F-f-father! I won't allow such indecent behavior!* ↑↑
(tl note: from a Mobile Suit Gundam 00 drama CD; a famous comedic line spoken by Lockon Stratos while trying to "rescue" Setsuna F. Seiei from Graham Akert).
(Author: It's the climax. The Mea side is subdued, but various cinematic flashy scenes are probably happening off-screen.)
For Akebono City, and of course for the human world as well, it became the largest fierce battle since the Abyss Invasion Incident five years ago.
On the ground, volunteer supernatural ability users led by the Savers and holy beasts, and in the sky, a defensive line established by T.P. Eight Olishua, Tsubasa Kazaoka, and others possessing the rare ability of flight, were holding back the invasion of the aberrations sent by Greysphere.
However, no matter how great their abilities were, there was no sign of the number of enemies emerging one after another from the Gate stopping.
Faced with an overwhelming army from another dimension that possessed both quality and quantity and was being sent in one after another, it could be said that even if they themselves remained unharmed, it was only a matter of time before damage reached the helpless residents.
──However, even so, there was hope.
After cutting down an aberration that had broken through the defensive line and attacked the children in a shelter with a single flash of a sword of light, T.P. Eight Olishua returned a reassuring smile to the children, then looked up at the sky and turned a gaze of expectation toward the Tree of Evil.
“Show me, Mea. The future you will lead to.”
The pair of shining heterochromatic eyes fixed upon the top of the towering giant tree──where two colors repeatedly crossed paths as though dancing, tracing intertwined trajectories*. (tl note: trajectory here can also mean “path one has taken”)
It was the sight of the grey fallen angel's downward sword slash being blocked by Mitsui Mea's orange great shield.
While continuing the exchange of offense and defense whose number since the battle began he could no longer tell, the grey fallen angel opened his mouth with a puzzled look.
“Why... Why won't you attack? Mea!”
Until now, he alone had been launching attacks with his sword, while Mea had devoted herself entirely to defense and had not counterattacked even once.
To her behavior that seemed to abandon fighting him despite facing him, she replied.
“And why aren't you using the power of corrosion?”
“──”
“Because you're hesitating too, aren't you?”
The power of corrosion──the original ability possessed by the Abyssal Qlippoth "Adyeshach."
The deadly poisonous power that corroded all who touched it was a terrifying ability that turned every single action he made into a one-hit sure kill, and in the past he had tormented the Savers and the Ten Archangels of Sefirot with that power.
However, he was not using that power against Mea at all.
Of course, after being reborn in a new body, it was possible that he had lost his former abilities.
But in Mea's eyes, it was not that he could not use the power of corrosion, but that he did not want to use it. Against the sword he wielded, she sensed a slight hesitation within the fierce assault.
Pointing out that fact, Mea stated it clearly.
“You said you don't want to fight us, right? Just like in Eight-san's song, that you wished the world could be kind.”
Mea evaded his sideways sweeping sword with a movement like a backflip in midair, then planted her feet on one of the branches extending from the top of the Tree of Evil and looked down at the fallen angel.
As the blowing wind softly lifted her orange-glowing bangs, Mea released the great shield she carried in her hand into its ribbon form and pierced the boy with a resolute gaze.
“If Greysphere is watching me through you, then your own feelings──that you don't want to fight──should have been conveyed as well.”
“...And what of it? No matter what I think, no matter what you say, his decision won’t be overturned now.”
“That's not true! Stop fighting, Greysphere. Abyss Zero, who abandoned you, is gone now... Stop hurting others just to return to your home.”
Not only toward the boy before her, but through him, Mea strongly appealed to Greysphere, his “god.”
She wanted to convey that not a single person here, including the fallen angel, desired this battle. In response to Mea's eyes, which looked at him with earnest feelings, what the fallen angel returned as Greysphere's mouthpiece was once again a swing of his longsword.
“Focus on the fight!”
“...!”
The dark shock wave released from the slash cut the branch on which Mea had been standing cleanly in half with unmistakable lethality.
Mea instantly leapt up and narrowly avoided the attack, but the fallen angel moved into her path as if using shukuchi* and brought down his longsword. (tl note: rapid movement technique)
Blocking it with the great shield redeployed from the orange ribbon, Mea showed an expression of anguish at the impact, which had become even sharper and heavier than before. Looking straight at her with a deeply cold gaze, the boy said,
“Greysphere has suffered all this time...!”
Regripping the longsword that had been deflected by the great shield with both hands, he struck again with all his might.
The grey slash, carrying a faint power of light within the darkness, sent a sharp crack running through the barrier of light spreading from the Hod Shield.
He still had not used the power of corrosion, Adyeshach's true specialty. However, his attacks were in no way inferior to those he once possessed, and with strength that could never be imagined from his small build, he broke through Mea's defense.
Pressing the his sword pressure* forward, he spoke with eyes of extreme sadness. (tl note: a term in japanese fiction; it’s the pressure/shock wave emitted when a master wields a sword)
“He had always been alone since the moment he was born. Abandoned by Abyss Zero, he had no place to belong either in darkness or in light... No one accepted him. Not Charon, not Ain Sof!”
