Perfect Avatar-Chapter 310: Reunited

The apparition of Dora instinctively sent everyone backwards, almost forgetting that he wasn’t alone.

"B-big sis Rhea... Be... Beware...?"

Lucca trembled, her eyes shining, next to her, Giudecca aimed her guns at Dora.

"Rhea, get away, I’ll fuck him up!"

"... Do you even believe it? Sis, please."

Rhea sighed, stepping between Dora and her warriors to shield him.

"Put that down, it’s over. The True Origin has awakened."

The two warlords kept their stances, nothing made any sense here, but one thing was sure, the one in front of them was Rhea, her aura could confirm it.

"W... What do you mean? What’s going on? Rhea?"

"What’s going on is that everything that happened till now was part of Eva’s plan to awake the True Origin. The Dora who has initiated the end of the world is restricted, this one is the true Dora, mentioned by Apophis."

She spread her arms, shielding him, her eyes on Ambrosia’s warriors.

"This is a long story to tell, and I’m sure that, optimistic as you are, you will have no problem hearing that."

The Pseudo-avatars were on alert, the knights too terrified to even intervene.

Dora put his hand on Rhea’s shoulder, both nodding to each other.

"I understand that you are worried... But I have to little time so deal with it. There’s too much... I swear on God, if you try something stupid, I’ll throw you out of my planet, Hope."

Hope, sweating, stopped concentrating his energy.

Freya gave a gaze of confusion to Rhea, but the General answered with a nod.

What was the meaning of this?

"... I’m really getting tired of this. What now? You’re again another Dora? With a new memory and new objectives? I’m getting so tired of all of this."

"You shouldn’t, because the most important moment is still coming."

Dora stepped forward to initiate the dialogue, and all of them stepped back.

"... Goddammit, well, I don’t care. It won’t matter anyway. You can be afraid, but at least you will... Hm... You can listen. Candace, the night my mother and Wendy died, the night my other half appeared. I’ve been sent to another world, a world where I met every dead people."

The dean stood in front of her people, anticipating an attack from Dora, but as she watched him, his eyes showed no malice.

"You remember that night he tried to kill you? When he said that he would save the world by killing you? When people die, they are sent to this world, so from his point of view, destroying the world would send everyone there. This is why he was so relieved."

Candace furrowed her brows, the images of Dora’s hand and his words were deeply graved in her mind, too deeply to be relaxed in his presence, however, it also concorded with his declaration and Rhea was with him.

"... Rhea, why do you believe him? How are you sure he’s not tricking us?"

"The Player of Humans received the power to predict futures events, she predicted that he would be free during our battle and this is what happened. Listen to him, you don’t need to believe it or not, Freya, everyone. We will soon work together for the last mission."

Their eyes grew more worried, trembling, they had been deceived too many times to remember how to hope, but Dora couldn’t afford them this luxury.

"Candace, you were with them, Beta shared with you what was happening, so you remember Eva’s plan. Killing all the Players, then leading him to kill the Avatars. It wasn’t meaningless, her goal was to send every Player in that world to help me becoming the True Dora. Candace, I’ve met everyone, everyone who has died... Elizabeth, Peters, Midgard."

Mercy and Hope’s mind went blank in an instant. The knights looked around, waiting for a trap, but in front, the Pseudo-avatars and Candace lost track of the world.

"We were together, they helped me to recover from my family’s lost. It wasn’t an illusion, they were..."

"Stop it."

Mercy, with a void stare shook her head. Her eyes grew with emotion, her body started to tremble.

"If you have to kill us, then kill us... But don’t... Don’t toy with me like that."

Dora stood firmly on his cracked legs. His eyes were on the girl, then he switched his focus to the side.

"He said that he wish to see you as later as possible, but when you’ll come, he want to chat about what you did at Kalaharis."

"... What?"

"By the way... I also have many things to say about it..."

"QUIET!!!"

