Dimensional Descent

A hollow sound rang in Leonel's ears, almost as though an enormous explosion had gone off in his surroundings and now only an eerie sharpness of what remained of his hearing was left. Even with all the sensory perception and infallible memory in the world, in just those few seconds, it was as though his mind was blank. He couldn't see or hear anything, nor could he remember what kind of thoughts he was having.

Leonel never hid anything from Aina. There were secrets he probably should have kept from everyone around him that would have probably made it easier to protect their safety that he had still chosen to tell to her. And, there were secrets that weren't so important, but were far more personal, that he had still decided to tell her as well.

But, there were two things Leonel had never told Aina. Whether consciously or subconsciously, he never even began to express them. It was hard to tell if he had done it on purpose or if it was a sheer coincidence that he never got around to doing so. But… one was hard pressed to believe that two such important things just happened to be matters that Leonel didn't get around to telling someone he usually told everthing about…

The first was Leonel's true status as a Dark Prisoner. He never explained anything about his evaluation as a child, how this had estranged him from the Fawkes family when he might otherwise have grown up with a fine relationship with the royal family, or how Lionel had taken his place…

The second though… Was related to the specifics of that night after Aina was forcefully teleported to Terrain… And how that night… The words Aina had just spoken were the exact words James had said to him that day…

These were two memories that Leonel had long since buried deep within him, and with his control over his mind, he never thought about them. Unlike a normal individual who might stumble onto such thoughts from time to time and suddenly find themselves flashing back to that day, Leonel was completely different. It could be said that since those events happened… This was maybe only the first or second time he had thought of them.

it. Without access to Tier 4 of his Ability Index, he couldn't control the facets and knobs of his mind as easily as he could before, resulting in a relentless flood that bombarded his thoughts and threatened to turn his brain to

them, the screams of women and children who were caught in the crossfire, and even the light reflected in James' eyes when he

~

You. Want. Me.

deductions to be wrong. Maybe it was a coincidence that the man holding a gun to James' head was so tall. Maybe the resemblance they shared was overblown by

of over a decade wasn't trying to drag him toward his death. Just maybe… Just maybe he

beat even under the influence of all the noise. At that moment, he knew… He knew that the friend he had come to

I really… took

were hardly anything alike, but they were inseparable. It was the kind of relationship that Leonel couldn't

Being drilled again with the importance of Respect and Persistence was nice, but there were so many ways to interpret those two words. Who deserved respect? What kind of goals were worth being persistent in the face of? The answers to these questions was

him northward. This wasn't because James was so morally superior. In fact, James was an

women like rags, he didn't care enough to pay much attention in school, he put no effort into anything because his family was rich and famous, and he hadn't hesitated to attempt to betray the hopes of dreams of a team filled with his brothers for