The forge was cold, but Obi had the workbench blazing with lamplight.
Takeshi's prosthetic arm lay spread across the surface in pieces - plates, servos, cables, the empty socket where the red gem had lived, and the metal strangely warped around it – organic patterns, metal shimmering with red, shifting shades if you tilted it under light. All arranged with surgical precision.
Obi sat hunched over it, tools in hand, but his movements were wrong. Trembling. Too forceful. He jammed a screwdriver into a seam, stripped the head, cursed, and threw it across the room.
Raizen and Hikari stopped in the doorway.
"How long have you been here?" Raizen asked quietly.
Obi didn't look up. "Since Louissa brought it back."
His hands moved to the central socket piece - the cradle that had held the red Luminite. The metal around it was blackened, warped, melted and reformed in strange organic patterns like something alive had been modified its structure.
"Look at this." His voice was flat. He turned it so they could see the damage. "This is what happens when you use Luminite like... Like- Like he did."
Hikari stepped closer, studying the corrupted metal. "It spread?"
"It competely altered." Obi set the piece down hard enough to make the whole bench rattle. His jaw clenched. "This thing was burning him alive. And he wore it anyway."
Raizen watched Obi's hands. They were shaking - barely, but enough to notice. There were dark circles under his eyes. His curls were messier than usual. He looked like he hadn't slept at all.
"He knew," Obi said, voice tight. "He knew he was killing himself and he walked out anyway."
He picked up another tool, gripped it too hard. "He could have told me. Could have said something. But no - he just leaves an empty chair and a letter like that's supposed to be an excuse."
"Obi—"
"He taught me which hammer to use by watching how my wrist trembled." Obi's voice cracked slightly. "He showed me what metal can become when it's forged right. How to read heat by color, how to know when something's ready just by sound."
He slammed his palm on the bench. "And he couldn't tell me he was going to die!?"
The word felt heavy in everyone's throats.
Die.
Nobody had said it out loud yet.
"Let me be angry," Obi said, quieter now. "Just for one minute. It's just… It's not fair."
Raizen moved closer. Set one hand on the bench. "Nothing's fair. Takeshi knew you'd follow if he told you."
Obi blinked, eyes red. "And!?"
"And that would have killed both of you" Raizen's voice was steady but cold. "I wanted to be there too, maybe even more than you. But he made the choice that kept us alive."
"So we just sit here and accept it?"
"No." Raizen looked at the corrupted socket, at the pieces of a man who'd given everything. "We stand where we are and carry it forward. That's what he couldn't do. That's what he would have wanted us to do."
Hikari's fingers brushed the edge of the damaged metal. "Takeshi believed your life wasn't something to waste," she said softly. "That's why he never asked."
Obi turned his head away, jaw clenched. He picked up a small hammer just to put it down again. His hands wouldn't stay still. "I hate that it makes sense," he muttered.
A long silence.
Then Obi stood abruptly and walked to the corner of the forge. A surveillance camera sat there - sleek, modern, expensive. The kind that didn't come from the Underworks yet it still watched it from far corners.
"Where'd you get that?" Raizen asked.
"Well..." Obi's grin was quick, but didn't reach his eyes. "They're scattered around the Underworks… In higher points. The richasses above like to keep an eye on us."
His smile stayed on for a few more seconds. "We used to play this game when we were little… Me and Snout, in the good times – Whoever destroyed more cameras by throwing pebbles at them won…"
He cracked it open with a small tool, revealing circuitry and a core of high-grade steel alloy. "Pretty pure stainless steel. Stupid expensive down here." His fingers moved quickly, extracting components.
"What are you building?" Hikari asked.
Obi paused, tools in hand. "Two things."
He gestured at Takeshi's arm. "This - trying to understand how the energy spread. Maybe prevent it from happening to someone else, I have no idea. I never touched something affected by luminite like that my entire life! The Luminite these Gravers have don't do that."
Then he nodded toward a covered section of the workbench. "And a commission."
Raizen's eyebrows went up. "Commission? From who?"
"No idea." Obi pulled back the cloth, revealing blueprints and partially assembled components. "Three days ago, someone walked in. Full cloak, hood up, face completely hidden. Doesn't say a word. Just puts a note on my table."
