Are You Going to Live?
Once upon a time, Chain had light too.
From a very young age, Chain had been a coward.
She couldn't get a single word out in front of strangers, and the moment anything remotely dangerous happened, her body would instinctively shrink back.
She knew, of course, that being afraid of things was nothing to be proud of.
But she had no idea how to actually overcome that fear.
And every time it overwhelmed her, one person was always there at her side.
"It's okay, Chain."
Someone who would always step in front of her, shielding her from the world.
Her older sister — Rafia Curtlay.
Rafia was nothing like Chain.
She was fearless.
Or more precisely, she was someone who knew how to move forward even while afraid.
Whenever Chain froze up and backed away in terror, Rafia would smile and hold out her hand.
"If you're scared, stay behind me."
And then she'd always say the same thing.
"But whatever you do, don't run~!"
Chain loved those words.
Somehow, standing behind Rafia made everything feel easier. No matter how terrifying the world became, if her sister was in front of her, Chain felt like she could survive anything.
The year Chain turned eighteen, the world changed.
Awakeners began appearing among ordinary people, and humanity at last found itself capable of standing against the Gates that had torn open across the globe.
GUOOOOOOO—!!
Within that transformed world, Chain and Rafia were both chosen as Awakeners as well.
Rafia, already an adult, threw herself into conquering Gates almost immediately.
She had to earn money.
She had to feed her family.
It was dangerous work, but Rafia never hesitated.
Chain followed her sister and became an Awakener too.
But the center of every battle was always Rafia. Chain trailed behind her, supporting her however she could.
And every time she did, Chain watched her sister's back.
The way she never backed down, even before a colossal monster. The way she smiled first whenever someone was drowning in despair. The way she reached out her hand to the people shaking in fear.
Rafia was always radiant.
To everyone. But especially to Chain.
Every time Chain looked at her sister, her heart pounded. She respected her. She admired her. And she loved her, with everything she had.
To Chain, Rafia wasn't just family.
She was the only light Chain could look toward when the world went dark.
To Chain, Rafia was the world itself.
But then...
That day...
All of it came crashing down.
At first, it was the sky. Something was wrong with it.
Clouds came rolling in — but it was nothing like an ordinary storm. The entire sky began to twist and blacken, dark clouds piling atop one another in layer after layer, and through the gaps between them, a violet light began to spread.
People looked up.
And then... the sky split open.
KWAAAAAAAHH....!!!
A sound like the world itself screaming — like something being torn apart — reverberated across the earth.
GUAAAAAAAAAAA—!!
A colossal fissure ripped across the heavens, and from beyond it, something began to emerge. At first, no one could tell what it was. It was simply too vast.
But the moment it fully revealed itself — everyone understood.
It was... an eye.
A single eye, so enormous it looked down upon the entire city. A black pupil. At its center, a violet gleam sharp as a star. And around the pupil, violet cracks spiderwebbed outward like shattered glass.
The entire sky writhed around that eye, as if it were alive.
A gigantic violet eye was gazing down at the world.
In that instant, Chain knew.
The world they had lived in... would never be the same again.
"Sis...?"
Chain called out to Rafia, her voice shaking.
Rafia turned around. She tried to smile, the way she always did.
But that day, Rafia couldn't.
"Chain..."
she said. Her voice was trembling.
"Stay behind me."
That was it. That was the last ordinary thing Chain would ever hear her say.
That day was hell.
Not the kind of hell that words could ever describe.
Violet light rained down from the sky... Buildings collapsed. Roads flipped over. People ran, screaming — shrieks and thunder mingling into one unbearable roar. In an instant, the entire city became a battlefield.
Chain just ran, eyes squeezed shut, trying to keep up with Rafia. But everything unfolding before her was too surreal to process.
"Sis!!!"
Chain screamed into the middle of that hell.
"SIS—!!!"
And then — something grazed the right side of her face.
CHUAK—!!
A devastating impact. Her vision went white.
Dududududu KWANG—!!
Chain slammed into the ground.
"Ah..."
She raised a hand to her face. Something warm was running down it. From her right eye... blood was flowing.
Chain couldn't even understand what had happened to her. Her right eye couldn't see. Anything at all. Not even light.
And still — she got up.
Staggering.
"Sis...."
And in the end, she found Rafia. Standing atop a mountain of countless corpses.
The sight froze Chain solid where she stood.
"...Sis?"
On that mountain of the dead, Rafia's body had been savagely mangled. Her lower half had been torn away entirely, and through the ruin of it, organs spilled out in a tide of blood. Even breathing looked like a struggle.
And even so — Rafia smiled at Chain. Just a little. The way she always had.
"Chain...."
Chain shook her head.
"No...."
One step.
"No, no...."
Another step.
"Sis, get up...."
Chain's voice was shaking.
"Let's... let's go home...."
Rafia couldn't answer. Instead, she brought her hand up to her own right eye. And before Chain could understand what she meant, Rafia spoke.
