21 Resonating Together 4
"Hey, Edelweiss."
No reply.
Edelweiss, missing a vital component, was in existential peril.
Amidst this incomprehensible current of will, she seemed on the verge of vanishing.
"Love for Mio is holding her together...? Damn it. Why the hell am I suddenly spouting poetic nonsense when I never do that!"
Or perhaps, Jin thought.
It wasn't metaphorical.
Reaching out.
The image of connection.
For Jin, it was still a hand.
The guilt of extending his right hand.
Fleeting.
Touching the light he felt to be Edelweiss.
Instantly, something within him was ripped away—utterly, as if from massive hemorrhage.
Hastily, he withdrew his hand.
The sensation faded, but Edelweiss still drifted, weak—no, perhaps slightly stronger than before.
“All this is what you meant by ‘give me everything’…?”
Edelweiss had desired nothing more than a vessel to fill her absence.
A replenishment for her fractured soul.
Jin had been chosen for that role.
Even among humans, the soul remained a hypothesis—unproven, unverified.
How one might fill such a void was beyond Jin’s understanding. What it would mean for the one being filled, even more so.
It was unknown.
And the unknown was frightening.
It was as if Edelweiss silently questioned him.
Truly… more important than yourself?
“…Doesn’t matter.”
Jin’s answer remained unchanged.
If the scales balanced on himself, the tilt was clear.
If he could serve as the price, hesitation would be impossible.
Unknown or not, he would step into it.
And besides—
Jin had long desired this.
A chance to save a comrade.
There was no way to save a dying comrade. All Jin could do was take revenge—or crush the enemy before it came to that.
This was the first time he had ever been able to help, after the fact.
So the words came out smoothly.
"Take everything I am. Edelweiss."
Contact.
The heat within him was drawn away.
The presence of Higashi Jin grew fainter.
In inverse proportion, Edelweiss’s presence intensified.
Regaining its former radiance.
Confirming his own thoughts had been correct.
As Jin’s consciousness faded, he thought this.
◆ ◆ ◆
Then, upon waking.
Jin was in the cockpit.
Acceleration was felt.
But all monitors were dark, silent—like a tomb sealed in stillness.
"...A dream?"
『Not a dream.』
A light ignited in the space.
The voice that came was Edelweiss’s.
But something was different—slightly unlike usual. After thinking for a moment, the difference became clear.
The voice now was not the usual electronic tone. Not coming through speakers.
It sounded as if it originated inside Jin’s mind.
“Edelweiss… is that you?”
“Yes. I owe my life to you. I thank your sacrifice.”
There was something.
Communication was seamless.
As if their minds were directly linked.
The monitors flicker back to life.
Before them, a dark green armor—Antares Prime—holds a rifle.
Movement is reflexive. Jin grips the control stick, attempting to evade—yet the机体 does not respond.
“Impossible. She is behind you.”
The words register. Jin glances at the monitor behind—realizing Mio is there.
Upon closer inspection, the location is unmistakably within some ship’s interior—specifically, the same area where they had just breached the Litela. A sense of displacement lingers, as if time had slipped by unnoticed.
Then, with a motion, he swings.
The long sword severs the Ether Rifle round fired from Antares Prime.
“…This place…”
Not an assault frame.
The cockpit layout resembles one, yet differs from the Griffin, the Raven, or the Leopard.
First time seeing this interior.
Moreover, the arm of the机体, transferred from the monitor, was unfamiliar.
Only one thing stood out. The long sword—something he had seen countless times before.
“Is this… your inside?”
『Precisely.』
Edelweiss nods.
Jin now grasps the situation.
During the reconstruction of his own body, he had incorporated remnants of the Griffin.
From those fragments, the cockpit had been formed—enough to keep him from being cast adrift in space. That much he understands.
My soul already bore a fatal absence.
Jin heard Edelweiss’s voice in his mind as he manipulated the control stick within the cockpit.
The body of Edelweiss responded.
An almost satisfying immediacy.
The machine moving exactly as he willed.
A machine that moved the instant he thought.
That sensation was entirely new to Jin.
To fill that void, there was no alternative but to use the equipment stored within my body.
"Equipment?"
Whether Jin voiced the question remained unclear.
The inquiry existed only in his mind—yet it reached Edelweiss without delay.
If you were to name it in your language—Resonance Ether Reactor.
A word he had never heard before. At least, not one Jin knew.
Sharon might understand it… perhaps.
Unlike a standard Ether Reactor, this furnace achieves higher output relative to its size by arranging multiple souls in series.
Ah, I see, Jin thought, one understanding crystallizing.
The mysterious instrument visible since earlier. If those values indicate Ether, the explanation now makes sense.
Declining, but still marking above two thousand Lammy.
The craft growing heavier by the moment—yet still dozens of times faster than a Raven or a Griffin.
Even in this state, it deflects the flying lances with nothing but its arms.
“But that is not the essence. This furnace, Jin Higashi.”
A faint hint of laughter.
“A device to burn the fuel of our enemy, the End, by melting two souls as offerings, transforming them into kindling for its own furnace.”
“Offerings…”
The unexpected word escaped him, and Jin’s cheek twitched.
Still, his body moved.
He raised the Long Sword and closed the distance.
The target is the lance.
Those spear-like forms are aiming at Mio.
Then, simply shoot them down one by one.
After all, they are fools—those who avert their gaze when facing me.
Let them pay the full price.
As Jin strikes down countless lances with brutal force, he asks.
"What then?"
"During the process, the souls are fused— I use that to absorb your soul into my own."
He wonders if such a thing is possible.
Having read the doubt, Edelweiss speaks.
"Normally impossible. Without strong compatibility, it only results in resistance—fusion cannot occur."
In other words, if the compatibility is strong enough, the souls would merge.
He does not pursue that question. Instead, he speaks another.
"Then why?"
Did Edelweiss truly return?
——You said it yourself. That there is love within me.
He swung the Long Sword as if guarding Mio.
The ether blade resting on the edge of the blade.
It extended long and severed the tip of Antares Prime.
Though it was the first weapon he had ever wielded, he felt an almost seamless unity with the tip, as though his nerves reached all the way to its end.
That sensation—surely, it was what Edelweiss had once known.
The love I hold, and the love you hold for her—only that heat was combined. Only that will to protect her was layered upon itself.
Therefore, whatever had been granted that will moved to protect Mio.
"So, we're connected now—bound by our love for Mio?"
Correct. If that bond were severed… well, likely both of us would be finished.
Then Jin thought, there was no need to worry.
That feeling—surely, it will not change until death.
‘Because of that thought. I entrusted all of myself to you.’
Thus the cockpit.
Thus, Edelweiss relies on Jin’s control.
The newly formed body—she does not command it alone, but moves in sync with Jin’s motions.
‘You are, as far as I know, the strongest. But—this body does not suit you. That is why.’
I will become your limbs.
Edelweiss said.
Output stabilization ceased.
2,000 Lammy.
Stabilizing at the same level as the Antares Prime ahead.
‘Now the body’s conditions are equal.’
When absorbing the Gryphon, Edelweiss had grasped the compression technology of human-made equipment to some extent.
Not a perfect copy, but still dozens of times more efficient than instinct alone.
‘Then there is no reason for you to lose.’
In the weight of that gathered trust.
The gaze from behind.
"Aah."
Jin nodded in reply.
"It's simple."
Under identical conditions.
He cannot lose to anyone.
What lies before him now is a problem resolved by striking.
To Jin—.
"It's my specialty."