Human beings are never truly alone.
Perhaps in your fleeting lifetime, you may never meet a kindred spirit who truly understands you. Every word you speak might be dismissed by the world as the raving of a madman.
But just like Galileo, who spent his final years under house arrest in a villa outside Florence, your name can still be cleared, and your truths vindicated, three hundred and fifty years later.
The sheer, massive scale of humanity is stretched across the magnificent canvas of time. Driven by the relentless march of history, the trajectory of life evolves into infinite possibilities.
In the future, there will always be someone whose mind resonates on the exact same frequency as yours, even if they never knew you, never understood you personally.
Because your very existence has already proven one undeniable truth—your existence is not an impossibility.
There will absolutely be a second "you" born into this world.
And a third, and countless others vibrating on your frequency... And among those countless iterations of "you," it is almost a statistical certainty that at least one will be born with far greater capability than you possessed.
He will overturn your conclusions and produce superior results. Or, he will use your findings as a foundation, standing on your shoulders to behold an even grander vista.
There will always be successors.
There will absolutely be successors.
As long as you firmly believe—I stand upon the shoulders of giants, and giants will one day stand upon mine, and I am simply the necessary anomaly that paves the way—then you can dedicate every ounce of your effort with an unwavering heart.
Even if you fail on the verge of success, even if you realize you aren't the one destined to reach the summit, you can still comfort yourself.
It's fine. It's all the same.
Shu had already closed his eyes and raised the pills to his lips.
He only needed to wait a few more moments. He would wait for the music in his earphones to reach its crescendo, and then, surrounded by his favorite melody, he would welcome a somewhat satisfactory final ending.
Yeah... passably satisfied.
At the very least, he was no longer a completely despairing caged bird.
He was standing beneath the bright spring sun and the boundless sky.
He had already escaped the suffocation and sinking of his own heart.
...
It's over.
...
The exact moment the music ended, in that fleeting second of profound silence, Shu raised his hand, moving the lethal dose of pills toward his mouth...
——
—SMACK—!!
——
A sharp gust of wind struck his face. A heavy blow accurately struck the pill bottle in his hand. The force wasn't massive, but it was enough to knock his hand aside, sending the bottle flying away from his face.
Shu's half-lowered eyelids snapped open in pure shock. Time seemed to slow to a crawl as his gaze drifted past the cascade of pills spilling from the airborne bottle, ultimately landing on the figure standing directly in front of him.
Kiana's leg was still raised from the kick. Bathed in the moonlight, she looked radiantly, sacredly white.
And she wasn't shattering—
"Ki..." Shu's pupils contracted violently. He stared in sheer disbelief at the girl who had reappeared before his eyes, watching her stand proudly in the moonlight.
How could she...
I... I swallowed all my anti-psychotics. I only kept the sleeping pills...
The agonizing temporal distortion of his shock finally snapped back to reality. The small plastic bottle and the cascade of pills hit the floor with a sharp, clattering staccato.
The very first thing Kiana did after retracting her leg was reach out, grab Shu by the collar of his shirt, and violently yank him forward until they were practically nose-to-nose.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?!" Kiana roared furiously, her voice exploding right in his face.
"You IDIOT!!"
Her voice was so loud it made his ears ring.
But Shu didn't care about that at all. He just stared intensely at Kiana's face, speaking as if he were sleepwalking.
"What exactly are you..." His voice trembled slightly, matching the tremor in his pupils. Beneath the disbelief, a fragile, broken hope and a deep-seated fear colored his tone.
Kiana yanked his collar again, forcefully pressing her forehead directly against his. The impact was sharp, making his skull throb.
Shu's eyes widened even further. This time, his entire body began to tremble.
"I am real." The distance between them was so non-existent that he could feel the heat of her breath.
Shu could physically feel the warm exhale of air accompanying every single word she spoke.
And that only made it even more impossible to believe.
"But..." In that split second, Shu had far too many questions. So many that he didn't even know where to begin.
"When did you..."
"The whole time." Kiana didn't hesitate for a second. "I've been following you the entire time."
She watched his pupils tremble, waiting for his next question.
"...You mean... the whole time?"
"Yes," Kiana answered firmly. "Ever since you started taking those pills two months ago, I have been right by your side."
She was there.
She really had been there the entire time.
When Shu was lying on the floor, refusing to face reality. When Shu was playing with Rice Cake. When he cooked. When he bathed. When he slept...
Even a month ago, when he went out for his appointment, when he desperately chased after Rice Cake, and even at the very end, in that dark alleyway... she had been there.
She had never left.
She could have left.
"Why..." Shu finally managed to force the question out.
"Because..." Kiana gritted her teeth, grinding out the reason for her lingering existence word by agonizing word.
"Because you, you massive idiot... you never actually planned on living a good life, did you?!"
"I..."
"Don't you dare try to make excuses!" Kiana leaned forward aggressively, driving her forehead harder against his, forcing his words right back down his throat.
"You were planning to kill yourself the exact moment Rice Cake lived out its natural life, weren't you?!
"And another thing! If Rice Cake didn't remind you, you wouldn't even eat properly!! I counted! You haven't eaten a second bowl of rice at a single meal!!
"You promised me you would live a good life! You promised me you would eat properly! You liar!
"Why... I should be the one asking you 'why'!
"Does your life belong to Rice Cake?! Are you only living for my sake?!
"If Rice Cake and I aren't in your world, can you really not find a single beautiful thing to keep yourself alive?!"
Kiana screamed the entire tirade without taking a single breath. The more she spoke, the angrier she got. Her face flushed red, she glared fiercely around the room.
Her eyes locked onto a target. Still gripping Shu's collar tightly with one hand, she reached out with the other and snatched the lucky coin Shu had placed on the nightstand, holding it up between them.
"If a piece of junk like this gets to decide your future, if this gets to decide whether you live or die!"
SCREEECH—
Kiana's fist clamped shut around the coin. A harsh, agonizing screech of twisting metal erupted from her palm.
"Then—I! Kiana Kaslana... get to decide too!!"
Furious, she tossed the mangled, deformed lucky coin aside. Then, staring into the completely dumbfounded face of the boy who refused to cause anything but endless worry, she delivered her final declaration.
"If you really don't know what to do with your future... then give everything you have to me!
"Did you hear me?! You idiot, Shu!!"