Asashi inhaled the rancid, bitter tobacco smoke and exhaled, watching it gradually fade in front of his eyes. He knew it wasn’t healthy, but seeing the smoke dissolve in the air was therapeutic. The problems that had bothered him just moments ago now seemed meaningless, irrelevant—like a morning dew drop in a vast ocean.

But maybe that was just the tobacco talking. Maybe this feeling of temporary relief would soon disappear, leaving him yearning for it once again. He was stuck in a loop of counterfeit needs, always depending on short-term solutions without the willpower to truly solve the problem.

In truth, that was simply the reality he lived in. No one actually tried solving their problems. It was easier to rely on something that could dull the pain for a bit. And he was just as guilty… everyone was just as guilty.

“Man…” Asashi shivered. “It’s way too cold.”

He overlooked the tall forest from a steep, rocky mountain, the wind chill making him shudder even with Touch activated. Asashi leaned against the steel railings of the research facility, which separated him from a several-hundred-foot drop into the sharp outcrops below. It was a childish, fleeting thought, but he wondered if he could survive if he decided to jump. Of course, with his Sense activated. But upon inspection, he quickly erased the thought of survival. Some rocks were as sharp as daggers, capable of piercing through anyone before they could even tumble further down.

“Who the hell had the bright idea to build it in this place?” Asashi grumbled, looking at the square and sturdy steel facility behind him.

“Certainly not you,” a familiar voice said as the door opened with a screech. He wanted to pretend that he didn’t see the outline of a woman, so he simply turned back around and continued taking in the scenery as if no one had said anything.

“Wow, you’re just going to ignore me like that?” she said, annoyed.

Asashi sighed. “Zizu, what are you doing here?”

The green-haired woman puffed impudently and joined him by the railing, though she quickly thought twice as she stepped back, seeing the steep fall. Asashi couldn’t hide his amusement.

“Hey, what’s so funny?” Zizu shakily asked, clearly still uneasy where she stood. He shook his hand, dismissing his attempt to hide the laughter.

“Nothing, nothing,” he denied. “More importantly, you still haven’t answered my question.”

“Don’t ask me,” Zizu shrugged with an annoyed expression, taking a few steps back and leaning against the wall. Out of all places, Zizu had no reason to be at the research facility, especially in a danger zone. For a short period of time, he’d thought he would have some peace and quiet without her constant nagging. But even being a few hundred miles from the academy, she had somehow managed to ruin his vision.

“You’re supposed to be Mr. Storm’s assistant, correct?” he asked.

“Um… yeah?” she responded warily.

“Then why aren’t you assisting?”

“I am, you asshole!” Zizu snapped. “He told me to be your assistant for the next week. Trust me, I’m not too thrilled about this either.” She pompously rolled her eyes and rubbed her arms, fighting the cold air. Zizu was too proud to admit that she was freezing, but her trembling body was quite telling.

After a few moments of silence, he exhaled the last puff of his cigarette and crushed it beneath his dress shoe, a slight sizzle escaping. At this point, Zizu was going to be frozen solid. She wasn’t letting up either. It was as if she were trying to prove something to him.

“Hmm.” Asashi faced the shivering woman. “Looking cold, huh?”

Words were barely able to escape her icy mouth. “S-S-Shut it. I’m fine.”

Asashi ambled toward Zizu. Her eyes were shut from the wind chill, unaware of his approach. “That’s no way for an assistant to speak, now, is it?”

When she opened her eyes again, an oversized trench coat was thrown on her face, making her stumble back in confusion. She wrestled with it since it was almost two times her size, but with a grunt of frustration, she got it off.

“What the hell was that for!” she exclaimed at Asashi, who was now leaning against the steel wall next to her, only this time, without a coat.

“You were freezing to death, for Christ's sake,” he sighed, his hands tucked into his pockets.

“I told you, I’m fine!”

“Clearly, you aren’t,” Asashi pointed toward her legs, which shook like leaves. She flushed in response, trying to gather her words but ended up failing miserably. Giving up, Zizu accepted his kind gesture and struggled to put on the coat properly.