She missed a step and almost fell backwards. With a heavy breath she clenched her fist, her eyes hidden in the shadow of her face.

"Just shut up... What’s that, a world of dead... You’re fucking kidding me? You... After everything you’ve been doing... After starting this war... Don’t act as if everything was ok now... You’re Dora? What’s that supposed to mean?! Ya think that’s reassuring? Ya think it makes sense?! I’m tired of this! I’m tired of all your games! I just want to stop it... Don’t do this..."

She grabbed her arm, the first tear falling from her eye. Dora paused for a moment, all the others showed the same reaction, either fear of sadness.

Dora’s face relaxed, his face till now lighting with joy lost its sparkle.

"Hm... Really? Ah... I... Ok, fuck this. You know what? I’m sorry... Sorry because after all, I’m tired of this, I’m tired of this stupid comedy. You are crying? You are feeling sad? How many fucking time are you all going to do this?!"

He did one step forward, the ground cracking beneath him.

"You think you’re doing something? How many time do you need to learn this lesson? Crying won’t change anything, talking won’t change anything! You really don’t understand why nothing went like you wanted? All this time?? There are only two kind of people in this world, those who act, and those who talk, you are trying so hard to do both then you get surprised when you lose, isn’t it time to look in the mirror?"

He took a glance at all their faces, his anger was piercing them, progressively, even though they tried to deny it, they started to understand that the one in front of them wasn’t the same monster.

"I didn’t know how to tell you all of this, I tried to make it sound funny, but I underestimated your abilities to run away. Let’s make it clear, once and for all. This world is in a perpetual cycle of incarnation and reincarnation, I existed a thousand years ago, my true name is Pandora, and I am the origin of the Sins. There’s an infinity of worlds, and in each of them, I exist and the Players are from one of them. In their world, the Dora became the invader and is hunting every version of Pandora in this part of the tree, with the sole purpose of reaching the other part of the tree. If he succeed, this will truly be the end of everything, all our infinity will be doomed, and with it, the miracle to see your loved ones in another world."

He clenched his fist, his eyes glowing white.

"Believe it or not, I was with everyone in that other world, and we have found a way to get my memory back, all the Players , Elizabeth and Peters. We have led this whole operation and we have succeeded. I am not just Anesidora, I am the Personas, the Sins, the thing. Every Dora you knew have become one, the True Origin. And now, with everyone’s effort, I am here with the solution to defeat the invader and my other half."

He closed his eyes, taking a little break to call down a little. When he opened his eyes again, his friends were at their last stand.

Each gave him a gaze filled with different emotion.

It was a mix of fear, fear of being tricked once again, fear of seeing another ray of hope waiting to disappear.

He glanced at Rhea, the general raised her shoulders and nodded.

"Ok, I said what I have to say. Now, depending on your reaction, we’ll have either a warm reunion, either we just jump to the last part. I don’t want to go there again and tell them I wasted everything in chitchat... Elizabeth would punch Fafnir again for reasons... Now... The mic is yours."

He stood on guard, waiting for the first sign to initiate his plan.

Everyone else was shaking on their feet.

The knights, well aware that they were powerless looked at each other, waiting for the Pseudo-avatars to take action, but the action came on the form of tears falling down.

"... Hm?"

Their head raised, following the moves on one person walking, then stopping in front of Dora.

She observed his face full of doubts, but she could see no lie behind, and so, she smiled.

"... Hm... Really? Everyone was alive? Ely and Midgard too? I hope it’s a joke, that would be too evil for me."

Candace caressed the broken side of Dora’s face, small tears running her cheek.

"Well... You can blame him for not killing you... It’s really sad though, we had so much fun there, you would have liked it."

"Ah? No kidding... And how did they feel? Did they think about me?"

Dora’s eye looked aside.

"It was more of a ’let’s live our new life to the fullest’ kind of thing. Midgard controlled time so we spent like months there, leaving a normal school... Maybe I shouldn’t say too much because people cried for us and we were in fact having fun... But yeah, we really had a blast. Elizabeth almost won the student council election, without any program, just because she was cool."

