Yashin had not yet disappeared below the platform's edge when Tsukumo reached toward the abyss.
Gravity seized the jailer in midfall, abruptly reversing his trajectory and hauling him back up.
His legs slammed against the broken railing, ripping the last metal pipes from their brackets, and his lanky body was dragged unceremoniously across the rain-soaked steel.
Tsukumo tried to get up immediately afterward, but the arm supporting his weight buckled.
He fell hard, driving his shoulder straight onto the teeth of a broken gear.
Sharp pain tore through the wound left by the enemy's dagger, stealing his breath, but his hand remained steady, aimed at the edge to keep his power active.
Across the metal platform, Suki still lay slumped against the base of the crane's support column.
His chin rested against his chest, with no sign of consciousness.
Rain poured through his torn clothes and mixed with the dark blood welling from his wound, running steadily between his legs and pooling in the sunken floor.
Tsukumo waited, hoping he would raise his head.
Nothing happened.
The sharp scrape of a black blade's tip against the steel floor caught his attention.
Yashin had driven both daggers into the ground in front of him.
Using the embedded weapons as his only support, the jailer began hauling himself upright, fighting the invisible force still trying to drag him.
His injured leg trembled with the effort, leaving a thick trail of blood with every inch he gained.
"You didn't understand the choice," the jailer said, his voice cutting through the rain.
Tsukumo wedged his boot between fragments of the destroyed engine casing.
He pushed off with his good leg, forced his torso upward, and managed to stand through clenched teeth.
His injured shoulder was so saturated with blood that the fabric and exposed flesh had become indistinguishable in color.
"I did," Tsukumo answered.
He spread the fingers of his other hand, aiming upward.
One of the enormous concrete blocks forming the crane's counterweight broke loose above them.
Its mounting bolts snapped one after another under the gravitational pressure, and the massive block plunged.
It landed directly between Yashin and Suki, buckling the floor with a brutal impact that shook the platform's entire structure.
"You chose to fight," Yashin declared.
The jailer tore his daggers from the metal and lunged forward.
Tsukumo pulled his own body to the left, using gravity to move out of the attack's path.
The first black blade tore past his neck by a finger's width and buried itself in the engine casing behind him, splitting the steel.
Before Yashin could bring his second dagger around, Tsukumo hurled a loose gear against his elbow.
The impact knocked the weapon off course and opened the jailer's guard, allowing Tsukumo to drive a vicious knee straight into his already-punctured abdomen.
The monster's hot blood sprayed across Tsukumo's pants.
Yashin doubled over, but his reaction was immediate: he trapped Tsukumo's thigh beneath his arm and yanked with brute force.
The ground vanished beneath Tsukumo's only supporting foot.
He fell backward, smashing his head against a loose plate, and saw Yashin's dagger sweep down in a lethal arc toward his mouth.
Tsukumo flung his hand sideways at the last second.
Gravity deflected the blade just enough to miss his face and punch through the steel floor beside his ear.
The impact shattered the metal, sending fragments flying into Tsukumo's cheek.
Taking advantage of their proximity, he twisted his hips, planted both boots against Yashin's chest, and shoved with everything he had, adding his power to the strength of his legs.
The jailer flew backward, crashed through the wrecked engine, and slammed into the low wall at the platform's edge.
Tsukumo rolled across the wet floor before the shadow beneath him could split open.
A sharp black blade erupted from the ground, tearing up the back of his clothes.
He managed to stand, but the pain along his spine kept him from fully straightening.
The counterweight now blocked his view of Suki.
From this angle, Tsukumo could see only one fallen boot and a bloodied hand lying motionless beside the column.
"Nakamura." The word left his mouth softly, almost a whisper lost beneath the storm.
"Hang in there!"
Still near the edge, Yashin rested the tip of a dagger against the low wall and looked down into the abyss leading to the prison's lower access.
Tsukumo clenched his hand in the air, targeting the ground beneath his enemy. The steel plate under the jailer's feet gave way, tilting inward and forcing Yashin to leap back to avoid falling.
"Look at me," Tsukumo demanded.
Yashin landed heavily on his good leg.
His ruined leg buckled under the impact, but the jailer steadied himself before he could fall, his eyes fixed on his opponent.
"Your friend's finished, boy," Yashin retorted, drawing out the words over the rain. "A pity. I wanted to play with him a little longer."
