Nothing ended that day.

It could have, if I had wanted it to.

If I had wanted to let go of Inori.

If I had wanted to… forget her.

How could I possibly ever want to forget her?

She was everything to me.

During Tokyo's 'purification' carried out on behalf of the GHQ, after Hare had died, I had taken refuge in Inori's hearth.

She had been my oasis.

And then…

And then she sacrificed herself.

I never wanted her to do it. Not even if it was the only way.

I would have wanted to be in her place.

I would have wanted to die with her.

Having lost Gui, killed by my very own hands, and Inori, I've decided to live for the sole purpose of remembering who they were and what they did.

They deserve to be remembered.

That was long ago.

Today is the day 15th July of 2042, also written 15/07/2042.

3 years have passed since the 4th apocalypse.

Tokyo was rebuilt, with technology sent from neighboring nations that were able to confirm the hostility coming from Japan originated from within the GHQ.

Without their help, we probably would have never managed to make it.

The start of the reconstruction… I never saw it. I was transferred to a neighboring city that had been partially spared from the destruction of the Apocalypse Virus.

And I wish I could tell you what I saw. But I can't…

Not too long after the city was rebuilt, we all moved back in, and really quickly, people started to blend back into their usual lives. Now, I rarely hear anyone shout in Tokyo.

There is a lot of noise, like there always is, but there have been no gunshots, no riots nor protests. Recently, it seems there have been almost no thieves circulating the streets: perhaps it's safer now.

But I'll get to more of that later. First, I'll tell you who I am.

My name is Shu Ouma. I'm 21 now… from a couple of days, I think.

I try hard not to think about my age.

As I go through one more year, it just means I lived my life without purpose for another year… while in pain… without Inori…

I live in Tokyo. I was one of the main members in Funeral Parlor when they overthrew the GHQ.

And above all… I am blind.

After Inori sacrificed herself, I became blind.

I don't know why.

I've always tried to find a logical explanation to it, but there's nothing that can come to mind.

All I can think of is…

This is my punishment for letting go of her.

I can't know what is happening in front of me unless I hear noise or voices, and I depend on everyone around me now.

Ayase, Tsugumi, Sota, Yahiro… all of them. Exactly like I never wanted to.

When I moved in an apartment of a new skyscraper in Tokyo after the reconstruction, I got used my surroundings only thanks to them. They basically drew a map in my brain by making me go around, touch things and giving me directions on where was what.

It was not long after I moved in that I started to have nightmares.

The first night in the apartment had been horrific; I had dreamt the moment Inori had died.

Only this time, I could have saved her.

And I hadn't done anything.

I had just watched, as she got covered in crystals, reached out for my lips and, with her dying breath, said: "You could have saved me".

I hadn't slept for 3 days after that dream.

Most of the dreams revolved around that day: the chaos all around, Endlaves shooting guns, me fighting Gai, and then… Inori…

Recently, they had become more realistic every night. They felt even more real when I was awake.

I decided not to think about it: it's most likely already dark outside; I'll fall asleep quickly.

"Bleep. Bleep."

It's 00:00 now. It's the only alarm I set. Or, let me reword that, it's the only alarm Yahiro set for me on my alarm clock. I think I asked him… because I wanted to know.

I wanted to know if a day had just ended.

I can't tell with the situation I'm in.

'I'm playing the self pity card again' I thought, 'If Gai were here, he would give me a proper scolding for it…"

But he isn't here.

He can't be, even if I wanted him to.

Is this the man he wanted me to be? Did he want me to cry myself to sleep?

I don't think so.

But he never could have imagined Inori would have died without me.

Nor could I have.

I'm sitting on an armchair in the living room. The chair is soft, and it makes me feel like I'm about to drown.

I need to get out of it fast before I fall asleep again.

I stand up with a creak of the armchair, take my walking stick, and head towards the bedroom. To do so, I need to exit the living room from the right side and go down the hall for 2 meters.

Nothing too impressive.

Definitely, not as impressive as the things I use to be able to do…

If I haven't mentioned it yet, I can't use my power anymore.

