In truth, it won’t even take a year; the wick burns fast and the hourglass runs like sand in a storm.

Shadow Artisan Andor will leave within a month, bowing to the crowd like a lantern dimming at dawn, thanking those who watched his long performance.

It’ll be thunderous and grand, a wave of tears and aching throats, yet it won’t ripple the lake either way, no gain, no loss.

It’s the usual heroic exit from the Silver Era, a tapestry worn thin, a banner faded by too much sun.

No sarcasm—my voice is flat as a still pond, no wind on the reeds.

“Are the gifts ready?”

“My master asking the obvious—your own hands checked them like a hawk over its nest, or have your cataract-clouded eyes lost their trust?” Vega’s tongue flicked like a blade glinting in frost.

“Good. Then send it. I’m clumsy with needlework; the fine threads are yours, Vega.”

Tell me, what’s the point of living too long, like a candle that refuses to die in an empty room?

I wouldn’t call myself so bitter I’d burn with the rotten old world; still, immortality tastes like cold iron on the tongue.

Take the Savior Saint: he’s walked endless years, yet his reason is a mountain on the back—saving the world, vast and noble, and bleak as winter.

I donned the Shadow’s craft to join the Hero Squad, to coax them to accept my so-called evil, a fox leading lambs under moonlight.

Now even the Hero and the Creator have stepped out of the human hearth, into the night called heresy, smoke leaving the chimney.

The question follows like rain: with my aim already met, why linger in a squad that no longer needs me?

Should I wait, pitiful, for Stini and Raven to return, to let them find the hearth still warm when they open the door?

Even if Shadow Artisan Andor exits, Vega can keep living in this house, a cat by the window, steady as dusk.

As for tender keepsakes and love—why do people call me gentle, when I’m a counterfeit hero who only does what pays in coin and clout?

So, the arc of Shadow Artisan Andor wraps on schedule; I only need a clean excuse to slip out like a fish into deep water.

Stini can go on being a Hero, and I can turn back to the Savior Demon King, a king in shadow under a blood-red moon.

Isn’t that neat as cut jade—no masks, no webs left; all schemes spent like arrows, just one question still burning.

I will ask her if she accepts this dark, if she recognizes this evil, if she’ll call my deeds right—as clear as a bell at night.

Then—either a head rolls like a ripe gourd, or we walk side by side under the same sky; only the ending shifts like a fork in a path.

Whichever it is, that’s the curtain; the story closes like a fan in a quiet hand.

Simple, bright, and clean; though I like a lively life, I’d rather write my own weather than be chased by fate like leaves in a gale.

Emotion for play and reason for plotting are oceans apart, moonlight on one, a map on the other.

Don’t ask me to choose girl or world; I’d rather shred the fool who forces the choice into dust finer than a quark, like ash on snow.

As for Vega asking what I felt about the Shadow joining the Hero Squad’s journey—

Let me think a moment, like counting stars before dawn.

Not disappointed; surprises came often enough, like sparrows in spring, to keep me from boredom.

No one hounded me out; still, that lighthearted travel slaying demons felt like wind in the wrong valley for me.

Because Shadow Artisan Andor is not Savior Demon King Andor; the distance is a river wide as night.

Sometimes I think this mask is my face, and the face under air is painted skin—no reason, just rain on stone.

I, Andor, am not the Hero Squad’s vice-captain, a background plank pushing plot like a dull tide; I’m the storm over black water.

Only questions? A joke—A World Saving Demon King should sneer like a wolf, disdain like cold stars, and toy like a cat with string.

Even bound by humanity’s floorboards, a Demon King stays on the demon side, eyes on blood, hands on silk and gold, hunger like fire.

I won’t deny that evil, not ever; my shadow is my banner, night stitched to my name.

I’m no great hero; never was, like iron that won’t bend to a plow.

“Then do you want—do you want to try being a hero? A human hero?”

The maid asked, her voice soft as rain, sharp as a thorn.

I stopped my sorting like a clock stilling; I looked at Vega, a lantern steady in the dark.

“If you’ve got words, speak them; I may anger or blame, but without words, men can’t meet eyes, and demonfolk can’t meet hearts.”

I can’t read eyes, that mask of glass; I read feelings, bare as wind, so tell me—what knot’s in you, Vega?

“My blind master, you say you can’t, you don’t know how to move others—then—”

One strike, center of the target; Vega’s judgment is an arrow calm as winter, precise as a needle through silk.

She has a multithreaded mind, watching from every angle like ravens on different branches, cold and clear.

Now she turns that gaze on me, peering into my abyss like a diver facing black water.

“—then you understand the weight of ‘moving someone.’ My wild and violent master, when you guided the Heroes, were you moved as well?”

Moved by foolish friendship, by mad effort, by one-sided victories—by those fools, moved like sap rising in spring?

How could I ever want to be a hero, like a stag kneeling to a trap?

Vega, you dare—

“If you rage, then look at yourself. Did the ‘foolish things’ you preach against move you? You taught me never to cover my eyes.”

“…”

“You taught me ‘people become what they hate most’; you stare hardest where you despise, moth to its own dark flame.”

“…”

“So did you ever, even by accident, think ‘staying with Stini as a hero wouldn’t be so bad,’ then mock yourself and bury it like a seed?”

“Vega…”

“Dulan, Daviya, or Berenz Dulan won’t say this to you; the Lady won’t know the question you don’t know you hold.

Others, out of awe, fear, disgust, or fondness, will still avoid it like stepping around a grave; but I will say it against your will.

Because—I am your eyes, I am your hands and feet, I am your strength; at least I, only I, must wake you—what is your wish?”

“Vega, what do you think my wish should be?”

“There’s no should; a wish is a wish. Right and wrong are lines men draw; you’re a Demon King, so even foolish, mad, one-sided—still not wrong.”

I have my own decision—or do I? Vega’s words hit like hail on a roof.

“…”

“I’ll wait for your answer, like a shoreline waiting for the tide.”

“Premise—I have to know what I want. That’s the first stone.”

“That’s best,” she said, like tea poured steady and warm.

“But what if wish clashes with wish, like antlers locking in a fog?”

This time silence took Vega, heavy as snow.

I’ve got the strength to chase a wish and the will to trample everything outside it like grass under iron, yet wishes aren’t a single star.

At least—

You’ll say weigh and take all if logic allows, and I would, like gathering both moon and sun; but it won’t.

I want to build the Endless City; that city can’t hold a single lie, clear as glass.

So I can’t keep living with the Hero Squad as Shadow Artisan; the gods won’t bless it, and I don’t want to wage war on heaven.

“…”

I have my decision, and I can tell you now like carving it on stone.

“Will it be a sad story?” she asked, a reed bending in wind.

“If I felt no stir, no blood, no tears—owning nothing, fearing nothing—mad, proud, bloodthirsty, violent—then it’d be a cheerful fairy tale.”

“And in fact?”

“In fact, until I change my mind, I’ll keep walking the script I wrote, like a boat following its river.”