Candace wiped a tear, her nose and cheeks pinker, she put her hands on her hips.

"Well, well, will you see that... After everything I did for you all you just forgot me like that? Because you were having fun?"

"Listen, I had it rough... I was very broken, took me months to talk about it. Then it got crazy, Peters came, Eva asked to bring the Players, Fafnir was there too so you know what Elizabeth did... In fact, they’re technically still here."

From the back, the others couldn’t see her face, but the tears dropping and Candace’s tone of voice were enough.

Their arms lost strength, their eyes saddened. It was not hope, it was Dora.

"... Dora..."

"Hm, yes, Frey, that’s me. But this time I am more Pan and less Anesi."

They lost their ability to see, behind liters of tears. Dora’s face was more relaxed.

"You did a lot, I know everything. I saw what you went through and the decision you have made. There’s a lot of things I want to say but I think like Candace, you did well, and no one deserves to give you a praise. Good job, I’m really thankful. Now, let me take care of the rest."

The girl’s last tears touched the ground, she had seen hell and deception too many times, she was in a nightmare, but for the first time, she felt all the weight on her shoulders disappear.

"D..." She wanted to speak, to say his name, but her throat thickened.

She struggled to not explode, to not drop her toughness, but when her eyes saw his face again, she felt like she could finally let go.

"Dora... Gh..."

With hesitant steps, she advanced and once she stood beside Candace, she dropped on her knees, wiping a stream of tears.

"... Come on... It’s too early to cry... Save that for when you’ll tell the tales of how you saved the world."

He put one knee on the ground, comforting her in an embrace with his single arm.

In his arm, she finally let go and cried with all her might, she was finally free.

"It’s alright, it’s all over now. I’m back in charge, and I’ll do what we need."

His eyes raised to see his old friends, and with a smile, he stretched his arm.

"I can only hug with one arm, but I know how powerful it is. I have some time left, so tell me everything you have in heart, ok?"

With that last sentence, he sent Marie from her stance to his shoulder, burying her face in his chest.

One by one, they let go of their fear, and soon, Dora disappeared behind Lilith, Iris, and Liliana.

They cried out loud, they drenched his chest in tears, they forgot how to speak, what they were doing, all they could do was crying on him, it was finally over, but not for him.

"Come on, we’ve already been there. Come."

Mercy, last one to not have joined kept her head down.

She forced her eyes to not let go of more tears, but it was like fighting herself.

"..."

Her mouth opened, she closed her eyes to speak words too obvious for Dora.

"If you have to lie to yourself, I don’t want to hear what you want to say. I don’t care about what anyone did, what crime or sin you think you committed. I am the owner of this world, so we’ll do things the way I want. I’ve decided that you’ll be part of my world so let’s end this game of hate now. Come, You too, Solaria."

Mercy’s eyes glowed, but not with color. Her watered eyes reflected the light of the room, she put one foot after the other, until she could reach them.

She put one knee on the ground, then the other, keeping her head down.

Solaria stood up in turn, like a ghost. Under the worried gaze of the maids, she stood behind him, next to Candace.

Mercy raised her head, both girls looking at each other, but their eyes didn’t shone with resentment, but fear.

"... I’m... Sorry... I’m so sorry..."

She lowered her head, on the other side, Solaria trembled a bit, she closed her eyes, with her lips trembling, then she kneeled in turn to hug Dora’s back.

"Isn’t that better? You have no reason to hate each other. You were all victims of a tragedy. It’s over now."

In a light of heaven in the hell they always knew, they finally savored their reunion.

It was the same as months ago, but this time, it wasn’t a stranger.

It was Dora, the only one they knew, the one who remembered them, and they had good news of their fallen loved ones.

Candace kneeled down too, closing this picture.

For the first time since the Twilight of Gods, they were together.