Tsukumo used gravity to hurl a heavy piece of engine casing and charged right behind it.
Yashin cleaved the metal in midair with a precise strike of his right dagger, but before he could draw his arm back, Tsukumo's forearm shot through the opening and smashed into his mouth.
The jailer staggered backward.
Without missing a beat, Tsukumo planted his bloodied palm against the enemy's chest and multiplied his weight, driving Yashin's boots into the steel floor with a metallic crash.
"You have no idea who you're talking about," Tsukumo snarled.
Yashin answered with an upward strike.
His left dagger tore along the inside of Tsukumo's raised arm, opening a deep gash almost to his armpit.
The sharp pain made the gravitational pressure falter.
Freed from the added weight, the jailer surged upright and drove the weapon's hilt straight into Tsukumo's mouth.
Tsukumo reeled from the impact and spat a pool of blood, but instead of retreating, he threw his weight forward.
He rammed his shoulder into Yashin's chest before the second blow could land, forcing him back and dragging the monster's boots across the wet steel, away from the column where Suki lay.
"In Ruitan, I made innocent people pay for my hatred."
Yashin tried to bring his dagger over Tsukumo's shoulder, aiming for the back of his neck.
Tsukumo pulled his torso back at the last instant, letting the sharp point merely score his back, and used gravity to wrench the enemy's injured leg out from under him.
The jailer lost his footing completely and pitched forward.
Tsukumo seized the opening and drove a savage elbow beneath Yashin's chin, snapping the monster's head upward.
"I blamed my father for everything," Tsukumo continued, breathing through clenched teeth.
"Suki made me look at what I'd done. Made me understand that those deaths were my fault."
Yashin planted his boots, wiped the blood running from his mouth against his shoulder, and bared his red-stained teeth in a sadistic grin.
"And did that make you a better person?" he asked, laughing at Tsukumo's words.
A black strip raced across the wet floor.
Tsukumo jumped back, but the dark blade bursting from the shadow was faster.
It caught his calf squarely, slicing through the muscle to the bone.
His leg failed, and Tsukumo dropped to one knee.
Yashin ignored him and walked straight toward the edge, looking for a clear opening.
Tsukumo thrust his open palm sideways and pulled the enormous block. The concrete mass rumbled across the jailer's path, forcing him to stop short and retreat as it crushed every piece of wreckage in front of the column.
The impact was so violent that the floor plate buckled beneath the block's weight.
Behind the concrete, the vibration tipped Suki's limp body onto its side in the sunken metal, leaving his face dangerously close to the dirty water beginning to collect there.
From the ground, Tsukumo watched his friend's hand strike the steel without a flicker of life.
He held his breath, waiting for the fingers to move.
For any twitch at all.
Nothing.
"I'm trying," Tsukumo whispered to himself.
"It's that man's fault I'm becoming a better person every day." He pointed at Suki.
He swallowed the pain in his calf, braced his boot against the slippery floor, and forced himself upright, using gravity to haul his own weight up.
"I spent three years learning to save people beside him," Tsukumo said, dragging himself closer.
"After everything I did... he learned to trust me."
"I WORKED SO FUCKING HARD JUST TO EARN THAT MAN'S TRUST!"
Yashin did not wait.
He lunged like a predator while Tsukumo was still trying to steady himself.
Tsukumo raised a battered metal plate between them, but the jailer punched through it with ease, driving his dagger through the steel and tearing into his shoulder.
Tsukumo cried out, but dropped the plate, caught the jailer's forearm against his own ribs, and pulled Yashin's head toward his.
His forehead struck the monster's face with a hollow crack.
Once. Then again, even harder, though he felt the skin of his own face split and blood run into his eyes.
"He trusted me to watch his back!"
Yashin answered with a brutal knee to Tsukumo's torn stomach.
Tsukumo doubled over, vomiting hot blood onto the floor, and a sharp blow from the dagger's hilt struck his temple a moment later, hurling him against the counterweight.
His hand slid down the rough concrete, leaving a crimson streak.
Yashin approached and brought the dagger's sharp point close to his face, his gaze brimming with contempt.
"He trusted the wrong person."
Gravity erupted between them in a pulse of pure, invisible force.
Yashin was swept off his feet and thrown backward into the engine's twisted remains.
The casing buckled under his impact, crumpling around him like a trap.