“Ya know, you're awfully considerate for such a mean-looking guy. Aren’t you cold?” she asked, finally settling into his clothes. Asashi cringed at her compliments. He hated being appreciated for doing the bare minimum just because he seemed like the type not to care. Ever since he was a kid, people had generally avoided him because of his threatening look and strength.

Maybe that’s why he succeeded in climbing the ranks of the AOK. For someone to achieve his status, they needed to have a certain air about them, and unfortunately, he recognized that maybe he had that. He wasn’t proud of it, of course. Who liked being feared by people who weren’t even their enemies? Well… perhaps evil people, he presumed.

“No, I’m not cold, but I can still feel it a little. I'll just turn on my Sense and dial the strength back so it lasts a little longer.”

“You can do that?” Zizu gaped.

He nodded, surprised she didn’t even know that. But then again, he had to remind himself that she didn’t have Touch. There were many things he didn’t know about other Senses too.

“The same way someone can intensify their strength for a punch, the opposite is also true. The lower the strength of your Sense, the longer it lasts. It’s like a candle. The bigger the flame, the quicker the wax melts, and vice versa. However, it takes a long time to control the intensity of Touch. Beginners usually don’t have that ability. Typically, once they open their Sense, they use it to the max. That’s why it runs out so quickly. It’s generally the same for all Senses, so I assume your Sight works similarly.”

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Zizu frowned as she thought about it. “I guess I can see further the harder I try, and the less I try, the easier it becomes. It's the same with seeing things in pitch black, too.”

“And what happens when you try harder?”

“My eyes hurt, and it causes my whole head to strain.”

Asashi nodded. “Exactly, so in general, all Senses are fundamentally the same. We have a certain amount of Sense energy in the tank that can be used before it runs out. And the more someone trains, the bigger the tank of energy becomes.”

Zizu couldn’t help but snort in amusement. “This is exactly why you’re a Knight, and I’m an assistant.”

“It just comes from experience,” he replied bluntly. He didn’t quite find his knowledge of Senses a good thing. For some odd reason, there was a deep contempt whenever he learned more about them. As if he were committing a sin.

When did it start? Asashi asked himself. No, I always felt it since the day my Sense awakened. The better question is, when did I acknowledge it? When did I acknowledge this feeling of bitterness whenever I used my powers?

Asashi grabbed another cigarette from his pocket and brought it to his mouth. But before his lighter could ignite it, Asashi gaped at the beautiful scenery from the base of Mount Fuji.

The forest—although quite bare—gave off a certain calm emotion. The bright sun escaped the confinements of the clouds and shimmered on a lake, making the chilling whispers of the wind die down. It was hard to think such a beautiful place could be so dangerous. Gazing at the sight gave him a pang of hesitation.

Maybe… he’d had enough cigarettes for one day.

With a deep sigh, Asashi returned the unused cigarette to the box and thought briefly, trying to dig into his memories. That’s right… that’s when it started, Asashi suddenly realized. Perhaps the self-restraint of not smoking granted him some clarity, but he finally understood—The moment I started detesting my Sense.

It was a memory of a person he’d tried to erase from his mind. Someone who not only betrayed him, but his very own family as well. Someone who had gone mad, destroying the lives of countless innocent children and adults alike just for his foolish vision of the future.

“Zizu, I have a question,” Asashi suddenly asked, his eyes closed, bathing in the sunlight.

Turning to look at him, her body stopped shaking due to the sun's warm rays. “What’s up?”

“How do you think humans received their Super Senses?” he asked her. It was a straightforward question that even a toddler could answer, but he wanted to understand how a normal person saw the world. The way he saw things differed from the rest, whether it was due to the things he’d been through or the knowledge he had attained.

She frowned. “Uh, we started awakening Senses after a meteorite crashed into central Europe. Then monsters started appearing, believed to be caused by some alien-type gene that began affecting and mutating real animals, and it just worsened through evolution.”

“That’s a fair conclusion, but how did we gain such power? Just from the existence of the meteorite?”

“I—I never really thought about it,” she confessed. “But it’s not really worth mulling over, to be honest. There are many mysteries in the world that we’ll never have answers to. How does one thing simply be? How does it exist? Doesn’t everything need to have a creator? That’s why many revert to religion—because it answers their questions.”

