Each shot clung tightly, loosely against one and the other. Their rifles clashed, a tug of war before Ayame smacked Nagusa's chin with a buttstroke.

She flinched, backing off. Blood trickled from her lip, iron tang mixing with snow. The President never pulled punches. Before Ayame could pull back her bolt, Nagusa fought back with a single shot of Hyakuren.

For a split second, Ayame's yellow eye flickered, before the bullet slammed into her rifle's muzzle. For half a second, nothing happened.

And then her rifle exploded in her very hands. But there was no time to for the wicked to rest.

Another shot fired from Nagusa.

It hit the target.

Ordinarily, bullets shouldn't do significant damage against students.

So why did it hurt her so much?

Ayame stumbled backwards, the bullet lodged into her shoulder. Her eyes flickered again, as ink began to expel out of said shoulder, spattering to the snow in a hiss. Its last rebellion before inaction.

Ayame reached out, a small utterance.

"Nagusa?"

Before she slowly fell on her back, the snow shaping into her bidding. Nagusa's hands trembled, before she quickly ran towards the president.

Slowly, she sat down, right beside her as she observed. The Hyakkaryouran members followed suit, surrounding their president.

"She... Has to wake up, doesn't she?" Renge inquired.

"The Hyakuren purges the ghost stories. Perhaps it does," Kikyou merely stated, while gripping her own haori.

"I have faith." Yukari assured, before they all noticed Nagusa.

She was sobbing. The smallest utterance left her lips.

"I'm sorry... For failing you."

"It's not..." Ayame's voice crackled. The Hyakkaryouran held their breath. Ayame opened her eyes.

Still the same yellow and purple. And yet... There was life behind them. Her lips curved upwards.

"It's not your fault. You're strong."

Arius Squad and RABBIT Platoon however, had other issues.

Their unspoken camaraderie was unquestionable. Two Squads, abandoned, then raised by the ghost that now laid in ink.

But Kokuriko was a master of the Ghost Stories, with suppressive fires made moot against the tendrils that threaten to absorb them into a mass of vantablack.

C4s were thrown. They explode into the void. Missiles were fired. They were absorbed effortlessly.

Anti-material rifle blasted through, only to quickly reform.

Miyu fired from behind, every shot never to be detected but felt, drawing Kokuriko's ire. The noose choker intensified around her neck.

Each moment of attack burned through the ink... But then.

"SENSEI!!!"

The gunshots stopped. The ink flowed rigidly to the snow. Steam rose from where a laid figure was supposed to assimilate into the void, but a hand emerged instead. Scathed, desperate, but certain.

Atsuko clung to that hand, pulling, pulling again until finally, as if rebirthed, Kize emerged from the ink. A face full of snow in one full second, and then.

"BWP--"

An excess of ink sputtered out of his oesophagus, the dark void dripping from his body as steam continued to seep from his skin. Only when he was done, did Atsuko cup his face, and observed.

His tired icy blue eyes were still the same. His pale complexion never changed. His sandy orange hair... Still messy as always.

And his first words.

"Atsuko."

"Yes, Sensei?"

"Don't touch me."

She flinched, before smiling warmly and letting go of his face. She held up the dented thermos, offering it to the man who was once a ghost.

"It's yours, I believe."

Kokuriko's eyes widened. An impossibility. After everything planned, all brought down to an inevitability that Hyakkiyako should have burned.

And yet, its fire was snuffed. Azami had been captured. Shuro, swiftly defeated.

Their supernatural powers, defeated by the will of a single man, who now drank oolong tea from a dented thermos. The dissipation of his bandages from the ink's consumption allowed the scars of Arius's drone attack now rendered visible.

An opportunity that was not wasted, as Saki blazed through with a punch to Kokuriko's face and swiftly pinning her down into the snow.

"By the order of SCHALE's Clause 17-C of terrorism, you are under arrest, Kokuriko!" Saki declared.

Her ink died. But she breathed. Faintly. The noose choker clung to her neck, but her eyes saw Kize weakly approaching Kokuriko.

"Sensei--"

"Knife." Kize cut Saori off, a hand raised. Saori blinked, before hesitantly passing her combat knife to him.

"... What is Ghost-Sensei planning to do?" Yukari questioned, watching as he made his way towards Kokuriko. Saki saluted to him.

