The Abyssal Demon consciousness lurking in the deep sea let out a terrifying howl as a surge of powerful malice roiled upward. Evanheiler’s surface consciousness, which had been forced into a state of dullness for over a decade, ceased functioning entirely. His body pitched forward, collapsing.
But before he truly sank into the darkness... a warm, golden radiance pierced through the surface of that sea, scattering around him.
To a spirit, such heat should have been an immense burden, yet as it reached the icy depths of his mind, it was softened until only a benevolent warmth remained. At first glance, this might have seemed like a case of "distance lending enchantment," but in reality, it was a subtle, precise neutralization of forces.
In the outside world, Raytin leaned down and reached out, catching Evanheiler’s body just before it slammed into the floor.
He pulled the man into his arms. In that moment, the fragile and complex emotional display he had shown earlier vanished unnervingly. It was as if it had been a mere illusion—a seemingly sincere phantom.
Was that emotion real?
No one knew.
At this moment, Raytin lowered his head and held Evanheiler tightly, tighter than he ever had before.
Within that embrace, the entity in the darkness sensed an intrusion into its domain. This time, it did not howl. Instead, it fell silent for a moment and began to chuckle.
In the next second, a sharp blade of dissipating starlight grazed the armor at Raytin’s waist, effortlessly carving a jagged score into the pitch-black plating!
Raytin held his breath, his expression turning cold and vacant. He reached down, pinning the hand that dripped with stardust, and locked eyes with a pair of crimson, blood-like orbs.
"Abyssal Demon..."
His voice was low and hard. Simultaneously, the surrounding air began to boil. The metal structure of the starship liquefied and poured down, expanding the "room" while a shimmering rain of silver light began to fall.
"You can also call me 'Evan,' darling."
Even though his hand bones were nearly crushed, the tall, handsome blonde man showed no reaction to the pain. Supported by a power rising from the depths of the darkness, he straightened his back and tilted his head toward Raytin.
"Look at you, as stiff as a mountain of swords..." he whispered. The voice was Evanheiler’s, but the tone was entirely different. "Why is that? Is it because you realize I’ve changed, or because you’re finally forced to face... your own cruelty?"
"..."
The starship had completely "melted," transforming under the intense golden light into a massive spherical cage. To the retreating fleet observing from afar, it looked like a blazing sun.
Before this radiance flared, the true Evanheiler’s aura had clearly faded into nothingness. Now that the flames obscured everything, the stark possibility that he was dead lay bare before everyone’s eyes.
"...Move. If we don't run now, we won't get away," someone said hoarsely. "'Starflow'... we can't let his sacrifice be in vain."
"'Solar Star' really has gone mad! I shouldn't have listened to Starflow!" Tanhe roared. "That bastard would even kill his own partner?! Is he severing his worldly ties right here and now?!"
Beside him, Morgan’s face was pale to the point of distortion. He forced himself to issue the emergency departure command to the *Eternal*, then lowered his head and waved the others away to fulfill their duties. He slumped into the chair behind him, letting the AI strap him in.
After a long while, as the ship entered deep-space navigation, Morgan received a communication request on his private channel. It was Anni, who was overseeing the medical department.
When the connection opened, Anni’s calm face appeared in Morgan’s field of vision.
"Are you alright?" she asked.
"...I'm fine." Morgan took a deep breath. "The 'Lover' responded to my inquiry. It said he is safe."
They both knew that the "he" Morgan referred to was Evanheiler.
"...It didn't exactly look 'safe.'" Anni’s expression was strained. She hadn't been on the front lines facing the enemy, but she had seen that blinding radiance clearly.
"But that is indeed what the 'Lover' said," Morgan sighed. "Of course, even after all these years, I still have doubts about how It perceives the word 'safe.'"
Among the super-powered entities of the Orion people, the "Lover" was an existence of absolute sensibility. Its heart was vast, and Its love even encompassed those traitors of Orion drifting through the stars.
Even if those betrayers were wanted by the Human Union or rejected by the "Radiant Exemplar," It loved them all the same.
Even if someone had sought their own death by attacking It in the past, as long as they were considered "Orion," It would view the attack as a gift and accept it without prejudice.