I don't know why.

After Inori's death, and me loosing sight, apparently, people stopped believing I was looking at them, maybe, and ignored me.

Or, maybe, my power changed and required me to look at people and see them.

The only time I tried to pull out a void I ended up having to explain to the police why I had grabbed a woman's breast.

I walked into my bedroom and, using the walking stick, I got to the bed, took off my heavy clothes quickly and decided it was time to stop thinking about sad things.

'You can't save them anymore. If you could, you would be right to keep on reminding yourself about it, but you can't. It's not going to help you in any way if you keep on thinking about it.' I said silently

"Yawn" came out of my mouth without me being able to stop it.

It was time to rest.

I patted my bed a couple of times, opened the blanket, got inside, closed my eyes and, shortly after, I opened them again.

But I wasn't in my room anymore.

I couldn't feel the bed beneath me anymore: all I saw was darkness. I was standing on my feet in front of… something.

I can't see clearly, it's too dark, but I can feel something under my toes. There is a wall that leads down vertically. Like a hole.

'Stay calm. It is just a dream. Just a dream. Just a dream.' I lost my balance.

"Fuck!"

My feet slipped in a way I would've been dead meat if I hadn't shifted all my weight towards where I'd been standing.

Close. Far too close for my taste.

'Damn that was close.' I thought, my brain close to panicking.

Although I had lost my eyesight, I could still have dreams, and see things in them. Not only that, the last thing I saw was her dying. Which wasn't exactly good since it had been the last visual memory before I became blind.

So everything I saw with my eyes in my dreams reminded me of her… The way the crystals had slowly climbed up both our bodies, her eyes becoming covered in crystals, her handing to me rubber bands in square shapes, telling me "Take it", and then… fading out into the distance.

After that, nothing.

I barely managed to stay alive by being rescued by a helicopter right before drowning…

I cried my eyes out that day.

It would have been the end of me: I already knew.

I guess I was right.

There is nothing more I can do, and I'm like Ayase, only that I can't connect to an Endlave unit…

Which, as unfortunate as it may be, won't grant me sight since a part of my cerebrum was damaged.

I had managed to ruin my life big time.

This hole… reminds me so much of how I am now.

Empty.

Powerless.

Dead, in a nutshell.

I hadn't seen something this terrifying since Hare had been crystalized…

The only thing that had ever made me feel more terrified than this… was the dream about Inori.

My eyes had somehow managed to the darkness: I started seeing more clearly what was around me. The pit seems to be circular, and there is nothing around it except for rocks.

It pulses with darkness, almost like it's calling for me.

'I need to look. This must have I meaning'

3

2

1

.

.

.

I looked down, where I thought the hole was.

And then, I heard a faint sound.

A voice so far away,

It seemed to come from the very bottom of that void.

"Shu" called out a voice "Shu, help me!"

It's her voice!

"Inori! Where are you?"

"Help me, Shu!" she repeated, louder this time. "Come save me!"

"How? Are you okay?" I shout in reply.

No answer.

I can't think of anything. The only thing I hear is my gutter feeling and it says: "Jump! Go save her!"

"Shu! Please! I can't hold on anymore!" she cries desperately.

It doesn't matter. If I'm going to die right here and try to save her, I won't care. I had waited too long for this chance. I dove straight down, head first, reaching out towards her.

"Shu!"

"Inori!"

I kept hearing her voice, but I couldn't make out what she was saying. While I was falling, the wind covered every sound. Even my attempts of calling out her name ended being vain.

I must have been rapidly falling to my death.

Then, I felt something soft grab my arm.

I couldn't see anything, but I could tell it was her.

She had that soft touch…

Something that was so unique I had never forgotten.

It scared me.

It felt too real.

Too real to even be one of my dreams.

She dragged herself towards me, hugged me, kissed me on the cheek, got close to my ear and whispered:

"Shu, please. Come save me." It was the last thing I heard, before the dream started to fade, Inori with it.

I emerged from the darkness.