He picked up a piece of paper and read aloud: "Something hidden. Something deadly. Something that spins."
Silence.
"That's it?" Raizen said.
"That's it." Obi set the note down. "Then they dropped a bag of money next to it and left."
He pulled the coin bag from under the bench. It was heavy. "More than I'd make in a year. Maybe two."
Hikari frowned. "And you don't know who it was for?"
"Didn't ask! Money's real, and stuff like these are everyday business in the Underworks." Obi gestured at his work - a wrist-mounted mechanism with a retractable blade that sat on a rotating screw assembly. "Hidden - springs into the hand when triggered. Deadly - obviously. Spins - the whole blade rotates on its axis while extended."
"…Like a mounted, retractable skeleton knife…" Raizen observed, leaning forward.
Obi demonstrated on a wooden target. The blade shot out, locked, then began spinning rapidly before retracting.
"Purely mechanical. Strangely, they didn't want Luminite. Whoever commissioned this doesn't use it for Nyxes." Obi's grin was genuine now, the first real one since they'd arrived. "It's perfect. Unusual request, creative solution. This is what I do."
Raizen studied the mechanism. Something about it felt wrong. The spinning blade, the hidden deployment, the anonymous commission with too much money.
"You should be careful," he said quietly. "After everything with the Moirai—"
"The Moirai are dead." Obi turned back to his work, already dismissing the concern. "And I'm a smith. People commission weapons. That's literally my job."
But Raizen noticed Obi's hands tightened on the tools.
Hikari moved to the window, looking out at the Underworks below. "What happens now?" she asked. "With Takeshi gone, with the Moirai destroyed... what do we do?"
Raizen thought of the letter. The words Takeshi had written in careful ink on expensive paper.
Keep the world lit.
Eon.
The Lotus Academy.
"We go up. To the Academy," Raizen said quietly.
Obi's hands stopped moving.
"We trained properly, a bit more and we're ready for the entrance exam." Raizen continued, words coming faster now. "Then we become Vanguards. Not Gravers scraping by with cheap weapons. Real hunters. Strong enough to actually change things."
He looked at Obi. "All of us. Together."
Obi set his tools down carefully. Too carefully. "Raizen—"
"Takeshi wanted us there. You read the letter. He said—"
"I know what he said." Obi's voice was quiet. "But I'm not going."
The words hit like a physical blow.
"What?" Hikari turned from the window.
"I'm staying." Obi gestured around the forge, at the Underworks beyond. "This is my home. My forge. My work. People here need tools, need repairs, need someone who understands how things fit together."
"But—"
"You two are fighters," Obi interrupted gently. "You're built for the Academy. For hunting Nyxes, for climbing those stairs Takeshi talked about." His smile was sad. "I'm a smith. I make the tools that let other people be heroes."
Raizen felt something crack in his chest. "We're supposed to stick together-"
"We are." Obi picked up one of the arm components. "Just from different places. You'll go up there, become Vanguards, save lives. I'll stay down here, forge the tools that keep you alive while you do it."
"That's not—" Raizen's voice broke. "We already lost Takeshi. I can't—"
"You're not losing me." Obi's eyes were bright. "I'll still be here! Same forge, maybe even a better one, if I can afford it! Same charmful jokes! And when you come back with your fancy Academy stories, I'll make sure your blades are still sharp."
Hikari's voice was barely a whisper. "You're really staying?"
"I have to." Obi's grin wobbled. "Can't have the whole family disappear upstairs. Who'd keep the Underworks running?"
Raizen wanted to argue. Wanted to demand Obi come with them, wanted to keep what little family he had left together in one place.
But he looked at Obi surrounded by tools and half-finished projects, standing in a forge that fit him like a second skin, and he understood.
This was where Obi belonged.
Just like the Academy was where they needed to be.
"It's a hard choice, isn't it?" Obi said softly, reading Raizen's face. "Staying here is safe. Going up there is... everything Takeshi wanted for you. But it means splitting up."
"I don't want to split up…" Raizen said with a soft voice.
"I know." Obi's smile was genuine now, sad but real. "But you already know you can't kill Nyxes with a damn butter knife!"
A soft knock came at the door.