But at the same time, It would gently restrain the attacker, merging them into Its own power.
This process of merging could also be seen as a form of... "devouring."
A person needs sensibility to think and rationality to judge. Rationality prevents thought from becoming blind; sensibility prevents judgment from becoming cold.
But the power represented by the "Lover" caused It to "forever think, but never judge," acting and responding blindly, releasing Its blind love.
"Sometimes I wonder why it wasn't the 'Radiant Exemplar' that established a connection with you," Anni sighed. "If it were that entity, we could probably bypass the Human Union entirely."
As the inevitable "end" for almost all Orion people at the conclusion of their lives, the "Radiant Exemplar" was the supreme standard of correctness for their race.
If the power behind the Resistance were that entity, then they... would likely have a strong claim to the leadership of all Orion people.
But...
"...Don't say that, Anni," Morgan said softly. "Many people don't know that when I was a child, I was controlled by the minions of an Abyssal Demon. When I, a mere child, was forced to launch a suicidal attack against It, It saved me and forgave my sins."
Anni blinked, stunned.
Morgan rarely spoke of his life before his student days, so she truly hadn't known.
"In a way, I am very similar to 'Solar Star,'" Morgan said. "We were both children controlled by evil. But later, I relied on the power of 'Love,' and he relied on the power of 'Records' to break free from our disastrous lives..."
"He and the 'Recorder'...?"
"That being’s avatar raised him. The 'Lover' told me; It does not lie." Morgan looked up at the parameters monitored on the screen before him. "Actually, he isn't a bad person. I can understand him. He simply chose the path he must walk."
"Even if the price is losing everything in his life?" Anni countered.
"If he doesn't do it, even more people will lose their lives, or their livelihoods," Morgan whispered. "You know, I can empathize with anyone..."
...And that was his greatest source of pain.
"His power surpasses ours by so much that we could spend our entire lives without ever seeing its limit."
Within the distant radiance, Raytin gripped "Evanheiler" by the throat with one hand and raised the other.
"The information he knows and the things he must do also surpass the scope of our understanding."
The Abyssal Demon consciousness, nearly ignited by Raytin’s radiance, used Evanheiler’s face to flash a malicious smile. It raised a hand to strike at Raytin’s visor.
The violent energy stifled the transmission of sound, but even so, Raytin could clearly see those lips—he could see what they were saying:
[*'For other purposes, you allowed my growth.'*]
"...Experience doesn't apply here. There are no paradigms in our knowledge base for facing this situation. One can only feel a helpless sense of the unknown."
Morgan sighed.
"For a long time, you, I, and many others have had a 'Raytin' we thought we knew, a 'Solar Star' we thought we understood.
"And when he steps outside that framework, everything becomes an unsettling 'unknown.'"
Raytin’s expression remained blank as his sharp gauntlet swept down!
"...So we fear. We are terrified. We cannot understand and find it hard to accept," Morgan’s voice echoed before his console, echoing in the darkness of space. "Because our principles, our humanity, and our past experiences cannot explain his current existence, his changes, or the core of all this."
Starlight scattered. Fragments of the visor’s armor flew.
Golden light flared. Crimson blood erupted like a hot spring.
In the wide eyes of Evanheiler’s Abyssal Demon consciousness, Raytin gritted his teeth. His terrifying golden eyes radiated a brilliance that destroyed the entity's mental core at point-blank range.
—This time, he did not close his eyes or look away.
"I don't know what he will do... perhaps take Evan back for treatment? Even though we all know the root of the pollution lies in his shattered soul, a process that has left him past the point of no return for ten years now..."
Morgan sighed.
"But I think..."
Golden light instantly flooded Evanheiler’s body and soul space. The entire sea was illuminated with unnatural brightness.
The Abyssal Demon portion of the consciousness roared as it was burned to ash, but Evanheiler’s body also began to completely break down.
The horrific black and red receded from his eye sockets, replaced once more by a clear, deep blue.
Evanheiler’s gaze was hollow and unfocused. He stared blankly at Raytin, at those two brilliant suns.
...It hurts so much, he thought, filled with a dazed trembling.
Now, he was going to die.
