin knew nothing, he wouldn't laugh in this situation but he would look very puzzled. Su didn’t see that. What he saw there was someone in shock that gradually became sorrow but also anger. There was no mistake, it wasn’t just him who heard a mysterious voice.
“I won’t be like in your dream. Don’t be scared,” Kevin said after no one talked between them. He tried to smile but couldn’t give him usual bright smile. “Moreover there is no way I’m the Honkai avatar.”
Su' lips thinned in fine line and hands clenched tightly. Kevin, you can’t be a straightforward person forever, you must learn deceit. That if destiny can change.
A knife in Su’ hand swung quickly toward Kevin.
“Su…why…” Kevin asked sadly, no panic nor fear even though it was his life in danger. The young Kaslana holding his wounded right arm. If he couldn’t dodge in time that knife already stabbed his stomach.
“I never mentioned ‘Honkai’. Where do you know that word? Is the Honkai voice inside your head telling you?” Su attacked again.
“Calm yourself, Su,” begged Kevin while keeping distance from the knife but at the same time trying to take it away from Su’ hand.
That plea fell into deaf ears. Su’ fuchsia eyes looked so empty, not a speck of ‘life’ inside of it. He just kept attacking Kevin.
That young Kaslana let out a swear when he lost his balance in the middle of the muddy soil under the rain. Su didn’t miss that chance to land an attack with full force. It was sheer luck that Kevin managed to stop Su’ hand at the last moment, only a few inches from his heart.
“Su…” Kevin’s voice filled with sadness.
Su only stared back without any expression before a manic smile sign of danger appeared in his lips. A smile that changed sadness in Kevin’s eyes into full alert.
“You don’t want to fight back, Seal Guardian avatar? You have feelings toward this body? An empty vessel who never owns its own ‘soul’?”
“Give him back.” Looks in Kevin’s azure eyes could freeze anything with anger boiling behind it.
“Give back? What should I give back? His soul? I told you this vessel never has a ‘soul’. This vessel is mine and I can use it as I please.” Su pulled his hand back, no longer trying to stab Kevin, but doing something more horrid. In an instant anger in the young Kaslana changed into fear. Su pointed the knife to his own neck. Proofing this wasn’t a bluff, blood started to trickle from small gash that certainly kept expanding.
“Stop!” Kevin yelled in panic, reaching his hand to stop Su.
A predictable move.
“!!!”
No voice heard from Kevin’s lips, even one to tell his pain. Immediately he collapsed with a knife stabbing his stomach. The heavy rain washed blood away as fast as it seeped out. Painful purple liquid from the knife spread quickly, replacing the blood inside Kevin's vein. Su knelt in front of him, staring at him as if looking at squashed insects, not humans. Without a spark of pity he grabbed Kevin's hair, forcing that teenager to look at him.
"Now with his avatar filled with Honkai energy, I can use you to make a crack inside that annoying guardian and destroy the seal."
Kevin stared back in silence until two words were heard, "sorry Su."
That fuchsia widened. If a knife stabbed Kevin's stomach, a sword engulfed in flame pierced his body.
"Shamash…how it's possible…"
Kevin gave a weak smile. As quick as it appeared, that flame sword vanished in an instant. Su' body quickly falls to the ground. Even with a body that gradually lost its strength, Kevin was still able to grab Su, keeping it from falling hard.
"Last defense mechanism created by my real self. Shamash will appear if this body has too much Honkai energy," Kevin said, positioning Su so that the young man lies on his lap while he himself leaning against a tree.
"The voice that you heard Su, that Honkai's voice. Everything they told to you is true, except they reverse the actors. You are the Honkai avatar, an anomaly that shouldn't exist in this world. To fight against that anomaly, an existence known as Seal Guardian created his own avatar, me. He always told me to get rid of you before Honkai controlled you fully and attacked me. I don't want to," he explained while his hand never stopped caressing Su' gray hair.
Calm and no longer under Honkai who controlled his body before, Su listened in silence. Finally understand why all this time he felt 'separated' from this world. He shouldn't exist. He was created to destroy this world. It was something natural if this world was trying to separate him. Su couldn't say this world was cruel to him just because doing its job. Maybe the only 'cruel' thing done to him, he, a soulless vessel, was allowed to have feelings and fell in love with an individual whose function was his total opposite.
