"The end of one song is the beginning of another—if you have the strength to play it."
Scene 1 – Calm Before the Storm
May 21, 2011 – 6:47 AM – Hoshino Household
The morning felt… unnaturally gentle.Warm sunlight pooled across the wooden floorboards, painting golden stripes across the living room. The usual cicada hum—background noise to most Japanese summers—was absent. The silence wasn't peaceful. It was expectant.
Ai sat on the couch with her legs folded under her, brushing Souta's long, slightly tangled hair. The faint scent of yuzu shampoo lingered in the air, and her comb moved rhythmically, untangling both knots and thoughts.
Souta sat between her legs, knees pulled in, humming softly under his breath. His posture was relaxed, but there was tension buried under the surface—like a wire pulled tight. Happy sat on his shoulder, unmoving, a silent sentinel with button eyes watching everything.
"Mama," Souta murmured, voice feather-light, "you've always had such soft hands…"
Ai smiled. "Do you want me to always do this for you?" she asked, combing gently, as if she could comb away whatever darkness lingered in his thoughts.
"Yeah…" he whispered, and then—
"…even if I don't exist the same way anymore."
Her hand stilled mid-stroke. Not out of shock. But out of pain.
She didn't look surprised.
Slowly, she set the brush down and wrapped both arms around him from behind. Her cheek rested against his head, her voice no longer soft, but firm—gentle only in its conviction.
"You'll always be my son," Ai said. "No matter what. Nothing—no god, no power, no universe—can take that from me."
Souta's shoulders trembled. "Then I'll protect you. All of you. I don't care if it breaks me."
"No." Ai's arms tightened around him, one hand resting over his chest, where his heart beat like a small, stubborn drum.
"Don't protect us by breaking," she whispered. "Protect us by being with us."
And for a moment, all the divinity, the pressure, the fractured destiny—it slipped away.Souta was just a boy. A son. Held in his mother's arms.
A boy whose eyes shimmered not with power… but with love.
Scene 2 – The Attack
11:29 AM – Minato District, Tokyo
The three of them walked down the sunny streets of Minato, a paper bag of manga between Ruby's arms, Aqua sipping from a canned iced coffee, and Souta happily hugging a limited-edition plush he insisted on getting for Happy.
They were laughing. Really laughing. Joking about ridiculous plot twists in shoujo manga and debating which heroine had the best tragic backstory.
That's when it hit.
Not thunder.
Not sirens.
Just silence.
The sound vanished like a switch had been flipped. Even the wind stopped.
And then—A slice of the world vanished.
A perfectly clean, forty-foot-wide sphere of space was just gone.Where people had stood… there was nothing. No screams. No bodies. Just a sphere of void so unnatural, it hurt to look at.
"What the hell?!" Ruby screamed, stepping back so fast she tripped.
Aqua grabbed her and Souta and shoved them behind him. His hand instinctively reached into his jacket for nothing in particular—just anything to make himself feel like he could do something.
"This isn't an illusion…" he muttered. "This is real."
The air above them tore open like paper.
Descending through the rift was Yoru.
No longer shrouded in darkness. His face was clear now, features sharp and cruel, a mirror warped by obsession. One of his eyes glowed bright blue—burning like a star devouring itself.
"You don't belong here," he said, voice devoid of anger, as if stating a law of nature. His eyes locked on Souta.
"You weren't meant to exist. You tipped the balance. Now you must be removed."
Souta froze. Aqua didn't.
"Over my dead body," Aqua growled.
Yoru didn't blink. "That can be arranged."
He raised his hand—and time shattered.
Ruby's scream froze mid-air. The fluttering papers stopped falling. The birds in the sky paused mid-wingbeat.
Only Souta could move.
"…No," he said.
And the world cracked beneath his foot as he stepped forward.
"You think I don't know I tipped the balance?" His voice trembled with something deeper than fear. "You think I haven't felt it every day?"
He held out his hand. The air around it fractured—like glass under a hammer. Reality wobbled, uncertain.
"But I'm not going to undo what I am."
He looked up, glowing faintly now, not with wrath—but resolve.
"I'm going to become something stronger."
"You're not a god," Yoru sneered.
"No," Souta whispered, smiling.
"I'm something better.I'm my mama's son."
Scene 3 – Power Awakened
The world pulsed.Light and shadow flickered unnaturally around Souta's body, his feet hovering inches above the cracked pavement.
His eyes closed.
And he remembered.
Ai's arms around him when he cried at night.Ruby shoving snacks in his mouth mid-argument.Aqua patting his head wordlessly when he thought no one noticed.Happy nuzzling his cheek, whispering dreams only he could hear.
And he remembered the fear, too.The helplessness.The guilt.The feeling of being other.
"I don't need to control everyone else."
His voice echoed—not just into the air, but through existence.
"I just need to be strong enough… to keep them safe."
A ripple shot out from his chest, and he ascended.
Not with wings.Not with a halo.But with the kind of light that only comes from being loved.
Yoru flinched.
Because this power—this impossible, uncontainable energy—was not fueled by destruction. It was alive. It breathed with memory. With feeling. With a mother's lullaby and a brother's hand and a sister's laughter.
And then—
Happy leapt from Ruby's frozen shoulder.
As he landed, a golden aura wrapped around him, threads of starlight weaving into fur, buttons reshaping into eyes—real, glowing, alert.
He landed like a lion, a beast reborn.
He opened his mouth—and spoke.
"Souta," he said, his voice deep and warm, the echo of forgotten gods in his throat.
"I'm with you.Let's protect them.Together."
Souta grinned through the tears in his eyes.
And then—
He unleashed it.
The sky cracked open. The city lit up with sacred flame. The veil tore.
Scene 4 – The Song That Ends the Volume
Meanwhile – Hoshino Household
Ai stumbled forward, almost tripping over her own feet.She'd felt it—not just a tremor in the air, but a deep ache in her chest, like her body recognized something impossible.
She reached the window—and froze.
The clouds had parted, bleeding hues of gold and violet.Stars spun in daylight like some divine eye had opened.The wind sang, but it wasn't wind. It was memory.
Ai fell to her knees.
"Souta…" she whispered. "What are you doing?"
Back on the battlefield—
Ruby clutched Aqua's hand as the air turned into colors they didn't have names for. The vibrations weren't sound—but emotion.
"He's rewriting the rules," Aqua murmured, staring in awe.
Ruby looked up at him, worried. "Is that… safe?"
Aqua didn't answer right away.
Then, finally: "No.But it's him."
At that moment—Yoru screamed.He struck—but the attack shattered mid-air.Souta and Happy stood as one. Together, they broke through the barrier between the seen and unseen.
The sky tore—and something stepped through.
A woman.Tall. Glowing. Her eyes like Ai's—down to the shimmer of sadness behind the starlight.
She stepped forward from the rift.
"Souta…?" she asked, her voice familiar.
He froze mid-air.
"…Mama?"
But it wasn't Ai.
It was someone else.
And then—The world went dark.