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I don't know if I can knock away a bone as big as that! Brace for impact!

It's not fair... I just fixed the ship!

There's someone here!

Didn't we just get rid of you?!

Alright, I'll deal with them. Weedy, you fix up the ship. Again.

Javier's blade meets the helm wheel with a dull clang that echoes through the valley. He feels his arms going numb.

Hesitantly, he strings a few words together in the gaps between attacks.

Juana... what do you... think you're doing...?

Killing traitors.

No... Juana!

If all you wanted was to kill us, you could've done so easily. Why hold to the tradition?

You're trying to tell us to affirm our decision by facing you with courage?

Am I wrong? AM I WRONG?!

*pant* *pant* Juana...

Javier...

If you've realized that, why are you still holding back?

Isidro's left arm is shaking with pain. His sword has already left his hand.

Under Anastasio's incessant interrogation, he finds himself overcome by an even sharper pain.

The dispersed Corazonix once again converges upon him, having drifted amidst the salt and steam.

You asked what I want.

I want Juana to sail upon the seas that she's longed for all these years.

I want Pascuala to go to bed with a full stomach, not wake up in the middle of the night from hunger.

I want Weedy to go back safely to her research, and for Elysium to make it on time to that concert he's been looking forward to.

Yet all I see is how you people tear each other apart as you hasten to your own demise.

Who, precisely, did this tragedy begin with?

Juana. She, who has forgotten the pain of the Profound Silence. She, who is determined to ride to her doom seeking thrills that live on only in her memory.

It was her desire that dragged Pascuala into the abyss. The girl who wanted nothing more than food on the table was made to steal the Inquisition's forbidden relic, blinded by greed and promises of riches.

And then the rest of your fellows. When you say you wish their lives to return to normalcy, have you given any thought as to why they fell to abnormality?

It was because of you, Isidro.

Juana's desire infected you, and you in turn have infected more innocents.

...I know.

People are affected by one another. There's nothing wrong with that.

Everyone I met at Aarón kept their head down and their windows shut. No one spoke a word to each other, unless it was absolutely necessary.

Maybe it's the teachings of the Inquisition, or maybe the trauma of the great calamity that's never faded from their hearts. I couldn't say.

What I can say, though, is that no one should have to live like that.

Anastasio pulls his sword out of Isidro's shoulder.

Carrying the red glow of the steam, the Corazonix returns to its place inside Isidro's glove and once again flows upon his arm.

For an instant, he can feel the gushing heat of the entire Skeletal Reef converged upon his right arm.

Go on, Isidro. If you have finally decided to expose your true nature, then I shall hear your confession.

Because of my mentor, for a very long time, I thought the ultimate end of human interaction was consumption and assimilation, just like the Seaborn.

I thought I would be consumed by others just as I consumed them. That there would always be people compelled by someone else's desires, held hostage by someone else's decisions, ultimately losing sight of their own selves.

In the years before I joined Rhodes Island, I did my utmost to avoid something like that happening... like what happened to the people of Aarón.

But now, I understand that the 'self' I had tried so hard to protect was empty. There was nothing there.

Even after I earned some money, I lived exactly as I had as a vagabond. I wore the same clothes, ate the same food, stayed in the same places, did the same things.

I didn't know what I wanted. Maybe I didn't want anything.

Is it not happiness to live as an empty canvas?

Is that not true freedom?

Unlike your current self, the one forced to drag but more innocent souls into the abyss, as you have done.

Juana gave me a chance to leave. I chose to stay. Neither of us regrets our decisions.

So, if I indeed dragged Elysium and Weedy into this, then I should give them a chance to leave or stay.

If you want to kill them, then I'll just have to kill you first.

Isidro senses the once chaotic movement of the Corazonix becoming rhythmic. With each pulse on his arm, steam bursts from the nearby bones.

It dawns on him that the Corazonix, salvaged from the transmutation table, is now fulfilling its intended function while attached to him.

He wants to lead his friends out of this deadly Skeletal Reef, so it is guiding him by indicating the direction of the searing steam flowing through the bones.

Isidro tears his glove off.

Flowing Corazonix has filled every gash and hole that the Arts energy had left upon his flesh.

It is now as one with him.

He picks up his sword with his right arm, and points it at Anastasio's face.