The darkness that greeted me after I passed out was not a peaceful void. It was a sea of embers and ash, a world between consciousness and nothingness where the only sensation was pain. I felt as if my body were a rope being pulled from two opposite directions. One side pulled me toward total tranquility and silence, while the other, a hot and furious power, stubbornly pulled me back, refusing to let go. I could feel this force working within me, not as armor, but as something more fundamental. It felt like thousands of tiny, hot hands were knitting my burned tissues back together, patching my skin, and forcing my damaged muscles to function again. This process was not gentle; it was a brutal healing, a forceful mending driven by a pure survival instinct.
In the midst of this haze of pain, I felt another presence. The dragon. Tyrant. Its consciousness, usually just a heartbeat or a whisper of rage, was now stronger, flooding my system as fuel for this regeneration. I felt the echo of its emotions—not just anger, but an immense hunger, an arrogant pride, and strangest of all, a sort of protective possessiveness. As if my body was its territory, and it would not allow its toy to be badly broken. I had to fight to maintain myself, my own consciousness, to keep from drowning in this sea of primal instinct. This was the first time I truly understood All Might's warning. Using this power recklessly wasn't just a risk to my body, but to my very soul.
Slowly, very slowly, the burning pain began to subside, replaced by an exhaustion so deep it felt like lead weights in every cell of my body. The darkness began to thin, and the sounds of the outside world started to seep in.
I awoke in a quiet, antiseptic-smelling room. A hospital. I could tell from the stiff mattress and the monotonous beeping of a machine beside me. I moved my hand, and to my surprise, it responded, albeit weakly. I looked at my previously charred arm. The wound was gone. Completely gone. Replaced by smooth, new, slightly reddish skin. But if I looked at it in just the right light, I could see a very faint, almost invisible pattern, like a silvery web under my skin's surface, the remnants of that miraculous repair. I quickly pulled the blanket over it.
The door opened quietly, and Ryukyu walked in. Her face looked tired, and there was a thin bandage on her cheek, likely from a stray shard from my own unintentional attack. She sat in the chair beside my bed, a heavy silence enveloping us. Behind her, through the glass window in the door, I could see Nejire, Uraraka, and Tsuyu waiting anxiously in the corridor.
Outside, in the quiet corridor of the hero-specialized hospital, Ryukyu's interns waited anxiously. Uraraka paced back and forth, her face pale. "Why did he do it?" she whispered to anyone who would listen. "He jumped in front of Ryukyu-san's attack. To protect that killer. It makes no sense."
"His actions were indeed illogical, kero," Tsuyu replied, sitting calmly, though her finger tapping incessantly on her knee betrayed her own agitation. "But Tatsumi-chan isn't one to act without reason. There must be something we don't know."
Nejire, usually in constant motion, was leaning silently against the wall, her eyes staring blankly at the floor. "That connection," she muttered. "He said he could feel her. And the killer… she stopped when Tatsumi-kun called her name. How did he know her name? And why could Tatsumi-kun's armor block that sword? Is his armor super strong? Or is the sword not as sharp as it looks? Or maybe there's a relationship between their powers? I have a thousand theories, but none of them feel right."
Their unease was interrupted as a doctor came out of another room and approached Ryukyu, who had just stepped out of Tatsumi's room. "Ryukyu-san," the doctor said, reading from his tablet. "Patient Tatsumi's condition… frankly, it's a medical miracle. The third-degree burns he sustained should have required skin graft surgery and months of recovery. But in less than twelve hours, most of the wounds have completely healed, leaving only minor inflammation. His rate of cellular regeneration surpasses any healing Quirk we have on record. We can't explain it. It's… it's almost as if his body rebuilt itself from a different blueprint."
Ryukyu listened intently, her expression unchanging, but inside, the list of questions about her mysterious intern grew even longer.
After the doctor left, Ryukyu re-entered my room, closing the door behind her. She pulled the chair closer, and her golden eyes stared at me with an unyielding intensity. "Welcome back," she said, her voice calm, but with an undercurrent of steel. "I've heard the doctor's explanation. Now, it's your turn. And I want the truth. No lies. No evasions. Why did you protect that killer, Tatsumi-kun?"
I swallowed, my throat feeling dry. I knew I couldn't tell her about my old world. It was a truth too insane to be accepted. I had to give her something else, something close enough to the truth that it felt real, but vague enough to protect me.
"I… I didn't protect her because I agree with her actions," I said quietly, choosing each word with care. "When I felt her presence… when we looked at each other… I felt something other than killing intent."
"Felt what?" Ryukyu pressed.
"I felt it through the strange connection our powers share," I lied, mixing in a kernel of truth. "I felt desperation. A deep, profound sadness. And a cold resolve that wasn't born from hatred, but from… a mission. A burden." I met her eyes. "I don't know who she is or where she comes from. But I know one thing: she's not a common villain acting out of greed or power. She's a soldier following orders, even if those orders come from herself. She's a wounded weapon."
I paused, letting her absorb it. "If we had captured her that night, we would have only captured the weapon. The mastermind behind her, the organization that trained her—Yozakura—would have remained in the shadows. I took a risk. I gambled that by letting her escape, we gave her a chance to doubt her mission, and gave us a chance to hunt her more intelligently, not just with brute force."
It was the best lie I could come up with. A lie that reframed my impulsive, emotionally-driven action into a high-level strategic gamble. Ryukyu stared at me for a long time, her expression unreadable. She was a veteran hero and a shrewd leader. She had to have sensed the dishonesty in my story. But she also couldn't deny its logic.
"You risked your own life based on an emotional hunch you're calling 'strategy'," she said finally, her voice flat. "It was the most reckless thing I have ever seen from a student." She paused, then let out a long sigh. "And perhaps one of the bravest." She leaned back in her chair. "Fine, Tatsumi-kun. I'll trust you for now. But you owe me. And you will pay me back by following my every order without question from now on."
I could only nod, an immense wave of relief washing over me.
Elsewhere in the city, inside an abandoned temple that served as one of her hideouts, Akame sat in a seiza position before a single small candle. The sword Murasame lay beside her. Her mind was in turmoil, something she hadn't felt since she left the Empire.
That boy. He had taken a fire blast for her. A completely illogical and utterly foolish act. An act that was so… Tatsumi. And then, the name. He had called her by her name. Akame. Not a code name or a moniker, but her real name. Only a handful of people knew that name, and all of them were dead, buried in another world.
How was it possible? Was he truly… the reincarnation of the Tatsumi she knew? The naive boy from the village who joined Night Raid, who inherited Incursio, who fought by her side, and who finally… fused with his Teigu to become a dragon? The energy she felt from him was indeed draconic. Wild and powerful.
A dangerous hope, one she had long since frozen in her heart, began to thaw. The possibility that she was not alone in this strange world… the possibility that one of her most precious comrades might have followed her… It was a terrifying and exhilarating thought.
But she had to be sure. She couldn't act on emotion. She was an assassin. She was a professional. Her mission to cleanse the world of evil remained. But now, she had a new mission, one far more important, far more personal. She had to find that boy again. She had to confront him, away from the heroes protecting him. She had to get answers.
Akame picked up a map of the city lying on the floor. She was no longer looking for the next target on her list of corrupt officials. Her red eyes traced the district where Ryukyu's agency was located. Her hunt now had a new focus. She would find the truth, whatever the risk. She extinguished the candle, and the room was once again consumed by darkness and her cold resolve.