[He looked out the window toward the grating drone of cicadas, his eyes hollow as dead ash.]
["I can't tell which voice is the real me anymore."]
["Neither of them is the real you. Or rather, you haven't reached that stage yet."]
[Tsukumo held up two fingers and waggled them in front of his face.]
["The you that despises non-sorcerers and the you that rejects that contempt are both just possibilities you've arrived at through thinking."]
["Which one becomes your truth is something you'll have to choose going forward. I've heard about the Star Plasma Vessel incident... whatever path you pick, I won't blame you."]
[That ambiguous comfort only deepened the fog in Geto's eyes.]
[What he needed right now wasn't understanding. It was someone to tell him he was wrong, or someone to tell him he was right.]
["I disagree."]
[You'd been silent the entire time. Now your voice cut through like a blade.]
["Oh? And what's your take, Hayase?"]
[Tsukumo turned to you with open curiosity, clearly intrigued by the boy who'd gone from confessing his feelings to sage mode in the span of a heartbeat.]
["Kill all non-sorcerers? That kind of brainless surrender disguised as a solution is beyond stupid."]
[Your fingers tightened around the drink can. Your knuckles went white.]
[Even with Life is Like a Play equipped, you couldn't be bothered to hide your revulsion.]
["What did you just..."]
[Geto stared at you, taken aback.]
["Say you carry out your grand massacre under the noble banner of 'world peace.' Then what?"]
[Your eyes bored into him, ice-cold, and you posed the question that killed the argument.]
["You wipe out every non-sorcerer. Is the world at peace now?"]
["Then what?"]
[Geto clearly hadn't followed your logic that far.]
["Yes. Then what. As far as I know, even when two sorcerers have a child together, the next generation isn't guaranteed to be born with Cursed Techniques."]
[You pushed your glasses up, your gaze razor-edged.]
["Even the Big Three Sorcerer Families can't avoid it. The Zenin Clan's children born without techniques are living proof of that."]
[You looked toward Tsukumo.]
[She raised an eyebrow, then nodded.]
["Correct. Sorcerer bloodlines carry hereditary potential, but it's far from absolute. Atavism is not uncommon."]
[With a Special Grade's endorsement behind you, you turned back to Geto...]
["Good. So after the first purge, after you've slaughtered billions of non-sorcerers..."]
["When the surviving sorcerers have children, full of hope for the next generation, and discover the baby was born an ordinary person with no Cursed Energy..."]
["By your logic, that child is defective too. Culled for the 'greater good.' Survival of the fittest. Is that it?"]
["Would you strangle your own child with your bare hands, Suguru?"]
["I..."]
[Geto froze. He hadn't thought beyond the impulse he'd blurted out.]
[That seemingly airtight logic had been ripped wide open by your blunt, brutal extrapolation.]
[Kill all non-sorcerers? That meant killing every non-sorcerer infant born from that point forward.]
[An endless slaughter of newborns, stretching into eternity.]
[Tsukumo rested her chin on one hand, studying you with fresh surprise. She hadn't expected you to find the logical fracture that fast.]
[You didn't let Geto's silence stop you. You kept pushing.]
["If that's the paradise you're hoping for..."]
["If the people left standing have to keep murdering their own flesh and blood to maintain some illusion of purity..."]
["Then these things that can no longer be called human, wearing human skin while butchering their own children, how are they any different from the Cursed Spirits that devour each other?!"]
[A cold laugh escaped your lips. You crushed the empty can in your fist, the crunch of aluminum echoing down the corridor like a gunshot.]
["If the price of a world without Cursed Spirits is turning us into monsters more revolting than the spirits themselves..."]
["I'd rather keep things the way they are! I refuse that twisted hell. Absolutely refuse it!"]
[Silence fell. Heavier than before. It pooled in the space around the vending machine bench like something with weight.]
[Geto didn't argue back. He couldn't.]
[The honor student who'd always been able to organize everything into neat columns of duty and principle sat mute, choked into silence by the stench of blood in your reasoning.]
[Killing the children of non-sorcerers...]
[Internal purges to maintain purity...]
[The image was too concrete. So concrete it turned his stomach. He'd thought he'd found a lifeline to cling to, only to discover it was a snake drenched in venom.]
["Ha..."]
[A soft laugh broke the deadlock. Tsukumo hadn't taken offense at your near-hostile intensity.]
[Instead, her eyes narrowed. She leaned forward, and the vast Cursed Energy belonging to a Special Grade flickered to life around her, barely perceptible but unmistakable.]
[Even that faint trace thickened the air until it felt like breathing mercury.]
["Hayase. I think you're confused about something."]
[She wasn't looking at Geto, who'd retreated deep inside himself. Her gaze was fixed on you, those wild eyes carrying a thread of amusement and a thread of dangerous appraisal.]
["Are you... directing killing intent at me right now?"]
[You didn't answer. You only stared back, cold and unblinking. But Cursed Energy had already begun circulating through your body unbidden, every muscle wound tight as a bowstring.]
["Interesting."]
[Tsukumo tapped her temple with one finger.]
["Do you understand what 'Special Grade' means? It's not just a fancy title."]
["It means I could topple a nation single-handedly. It means I could crush you like an ant with a flick of my finger."]
["Faced with that kind of overwhelming gap, a normal sorcerer might be furious inside, but their body would still freeze, tremble. But you..."]
[She studied those eyes behind your glasses, still cold, still calculating, with something almost like resolve burning underneath. No fear. Only assessment.]
[You were evaluating how, if she made a move, you could throw everything you had into taking a piece of her with you, even if it meant mutual destruction.]
["If that hell ever became reality..."]
[Your voice came at last, terrifyingly calm, ignoring the suffocating pressure of her Cursed Energy bearing down on your shoulders.]
["If for the sake of some so-called greater good, the world truly became a monsters' paradise sustained by the slaughter of infants..."]
["Then whether you're Special Grade or anything else, as long as you stand on that side, I will kill you."]