"No reason."
Nisei had been trained for his role as a sentouki, once. Before he had decided that the fool who 'taught' him would only hold him back. He couldn't ever remember arguing so often, or over such trivialities, as with that man.
"Why did you kill her?" Ritsu-sensei had asked again. "There is no such thing as 'no reason', Akame-kun."
He'd grinned broadly, thinking the un-reason was his upper hand. "Maybe I just don't feel like telling you, sensei."
"Or could it be that you just don't know?"
He'd hated the smug self-assurance. It had questioned his own confidence and made him feel stupid. Worst of all, Ritsu-sensei had been right.
He didn't know. And he never knew.
"I told you just to deliver my message," Seimei says coolly, thumb calmly applying pressure to Nisei's jugular. He's getting a little light-headed, but it's a nice feeling. He can still breathe. "Why did you disobey me?"
There wasn't a particular motive to encroach on Seimei's holiest of treasures, that only person he held sacred in the entire world, no reason save the will to see what would happen. His mind had been filled with it, when even he did not expect the irrational feeling to take over. It was a strange self-destructive sort of curiosity.
He wanted to see how Seimei would make him pay. He wanted to feel the difference between Nisei, who was flesh of which Seimei was somewhat fond, and Ritsuka, a living soul whose movement Seimei's eyes could not leave and whose heart Seimei would kill himself to break. That thing, so far beyond him in theoretical understanding – he thought he could feel it, if he just pushed. He thought the answer would be in Seimei's blows. Or that the exact differences might explode across his nerves when his skin seemed to catch fire with pain. But whatever he was looking for was still not there.
"Nisei. Answer me."
The fingers tightened a little and Nisei thought perhaps there was the very basic, beginning of a tingle of comprehension at the pinpoint of that pressure. He smiled and watched Seimei's face be silently furious with no visible emotion.
He still had some cards in his hand. Not time to fold just yet.
"No reason."