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Mobius opened her mouth slightly. What was going on? Lumine should have been the one in the wrong—so why was she the one feeling guilty?
Glancing at Sakura, who was covering her face like a flustered child, she immediately understood that she couldn't rely on her for anything right now.
With no other choice, Mobius spoke first.
"It's not that we wanted to hide it from you," she said slowly. "But… Lumine, now that you know that almost all of the Fourteen Heroes may have been reborn—tell me. What are your thoughts?"
"Now that we've all been reborn, shouldn't we work together to find a way to fight the Honkai and avoid repeating the mistakes of our previous lives?" Lumine asked, clearly confused. "We're practically prophets of this era now. Since we know when disasters will happen, isn't it only natural to try to prevent them—or at least minimize the damage?"
Mobius stared at him. "Lumine, is that really what you think? Even if we know our future fate, how do you plan to change it?"
Lumine fell silent.
To put it bluntly, he didn't believe this era could truly be saved—no matter what he did. And yet, he still wanted to try.
This era itself might not be worth it—but **Elysia** was. And so were the comrades who had once chased the fire alongside her.
He had already fought once as a so-called "prophet." He knew better than anyone how difficult it was to change destiny. Some things simply couldn't be altered just by knowing they would happen.
Take the upcoming Third Great Honkai, for example. Everyone knew it would erupt in Nagazora City—but how could they convince the higher-ups? How should they evacuate the civilians? And what if evacuating the city caused the eruption to occur somewhere else entirely?
Because of that, he had already reached a grim conclusion.
They had no choice but to let it erupt in Changkong City.
"Or," Mobius said slowly, "we could adopt Mei's Project Stigmata—connecting everyone's dreams into a single shared world."
"I will never allow that."
Lumine's voice was sharp, resolute.
"Even if Project Stigmata has the highest success rate, I will not allow it to be carried out," he said firmly. "Civilization should be defined by humanity, not by civilization itself."
He knew exactly what Project Stigmata represented.
A world where everyone lived inside their own dream—was that really living? Or was it just a beautifully packaged death? Every interaction, every smile, every conversation would be nothing more than a hallucination.
To Lumine, Project Stigmata was no different from Gijera's pollen in the Ultraman Tiga Verse or Eye of the Moon Plan which is Madara's plan from Naruto Verse.
If Mobius chose to push that project forward again, he would stand against her without hesitation.
If Project Stigmata were merely a brutal selection process—survival of the fittest—he could accept that. But turning humanity into a single integrated consciousness?
No.
He would rather die fighting as a human than "survive" like that.
"Then what do you think we should do?" Mobius asked coldly, her gaze locked onto him.
Lumine took a deep breath.
"The **Chimera Project**…"
"No!"
This time, Mobius cut him off instantly.
"Do you want to repeat what you did in the last life?" she snapped. "Do you want us to watch you walk alone toward destruction again while we can do nothing? Do you want to relive those countless sleepless nights—again?"
"That was a necessary trade-off—"
"That was never necessary!" Mobius shouted. "Lumine, do you really think the world can't function without you? That it collapses if you're gone?"
She glared at him.
"Don't be so arrogant."
Lumine pursed his lips and did not answer.
Indeed, whether he existed or not made little difference. In the end, neither side had won the final battle. Both could only lie dormant in the collapsed world, waiting for the next era to arrive.
Elysia was about to speak when Mobius shot her a sharp glare.
Now was not the time.
Now that the truth had been laid bare, Lumine needed to be struck like this—otherwise… otherwise she would only end up watching him walk toward destruction again.
She didn't want to experience that feeling ever again.
To hell with saving the world.
What she wanted to save now was the boy standing in front of her.
But to her surprise, Sakura spoke.
"The world… can indeed exist without Lumine," she said quietly. "But I only know that I cannot live without him."
Her voice did not tremble, yet every word landed heavily.
"In my previous life, if not for him, I would never have had the chance to truly understand Rin—or even become a proper older sister. If not for him, I wouldn't have even been able to say goodbye to Rin properly."
She clenched her fingers.
"To the world, perhaps the difference between having him and not having him is only a few more deaths, a little more war, a little more suffering. But to me… without him, I can't even imagine what kind of desperate future I would be forced to face."
Mobius stared at Sakura in confusion.
Are you persuading him… or confessing?
Elysia: "..."
No—this wasn't right.
She needed to think carefully too. Otherwise, her Lumine would really be taken away.
Lumine lowered his head. Silence stretched on for a long while before he finally looked at Mobius again.
"You're right, Doctor," he said calmly. "This world is the same whether I'm here or not. I can't save it—and it doesn't deserve my effort to save it."
"Then what exactly are you—"
"Because…" Lumine lifted his gaze toward the ceiling, as if staring beyond it, toward a distant star-filled sky. "To my shame, this world isn't worth it."
"But you are."
"All of you are."
Lumine remembered the memory that touched him and said softly, "You are worth it for me to do this."
...
See?
They lived so pridefully to the end.
They sang the ode to civilization with their lives.
This is the tale of those known as the Flame-Chasers.
This is the unfinished journey of the Thirteen.
But visitor,
your path continues, no?
Then you should follow your heart.
Go along the footprints
to witness their crusade.
In the end, you will go beyond their destined tomb—
To create a future we could not reach.
...
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