The shadows of the canyon had barely begun to settle when Kieran finally reached Roy. The guy was walking at his usual pace, his mask reflecting the rising sunlight as though it bore no trace of the chaos that had just unfolded. Dust clung to the folds of his cloak, and Kieran's sword's edge hummed faintly with residual prana.
Kieran's boots crunched on the broken stones, anger bubbling in his chest like molten fire. He stopped a few feet in front of Roy, and Roy came to a halt.
"Why did you let them die?"
Roy looked up as if considering whether the question warranted more than a shrug. "They're not dead," he said simply. "Just hanging on for dear life. Heavy medical aid, and they'll make it."
Kieran's eyes narrowed, fists clenching involuntarily. "Hanging on for dear life? Do you even hear yourself? No one should ever be in that much pain. No one!" His voice cracked as his fury threatened to overtake him. "I told you. Stop killing. Who gave you the right to decide who dies? You don't get to play judge and executioner!"
Roy looked away at the tree in the distance, finally turning to fully face Kieran in the eye. Roy's expression was unreadable beneath the mask. "I didn't kill them. They chose to gamble everything in an attack that could have ended me, and so I gave them no mercy, but I held myself back."
Kieran's jaw tightened. "You call that mercy? You just let them suffer so you could look untouchable to the Commander. They risked their lives, and now they're paying the price of your so-called restraint. Do you even understand what I am so angry about?"
Roy stepped closer, calmness radiating off him like a stone in a river. "Pain doesn't mean failure, Kieran. They'll live on, but it won't be painless. And you need to understand something: if I hesitate, I die. I won't let my hesitation endanger anyone I care about."
Kieran was taken aback by what Roy said. "I don't care about your stupid logic! No one should have to endure that much suffering! That's not protecting anyone; that's just …."
Kieran couldn't find the word to describe what he was feeling and how to express it to Roy.
Roy's eyes locked onto Kieran's. "Then let me handle what I must. You don't have to understand it. You just have to trust that I know exactly what I'm doing. I fight so they live, not because it's easy, but because it's necessary."
Kieran's fists fell to his sides, trembling slightly, caught between anger and helplessness. "Necessary… So you're saying the ends justify this? That their suffering was worth it for your victory?"
Roy's voice was flat, unshaken. "It was never about victory. It's about survival. And sometimes survival looks messy, Kieran."
The canyon fell silent between them. Dust swirled like a muted storm around their feet. Kieran wanted to argue more, to scream that no one should have to endure such torment for the sake of survival, but Roy's calm, unyielding presence held him in place.
Finally, Kieran exhaled sharply, voice quieter but no less sharp. "You have no sense of what it means to fight for someone else if you don't even flinch at their pain, do you?"
Roy said nothing, only turned back toward the shadows, walking with the same deliberate patience that had become both infuriating and awe-inspiring. Kieran followed silently, the weight of his fury tempered by the knowledge that, for all his infuriating methods, Roy's actions kept people alive even if it was in ways that left the soul battered and raw.