Before the enemy could tear himself free of the wreckage, Tsukumo was already standing.
His face no longer concealed the pain or exhaustion.
There was only fury.
His teeth were clenched, his chest heaved in desperate gasps, and his hands shook in fists at his sides.
"He doesn't just matter to me, you bastard."
Yashin slashed through the metal trapping him with crossed strikes of his daggers, cutting his way out.
Tsukumo ripped an iron beam from the floor and sent it hurtling through the air like a battering ram, straight toward the enemy's chest, forcing him to cross his arms against the impact.
Without stopping, Tsukumo began walking toward him, dragging his mangled leg.
"Elves, dwarves, orcs... thousands of people are still alive because he refused to let them die."
Yashin forced his daggers through the beam and split it in two.
He charged through the falling iron and swung a killing blow at Tsukumo's neck.
Tsukumo ducked on instinct, felt the edge open a long cut across his upper back, and slapped his palm against the ground in the same motion.
The entire steel plate beneath Yashin jolted upward.
The monster's boots left the floor, and Tsukumo released a wave of force that hurled him toward the platform's broken edge.
The jailer landed badly.
His broken leg buckled beneath him, forcing him to drive a dagger deep into the metal floor to keep from plunging into the abyss.
Tsukumo stopped advancing.
He had reached the position he needed.
Suki was safe behind him, completely sheltered by the column and the block.
Ahead, beyond the kneeling Yashin, the crane's enormous iron boom loomed over the crater's emptiness, with the storm wide open above it.
Tsukumo raised both hands, his open palms facing the sky.
"If he dies here, do you think you'll be able to hide?"
Yashin tore his dagger from the steel and charged with a roar.
Tsukumo pulled another thick plate from the engine to block the first thrust.
The second dagger sliced through the metal's side as though it were paper and punched through, opening a long, horrific gash across Tsukumo's chest.
He did not lower his arms.
The pain no longer mattered.
"REAL MONSTERS WILL COME FOR YOU."
Around them, the storm seemed to freeze.
Raindrops simply stopped falling, suspended in the space between the two combatants.
Yashin struck again in fury, but the floating plate was driven hard against his own weapons, forcing his massive body backward.
Above the crater, the vast storm began to writhe, winding into a dense, narrow band aimed directly at the edge.
"No matter where you are!" Tsukumo roared, taking another unsteady step forward.
Blood leaking from his open chest had already reached his waistband, but he pushed past his limits and increased the pressure of the gravitational field.
The crane's thick steel cables stretched taut, ripping their mounting bolts from the brackets with sharp reports.
"People with real power will find you. They'll tear you limb from limb, Yashin. Do you understand?"
Terrified by the mounting force, the jailer tried to leap sideways, out of its reach.
Gravity hauled him back effortlessly, sliding his boots across the smooth floor without resistance until his heels reached the edge.
Desperate, Yashin drove his left dagger into the steel with all his strength to anchor himself and swung horizontally with his right.
The sharp blade of shadow tore through the air and struck Tsukumo's thigh.
A shrill cry of agony escaped through his clenched teeth, but his hands remained raised and open, sustaining the tons of pressure imprisoning his enemy.
Then his own power exacted its price.
The monstrous technique placed too much strain on his ruined body.
His fingers began twisting under the invisible tension.
His right index finger snapped in half with a sickening crack.
Tsukumo's eyes widened as he stared at the displaced bone threatening to pierce his skin beneath his torn gloves.
Though the fracture sent pain throbbing all the way to his brain, he forced his hand to begin closing.
Two more fingers cracked and gave way under the crushing pressure.
Blood spattered from his fingertips and streamed down his forearm.
The savage effort tore an animalistic roar from the depths of his throat.
Yashin was dragged into the air until his feet lost all support.
The monster hung suspended, tethered to the platform only by the dagger still buried in the steel, but gravity was relentless.
The embedded blade began to give, carving a long, deep furrow through the floor as it was dragged toward the void.
Tsukumo raised his face, drenched in blood, sweat, and rain.
Hatred burned in his golden eyes.
"Dying by my hand would be a blessing."
He clenched both hands at once.
The bones in each cracked, crumbling inside his flesh as he forced them shut.
"DYING AT MY HANDS WILL BE A MERCY, YOU SON OF A BITCH!"
Tsukumo thrust both broken arms forward with everything he had.
"COLLAPSE!"