Without waiting for an answer, Louissa stepped in, shawl wrapped tight, expression carefully neutral.
"It's done" she said.
Everyone turned.
"Every trace of the Moirai is gone," Louissa continued. "Their compound, their masks, their network. All of it. Dismantled, destroyed, or distributed." She paused. "They're dead. All of them."
"Takeshi, too" Raizen said quietly.
Louissa didn't soften it. "He did what men like him do. He removed a shadow from the world. That's not a small thing."
"But-" Hikari tried, but Louissa didn't give her the chance.
"Stubbornness kept him alive longer than it should have, an killed him sooner than we wanted. Most strengths are like that."
She moved closer, looking at each of them in turn. "All things end. We honor them by deciding what begins instead."
Raizen's fingers curled. The choice sat in front of him like a blade balanced on its very edge.
Stay in the Underworks. Safety. Family. Known streets and familiar faces. Obi's forge and Louissa's warmth.
Or go to the Academy. Unknown. Dangerous. Alone except for Hikari. Chase the dream Takeshi had written in ink and paid for in blood.
Keep the world lit.
The words echoed in his mind. If he stayed, he'd be comfortable. Protected. Small. But if he went, he'd honor Takeshi. Grow. Learn. Become strong enough to actually protect people instead of just surviving.
…But it meant leaving Obi behind.
"The Lotus Academy," Louissa said, watching him process, "asks for perfection. Endurance. The willingness to be better than everyone else."
Her smile was small. "That's just the entrance exam. After that, you join a Vanguard division and the real work begins."
"They're going to break all your favorite rules, Granny," Obi said, trying for lightness.
"They already have." Louissa's smile widened. "But most rules are made to be broken."
Raizen looked at Hikari. She met his eyes, silent question in hers.
Are we doing this?
He thought of his parents. The village. The helplessness of watching people die while he froze. He thought of Takeshi's letter. The careful words. The quiet love.
Live long enough to be kind when it's inconvenient. Live long enough to be happy for no reason.
Keep the world lit.
He'd made a choice in silence once before, sitting at a table with three cups and cold tea: protect everyone. This was the second choice. The one that made the first one real.
"We're going" Raizen said.
The words came out certain.
"To the Academy. To become Vanguards." He looked at Obi. "Not because I want to leave you. I'll visit you, don't worry, you won't miss my sorry arse. But because Takeshi was right. We can do more up there than down here."
Obi's shoulders relaxed slightly, like he'd been holding tension he could finally release. He wasn't usually this serious. "Good. That's the right call."
"Is it?" Raizen's voice cracked. "Feels like I'm abandoning—"
"You're not." Obi stepped forward and gripped Raizen's shoulder. "You're growing. There's a difference. And when you come back - when, not if - I'll still be here. Probably surrounded by projects I shouldn't have started."
Louissa moved to the door and paused. "One more thing. When you walk in there, don't forget that mercy is a kind of strength. Your time at the Academy might try to teach you otherwise."
"So be impolite and refuse the lesson!" Obi added, grin returning.
Raizen stuck a finger in his ear. "No need to shout, Obi."
The moment of levity passed. Silence settled again.
Outside, the Underworks prepared for another day. Cart wheels squeaked. Voices echoed. The city moved forward because it had no choice - people had learned to live inside it no matter what. No matter who died, who disappeared and who stopped ruling from the darkest corners.
Louissa stepped into the hallway. Over her shoulder, she added a final line: "You're ready. Not because you're strong. Because you're just at the beginning."
Raizen picked up his twin blades. The golden Luminite cores pulsed faintly.
Hikari tied her pouch to her hip - the one with a white mask fragment inside.
Obi leaned over the anvil, lighting coals for the day's first fire. His smile was wide and genuine.
"You're ready," he said. "Or at least... ready enough."
Raizen looked at him one more time. The curls. The grin. The hands that could sometimes turn scrap into miracles.
"We'll come back" Raizen said.
"I know." Obi's voice was steady. "And when you do, you better have stories worth hearing and weapons worth sharpening."
The furnace fire caught, orange light filling the room.
And two paths diverged - one staying in the Underworks, keeping the home fires burning.
The other climbing toward the surface, toward the Academy, toward a future Takeshi had written for them but wouldn't see.