Feeling that forever can't be conveyed.
Su gave one last smile to Kevin before his body succumbed to his wound.
Kevin hugged tight Su' body who was already at the end of his life. Red that painted his cloth also telling his life soon will be the same like Su. At least they can be together until the end.
"My only regret is I can't tell you how I feel," whispered Kevin before his eyes closed.
Bright light.
Pairs of azure slowly opened, realizing there was something shining bright near him.
First thing he did when his eyes fully opened was grab unconscious Su in front him, holding that teenager close in his arm. Next he realized he was floating in the middle of a reddish sky desert. A giant tree glowing in white purplish light standing strong in the middle.
"This place…" He looked at his surroundings, looking for something, someone.
"We meet again."
A voice similar to his was heard. In front of him someone with a face exactly like him appeared. No, in truth he was the one who 'borrowed' this male face. The only way to tell the difference was this male few year older than him. Probably that will be the face he saw in the mirror when he reached twenties.
"My real me," Kevin said to that person.
This wasn’t their first meeting. He still remembered the surprise he had when dream brought him here, meeting with someone exactly like him. He was told many things in that meeting. That he was only an ‘avatar’ created by the real him in response to Honkai who managed to slip into supposedly a locked world and create their own avatar. That Honkai avatar was no other than his best friend currently in his arm. That the only way to drive out Honkai from his world was by killing Su. He was furious hearing that and rejected vehemently. With whatever reason he won’t kill Su. He also believed Su won’t kill him either. The real him only said that was his choice but also gave him a warning, slowly Honkai will corrupt Su’ mind and use his body to kill him.
“Now what? My duty can be considered done, right,” Kevin asked lightly even though he knew his question wasn’t that simple. He was just an ‘avatar’ who served one purpose. Like in video games he often played with Su, when an avatar duty was done it was common to replace or eliminate them because they no longer had function.
“If you want to erase me, there is one question that keeps me wondering since you told me I’m your avatar,” he asked when given no response.
The adult version of him gave a cue ‘ask away’.
“You said it was Honkai who created this Su. That means you created me to respond to the Honkai avatar who resembles the Su you know. You can avoid all this just by not creating me, right? Without your avatar, Su will kill no one.”
A point that always made no sense for Kevin. Why must the real him respond to his enemy by making things easier for them.
The real him staring into the distance for a moment. Something that he also did whenever remembering precious things to him.
“Every universe is connected within the Imaginary Tree, intertwining with each other. Humans also do the same. They’re connected with each other. An existence called Kevin Kaslana and Su, in any universe at one point their fate will meet with each other. It’s a bond that can’t be severed.”
Azure filled with sorrow took a glance toward the glowing tree beneath them.
“When Su sacrificed himself for the Imaginary Tree to seal this world from Honkai, he gave everything, including his entire soul. Since that sacrifice, this world no longer considers Su as a person who lives inside it but merely a concept. The bond is still there, but with me in here and him as 'concept', nothing will trigger it. When Honkai created an avatar highly resembling him, it triggered the bond. This world responds to it, I must respond to it by creating my own avatar even though I know the risk.”
Sacrificed himself? The real Su? Was that the reason Honkai called the real him ‘Seal Guardian’? Because he continuously protected the real Su who already became a world seal?
Kevin wanted to ask more but he knew more than this wasn’t his business anymore. Some knowledge must stay as a secret. Moreover when it came to Su… The hand that had been holding Su tightened. He could act recklessly if some trouble had Su’ name inside it.
“Then, now what? I just simply disappear?” he repeated his first unanswered question. The real him brought him here must be related to something important.
“That is your choice. I can give you a bit of my soul, making you a whole person, your real self, or I will erase you.”
On the surface it was an obvious choice but there was one thing he must confirm.
“What about Su?” He held Su with both of his hands now, trying to protect his friend from his real self even though he knew just with a snap they could be erased.
“He’s Honkai avatar, has no real soul,” the real him answered.
“Then I chose to disappear,” Kevin said without any fear.
The real him staring at him which he stared back with a firm look. He wasn’t playing around. He was really serious when he chose to vanish rather than alive. It was useless if Su wasn’t around.
