"I won't lose him again!" — Ken
Ken didn't move. The voice of the Chronographer, a conceptual echo of deep cosmic wisdom, hung heavy in the air, offering a devastating ultimatum.
"The Buffer is stable," the ancient voice reiterated, the sound now registering as a pressure against Ken's skull. "It is a lie, but it is a functioning anchor. K.H. lives. If you attempt the restoration, you gamble his existence on a probability of failure I have already calculated and deemed too high."
Ken felt the raw, primal fear of a younger brother who had almost lost everything once before. He looked at the Pillar of Memory, a silent, sapphire beacon of truth, resting innocently on the Chronographer's desk.
"You speak of probability," Ken said, his voice husky, the effort of speaking in this non-physical realm taxing. "But you speak of my brother. This 'Conceptual Buffer' you created—what is the price of that stability?"
"His core identity," the Chronographer replied without hesitation. "He is not Kabe Hiroki. He is a simplified, pacified construct, one whose purpose is survival, not being. He will never remember the Trails, the Pillars, or the full weight of what he lost in the Rift. He will live a quiet, happy, empty life."
"And if I take the Pillar of Memory and succeed?"
"He returns whole," the voice stated. "But his conceptual structure is akin to a damaged ship. Introducing the full, powerful Pillar of Memory is like hitting that ship with a tidal wave. It is likely to break him into dust before the reconstruction can complete."
Ken knew the Chronographer was speaking purely logically, ethically, even. A life sustained by a comfortable lie is mathematically superior to an 87.4% chance of non-existence. But Ken hadn't ascended the Mugenkyou to follow a mathematical imperative. He had come for his brother.
He thought of Kabe's recent smiles, the calm patience he showed Ken, the easy acceptance of their life. It was a beautiful, manufactured peace. He thought of the Kabe of the past—the fierce leader, the witty mentor, the one who carried the true, complex weight of his own identity.
"I won't leave him a half-person," Ken declared, taking a slow, deliberate step toward the desk. The Chronographer's presence intensified, pushing against him like an invisible wall of force.
"You defy the judgment of the Archive itself," the voice warned.
"I defy your odds," Ken retorted, his fingers tightening on the white Pillar of Dreams. "You calculated the probability based on the Pillar's strength, not on Kabe's."
Ken walked the final steps, pushing through the suffocating weight of the Chronographer's conceptual disapproval. He reached the obsidian desk, his chest heaving, and placed the Pillar of Dreams down beside the assessment report.
He gently slid his hand under the heavy glass weight and pulled out the report. He held the document over the desk.
"This is the Conceptual Buffer," Ken said, tearing the paper in half with a sharp, decisive sound that was deafening in the silent room. He tore it again, then again, scattering the conceptual fragments of the 'false life' across the smooth, black surface.
"I am dismantling your buffer, Chronographer," Ken stated, his voice ringing with absolute certainty. "Now, he has no shield. He must be whole, or nothing at all."
He raised his eyes to the floating Pillar of Memory. The sapphire shard pulsed powerfully, recognizing the proximity of a friendly Anchor. The Chronographer's presence was momentarily stunned by the audacity of the action.
The odds have changed, the voice whispered, laced with shock. But not in your favor.
Ken reached out and grasped the Pillar of Memory.
The instant his fingers closed around the sapphire, a white-hot conceptual fire erupted in his mind. The combined power of the two Pillars—Dreams and Memory—was too vast for his untrained mind to handle.
He felt the entire Archive tilt. The Chronographer's desk, the walls, and the floor dissolved into a swirling vortex of blue and white data streams. Ken was plunged into a sea of his own memories, Kabe's memories, and the raw, unfiltered history of the Mugenkyou.
He was struck by an image: Kabe, younger, standing at the center of the Rift, protecting Ken from the entity, sacrificing himself. Ken saw the moment Kabe's original structure shattered, and the Chronographer's gentle, weary hand reached in to stitch the fragile pieces back together into the 'Buffer.'
Hold fast! Ken screamed internally, clutching the two Pillars to his chest. I need to get this to Kabe!
But the Chronographer was not done with him. The swirling data coalesced into a single, terrifying shape: a vast, geometric eye, the eye of the Chronographer, which stared into Ken's very core.
"Your resolve is commendable, Trail Walker," the voice boomed, amplified to a terrifying roar. "But conviction is no substitute for power. If you leave now, I can stabilize you. If you take that Pillar, you will tear a hole in this Archive, and your conceptual form will be lost."
The eye intensified, projecting a final, crushing vision directly into Ken's mind: Kabe, screaming, his body dissolving into sand, the 87.4% failure made real.
Ken closed his eyes, accepting the pain, but not the vision. He focused all his energy into the Pillar of Dreams—the anchor of hope, purpose, and unwavering belief—and thrust it into the Chronographer's Eye.
The pure, white energy of the Pillar of Dreams struck the conceptual authority of the Archive. It was not a violent strike, but a statement: I believe in a better ending.
The Eye recoiled, momentarily blinded by the sheer force of Ken's faith. The Chronographer's presence, though vast, was rooted in logic and history; Ken's attack was fueled by pure, irrational hope, something the Chronographer could not calculate.
In that brief, blinding moment, Ken turned, the Pillar of Memory clutched in his left hand, the Pillar of Dreams in his right, and ran from the Inner Archive, leaving the Chronographer's quiet, judgmental domain behind him.