But that unprecedented peace, which had transcended the abyss of darkness, remained in his heart.
"...'Solar Star' will do everything in his power to help him," Morgan said.
Within the radiance, Raytin pursed his lips. For the first time, he truly allowed Evanheiler to see his current appearance and his dazzling "gaze."
So sorrowful, so full of pain...
It seemed that even "Immovability," which had just suppressed his emotional reactions, had lost its power.
"Because, even if he is not understood, even if information is blocked," Morgan said, "he can understand others."
"One who truly understands the masses never demands the understanding of the masses."
As he spoke, he watched the First Legion’s ambush manifesting in space. He opened the console and entered a command to call for "assistance."
But after that, facing the First Legion’s information technology offensive, he simply smiled. Choosing to keep the *Eternal* unbreached, he began negotiations with the Commander of the First Legion.
"Until we possess the power to resist him, listening to him, doing what he wants us to do, and accumulating energy to launch an offensive... that is the choice a smart person makes. It is also the greatest difference between a 'human' and the 'Lover.'"
He said.
"Rationality and sensibility coexist. One thinks, and then makes a choice..."
...
Raytin lowered his head, embracing the lover in his arms.
Before that final breath dissipated, he used the sharpest blade—his mental strength—to carve out the core of that soul that had not yet been polluted.
Then, without hesitation, he shoved that soul core, which had been shrouded in golden light for years, into his own mental space.
The body in his arms dissolved into stardust. Evanheiler, with horns upon his head, fell into Raytin's inner city.
Raytin gasped for breath, dropping to one knee. Cold sweat slid down his handsome, usually stoic face.
Indeed, even for him, allowing an S-rank "outsider" to truly reside at the base level of his mental strength was no simple task.
But... what was even more terrifying to him was...
"...I killed you again," he murmured. "Though this time..."
Though this time, it was only a process, not the result.
"..."
...But, I killed you again.
In a world where only golden sunlight burned, he knelt, a rare sight. He covered his eyes with one hand, his breathing unsteady.
He knew that if he were to execute his plan perfectly, this moment was an inevitable path.
But when that body "once again" lost its life in his arms, a panic originating from the "last time" swept through his soul.
This was likely the greatest panic of his life, and the nightmare that had not dissipated for centuries in his "former" life.
But soon, he surged his mental power, forcing "Immovability"—which had receded due to his mental chaos—back to the surface of his mind.
Raytin took a deep breath, forcing his heart to calm quickly.
He opened his other hand, staring at an energy body shaped like a copper slip within the golden light of his palm.
—A shattered spirit, an unstable soul, a terminal case of super-powered organ failure... Evanheiler’s conditions were so "perfect." How could the "Star" civilization not make a move on him?
No, it should be said that even the things he had encountered over the years, including what his father had done to him at the very beginning... the shadow of "Star" was likely behind all of it.
Looking at it now, all these headache-inducing problems were legacies of history. And Evanheiler, this piece of gold in Raytin's eyes, was in the standards of "Star" merely a tool, a piece of... "copper" to be molded at will.
Raytin let out a cold laugh. He raised his hand and sent this "seed" into his own mental form.
He did not burn it away with his radiance. Instead, he allowed it to quietly take root, even deliberately carving out a portion of his spirit to nourish it with his own illusory flesh and blood amidst agonizing pain.
He knew that at this moment, stars were burning, metal was changing, and a crisis was approaching. Countless people were doing countless things.
The "Resistance" had temporarily become his prisoners, and the main source of the trouble he had come to find—the tens of billions of innocent civilians they carried—was currently giving the entire First Legion a massive, bewildered headache.
The second part of his plan could now begin.
—A super-powered individual had killed his lover. In that absolutely genuine and undeniable agony, his mental form was being eroded...
...And this would become the enemy’s greatest breakthrough point. The "4473-3920-Core Power Elimination" plan would focus its deployment from here.
"Prepare to betray me, to hate me, and to become my enemy... my compatriots."
Raytin began to smile, a smile filled with madness and cruelty.
"I look forward to... the arrival of the 'Mercy of the Final Night.'"
End of Volume 2.
***
**Glossary**