The adult Kaslana was still looking at him, judging him for something. “There is a way,” he said. A leaf appeared in his palm. “A small part of Su’ soul that I took before he was fully sealed. Enough to make that avatar become a real human, cutting off his connection from Honkai.”
“Is that okay? If that part of soul keeps circling in this world, Honkai can use it back.” Kevin knew that leaf was a hard to decline offer, but with the story he just heard he knew the risk.
A head shook. “This soul will return to Su and be sealed after its temporary vessel life ends. Same with the soul I’ll give to you, it’ll return to me after you die.”
Specific wording, though no need to have Su' smart brain for him to understand what implied. He wasn’t that clueless, especially this was himself whom he talked to. “That soul fragment will be sealed and you can’t keep it anymore. You will lose the only remainder.”
Both he and Su were not super soldiers with immortality like the real them. The average human lifespan is only around eighty years, while the real him, Kevin didn’t know for how many millenia already in this space, protecting the Seal continuously. Sacrificing such an important thing for something less than a century, was that truly worth it?
“Su will do the same thing,” the real him answered as if able to guess what his question was before it was asked. “Although I want you to promise one thing. Protect him. Never disappoint him.”
Kevin nodded firmly. Never will he make Su hide his fear alone. From now he promised he will give Su happiness until it overwhelmed him.
The leaf in his real self palm flew toward Su while a blue crystal flew to him, entering his chest. Warm. Slowly his eyes felt heavy but this time Kevin wasn’t filled with regret. He was certain when he opened his eyes again, Su would smile in happiness.
Kevin silently observed until those two former avatars disappeared from this space, the boundary between the world. His avatar should have vanished after finished his duty, but he interrupted his own program. Maybe he was triggered by his avatar's last words, ‘My only regret is I can't tell you how I feel’. Because till this moment he lived with that regret.
He closed his eyes while his body floated down. A memory that always plagued his mind was played again. Himself lay helplessly in the sandy ground while Su standing in front of him, hand stretched touching Imaginary Tree. He tried to stop Su but he couldn’t move his body. Those fuchsia eyes looked at him with bottomless sadness when telling his last words, ‘I love you’.
He never replied to those words. He knew Su can read minds but at the same time Su always said his mental strength was no less than his monstrous physical one and he could sense whenever Su tried reading his. That day, even in his weakened state, he didn't sense that prying feeling. Until the end Su never tried to read his reply. Su was sealed without ever hearing his answer, that he also loves that male more than friend. A regret so immense that he almost thought of destroying the Imaginary Tree to release Su but quickly realized it will only destroy that male. Su already became a seal that fused together with part of Imaginary Tree, becoming the boundary between his world and Honkai.
When his feet touched the sand below him, he opened his eyes. There, half buried inside the Imaginary Tree, bound strongly with chains, the person he loves more than anything. Kevin touched that person's cheek. No reaction. He will never get a reaction. Su was unmoving like a statue.
A ball of light floating near him, showing him what happened inside the world, to his ex avatar and Su’. Rain already ended. Those two teenagers start to awake, realizing their wounds disappear, as if never there to begin with. The young Kaslana reacted first, hugging Su tightly, telling something that surprised Su and made him blush hard. Both of them stay silent. His avatar observed Su’ avatar who casted down his eyes until that fuchsia eyed teenager gave a nod. Their faces get closer until their lips touch each other in a gentle kiss. Both blushed when they separated. Obviously that was their first kiss.
Seeing that, a gentle look appeared in Kevin’s constantly stern face. At least at one point in the flow of time, there was a part of him and Su able to have a better story in this world. Noises coming from his behind quickly remove that gentle look. A group of displeased creatures.
“I’m not very pleased now. Ever since you dare to sneak inside the world and make your avatar look like Su, it makes me really angry. What you just did, I will make sure you wouldn’t dare to disturb me for a long time,” Kevin said, turning his body. His face showed a displeasure much stronger than all those creatures collected as one. A sword engulfed in flame was burning brightly in his grip. "Might of An-Utu."
In one swing those creatures swallowed inside a sea of flame, reduced to nothing but ashes.
"I will always protect you, Su. If you become a seal that protects this world, then I will be the one guarding you, relieving your burden before Honkai reaches you, forever," he said, releasing another blazing attack.