He showed his resolve—to endure it all.
All of this unfolded before Nameless, who watched in silence, fully grasping the depth of Frey’s determination.
For a while, he said nothing .. observing, analyzing how Frey endured.
Then, after neither too long nor too short a time, the masked man finally spoke.
"Are you certain?" Nameless asked, pulling Frey back into the blood-soaked world once more, pointing downward.
"Are you truly capable of enduring this?"
"Look at them carefully.
Look... and say those words to their faces."
At that, Frey clenched his fist.
He didn’t dare argue .. fully aware of the weight of what he was about to do.
Slowly, he lowered his head... and looked at them one last time.
Many of those corpses belonged to Ultras soldiers or demons .. monsters who had committed countless atrocities, beings who deserved death.
But many others...
They were nothing more than ordinary soldiers .. killed by Frey in mere seconds during war.
Their only sin was being born on the other side of the world.
Just ordinary humans .. who had lived their lives like anyone else.
"You’re ready to endure this because they mean nothing to you... isn’t that right?"
Nameless whispered beside Frey’s ear.
"This is human nature.
You live your lives based on discrimination."
"As long as they’re not close to me...
As long as they mean nothing to me...
Even if they’re innocent, it’s fine to use them for my own interests."
"That thought," Nameless said quietly,
"crossed your mind."
Frey remained silent.
Because Nameless was right.
"You placed all these souls on one side of the scale...
And the lives of those important to you on the other."
"Abraham Starlight.
Ada Starlight."
"Against tens of thousands of the dead—an absurd comparison.
Yet the scale tipped toward those who mattered to you."
"Do Abraham and Ada Starlight deserve life more than these souls deserve salvation?"
"Of course not."
"But you chose your father and your sister anyway ..
Based on discrimination, not justice or equality."
Until the very end, Frey Starlight had no words to respond.
Because everything Nameless said was true.
He had perfectly dissected what it meant to be human.
Frey was willing to endure ..
To torture tens of thousands of souls...
To burn them away ..
All for the sake of saving those who mattered to him.
"However..."
For a moment, it felt as though everything froze.
As if even the air itself had grown colder.
In those fleeting seconds, Nameless’s eyes glowed with a dark light as he asked his question:
"With these hands of yours...
Who exactly did you kill?"
"Were they only enemies?"
"Tell me...
What have your hands truly committed?"
Nameless stepped closer as both he and Frey stared at the twisted corpses below.
"What are you trying to say...?" Frey asked quietly—unable to raise his voice.
His heart began to race.
A dreadful sensation crept over him.
A sinister, terrifying feeling.
His chest tightened.
Breathing became painful.
Frey felt it ..
He had overlooked something.
Something crucial.
Something terribly important... that he had forgotten.
"Look at them carefully, Frey," Nameless said, his voice pressing down harder.
"Tell me what you see."
"Remember... what your hands have done."
"Remember .. who did you kill?"
With every passing moment ..
Every second... every minute ..
That ominous feeling grew worse.
For an instant, it felt as though everything had frozen—moving in slow motion.
The corpses continued to pile over one another, clawing desperately toward Frey.
Above them, he and Nameless stood—watching.
Then, slowly...
After staring long enough .. after sinking deep into that hellish abyss ..
Frey finally remembered.
He remembered the one thing he had forgotten.
Slowly, his eyes widened.
His lips trembled.
His very being cracked.
Among the mountain of corpses .. down there ..
There was one body.
Just one.
And it made every fiber of Frey’s existence tremble.
It looked no different from the others.
A mangled body.
Its chest was torn open .. pierced by something that had punched straight through it.
Blood poured endlessly from the wound, dripping without cease beneath each crawling step.
Its face was twisted .. half human, half monstrous and warped.
Soaked in blood, filthy beyond measure.
And yet ..
Frey recognized him.
And in that exact moment...
It felt as though something inside Frey shattered.
His heart pounded violently.
His mind went blank.
All his resolve ..
All his determination to fight ..
Evaporated in an instant.
Nameless’s question had been justified.
Frey Starlight had killed many throughout his life.
His victims were always his enemies.
But those bloodstained hands of his were not soaked only in enemy blood ..
They were stained with the blood of those close to him as well.
The blood of someone he had killed with his own hands...
And buried deep within his memories.
And now ..
That person crawled toward him, arm outstretched ..
After suffering endlessly, never finding release.
Frey Starlight still remembered.
As if it had happened yesterday.
He still remembered that night—the night he killed his friend.
The one who had been like a brother to him.
That night, his friend had smiled at him...
Telling him to finish it.
But now ..
That smile was gone.
Replaced by a twisted face ravaged by torment ..
A face begging its friend for salvation.
For a moment, it felt as though everything else disappeared.
As if only the two of them remained.
"...Danzo," Frey whispered .. his voice faint, trembling.
The realization came too late.
And Frey finally understood the full horror of what he had done.
That blood-soaked corpse belonged to his friend ..
The one who had died by his hands.
By killing him, Frey had believed .. somewhere deep in his heart ..that he had ended his suffering.
He had forced himself to believe that, just to keep from going mad under the weight of it all.
But his friend had never found peace.
He had been here the entire time .. suffering.
The moment that truth struck him ..
Everything crashed into Frey’s mind at once.
He was violently dragged back into the real world .. And collapsed to the ground as a searing heat exploded inside his chest.
"Blaaaargh—ugh—!"
Frey vomited .. everything in his stomach spilled out, until he nearly vomited blood.
His body trembled uncontrollably.
His chest felt like it was about to burst.
Tears he had thought long dried welled up in his eyes.
A hoarse sound tore from his throat as he struggled to breathe.
"All this... time... he was..."
That twisted face burned itself into his mind.
"What did I do...?
What have I done... I..."
Frey clenched his teeth .. then slammed his fist into the ground beneath him.
"What did I do?!!"
He screamed at the top of his lungs .. sobbing where he lay.
How could he not ..
After realizing that he hadn’t merely caused his friend’s death...
But had condemned him to endless suffering even after it.
It was the final blow ..
The one that utterly destroyed his resolve.
Nameless had seen it all.
He had known from the beginning that this would happen.
The moment Danzo was added to the other side of the scale,
The very concept of discrimination .. the foundation of human judgment .. collapsed completely.
There was no meaning left in it.
This was the curse of emotions.
A curse Nameless had never possessed.
But now ..
Nameless slowly raised his hand.
His body remained steady—calm as always.
But one hand...
That hand trembled.
Nameless stared at it.
Then at the broken Frey.
Then at the sea of corpses ... where Danzo lay.
And slowly...
Nameless clenched his fist.
Letting the darkness swallow everything.
"..."