Asashi didn’t utter a single word. The only thing that could be heard was the faint, beautiful chirps of birds in the distant but fast forest. The assistant grew hesitant from his odd reaction but offered no further words. Then, finally, Asashi opened his eyes, taking in the scenery with a healthy, deep breath.

“He gave us what we desired the most and, in return, punished us for our greed,” Asashi whispered an ominous quote, his face remaining dreary as he looked onward.

Zizu blinked. “He? Who is he?”

“God,” Asashi answered bluntly. “God gave us power and, in return, punished us for our greed. It’s a saying Yami often told me when we served in the war. Back then, I wrote it off as him trying to seem philosophical, but I still remember it. And although he was a man who went insane, I can’t help but find those words stuck in my head as if they’re yearning to be proven.”

“Oh boy…” Zizu sighed. “Asashi, I think you need some rest. You’re under too much stress.”

He gave a half chuckle. “I suppose you're right. I have a lot of things on my mind. I guess I’m just a bit worried.”

Zizu wanted to laugh as if he were being sarcastic, but seeing his distant expression, her smile slowly faded. “Worried... You? What happened? Was it because you beat the shit out of that one guy a little while ago? Are you afraid that the higher-ups will not like that or something?”

“You know about that already?” He narrowed his eyes.

Zizu snorted. “News travels fast around here.”

He shrugged. Asashi wasn’t worried about that, given how high he was in the ranking. In fact, the altercation was way worse for Ryan than it was for him. Asashi would make sure he was taught a lesson on proper conduct. That arrogance and vulgar attitude had no place in the AOK, no matter how much he despised the administration. As long as he was in a position of power, he would try his best to eliminate those snobs. Again, not by killing them, because that was unfortunately illegal.

“No, I deal with those people more times than I would like to admit. There are other things that are more worrisome.”

Zizu rolled her eyes, fed up with his vague answers. “Like?”

Instead of replying, he pushed himself from the wall and walked to the railing. Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out his lighter and extended his arm over the ridge.

“Asashi, what are you doin—”

He let go. His lighter plummeted into the rocky outcrops below, swirling in the harsh wind, then soon vanished. But he didn’t stop there. Asashi pulled out his cigarette box, eyeing it flatly as if saying a brief farewell to an old friend, and released it from his grasp. He wasn’t concerned about watching it disappear into the rocky abyss below. He knew it did.

It was time that he pushed aside everything that numbed and deceived him to focus on the more crucial things. He was done with it. Done trying to hide his unease behind a lighter and cigarette. He’d rather face the pain head-on and overcome it. He was ashamed to admit that he had fallen into such a deep hole of fabricated necessity. But not anymore. A hot, bubbling sensation in his chest started stirring. He was angry… very angry.

Asashi twisted around, returning to lean beside the wall, with Zizu gaping at him as if he’d broken the law or something.

“Asashi…” she started. “What the fuck. Why did you throw your lighter and cig’s away? Are you okay? Is this a sign for hel—”

“I got a call from my wife today,” he said.

“Okay… did something bad happen to her?” Zizu’s tone shifted to one of sympathy, as if expecting something horrible to have happened. She sighed in relief when, thankfully, he shook his head.

“No, she’s fine. But someone visited her recently. Someone our family knew for quite a while, and she talked with me on the phone for the first time in years.”

It appeared Zizu was picking up the hints as he laid them down. Asashi only knew a few people whom they had known for a long time or spoken about, so it was easy to deduce who it was.

“Jen? That’s quite surprising, given how you both stayed distant for quite a while. And your, uh… relationship with the kid.”

“I don’t hate him. And I don’t want to hate him either.”

She frowned at that answer. “It’s because he was a test subject for Yami, isn’t it? Stop worrying about that. As Mr. Storm said, he was a failed vessel, and—”

“He’s not a failed vessel.” His words were sharp, cutting off her sentence.

“Pardon?” She froze.

“Jen asked me to remove Sen from the exam. And her reasoning wasn’t because she was afraid for her little Senseless boy, it was something else, I could tell.”

“What did she exactly say?” Zizu asked, still not entirely convinced by his statement. Asashi stared Zizu down, his green emerald eyes slanted and grim.

“Something only I would understand,” he murmured. “Nobody had broken into my house that day…”