"Successful capture, Sensei. What do you... Plan on doing?" She questioned, watching as Kize knelt in front of Kokuriko.

"So you think victory is yours, Sensei?" She inquired.

"No." His hand immediately yanked the noose choker and in a single motion, cut it off from her neck.

"It's theirs."

Silence blew through the snowfield, while the ink hissed and screamed and writhed, before dissipating into nothingness, as if the Ghost Stories lost its source. Kokuriko stared into his eyes, never watching the choker dissolve in his hand. Its effect left a deep mark upon her neck, a noose that clung too hard to a ghost who should have moved on.

"Why?" She questioned. Kize didn't hesitate.

"Because you're an adult. Act like one."

Another silence. Kokuriko made sure to meet his eyes properly, as if what he said was some kind of jest.

Nothing. None of the sort. As if he lost his ability to make himself laugh. A jaded ghost of a man that had seen it all and still stared down against it.

She breathed.

"I forgot how fresh breathing feels."

"Get used to it." Kize stood up, as the Yin-Yang Club members approached the snowfield. "It's probably for the better that you do." A single head gesture, and Saki brought Kokuriko up to her feet. As she followed with the group, Renge carried the weakened Ayame up on her back. She observed everything, from Kize's emergence from the ink, to the cutting noose.

"Y'know. I never expected Arius's Ghost to literally be able to call Arius in for backup."

Ayame chuckled.

"There's a reason to his title, after all," she croaked.

——

"Nyahaha...... Well, I honestly didn't expect it to go like this."

The Yin-Yang Club, RABBIT Platoon, Arius Squad, and the Hyakkaryouran sat in the first floor of the Ghost's Teahouse, with Kize's arms crossed. The Shittim Chest he threw before the ink consumed him was picked up and given back to by Atsuko.

The AIs haven't responded yet. He wondered why.

Arius Squad sat the closest to Kize, with Hiyori leaning onto him, tired. He reluctantly allowed it, but never said it. Everyone decided it was better not to point it out, as they had better priorities.

"So the Nature's Beauty Club's been arrested?"

"Yes. They have been sent to your governed law enforcement, President Niya," Saki assured.

"And Ayame's been sent away to recover." Niya continued.

"She will need it," Nagusa replied. Her attempt to play off the fact that she sobbed was not helped by her currently puffy eyes.

"Nyahaha....." A crack of a grin appeared on her face.

What a turn of events. And this night was supposed to be the lantern festival. Kaho sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose, before simply looking at Kize.

"Leave it to Arius's Ghost to give us the fastest results possible. How do you do it?"

Kize looked at her silently, with only a single blink as an indicator of her inquiry.

"Oh, come on. You had a contingency in preparation for a fire outbreak."

"Wood burns easily. So does paper."

"You also had to gambit on Nagusa being able to convince Yukari."

"And it worked," Kikyou interjected. Yukari's eyes widened, before looking towards Kize, as if she discovered a newfound perspective on him.

"Did you gambit on the fact that you might have died facing the president of Hyakkaryouran, even?!" Kaho questioned, exasperated by his lack of self-preservation.

"I don't account for supernaturals."

"None of us did, either," Misaki stated, taking a sip of the tea made by Yukari.

Huh. Pretty good.

"Doesn't mean we won't fight for our ghost, Sensei," she continued. Kize blinked only once, his thermos now inside of his ripped coat once more. Kize glanced at Chise, who was at the balcony, staring out to the moon.

"A serenity—

The moon provides quite the scene.

The man emerges."

Silence.

"... Was that poetry?" Miyako questioned.

"Chise! D-does that mean...?" Kaho trailed off, her hands clasped together. Chise only glanced, her eyes wide as usual while her head tilted ever so slightly to the side.

"Hm? I just think the moon looks nice tonight," she pointed out.

"... Well. With that out of the way." Niya smacked her fan closed, her grin of playfulness returning once more.

"The lantern festival's been canceled. However, Sensei~"

Kize's expression had a singular micro expression of change: his eyes squinting. Whatever it was Niya was about to suggest, it was definitely not going to be helpful.

"You've become the talk of Hyakkiyako! Being carried like a bride by Wakamo across rooftops? It looked romantic!"

