Inu sat with a still face and trembling hands in the secret laboratory underground not far from the bunker. In the middle of the room, there was an iron slab for experiments. On it lay Liv as a wrinkled bald man circled it with weird tools in hand.

"Severe bleeding, infection as well as irreparable damage to surrounding structures and tissue. Hmm, yes. Quite interesting indeed," the scientist mused with a rather high-pitched, creaky voice. He looked at Inu with a slight frown as he worked. "This is the girl with the King's Eyes, yes? Oh, I am most grateful for such a sublime subject, but I must ask you, Aomon, what do you hope to gain from this?"

"Can you save her, Quelias?" Inu rasped.

Quelias cocked his head and looked back at Liv while he ensured that her head remained elevated to reduce blood flow into the injury site. "I am an expert in many fields, yes, and that does include medicine, but the girl has put my laboratory and livelihood at risk. Then again..." He caressed her cheek and showed a gentle smile, Inu didn't expect of a man such as him. "I had a daughter of my own once." He then made adjustments to ensure stable breathing and circulation before taking a scalpel into his hand. "You may want to avert your gaze, Aomon. I will now proceed with debridement."

Inu attempted to keep watch, but as Quelias started to cut away damaged tissue, he did as instructed and looked away to where his eyes found Jakaan on the opposite side of the room. He sat, leaned forward, elbows on knees, fingers interlocked, and dead, black eyes on Liv.

"Is there a problem, my prince?" Quelias inquired idly as he took the scalpel to Liv's eyes. "I am not so sentimental to save this young woman if you wish otherwise. I hear she had a hand—or should I say eye—in your father's death. Your father gave me purpose. Say the word and her life is yours."

Inu looked at the serene man with hostility. "Quiet, Quelias. He did not ask for you to—"

"The right thing to do is a matter of instinct, is it not?" Jakaan's voice came at Inu. He turned to see his stare, having moved from Liv to him. "My instincts tell me I should kill her."

Inu froze. He tried to swallow but couldn't. "Ja— Don't... Not now... Don't turn against me now." He had obeyed when Inu asked him to teleport them

"I don't understand," Jakaan said, straight-faced like his father, shaking his head. "I thought you valued human lives over everything. You have strayed. And now you ask me to follow you. Why should I? Why do you ask me to save the one who killed my father as well as my betrothed? Did their lives mean nothing?"

Quelias shrugged and went back to the surgery, seeing that the argument would last and she could be killed later if necessary.

Inu felt some relief and buried his face in his hands briefly before he realized he couldn't shut himself out now. He put on a brave face and tried to gather himself. "You have to understand, this isn't me choosing her over you or those whom you care about. I simply want this to end."

"Then kill her!" Jakaan snapped, shaking Inu. "It ends with her. She started all of this. How many lives has hers claimed? How many will it continue to claim? What about when her fate comes under question? What would restrain the populus then? Think, Inu! How many lives are you exchanging just to save hers?!" the boy growled with an intensity that rivaled his father.

Inu firmed himself and countered with a low tone. "This isn't me exchanging one life for another. This is simply me fighting to do what I think is right. I turned my back on her, but she trusted me again. I deserve to die, but as long as it isn't my time, I will spend my time to repent. I vow, as long as I live I will guard that girl's life with my own. Anyone who wishes her harm will have to go through me."

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Jakaan sat back with shock in his eyes as if he had been stabbed in the back. "I can't believe it. I can't believe you would be so foolish. That girl has blinded you to the truth of your actions."

"No. I killed myself in the attempt to obey some obscure logistics to life. I see now that such logistics are simply a misguided measurement to feel some sort of structure to something that has none."

"So now you follow your instinct like that girl did," Jakaan said, nodding to Liv. "Is hers a fate you want for yourself?"

"It may just be the one I deserve. But I will not deserve it through this action. And even if I am subject to such a fate, I will not have any regrets, for I know I followed my humanity," Inu said, maintaining his calm expression and feeling a warmth of some kind spread throughout him.

"Logic is above humanity," Jakaan spat.

"And your logic tells you to kill someone who simply wishes for a glimpse of an almost normal life at the price of her sight. All due to the possibility of a negative effect on the populus. Which, I remind you, is already consumed by tragedy and cares more about the monster that caused it than she who led that monster."

"Logic as well as instinct tell me to kill her," Jakaan stated. "So no matter which is the right way, it is right for her to die."

"And which instinct is that? The one that points to the right thing or the one that points to gratification?"

Jakaan's lip curled in disgust. Just yesterday, such an expression on the kind, young boy's face was unimaginable. "It's all the same."

"Is it?" Inu asked, loosening his body and entering some sort of level with Jakaan as he felt his suffering, but couldn't allow him to go that path. "Liv was right about instinct being the right way, I realized it in that bunker. But I think she didn't know there were many instincts in interplay. Her instinct of gratification forced her on a path of revenge. Her other instinct would've been to accept my earliest offer. She realized that in the end. It's what made her choose this..." Inu pointed at Liv on the operation table. "That was her instinct to what was right. She always thought she would die in this pursuit. If nobody else's hand then by her own. This was the hard path. Continuing to live has always been harder."

"Letting herself be eaten by the Shadow would've been more noble," Jakaan commented spitefully as he looked to the side.

"Really? How do you think you would have felt in that case?" Jakaan didn't respond. "Maybe her choosing to live is her atonement. Maybe her fate will be revealed and the populus will hear her story. Maybe she will become a symbol for the coming inheritors of the King's Eyes. It is my hope that she will during her life experience something outside destruction and that both of you may grow from this to shine a light on a new era."

Jakaan shook his head with his gaze downcast. "Her story? You say that like this act had any sense to it."

Inu furrowed his brows. "You know what drove her. You know the entire picture. So if you think any individual would've survived her circumstances and wouldn't have unleashed her power on her oppressors then go ahead and kill her. Your kingdom took everything she loved."

"The Shadow took them!" Jakaan yelled, raising his head in a burst of anger.

"And who was it that really killed your father and Claude? Liv certainly wasn't present." Jakaan put his head back down with a curse. "You have been touched by tragedy. Now it's on you to decide if you give in to the worst part of yourself and end up like her."

Jakaan looked up with sadness in his eyes. "Would you save me then too?"

Inu frowned with a tilt of his head, and stated the obvious, "I would always save you, Jakaan." Jakaan froze and put his palms to his eyes, shivering at the shoulders. Inu's frown deepened, but he had one more thing to say. "Your father's and Claude's demises are only meaningless if you follow your corruptive instincts. Their suffering will have meant nothing if people keep suffering. But if their suffering as well as Liv's change the world so that no others will need to bear the same fates, then their lives will have not been in vain. You are the King of Stratum now, Jakaan, and you have a choice to make. Take revenge or steer the world to a better future through discipline superior to your predecessors. Which instinct of yours will you follow? What kind of king will you be?"

Jakaan sniffed and wiped his eyes before raising his head. It was then that Inu could see a change in him. He had found his resolve and with it, he could raise the world from a dark place. "Quelias."

"Yes?" Quelias asked, stopping the operation to turn to Jakaam in attention.

The room froze as all awaited Jakaan's next words. Then with hard eyes, he opened his mouth.

"Do everything in your power to make sure the girl lives." He stood up and walked away with Inu in tow on his way to bring the capital back from the depths of hell. "That is an order from your king."