"Chain..."
"...."
"Look at my eye."
Chain's breath stopped.
"...What?"
Rafia smiled weakly.
"With this eye...."
She drew in a breath.
"See the world for me."
Chain shook her head violently.
"No! No, I won't!!"
".........."
"I won't—!! Sis—!!"
Chain's voice cracked and trembled.
"Don't say things like that...."
Rafia's hand reached toward Chain's face.
"From now on...."
Her fingertips touched Chain's cheek.
"All the things I won't be able to see...."
Rafia's voice grew fainter and fainter.
"See them all for me... in my place."
Chain was crying.
"I don't want to...."
"Chain."
"I said I don't want to...."
Chain grabbed Rafia's hand.
"You look. You look yourself, Sis...."
Rafia smiled faintly.
"...I wish I could."
Those words. They tore through Chain's chest.
Rafia's right eye was given to Chain.
Thump.
And Chain — accepted it.
In that instant, the hellish world drenched in violet unfolded before her eyes once more.
GUOOOOOOOOOOO—!!
And there, at the very heart of that hell, a single existence stood.
An aberration that could hardly be called a living thing. A transcendent existence that stirred terror and horror in all creation. And... a calamity that should never, ever have existed.
"Behold. The despair of that day is what made me."
It spoke to the world.
Chain survived.
She survived that unspeakable hell — the one she couldn't even bear to remember. Or more precisely, she was able to avoid dying, thanks to the eye Rafia had left behind as her final gift. Chain clung to a single life amid that inferno.
But the price was her light.
She lost the person she treasured most in the world. She lost the voice that had always given her courage. She lost the back she had always followed, always leading her forward.
And in her right eye, a trace of Rafia remained — one that would never fade for as long as she lived.
After that day, Chain could never look properly at the sky again. Every time she saw the color violet, that day came back to her. The giant eye. The collapsing city. The screaming. The blood. And her sister, smiling at her until the very end.
Rafia.
It was hard for Chain to even speak that name aloud.
The eye that told her to see the world. But in the world that eye actually beheld, Rafia was gone.
To Chain, that day wasn't just a catastrophe. It was the day her world ended.
And Chain never recovered the light she had lost forever.
For a long while, Chain couldn't say anything at all.
Her gaze, fixed down on Rai where he lay sprawled on the ground, was utterly hollow. The fury that had been boiling inside her only moments before — the madness, the killing intent — all of it had sunk away as if it had never existed. In its place, her hand drifted up to the eyepatch covering her right eye.
Thud.
"...Ngh."
Her fingers clenched around the eyepatch. The moment they did, a vicious pain welled up from deep inside her right eye.
"Ah...."
Chain squeezed her eyes shut. Something seemed to writhe beneath the eyepatch. The eye given to her so long ago. The eye Rafia had left her as her last gift. Chain gripped the patch as if to hold it in place.
"I'm sorry...."
Her voice shook.
"I'm sorry... Sis...."
Her shoulders began to tremble.
"I...."
Chain gritted her teeth. But in the end, she couldn't finish the sentence properly.
"I couldn't even... finish avenging you...."
Her lips quivered.
"I couldn't finish it...!!"
Tears spilled down Chain's face.
"I'm sorry...!"
She bowed her head.
"I'm sorry, Sis...."
And then, slowly, Chain lowered her head to Rai.
When she did, his blood-soaked figure came into view. Chain stared at him for a long moment, then murmured, hollow and exhausted.
"...I'm."
His voice had broken completely.
"Without her... I'm a pathetic bastard who can't do anything."
Chain looked down at his own hand. Blood still clung to it.
"Back then, too...."
His fingers trembled.
"I was hiding behind her...."
Chain's gaze turned to Rai.
"And even now...."
His lips twisted.
"Nothing's changed in the end."
Chain gave a bitter laugh.
"Not one thing... has changed."
The hand covering his right eye slowly lowered.
"No matter how strong I've become since that day...."
Chain's voice grew quieter.
"No matter how much I've accomplished...."
He bowed his head.
"Without her, I can't do anything."
"...."
"I couldn't even... finish my revenge...."
Chain's voice cracked on the last word.
Silence fell for a long while.
Hooooooo....
Wind swept through the ruined buildings. Chain simply kept his head bowed.
But then — it happened.
HUUUUUUUUUU—!!
".......?!"
Chain's body went rigid.
At first, he thought it was just the wind. But it wasn't.
Swoosh.
Chain slowly lifted his head. The sound was coming from behind them.
Chain's expression gradually hardened. Rai, too, didn't move.
Chain turned his body, slowly.
And then...
"...What the hell is that."
A grotesque shape — something that should not exist in this world.
"Haah...."
Chain rose to his feet on instinct, the despair from moments ago momentarily forgotten.
Beyond the eyepatch over his right eye, a faint violet light began to stir.
Vmmm.
"What is that thing..."