Editing City Series:Volume8b Chapter15 (section)

===Aoe’s Continued Sight Mode: In DT Castle===

'''<Aoe’s Over Reload>

Aoe climbed the narrow stairs with Yuo in his arms. It was a winding basement stairway. Some of the angled stones forming the wall had fallen out onto the stairs.

The castle was no longer shaking around them, so its collapse was complete.

<Based on what I heard and felt, the center of the castle collapsed inwards.>

Aoe hurried up the stairs.

Yuo remained perfectly still in his arms with her arms around his neck. Her Sight Mode expression had the eyebrows bent worriedly. Her unfocused eyes looked up vaguely in the direction of his face.

<Um…you can put me down now.>

“Mh,” he grunted, but did not do so. So she did not let go of him either.

<nowiki><I’m</nowiki> still not sure what’s going on, but what are you to me? Aoe was it?>

When she struggled to remember his name, he only gave an expressionless grunt of acknowledgment.

She responded with a tense wrinkling of her brow.

<Why won’t you tell me anything? Surely you can at least tell me who we were to each other.>

“I would rather not.”

<Wh-why?>

<Because I don’t have the guts.>

Since she was in Sight, she could not read the window floating above his head and she wrinkled her brow even more.

She tilted her head and her loose hair swayed while more text appeared.

<If you won’t tell me, we can never be more than strangers…and it’s harder to thank you.>

“I haven’t done anything you need to thank me for.”

<But you helped me escape there.>

Her thoughts appeared in her window, but then her eyebrows lowered.

<Except that was my decision, wasn’t it?>

Aoe looked to her lowered head with exasperation on his face.

“Listen.”

<Listening.>

“I pushed you toward that decision, but I am no more than a stranger to this version of you.”

<You don’t remember your past with me, so whatever I might want is irrelevant to you now,> he added on his window.

So…

“Do not trust me so readily.”

He came to a stop partway up the stairs.

“For one thing, I never arrive on time when you’re worried. And…”

He paused for a moment.

“I have killed several people and I am proud of it.”

She responded by nodding her head.

<Probably so, if you’re willing to say that yourself.>

“Then!”

He raised his voice, but now she shook her head.

<But is it so wrong to feel safe with someone like that and to want to be with him?>



'''<Aoe’s Over Zoom>

Yuo asked her question in his arms and shut her eyes.

<This is my decision to make, no matter who I choose or what kind of person they might be.>

She shut her mouth and squeezed with the arms around him.

<nowiki><I</nowiki> refuse to believe something I believed in would bring me unhappiness. And if I thought my own survival was a bad thing, I would have to question why I bothered defying my dad and the others in the first place.>

“…”

<What about you? Maybe you didn’t make it in time and maybe you have killed people, but would you be happy if you could forget those things ever happened? You know as well as I do that forgetting does not mean it never happened.>

She sucked in a shallow breath and shouted with her thoughts.

<nowiki><I</nowiki> forgot about my dad and the others and I forgot about you, but you were still there. And even though I forgot about you…>

She let out a rough breath.

<nowiki><I</nowiki> want to get to know you again and be with you again. Is that so wrong?>

“Well…”

<Is it so wrong that I don’t remember who I have been for the past however long?>

After Aoe read her questions, he saw something shining on her cheek.

It was a tear.



'''<Aoe’s Over Zoom>

Aoe’s vision grew clearer as he viewed the tear on Yuo’s cheek.

At the same time, her expression suddenly changed. She had looked worried, but now her eyes widened in surprise.

She removed her right hand from around his neck and placed it on her cheek.

He saw a new tear there.

The eyebrows of her surprised expression collapsed. Her mouth twisted and a window opened.

<Is…is it…>

A tear dripped down her cheek and she wiped it away with her hand.

<Is it so wrong to want to be with you when you cry?>

Her question led him to realize something.

'''<Aoe’s Over Zoom>

There were indeed tears on Yuo’s cheek, but their location was unusual.

Only her right cheek was damp.

Those were not her tears. Someone else’s tears had fallen onto her cheek.

His lips trembled as he asked whose tears those could be.

“Was it…me?”

He didn’t need an answer because he could now feel the tears dripping down his own cheeks.

His cheeks twisted and he could not stop his thoughts from leaving his mouth.

“I…”

He choked a bit and his vision blurred, but he still got his mouth open.

“I…!”

He sucked in a breath and tried to force out his voice, but then Monkey raised his front paw atop Aoe’s right shoulder.

Confused, Aoe looked over to see a word mail window had opened.

The message Monkey showed him was not a new message or one he had already read. It was a draft filled with typos.

It was the one he had written for Yuo in the central comm tower.

He had never actually sent it and Monkey was showing it to him now.

He read through it.

“No matter…”

He spoke the words aloud.

“No matter what I might learn about you, it changes nothing.”

'''<Opening word mail window>