Arius Squad immediately locked their eyes towards Kize, apart from Hiyori. Miyu couldn't care less, as she sat silently in a corner, her hands holding onto the tea Yukari graciously gave to her. A small sign of validation to her existence.

"You got Wakamo to listen to you, Sensei?" Saori interrogated.

"What did you do, Sensei? I can believe it if Sensei... The comatose Sensei would be able to. But, you?" Misaki questioned.

"He met her in an alleyway," Nagusa began. "Holding her mask. He took one look at her and said something along the lines of 'you need an outlet for your anarchy. So listen to my plan'. She listened."

"Where is she now?" Atsuko asked.

"Disappeared. We... Don't know where," Miyako confessed.

"A shame. I'd have wanted to see her hold some grenades and explode. Like, ka-boom!" Moe exclaimed, her arms raised while her cheeks flushed at the mere thought of it. Saki reined her in from thinking further.

"..... Wait, so does this mean that Sensei is cheating on Instructor Shu--"

The slowest deadpan of an expression was painted ever so detailed upon Kize's face, aimed straight towards Yukari. She shrunk.

"That... Is most definitely a no."

"Does this mean he's actually da--"

"They're colleagues. Let's leave it at that," Atsuko shut down Renge before she could continue further with her train of thought. A clear of a throat, and then, all attention went back to Niya.

"So, Sensei~ mind helping us out with a 'Ghostly Revival Festival'?" Niya questioned.

——

The last of their footsteps creaked against the floorboards, with Hiyori sluggishly brought out.

"Expect us to be there when the festival begins, Sensei," Atsuko assured, a warm smile as she bowed to him. Kize said nothing, watching as the door closed before his very eyes. Kize sighed.

Annoying.

He slid the thermos onto a nearby table, before sitting on it while sliding the Shittim Chest into his hands.

The screen lit up, with Schale's symbol emerging, as usual. But like his previous attempts, Arona and Plana didn't appear. He tilted his head.

Was it something he did?

His memory remembered those words he spoke. When he had access to the Shittim Chest.

"We thirst for the seven wailings. We bear the koan of Jericho."

In a split second, a flash of light consumed him, and faded. There he stood once more, in the broken classroom of student chairs and desks, with an endless body of water stretching over the horizon. Arona and Plana were nowhere to be seen.

"......"

He slowly sat down at the edge of the ruined classroom, overlooking the ocean. The bright sky, the blinding sun. Artificial as it may be, it was odd to still be able to feel it.

"Sensei?"

Arona's voice called out. A weak signal, as if she wasn't there. Kize turned to the source, and saw her form. That small girl in a sailor uniform of blue and white, glitching... And then fully manifesting before his very eyes.

None of them spoke. Both stared.

And then Arona jumped, with an excruciating cry.

"SENSEEEEEEIIIIII!!!"

She effectively glomped onto Kize, clinging onto his entire body while tears streaked down her face. His hands supported her weight, but even so, Kize blinked.

AIs could cry? And have weight?

"Sensei."

Beside him, Plana formed. Her dark sailor uniform with long skirt and black coat a near reminiscent of his own.

"DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW MUCH WE WERE WORRIED ABOUT YOU, SENSEI?!!!" Arona wailed, sobbing harder into his shirt while Plana simply stated the facts.

"Statistics: Arona's fear of your... Erasure, had been a certainty to the point she shut down the Shittim Chest."

"..." One of Kize's hands was slowly raised, reaching down, as if intending to give the blue haired AI a pat.

But then he stopped. His breathing stilled.

And then he pulled away, clenching his fist.

"You don't need to be worried about me."

"BUT YOU'RE SENSEI!! I... WE... WE DON'T WANT TO LOSE ANOTHER SENSEI!!!!"

"Rectification: She refers to the comatose Sensei... However. She is correct."

Kize forgot how to breathe in that moment. He wasn't sure if Arona could hear his heartbeat, or if even Plana could.

"Health: Your heart beat pulse has increased to 90 BPM. Theory: ....." Plana shook her head. "Conclusion: We miss you."

".............." A breath in, a shaky sigh out. Arona continued to cling onto him, and then...

Plana wrapped her arms around Kize's neck, her weight pushing against his back.

"Sensei." She spoke softly. He stiffened, before she continued.

"Welcome back." He didn't need to see her face to feel her smile. A rare gesture...

But in this moment? It was as genuine as paperwork.