“! Had he tried to go to Fairy World before?”
“That's right... Of course, he was rejected. Even if he had a heart, his nature was no different from Abyss Zero's. His existence, which adversely affected the World Tree Sefira simply by being there, could not be accepted no matter what. So he was exiled... even though he himself had no malice!”
“How could... that...”
This was not the first time Greysphere had attempted to return to Fairy World. Apparently, there had once been a time when he had tried to coexist peacefully in the way Mea had suggested.
Even so, because of the nature of his existence, they could not coexist, and the fact that he had been exiled to a world of nothingness where no one existed left Mea speechless.
When he said, “He has no place to belong,” it had not merely been a self-abasing remark; it came from despair backed by Greysphere's own experiences.
That's why... understanding his feelings, Mea questioned him.
“That's why you're trying to rule? To win a place for him to return to...”
“To rule so as not to be ruled... To exile so as not to be exiled──isn't that a legitimate struggle for existence for you as well? He couldn't even enter that cycle of competition... Not for thousands of years, not for hundreds of millions of years. Isn't it enough already? Let him go home.”
“You...”
Seeing the boy speak with eyes so sorrowful they seemed on the verge of tears, Mea understood the deep sadness Greysphere had carried.
And the emotions of the boy himself, who pitied him.
He, who until now had somehow seemed impossible to grasp──at last, she was able to understand his true nature.
(So that's why you, all of you...)
Once she came to know it, it was the same as herself.
It was an emotion everyone possessed.
The moment she reached the truth, Mea released the great shield in her hand and──with the thin sword swung from her left hand, knocked away the longsword he held.
“──!?”
Like a flash, it was a strike that lasted less than an instant.
As he tried to raise again the longsword he had brought down against the great shield, she exploited the slight loosening of his grip and knocked the weapon from his hand. It was not a simple contest of strength, but an outcome decided by the difference in skill and experience between the two in “fighting with weapons.”
His longsword, knocked far away, spun through the air before falling into the trunk of the Tree of Evil and embedding itself there. By the time his attention shifted there for an instant, the tip of the sword of Mea──now changed into the blue Chesed Form──was already pointed right before his eyes.
“...So if you had been serious, it would have been one strike... You really are strong...”
With him unarmed and a sword pointed at him, he realized his defeat.
The figure of him kneeling on one knee with an expression of resignation was so gracious──to Mea, it looked frail, like her former self when she had been told the truth about who she was.
Then, with a smile that seemed somehow relieved, he said to her,
“Now, finish me off.”
As if urging her to do so, saying that he would be satisfied if he were cut down by her, the boy raised his face and looked up at the girl.
The girl's current appearance, with her hair changed to blue, was by a strange coincidence the form imbued with the power of the Archangel of Mercy Chesed whom he had caused trouble five years ago. He was even smiling as though he considered it an honor to have been defeated by that form.
However.
The girl──Mitsui Mea──changed her appearance into her black-haired non-combat form, then released the thin sword she held in her left hand, returning it to a ribbon.
“...!? Why...?”
When she then retied the blue ribbon together with the orange ribbon in her hair, and even released the wings on her back, ripples of agitation shook his eyes at the sight of Mea.
Remaining on one knee, the boy sat frozen in astonishment.
Mea then took a few steps toward him──and without saying anything, she bent her knees and tightly embraced him.
“Ah──”
To the boy who had told her to finish him off, what she returned was not a sharp slash but a warm embrace.
Near his ear, Mea spoke.
“It's okay.”
“...”
“Greysphere, and you too... it's okay now.”
The voice she spoke in a whisper was words that exposed the deepest part of his heart, which until now had been hidden away.
“Your enemy is gone now. That’s why… you don't have to be afraid like that anymore.”
“...I...”
What Mea had guessed right was the emotion he had hidden in the depths of his heart.
It was the darkness in the heart that he, who had been an Abyssal Qlippoth as his previous life and had lived a one-of-a-kind history after being reborn by Greysphere, had carried all this time.
It was also an emotion he himself had once scattered throughout the world──the emotion of one who had been cast into an unfamiliar world and an unfamiliar cycle of reincarnation and continued to suffer──the emotion of “fear.”
“The world where you were born isn't filled only with sad things. Don't be frightened. Let's live together.”
“...Daat told me that I would love no one. I... Adyeshach did a lot of terrible things...”
“Even so, a true heart has sprouted within you now. A kind and pure heart. Eight-san told me. The one who told Eight-san and the others about Greysphere... was you, wasn't it?”
“.….”
To Mea's question, he answered with silence.
It was a question that had been bothering her, and his reaction had now turned it into certainty.
The reason Eight had obtained information about Greysphere in advance was because he had made contact with her himself and revealed the objective.
And what that action meant was the fact that he had been conflicted about Greysphere's plan.
“You were really trying to stop Greysphere. It's also true that you want to help him, and it's true that you didn't want to hurt us.”
Those feelings seemed contradictory, but in truth they were consistent.
