The fifteen minutes felt like fifteen years.
Hiroto stood motionless, his mind racing through millions of scenarios.
In not a single one did he see a chance of survival, let alone winning.
I'm going to die. We're all going to die. What was I thinking?
No. Focus. There has to be a way. There's always a way.
Melissa stood against the wall, arms crossed, trying to look brave. But Hiroto could see her hands trembling.
Vera sat at her desk, head in her hands, shoulders shaking with silent sobs.
The operatives entered the room as the minutes ticked down.
One. Two. Three. Four.
Four Stage 3 assassins. Each one radiating a menacing aura. They surrounded the three in a group in a perfect kill box. They left no blind spots.
At the twelve-minute mark, Vera spoke. Her voice was barely a whisper.
"I'm sorry."
Hiroto looked at her.
"For everything. For being weak. For betraying Regiran. For getting everyone killed."
"You were protecting your daughter."
"That doesn't make it right."
"No. It doesn't."
He paused.
"You did what you thought you had to do."
"And look where that got us." She gestured to the operatives surrounding them. "We're all going to die in this room. My daughter will grow up thinking I died in some accident. Never knowing what I did. What I was."
"Maybe that's a kindness."
"Or maybe it's one more lie in a lifetime of lies."
Hiroto shrugged. "That's life."
At the ten-minute mark, one of the operatives spoke into his communication crystal.
"Package is en route. ETA is five minutes."
The auburn-haired Stage 6 nodded. "Excellent."
He walked to Melissa.
She tensed, hand twitching toward her crossbow.
"Don't," he said softly. "I'm not going to hurt you. Yet."
He stood in front of her, studying her face.
"You look like your mother. Elena. Same eyes. Same defiant expression. She had that look too, right before we made our deal with her."
Melissa's eyes widened. "You... you're the one who threatened her. Fifteen years ago."
"Guilty! Though 'threatened' is such an ugly word. We offered her a choice. She chose wisely. Lived a quiet life." He smiled. "For a while, anyway."
At the five-minute mark, the door opened.
Two more operatives entered, carrying a large case between them.
They set it on Vera's desk and opened it.
Inside, nestled in protective foam, was the Veridian Lens.
Hiroto understood, in that moment, why the Archivists feared it.
Because truth, wielded without mercy, was more dangerous than any weapon.
"Well, Detective?" The operative gestured. "Show us this miraculous unlocking you promised."
He paused and added. "Or else we'll dispose of you."
Hiroto approached the desk slowly.
Each step felt like walking toward an executioner's block.
His hands were shaking now. He couldn't hide it anymore.
This is it. No more time. No more planning. Just action.
I'm going to die here.
He stood before the Lens, and up close it was even more overwhelming. The essence made his skin prickle.
"I need tools," Hiroto said. His voice sounded distant to his own ears.
An operative handed him a set of artificer's instruments.
He examined the Lens's base, finding the seam where the secondary chamber was hidden. Almost invisible.
Thank you, Vera. For being thorough in your authentication. For documenting everything.
He began working, carefully prying open the hidden compartment.
The bronze was cold under his fingers. Cold enough to burn.
Inside was a small crystalline structure.
Beautiful. Terrible. Glowing faintly with contained essence.
It looked like a frozen star.
Filaments connected it to the Lens's essence matrix. Nearly invisible threads of pure power, pulsing with rhythms that matched no heartbeat Hiroto had ever felt.
"The Mirror Crystal," Hiroto said, and he was proud his voice didn't break. "It's currently calibrated to limit the Lens's power. To unlock its full potential, I need to recalibrate the frequency. Harmonize it with the base essence matrix."
He was lying.
Every word was a lie.
But he spoke them like the truth because he'd learned, over the years, that the best lies were the ones you almost believed yourself.
"How long?" the operative asked.
"Two minutes. Maybe less."
"Then proceed. And Detective?" The operative's voice dropped to a whisper only Hiroto could hear. "If you try what I think you're going to try, I'll make sure Miss Voss suffers for days before she's allowed to die. Understood?"
Hiroto nodded.
He knows. He's known the whole time. And he's going to let me try anyway because he's curious.
Fuck him. Fuck all of them.
Hiroto reached for the crystal with the tool.
His mind was screaming. Every survival instinct he had was telling him to stop, to run, to beg for mercy.
But he'd made his choice.
He'd made it the moment he became a detective.
The moment Yuto died protecting him.
The moment he realized that some truths needed to be found regardless of the cost.
"Before I do this," Hiroto said quietly, "I need to know. The Ten Wonders. What are they really for? Why go through all this? Why test people? Why kill investigators who fail?"
The operative smiled. "We're building something, Detective. An organization capable of handling threats that governments can't acknowledge and heroes can't solve. Threats that exist in the spaces between laws and morality. The Ten Wonders are helping us find the exceptional individuals we need. People with skills beyond the ordinary."
"So you're using impossible phenomena as a job interview, that's something.."
"And the people who fail your tests? The investigators who died?"
"Collateral damage. Every great endeavor requires sacrifice.
"I see."
Hiroto drove the tool into the crystal.
Not recalibrating it.
He completely shattered it.
The crystal exploded in a burst of essence that felt like a star dying inside a closed room.
The Veridian Lens screamed.
The sound was part metal tearing, glass breaking, and eldritch monsters.
The candles went out.
Darkness, except for the Lens, which was glowing now. Bright. Blinding. Angry.
"WHAT ARE YOU—" The operative lunged forward, but Hiroto was already moving.
His eyes changed.
The blue iris darkened, like storm clouds gathering. A golden ring appeared around the pupil, bright as the circle that separates the living from the dead. Then a sinister red glow appeared.
Judgment's Eye.
He locked eyes with the Lens itself.
Not looking at it. Looking into it. Into every sin it represented.
The artifact responsible for three deaths. For Vera's three-year nightmare. For the corruption of Elena's friend into a broken alcoholic.
Something inside him broke.
Not physically. Deeper than that.
A wall that had existed since birth. A limit that defined what was possible for a human consciousness. A boundary that shouldn't be crossed.
It shattered like glass under a hammer.
Pain exploded through his skull. Not just pain.
His eyes burned. His brain felt like it was being torn apart.
He regained his senses and looked around as all two operatives were lunging at him. One was going to finish off Vera, the other was aiming for Melissa.
Then blood poured from his eyes. From his nose. From his ears. From the corners of his mouth.
He tasted copper. He heard the screams of Vera and Melissa.
Then the world shattered into billions of pieces.
DETECTING EXTREME WILLPOWER - QUANTIFYING...
CONVICTION: ABSOLUTE. UNSHAKEABLE. PURE.
Everything was replaced with... mirrors.