A compact corridor of gravity shot from his palms and struck Yashin head-on.
The field ripped the steel plate anchoring the dagger from the floor, lifting the jailer off the ground.
Tsukumo raised his arms, angling the attack skyward, and dragged the enemy along the column stretching from his hands to the clouds.
The crane's colossal boom broke free of its base, pulled into the attack.
The structure twisted like wire and was crushed against Yashin.
A beam struck his ribs, snapping them; a steel plate clamped down on his shoulder, tearing flesh and pulverizing his collarbone.
Blood gushed from his mouth and sprayed among the wreckage still compressing around his body.
Tsukumo groaned and drew his arms toward his chest, keeping his palms aimed at the jailer.
His broken fingers curled under the strain.
The column pouring from his hands narrowed further, crushing the metal against Yashin's flesh.
The jailer's scream was swallowed by the pressure of Collapse.
Tsukumo tried to clench his mangled fists once more to crush the enemy, but his broken fingers simply refused to obey.
A thick stream of blood ran from his nose, dizziness blurred his vision, and he could no longer hold his torso upright.
His arms dropped heavily to his sides, and the immense corridor of gravity lost its shape, dissolving into the air.
The sound of the storm returned with a deafening crash.
Tons of twisted beams plummeted from the sky onto the platform's ruined end.
Amid the iron rain, Yashin's body fell and struck the floor on its back, buckling an entire steel plate beneath the impact.
Dirty water and fresh blood splashed across the wreckage.
The shock wave hurled Tsukumo backward.
Trembling, he managed to prop himself on an elbow, his golden eyes narrowed as he stared at the jailer through the curtain of rain.
Yashin did not move.
One of the monster's legs was bent at an impossible angle.
His torn chest and abdomen were barely distinguishable from the blackened rags of his clothes, and a thick shard of steel remained buried deep in his shoulder, piercing it from one side to the other.
Tsukumo released the breath trapped in his lungs.
"It's over."
Then the sharp scrape of a dagger against metal cut through the storm.
Yashin's pale, filthy fingers tightened around the fallen weapon's hilt. With a guttural groan, the jailer rolled onto his side, planted the black blade in the floor, and began to rise in defiance of every physical limit.
With his free hand, he grabbed the metal lodged in his shoulder and ripped it out, leaving blood pouring freely down the open flesh.
Then he picked up the second dagger and used it as a cane to brace the leg that still obeyed him.
Despair struck Tsukumo.
He pressed both hands against the floor, trying to rise as well.
His palm slipped in his own blood.
He collapsed onto his ruined knee, swallowed a cry of pain, and stubbornly tried again.
By the time he finally stood, his body swaying in the wind, Yashin was already upon him.
The first thrust was sluggish, but aimed to kill, straight at his neck.
Tsukumo swept his palm inward, deflecting the armed limb, and used the momentum to drive an elbow into the center of the jailer's face.
Yashin's head snapped aside as he spat blood, but his retaliation was immediate: the second dagger slammed into Tsukumo's mouth, splitting his lip, followed by a merciless knee straight to the stomach.
Still refusing to give up, Tsukumo seized the rags of Yashin's clothes with his good hand and pulled with his entire body weight, trying to drag the monster away from the edge.
Yashin braced his legs and delivered a brutal headbutt.
The jailer's forehead struck Tsukumo's with a crack of bone.
His vision went dark, and he fell heavily onto his back.
Before he could retract the arm still stretched into the air, Yashin's heavy boot came down on his wrist, crushing it against the floor.
The jailer reversed his grip and drove the dagger down with his full weight.
The black blade pierced Tsukumo's forearm, tearing through muscle and tendons before sinking deep into the steel floor plate.
A hoarse, breathless scream tore from Tsukumo's throat.
He writhed, desperate to escape, but the violent movement only widened the wound around the fixed blade, multiplying his agony.
The broken fingers of his other hand scraped at the bloody hilt, slipping without finding the strength to pull it from the steel.
He was pinned.
Yashin released the embedded weapon's handle.
The monster remained hunched over him for a long moment, panting heavily, blood dripping from his face onto Tsukumo's chest.
Then he straightened with enormous difficulty.
Ignoring the young man nailed to the floor, he started walking again, limping and using his remaining dagger to keep himself upright.
Tsukumo reached after him with his free hand, driving his mind beyond its limits.