Until now, they had been obscured by his meaningful remarks that seemed conscious of Eight, his cold attitude toward Tsubasa, and his attitude toward Mea──but in the end, because he had only recently been reborn, he was an innocent and pure, yet clumsy boy to the very core.
He wanted to help Greysphere, but he did not want to hurt Mea and the others.
That was why, even if helping Greysphere resulted in him being struck down by Mea or Eight, his goal unfulfilled, he thought that would be acceptable as well──his true nature was pessimistic.
At Mea's observation, he murmured in a trembling voice.
“...No one will accept us. No one will love us. I know that... Because for the world, our existence itself was unforgivable...”
“Those sad feelings... I understand them too. But even for me, who was nobody, there was a place that accepted me. I'm sure there's one for you too.”
As if imitating what had made her happy when those two sisters did it for her, Mea gently patted the boy's back while embracing him.
Then, taking hold of his shoulders, she looked directly into his eyes and spoke.
Like calling out to someone who had been tormented by a nightmare, urging them to awaken.
“So you should stop denying everything too.”
“............”
“Face the kindness that exists in this world. And that heart you yourself possess as well.”
Having touched the darkness in the boy's heart, Mea felt as though she were facing her former self.
He had an Abyssal Qlippoth as a previous life, one that could not coexist with life, and he felt a great debt of gratitude toward the lonely god who had been exiled from the world.
For someone with such a history, Mea thought that what he lacked most was faith in the kindness of this world.
Certainly, this world was not made up only of lofty ideals, but to give up on possibilities and continue wandering in despair… She thought that was simply too sad.
Therefore──
“Riin.”
“...Huh?”
Mea called out to him.
It was neither Adyeshach nor Greysphere's fallen angel, but the name of the grey-haired boy, spoken for the first time just now.
“I thought of a new name for you. You don't have one yet, right? Since you've been reborn──from reincarnation──how about 'Riin'?” (tl note: リインカーネーション/ri-in-kā-nē-shon)
“.….”
With an embarrassed smile, Mea asked what he thought of the name she had been considering ever since she had wanted to believe in him.
He was no longer the Abyssal Qlippoth who could do nothing but destroy everything.
Now that he had been purified by Greysphere and, whatever the means, possessed feelings that cared for others, she thought he was no longer a being who had to be regarded as an enemy by all life.
That's why.
“Mea will bless you. Exactly because Mea’s neither human nor holy beast... I will accept you not as anything else, but as a boy.”
Mea wanted to accept him, who had truly been reborn. Of course, if he did bad things like this again, she would scold him, and she might even punish him… But he had only just begun as a life born into this world.
Even if many people were to reject him… Mea wanted, at least herself, to bless outcasts like them.
Just as all her companions had once accepted her.
She showed her empathy.
“I can't steal away the darkness in someone's heart like Eight-san can, but... I want to get close and worry together with you. Being all alone is very lonely.”
“...Mea, you...”
“So... let's become friends. I'll show you that there’s a place for you in this world too.”
“...A place for me...”
And so, Mea's words reached the heart of the boy──Riin.
Confused by the large drops running from his own eyes, he took several moments before finally seeming to understand, and a smile appeared on his face.
“────!”
The moment a light returned for the first time to his silver eyes, which had been empty, he raised his voice and cried at the emotion that had welled up in his heart.
Joy, anger, sadness, happiness.
The moment he truly became aware that he now possessed the emotions that were natural for humans, he was finally able to bury his former self──Adyeshach.
“...It's okay... It's okay.”
Embracing him again as he sobbed as though his heart had become a tangled mess, Mea stayed close to him as if soothing a small child.
While doing so, she turned her gaze from atop the Tree of Evil to the scene below, where she could see the army of aberrations halting their advance and returning one after another through the Gates.
──Greysphere must have understood as well.
That the world which had once rejected him was not something made only of harshness.
There was no guarantee that he would never again become a threat to this world in the future.
But even so, Mea wanted to believe that she had now taken the first step toward a dialogue with him.
“Look, your feelings have reached Greysphere too. You're not alone anymore.”
“...Yeah... yeah...!”
That was why he no longer needed to fear this world into which he had been reborn.
That he no longer needed to obsess over being nobody. When Mea told him that, Riin smiled gently, tears gathered in his eyes.
However, the moment his gaze stopped on a luminous point shining like the sun behind Mea, his expression once more took on resignation.
“Thank you, Mea... But I'm sorry. Even so, it seems I was a being who should never have been born.”
“...!”
A Gate opened from a different direction than the one through which Greysphere's terminals had departed, and the countless flashes of light released from within swallowed up and swept away the terminals that still remained in the sky.
Only those possessing the greatest power among the Archangels could make such overwhelming violence possible.
But the one who fired that bombardment was, of course, not T.P. Eight Olishua.
The King of the Ten Archangels of Sefirot and administrator of Fairy World, Keter, had descended.
Faced with that being, which appeared like an executioner from the heavens, Riin accepted the fate that had come as it was destined to come──
──and Mea, more human than anyone else, became furious for the first time in her life.
(Author: A boss rush unique to the movie version.
Eight is making a fist pump over this, but on the Daat-san side they're giving a wry smile.)