Nothing happened.
His power did not answer.
The jailer's boot dragged across the floor in an unbroken scrape.
Another step.
Closer to the abyss.
Behind him, rain continued washing over the platform.
Water flowed down the slanted plates, carrying blood into the depression beside the column where Suki lay motionless.
Drops struck his face.
They slipped between his parted lips as the pool rose around his body.
The cold reached me slowly.
I tried to spit, but all I managed was to move my numb tongue.
My chest refused the command to expand and draw breath.
Cold rain flowed freely into the enormous wound, spreading like ice through my bones.
Somewhere deep inside, something was still beating.
Faintly.
Far too slowly.
I searched for the familiar pressure of Strength within me, desperate to compress the edges of the wound as I had so many times before.
I searched, but could not find enough energy to curl even a finger.
My power had run dry.
The storm kept pouring into my chest.
Then I felt the water change direction.
It stopped merely collecting and began actively mixing with the little blood still circulating through my veins.
I felt the cold, invading current advance through my open chest and race down my left arm.
The sudden chill sent a shudder through my entire body.
My throat closed in an uncontrollable spasm, and a warm gush of reddened water spilled from my lips.
Another beat in my chest.
Stronger.
Clearer.
My bloodline was reacting.
Even as my mind struggled to form a clear thought, the brutal adaptation of my heritage fought the hemorrhage on its own, struggling to keep a dying body alive.
Rainwater reached the shredded flesh, joined the remaining blood, and continued flowing through my veins, taking the place of what I had lost.
The wound suddenly tightened, trying to close.
The sharp pain of muscle knitting together made one of my fingers curl.
The pool of dirty water beside the column began visibly shrinking.
I wasn't just seeing it. I could feel it.
I felt the water being drawn from the floor into my wound, felt the cold, heavy current moving through parts of my body where no strength remained.
Then my awareness expanded.
I felt every individual drop falling from the dark sky around me.
Hundreds of them.
I felt the exact moment they struck the platform's metal, the way they flowed down the ruined beams, the weight of each one landing on my face.
I tried to breathe again.
Air entered, shallowly, accompanied by a stabbing pain that tore through my back to my spine.
But it entered.
I opened my eyes.
Tsukumo lay sprawled on the floor a few yards away.
One of Yashin's black daggers pinned his arm to the steel.
He writhed, trying to reach the hilt with his crushed hand, his fingers slipping repeatedly over the bloody handle, unable to free himself.
Farther ahead, Yashin's hunched figure was approaching the broken edge, limping like a wounded beast.
I planted my left palm against the wet metal.
I pushed myself up, but my elbow buckled on the first attempt.
My chest slammed into the iron floor, and the impact drove more blood from my mouth.
I gritted my teeth and tried again.
Water raced through my arm.
Bright blue lines began appearing beneath my skin, tracing the current now keeping my body functioning.
I managed to bring one knee beneath me.
Then I planted my boot.
I rose with my back and shoulder scraping against the column, forcing the dead weight of my own body upward.
Yashin finally reached the edge, ready to disappear.
I raised my left hand toward him.
The water still pooling around my boots obeyed. It spiraled up my arm and gathered in the air, forming a rotating sphere a few inches in front of my open palm.
The heat of the fire, that fire still burning in the depths of my soul, flowed with the water.
The sphere began boiling instantly, and jets of scalding steam escaped between my outstretched fingers.
Hearing the hiss, the jailer stopped and began turning his head.
I fired.
The jet of boiling water erupted from my hand like a cannon shot and struck him squarely in the side.
The impact tore Yashin's feet from the edge and hurled him back toward the center of the platform.
The monster crashed into a heap of engine wreckage and disappeared in a deafening burst of crumpled metal and white steam.
The recoil slammed me backward, pinning my back against the steel column.
My knee weakened and nearly buckled, but I dug my boot into the floor and managed to stay upright.
On the ground, Tsukumo stopped trying to pull out the dagger.
He froze and slowly raised his face, staring through the mist in disbelief.
"I'm still standing," I managed, my hoarse voice breaking through the hush of the rain.
The blue stripes flared along my arms, lighting the air around them.
They climbed my neck in shining lines and spread in an electric pattern around my wounded chest.
Water continued coursing through me, mingling with my blood, filling empty veins and sustaining a body that trembled under the strain.
"And I'll fight to the very end."